Culture

Rhinestone cowboysI was there. Twice. The first time was in San Francisco in '78 when Dan White shot and killed Harvey Milk and George Moscone. The second time was at the Castro theatre for the opening week showing of Milk, almost 30 years later. It was a special, bittersweet night.

Milk is directed by Gus Van Sant, an openly gay director known for diverse films including Drugstore Cowboy and Good Will Hunting. Harvey Milk was a gay rights activist with political aspirations. Dubbed "The Mayor of Castro Street," he was ultmately elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors-not because he wanted to be a politician per se, rather he saw it as the right thing to do.
I lived on Castro Street for two years as an outcast - the slob-hetero of the neighborhood. This year, as the token straight waiting in line for the movie, I had a similar feeling, but this time we all shared the communal interest and a kind of sublime reverence.

If you have ever been unfortunate enough to work the graveyard shift, you may recall the downsides: When you're sleeping, everyone is awake. When you're awake, everyone else is sleeping. Your breakfast is their dinner. Their lunch is your midnight snack.

Based on the short story of the same name by F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button attempts to give us a peak at a life lived backwards. Benjamin is an old man with cataracts in both eyes and ossified joints at birth. The twist is that with each passing year, he gets younger. His muscles and hair thicken, his eyesight improves. His peers die before he reaches childhood. His entire life is a graveyard shift.

We’ll always have PunjabThanks to Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, Millions, 28 Days Later) and India's casting director turned co-director Loveleen Tandan, Slumdog Millionaire may be the most hyperkinetic rags-to-riches saga ever made. What could've easily sunk into the abyss of Hollywood love-mush takes on three distinct genres: a love story, an interrogation flick, and a nail biting game show. Boyle then rolls all three together in a barrage of fast-paced eye candy.

Based on Q&A, a novel by Vikas Swarup and jazzed up by The Full Monty's writer Simon Beaufoy, the movie chronicles the improbable rise of Jamal Malik (Dev Patel), an 18- year-old dirt-poor orphan from the slums of Mumbai who becomes a celebrity as he wins a fortune on India's most popular quiz show, their version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. Interrogated by police who think he must have cheated, Jamal flashes back to harrowing stories of his childhood, each revealing an answer to one of the game show's questions. In the process, we learn of his relationship with his brother Salim (Madhur Mittal) and his love-at-first-sight affection for Latika (Freida Pinto).

You’re right, they do smell like peanuts.Seven Pounds is a film that you will think about long after you leave the theater. Conversations and phone calls that were so frustratingly unclear in the midst of the film must be re-conjured, mulled over and made sense of long after the final credits roll. This film is shrouded in mystery, from the main character's tragic past to his plans for the seven strangers he has chosen and the roll they will play in his redemption.

A gaunt and disheveled Will Smith plays Ben Thomas, an IRS agent looking to change people's lives, to "drastically change their circumstances." While not equal to his Ali brilliance, the film is sustained by Will Smith's ability to be at once cold and ambiguous without the audience losing faith that his intentions are ultimately good. More than one supporting character asks, "Who are you?" a question for which he has no answer. The audience will ask the same: Is this a megalomaniac or a man seeking to repay an impossible debt?

Oh, the sad plight of the young vampire.While it stands on its own as an atmospheric art movie, Let the Right
One In could be interpreted as the ragingly popular Twilight's polar
opposite - human boy meets vamp girl instead of the reverse. Adolescent
love grows between pre-pubescent 12 year olds instead of
hormone-frenzied 17 year olds, the plot and direction being realistic
and bleak, rather than fantastical and uplifting.

This movie sucks
you in from the eerie opening scene: through a window an anemic-looking
blonde boy Oskar (Kare Hederbrant) brandishes a knife in front of a
mirror, pretending he is telling someone to "squeal like a pig."
Oskar's morbid side stems from the bullying he confronts in school on a
daily basis. He's a weird kid for sure, but not as weird as his
neighbors. Eli (Lina Leandersson) and her "dad" (Per Ragnar), move in
next door, revealing a relationship that is bizarre beyond belief. Set
in a remote Swedish town, most of the action takes place in a park
between an apartment complex and an elementary school.

Dude, I don’t need this. I was in Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.If you're like me, you may have serious concerns about the Keanu
Reeves/apocalyptic-star-vehicle industry. Is the stock spiking?
Plunging? Should we ask Congress for a bailout?

Well, with The Day
the Earth Stood Still, an impossibly boring, humorless, pedestrian
remake of the 1951 sci-fi classic, I am proud to inform you that
industry is receiving a stimulus of sorts. Turns out crappy Keanu
movies are like Detroit sedans: quality doesn't matter, as long as they
sell.
Reeves is back in Neo/Messiah mode, as Klaatu, an alien
diplomat who travels across the cosmos with his robot, nicknamed
"GORT." Klaatu takes human form in an effort to observe people, and
ready Earth for his plans.