Friday’s openings: Trains and the plains of history

Movies mentioned on the national release schedule usually affect Spokane, but not always. It sometimes takes a week or two for our fair city to catch up. Sometimes our local theaters simply never do.

Anyway, the national releases scheduled for Friday so far are:

"The Birth of a Nation": Named after D.W. Griffith's famous 1915 celebration of the Ku Klux Klan, but actually a retelling of the story behind William Styron's controversial novel "The Confessions of Nat Turner," this look at U.S. history may raise a few eyebrows — if not a few voices. The man who directed it, Nate Parker, is already embroiled in his own controversy.

"The Girl on the Train": Based on the novel by British author Paula Hawkins, this mystery tells the story of a divorced woman (Emily Blunt) who throws herself into a missing-persons investigation that may — or may not — involve her directly. Notice I avoided writing "troubled" divorced woman, which at least is the trailer's implication.

"Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life": A sixth-grade boy worries about heading into the next school year. Based on the novel by James Patterson and Chris Tebbetts, which is another sign that James Patterson is the co-author of virtually everything.

Note: As for the Magic Lantern, recent stories in The Spokesman-Review and The Inlander have run down the situation. Now that the lease with Joe Davis has run out, the owner of the Saranac Building will decide what to do with the space. Whatever the future holds, it's clear that, for the moment, the theater will not be running a regular program of movies. Thank you Joe and especially you, manager Jonathan Abramson, for your years of service.