Booth, I never cease to be amazed by your synaptic plasticity.  But probably everyone tells you that.

Susan 

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin

Rendition - Decent film with a nicely layered plot and a genuinely great twist near the end. Meryl Streep was good, but character had little definition beyond being the "villian". Jake Gyllenhall was good, good subtleties, because he had to rely on his reaction in a lot of the scenes because he had no dialogue. Omar Metwally was very good, a really tough role to play and yet he had like 5th billing under Alan Arkin who had one good scene. I would have like to have had a longer ending, it was wrapped up nicely, but a little too concise, left me wanting a little more.    

Can't wait to get to work where Luis will have a copy of No Country For Old Men waiting for me. been wanting to see it a second time for quite a while.   

"Every day holds a new beginning and every hour holds the promise of an Invitation to Love." 

That god damn trailer's more popular than Uncle's Day in a whorehouse!

Hi Carl,

I have enjoyed your posts since you have joined the board, but am having difficulty getting a handle on what you considering a "good" film"...so, if you would indulge me, put a check by any of the following you consider "good" or even "great"...anyone else can play along if they so desire...

1. Lawrence of Arabia
2. Blue Velvet
3. Taxi Driver
4. The Conversation
5. To Kill A Mockingbird
6. Casablanca
7. Once Upon a Time in the West
8. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest
9. Dr. Strangelove
10. On The Waterfront
11. The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
12. Chinatown
13. Network
14. Night of the Iguana
15. Double Indemnity
16. Barton Fink
17. Rushmore
18. The Ice Storm
19. Thelma and Louise
20. Bridge on the River Kwai
21. Vertigo
22. Deliverance
23. The Prestige
24. 21 Grams
25. Maria Full of Grace
26. 12 Monkeys
27. Delicatessen
28. The Motorcycle Diaries
29. Notes on a Scandal
30. Schindler's List
31. Suicide Kings
32. In the Bedroom
33. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
34. Seabiscuit
35. In America 
36. The Shawshank Redemption
37. The Machinist
38. Good Night, And Good Luck
39. V For Vendetta
40. The Shining
41. The Departed
42. Drugstore Cowboy
43. Million Dollar Baby
44. A Streetcar Named Desire
45. Fargo
46. Glengarry Glen Ross
47. The Usual Suspects
48. Fight Club
49. Children of Men
50. The Mission

"Every day holds a new beginning and every hour holds the promise of an Invitation to Love." 

Carl, you do have interesting taste! Smokey knows that I was harrumphing when I saw Barton Fink unchecked on your list but to each his own mistaken opinion. Glad to see you were bamboozled by that silly Shawshank Redemption though.

LWaFoM, I don't recall where I heard about the long dialgoue-less opening. Maybe here? Don't worry, I'll give the Blood movie a chance. See, I usually do two movie reviews for every film I ultimately watch -- one BEFORE and the one AFTER. There Will Be Blood is in good position of being better than I expect it to be.

We watched Rob Zombie's remake of Halloween. Sigh. I loved the first Halloween. LOVED it! It was an interesting time for me to have seen the first one and I'm sure the circumstances at that moment colored my response. A day or two before, my two-year old son and I had been kidnapped at gunpoint from the parking lot of a suburban mall. That was scary but only for the first half-hour. In the aftermath I was pretty much amused by the wackiness of the experience more than anything else and the fact that nothing bad happened to either of us. But sitting in that dark theater watching Halloween really spooked me. And I loved it.

Enough time had passed and I looked forward to Rob Zombie's version though I've never seen any of his other films. I had always enjoyed his appearances on the Howard Stern show and had a very receptive attitude about the film. But YECH! This one I HATED. It was dark, ugly, dark, ugly, and dark and ugly. It was also too long. (We watched the director's cut) I now feel like I need to rewatch the original just to purge the ugliness of RZ's from my brain cells. Trivia: I hadn't realized I was watching Malcolm "Little Alex" McDowall until the very end. Since I needed to keep myself diverted in order to finish the thing, I just tried to reconcile that old psychiatrist character with the guy in A Clockwork Orange and If.

Susan

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin

Good timing, Susan, with mentioning Barton Fink because I am gonna let my buddy Luis at work borrow it tonight because he hasn't seen it. Wish I could remeber which Coen films he's seen. I recall loaning him Miller's Crossing, I think and I know he hasn't seen Blood Simple. Oh, I just remembered, since we both really enjoyed The Lives of Others, I have been meaning to loan him The Conversation. And since he loves Michael Clayton, I was going to loan him Network and we were talking about Michael Caine and he hasn't seen The Quiet American...that's four movies, so need to think of anymore right now.

"Physician, heal thyself"

"Good luck with no f-ing head."

The Prestige - watched it again, I think for the third, maybe 4th time. I can never get tired of this film. I love it!!

No Country For Old Men - watched it for the second time and enjoyed it just as much. Now, I totally understand why people were disappointed with the ending. I personally didn't have too much trouble with it. Tommy Lee Jones' character is basically heading to where he ends up the whole movie and I just thought of a possibility for this...(spoiler below)

** suppose Moss' wife won the coin toss and Anton walks out of the house unassumingly. She gets' in her mother's car, which isn't in the best shape anyway, follows Anton and slams into him to get revenge for the deaths of her husband and mother...probably not likely but it did cross my mind...              

"Every day holds a new beginning and every hour holds the promise of an Invitation to Love." 

Carl, I am so with you on the Hours.  I wanted to shove Ed Harris out of that window myself.  Blah, blah, blah, I'm so depressed.  Depressed people depress me.  Put that on your DVD box and smoke it!

 Yes, Booth, all in all it was a Mary Hartman Mary Hartman experience and I've gotten many laughs over it since both waking and dreaming.  I'm only serious too.

Susan 

     
“Half a truth is often a great lie.”

Ben Franklin

Solaris (the 2002 version with George Clooney)

I remember hearing when this came out, and didn't bother to see it due to some negative reviews I was hearing at the time (I try to ignore reviews, but not always successful). I know Clooney's political comments do sound kinda smug, but I enjoy most George Clooney movies I've seen. However, the only trailer I saw of Solaris looked like it was more dramatic than Clooney would have the chops to pull off. I never read Lem's novel.

Tonight I couldn't sleep, and by chance this movie was on TV. So I sat up and watched it. And I found myself engrossed by it. I couldn't help but feel sorry for Clooney's grieving character, who I thought had just the right amount of bitter guilt over the death of the love of his life. And I thought it was interesting to watch the evolution of awareness of the construct, as she became aware of her own hollow nature.

Am I really enjoying a great movie, or am I really enjoying a book I've never read?

Horton hears a who!  Very entertaining dialogue.  The cheesy jokes were appropriate for the kids and there were parts that made me laugh as well (and I don't do cheesy).  I think that my favorite part of the film was seeing all the vibrant colors and different types of little creatures and the funny contraptions that are typical of Dr. Seusse.  That kind of thing will never get old to me. 

I'm just a little fairy princess.... I am mad with the power.  MUHUHUHUHAHAHA!!!

What Booth said.

I've been rewatching the second season of Big Love

"Every day holds a new beginning and every hour holds the promise of an Invitation to Love." 

"Every day holds a new beginning and every hour holds the promise of an Invitation to Love." 

"Every day holds a new beginning and every hour holds the promise of an Invitation to Love." 

All I've seen by him is Halloween, which I adore. It's so famous that people can't help seeing it as such another slasher flick, but I think it's a great film about how evil is constantly present everywhere, even the most peaceful of towns. I only wish it had been left open ended instead of having the meaning of the unconventional ending destroyed for the public (though I do like the twist that Laurie is Michael's sister in the sequel, if only that was in the original, and there had never been any sequels).

PS: Oh yeah, I also saw most of Vampires several years ago... God I hated that movie, makes From Dusk Till Dawn look like a work of genius.  

That god damn trailer's more popular than Uncle's Day in a whorehouse!