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Under discussion:

The China Syndrome  (1979)

Grand Hotel  (1932)

The Red Shoes  (1948)

Roman Holiday  (1953)

Talk to Her  (2002)

The China Syndrome focuses on two journalists, Jane Fonda ("Georgia Rule") and Michael Douglas ("King of California"), who try to expose the dangers of a nuclear power plant in California. Jack Lemmon ("The Odd Couple II") works in the plant and helps them when he becomes convinced that safety standards are not being met. The film is a bit slow starting off, but when it gets going, the paranoia and cover-ups are easy to buy into. The ending is also very good. Definitely worth checking out.

I haven't seen a film as moving as Talk to Her in quite awhile. Written and directed by Pedro Almodovar ("Volver"), the story follows two men who become friends while caring for the women they love, both of whom happen to be in comas. But it's so much more than that. There's love, of all kinds, morally questionable actions, beautiful cinematography, haunting music, crying, laughing, general amazement on my part. This is what movies are all about.

Grand Hotel was the Best Picture Oscar winner in 1932, and thought it took me a bit to get involved in the story, once I did, I was thoroughly hooked. The film shows the events in The Grand Hotel in Berlin over the course of 24 hours. The intrigues, friendships, love affairs and agonies of the people staying in the hotel, give us plenty of drama. Also, according to the TCM guy, this was the first film with an all-star ensemble cast, composed of brothers John ("Playmates") and Lionel ("Lone Star") Barrymore, Greta Garbo ("Two-Faced Woman") and Joan Crawford ("Journey to Murder"). Very entertaining.

Roman Holiday stars Audrey Hepburn ("Always") as a princess who just wants to have some fun. So, she shirks her duties for a day, and ends up touring Rome with Gregory Peck ("Cape Fear"). Only she doesn't know that he's a journalist planning to write a story about their adventures. But then they start to have feelings for each other, and Peck faces a moral dilemma. Very funny and sometimes heart-wrenching. Peck and Hepburn have great chemistry. I really enjoyed this.

The Red Shoes is a film by director Michael Powell and writer Emeric Pressburger ("Ill Met by Moonlight"), whose names I have always heard, but work I had not seen. The story has a fairytale quality. It's about a ballerina who wants to be a great dancer. A director takes her under his wing, promising to make her a star, but when she falls in love with a composer, the director tries to crush both their careers. The film starts slow (I seem to be saying this alot. Maybe I'm the slow one.). There's also quite a bit of ballet, so be aware of that going in. I really enjoyed the use of color and the examinations of career versus life, art verses love. I'm not sure I'm sold on this duo's genius, but am definitely interested in seeing more of their films.

Under discussion:

Anatomy of a Murder  (1959)

The Shop Around the Corner  (1940)

Suddenly, Last Summer  (1959)

Shrooms  (2007)

Crazy Eights  (2007)

Shrooms was the big surprise of Friday the 13th. It was really good. The cover box looked terrible, the description - a group of kids go to Ireland just to eat Mushrooms and then don't know whether or not they are hallucinating ghosts - sounded pretty lame. But the effects were very creepy. The acting believable. And the story, especially the ghost part, was quite good up until the twist ending. And even that didn't ruin it. Very nice surprise.

Crazy Eights was not such a good time. Frankly, I was bored. Old friends reunite when one of their group dies and then they end up following a map which leads to the corpse of a child. Then weird stuff happens. Ghosties and flashbacks. Confusion and no clear "good guy" for whom to root. I can't recommend it.

Suddenly, Last Summer is based on a Tennessee Williams ("Night of the Iguana") play, so it's emotionally disturbing. Katharine Hepburn ("Love Affair") is trying to have a lobotomy performed on her niece, Elizabeth Taylor ("The Flintstones"), because the niece made some disturbing comments about the circumstances surrounding the death of Hepburn's son. Montgomery Clift ("The Defector") is the brain surgeon caught in between these women's monologues on relationships and human behavior. Very good.

The Shop Around the Corner is a sweet little romantic comedy starring Jimmy Stewart ("The Magic of Lassie") and Margaret Sullavan ("No Sad Songs for Me"), who love each other through anonymous letters, but can't stand each other in person. The banter is good, and there are some excellent comedic moments. I really enjoyed it.

Anatomy of a Murder started a bit slow for me. But once it got into the courtroom, I got really involved. Jimmy Stewart ("The Magic of Lassie") stars as a small town attorney defending a man who killed the man who raped his wife. There's some comedic moments between Stewart and his assistants, but mostly this is a tense back and forth between lawyers and witnesses. Director Otto Preminger ("The Human Factor") doesn't really go into the right and wrong, but just let's us think about the evidence and what the jury's decision means. Very good.

Under discussion:

The Adventures of Robin Hood  (1938)

WarGames  (1983)

The Namesake  (2006)

Room 6  (2005)

The Hamiltons  (2006)

I'm probably spoiled on Robin Hood movies, having seen too many darker versions to really appreciate the technicolor spectacle that is The Adventures of Robin Hood. Errol Flynn ("Cuban Rebel Girls") is very charismatic and the Merry Men have a joviality not even matched by the Disney version. The film has all the familiar legend highlights, including the archery contest, and everyone is into their parts. Maid Marian's handmaid brings in some excellent comic bits. But no one will every be as good as Alan Rickman in the Sheriff of Nottingham role.

WarGames is a really fun thriller from the '80s with the lovable Matthew Broderick ("Bee Movie") and a surprisingly cute Ally Sheedy ("Steam"). Broderick is a computer geek who stumbles upon a military computer and gets it started playing a nuclear simulation "game." The computer is so huge it takes up a room, and Broderick has a telephone line especially for his modem. It's so cute. Anyway, despite the outdated technology, the story is very tense. Broderick and Sheedy are adorable together. Lots of fun. And a good moral about the misuse of technology with personality.

Room 6 seemed promising. A woman's in a car crash and her husband gets taken away in an ambulance. Then she can't find him in any local hospitals. Weird dreams, visions and creepy little girls ensue. And boringness, unbelievability and ridiculously twist endings. Lame.

I also thought The Hamiltons would be good. But it wasn't. The style was very film school. One of the annoying main characters even carries around a hand-held camera, so we get those shots, too. Great. Weird family keeps hostages in the basement where they drain the victims blood and feed it to something mysterious in a cage. I just didn't care. Avoid. Avoid.

Mira Nair's ("Vanity Fair") The Namesake was amazing. I loved it. I feel in love in the beginning of the film and just stayed there all the way through. The story follows and Indian family over the course of about 30 years. It focuses on their family relationships and the struggle of the son (Kal Penn, "Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay") with his heritage and the modern American world. I enjoyed the earlier part of the film with the parents, Irfan Khan ("The Darjeeling Limited") and Tabu ("Fanaa"), more than the later half. The film had so much going for it that I ignored any flaws. I bawled like a baby more than once. And I thought about the movie for days. See it now.

Under discussion:

Fanny & Alexander  (1982)

Love Story  (1970)

Sicko  (2007)

Iron Man  (2008)

The Orphanage  (2007)

OK. The internet has crashed on me twice while I was working on this review. So please forgive any spelling or other errors as I am going crazy trying to get this posted.

At the beginning of Love Story, I wasn't sure I felt the repartee between Ali MacGraw ("Glam") and Ryan O'Neal ("Waste Land"). Then a young Tommy Lee Jones ("No Country for Old Men") popped up out of nowhere. Then there was some hockey. Then the banter got better. The passage of time was handled pretty well. And by the end of the film, I was crying like a baby. So take that as you want it.

Iron Man was a pretty good comic book movie. Robert Downey Jr. ("Charlie Bartlett") is perfect (as always) as Tony Stark. He and Gwyneth Paltrow ("The Good Night") have excellent chemistry. Jeff Bridges ("Surf's Up") is kind of thrown away in the you-can-see-it-coming-a-mile-away bad guy role. The suit was amazing, and I think director Jon Favreau ("Zathura") handled it with the right light touch. I will see the sequel. Cause you know it's coming.

The Orphanage is a gloriously atmospheric ghost story. I wasn't scared, but definitely enthralled the plot follows a young boy who disappears in an old house his parents were planning to turn into a school for special needs kids. But his mother also has some past connections to the place and it doesn't really go exactly where you think it will. Compared a lot to Pan's Labyrinth, it's different, and yet, has a similar fairy-tale quality.

Sicko really made me think about America's health care system. Director Michael Moore ("Fahrenheit 9/11") sort of toned down his brazenness and tried to let the subject speak for itself. Of course, he doesn't quite manage it, but then,  he wouldn't be Moore if he didn't get all up in your face. Good food or thought.

Fanny and Alexander - Wow. Ingmar Bergman ("Saraband") really is one depressing SOB. Yes, I know, you'd think I'd realize that by now, but I'm a little slow on the uptake. I really did love this movie. It's breathtaking in its cinematography and the despair it explores. I saw the theatrical version and there's a part of me that wants to see the original, longer, television version. The rest of me is still fighting to urge to slit my wrists. The story follows two children, Fanny and Alexander (though the focus is more on Alexander) and their extended family. The children deal with the death of their father and their mother's remarriage to a very stern priest, played perfectly by Jan Malmsjo ("Goodnight, Irene"). He will, most likely, haunt my dreams for life. See this as soon as you feel happy enough.

Under discussion:

Highlander: Endgame  (2000)

I found this old review from when I used to work at a newspaper. Dated 9/7/2000

There Can Be Only One

Unless it's a movie, and then there can be as many as you can imagine.
The fourth Highlander movie, "Highlander: Endgame," represents the changing of the guard for this series. It combines the original movie character, Connor MacLeod (Christopher Lambert) with the television show character Duncan MacLeod (Adrian Paul).

For those who know nothing about Highlander (shame on you all) here's a bit of back fill. Some people living among us humans are immortal. Once they are killed in their regular lives, they revive and begin their lives as immortals, never aging and never dying. The only way an immortal can be killed is if someone cuts off his or her head. If one immortal kills another, then he/she gets the dead immortal's power in a surge of lightening called the Quickening, which usually destroys large buildings and blows up nearby cars or trees.

So the immortals are all fighting each other in this big game, usually good verses evil, to be the last one left alive. Hence, there can be only one.
There's also a big set of rules that goes along with being an immortal, like you can't fight on holy ground, only one immortal can challenge another immortal and so on.

In this film, one of the evil immortals, Kell (Bruce Payne), gets a group together and they jointly attack other immortals. (Evil guys are always breaking the rules.) And he has a personal grudge against Connor from like 600 years ago and since that time, he has been tracking Connor and making his life a living hell by killing off all the people he loves. Thus, Duncan becomes a target.

For those who are confused, Connor and Duncan are from the same clan, so they're both Highlanders, but Connor's several hundred years older. He found Duncan when Duncan first became an immortal and trained him and taught him all the rules.

Watching this movie was like watching a really long episode of the show, which is cool if you like the show. If you don't, you probably won't like the movie.

I, however, enjoyed it immensely. Except for the excess flashbacks. I know the director was just trying to tell the story in an interesting way, but I would have liked fewer flashbacks.

There was one weak spot in the plot, but not too bad. Otherwise, I give it two thumbs up for being a really long episode. Think "The X-Files" movie.

Spoiler Alert: It's a little bit sad. Something had to be done to keep the movies going, and since Lambert is starting to show his age, it's hard to believe that he's immortal. I don't want to spoil it, but think "Star Trek Generations" where they bring the new crew in to join the old crew.

You can't have two captains.

I can't believe that they let me do this. And paid me. I think I got better at writing reviews as time went on. I'll have to wait until I come across some more.

Under discussion:

The Lady Vanishes  (1938)

Marnie  (1964)

The Strange Love of Martha Ivers  (1946)

Margot at the Wedding  (2007)

Wicked Little Things  (2006)

I'm so far behind that these are going to be super short (even for me). Maybe I can catch up.

The Lady Vanishes, an Alfred Hitchcock ("Family Plot") movie mostly set in the confines of a train, is a mystery where one woman notices another has gone missing, but no one believes her. Of course. Good. Of course. But not Hitch's best.

I liked Marnie, another Hitchcock film, better. Tippi Hedren ("Dead White") stars as a con girl who falls for her mark, Sean Connery ("The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen"). But then he turns the tables on her. There's also fits of hysterics, horses, crazy mothers, color flashbacks and birds. Different than the average Hitchcock, still very suspenseful and good.

The Strange Love of Martha Ivers was definitely strange. A young girl kills her overbearing aunt, but a friend witnesses the event and things change forever. Most of the story occurs when the participants are grown-up and full of bitter mind games. This is classified as a film noir, so it has much of the darkness, femme fatale and brooding anti-hero typical to that genre.

Margot at the Wedding is quite possible the worst movie I have ever seen. Wow. Horrible people saying ridiculous, hateful things to each other and behaving as humans never should. Jack Black ("Be Kind Rewind") is the best thing about this movie. Sad, but true.

Anther After Dark film, Wicked Little Things is definitely not the best, but there are some very creepy moments. A bunch of kids were buried alive in an old mine and have since been terrorizing the families in the area. When some new people move into an old house, they begin piecing together the mystery and things come to a head. Look for creepy old houses, zombie children and some annoying teenagers getting eaten alive.