Culture

So why do they call you the gay blade?There's something extremely vapid about The Spirit and I don't mean the
character-the movie. Sure there are big guns, pummeling, wisecracking
and tons o' cleavage but the acting is wooden and stiff. The characters
all seem soulless, leaving the audience no reason to care about any of
them.

This work pays homage to the work and genius of comic book
writer Will Eisner. Director Frank Miller gives Spirit his Sin City
treatment-color highlighting the black and white tone, a constant weird
sepia look, manic silhouettes, and white blood. You'll leave the
theater with memories of these images, but the slick stylizing of Sin
City just doesn't gel. There are some really funny lines, some
over-the-top scenes, but overall it's too arty for its own good. All
flash and no heat.

A bee in her bonnet. There is a line in Good Will Hunting that could be paraphrased thusly:
"Only a handful of people can tell the difference between how good we
are." And when it comes to acting, there are probably only a handful of
people who can tell the difference between the best performance ever,
and the performances by Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman in Doubt.

I could go on and on about the plot of Doubt,
the meditation on religion in general and the Catholic Church in
particular, as well as its relevance to the clergy molestation scandals
today. I could talk about the script, the play from which it's based
(written by John Patrick Shanley, who also directed this film), and the
superb set design that gives the movie its frigid, eerie feel.

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?