Dark ‘Hangover III’ takes series to ‘the next level,’ Bradley Cooper says

LAS VEGAS — At 9 a.m. Saturday at Caesars Palace, the Wolfpack should be waking up in a trashed hotel room with a tiger in the bathroom and livestock snacking near the mini-bar.

At the very least, Doug should be missing.

Instead, “The Hangover Part …

‘Erased’ runs through the conventions of a standard chase movie

RICHARD ROEPER: “Erased” is something of a mash-up of “Taken” and “Unknown,” with Aaron Eckhart in the Neeson role as Ben Logan, a former CIA agent with a stereotypically resentful teenage daughter. When the security company Logan works for wipes him off the grid, he must go to extreme lengths to protect her.

‘Black Rock’ a surprisingly effective thriller

RICHARD ROEPER: Three young women head for a weekend getaway on Black Rock, a remote and forbidding locale off the coast of Maine. “Black Rock” doesn’t reinvent the genre, nor does it avoid some of the clichés we’ve seen in thrillers with much bigger budgets and much higher body counts. That said, here is a film that doesn’t waste one minute of its running time, delivering the set-up and the conflict and the resolution in refreshingly brisk and often quite brutal fashion.

Family secrets revealed in ‘Stories We Tell’

Sarah Polley began her career as an actress, but her remarkable success behind the camera in recent years has shown where perhaps her true talent lies. Her best-known directorial efforts, the critically acclaimed “Away From Her” (2006) and “Take This Waltz” (2011), are now joined by an equally stunning project, the documentary “Stories We Tell.”

‘Scatter My Ashes at Bergdorf’s’ blows an air kiss to a temple of high fashion

Matthew Miele’s documentary is a fawning valentine to Bergdorf Goodman, the elite New York department store that specializes in high fashion.

Kartemquin showcase will provide feedback for filmmakers

Known for acclaimed documentaries such as “The Interrupters” and “Hoop Dreams,” Kartemquin Films will preview four works in progress during its annual Spring Showcase on Sunday at the Gene Siskel Fim Center. After viewing 10 minutes from each film, the audience will weigh in on what works and what needs work.

Scoring designers was a challenge for Bergdorf’s documentary maker

When you make a hit documentary about Bergdorf’s, one has to wonder: Does that mean a 20 percent discount card … for life? “Scatter My Ashes at Bergdorf’s” director Matthew Miele laughs as he tends to his toddler on a busy day in his Manhattan …

‘Pieta’ delivers Kim Ki-duk’s brand of extreme justice

Self-inflicted violence unfolds with tragic costs in “Pieta,” writer-director Kim Ki-Duk’s 18th drama. It offers pathological revenge after a debt-collector meets a woman posing as the mother he never knew.

‘Leviathan’ immerses viewers in the wonders of the sea

This experimental documentary from the Sensory Ethnography Lab at Harvard University is bloody with viscera, yet beautifully abstract. On a New England trawler, Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Verena Paravel record astonishing visuals and discordant audio that hit your eye, ear and gut for the most radical non-CGI spectacle in sight.

Latest ‘Star Trek’ appears to be quite the Enterprise

RICHARD ROEPER: Director J.J. Abrams is a true talent, and he’s also a pop-culture savant who has great respect for the legacy of this franchise as well as a keen understanding of the mega-importance of box-office figures. There’s no better choice to make the best, the purest AND the most accessible big-budget “Star Trek” movie possible. Yet with all the futuristic splendor and the fine performances, “Into Darkness” only occasionally soars, mostly settling for being a solid but unspectacular effort that sets the stage for the next chapter(s).

‘Star Trek Into Darkness’ shoot got silly for Zoe Saldana

Returning as Uhura in the sequel, the actress says the “beam me up, Scotty” scenes never failed to give the cast the giggles. “They can hardly ever use the first or second take,” she says.

‘Scandal’ introduces Kerry Washington to a new world

LOS ANGELES — “I didn’t have a crystal ball,” says Kerry Washington. “I wasn’t sure at one point if this show would have a second season.” That’s easy to say now that “Scandal,” about a D.C. crisis manager, is one of ABC’s biggest hits. The …

‘Peeples’ predictable but entertaining, thanks to good cast

BILL ZWECKER: While “Peeples” follows a very predictable course as a romantic comedy and does not break any ground in that genre of filmmaking, this movie is more engaging than you might expect. That’s due to the ensemble of actors who give spot-on performances that actually enrich the fairly pedestrian screenplay.

‘In the House’ a clever diversion from Francois Ozon

A student at Lycée Gustave Flaubert writes himself into a serialized class paper that ensnares its subjects and its readers — including his teacher, a classmate and his middle-class family. “In the House” might well be called “In the Story” because that’s where it plays out: the house in the story and the story in the house. This slight but playful comedic suspense thriller from director François Ozon is about the voyeuristic pleasures of narrative: Who are these characters really, and what do they want?

Specialty film events in local cinemas this week

BEVERLY ARTS CENTER: “Chasing Ice” (2012), 7:30 p.m. Wednesday. BACinema, Beverly Arts Center, 2407 W. 111th. (773) 445-3838, beverlyartcenter.org.

BLOCK CINEMA: “Sonic Celluloid,” musicians performing live with their own original compositions or improvised scores to silent and experimental films of their choosing. Performers include Madalyn …