Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004)

When an investigation is launched, Polly Perkins, reporter for the prestigious Chronicle, and Sky Captain, resident flying ace, are at the forefront of the case. Though the mission's perks include traveling around the world, the stout-hearted duo are nonetheless risking their lives with each passing moment, as the culprit is none other than the nefarious Dr. Totenkopf, and his goal, from what they can gather, is to destroying the earth in its entirety. Luckily, Sky Captain and Polly are not alone -- Franky Cook, the commander of an all-female amphibious squadron, and Dex, an unparalleled technical genius, have joined them in hopes of saving the planet before it's too late.

Director: Kerry Conran
Writer: Kerry Conran
Stars: Gwyneth Paltrow, Jude Law and Angelina Jolie
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0346156/

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004)

Steve Zissou is an eccentric and renowned oceanographer who has decided to seek out and enact mortal revenge on a shark that ate one of the men on his team. Along for the ride is Ned Plimpton, a young man who has joined Zissou's crew after showing up claiming to be the seaman's long-lost son and Zissou's co-producer (and estranged wife), Eleanor. As the expedition ensues, the two bond and Plimpton falls for a female journalist who is writing a piece on Zissou. The crew meets a host of obstacles on their journey, including pirates, kidnapping, and bankruptcy.

Director: Wes Anderson
Writers: Wes Anderson and Noah Baumbach
Stars: Bill Murray, Owen Wilson and Anjelica Huston
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0362270/

House of Flying Daggers (2004)

 

In the year 859 A.D., as the Tang dynasty is beset by rebellion, Leo and Jin are a pair of lawmen who have been given the task of ferreting out the leaders of a revolutionary faction known as the Flying Daggers. Working on a tip that members of the group are working out of a brothel called the Peony Pavilion, Jin arrives there in disguise and is introduced to a beautiful blind dancer named Mei. After watching Mei's performance following several drinks, Jin drunkenly attempts to have his way with her, and Leo is forced to intervene. After gaining Mei's trust in a game of skill, Leo arrests her and informs her that she'll be tortured if she doesn't tell all she knows about the Flying Daggers. Jin responds by helping Mei break out of prison, but he has an ulterior motive -- by following her, Leo and Jin are certain she'll lead them to the Flying Daggers. However, as he helps the blind girl find her way back home, Jin finds himself falling in love with Mei, and isn't certain if he's willing to betray her again.

Director: Yimou Zhang
Writers: Bin Wang and Yimou Zhang
Stars: Ziyi Zhang, Takeshi Kaneshiro and Andy Lau
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0385004/

The Girl Next Door (2004)

 

Matthew Kidman is a straight-laced and highly ambitious high school student who plans to study at Georgetown University and dreams of a career in politics. While most of his classmates are in the throes of an epidemic of senioritis, Matthew is obsessed with schoolwork and has a hard time relaxing and having fun. But he finds himself a bit less focused on his future career when Danielle, a beautiful 19-year-old blonde, moves in next door. Danielle is playful, spontaneous, and doesn't always remember to draw her shades, and before long Matthew is head over heels in love. Danielle soon finds herself taken with Matthew as well, but their relationship takes an unusual turn when he discovers that, before she moved to town, Danielle had a successful career as a porn actress. Matthew is able to convince Danielle that she's cut out for better things in life than appearing in porn videos, but his advice doesn't especially please Kelly or Hugo, two porn moguls who figure Matthew owes them big-time after convincing their leading lady to drop out of the adult industry.

Director: Luke Greenfield
Writers: David Wagner and Brent Goldberg
Stars: Emile Hirsch, Nicholas Downs and Elisha Cuthbert
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0265208/

Dead & Breakfast (2004)

 

A handful of twenty-somethings are driving to Galveston, TX, in an RV to attend the wedding of a close friend. After a long day on the road, the travelers find themselves in a tiny town called Lovelock, where the only available accommodations are at a bed and breakfast run by the eccentric Mr. Wise. One of the kids, Johnny, notices that Mr. Wise is carefully looking after a small box; curious about its contents, Johnny opens it, only to unleash a torrent of evil spirits who turn the local rednecks into bloodthirsty creatures hovering somewhere between life and death.

Director: Matthew Leutwyler
Writers: Matthew Leutwyler and Jun Tan
Stars: Jeremy Sisto, Erik Palladino and Bianca Lawson
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0350774/

Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning (2004)

Follows Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed (2004). The doomed sisters are wandering the wilderness when they stumble across a broken down outpost whose supplies have been cut off for nearly two months. Sadly, while they've been waiting, they've also been dying -- not of starvation, but from werewolf attacks. While Bridget recovers from an unfortunate encounter with a bear trap, the two lone women in the camp are faced with growing hostility stemmed from the fire and brimstone preacher and a dangerous secret that lands Ginger back in werewolf land once again. With tensions rising as the bloodthirsty creatures try to break down the fort walls, how will the group react when one of its own starts becoming the one thing that they want to keep out?

Director: Grant Harvey
Writers: Christina Ray and Stephen Massicotte
Stars: Katharine Isabelle, Emily Perkins and Nathaniel Arcand
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0365265/

Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed (2004)

Follows Ginger Snaps (2001) and followed by Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning (2004). Brigitte is found by the police after being attacked and taken to rehab when it's assumed that the wolfbane serum that keeps her from turning into a monster is a narcotic. Once inside the facility and denied the substance, Brigitte must strike deals with one of the orderlies to obtain it; meanwhile, she is pursued by another werewolf, and escapes with Ghost, another female patient, to that girl's vacant old house, which sets the stage for a brutal showdown -- made even nastier when the orderly, a hospital doctor, and the elderly Barbara show up and decide to intervene.

Director: Brett Sullivan
Writers: Megan Martin
Stars: Emily Perkins, Brendan Fletcher and Katharine Isabelle
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0353489/

Club Dread (2004)

Broken Lizard is surrounded by limber, wanton women on a booze-soaked island resort owned by Coconut Pete, a rock star has-been. But the non-stop party takes a turn for the weird when dead bodies start turning up. Everyone begins to look suspicious. Could it be Sam, of the Fun Police brigade, who is quick-on-the- trigger with his tequila loaded super-soaker; Jenny, the over-sexed, fitness instructor; Juan, the flamboyant diving instructor with a secret third-world past; Putman, the bratty-British tennis coach/fanatic; Dave, the ecstasy-crazed, adopted nephew of Coconut Pete; or the burly masseuse blessed with a creepy touch, that can render anyone into instant Jell-O? Can the inhabitants of Pleasure Island unite, solve the mystery and restore happy hour to this tropical bacchanal?

Director: Jay Chandrasekhar
Writers: Jay Chandrasekhar and Kevin Heffernan
Stars: Jay Chandrasekhar, Bill Paxton and Kevin Heffernan
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0331953/

Eulogy (2004)

When three generations of a dysfunctional family gather in Rhode Island to bury the family patriarch, members of the Collins clan are at each other's throats in no time. Son Daniel is a secret porn actor, and daughter Lucy is a lesbian. Lucy totes along her lover Judy to the outrage of Lucy's aggressively neurotic sister Alice, whose hysterical overreaction to the pair's marriage plans ought to tell everyone something. Rounding out the delightful crowd are dim brother Skip, whose unfailingly rude twin sons offer caustic commentary on their elders' infantile predilections; matriarchal widow Charlotte, who becomes so justifiably distraught at the insanity of her children she tries to commit suicide; and Kate, a confused but comely college freshman who juggles preparation of the eulogy with internal debate over what to do with her childhood friend-turned-suitor, Ryan.

Director: Michael Clancy
Writer: Michael Clancy
Stars: Zooey Deschanel, Ray Romano, and Famke Janssen
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0349416/

Fighter in the Wind (2004)

A young Korean Taekwondo competitor arrives in Japan near the end of World War II with hopes of being a fighter pilot, but ends up on the streets battling racism, organized crime, occupying American servicemen, and his own fear of failure as a martial artist. He retires to the wilderness for two years to train his body in the art of karate and returns to take on the world.

Director: Yun-ho Yang
Writers: Yun-ho Yang and Hak-ki Bang (comic book)
Stars: Dong-kun Yang, Aya Hirayama and Masaya Katô
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0416499/

The Machinist (2004)

Trevor Reznik is a lathe-operator who suffers from insomnia and hasn't slept in a year. Slowly, he begins to doubt his sanity as increasingly bizarre things start happening at work and at home. Haunted by a deformed co-worker who no one seems to think exists, and an ongoing stream of indecipherable Post-It notes he keeps finding on his fridge, he attempts to investigate what appears to be a mysterious plot against him and, in the process, embroils two women in his madness.

Director: Brad Anderson
Writer: Scott Kosar
Stars: Christian Bale, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Aitana Sánchez-Gijón
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0361862/

The Libertine (2004)

In 1660, with the return of Charles II to the English throne, theater, the visual arts, science and sexual intercourse flourish. Thirteen years later, in the middle of political and economical problems, Charles II asks the return of his friend John Wilmot, aka the second Earl of Rochester, from the exile to London. John is a morally corrupt, drunkard and sexually active cynical poet, and the King asks him to prepare a play for the French ambassador to make him pleased. John meets the aspirant actress Elizabeth Barry in the playhouse and decides to make her a great star. He falls in love for her, and she becomes his mistress; during the presentation to the Frenchman, he falls in disgrace in the court. When he was thirty-three years old, he was dying of syphilis associated to alcoholism and he converted to a religious man.

Director: Laurence Dunmore
Writers: Stephen Jeffreys
Stars: Johnny Depp, Samantha Morton and John Malkovich
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0375920/

Night Watch (2004)

Followed by Day Watch (2006). Among normal humans live the Others, possessing various supernatural powers. They are divided up into the forces of light and the forces of the dark, who signed a truce several centuries ago to end a devastating battle. Ever since, the forces of light govern the day while the night belongs to their dark opponents. In modern day Moscow, the dark Others actually roam the night as vampires while a "Night Watch" of light forces, among them Anton, the movie's protagonist, try to control them and limit their outrage.

Director: Timur Bekmambetov
Writers: Timur Bekmambetov and Laeta Kalogridis
Stars: Konstantin Khabenskiy, Vladimir Menshov and Mariya Poroshina
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0403358/

Cube Zero (2004)

Follows Cube (1997) and Cube²: Hypercube (2002). In this second sequel, the hero is not just another disoriented captive of the cube's interconnected, often lethal, rooms, but rather a geek named Eric who sits in a control station wrestling with his conscience about inflicting misery on innocent people. Taking orders over the phone from some almighty, unknown power in a distant office, Eric reaches a breaking point and enters the maze himself, intent on helping a woman who doubts his motives. The existential bent of the prior films becomes even more Kafkaesque this time with the arrival of a white-collar team of tormentors: bureaucratic tyrants who can't or won't explain the point of the cube.

Director: Ernie Barbarash
Writer: Ernie Barbarash
Stars: Zachary Bennett, Stephanie Moore and Martin Roach
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0377713/

The Dreamers (2004)

The tumultuous political landscape of Paris in 1968 serves as the backdrop for a tale about three young cineastes who are drawn together through their passion for film. Matthew, an American exchange student, pursuing his education abroad in Paris, becomes friends with a French brother and sister who share a common love of the cinema. While the May 1968 Paris student riots--which eventually shut down most of the French government--are happening around them, the three friends develop a relationship unlike anything Matthew has ever experienced, or will ever encounter again.


Director: Bernardo Bertolucci
Writers: Gilbert Adair
Stars: Michael Pitt, Louis Garrel and Eva Green
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0309987/

Employee of the Month (2004)

David Walsh has a perfect life: a gorgeous fiancée, Sarah Goodwin; a beautiful house; a fancy car; a job of manager in a bank. On the day he expects to be elected the "Employee of the Month", he is fired; Sarah finds that he had an affair with his colleague Wendy and calls off their engagement; and a hooker sent by his friend Jack to stay with him in a motel steals his car. On the next day, in his farewell, there is a heist in the bank and he is abducted. But his fate before reaching Nirvana has not finished yet

Director: Mitch Rouse
Writers: Mitch Rouse and Jay Leggett
Stars: Matt Dillon, Steve Zahn and Christina Applegate
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0362590/

Saved! (2004)

Mary is a good Christian girl who goes to a good Christian high school where she has good Christian friends, mainly Hilary Faye, and a perfect Christian boyfriend, Dean. Her life seems perfect, until the day that she finds out that Dean may be gay. After "seeing" a vision of Jesus in a pool, she does everything in her power to help him turn straight, including offering up her virginity. But none of it helps because Dean's caught and sent to a "degayification" center and Mary ends up pregnant. It's during her time of need that she becomes real friends with the school's set of "misfits," including Cassandra, the school's only Jewish girl; Roland, Hilary Faye's wheelchair-bound brother, and Patrick, the skateboarder son of the school's principal, Pastor Skip; whilst Hilary Faye turns her into a social outcast.

Director: Brian Dannelly
Writers: Brian Dannelly and Michael Urban
Stars: Jena Malone, Mandy Moore and Macaulay Culkin
More info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0332375/