A new ‘Avatar,’ a marital stand-up story and a gut-wrenching drama are in theaters

Three fresh hours of eye-popping Pandoran adventures are in theaters this week, plus a guy who turns the breakup of his marriage into stand-up comedy (based on a true story). And there’s a harrowing tale of family anguish in Gaza told through the real phone recordings of a five-year-old girl calling for help.

Those films join Zootopia 2, Wicked: For Good, Hamnet, and more in cineplexes. Here’s our movie roundup from last week, and the week before.

Avatar: Fire and Ash

In theaters Friday 

It’s been 16 years since Avatar introduced audiences to Pandora’s forest-dwelling Na’vi, three since we met their coastal brethren in Avatar: The Way Of Water. Now, it’s time to meet the mountain Na’vi known as “ash people.” Their tribe decimated by volcanic eruptions, a cataclysm their goddess Eywa did nothing to alleviate, the ash people are aggrieved, aggressive and, unlike the tribes in Pandora’s low-lying regions, willing to embrace technology. That gives an old human foe — Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang) — an in. That 13-year gap between the world-building first and ocean-plumbing second films allowed film wizardry to progress, so audiences came freshly wide-eyed to James Cameron’s gargantuan adventure in 2022. But with the second installment still sloshing around in my memory, my sense of wonder began to wander during this film’s three and a quarter hours. The undeniably eye-popping action is non-stop, but it’s also getting awfully repetitive.

Is This Thing On?

In limited theaters Friday 

Alex (Will Arnett) seems unsurprised by his wife’s matter-of-fact assessment of their marriage — “we need to call it, right?” — while they’re brushing their teeth one night. But he’s still processing it when, to avoid a comedy club’s $15 cover charge, he signs up for five minutes on stage. Though he’s hardly a riot this first time, something clicks as he talks about his impending divorce, and he decides to come back for more. His wife, Tess (Laura Dern), is also stretching, as she contemplates a return to women’s volleyball, this time as a coach.

Based on the real experience of British comedian John Bishop, Bradley Cooper’s warmly observant film incorporates a variety of mid-life challenges — the couple’s efforts to neutralize the mostly well-meaning meddling of friends (Cooper steals a few scenes as a clumsy, self-absorbed actor pal), their need to reassure their 10-year-old sons, their tentative attempts to forge a new relationship. Cooper may not have set out to make a trilogy of films about marriage and performance, but his first three directorial efforts – A Star Is Born with Lady Gaga, Maestro about Leonard Bernstein, and this restrained, heartfelt dramedy — are effectively that.

The Voice of Hind Rajab

In limited theaters now, expanding nationwide in January 

The title, sadly, says it all. Kaouther Ben Hania’s wrenching single-location drama is set in a Red Crescent call center in the West Bank where operators field calls from people miles away in Gaza who need help. While playing rock/paper/scissors with a colleague, Omar (Motaz Malhees) gets a call from a man in Germany, frantic because he can’t reach his relatives who were driving in Gaza and now appear, from GPS tracking, to be in a gas station. Omar makes a call to the cellphone number he’s given, and discovers that Hind, a terrified five-year-old, is trapped in the car with the bodies of her family, surrounded by tanks and constant bombing and strafing.

The next several hours are spent trying to get clearance from the Israeli military to reach her with an ambulance that is eight minutes away. The film’s power stems from a simple fact: Hind’s voice is real — recorded on January 29, 2024, when she was trapped in the car. The actors on screen react in real-time with the recordings of that harrowing day, and the effect is at once painfully direct, and profound.