Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) is nearing the end of his contract with Lunar. He’s been a faithful employee for 3 long years. His home has been Selene, a moon base where he has spent his days alone, mining Helium 3. The precious gas holds the key to reversing the Earth’s energy crisis.

Isolated, determined and steadfast, Sam has followed the rulebook obediently and his time on the moon has been enlightening, but uneventful. The solitude has given him time to reflect on the mistakes of his past and work on his raging temper. He does his job mechanically, and spends most of his available time dreaming of his imminent return to Earth, to his wife, young daughter and an early retirement.

But 2 weeks shy of his departure from Selene, Sam starts seeing things, hearing things and feeling strange. And when a routine extraction goes horribly wrong, he discovers that Lunar have their own plans for replacing him and the new recruit is eerily familiar.

Before he can return to Earth, Sam has to confront himself and the discovery that the life he has created, may not be his own. It’s more than his contract that is set to expire.

Writer-director Duncan Jones is the son of David Bowie, but I swear: If anyone uses the term “space oddity” to describe this movie, I will petition to have their blog shut down. What this film really is: A wonderfully composed, thoughtful, even funny addition to the list of elite science-fiction films, which offers a major twist in its first act.

Rated R for language.

Director: Duncan Jones
Stars: Sam Rockwell
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics
Release Date: 17 July 2009 (UK), 12 June 2009 (USA)
Genre: Sci-Fi, Thriller

A drama focused on a life-changing moment in 67-year-old train engineer Odd Horten’s existence: the evening of his retirement.

A catnap is the plot device that drives the narrative in the latest comedy/drama from Bent Hamer, the Kitchen Stories director who took last time took a Hollywood detour with Factotum. I love that he’s back on his native soil, and I’m ready to be hypnotized with his latest characterization, which has received raves even from those who don’t let the story’s metaphor-heavy moments escape without criticism.

Rated PG-13 for brief nudity.

Director: Bent Hamer
Stars: Baard Owe, Espen Skjønberg, Ghita Nørby
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics
Release Date: 15 May 2009 (USA)
Genre: Comedy, Drama

A mixture of original interviews, archival footage, and photographs sheds light on the life experiences of Mike Tyson.

James Toback is known primarily as a writer, and he hasn’t helmed a documentary in a decade, but his connection to Mike Tyson, which reaches back to 1987, when Toback was directing The Pick-Up Artist, makes him the only credible filmmaker to handle a profile of the former heavyweight champ (sorry Spike Lee and others). Back then, Toback acknowledges he spoke with Tyson about his experiences in losing himself — “to have the ‘I’ disintegrate, and to feel disembodied, as if there were a void inside.” With a bond like this, that strengthened through Tyson’s prison stint and continues to this day, what else do you really need to know before you rush out to see one of the best documentaries of this year?

Rated R for language including sexual references.

Director: James Toback
Stars: Mike Tyson
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics
Release Date: 27 March 2009 (UK)
Genre: Documentary

A documentary that follows a group of dancers as they navigate the auditions for the Broadway revival of “A Chorus Line”. Follows the plight of real-life dancers as they struggle through auditions for the Broadway revival of “A Chorus Line”. Also investigates the history of the show and the creative minds behind the original and current incarnations.

Spout’s Karina Longworth says: “James D. Stern and Adam Del Deo’s uber crowd-pleasing expose of the casting process for the recent Broadway revival of A Chorus Line, is both candy for confirmed theater nerds, and functioning propaganda for the uninitiated.

Rated PG-13 for some strong language including sexual references.

Director: Adam Del Deo, James D. Stern
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics

In the spring of 1936, three residents of “the Faubourg,” a working class neighborhood north of Paris, look to produce a musical that will bring back to life their cherished local theater.

Christophe Barratier was last seen in U.S. theaters with the Oscar-nominated The Chorus, and he returns with another musical in a time when Stateside audiences have demonstrated their hunger for all things French. (Isn’t it time to ramp up the marketing for this one, though?) Chorus members Kad Merad and Gérard Jugnot star alongside Clovis Cornillac, but I hear Nora Arnezeder nearly outshines their collective talent.

Rated PG-13 for some sexuality and nudity, violence and brief language.

Director: Christophe Barratier
Stars: Gérard Jugnot, Clovis Cornillac, Kad Merad
Studio: Sony Pictures Classics
Release Date: 24 September 2008 (Belgium)
Genre: Drama