Reviewed in brief

★★ out of four stars

Unrated; in subtitled Spanish. Theater: St. Anthony Main.

The language of dopey romantic comedies is universal. In this Argentine entry, Diego Peretti plays film composer Ezequiel, who's creatively blocked but needs the payday from his next score to get current on his mortgage. While waiting on the bank's phone line, the sad sack hears a snatch of melody that could save the day, but is cut off before he can transcribe it. He barges into the bank to track down the recording, crosses paths with pregnant, unmarried go-getter executive Paula (Natalia Oreiro), and finds himself roped into impersonating her runaway boyfriend while her pushy mother visits from Spain. It's typical romcom fluff slightly elevated by the honest efforts of the game cast. Peretti shines as the tired but kind musician. His piercing eyes are ringed with circles, but when he smiles they sparkle with sly intelligence. Audiences will forgive a lot to watch an actor with a face like that.

COLIN COVERT

WILLIE NELSON'S 4TH OF JULY PICNIC ★★★ out of four stars • Unrated. When: 7:30 p.m. Wed. • Where: Trylon Microcinema, 3258 Minnehaha Av. S., Mpls. • Tickets: $8.

Every year or two (if he's feeling it), Willie Nelson takes advantage of the 110-degree July heat and his acquaintance with local law enforcement to stage one of his Picnics somewhere in Texas. Exactly how delirious and dangerous these events can be is on full display in this little-seen concert movie. In a coup for Nelson fans, Twin Cities rock-doc curators Sound Unseen got the rights to screen it from the film's private owner. It's "Woodstock" with brown cowboy boots instead of brown acid.

Filmed at the second Picnic in 1974, it features a still-redheaded Nelson playing Pied Piper to the then-burgeoning cosmic-cowboy scene. "Is everybody loaded?" he asks the literally rednecked, chest-baring crowd. "Great. We are too!" Leon Russell stumbles around the stage so hazily, you can't believe he stays upright, but he and the rest of the musical cast pull off some terrifically rowdy and often breakneck-paced performances. Also featured are Waylon Jennings, Jerry Jeff Walker, B.W. Stevenson, Michael Martin Murphy and Cajun twanger Doug Kershaw, who shows up dressed like he's playing "Riverdance." The music is memorable, but the moment-in-time footage is unforgettable.

★★★★ out of four stars

Unrated; in subtitled Japanese.

Theater: Edina.

"King Lear: goes Samurai in Akira Kurosawa's 1985 epic war tragedy, showing with a new print. "Ran" (I've seen it translated as "revolt" and "chaos") focuses on the abdication of Lord Hidetora Ichimonji (Tatsuya Nakadai), who has amassed a great empir through decades of bloodshed. Dividing his domain among his three sons, he expects to spend his remaining years in peace. Instead, rifts, form between the old leader and his heirs, and between the brothers themselves. His house divided in a vicious power struggle, Hidetora witnesses scenes of treachery and slaughter that drive the old man to the brink of madness. "Ran" is one of the most beautifully photographed color films ever made, with infantry and cavalry battles of astounding sweep and scope. The score by Toru Takemitsu is a masterpiece in its own right; Emi Wada deservedly won the Oscar for the majestic costume design, and the film earned Kurosawa his only best director nomination. The drama is both grand and intimate, with unforgettable combat scenes and episodes of palace intrigue that turn on an actor's subtlest expressioens. Mieko Harada, brilliant as Lady Kaede, Hidetora's scheming, serpent-like daughter-in-law, delivers the pessimistic moral: "Do not curse the gods. It is they who weep. In every age they've watched us tread the path of evil unable to live without killing each other. They can't save us from themselves."

COLIN COVERT

Rated: R for sexual content, pervasive language and some violence.

Theater: St. Anthony Main.

Dame Helen Mirren as a tough-talking Nevada brothel madam? We like to think our finest screen performers can play anyone. This specific character, however, is nearly unplayably false, as written by Mark Jacobson and directed by Taylor Hackford (Mirren's husband). What could have been a juicy, pulpy noir, based loosely on the real-life 1976 Mustang Ranch love triangle involving a boxer, instead has the dramatic consistency of rice milk.

"Love Ranch" begins as a comedy of bad manners, with Pesci chewing it up as Charlie Bontempo, co-owner of the Love Ranch. For an hour, Mirren's Grace Bontempo has little to do beyond suffer in relative silence. Then comes the noir part, when the boxer and the madam become professional associates, then personal ones, then runaways.

Only Mirren's valiant efforts to convey something of this character's inner life salvage bits and pieces of a protracted two-hour movie.