Path may not be straight

With his first feature, “The Art of Being Straight,” writer-director-actor Jesse Rosen strikes a good balance between humor and seriousness in his deft depiction of a recent college grad, played by Rosen, who takes an entry-level job at a top ad agency. Rosen’s Jon is a pleasant-looking, low-key guy who has no trouble with women but down deep wonders if he might just be gay.

Jon moves in with a college friend, Andy (Jared Grey), a decidedly alpha male with lots of similar pals who horse around a lot, occasionally letting loose snarky references to homosexuality that aren’t meant to be taken too seriously but are hardly conducive to Jon discussing his uncertainties. Jon’s situation is paralleled with that of Maddy (Rachel Castillo), an edgy, brittle type who craves security and may discover it is easier to find with a woman than a man.

“The Art of Being Straight” proceeds with ease and keen observation through shifting moods and suggests that it will take time and courage for Jon to discover his true nature and that his friends are more likely to be accepting of him than he had realized.

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Kevin Thomas --

“The Art of Being Straight.” MPAA rating: Unrated. Running time: 1 hour, 10 minutes. At the Music Hall in Beverly Hills.

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Lingering too long in the steamer

It’s hard to imagine anyone but beleaguered matriarchs finding much to revel in with “Dim Sum Funeral,” a stultifyingly modest and cliche-ridden family-gathering saga about the Seattle convergence of far-flung, bickering Chinese American siblings for a ritualistic send-off of not-so-dear departed Mom. Sad-eyed Elizabeth (Julia Nickson) flies in from Hong Kong, where her marriage is a shambles; Manhattan doctor Alexander (Russell Wong) wrestles with his womanizing; middle daughter Victoria (Francoise Yip) is an embittered real estate broker and single mom; and martial arts star daughter Meimei (Steph Song) is hoping to have a baby with her lesbian lover (Bai Ling). They’re all refereed by Mom’s caretaker, played by Talia Shire.

Director Anna Chi and screenwriter Donald Martin’s blase gloss of familial tension simply never takes flight amid the sitcom-meets-soap situations and pedestrian filmmaking. Even its final-act twist of juicy venality makes one wish it had kick-started the movie rather than ended it. The performances have an embalmed quality, save for the eccentric Ling and Nickson’s stirring fragility.

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Robert Abele --

“Dim Sum Funeral.” MPAA rating: R for brief drug use and sexuality. Running time: 1 hour, 35 minutes. At Laemmle Sunset 5 in West Hollywood and Laemmle Playhouse 7 in Pasadena.

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Heart and hearth in WWII Japan

Marked by the reserve and sincerity of its title character, “Kabei: Our Mother” is the rare World War II film told from the perspective of the Japanese home front. Prolific filmmaker Yoji Yamada, adapting the memoir of longtime Kurosawa associate Teruyo Nogami, pays homage to maternal fortitude and the sacrifices that don’t win medals.

Interweaving gentle humor and unambiguous social criticism, Yamada centers the story on a mother of two, nicknamed Kabei (Sayuri Yoshinaga). She must and does carry on after the 1940 arrest of her intellectual husband (Mitsugoro Bando) for espousing reform. Amid the constraints of rations and the rising fever of militaristic patriotism, Kabei gathers an extended family around her. Her police officer father offers mainly rebuke, but she enjoys sympathetic support from her husband’s sister and his former student, the gangly Yamazaki (Tadanobu Asano), whose transformation from earnest clown to tragic figure is not entirely convincing. To her elder daughter’s disbelief, Kabei even draws strength from a crass uncle (scene-stealing Tsurube Shofukutei), who turns out to be the film’s most affecting character.

Over its two-hour-plus running time, the straightforward narrative’s progress is more episodic than flowing and sometimes lapses into overt tear-jerking. But Yamada’s eye for domestic detail is astute. He crafts melodramatic plot points into elegant tableaux, and his lead actress channels emotional depths into a mask as compelling as the “Mona Lisa’s.”

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Sheri Linden --

“Kabei: Our Mother.” MPAA rating: Unrated. In Japanese with English subtitles. Running time: 2 hours, 13 minutes. At Laemmle’s Music Hall in Beverly Hills.

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Plenty of steak but no sizzle

There’s nothing unbeatable about “Unbeatable Harold,” an inane, clumsy, gooily sentimental and grimly unfunny comedy. In the title role, Gordon Michaels, who wrote the script from a play by Randy Noojin, plays the assistant manager of a Reno-area steakhouse with vague dreams of fame and fortune, heavy sideburns, gaudy western clothes and a ramshackle pink ’59 Cadillac convertible. Pretty Wanda (Nicole DeHuff) is running away from her sleazy, faded rock star lover (Dylan McDermott) and winds up a waitress at the steakhouse, where Harold soon pursues her -- but McDermott’s character shows up to win her back. DeHuff’s Wanda is none too bright -- but then nobody is in this movie -- and she apparently sees no alternative to settling for either McDermott’s Jake Salamander or the relentlessly hapless Harold.

Directed with a wavering hand by Ari Palitz, “Unbeatable Harold” boasts an array of familiar faces: Henry Winkler as Harold’s stern boss, Phyllis Diller as a spunky regular at the steakhouse, Charles Durning as Harold’s loving father, Gladys Knight as a good-hearted steakhouse waitress, Lin Shaye as a zany diner waitress and Zelda Rubinstein as a cheery slot machine player. All are pros who hold onto their dignity and fare better than the stars.

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Kevin Thomas --

“Unbeatable Harold.” MPAA rating: PG-13 for some sexual material and a brief drug reference. Running time: 1 hour, 22 minutes. In general release.

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Baring their burlesque dreams

The art of taking it off -- most of it, that is -- is center stage in “A Wink and a Smile,” an earnest and admiring look at Seattle’s thriving neo-burlesque scene. Filmmaker Deirdre Timmons follows a group of wannabes enrolled in a six-week course taught by Miss Indigo Blue, headmistress and founder of the Academy of Burlesque. Their progress to the spotlight for a class-capping performance is only mildly engaging; the documentary’s electrifying moments belong to the experienced practitioners, male and female, who interlace their artful struts with subversive wit.

The fall 2007 academy class consisted of 10 women, ages 21 to 51, among them an opera singer, a tattooed taxidermist, a recovered bulimic and a virgin. Their body types are as varied as their reasons for taking the leap, but essentially they’re all pushing themselves to what their teacher calls “radical self-acceptance of their bodies.” The language of empowerment and inclusiveness informs much of Miss Blue’s hyper-articulate commentary on the history of burlesque and its current resurgence -- sometimes to the point of unintentional parody, as when she refers to “the trapeze community.”

The film’s only twist involves the student who most vehemently proclaims her fearlessness. Otherwise, as the women learn to wield pasties and feathers and create their burlesque characters, the idea of their pursuit is more interesting than the actual pursuing. Something far more compelling is revealed in the glimpses of Seattle’s seasoned pros, whose retro fantasies and gender-bending impersonations are as expressive and deliberate as performance art through the ages.

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Sheri Linden --

“A Wink and a Smile.” MPAA rating: Unrated. Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes. At Laemmle’s Sunset 5 in West Hollywood.

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