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Run, Leica, Run
In thrillers, the mysterious man who takes photographs of the hero is always chased. With a few exceptions such as "Pi," he is never caught.

Jaime N. Christley, Oak Harbor, Wash.
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Green Zone (R)
"Green Zone" looks at an American war in a way almost no Hollywood movie ever has: We're not the heroes, but the dupes. Its message is that Iraq's fabled "weapons of mass destruction" did not exist, and that neocons within the administration fabricated them, lied about them and were ready to kill to cover up their deception.

Red Riding Trilogy (No MPAA rating)
"Red Riding Trilogy" is an immersive experience like "The Best of Youth," "Brideshead Revisited" or "Nicholas Nickleby." Over the course of 302 minutes, we sink into a virtual world: the corrupt police and establishment figures of West Yorkshire in England, at the time of the real-life "Yorkshire Ripper." Peter Sutcliffe, the Ripper, was convicted of killing 13 women, and may have killed more. The fictional Ripper here enjoys the same inexplicable immunity to police investigation.

The Art of the Steal (No MPAA rating)
Dr. Albert C. Barnes accomplished two things for which we must be grateful: He invented a treatment for VD, and he founded the Barnes Foundation in the Philadelphia suburb of Merion. The first paid for the second, so the wages of sin were invested wisely. In his imposing private structure, far from the power brokers of the city, Barnes created an oasis for serious students, who could learn from his collection without rubbing elbows with crowds of art tourists.

She's Out of My League (R)
Molly is a perfect 10. Kirk is a five. This scoring is provided by his best friends, who sadly inform him, "You can't jump more than two." Because of reasoning like that, Aristotle Onassis remains a hero to fours and fives everywhere. "She's Out of My League," which is sort of a good comedy, tells the story of a five who meets a 10 who believes there is a 10 inside of him fighting to get out.

Remember Me (PG-13)
"Remember Me" tells a sweet enough love story, and tries to invest it with profound meaning by linking it to a coincidence. It doesn't work that way. People meet, maybe they fall in love, maybe they don't, maybe they're happy, maybe they're sad. That's life. If, let us say, a refrigerator falls out of a window and squishes one of them, that's life, too, but it's not a story many people want to see. We stand there looking at the blood seeping out from under the Kelvinator and ask with Peggy Lee, is that all there is?

The Yellow Handkerchief (PG-13)
The action in "The Yellow Handkerchief" takes place within the characters, who don't much talk about it, so the faces of the actors replace dialogue. That's more interesting than movies that lay it all out. This is the story of three insecure drifters who improbably find themselves sharing a big convertible and driving to New Orleans not long after Hurricane Katrina.

Our Family Wedding (PG-13)
"Our Family Wedding" is a perfectly good idea for a comedy: A wedding between a Mexican-American woman and an African-American man leads to culture clash. The film, unfortunately, deals with the situation at the level of a middling sitcom. You almost miss the laugh track. Difficult problems are sidestepped, arguments are overacted, and there are three food fights involving wedding cakes. Well, two, actually, and the destruction of a third cake.

Alice in Wonderland (PG)
As a young reader, I found Alice in Wonderland creepy and rather distasteful. Alice's adventures played like a series of encounters with characters whose purpose was to tease, puzzle and torment her. Few children would want to go to wonderland, and none would want to stay. The problem may be that I encountered the book too young and was put off by the alarming John Tenniel illustrations. Why did Alice have such deep, dark eye sockets? Why couldn't Wonderland be cozy like the world of Pooh? Watching the 1951 Disney film, I feared the Cheshire Cat was about to tell me something I didn't want to know.

A Prophet (R)
There is a murder at the center of Jacques Audiard's "A Prophet" that is unlike most murders I've seen in films. It's clumsy, messy and brutal, and leaves the killer shaking. Whether he shakes with grief, relief or anger we cannot say. That's the key to this film. We look, we see, but we cannot say. It often must be that way when we witness violence. Those capable of murdering live in another country.

Brooklyn's Finest (R)
Three cops, three journeys to what we suspect will be doom. No good can come of the lives they lead. They aren't bad guys, not precisely, but they occupy a world of such unremitting violence and cynicism that they're willing to do what it takes to survive. In the kind of coincidence provided only by fate or screenplays, each one will mean trouble for the other two.

The Good Guy (R)
"The Good Guy" creates the interesting notion that Wall Street trading involves a gang of hard-partying goofs who pass their days playing video games with our money. They trade too fast to know much about the stocks they're selling -- and besides, they mostly trade funds and may only vaguely know how the portfolios are weighted.

Terribly Happy (No MPAA rating)
The cow gave birth to a calf with two heads, and they weren't just any two heads. Into the bog it went. All sorts of village problems sink in the bog. No telling what's rotting down there. This beginning may make "Terribly Happy" sound like a modern-day "Motel Hell," where Farmer Vincent buried people to their necks and fattened them like geese. But no, this is a dour and deadpan film noir from Denmark, and a good one.

The Ghost Writer (PG-13) (2/24) »

Cop Out (R) (2/24) »

The Crazies (R) (2/23) »

District 13: Ultimatum (R) (2/24) »

North Face (No MPAA rating) (2/24) »

The Big Lebowski (R) (1998)
"The Big Lebowski" is about an attitude, not a story. It's easy to miss that, because the story is so urgently pursued. It involves kidnapping, ransom money, a porno king, a reclusive millionaire, a runaway girl, the Malibu police, a woman who paints while nude and strapped to an overhead harness, and the last act of the disagreement between Vietnam veterans and Flower Power. It has more scenes about bowling than anything else.
Q. In "Shutter Island"  I noticed something odd. About mid-way through the movie, the Leo DiCaprio character is interviewing a female patient. His partner Chuck gives her a glass of water. At first she only pantomimes drinking the water, then in the next shot you see her putting down an empty glass. When at last she leaves the table, the glass is shown half full.
HOLLYWOOD — "The Hurt Locker," a film that was made with little cash but limitless willpower, defeated the highest-grossing film in history and won the best picture Oscar here Sunday night. The director of the spine-chilling war drama, Kathryn Bigelow, became the first woman to ever win the best director Oscar. James Cameron, director of "Avatar" — and her former husband — cried all the way to the bank.

Live-tweeted from Los Angeles:

10:06 -- The Oscar acceptance speech the Academy refused to televise: http://j.mp/bwA1yo

9:55 -- Shortest Oscar story in history: ( ! > $ )

9:52 -- http://twitpic.com/17b5ry - I would like to thank the Academy for getting me 6,575 new followers on twitter. And my drama coach, of course

9:46 -- The Dude Aboded.

For many years George Penacchio of KABC and I co-hosted the Oscar Night red carpet interviews for the ABC owned & operated stations. It was fun. It's the one night in a year of dreaded red carpet gauntlets that stars actually seem to enjoy.

Dear Readers:

Most web sites generate less income than they cost to maintain. Mine is no exception. Because I want to preserve free access to the site, I've come up with an idea I'd like to run by you. I'm announcing The Ebert Club, which will offer a group of additional attractions and conveniences for members.

Lucas (PG-13)
The first loves of early adolescence are so powerful because they are not based on romance, but on ideals. When they are 13 or 14, boys and girls do not fall in love with one another because of all the usual reasons that are celebrated in love songs; they fall in love because the other person is perfect. Not smart or popular or good-looking, but perfect, the embodiment of all good.
"Why do we put so much weight on memory relative to the weight that we put on experiences?"

Think of the implications of that question, and how it affects how we think about our lives. I'm tickled and intrigued by some of the things psychologist and Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman has to say in this TED talk, "The riddle of experience vs. memory," and how they apply to our experiences (and memories) not only of our lives, but of works of art. He tells a story of someone who said he had listened to a wonderful symphony, but how a "dreadful screeching sound" at the end "ruined the whole experience."

But it hadn't.

Is The Ghost Writer a Polanski masterpiece?

Avatar and Oscar again raise the question: What is cinematography? (Part 1)

A priest reviews A Serious Man

Who directed this shot?

Babs, Henry and Long Duk Dong: Cleaning up after the Oscars

ICUN4D: Two-eye-witness report from Korea on 4-D Avatar

Is suggesting "retroactive abortion" for a director's mom a kind of film criticism?

Generic Movie Based on the Movie They've Been Releasing Every Single Week Since the 1980s

Trix Nix Pix Crix: The death of Variety

And the Muriel™ for the Oscar™ for Best Picture goes to...

How Bigelow delivers more bang for your buck

Young Haven Hamilton: A Poem by Henry Gibson

Oh dear, who's killed film criticism this week?

Artifice and reality: Mean Streets to Shutter Island

The Ultimate Movie Metaphor

The Ghost Writer: Polanski was here

Face/Off: Avatar



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visit jim emerson on twitter

The Opening Shots Project Index

Pretty near everything Glenn Beck says strikes me as absurd, but he scored a perfect 10 when he warned his viewers against the dangers of Christianity. You already know all about it. Well, maybe not, because the usual defenders of Christianity, like James Dobson and Pat Robertson, were very quiet on the topic. Not even a peep from Pat about this man who showed every sign of having hired the best lawyers to draft his pact with Satan.

I flew home from the Oscars to find half a dozen e-mails awaiting with the same unbelievable message: Variety had fired its chief film critic, Todd McCarthy. Its spokesman was hopeful Todd and its chief theater critic, David Rooney, who was also fired, could continue to review for the paper on a free lance basis. In other words, Variety was hopeful that without a regular pay check, McCarthy would put his life on hold to do a full-time job on a piecemeal basis.

"Nobody on the web is has figured out how to make any money," I said one day before a screening at the Sundance Film Festival. I was talking to another movie critic whose reviews were also online.

"My wife has," said a voice behind me. I turned around and saw a robust man in a ski sweater who seemed to be bursting with things to tell me.

Gerardo Valero, Mexico City:

Recent years have seen the world's two most successful film directors in history do the unthinkable by tinkering with some of their most classic work. First up George Lucas decided to update his original "Star Wars" trilogy, I imagine with the purpose of standardizing its look with the new three films he was working on at the time.

• Michael Mirasol, Manila

Post World War II British Cinema was one of the richest periods in film history. Finally free from budget and stylistic constraints saddled during wartime, some of the greatest filmmaking talent the filmdom had arisen. John and Roy Boulting, David Lean, Laurence Olivier, and Carol Reed were just a few of the notables whose directorial prowess had struck the scene. But a pair which was the period's most prolific was Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger; The Archers.

thumbs
Linked here are reviews in recent months for which I wrote either 4 star or 3.5 star reviews. What does Two Thumbs Up mean in this context? It signifies that I believe these films are worth going out of your way to see, or that you might rent them, add them to your Netflix, Blockbuster or TiVo queues, or if they are telecast record them.

Gathered here in one convenient place are my recent reviews that awarded films Zero Stars, One-half Star, One Star, and One-and-a-half Stars. These are, generally speaking to be avoided. Sometimes I hear from readers who confess they are in the mood to watch a really bad movie on some form of video. If you are sincere, be sure to know what you're getting: A really bad movie.

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Fantastic Mr. Fox  (3/24)
Bright Star  (9/26)
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