LOVE & SEX L.A. journalist Kate (Famke Janssen) is assigned a relationship story for her women's mag, sparking a navel-gazing tour of her dating history and recent breakup with paunchy artist Adam (Jon Favreau). In the grand tradition of crowd-pleasing Sundance romantic comedies, the two exes circle each other--trading witty barbs and pontificating on love--eventually attempting to reconcile. BOTTOM LINE It's true. Lots of journalists look like Famke Janssen. (Aug. 18)
LOVING JEZEBEL Hill Harper (The Skulls), David Moscow (The WB's Zoe), and Laurel Holloman (Tumbleweeds) form a volatile love triangle, with Moscow and Holloman as marrieds and Harper as a compulsive home wrecker. Rookie writer-director Kwyn Bader won an Audience Award at this year's South By Southwest Film Festival for this romantic comedy. BOTTOM LINE Movies about marital infidelity are usually the realm of the white and middle-aged. Bader's young, multicultural take sounds like piquant formula-busting. Or Ally McBeal, at least. (Aug. 18)
THE CREW It's the yuppies vs. the mobsters in this South Beach-set comedy starring Richard Dreyfuss and Burt Reynolds as ex-goodfellas trying to save their shabby retirement/residential hotel from being overrun by the beautiful people. Matrix babe Carrie-Anne Moss portrays a police detective investigating the wiseguys' schemes: "I play this girl who can't quite get it together--she's kinda missing a beat here and there." BOTTOM LINE Think Grumpy Old Men meets The Sopranos. Well, hope for it. (Aug. 25)
THE REPLACEMENTS The NFL is in the throes of a players' strike, but that doesn't stop Gene Hackman's cantankerous coach from recruiting washed-up quarterback Shane Falco (Keanu Reeves) and a gang of misfits (Swingers' Jon Favreau, Mad TV's Orlando Jones) for an end run to the play-offs. BOTTOM LINE Reeves and Hackman lend star power and prestige to what could be another Necessary Roughness, were it not for the conspicuous absence of Sinbad. (Aug. 25)
SOLOMON & GAENOR Ioan Gruffudd (the cult-fave star of A&E's Horatio Hornblower miniseries) plays an Orthodox Jew in 1911. Living in an anti- Semitic Welsh town, he keeps his religion a secret from his churchgoing girlfriend, even after impregnating her. This is the first feature by U.K. documentarian Paul Morrison. BOTTOM LINE If you watched the Oscar telecast in March, you've probably heard of the movie; it was the U.K.'s nominee for Best Foreign Language Film. (Aug. 25)
STEAL THIS MOVIE! If Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young can still mount a successful concert tour, why shouldn't rising indie Lions Gate let its freak flag fly and tackle a biopic about the rise and fall of Abbie Hoffman? Vincent D'Onofrio stars as the wild-eyed revolutionary prankster who became a countercultural cause celebre and unlikely media star during the 1968 Democratic National Convention. Look for splashy star assists from Janeane Garofalo, Jeanne Tripplehorn, and Kevin Pollak. BOTTOM LINE Nostalgic boomers should dig it, but will the Total Request Live generation? (Aug. 25)
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