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Inglourious Basterds

Quentin Tarantino's imaginative and comedic take on the Second World War has a group of Jewish soldiers getting revenge on the Nazis by relentlessly killing them all over German-occupied France. Lieutenant Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) organizes the group, whose targeted acts of brutal retribution - and their scalping of dead soldiers - wins them the name "The Basterds." The film, organized in Tarantino's trademarked chapter structure, begins in German-occupied France, where Shosanna Dreyfus (Melanie Laurent) witnesses the execution of her family at the hands of Nazi Colonel Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz). Shosanna narrowly escapes and flees to Paris, where she forges a new identity as the owner and operator of a cinema. Elsewhere in Europe, Raine's squad joins German actress and undercover agent Bridget Von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger) on a mission to take down the leaders of the Third Reich. Fates converge under a cinema marquee, where Shosanna is poised to carry out a revenge plan of her own.

Director: Quentin Tarantino. Stars: Brad Pitt, Diane Kruger, Melanie Laurent, Christoph Waltz, Daniel Bruhl, Eli Roth, Samm Levine, B.J. Novak, Til Schweiger, Gedeon Burkhard, Paul Rust, Michael Bacall, Omar Doom, Sylvester Groth, Julie Dreyfus, Jacky Ido, August Diehl, Martin Wuttke, Richard Sammel, Christian Berkel, Sonke Mohring, Michael Fassbender, Mike Myers, Rod Taylor, Denis Menochet, Cloris Leachman, Maggie Cheung, Samuel L. Jackson. 2009, 152 mins., action

The Hangover

Raunchy, crude, bathroom humor comedy told in flashbacks. Two days before his wedding, Doug and his three friends drive to Las Vegas for a blow-out bachelor party they'll never forget. But, in fact, when the three groomsmen wake up the next morning, they can't remember a thing. For some reason, they find a tiger in the bathroom and a six-month-old baby in the closet of their suite at Caesars Palace. The one thing they can't find is Doug. With no clue as to what transpired and little time to spare, the trio must retrace their hazy steps and all their bad decisions in order to figure out where things went wrong and hopefully get Doug back to L.A. in time to walk down the aisle.

Director: Todd Phillips. Stars: Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, Zach Galifianakis, Heather Graham, Justin Bartha, Jeffrey Tambor. 2009, 96 mins., comedy.

Taking Woodstock

The true story of Elliot Tiber (Demetri Martin) and his family, who inadvertently played a pivotal role in making the famed Woodstock Music and Arts Festival into the happening that it was. It's 1969 and Elliot Tiber, a down-on-his-luck interior designer in New York's Greenwich Village, has to move back upstate to help his parents run their dilapidated Catskills motel, The El Monaco. The bank's about to foreclose; his father wants to burn the place down, but hasn't paid the insurance; and Elliot is still figuring how to come out to his parents. When Elliot hears that a neighboring town has pulled the permit on a hippie music festival, he calls the producers, thinking he could drum up some much-needed business for the motel. Three weeks later, half a million people are on their way to his neighbor's farm in White Lake, N.Y., and Elliot finds himself swept up in a generation-defining experience that would change his life, and American culture, forever.

Director: Ang Lee. Stars: Demetri Martin, Emile Hirsch, Liev Schreiber, Imelda Staunton, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Henry Goodman, Eugene Levy, Paul Dano, Dan Fogler, Mamie Gummer. 2009, 120 mins., comedy.

G-Force

Animated comedy adventure about a top-secret, highly trained trio of guinea pig super spies assigned to stop a dastardly plot to take over the world. The latest evolution of a covert government program to train animals to work in espionage, highly trained guinea pigs armed with the latest high-tech spy equipment discover that the fate of the world is in their paws. Tapped for the G-Force are guinea pigs Darwin (voice of Sam Rockwell), the squad leader determined to succeed at all costs; Blaster (voice of Tracy Morgan), an outrageous weapons expert with tons of attitude and a love for all things extreme; and Juarez (voice of Penelope Cruz), a sexy martial-arts pro; plus the literal fly-on-the-wall reconnaissance expert, Mooch, and a star-nosed mole, Speckles (voice of Nicolas Cage), the computer and information specialist.

Director: Hoyt Yeatman. Stars: Voices of Nicolas Cage, Steve Buscemi, Tracy Morgan, Bill Nighy, Will Arnett, Zach Galifianakis, Kelli Garner, Gabriel Casseus, Jack Conley, Penelope Cruz, Tyler Patrick Jones. 2009, 88 mins., animated.