Unknown - Movie Review

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Starring Liam Neeson, Diane Kruger, January Jones, Bruno Ganz, Aidan Quinn, Frank Langella, Sebastian Koch and Karl Markovics.
Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra.

I love Liam Neeson kicking butt in Europe. We had Taken, now we have this. I'd like it to become a genre. Every third movie Liam makes should be him kicking butt in Europe.

This isn't as satisfying as Taken, but it is a nice little puzzle of a movie where Liam plays Dr. Martin Harris, attending a convention in Germany with his wife. He forgets his suitcase with their passports and hopes into a taxi to recover it. The taxi crashes, and he wakes up with partial amnesia. Nevertheless when he shows up back at the hotel, his wife (Mad Men's January Jones) acts like she doesn't know who he is, and there's another man (Aidan Quinn) there caliming to be Martin Harris.

So Martin has to go on the run, trying to figure out what's going on. Is his wife a double-agent, or is she being forced to play this out? The revelation toward the end at first disappointed me until I thought about it and realized it was the only way the first two acts made sense. But then there are decisions made in the third act that don't make sense, but it's house of cards that asks you to admire the patience of construction, not how easy it is to swipe and knock it down.

I also like the bonus of respectable German actors popping up, like Bruno Ganz (Downfall), Sebastian Koch (The Lives of Others) and Karl Markovics (The Counterfeiters).

It's not high art; it's pulp action. It has its share of car chases, most of which bored me, honestly. Two guys in pursuit of a snowy rooftop will do more than any standard car chase.

The Way Back - Movie Review

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Starring Ed Harris, Jim Sturgess, Colin Farrell, Saoirse Ronan and Mark Strong.
Directed by Peter Weir.

"Inspired by a true story" makes me wonder just how far away they strayed from real events. Did they stray a little, like The King's Speech, or a lot, like The Exorcism of Emily Rose? Regardless it's a solid study in the examination of the lengths to which people will go to be free.

We get Nazis up the yin-yang in our movie villains, but sometimes people forget just how nasty the Stalinists were. We meet one Polish prisoner (Jim Sturgess), sent here after Stalinists torture his wife to make her lie about her husband, and he immediately starts thinking about how to escape. Throw in a grumpy American (Ed Harris), a wily Russian (Colin Farrell) and some other rag-taggers, and we have our escape group.

The movie puts us through the slogs they went through, and while I can't say it was fun, it was just the right length and served as a testament to human determination.

P.S. It had a limited release in December somewhere to qualify it for Oscar nominations. It has one nomination - makeup - and it would be a worthy winner. Walking from Siberia to India does horrible things to your skin.

FOX's Traffic Lights - TV Review

Gigantically unappealing clone of Rules of Engagement and Perfect Couples and How I Met Your Mother and any show where there are friends where some are married and some aren't. This one has a married couple, a couple that just moved in together, and one single guy. The single guy (Love Actually's Kris Marshall) is happy and carefree, and the other two men are whipped. In fact the wife came across as a total shrew.

More DVD Reviews

THE GIRL WHO PLAYED WITH FIRE (lll) &
THE GIRL WHO KICKED THE HORNET'S NEST (lll) -
Starring Noomi Rapace and Michael Nyqvist. Directed by Daniel Alfredson.

The further adventures of Lisbeth Salander continue. While she and Blomkvist teamed up to solve an old murder mystery around the Vanger family, Part 2 finds Lisbeth on the run, falsely accused of murder, and Part 3 finds her on trial to prove she's sane.

The sequels don't quite have the kick of the first one, but Lisbeth's more front and center to the action. In Fire, three people are murdered, including her guardian/rapist Bjurman. The evidence looks bad and Lisbeth goes on the run. Blomkvist does his best from his vantage point to prove her innocence, but there isn't a lot to go on. We learn more about Lisbeth and how her background was the result of a large government cover-up.

In Hornets, Lisbeth is on trial for her mental competancy. I actually hadn't read Book 3 when I saw this, and so there were plot points the movie seemed to rush through. I felt that way about the first two, and with the third movie, not having read the book, my feelings remained the same.

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WELCOME TO THE RILEYS (ll) - Starring James Gandolfini, Kristen Stewart and Melissa Leo. Directed by Jake Scott.

Three good actors in three sadsack roles. Could've benefitted from filling up the script, which centers on a man who befriends a stripper because she reminds him of his late daughter. Feel like an hour of material stretched to an hour and a half.

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PIRANHA 3D (ll) - Starring Elisabeth Shue, Adam Scott, Jerry O'Connell, Ving Rhames, Steven R. McQueen, Christopher Lloyd, Dina Meyer, Eli Roth, Jessica Szohr, Riley Steele and Richard Dreyfuss. Directed by Alexandre Aja.

A movie that pokes fun at its trashy self still has a trashy self. It does have some intentional laughs, never really taking itself seriously, but it doesn't add up to more than babes in bikinis being ripped apart at predictable intervals by CGI killer fish. So, mission accomplished.

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FOR COLORED GIRLS (ll1/2) - Starring Thandie Newton, Janet Jackson, Kimberly Elise, Whoopi Goldberg, Loretta Devine, Anika Noni Rose, Kerry Washington, Phylicia Rashad, Tessa Thompson, Macy Gray, Hill Harper and Michael Ealy. Directed by Tyler Perry.

Based on the stage-play For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf by Ntozake Shange, this movie takes 35-year-old monologues and meshes them into a modern-day settings, striving to combine the beat poetry of the original words with the dramatized surroundings of a Waiting to Exhale ensemble. So good are most of the actresses here that it makes me feel bad I didn't like it more, but the source material of the 1970's, despite some updated (like AIDS), still boils down to "men ruin women's lives."

The story connects most of the characters by having them live in the same apartment building, and the eight main characters have enough tragedy between them to make Shakespeare suicidal. Murder, rape, infidelity, abuse... it's all here. The shifts the movie takes are obvious each time they happen, to where title cards wouldn't have been any less distracting. "And now, another monologue..." It's a noble undertaking by Perry, an attempt at artistic cred. But too often it's just wallowing in misery.

Gnomeo & Juliet - Movie Review

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Starring the voices of James McAvoy, Emily Blunt, Jason Statham, Ashley Jensen, Matt Lucas, Michael Caine, Maggie Smith, Ozzy Osbourne, Stephen Merchant, Patrick Stewart, Hulk Hogan and Dolly Parton.
Directed by Kelly Asbury.

A G-rated kids cartoon movie taking on Shakespeare's tragedy isn't going to end with the two leads dying, is it? Is it? That would have been cool.

The story of star-crossed lovers takes place almost entirely in two adjoining backyards, one with blue-themed garden gnomes and one with red-themed garden gnomes. They have been at war since before they can remember. In fact no one really knows why, but the war must go on. But then the blue Gnomeo (James McAvoy) and red Juliet (Emily Blunt) and it's instant love.

There's a lot of cleverness on hand and attention to detail, not to mention the occasional pop-culture reference for adults (Braveheart, American Beauty and Borat are among them). Elton John's greatest hits populate the soundtrack. We get our inevitable wrap-up, followed by an ill-conceived dance number/curtain call, and so, mere hours later, I feel like I've forgotten most of it. The trippy voice cast makes it at least worth a rental though.

A Brief Look at Disney's 52 Animated Movies

There are fifty-two official movies considered to be called Walt Disney Animation. Movies where there's more live-action than animation don't count (Mary Poppins, Bedknobs & Broomsticks, Pete's Dragon), nor do movies from their secondary studio (Jungle Book 2, A Goofy Movie), nor movies they distributed but done by other studios (Valiant, The Wild), nor Pixar (Toy Story, Up).

So here's a brief history of the official titles.

THE BEST FOOT FORWARD

1937 - Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs
1940 - Pinocchio
1940 - Fantasia
1941 - Dumbo
1942 - Bambi

Snow White was a giant gamble for its time. Consider the level of animation back then. You had Steamboat Willie and Betty Boop, but the 1930's had Porky Pig and Popeye starting to catch on. Still, a full-length movie? Then you have the timelessness of the next four, and you have the best starting five of any studio or artist ever.

THE SHORTS COLLECTIONS


1943 - Saludos Amigos
1944 - The Three Caballeros
1946 - Make Mine Music
1947 - Fun & Fancy Free
1948 - Melody Time
1949 - The Adventures of Ichabod & Mr. Toad

During World War II, Disney saved money by making movies that were essentially collections of shorts. Saludos Amigos and The Three Caballeros were made at the behest of the Office of Inter-American Affairs, and Disney was happy to make what are essentially commercials for South America. Each after that has good episodes within (Make Mine has Peter & the Wolf, Fun & Fancy Free has Mickey & the Beanstalk, Melody Time has Johnny Appleseed & Pecos Bill, and the 1949 titles peaks for itself).

THE SECOND WIND


1950 - Cinderella
1951 - Alice in Wonderland
1953 - Peter Pan
1955 - Lady & the Tramp
1959 - Sleeping Beauty
1961 - 101 Dalmatians
1963 - The Sword in the Stone
1967 - The Jungle Book

Disney got back to classic storytelling with Cinderella, and even though the mice's roles might be too big, it remains one of his best. Alice in Wonderland has a weirdness no other Disney tale has been allowed. 101 Dalmatians is where rotscope animation came in, giving the movies cheaper looks, though the 60's stories remain strong. Jungle Book's still groovy, but it lead to Phil Harris dominating the next few films.

THE POST-WALT ERA


1970 - The Aristocats
1973 - Robin Hood
1977 - The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
1977 - The Rescuers
1981 - The Fox & the Hound
1985 - The Black Cauldron
1986 - The Great Mouse Detective
1988 - Oliver & Company

Disney's finances got weaker and weaker in the year after Walt Disney died, and the quality of the movies suffered. I still find Robin Hood one of the funnier scripts, particularly from Peter Ustinov's line-reads as the snivelling Prince John, but its shortcuts are transparent. The Black Cauldron was a low-point for their box-office, and longtime animator Don Bluth left digsusted with the Disney trajectory and made the classic Secret of NIMH.

THE RENAISSANCE


1989 - The Little Mermaid
1990 - The Rescuers Down Under
1991 - Beauty & the Beast
1992 - Aladdin
1994 - The Lion King

The Rescuers Down Under would fit better in the Post-Walt section, even though it's a good movie. These other four highlighted the return to box-office success and critical darlinghood.

THE ROLLER-COASTER

1995 - Pocahontas
1996 - The Hunchback of Notre Dame
1997 - Hercules
1999 - Tarzan
1999 - Fantasia 2000
2000 - Dinosaur
2000 - The Emperor's New Groove
2001 - Atlantis: The Lost Empire
2002 - Mulan
2002 - Treasure Planet
2003 - Lilo & Stitch
2003 - Brother Bear
2004 - Home on the Range

Pocahontas's oddly preachy, politically correct story was still a huge hit, but one where the silent raccoon was the best character and audiences might have come to see not everything that has the Disney label is gold. The musical formula still worked for Hunchback, Hercules and Tarzan, but Dinosaur was an expensive disappointment. Michael Eisner insisted the dinosaurs speak, and for my money it would still be remembered if they'd tried to find a way to make it like a nature film and not a humorless Land Before Time ripoff. Emperor's New Groove rediscovered the Jungle Book-level of laughs Disney movies could have, and Mulan succeeded in the Hercules-Tarzan vein, but the one-two actioners of Atlantis and Treasure Planet is where 2D animation showed its weaknesses. Lilo did well, but Brother Bear did less so, and Home on the Range was publicized as the last 2D effort of the studio, and the humor couldn't match new Groove's.

THE CG-ANIMATION ADDITION

2005 - Chicken Little
2007 - Meet the Robinsons
2008 - Bolt
2009 - The Princess & the Frog
2010 - Tangled
2012 - Wreck-It-Ralph
2013 - Frozen

Chicken Little had two years of marketing, but Disney's own 3D effort paled next to the Pixar canon. Meet the Robinsons is fun but light. Somewhere in there, Disney bought Pixar rather than just distributed its movies, and the Pixar touch is evident in the rewrites of Bolt, particularly since Bolt goes through the same character-crisis as Buzz Lightyear. The Princess & the Frog saw the decent return of 2D animation and finally an African-American princess, and Tangled, Wreck-It-Ralph and Frozen have all been hits.

Around 2010, Disney and Pixar said they felt like fairy tales are of the past, but Frozen showed that all they have to do is tell the story well, and it'll be a hit. I do hope any future ones they tell, they let them have their real names. No more "Rapunzel becomes Tangled" or "The Snow Queen becomes Frozen."

Buried - DVD Review

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Starring Ryan Reynolds.
Directed by Rodrigo Cortes.

Everyone who's ever wondered if Ryan Reynolds can actually act, I give you Exhibit A. Beyond that, though, Rodrigo Cortes can really direct, making the most of a 90 minute film that all takes place in a coffin.

Reynolds plays Paul, a truck driver in Iraq who awakens buried alive in a box. He has a cellphone and a lighter and a bag, and he has to figure out how to get out. He gets a call from an insurgent, demanding $5 million or he's going to leave him there to die.

Paul calls everyone he can think of to get him out of this mess. Some of it is believable, some of it is not. It's amazing how detached and red-tapey some of the people are that he calls, including a calloused personnel director who may be the most evil human being on the face of the earth. At one point Paul even finds himself accompanied by a rattlesnake that he just didn't notice earlier.

It's one of those simple concepts of which Hitchcock would have been jealous.

Red Hill - DVD Review

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Starring Ryan Kwanten, Steve Bisley, Tom E. Lewis and Claire van der Bloom.
Directed by Patrick Hughes.

The reason to see this is to see Tru Blood's Ryan Kwanten speak in his native tongue, and then from there watch an old-fashioned Western that transpires in the small town of Red Hill, Australia.

Kwanten plays a deputy newly transferred to Red Hill, pregnant wife in tow. The good ol' boys at the sheriff's department already have a way of doing things, but that night they learn the town's most dangerous killer, a Maori beast named Jimmy, has escaped from prison, and he's coming for revenge. Seems the sheriff is the one that put him away.

Jimmy is an unstoppable force, a cross of Anton Chigurh and Jason Voorhees. There's some nifty backstory that gets filled in as the climax mounts, and it's just rhe sort of pulp that makes for a decent rental when one is in the mood for what it delivers.

Never Let Me Go - DVD Review

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Starring Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley, Andrew Garfield, Charlotte Rampling and Sally Hawkins.
Directed by Mark Romanek.

My understanding is the book is really good, and maybe the book addresses my main flaw with the film.

It follows three kids who grow to adulthood in an alternate reality where certain kids are groomed to be organ donors. These three know they don't have long to live, as they'll soon be called to make the donations, but they hear that exemptions are granted for donors who fall in love, and they engage in a love triangle.

My one problem, which could have been addressed with a line of dialogue, is why don't they ever try to escape? There's plenty of opportunity, but it never occurs to them. If they were genetically engineered to just be that way, fine. Say so.

Takers - DVD Review

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Starring Matt Dillon, Idris Elba, Paul Walker, Hayden Christensen, Michael Ealy, Tip "T.I." Harris, Chris Brown, Jay Hernandez, Zoe Saldana, Steve Harris, Johnathan Schaech, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Nick Turturro and Glynn Turman.
Directed by John Luessenhop.

Slick, empty caper about a gang of thieves and the cops trying to stop them. Idris Elba, using his real accent, leads the crooks, and Matt Dillon cracks skulls as the main cop. It was passable to me until I realized it's virtually the same plot of Michael Mann's Heat. Then it instantly paled.

It's not without its guilty pleasures. I liked seeing a skinny, suspenders-wearing Hayden Christensen beat up three guys in a well-choreographed fight scene in a small office. I liked Michael Ealy giving earnestness to a movie that doesn't really deserve it.

It's dragged down by subplots that don't really add anything, like Elba's drug-addict sister and Dillon dealing with red-tape and possible corruption at the station. The final shoot-out held no emotional wallop, but I think it was supposed to. That's a bad sign.

The Green Hornet - Movie Review

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Starring Seth Rogen, Jay Chou, Cameron Diaz, Christoph Waltz, Tom Wilkinson, Edward James Olmos and James Franco.
Directed by Michel Gondry.

Seth Rogen & writer partner Evan Goldberg reinvented action-buddy comedy with Pineapple Express when they made it about a pot-smoker and his dealer on the run. It was a messy romp. Now Rogen's trying to do the same thing with superhero movies, but fortunately he leaves the marijuana at home. Kato & the Green Hornet will have to settle with getting drunk with each other.

As a comedy, it's not funny enough, and as a superhero movie, it didn't work either. I appreciated that it didn't aim for fake earnestness like, say, Elektra, but that it also didn't degenrate into pun-happy neon camp like Schumacher's Batman.

Rogen, that Fozzie Bear of an actor who's the same in pretty much everything, plays Britt Reid, son of a multimillionaire (naturally), wasting his life with partying. One day Dad dies, and now Britt is heir, and his primary responsibility is running the Daily Sentinel, the only insanely-profitable newspaper left in America. Britt decides to team up with Kato, his dad's driver, to fight crime, but in order to get close to the criminal underground, they'll pretend they're bad guys. He uses his paper to help villify the Green Hornet.

Chou does kick butt as Kato, but it seems torturous for him to speak English. Cameron Diaz shows up as the token female interest and the movie grinds to a halt for all of her scenes. Christoph Waltz never quite hits the right comedic notes as Chudnofsky, a crime boss going through an identity crisis.

The 3D added absolutely nothing except the increased price of the ticket.

As my wife said as we left the theater, "Jack Black could've played the Green Hornet."

Survivor's Russell: Spoiler Villain

Check out this on Russell Hantz's alleged involvement with a spoiler site. COuld cost him millions.

True Grit - Movie Review

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Starring Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, Hailee Steinfeld, Josh Brolin, Barry Pepper and Dakin Matthews.
Directed by Joel & Ethan Coen.

I loves me a well-crafted Western as much as the next feller, and this one fits the bill. Can't say it's Best Picture material, but it's fine innertainment nonetheless.

Hailee Steinfeld is yer heroine here, a 14-year-old girl full o pluck and resolve out to find the man who killed her pa. She's a resourceful tyke, and she sets out to find the meanest marshal she can to hire. She sets her sights on the drunken Rooster Cogburn.

Cogburn is played by Jeff Bridges, who drawls so deep, there's plenty of clever dialogue we miss because he's too hard to understand. I really had to strain. When they show this in Australia or England, the locals will want subtitles for Bridges's lines. But when he gets upset, that one-eyed stare can be chilling.

I never saw the 1969 version, seen pieces, so I didn't have that distracting thing most might, of thinking what Bridges is doing different from Wayne, what Matt Damon's doing different from Glen Campbell, and so forth. I dug Bridges, his deep drawl notwithstanding. Damon was also really good as LaBeouf, at times comical in his bravado but still one you root for when he discovers his true integrity. LaBeouf sees Maddie as a brat when they meet, and she sees him as a buffoon, but mutal respect and understanding is earned.

Then there's Hailee Steinfeld as Maddie, a true find in casting. She's nominated for Best Supporting Actress but she's in every scene.

Twere I to have any other beef with the film, it'd be the denouement. That may be the way the book ends but I thought better choices were there.

Hollywood used to love the Western, and since we only get about one a year, I'd like to see more. Maybe with the financial success of this, we will. But I hope this doesn't mean High Noon and The Searchers remakes are in the works. There's plenty of pulp material to mine from Louis L'Amour, Zane Grey and Elmore Leonard.

The Other Guys - DVD Review

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Starring Will Ferrell, Mark Wahlberg, Eva Mendes, Michael Keaton, Dwayne Johnson, Samuel L. Jackson, Steve Coogan, Ray Stevenson, Lindsay Sloane, Natalie Zea, Rob Riggle and Damon Wayans Jr.
Directed by Adam McKay.

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Samuel L. Jackson star as the quintessential action-buddy cops. With great disregard for public property and their own safety, they chase those bad guys down and get the photo op. They're the envy of the department. They blast the tunes and spout the one-liners.

They're gone by the end of the first act. Oh, where's the rest of the movie supposed to go?

We follow the B Team, the "other guys" of the title. Will Ferrell is the nerdy one who loves paperwork. Mark Wahlberg is his tightly-wound partner who might be a great cop were he not so overzealous. Ferrell and Wahlberg are fine, but I actually got more entertainment out of the supporting cast, like Michael Keaton as the precinct captain who holds a surprise second job, or Steve Coogan as the weasily CEO at the center of an investigation.

P.S. The closing credits seem to have been lifted from a documentary about the financial crisis, as we get all these stats and figures about TARP and CEO salaries and whatnot.

The King's Speech - Movie Review

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Starring Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush, Helena Bonham Carter, Guy Pearce, Michael Gambon, Derek Jacobi, Timothy Spall and Jennifer Ehle.
Directed by Tom Hooper.

It may feel like award-bait, but that doesn't mean it isn't really good. Plenty of films aim for award-bait and miss. (Remember The Shipping News?) They must first and always be high quality entertainment, and this suceeds mainly on Colin Firth's remarkable central performance.

We first see Albert the Duke of York (Firth) give a disastrous radio speech in 1925, then fast-forward a few years to where his wife (Helena Bonham Carter, as crisp and subdued here as she is wild in Harry Potter) has sought the help of unorthodox speech therapist Lional Logue (Geoffrey Rush). Seems that Albert (Bertie to his family) has been plagued with a stutter his whole life.

When Bertie's elder brother leaves the throne, Bertie is now King George VI, and in this era of radio, and rising Nazi Germany, the U.K. needs a leader who can speak.

It's essentially a buddy film, but Firth, who was great last year in A Single Man, steps it up here. I can imagine many ways where this could have gone wrong but it never does.

2010 Academy Award Nominations

BEST PICTURE
Black Swan
The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
The King's Speech
127 Hours
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter's Bone

BEST ACTOR
Javier Bardem, Biutiful
Jeff Bridges, True Grit
Jesse Eisenberg, The Social Network
Colin Firth, The King's Speech
James Franco, 127 Hours

BEST ACTRESS
Annette Bening, The Kids Are All Right
Nicole Kidman, Rabbit Hole
Jennifer Lawrence, Winter's Bone
Natalie Portman, Black Swan
Michelle Williams, Blue Valentine

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Christian Bale, The Fighter
John Hawkes, Winter's Bone
Jeremy Renner, The Town
Mark Ruffalo, The Kids Are All Right
Geoffrey Rush, The King's Speech

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Amy Adams, The Fighter
Helena Bonham Carter, The King's Speech
Melissa Leo, The Fighter
Hailee Steinfeld, True Grit
Jacki Weaver, Animal Kingdom

BEST DIRECTOR
Darren Aronofsky, Black Swan
Joel & Ethan Coen, True Grit
David Fincher, The Social Network
Tom Hooper, The King's Speech
David O. Russell, The Fighter

BEST ANIMATED FILM
How to Train Your Dragon
The Illusionist
Toy Story 3

BEST FOREIGN FILM
Biutiful, Mexico
Dogtooth, Greece
In a Better World, Denmark
Incendies, Canada
Outside the Law, Algeria

BESY DOCUMENTARY FILM
Exit Through the Gift Shop
Gasland
Inside Job
Restrepo
Waste Land

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
127 Hours
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter's Bone

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Another Year
The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
The King's Speech

BEST ART DIRECTION
Alice in Wonderland
Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows Part I
Inception
The King's Speech
True Grit

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Black Swan
Inception
The King's Speech
The Social Network
True Grit

BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Alice in Wonderland
I Am Love
The King's Speech
The Social Network
True Grit

BEST FILM EDITING
Black Swan
The Fighter
The King's Speech
127 Hours
The Social Network

BEST MAKEUP
Barney's Version
The Way Back
The Wolfman

BEST SOUND EDITING
Inception
Toy Story 3
Tron: Legacy
True Grit
Unstoppable

BEST SOUND MIXING
Inception
The King's Speech
Salt
The Social Network
True Grit

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Alice in Wonderland
Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows Part I
Hereafter
Inception
Iron Man 2

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
How to Train Your Dragon
Inception
The King's Speech
127 Hours
The Social Network

BEST ORIGINAL SONG
"Coming Home", Country Strong
"I See the Light", Tangled
"If I Rise", 127 Hours
"We Belong Together", Toy Story 3

BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT
Killing in the Name
Poster Girl
Strangers No More
Sun Come Up
The Warriors of Qiugang

BEST ANIMATED SHORT
Day & Night
The Gruffalo
Let's Pollute
The Lost Thing
Madagascar, Carnet de Voyage

Ebert Presents At the Movies

Christy Lemire (Associated Press) and Ignatiy Vishnevetsky (Mubi.com) are your new critics. No "two thumbs up" or "two thumbs down" in the first episode.

No Strings Attached - Lemire Down / Vishy Up - Lemire felt like it fell apart toward the end, Vishy thought it was better than most rom-coms, cliches notwithstanding.

The Company Men - Lemire Down / Vishy Up - Lemire felt the characters never broke out of their two-dimensional setups. Vishy found it an interesting commentary on unemployment.

The Way Back - Lemire Down / Vishy Up - Lemire found it a slog. Vishy likes long, gritty epics.

The Green Hornet - Lemire Down / Vishy Up - Lemire found Seth Rogen doing his same old schtick and hated the 3D. Vishy liked the visual creativity and the direction, and liked the Rogen/Chou chemistry.

The Dilemma - Lemire Down / Vishy Up - Lemire said none of the comedy worked. Vishy said it's being billed as a comedy but it's actually a depressing drama, and he liked that. He thought Channing Tatum stole the show.

As Christy summed it up "I hated everything, he loved everything." Very interesting show. It's on PBS so there are no pesky commercials. The two critics do have good chemistry, and while I bristled at the original announcement of 24-year-old Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, he's instantly more credible than Ben Lyons. I'll give him the same benefit of the doubt I would have hoped others would've given me if I'd gotten the job. Ebert writes for the show, and I gather he'll have guest voices read his essays. This week Werner Herzog read his essay on 1967's My Dog Tulip. They'll also have Classic Film spotlights, and Kim Morgan did it for 1949's The Third Man. I appreciated it but at the time thought "How many people watching this show have not seen The Third Man?" I can't imagine the number is high.

NBC's Harry's Law - TV Review

I could not buy into this David E. Kelley show, and I'd say the main reason was that with every Kelley law show he makes, the lawyer arguments get weaker and weaker. When Kathy Bates makes a closing argument, I groan at what this show is asking me to swallow. Makes the Ally McBeal gang sound like they're arguing before the Supreme Court. I'd rather see Kathy Bates close this shop and do more cameos on The Office. I'm also rooting for Nate Corddry to find the right vehicle. It's not for lack of trying with creative people (be it this or Aaron Sorkin's Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip or his occasional contributions to The Daily Show).