COCAINE COWBOYS [R]
It’s 3 a.m., and my cell phone rings – 305 area code – Miami, Dade County. “Yo, son.” It’s my homie, Bo D. ” ‘Scarface’ been replaced.” What? “You ain’t seen ‘Cocaine Cowboys’ yet, son, you better check it — ‘Scarface’ been REPLACED!” Hold up – Scarface, the ultimate drugs-and-violence Film Of Choice for today’s hip-hop generation? REPLACED? By an independent DOCUMENTARY FILM? Bo Dee, you snortin’ that yayo, kid? “Nah, man, Miami is going wild for ‘Cocaine Cowboys.’ Check out the interviews on YouTube — you’ll see!” I checked it — and there was rapper Pitbull, Mr. 305, welcomin’ me to Miami, talkin’ ’bout how much he loves the film. Impressive. I watch the flick – then I watch it again. And again. Forget Tony Montana, Manolo, and the Diaz Brothers — they’re finished. The Cocaine Cowboys are the real deal. Check the film’s factual depictions and insider tales of the cocaine boom in late 1970s Miami. It’s got tons of cocaine, airplanes bought with cash, money laundering and Colombian cartels. There’s also hundreds of ruthless machine-gun murders, confounded customs agents, ingenious smuggling techniques and political corruption in this city literally built on drug money. Fun for the whole family. Welcome to Paradise Lost, as told by the Cowboys themselves. Hasta luego, pelican…and say hello to the Cocaine Cowboys. –Allie BombaJESUS CAMP [PG-13]
With an unbiased eye and a keen cutting hand, Oscar-nominated documentarians Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady (The Boys Of Baraka) follow three pre-pubescents and Pastor Becky Fischer at her “Kids On Fire” Evangelical summer camp in Devil’s Lake, North Dakota, and many will find it a very scary ride. Watching this proud and passionate “Army of God” chant in tongues while worshiping a cardboard cut out of George Bush is unsettling enough without seeing them play so earnestly with miniature plastic babies to drive home their teachers’ point that abortion is wrong. With the exception of one radio host who questions whether the Evangelical movement is actually teaching children or just pushing them into their beliefs, everyone else in this film shares the belief that it is up to the kids to change things in this world and be obedient followers of the Truth (with a capital “t”.) To non-Evangelicals, the thought of a world run by these kids all grown up can be a very scary thing indeed — until they consider that these devoted kids are an exception, as getting most kids to commit to anything would require an act of God himself. Makes a great double feature with Hell House. –Andrea Ajemian

BROTHERS OF THE HEAD [R]
Not-actually-conjoined twins Harry and Luke Treadaway play brothers Tom and Barry, conjoined at the chest…and ready to ROCK! The boys’ father sells them to a music producer looking to combine the appeal of the vaudevillian geek sideshow with the sound of The Kinks, circa 1975, and the film is authentic to the point of total deception. Lost In La Mancha creators Keith Fulton and Louis Pepe’s completely brilliant rock mocukentary captures the music of pre-Sex Pistols England while spinning a dark gothic tale of twin sibling psychology akin to Twin Falls Idaho and Dead Ringers and the disastrous temptations of Rock & Roll. Fulton and Pepe follow them vérité-style as both boys break out of their shy seclusion and embrace the decadent freedom that comes from their rock band, The Bang Bang. It’ll make you wish Metallica’s Some Kind Of Monster was about a fictitious band and that The Bang Bang was on tour. –Eric Boyle

SHERRYBABY [R]
The most difficult thing to grasp about Maggie Gyllenhaal (Stranger Than Fiction) is how to spell her name, as her Golden Globe-nominated performance in this down-and-dirty drama clearly and vividly showcases the hard-nosed actor’s incredible ability to rope, bind and brand any role to make it her own. The unconventional star, whose career exploded after the characteristically risky Secretary in 2002, simply dazzles as a recently paroled single mom trying to start a new life without falling back into the drug-fueled lifestyle that put her in prison in the first place, and she positively is on fire, making her frustration and desperation real enough for us to own, too. –Robert Newton