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In advance of the Oscar nominations I thought I'd share a few thoughts about 2008's slate of movies. In thinking about the forthcoming Oscar noms it is strange that there was nothing huge this year that would make for typical Oscar fodder, big films such as Titanic , The English Patient , Braveheart or Shindler's List . I suppose those who produced the big-budget period picture Australia were hoping a late-year release might generate Oscar buzz. No one, apparently, went to see it. So this years best movies are, in my opinion, all over the board. Still having not seen a couple of flicks on many critics' top ten lists ( The Wrestler , Happy-Go-Lucky and Revolutionary Road among them), I will endeavor to offer one of my own: Frost/Nixon Slumdog Millionaire In Bruges Doubt Gran Torino Changeling The Dark Knight Man on Wire The Bank Job Iron Man Regarding Wall-E: although it failed to move me personally, I was impressed with the animation and particularly the storytelling...

Director Ron Howard is at the height of his powers with this screen adaptation of Peter Morgan’s play about a series of interviews British talk show host David Frost conducted with Richard Nixon in 1977. For such a simple concept the film is taut, engaging and fascinating. Frank Langella is brilliant as the embittered Nixon, hoping to reverse his fortunes by vindicating himself in the interviews. It’s an Oscar-worthy performance. Sheen (Tony Blair in The Queen) is spot on as the talk show host hoping to reverse his own fortunes by essentially “convicting” Nixon of his crimes. Langella and Sheen are supported by terrific performances by Sam Rockwell and Oliver Platt as Frost’s associates, and Kevin Bacon as Nixon’s chief of staff. Frost/Nixon is an absorbing exploration of television journalism, entertainment and politics. Watching the movie I was unaware as to what was fact and what was not, but the end result was so engrossing that ultimately the line that blurred truth from fictio...

That The Tale of Despereaux is beautifully designed and animated does help to make up for its few flaws, among them a script and a story that could have been a bit tighter. Despereaux hails from Universal Animation Studios (the folks who brought you Curious George and The Land Before Time XIII: The Wisdom of Friends ), no giants in the animation arena and not known for the caliber of films coming out of PIXAR or Dreamworks Animation. Despereaux seems to be Universal's desperate attempt to play in that arena. That said, it is an honest effort despite the mixed results. In addition to the elegant production design the movie boasts an A-list cast that is at times stellar but for the most part merely adequate. Matthew Broderick hits the mark with his portrayal of the titular mouse, an oddity among his peers because of his uncommon boldness and desire for adventure. After being banished from Mouse World for essentially not fitting in, Despereaux discovers that he is destined for grea...

Director Mark Herman ( Brassed Off, Little Voice ) adapts a moving and tragic novel about two boys separated by race, hatred and superstition during the height of the Third Reich. Having seen this movie it’s no surprise why the reviews are so mixed, and why both positive and negative reviews have been delivered with such conviction. There seems to be little middle ground as to whether or not it is fitting for filmmakers to tell this type of story in the way that it was told, partially set in a concentration camp in Germany during the second World War. The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas brings to mind Roberto Benigni’s Life is Beautiful , a concentration camp film that dealt with the tragedy of the Holocaust with hope and at times a comic touch. Both films use similar elements to tell their stories, but Pyjamas takes a heavier hand and Herman never flinches away from the story he is telling, and in the end he delivers a film that is sure to elicit discussion from its viewers. It was only...

The new James Bond movie kicks off with a ferocious car chase wherein Bond struggles to get the upper hand. He leads his pursuers around narrow winding mountain roads and, not surprisingly, experiences a number of close calls. I kept waiting for Bond to engage some Q-section gadgetry on his Alfa Romeo to take out his opponents -- machine guns, oil slicks, and so on. But not this Bond. He has but his raw nerve and wits to get him out of this scrape, and I realized that this is the new Bond. Bond retooled. A tough, layered and resourceful secret agent who doesn't need to rely on techy gadgets to save his skin. And I like it. Quantum of Solace is a new Bond adventure, yes, but ties in heavily with Casino Royale . Quantum builds on the story told in actor Daniel Craig's initial outing as 007, and as such this film does not stand well on its own, which is its weakness. That said, director Marc Forster ( The Kite Runner , Finding Neverland ) delivers everything audiences have com...

My friend Mike summed up one aspect of this film with the comment, “The half of the audience that doesn ’t have kids was watching this movie on a whole different level.” Director Clint Eastwood’s Changeling brings to mind other recent films wherein parents deal with tragic circumstances involving their children: Gone Baby Gone and Eastwood’s Mystic River among them. The emotional core of films like Changeling rely on the audience empathizing with the pain of a parent who loses a child, and Angelina Jolie delivers her best performance in years as a mother whose son is nowhere to be found when she returns from work. Set in Los Angeles during the 1920’s, Changeling is a true story. Eastwood works from a marvelous canvas in this period film. Its rich set and costume design suits the movie’s slow and deliberate pacing, and Eastwood’s minimalist musical score allows the audience to immerse itself not only in this world of 1920’s L.A. but in Jolie’s solid performance as a determined woman...

Ben Stein (speech writer for both Nixon and Ford, comedian, game show host, and actor) continues to intrigue me. Like many of you, my first introduction to him was as the droning economics teacher from Ferris Beuller's Day Off ("anyone? anyone?") . Years later, he hosts a game show called Win Ben Stein's Money , a series of Visine commercials and an internet letter. And that leads us to his documentary, Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. If it was not for this appearing on Netflix's Watch Now section, I most likely would not have watched the film, but why not? I added the title to my Watch Now queue and went upstairs to have it streamed to my TV via the ROKU Box. One other thing you have to know is that Stein rejects Darwinism and embraces Intelligent Design. The premise of the movie is that Academia has created a wall that is dividing science and rejecting new ideas. In this case, Academia is rejecting Intelligent Design as a new attempt by Christian's to h...

This year I have seen two post-apocalyptic movies about Earthlings returning to terra firma after some cataclysm, Disney’s WALL-E and the yet-unreleased Terra . City of Ember is the third, and this time humans are tucked away in an underground city for two hundred years, with instructions on how to leave the city passed down generation to generation through the office of the mayor. Except something goes wrong, and the instructions are misplaced for nearly half a century. When the power source for the city begins to wind down, two clever teens must figure out the secret of getting out of Ember and back to the surface before their world is plunged into darkness. City of Ember is not without its faults. The performances are merely adequate, and Bill Murray, as the mayor, never seems to inhabit the character. It’s Murray up there reading lines, and it’s a distraction. I could go on about the gloomy set design or the holes in the script, but I won’t. City of Ember is an intriguing famil...

Even though summer hasn't officially ended, the 2008 Summer Movie season is at an end. This year, I did not see as many as I would like. But what did surprise me was how fast they seemed to drop out of the theaters. Already, X-Files can be found in our local second run theaters. And, I really wanted to see The Happening , but it left the theater so quickly, it left you asking "What Happened?" So what films stood out for me this summer? Iron Man: What a way to start the summer. This film could have been such a miss, and I was prepared to dislike it. But it seems that Marvel knows what their characters are about. Robert Downey, Jr just owned the role of Tony Stark. Prince Caspian: I think I saw this movie. I think I just didn't care about it. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull: Ok, it was fun and captured the essence of the original film, but I think I could have lived without this adventure. Kung Fu Panda: Finally a Jack Black film I liked. The Incre...

Don Cheadle is one of those actors who can say volumes with a simple expression. Maybe it’s his dark, contemplative eyes set into a face that the audience wants to trust. Someone told me that director Steven Soderbergh once said that if you wanted to make your movie better, put Don Cheadle in it. Whatever it is that makes Don Cheadle a believable character actor does not fail him in this summer’s political thriller Traitor. Traitor is yet another one of those moralizing post-9/11 films that attempts to make a statement at the expense of character, story and dialogue. I have no problem with films with a message, and the message here is one we have heard before: Muslims are wonderful people, except for the few nuts who misinterpreted the Koran and became terrorists, and the US government is a lot like those aforementioned terrorists – good people who lost their way. And there is plenty of blame in Traitor for both Islamic terrorism and American Imperialism to share. Aside from the over...

It seems as if there are a rash of space-themed CG animated films out. We’ ve already covered WALL-E and the yet-to-be-released Terra in this blog. Then there is the forthcoming Flyboys , about a trio of houseflies who travel in a space capsule, a movie I hope never to have to review. In the mean time there is Space Chimps , an uninspired idea so poorly developed and executed that I realized I was not the only adult snoozing in the Cineplex . It's from Starz Animation (the cable & satellite TV channel?) and the Weinsteins. It’s about a trio of chimpanzees who travel in a space capsule. They go to a strange planet. Stuff happens. They return home as heroes, each having grown a bit in the process. The script, animation and performances are so mediocre that I won’t bother to mention them further. So is there anything good about Space Chimps , you ask? My reply: yes, and it's this: it’s clean, G-rated fun for the little ones. And they will love it. * out of 5

Hellboy II: The Golden Army was a fun movie, and on top of that, was extremly interesting to look at. I guess you really should go and see the first movie because I felt like I could have used a refresher. Guillermo Del Toro has created a world that blends live action, animatronics and a bit of CGI along with a really cool story. The movie opens with a prologue that sets the history. A war between humans and elves (and other non-human creatures) results in defeat for the elves. The king employs the goblins to create an army golden mechanical warriors. The humans are nearly decimated and the king realizes the danger of the army. He divides the crown used to control the mechanical fighter into three pieces, giving one to the humans, one to himself and one to his daugther. The princesses twin brother disagrees with this action and leaves. Years pass. The Prince returns and he wants to bring the three pieces of the crown back together and control the army so that he can finish the job tha...

There was something about the trailer for Hancock that made me want to see this movie. The idea of a bum with superhero powers, drinking a big bottle of Jim Beam while fighting crime, really spoke to this comic book guy. And, Hancock delivered. To a point. Will Smith is Hancock a street bum with superhero powers: he can fly, bullets bounce off of him, and, oh yea, he doesn't age. Everyone in LA hates him because everytime Hancock helps, millions of dollars in damages occur. Jason Bateman play Ray Embry, a PR rep who is saved by Hancock from an oncoming train and takes Hancock on as a pro-bono case. Charlize Theron plays Bateman's wife, Mary, who is more than skeptical of Hancock and warns her husband that this will end badly. For the damages that he has done, Ray convinces Hancock to turn himself in and go to prison. The plan is that the crime rate will rise so high that they will beg Hancock to come back and save the day. In the meanwhile, Hancock attends a twelve step progra...

Earlier tonight I shuffled off to a late showing of The Incredible Hulk , not particularly looking forward to it but it was the one film that started at the Cineplex when I arrived. I thought with director Ang Lee at the helm of 2003’s Hulk that perhaps Marvel could get it right with everyone’s favorite jolly green giant. I was wrong. Eric Bana was barely okay in the role of Bruce Banner, and costar Nick Nolte provided some interesting moments. But when the Hulk-dogs appeared on the scene, I though the film had jumped the shark. Besides, the CG Hulk was too much like, well, a CG Hulk. So why do it again? And with another CG Hulk who is too much like, well, another CG Hulk? The Incredible Hulk is wholly unrelated to the 2003 movie Hulk , and has a couple of things going for it. It appears Marvel had more control over the material. It had an A-list star as Bruce Banner, one Edward Norton, an Oscar-nominated performer who is no slouch when it comes to acting. (Marvel Studios scored well ...

Pixar Animation continues to reaffirm itself as the preeminent animation studio by telling good, compelling stories. WALL-E , about a solitary robot whose purpose it seems is to clean up the long-abandoned Earth, uses a strongly visual storytelling technique to establish character and place. WALL-E’s interaction with his environment, his possessions and a cockroach, his one companion, establishes his character and sums up his existence without the use of any dialogue. When a space ship lands and leaves behind another robot, WALL-E’s desire for companionship becomes a real possibility. But nothing in Pixar ’s worlds is so easy, and WALL-E ends up accompanying Eve, his sleek new robot friend, into the far reaches of outer space for adventures WALL-E could never have dreamed of. Thematically it is a lot like a full-length animated indie flick floating around out there called Terra , in which the short-sighted humans destroyed their earth and were forced into space. In Terra , which featu...

The Seattle Film Festival wrapped for the year and all-in-all I had a great time. For one who enjoys movies, the film festival experience is unique and fascinating. I saw dozens of movies, met many interesting people, learned about movies and the film making process from many of the artists involved, and ate at Bill’s Pizza a couple of times, which has become part of the festival experience for my movie-going buddy Dan and me. This year’s Secret Festival was a smash as well, but I am unable to communicate anything about any of the films I saw there. I have eleven months to rest up before the 2009 Seattle International Film Festival.

Each year at the film festival I always manage to find a small independent film that I might not have otherwise had the chance to see, the kind of film that will make the festival and art house circuit but is unlikely to flicker across screens at the suburban multiplex. Previously it was a clever little death by milk comedy called Expiration Date . This year it's another Seattle-filmed flick called Visioneers . Thematically reminiscent of Terry Gilliam's Brazil, Visioneers is the story of George (comedian Zack Galifianakis ), a man with dreams stuck in a drab world of mindless conformity and desperately wishes for a way out amid a growing national crisis in which the emotional and the discontent inexplicably explode. His absent brother, having extricated himself from society, returns and moves into the pool house with designs on becoming a pole vaulter, and George realizes that his brother is truly free – free from the constraints of society and free from the risk of unnecess...

Two documentaries stood out in my mind at this year's Seattle Film Festival, and they could not have been more different. The first, Alone in Four Walls , is a lyrically shot documentary about nine to thirteen-year-old boys serving time for crimes ranging from theft to murder in a rural Russian prison for boys. The film is startling in that the inmates are indeed children: frightened, weeping and pining for parents who never come to visit. As sympathy for the boys begins to mount, Director Alexandra Westmeier takes her audience outside the prison walls to the sad, angry and sometimes bitter families who tell stories of oft times startling delinquency, including the story of one of the featured boys' grisly murder of a friend. Westmeier had free access within the walls of the prison and the result – a simple film told in images and interviews without narration and commentary – is powerful and mesmerizing. Man on Wire , from France, is a first rate documentary that feels like a...

Over the past few weeks I have been attending the Seattle Film Festival. I have enjoyed a few outstanding flicks, like director Anand ( Shopgirl ) Tucker's When Did You Last See Your Father?, as well as a little gem of a movie called Phoebe in Wonderland with Felicity Huffman, Bill Pullman and a remarkable Elle Fanning. There was some mediocre fare ( Continental, a Film Without Guns and the Sundance award-winner Ballast ) among the films I saw, and a couple of great documentaries as well. Then of course, amid the hits, there were the misses: Huddersfield , a pointless drama from Serbia, and The Bluetooth Virgin, a small film about struggling Hollywood screenwriters, were two outright snoozers . I've also attended some interesting presentations and Q&A from writers, directors and actors attending the festival. Among the highlights were two foreign films brought to the festival from Japan and Australia, respectively: Love and Honor , a period samurai movie, and The Chi...

A disastrous fire on the Universal back lot destroyed a number of exterior sets this past weekend, including the clock tower from the Back to the Future movies. To see it as pictured here, in 1992, you will need a Delorean. A very special Delorean.