Chaotic plot of ‘Premonition’ predictably disappointing

In theaters

PREMONITION, directed by Mennan Yapo, written by Bill Kelly, 110 minutes, rated PG-13.

The new Sandra Bullock movie, “Premonition,” is being billed as a psychological thriller, when really, after seeing it, some might question whether it’s a psychotic thriller.

The movie has the sort of compelling premise that will draw people to see it, but quickly it squanders that premise to become as crazed as a lunchtime party thrown by Blanche DuBois, Baby Jane Hudson and Big Bad Mama herself. (Not that some of us would mind such an invitation.)

As directed by Mennan Yapo from Bill Kelly’s script, the movie has an effective first half, but then it curdles, with the script becoming increasingly chaotic in ways that aren’t just confounding, but – worse – disappointing.

Following her turn in “The Lake House,” Bullock has chosen to star in yet another movie in which time isn’t on her side. In fact, it’s something of a pest, weighing on her in ways that tend to make the actress look increasingly frazzled as the movie unfolds.

In “House,” two years separated her from the possibility of having a great love affair with Keanu Reeves. To make their relationship work, they had to rely on the gift of a magic mailbox. In “Premonition,” one week is shuffled like the deck of cards from Hell, with nothing making sense until, at the end, still nothing makes sense. The filmmakers have to rely on logic, and logic, in this movie, is not their strong point.

With its broad echoes of Hitchcock and specifically the movie “Groundhog Day,” “Premonition” stars Bullock as Linda Hanson, who is living what appears to be an idyllic life with her husband, Jim (Julian McMahon of “Nip/Tuck”), and their two daughters when bad news strikes. After Jim leaves for work one morning, a police officer bearing bad news shows up at Linda’s door – Jim was just in a massive car accident and is dead.

Devastated, she is thrown into the murky haze that accompanies the business end of death – telling her children about their father’s death, dealing with relatives and making the funeral arrangements, all while working through her own emotions. But next morning, when she awakens, there’s Jim beside her in bed, ready to begin the next day. Did the bewildered Linda just have a nasty dream about Jim’s death or, as the movie explores with increasing instability, did she have … cue the music … a premonition!

When Jim continues to wind up dead and alive, the jigsaw puzzle begins, with lithium, a psychiatrist, a priest and a mental institution all thrown into the jumbled mix. And that’s the problem with the movie – after its midpoint, it fractures, with so many story threads left unanswered, confusion is what it courts, not entertainment. Bullock, perhaps sensing the chaos, acts as if she’s standing just outside herself, not quite vested in the role, her mind seemingly elsewhere.

If she’s thinking about that magic mailbox, it’s tough to blame her.

Grade: C-

On Blu-ray disc

MARCH OF THE PENGUINS, directed by Luc Jacquet, written by Jordan Roberts, 80 minutes, rated G.

It’s their bodies that you notice first.

Not made for flying, not particularly well-made for walking, the emperor penguins of the Antarctic are awkwardly built, their rotund heft, stunted limbs and gnarled feet creating a curious waddle that’s at once comical and endearing.

It’s only when they swim in the freezing waters of the Antarctic that these creatures realize a ballet of physical release that seems beyond their capabilities. There, in the electric blue of a faraway deep, they become tuxedoed missiles – as slick as dolphins, as graceful as seals, faster than you could imagine, able to dart with ease to the feast of fish that fret along the fringes of the icebergs that sustain them.

Still, on land, where these penguins spend most of their lives, they are designed in ways that appear completely wrong for the process that takes up so much of their lives: breeding. Pegged to a life of almost impossible difficulty, these driven, nearly 4-foot-tall birds must walk more than 70 miles through the most treacherous terrain and weather in order to come to a place in which they feel safe to hatch their chicks.

And then, to find food, they must walk those 70 miles again. And again. And again. Meanwhile, starvation is a thief that has its way with them. It’s this moving journey – the lives that spring from it, those that fall because of it – that is the focus of Luc Jacquet’s excellent Academy Award-winning documentary “March of the Penguins,” which is just out in high definition on Blu-ray disc.

Morgan Freeman narrates without a trace of emotion – respect is what he achieves. Following the penguins over the course of a year, director Jacquet chronicles a quest that finds the birds facing death daily in an effort to sustain life.

Blizzards strike. Water is sparse, but for the resourceful bird, it can be found after the storms in pellets of snow. When the exhausted females leave for the ocean to find food, the males are left behind for two months to balance the egg on their hooked feet. There is no food for them, just patience, hardship, endurance. Should the egg touch the frozen surface, it will freeze in seconds and life will be lost.

And so they can’t drop it – though some accidentally do. It’s the wail of grief that rings from their throats that binds us to them, just as it does when the females return to either see their hatched chicks for the first time, or to realize that in their absence, their mate failed to keep the egg safe.

In the Antarctic, where the southern lights weave through the skies like hallucinogenic ribbons, the emperor penguins endure.

Grade: A

Visit www.weekinrewind.com, the archive of Bangor Daily News film critic Christopher Smith’s reviews, which appear Mondays and Fridays in Lifestyle and weekends in Television, as well as on bangordailynews.com. He may be reached at Christopher@weekinrewind.com.