“Country Strong”
There is a down-home comfort saturating this movie that almost carries you through when its music-drenched melodrama gets predictable. Which is pretty much as soon as the fragile, still-in-rehab country superstar played by Gwyneth Paltrow starts talking about the baby bird she’s found and is trying to save. The actress brings her own surprisingly sweet voice to the foot-stomping, two-stepping proceedings; her co-stars are real-life country superstar Tim McGraw and “Gossip Girl’s” Leighton Meester — plus Garret Hedlund as a singer-songwriter hunk named Beau. This is director Shana Feste’s second film; in the more nuanced moments, she has a way with dialogue that could turn her into a force if she can ever get the balance right. PG-13. 1 hour, 52 minutes. Betsy Sharkey, Los Angeles Times
Friday
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1”
The seventh film in the series, based on J.K. Rowling’s seventh and final book, is the bleakest and most frightening yet — though, by any measure, it’s also a ripping thriller. Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe), Hermione Granger (Emma Watson) and Ron Weasley (Rupert Grint) separate themselves to spare friends and family from the Death Eaters and other Voldemort lackeys stalking them. The venality of the dark wizards and witches seems magnified; among the most unnerving: Bellatrix Lestrange (Helena Bonham Carter). The ending is a theatrical cliffhanger that won’t be resolved until the final installment arrives this summer. PG-13. 2 hours, 26 minutes. Claire Martin
More releases
Available today
The BBC Tudors Collection
Behind the Burly Q
Car 54, Where Are You? The Complete First Season
Dirty Mary Crazy Larry/Race With the Devil Double Feature
Doctor Who Classics
The Garfield Show: Private-Eye Ventures
Go, Diego, Go!: Diego Saves The World
Goodnight for Justice
A Royal Romance: William & Kate
A Summer in Genoa
Tracy and Hepburn: The Definitive Collection
White Material
Friday:
Harry Potter Years 1-7: Part 1 Giftset
