Movie reviews: ‘Mean Girls,’ ‘The Beekeeper,’ ‘The Book of Clarence,’ ‘Freud’s Last Session’

MEAN GIRLS: 4 STARS

“Mean Girls” returns to theatres with some fetch songs and performances in a new version that updates the story of high school cliques and comeuppance for a new generation.

Angourie Rice plays teenager Cady Heron, the role made famous by Lindsay Lohan in the original film. Homeschooled in Kenya by her zoologist mother (Jenna Fischer), she experiences culture shock when thrown into the wilds of the North Shore High School in suburban Illinois. Helping her to navigate the school’s treacherous social structure are Janis ‘Imi’ike (Auliʻi Cravalho) and Damian Hubbard (Jaquel Spivey), who also serve as the story’s narrators.

They tell her about the school’s various cliques–the theatre kids, the Matheletes, the stoners–and Regina George (Reneé Rapp) and sycophants Gretchen (Bebe Wood) and Karen (Avantika), the popular girls known as the Plastics, because they’re “shiny, fake and hard.”

Regina is the undisputed leader of the group, a sharp-tongued meanie (“Her love language is anger,” says Gretchen.) who sings, “I am a massive deal. I will grind you to sand, beneath my Louboutin heel.” The Plastics embrace the unassuming Cady, inviting her to join their group. “You could be really hot,” says Regina, “if you change, like, everything.”

Just as Cady is getting tight with her new friends, she falls head-over-heels for Aaron (Christopher Briney), the cute boy who sits in front of her in calculus class. “I’m astounded and non-plussed,” she sings. “I am filled with calcu-lust.”

Trouble is, Aaron is Regina’s ex, and, as such, makes Cady a target for the full fury of the school’s apex predator. With the help of Janis and Damian, Cady launches a preemptive strike to unseat Regina as high school queen bee, but soon realizes she has become just like her enemy.

The new musical “Mean Girls,” and it is very much a musical despite what the talky trailers suggest, holds up well in comparison to the classic, original film. Many of the same elements appear. Tina Fey and Tim Meadows both reprise their roles, the Burn Book is a key plot element and the hierarchy of high school life is very clearly and effectively defined. What’s different are the updates in the film’s deft handling of diversity, the open discussions of sexuality and, of course, the showtunes.

The songs are nicely integrated into the story. Co-directors Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. find a balance between the stage and the screen, blending highly stylized dance moves straight out of Broadway with a cinematic, and occasionally even a social media spin on the cinematography and choreography. That, mixed with an enthusiastic theatre kids vibe, allows the songs to forward the story, act as the inner thoughts of the characters and give Janis and Damian some tuneful narration opportunities.

Standouts include Rapp, who recreates the role from the original Broadway run, and Cravalho, best known for providing the voice of the title character in Disney’s “Moana.” Both deliver powerhouse performances, although Avantika’s spirited rendition of the Halloween tune “Sexy” is probably the film’s most memorable number.

“Mean Girls,” from its beginnings as Rosalind Wiseman’s 2002 book “Queen Bees and Wannabes,” through to Tina Fey’s film and stage adaptation, connected with audiences because of its authentic portrayal of high school life. The new version, adds more than just songs to the source material. It’s a joyful celebration of self-respect, anti-bullying and even the importance of STEM-based education. It has plenty of Easter Eggs for fans of the first film but has plenty to offer to all fans, old and new.

THE BEEKEEPER: 3 ½ STATHAM STARS

A grade-A Jason Statham B-movie, “The Beekeeper” is a back-to-basics effort from the action star that adds a new variation to his standard character assortment. We’ve seen Statham Character #1, in which he is a “loner with a past who must protect a loved one.” Then there’s Statham Character #2 which is the “loner with a past who must protect a youthful innocent.” And now we have Statham Character #3, a “loner with a past who avenges the death of ‘the only person who ever took care of me.’”

When we first meet Adam Clay (Statham), his neighbor, the kindly Mrs. Parker (Phylicia Rashad), invites him over for dinner. Later in the evening, he returns with a jar of the liquid gold produced by the bees he keeps on his property, to find a terrible scene. Turns out, while he tended his bee hives, she was the victim of a sophisticated phishing scam that siphoned out all the cash from her personal accounts, and from the children’s charity she controlled.

He arrives to find dinner burning unattended, and Mrs. Parker dead from a self-inflicted gun-shot wound. After a tussle with Mrs. Parker’s F.B.I. agent daughter Verona (Emmy Raver-Lampman), he sets off to get to get even with the people who caused the death of, “the only person who ever took care of me.”

“Taking from an elderly person is as bad as stealing from a child,” he says, buzzin’ around the bad guy’s hive.

Turns out he’s a retired operative for a clandestine organization called “Beekeepers.” The deadliest of the deadly, they make John Wick look tame, and are sworn to protect the hive at all costs.

As the bodies pile up, all roads lead to Derek Danforth (Josh Hutcherson), the human grease stain at the head of Danforth Industries, a sleazy operation that makes millions by separating the vulnerable from their cash.

“Just tell me who this guy is,” Danforth demands from his head-of-security Wallace Westwyld (Jeremy Irons).

“He’s probably the last pair of eyes you’re going to stare at,” he replies.

“The Beekeeper” is Primal Statham. It’s exactly the Jason Statham movie you expect it will be.

A man of few words, Clay is someone who lets his fists do the talking, and they speak multitudes. An exercise in overkill, this is a violent movie that delights in punching the bad guys in the face. Or tying them to a runaway truck. Or nailing them repeatedly with a stapler. It’s pure good vs. evil, no more or less.

It’s also a little silly. Statham actually asks, “To bee, or not to bee?” at one point, but the laughs are part of the experience. Verona delivers one of the film’s biggest, possibly unintended, laughs when she says, to the cockney-accented Clay, “There’s some British Isles hiding in your accent.” That line makes as much sense as anything in this movie, but that’s cool because “The Beekeeper” is an old-school, over-the-top actioner, laced with one-liners, that doesn’t take itself too seriously.

THE BOOK OF CLARENCE: 3 ½ STARS

Set in Jerusalem in the year 33 A.D., “The Book of Clarence,” now playing in theatres, is unlike any other biblical epic.

Funnier than “Ben Hur” and more faith-based than “Monty Python’s Life of Brian,” it has to be the first biblical story to feature chariot races, a disco dance number and language that might make your pastor blush.

“Atlanta” star LaKeith Stanfield is Clarence, the “village mischief-maker” (and resident drug dealer) who admits, “I am not a man without faults.” And how.

His twin brother Thomas (also played by Stanfield) is an Apostle, but Clarence is too busy trying to hustle a buck to buy into any kind of organized religion.

But when he loses a chariot race to Mary Magdalene (Teyana Taylor) and ends up deep in debt to merciless gang leader Jedediah the Terrible (Eric Kofi Abrefa), he takes note of the attention Jesus Christ (Babs Olusanmokun) is getting and hatches a plan to present himself as a new Messiah sent by God.

“I can just replicate what he does,” he says. “Imagine the money people will give us.”

John the Baptist (David Oyelowo) calls him a “blasphemous swine,” but his pals Elijah (R.J. Cyler), Zeke (Caleb McLaughlin) and Barabbas (Omar Sy) are all in. Thomas, however, has doubts. “You know what it takes [to be spiritual],” he says, “but you do not possess what it takes.”

“Clarence,” says Elijah, “you need miracles.”

“I have a plan,” says Clarence.

Just as Clarence gains traction as a new Messiah, however, Pontius Pilate (James McAvoy) and the Romans crack down, announcing, “Clarence, you are guilty of the crime of fraud for your ill-gotten gains.”

Subversive, yet somehow solemn, “The Book of Clarence” is a brash alternate gospel buoyed by Stanfield‘s charismatic performance. For much of its running time writer/director Jeymes Samuel presents an irreverent biblical reimagination, but then takes a pious, respectful u-turn in the film’s final third.

Before the traditional ending, Samuel takes us on a wild ride where Clarence and his friends float through the air, high on “lingonweed,” while the soundtrack plays like a best of old Hollywood with a contemporary bent to catch the ear. It’s bold, with traditional epic style photography and setting (it was filmed in the ancient city of Materna, Italy) mixed with Samuel’s often restless camera. It’s brash, exciting filmmaking that gives the biblical epic genre a facelift.

As Clarence, Stanfield leads the cast, and it is his shift from shiftless charlatan to conscientious do-gooder that lies at the heart of the story. Clarence doesn’t suddenly become religious, he simply accesses the good part of his humanity, by thinking of others before himself. It’s this performance that smooths the film’s abrupt shift in tone, from sweeping epic to a personal story of suffering and redemption.

Clarence’s mother, played by Marianne Jean-Baptiste, tells him, “Be the body, not the shadow. Hold space,” and it’s clear Stanfield took the advice to heart. The final third is more traditional, less bold than the first two, but Stanfield’s magnetism keeps it on track.

He’s aided by an eager supporting cast, including McAvoy, who is equal parts imperious and manipulative as Pontius Pilate, Sy as the immortal and loyal Barabbas and Oyelowo as a quick-tempered John the Baptist.

“The Book of Clarence” is so layered, so original its reimagination of the gospel and pointed look at racism, that the odd misstep, like a third act miracle that seems like a plot contrivance rather than an organic story element, is easily forgiven.

FREUD’S LAST SESSION: 3 STARS

“Freud’s Last Session,” a new drama starring Anthony Hopkins and Matthew Goode, documents imagined conversations between two of the most engaged minds of the twentieth century as they grapple with the greatest mystery of all time, the existence of God.

Set in 1939 England, Hopkins is the Father of Psychoanalysis, living in London after fleeing his Vienna birthplace as the Nazis marched in. A religious skeptic, he says, “I’m a passionate disbeliever who’s obsessed with belief.”

Goode plays Oxford don and author C.S. Lewis, a troubled World War I vet who reclaimed his lapsed belief in Christianity after facing the horrors of war. As he is diagnosed with terminal cancer, the atheist Freud invites Lewis in for a conversation regarding what happens after you die.

As Freud faces mortality, he is unbowed in his dismissal of Lewis’s “fairy tale of faith.” Lewis, who came to religion through trauma, literature and study, uses their time together to prove that true believers are not, as Freud labels them, imbeciles.

As their philosophical joust heats up–“Have you ever considered how terrifying it would be if you’re wrong?” asks Lewis—the story splinters to include subplots involving the codependent relationship between Freud and his devoted daughter Anna (Liv Lisa Fries), her closeted relationship with Dorothy Tiffany Burlingham (Jodi Balfour) and Lewis’s involvement with Janie (Orla Brady), his late best friend’s mother. These story shards and the odd flashback, open up the story, taking us outside Freud’s booklined study.

This war of words, set against a backdrop of the rise of war in Europe, is more contemplative than confrontational. It’s provocative material, expertly delivered by Hopkins and Goode, that recalls Hopkins’s back-and-forth with Jonathan Pryce in “The Two Popes.” Their verbal sparring reveals more about their personalities than the flashbacks, which often interrupt the story’s rhythm, rather than embellish it.

“Freud’s Last Session” is based on the stage play of the same name by Mark St. Germain, and is the rare movie that doesn’t feel served by opening up the story. When it moves away from its two leads, it wanders, lessening the impact of their interaction.

Still, watching these two terrific actors bring these two titans to life on screen, even though they likely never met in real life, is time well spent.