Film

One of the many graphic rape scenesI can't say that this movie is boring. Let's just say it's longer than it should be. It's the kind of documentary you can watch on the History Channel and be glad there are commercials so you can take a well-deserved break.
There are, however, a ton of interesting facts. In fact, I wrote down a lot of them just so I could feel smarter. But the gist of this movie is pretty simple: Hitler stole or destroyed a bunch of artwork. Some items are lost forever. Some were found and restored. There are debates on who gets them after they are rediscovered. The End.
Rape of Europa provides a fairly detailed history lesson on the rise and fall of the Third Reich, introducing a theory that most cities were targeted due to the artwork they housed to accommodate Hitler's desire to build the ultimate Nazi art museum. There was a hit list of cities to be plundered and pillaged for masterpieces he deemed Third Reich-worthy. The film suggests, for example, that Russia's Leningrad was bombed for its Armitage museum. On the other hand, Warsaw was almost annihilated because like the Jews, the Nazis considered Poles a vile race and their art degenerate. That's right, the film suggests that Warsaw was virtually destroyed because its residents had bad taste. Soon, cities got wise to the fact that museums were obliterated and/or looted. There were massive evacuation relocation plans from the Louvre and other museums, moving the precious treasures to remote castles miles away. Oddly, Hitler spared Paris, because he wanted it to be a mere shadow next to his uber museum.

Sandler stars in Teen Wolf IIWho knew that cutting hair could be so gross? Or that co-authors Adam Sandler and Judd Apatow (seemingly in a professional freefall from triumphs such as Forgetting Sarah Marshall and The 40-Year-Old Virgin) could create any relationship at all between a Mossad agent and the gyrating hair stylist in New York City he morphs into? If you think the previews look bad, the movie proves downright nasty. Director Dennis Dugan (I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry) delivers a movie that even made a grown guy sitting next to me cover his eyes more than once.
Sandler combines every disgusting pelvic gesture imaginable with sticky, icky hair crèmes, as he pours, squirts, and spurts various liquids on the manes of middle-to-older aged women in a hair salon. And unfortunately those aren't the only things spurting in this film. For some reason, he then feels compelled to escort these by now willingly wanton women, fairly panting into the back room in order to facilitate their youthful imaginings. Uck. Whatever happened to just bestowing an exaggerated compliment, like "Boy Mrs. Wilson, you look at least thirty years younger with those new gold highlights and spikes?"

Tribal fisherman have suffered along with the salmon on the columbia river. Who says all fish-talk is boring? River Ways proves the opposite in a documentary about four controversial Snake Rivers dams. Set against the backdrop of the collapse of a once unrivaled salmon fishery on the Columbia River and a campaign to have four dams that have contributed to that decline removed, River Ways finds there are no easy solutions, or easy villains in this story.
River follows three essential characters-Frank Sutterlict, a Yakama tribal fisherman, Ben Branston, a wheat farmer, and Mark Ihander, a commercial fisherman. It keeps most interviews short and to the point, highlighting viewpoints from both sides of the river debate. The other perspectives include conservationists, protesters, board members, biologists and river advocates. The big river draws in a huge spectrum of interests, both economic and environmental, and there is plenty of acrimony between the extremes. One scene shows gun-toting, racist fishermen making a stand at what they consider "their river" when a Native American tries to fish the same stream.

refuses to clean up her room. The Strangers will piss off a lot of people, but probably not for the same reasons as me. It has its moments as it's an odd twist of a film. It's all about a victimizing, murderous act and any substance beyond that is all but lost. Relying only on scare tactics, the film has virtually no plot. This can be a good thing, but in this case it leads to an unredeemable finale with a supremely uncalled for ending.
 
The beginning has that good ol' horror movie promise with narration and "inspired by true events" facts straight out of Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Strangers keeps the suspense up and will undeniably creep you out. (The sound of a knock on a door might never be the same for you again.)
Kristin (Liv Tyler) and James (Scott Speedman) are back from a party early because Kristen has re-buffed James' marriage proposal and they're in a sad quandary as to what to do next. Staying at his folks' remotely situated house, they receive a knock at the door from a seemingly lost girl. They send her on her way and the trouble begins. Knocks turn into pounds, windows break, and masked figures begin to appear. (Props go to the creepiest masks ever: doll-face and pillow-head.)

some flowers are just funnier than others. The Visitor is tough to categorize. On one hand it's a straightforward story of a lonely guy who finds meaning in life, and on the other it's so deadpan and simple that it makes you remember why they make movies: Because real life depicted as real life can be boring.
 
The movie stars Richard Jenkins (Six Feet Under) as Walter Vale, a withdrawn, forlorn professor gliding through life in isolated emotional pain. Jenkins (an underrated actor) proves to be absolutely proficient in this role, broadening his range to new heights or in this case, lows. Gone are his usual comedic wise-cracks and/or witty flamboyance.
When Walter is sent from Connecticut to New York City to give a lecture and visits an apartment building he owns, he finds a couple of illegal immigrants, Tarek (Haaz Sleiman) and Zainab (Danai Gurira) living there. He reluctantly befriends them and his life begins to change. Tarek plays an African conga-drum and entices the prof into giving it a whirl. Next thing we know, Walter's beating the darn thing while wearing his underpants. Soon they are playing in a drum-circle in Washington Square Park. Trouble ensues in a subway when cops apprehend and arrest Tarek for supposedly jumping a turnstile. The rest of the movie is the slow-burn-saga of Walter trying to come to grips with saving someone else's life, therefore saintly redeeming his own. The film's tricky title will provoke discussion as to who's the visitor: Walter charting new territory or Tarek whose immigration status is challenged.

Hey, aren’t you han solo?The unabashedly campy Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull takes us on yet another retro, whirlwind adventure, this time led by an older, slightly mellowed, but still dashing "Indy." The latest installment of the four Indiana Jones films taps into '50s nostalgia-beginning in a malt shop in Cambridge, Mass. - and winds up in the Amazonian Jungle of Peru. Once again, we get to tag along with our favorite rogue archeologist, while in this episode he fends off several near-fatal attacks by Russian KGB operatives turned treasure hunters, and an onslaught of computer generated ants.
The plots of the Indiana Jones movies are always somewhat ridiculous; but who cares when in a span of under three hours the audience gets to trek to Nepal and Cairo, Shanghai and India, Venice, or the Amazon Jungle, all in the name of discovering treasure (which always bears some supernatural power), while preventing evil-doers from getting there first? The Crystal Skull, possibly the most schmaltzy of the bunch, is no exception.

Wait a minute, you’re not frodo. As a fan of the C.S. Lewis book series, The Chronicles of Narnia, in which fantasy and adventure are underlain with greater conflicts, I truly wanted to fall under the spell of the second installment of its film franchise, Prince Caspian. Ten minutes into it, when the four Pevensie children land back in Narnia-this time perched atop a stunning New Zealand beach-I thought the film might be spectacular in both setting and emotional scope. And although certain aspects of the film prove awe-inspiring, the piece as a whole does not leave me longing for a return voyage to Narnia.
 
Flying griffins, fearless mice, Narnian dwarves, and other mythical woodland creatures steal the show in Prince Caspian. This is due partly to the fact that the acting and the emotional depth of the human characters remain shallow. Lucy, Edward, Susan and Peter all return, but produce disappointingly wooden performances. Only Lucy (Georgie Henley) and Edmund (Skandar Keynes) show some spunk, with Edmund occasionally able to convey subtlety imbued with a spark.

something about a whipper snapper. I defy anyone to not like this movie. Young at Heart will run your emotions through the gamut of joy, sorrow, anticipation and hilarity with affirmations of life, death and yes, even sex…you get it all.
 
This documentary is about the "Young at Heart" senior citizens chorus whose average age is in the 80s, conducted by a 53-year-old taskmaster and musical genius named Bob Cilman. Focusing on the rehearsals for their "Alive and Well" tour, the film follows the development of three diverse new numbers: Sonic Youth's "Schizophrenia," James Brown's "I Feel Good" and Allen Toussaint's "Yes We Can-Can." The songs are chosen by Cilman, as the performers' personal tastes range from classical to opera with only a vague knowledge of rock. After performing "Should I Stay or Should I Go, " 92-year-old singer Eileen says, "I dunno, I think it's the Crash?"

Band of brothers. Martin Scorsese knows his rock-n-roll. He knows how to film it, document it and enunciate all the sounds, focusing on everything cool. But can he save the Rolling Stones, now in their fifth decade, with a concert engulfed in lights, camera, and action? Well kind of…
 
Shine follows essentially the same pattern of Scorcese's excellent opus, The Last Waltz, The Band's farewell show. The film starts with black-and-white footage of Scorsese and Mick Jagger talking by phone. Immediately humorous and edgy, we wonder if they will ever see eye-to-eye on anything. Jagger bitches about the hot lights and Scorsese nervously wants to open with the correct shot.
The concert is held in 2006 at the Beacon Theatre in Manhattan. Bill Clinton introduces the Stones allowing for a hilarious "meet and greet" installment; a co-mingling of rock stars and politicians.

the joke, unfortunately, is on us. Even though I expected little to no meat in this entree, I did hope for a sizeable helping of Cameron Diaz's comedic dazzle. She still manages to ignite her usual spark as the spunky party girl. Distinctly absent, though, are the laughs she so effortlessly generated in the wacky characters she portrayed in There's Something About Mary and In Her Shoes. It's not really her fault; the unleavened script Diaz is forced to work with here offers little more than insulting retorts of the kind most of us abandoned in junior high. Instead, we are left to marvel only at her gorgeous wardrobe.
 
Until now, I had never seen Ashton Kutcher in an actual film role, so I admit that I was curious to see if he had any real talent, or if he's just cute. It turns out he's just cute. Gratifyingly so, since there's little else in this movie to hold one's attention.