2009

Dirty Harry ages into Old Man Dirty Harry in the 'hood. I enjoyed this movie for various reasons: Walt's slow friendship with his Hmong neighbors, the featuring of a lesser-known culture, and the idea that mentoring can help stave off a negative path. Some of its flaws: The constant racist one-liners, while funny in context, at times made the movie feel like a common sitcom. Clint's Old Man Dirty Harry portrayal was a liitle overplayed, I thought. And while I greatly appreciated the effort to maintain cultural authenticity, the casting of local Hmong made for often rough acting. Still, an enjoyable character movie starring a legend.

And no, this is not an action-packed movie about Dirty Harry burning rubber in a hot car, as the two young men who walked out in the middle probably expected. HA!!!

Gleefully bloody violence, artfully--and sometimes even beautifully--rendered. A film fantasy for hot-blooded and thinking boys alike.

A film about a teen that's not a typical "teen flick." Sir Ben relishes his role as Luke's eccentric therapist Dr. Squires and even Mary-Kate Olson's little cameo is entertaining. This slow-moving film is strictly for those who are into character-driven stories.

Two boys deal with the divorce of their parents. It sounds so afterschool special but with an R rating this obviously is a far edgier, adult treatment! Linney and Daniels are superb as the annoyingly self-absorbed intellectual parents...aughhh, you just want to strangle them and tell them to grow up and do right by their kids!

I enjoy a good period piece but while this had its attractions, it was rather slow for me. I didn't find Charles' romance with Julia nearly as interesting or compelling as his friendship (romance?) with Sebastian.

Ahh, the power of young love! A highly captivating storyline; I liked the weaving of Jamal's life with the game show questions.

Bud, bad language, slapstick and cue the "bromantic" moment...typical Apatow!

Suspenseful storyline kept me engaged from the start, even though the corporate hijinks confused me. Still don't get why Michael stopped to look at the horses...

I'm guessing Penelope Cruz was nominated for an Oscar because she livened up this talky movie. I liked the character interactions but generally, they were people I wouldn't want to meet.

Hilarious! The queens are so compelling you forget they're men dressed as women. Well, except Wesley Snipes. Nothing can make you forget he's not really a woman. lol!

A gentle coming-of-age story. Queen Latifah is the rock of the Boatwright family and little Dakota Fanning is an acting force to be reckoned with...keep an eye on her future!

WDF????

Somewhat uneven but enjoyable if you appreciate blues music and movies based on true stories that will inspire you to follow up with your own research. Great soundtrack though.

A great civil rights movie although it seemed to run a little long. The assassinations happened when I was in junior high so the movie helped me finally understand the players and the history.

Revisiting a classic romantic comedy! Lead lovers Linda and Steve talk and think too much but otherwise this still holds up after all these years. Plus it's fun to see early '90s Seattle before its inevitable slide into high-end gentrification. Food Giant! Pay 'n' Save! Brown and yellow Metro buses! Wayne Cody, for god's sake!

Only the blindly passionate "Twilight" fan could overlook the flaws in this movie adaptation. The movie doesn't really get interesting until the vampire baseball game. And Edward and Bella's halting, monotone conversations don't exude romantic attraction, sexual tension or anything that would indicate why they're irresistibly drawn to each other. And therein lies the problem for me: a vampire romance with no convincing chemistry. Unless a glowering pasty-face really does it for you.

On the other hand, the moody, mossy forest scenery is gloriously beautiful. Hooray, Columbia Gorge!

An excellent all-sides perspective of the 1999 WTO protests. Charlize, Woody and Ray may be the better-known stars but the entire cast holds their own, especially the surprising Andre Benjamin. Who knew?? Points off for the odd Space Needle configuration in the opening scenes.

Hadn't read the YA book this is based on, but it appears to be a decent adaptation. A thinking teen flick with just enough high jinx to keep things light but not too stupid. Michael Cera and Kat Dennings make good chemistry as Nick and Norah.

Watching this in the aftermath of the financial meltdown, it is stunning to realize how quickly history repeated itself. Greed, manipulation, and no questions asked. Can you imagine Enron getting a bailout today?! Heck no!!! The traders were particularly odious and that came from the top down. I didn't exactly understand all the machinations described but hearing the story of the hubris and downfall all in one place as opposed to news stories over several years was compelling and fascinating.

Whoa, not what I expected! I thought it would be about the discrimination a Middle Eastern or Muslim girl faces and how she copes. Instead she's Lebanese and white, not Muslim, she gets sexually abused by her neighbor and sneaks around with her cute black boyfriend behind her father's back. More a disturbing coming-of-age story. The actress playing Jasira must be much older than she really looks...can't imagine a young teen acting out some of these graphic scenes. In any case, she's the real star of the movie, playing Jasira as very young, naive, experimental and confused. In other words, she's a convincing teenaged girl!

A thought-provoking movie about living the life you want to lead. It was great to see two acting legends together even though it seemed to me they were holding back or somehow the chemistry was off-kilter.

With the large acting ensemble and numerous storylines, this came off as rather chaotic. (Did the story really need Ashton Kutcher's hippie drug dealer??) This movie is more for the people who lived through that time and revered Bobby Kennedy; otherwise you don't really get a full sense of who he was and what he meant.

Sometimes you wonder if society and its institutions are making any forward progress and then you see a story like this and you realize how much they have. A distressing and compelling mystery although Angelina Jolie came off as too luminous to be a single working-class mom. But she nailed the emotional notes of an anguished mom.

A bit overlong and tedious, although Jennifer Aniston and Owen Wilson played off each other well as the married Grogans. Read the book; it's better.

Viewers will ache at the bittersweetness of Ram's hardscrabble existence. Every moment and scene of this movie speaks nobly to working-class day-to-day survival.

I listened to the audio version of this devastating novel and the movie does it full justice, if not more. The two boy actors portray Bruno and Shmuel with heartbreaking purity, fully realizing the quote that opens the film, about children experiencing life through their senses before the "dark hour of reason." Sadly this movie did not get much critical acclaim or public attention. A pity because this is really an affecting movie that will linger in your conscience for a long time.

I get where Bill Maher is coming from with his questions about religion and faith, although I'm not snarky about it and he's much more informed on the religions than I am. The devout will misinterpret the intent of this work which is really about a man expressing doubts and questions and wanting to better understand the whys of being attached to a faith. And in a way it's asking the religious to examine their beliefs as well. This could have been a more thoughtful movie if Bill had been less snarky and argumentative (which he probably had to be for the humorous sake of the movie and because he's Bill Maher). It's a ragged ending, with Bill exhorting the doubters to keep doubting. Nothing is tied up neatly but a topic of this magnitude can never be tied up neatly. It's a movie to make one think but the process is a little sloppy.

This did not feel like a nearly-three-hour-long movie at all. The story and characters held me until the end. Brad Pitt deserved his Oscar nomination, bringing a subtle balance to his portrayal of an old man with a naive perspective and a young man with an old soul. And there was something appealing about two soulmates reuniting again and again.

A slow, deliberate story with lots of quiet nuance...in other words, not the average moviegoer's cup of tea. Almost too quiet for me but I don't regret sticking with it.

A frenetic mess from start to finish. I'm not really sure what the bad guys' intent was.

I first heard of Mr. Petit in a picture book for kids by Mordecai Gerstein. This movie fleshed out the full story for me in an enthralling way. You just cannot think of him as crazy, just someone who loves what he does. Some of us are born to rebel and inspire; the rest to see them and believe we could do something extraordinary, too, even a small thing. I love that the movie title was inspired by the police report!

If you're an oenophile, you'll appreciate this movie. If you're a Bud drinker, move on. This movie about the triumph of California wines over French takes a while to establish its characters but once Steve Spurrier visits Napa Valley, the story takes off. Alan Rickman is hilarious as Steve, a very particular Brit who is quietly stunned by the Napa wines. But it's Freddy Rodriguez as winemaker Gustavo who really makes you see and feel the passion of winemaking.

Definitely not a popcorn escape movie. This is for the thinking people! All Academy Award acting nominations were well deserved. I liked Amy Adams the best, though. Her idealistic Sister James was an interesting buffer caught between Sister Aloysius and Father Flynn.

One of those quiet movies where subtle facial expressions and movements say as much as the dialog. Kristin Scott Thomas was an authentically bedraggled Juliette who you could see was slowly venturing from her shell but would always be, as she said, locked in the prison of her child's death.

Intense character movie about conformity vs individuality, and social vs personal expectations. Great acting, especially with Leo and Kate together, although I sometimes found Kate Winslet scary-intense!

This movie has a fly-on-the-wall feel as the viewers are privvy to intimate family moments and dysfunctions and all the emotions of a wedding celebration. Anne Hathaway is intense as Kym...this is the same luminous Princess Diaries girl?? And the fact that the movie ends with no happy resolution with Mom...wow, just like the messiness of real life. Some scenes were so noisy and hectic as to be almost overwhelming. Also, the wedding reception seemed to be the longest in history!

Absolutely charming story with a more adult sensibility than i expected. And the little boy is Asian--whoop whoop!

100% delightful!!!

Some of the couples portrayed were stereotypically over the top. Otherwise, if you like thoughtful indies about relationships, this might be your bag. Maya Rudolph...who woulda thought she used to be cracking 'em up on SNL???

Plenty of lush scenery and costumes as these period pieces always tend to have, but I found the storyline and character interactions somewhat lackluster. Go to the book!

This story is full of emotional and social complexity...no wonder Michael Berg couldn't get Hanna out of his mind. Intense!

Josh Brolin was quite effective as Dubya. But this movie is just too close to the times. I needed a little more distance of time to better appreciate this movie. Poor Thandie Newton spent too much time trying to be Condoleeza Rice than acting.

Wished I'd seen this one on the big screen. The animation and visuals were eye-popping. It's also very true to the spirit of the children's novel, dark and a bit sinister.

Very compelling movie. Langella and Sheen had great give and take as the lead characters. Who would have thought the story of a presidential interview would make great Hollywood entertainment??

An ensemble movie with compelling storylines. I found the story of the anguished clarinetist the most affecting. This one will linger in your mind after the credits roll.

A very tender and sweet movie from Uruguay. Jara is such a harmless teddy bear that what would come off as stalking by anyone else is really just him protecting Julia and crushing from afar. The closing movie of the Latino Film Festival.

Been meaning to watch this Asian-cast movie for years. There's a dark twist on the overachieving Asian stereotype: break the rules in a big way and overachieve doing so. Dark!

A terrifically funny and poignant character movie about an unexpected topic. I've mostly seen Amy Adams in her ditzy roles ("Enchanted" and "Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day") so seeing her in a more rugged turn was fun.

Checked this out because James McAvoy is in it. His part is just too brief and I think I missed some key moments because I couldn't understand with all the accents. Otherwise, an easy passing of 105 minutes.

When it comes to exploring men/women relationships, this isn't as deep or clever as "When Harry Met Sally," in my opinion. But as a lighthearted chick flick to relax with on a rainy evening, it fit the bill.

Revisiting an oldie from college days. Still entertaining and the '80s vibe is just as I lived it. Anthony Michael Hall is the comedic highlight for me. Gedde Watanabe got stuck with the unfortunate stereotypical Asian role, but he played it so over the top it's more a caricature than anything.

From Edward Scissorhands to Captain Jack to John Dillinger...JDepp's got range! This historical epic got me thinking about how very different and more efficient crime-fighting is today. Nice hats, fellas!

Ahaha, ridiculous and raucous! American Pie for the older set. I also liked the unfolding of the mystery...made this film much more than just a gross-out buddy movie.

I found this extremely sophisticated for a children's movie. It's actually quite talky and erudite, great for adults, but probably going well over kids' heads. George Clooney was just right as the crafty but soft-hearted Mr. Fox.