“Mad Money”
“Mad Money” features the likable odd squad of Diane Keaton, Queen Latifah and Katie Holmes, co-workers who figure out a way to steal — lots — from a Federal Reserve bank where cash goes to meet its shredder. Director Callie Khouri (writer of the great “Thelma & Louise,” director of the not-so-great “Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood”) recognized something potentially divine in this film’s goofball sisterhood of high-strung Keaton and take- no-mess Latifah. Not as venal — or as ingenious — as Showtime’s pot-dealing dramedy “Weeds,” “Mad Money” nevertheless leaves us pondering the ways audiences abet amorality tales. The heist comedy banks on the notion we’ll want the gals to succeed and lets us off the hook by starting out with their failure. Ted Danson also stars. PG-13, 1 hour, 44 minutes. Released today. Lisa Kennedy“The Great Debaters”
Actor-director Denzel Washington brings the energy and rhythms of a sports flick to a little-known bit of American history in this enjoyable film about the challenges and triumphs of a small African-American college debate team when it takes on Harvard University in 1935 for the national championship. The film — with Washington as Wiley College professor Melvin B. Tolson and Forest Whitaker as James Farmer Sr. — has taken the “inspired by” route and changed USC to Harvard and created a number of composite characters. But from the opening credits carried forth on a pulsing rendition of “My Soul Is a Witness,” the second-time director takes comforting genre conventions and uses them to tell a culturally potent tale. With Nate Parker, Jurnee Smollett and Denzel Whitaker as future civil rights stalwart James Farmer Jr. PG-13, 2 hours, 5 minutes. Released today. Lisa Kennedy
“Untraceable”
While she may (or may not) save the day as FBI agent Jennifer Marsh, the ever-watchable Diane Lane can’t rescue “Untraceable” from being a sullied undertaking. Gregory Hoblit directs this thriller that wants to have its gruesome kills and moralize about them too. A murderer streams his sadism online, starting with a kitten. Goodbye Kitty! The more visitors to the faster the demise. Lane and Colin Hanks (yes, of that bloodline), partners in cyber-crime solving in Portland, Ore., begin piecing together the seemingly random horror. When they do, the killer takes a lethal interest in them. R. 1 hour, 40 minutes. Released today. Lisa Kennedy
