I love you, man: review

Some friends showed up last night to surprise me that they actually want to go see, I love you, man and I couldn't have been happier. I love Paul Rudd, from Object of my Affection to Knocked UP, and Jason Segal from "How I met your mother". The ads make the plot fairly clear, Rudd is getting married and has never really had lots of male friends. This seems to make his fiancee nervous, so he tries to go out and meet a guy friend. He gets help from his gay brother - no dinners, sends the wrong message and finally meets Sydney Fife (Segal) at an open house. Fife uses open houses to get free food and meet divorced women. Rudd is intrigued by his honesty and they start hanging out and hitting it off. Of course this makes some of Rudd's manly qualities take over and annoy his fiancee. They jam together playing Rush music, go to concerts, eat and drink and talk about sex and women. Basically, all the things best friends should do. It's very funny without the gross-out humor that Judd Apatow's movies always seem to have. The acting is really good - Paul Rudd is awkward, using stupid phrases on the phone, saying goodbye. He struggles to figure out why he doesn't have guy friends and why not having any has left him without the self-confidence guys provide. Segal was terrific too. He's an unknown quantity, so he pulls off the maybe creepy, maybe genuine friend really well. They're both really funny, and the screenplay is very funny. However, I have one tiny complaint. Men should NEVER wear Uggs with shorts, walking on the beach. Should not be done. 4.5 stars/lambs

Vacation catch-up: Taken

I was nervous going in to see Taken. The ads made it look full of violence and torture, and while that was definitely present, it was more like Bourne than Sin City. Liam Neeson has given up his career as a CIA spy to be closer to his 17-year-old daughter (Maggie Grace). She's still not sure if she can forgive him, but when she asks him to sign papers allowing her to follow U2's European concert tour (he thinks she's going to visit museums in Paris), he relents, and off she goes. She meets a guy at the airport who is obviously scoping them out. When people break into the apartment to kidnap the girls to sell into prostitution, Grace is on the phone with Neeson and he uses all the information to start looking for her. The rest of the movie is Neeson using all his CIA tricks, which are substantial, to dig into the world of Parisian human trafficking. There are quite a few gun fights, a knife fight and a car chase, but it's a terrific thriller. Neeson is incredibly sympathic as the terrified father searching for his daughter, and while surprised and sickened by what he finds, he just keeps going. I really liked it. There were a few moments when it seemed Neeson avoided bullets, by shrugging his shoulders away from them, but that was fine. Overall, 4 Lambs/stars

Vacation Catch-up: Frost/Nixon

Frank Langella is terrific as Richard Nixon and totally deserved his Oscar nomination and Tony awards for this script. I knew it was originally a play, but neither saw nor read the play, so I'm incredibly impressed by how well they created the movie. It was very complete, using locations and sets that I can't imagine on stage. The story follows David Frost (Michael Sheen) and his desire and success in interviewing Nixon after he resigned from office.

I have a theory that it's very difficult to keep track of the events in the 10-20 years surrounding your own birth. This means that things that happened between 1970 and 1990 are fairly difficult for me to keep track of or fully understand. This is because we didn't make it that far in American History in high school (which was after 1990) and I was too young for the 80's to really capture the full extent of what happened. Thus, watching this movie was an amazing history lesson. It's told in a somewhat documentary style of today's reality programs, but still with a cinematic feel, very typical of director Ron Howard. I was impressed by how much depth the story had which is why I think of is an educational movie for those of us born during that gap I mentioned. There's a sense of how different people reacted to Nixon's crimes, whether they were crimes ("I"m saying, when the President does it, that means it's not a crime"), how involved they were and how it affected different people. It's a great movie for any reason, but particularly if you feel like there's a gap in your historical knowledge. The supporting cast, including Oliver Platt, Kevin Bacon, and Sam Rockwell is also terrific.

Top Grossing Guesses

My friend Fletch, over at Blog Cabins created this amazing contest for those of us who aren't interested in basketball, or most sports, but love movies. He's challenging us to predict who will take the Top Grossing movie of the summer - will it be Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince or Transformers 2 or Up. Possibly Night at the Museum will take it all. Anyway, you too can participate. Just click here to check out the details at Blog Cabins or download this file and send it to him at blogcabins@yahoo.com. It's awesome. I filled out my bracket today and can't wait for September now....you'll forget all about it by then. Fill it out by April 2 as the summer starts early at the movies.

Vacation Catch-up: The Reader

I saw quite a few movies on my vacation so I'm going to write up reviews of all of them, though most cinephiles will have already seen them. What I'd love is to hear what other people also thought of them, or how you agree or disagree with me because even if I read a review on a fellow blogger's site, or a general review, it would have been months ago when these movies opened, so I'm not sure anymore what people thought. First up, The Reader. I actually read the book just before seeing the movie (I don't usually care about having read the book when I see the movie but I remembered it was around and not too long). Both are fantastic. Possibly because I liked the book so much, it colored how I thought about the movie, but I just think the story is fantastic. The acting was good, and the methods the screenwriter and director used to bring a remembered account to life was fantastic. Kate Winslet was terrific, playing Hanna Schmitz, a 30 something trolley car ticket taker who helps our 15-year old hero, Michael Berg, get home when he gets sick right in her doorway. When he returns to say thank you, he sees her putting on her stockings and a sexual relationship evolves. He completely falls for her over the course of a summer. They take a biking trip together, sleep together, bathe together and he reads to her. He reads his school assignments and then things that interest her. You wonder why she wants to be read to so much, but she just seems to enjoy it so much. Hanna leaves without warning one day and Michael is heartbroken and never really recovers. He later attends law school and a seminar that examines a trial going on of female guards from some of the Nazi concentration camps. Surprisingly, to Michael, Hanna is one of the guards on trial now. The rest of the movie follows her trial and sentencing. It's difficult to watch and hearing Winslet deliver the pivotal speech about "what would you have done?" to the judges is just heartrending. Ralph Fiennes plays Michael as an adult and is wonderful struggling with his boyhood love, which he never got over, appearing later as a criminal he has been taught to think of as pure evil. It's a terrific movie and an Oscar worthy performance by Winslet and excellent performances by Fiennes, and David Kross, the younger Michael.

Duplicity: Review

I'm back from vacation (a wonderful sun-filled, food-filled, healing vacation) and will post reviews of the 7 movies I saw this week! I will start with the most recent because I so rarely see movies on opening day, Duplicity. I was excited to see Julia Roberts and Clive Owen again as they did such a good job torturing each other in Closer. As we watched the previous crowd leave the theater, I heard a few times it was quite confusing, so I paid close attention, and have to say it wasn't confusing. Yes, it jumps back and forth in time a bit, but they carefully tell you when it is. The basic plot surrounds Roberts as a ex-CIA agent and Owen as ex-MI6 combining their talents to make their fortune through corporate espionage. It's a long-con so they spend a lot of time trying to plan their way in and out. They're funny together and the movie is reminiscent of the Ocean's series of movies, but not as complicated or funny or satisfying. It was good, with quick, clever dialogue and just the right length. I think it was hard to support people trying to rob from the rich to be really rich. The Robin Hood aspect of most good spy stories just wasn't present. The chemistry between Roberts and Owen was good and they're funny teasing each other, but there's no huge payoff at the end (not really a spoiler - I meant payoff in the sense of getting something out of watching the movie). 3.5 Lambs/stars

Watchmen: Review

I've never really read comics or graphic novels, but I really like most of the movies based on either. The characters are usually really complex, trying to do good things, but struggling with their identity or personal demons and attempting to make the world a better place. I understand Watchmen changed the face of graphic novels, and from the movie I can see how it would have done that really well. The characters all work to preserve society when traditional methods seem to be failing, but they're not actually superhuman (except Dr. Manhattan, obviously) - they age, can be killed, but do have skills at fighting crime. However, they're not all perfect either. The movie starts with the death of the aged "Comedian" (Jeffrey Dean Morgan - so cute and pretty awesome) as they figure out that someone is killing off the remaining Watchmen. The original Watchmen all started up before WWII and as some aged, younger people took their places. The movie goes on to showcase the back stories of how the remaining Watchmen became who they are, but overall, I didn't care for the movie. It was much too long, and in specific scenes much too violent compared to the dark nature of the rest of the movie. However, the soundtrack was lots of fun, and I appreciated the alternate time, with Nixon in his 5th term. The individual characters were uneven in the story and there wasn't a real leader or hero to care about, except perhaps "Comedian" who we know is dead, see only in flashbacks, and doesn't turn out to be a great guy. There's a moment when Dr. Manhattan disappears where the movie seems to be gaining plot, but Billy Crudup is so unconvincing, that it barely returns to any sort of story. The visual effects were good, but if it doesn't result in a story worth remembering, I wouldn't bother seeing it again. 2 Stars/Lambs

Vacation Break

I'm heading off to warmed climes for the week, so there won't be any posts until I get back, but I've been stalking Fandango to find out what's available, so look for my reviews of Watchmen, Frost/Nixon, The Reader, The Wrestler, Rachel Getting Married and possibly some really new movies like Duplicity, and Race to Witch Mountain. I hope you all have a terrific St. Patrick's Day (Happy 30th Rosie!) and a great week.

DVD Round up: Eagle Eye Encounters

I'm getting better slowly, but still watching mostly DVDs at this point, so you'll have to wait a bit for new reviews, but they should appear in a week or so. For now, I'll just warn you about two movies I didn't like, but really thought I would: the Oscar nominated documentary Encounters at the End of the World and the action flick Eagle Eye.

This year Man on Wire and Encounters at the End of the World were the two nominated documentary features available on DVD before the Oscars so I made an effort to see them. Man on Wire was terrific and fully deserved its win. I can't actually understand why Encounters was nominated except that people saw that Werner Herzog was the director. He narrates his trip to Antarctica to explore who lives there, what they do, and what they study. Now I'm all for science documentaries (Planet Earth, Life of Birds, etc. I've seen them dozens of times) but this was not that at all. He mocks the scientists (who I admit are a motley crew, I've been one of them (in Kenya, not Antarctica) and they're a strange bunch), and tries to explain the usefulness of their science (rarely anything beyond exploration). Herzog also tries to understand what brought them to McMurdo Station and the South Pole. They're not very interesting stories. Herzog also mocks the Station itself rather than his own misconception of what it will look like. It's minimalist and resembles a airport, with metal structures and construction vehicles and, since it's spring, lots of mud. When describing the town that has arisen to support the Station, he laughs that the town has a bowling alley and a yoga studio. I won't bore you with the rest that annoyed me about this movie, but will sum up by saying I didn't care for his style of directing or narrating his own views about the topic as if they were everyone's. Most of the nature images he photographed were beautiful and worthy of being included in an actual documentary on Antartica's beauty. 2 Stars/Lambs

The other movie that I don't think is worth renting is Eagle Eye. Shia LaBeouf, Michelle Monaghan, Rosario Dawson, and Billy Bob Thornton all feature prominently and all did a terrific job with very little plot. From the commercials it's a fun movie with Shia being told what to do by a woman on a phone who can obviously see everything he does. It takes more than 80 minutes before there's any more plot than that. We see "Her" controlling LaBeouf and Monaghan by having them drive through cities while "she" changes the traffic lights and controls cranes. "She" sends them to other cities and has them rob armored cars. However, not until the last 20 minutes to we find out who "she" is and why this story is taking place. In case you do choose to see it, I won't reveal the mystery, as there's no other reason to watch this movie. Too much action with very little to have any of it make sense. Shia LaBeouf is a good action star but watch Transformers again rather than renting this. 2 Stars/Lambs

DVD Round up - really random collection

Just before the Oscars I got really sick again so I managed to post about everything I'd seen, but haven't see anything in the theater since Doubt but caught quite a few DVDs lately, and if I feel like it I'll write more later, but typing's not really easy so this will be short.

Changeling - Angelina was good and the other detective (Michael Kelly) was good. Though I love him on "Burn Notice" (LOVE HIM!) I didn't think Jeffrey Donovan was terrific as the person who convinces us of the insane corruption of the LAPD. Overall, it was a really slow movie that didn't tell a very compelling story once you know what happens with the kid. 3 stars/Lambs.


Made of Honor - When you're sick, cheesy movies win out. This wasn't bad. A vehicle for Dr. McDreamy, Patrick Dempsey is good, charming, a little ridiculous but fun to watch. Plus, the other Dr. from Grey's, Kevin McKidd (also from short-lived Journeyman) is Scottish and very cute. Michelle Monaghan is a little ditzy and oblivious to the fact that her wedding planning is actually impossible, but if everyone's really really rich maybe you can plan a wedding in another country in 2 weeks. Very fun, cute, and worth watching when you're sick. 3.5 stars/lambs


Ghost Town - I love Ricky Gervais. This movie is him through and through. Kristin Wiig adds fun bits as his doctor - who has to explain that he died. He's a wonderful curmudgeonly misanthrope who has to reach out to dead people. Tea Leoni is better than usual, laughing at Ricky throughout. Very predictable, but consistently funny in Gervais' style. 4 stars/Lambs

The Tudors: Season 2 - This is just awesome. Everyone should see this show. You don't have to see the seasons in order if you're at all familiar with history. Watch the second season to see the fall of Anne Boleyn! 5 stars!

Oscar nominations review: Doubt

The most nominated film for acting awards this season is Doubt. Meryl Streep (Best Actress), Philip Seymour Hoffman (Best Supporting Actor), Amy Adams and Viola Davis (Best Supporting Actress) all give terrific performances adding depth and nuance to the plot. Streep's principal nun, accuses Hoffman's priest, indirectly, of behaving inappropriately towards a little boy (Davis' son). The majority of the movie deals with how a person's character gives credence to whether or not they are capable or able to commit horrible acts. Streep's sister Aloysius is mean, a dragon of a teacher, very much of the old-school church. She's suspicious of Hoffmans' new ideas and enthusiasm which she eventually taints with a possible crimes and sees all his behaviors as suspicious. Adams is the young nun who has more optimism than maturity and faith in the goodness of people rather than the suspicious nature that comes with experience (as Streep's character has in spades). About half the people I know think he did it, but I'm still on the he didn't do it (he did something in the past that's still following him, but not this). The acting is supurb throughout and was worthy of all it's nominations. I'd love to see Viola Davis win, and would be fine with Meryl taking another one (Even if means Winslet doesn't win again). 4.5 Lambs/Stars overall too.

Oscar nominees on DVD: Vicky Christina Barcelona

I'll start with the fact that I don't really enjoy Woody Allen films. There are often good scenes, usually great acting, but rarely a story worth remembering. I found this to be true again with Vicky Christina Barcelona, for which Penelope Cruz is nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. Quick plot summary: Vicky (Rebecca Hall) and Christina (Scarlett Johansson) go to Barcelona for the summer. They are picked up one night by Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem), a Spanish painter and taken away for the weekend. Vicky is engaged to be married and more straight-laced than Christina who seeks adventure and true love, but they still decide to go away with him. Christina puts the moves on him, but ultimately gets sick and Vicky sleeps with him. They get back to Barcelona and Juan Antonio and Christina move in together and Vicky gets married, but can't forget her romantic night with a stranger. Then returns Maria Elena (Penelope Cruz) Juan Antonio's crazy ex-wife. She moves in with the couple and the tragic, sprited, love affair she and Juan Antonio always had (she once stabbed him out of love) is tempered into nomalcy by Christina's presence. Ultimately, Christina realizes she's a little more normal than she thought and Vicky realizes she wants no part of the crazy, courageous life of Juan Antonio after all.
While Penelope Cruz is good, I don't think it deserved a nomination, let alone an award. Javier Bardem was very good at the carefree artist, without being a careless jackass. He seemed humbled by his failed marriage, but whimsical enough to have fun with two American tourists. The scenery and musical score are terrific, but don't really connect with the story very well. Overall 3 LAMBS/stars

TV/ movie Couples

There were a bunch of lists of good and bad media couples and I mostly didn't find any I liked or agreed with, so I figured I'd start my own list. Here are the couples I admire usually both from an acting and a writing perspective. The reason I think these characters appeal to me more than movie couples is that we get to see them through a whole relationship spectrum, whereas most movies give a situation and watch them deal with it (like "The Notebook" - we watch Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams fall in love and eventually work things out and then see them as adults much, much later but we don't get to see how they argued or changed as people and together as a couple.) .

Eric and Tammy Taylor ("Friday Night Lights") - Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton

They're the football coach and now principal at the school, so they have to debate both the policies of having the boosters pay for a Jumbotron while teachers are being laid off, and whether their daughter is old enough for her own car. They're friends, lovers, parents, and partners and while they don't always agree, they always have each other's back. The united front they present is both good TV and a great couple.

President and Dr. Abigail Bartlett ("The West Wing") - Martin Sheen and Stockard Channing

Rising to the top of their respective fields (politics and medicine) makes for an intimidating couple. They balance their own rights as people with the larger rights of the people they represent. They fight religion, politics, medicine, health and power and how they and their family falls in between. There's a great scene in the second or third season where they've been fighting and Abby arrives in the West Wing and starts right into their fight and Jed stops and says "no, first we do, how are you, how was the flight?" They try to keep their relationship above the stresses they deal with as a power couple.

Admiral Adama and President Laura Roslin ("Battlestar Galactica") - Edward James Olmos and Mary McDonnell

They literally lead the entire human race, from a military and civilian perspective. Their methods often differ, but their mutual respect makes at least the fight for their own way reasonable. They've only recently developed an intimate relationship, but it hasn't cramped their leadership. They know what's right and that sometimes you have to fight like hell to make sure it happens. It seems that when they each have a crisis of faith, they other is there to support them through it to a better place.

Marshall Eriksen and Lily Aldrin ("How I Met Your Mother") - Jason Segel and Allyson Hannigan

They've been in love since college and eventually broke up and got back together and got married. They worked together to create a life and be friends to each other as well as other people. They share jokes and personal moments, but they're hardly perfect - keeping secrets from each other and trying to still be the best person they each can be.

Milk review

It's been quite a few days since I've seen Milk, but I wasn't sure I had anything new to say except to expose my own ignorance about events that preceded my birth. First, I loved the movie. It's a great biographical history of Harvey Milk, as well as some of the first major events of the gay rights movement (pre-AIDS, which was interesting historically, certain arguments weren't used or brought out that prevailed after AIDS became prevalent). Sean Penn was wonderful. From the trailers I expected him to be playing a character very similar to his in I Am Sam, but the trailers do him a disservice. He's much more up and down in energy, politics, and relationships than the snapshot shown quickly in trailers. The supporting cast is also pretty amazing (though I don't think Josh Brolin deserved his nomination this year - perhaps it's a make-up for last year). Given how the move through Milk's life in different ways and we barely hear their names, it was remarkably easy to keep track because they just made an impression. Emile Hirsh, James Franco, Diego Luna, and Alison Pill (the oldest daughter in Dan in Real Life which I just saw again) were all good, individual characters that helped Harvey fight for what was right. I had a lot of trouble watching all the hate that they battled for equal rights, and can't really believe we're still fighting some of the same battles, but at least the people fighting today have a little more info on how far they have come. 5 LAMBS/stars

Heroes, so far

So this is what I think is going on this season on "Heroes". You can watch ALL of season 3 on Netflix watch instantly. The episodes are up on Netflix about a day after they air live - also I'm sure you can get much of it on NBC.com.

There are two sets of good guys/bad guys this season - one belongs to The Company which is where most of the previous good guys worked to get really bad guys off the street. Now there's another set of peeps at "Pinehearst" another group working to figure out how the special powers people have can be duplicated or controlled. A long time ago, a formula was put to paper that would create powers in people. This formula was torn in half and given to Hiro's father who wants Hiro to guard it and to Angela and Arthur Petrelli. Now Pinehearst is trying to put the formula together and enlisted Daphne (a super fast runner) to steal it. However, even after the get the whole thing together it turns out they need some extra catalyst which turns out was stored in Hiro's mother. Arthur (who was presumed dead) steals all his son Peter's powers and Nathan takes his side on having to round up all the Superheroes and take away their powers. Then, I think another eclipse happens and everyon realises what it would be like to go back to living without powers and think it sucks. Somehow during this Hiro looses his time traveling powers AFTER he's gone back to his own childhood and figured out about the catalyst. Arthur seems all powerful and steals the catalyst from Hiro (who got it from his mom in a very sweet moment). They use the catalyst to soup up the formula and start injecting soldiers to give them powers. It goes crazy with lots of violence I didn't really follow. Eventually, Peter defeats both his father and Nathan (who has become a NY senator) and destroys all the formula. They burn down Pinehearst and all the people we like escape. Oh, and Ando got powers, but still seems to be a good guy, and Suresh got powers, but turned into a bad bug-like guy (he was gross). That's the end of the 3rd Volume - so basically it was "find and destory the formula or all people will become crazy superheroes" - doesn't have the same ring as "save the cheerleader, save the world". But alas, the world has been saved again - from whom and for whom I'm not quite sure.

Romantic movies

These are my picks for romantic movies, that make you think a little bit too or just make you smile and want to hug a sweetie or a friend.
Out of Africa - this 1985 Oscar winner stars the incomparable Meryl Streep and Robert Redford at his most ruggedly sexy. Streep is real-life Karen Blixen, a woman who arrived in Kenya to marry and escape her European background. She figures out the boys network of colonial Kenya is incredibly difficult for women to navigate, and that colonizing the local people, Kikuyu in her case, isn't always possible or necessary. She meets Redford's Denis Finch-Hatten and he sees that daring in her, but the constraints her background put upon her. He has no constraints and they have an amazing affair, that of course ends tragically, but appropriately - especially given they're real people. Definitely an escape - plus you can wash your sweetie's hair afterward.


50 First Dates - Another Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore movie, where he plays a bit of scum and she helps him figure out how to be a better guy. But it's so much better than that. Drew had a head injury and can't retain memories beyond what she had the day of the accident. Then she meets and hits it off with Sandler, but can't really remember him the next day. So they work on things that help her relearn new things every day - a video, a diary, etc. Where's the romance you might ask - how about getting the girl of your dreams to fall in love with you every day, and then being the girl who gets to live every day with that sense of new love.
Sense and Sensibility - This is just one of those old fashioned love stories. Boy meets girl, can't be with girl, they try to move on, life conspires to eventually bring them back together. Oh yeah, and Kate Winslet plays the girl's sister who falls for the wrong guy before finding the right guy. Not so much with the guys, but girls will love it.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind - This one covers most of the stages of a relationship, ups downs, highs, lows, happy, rage, and then the wonderful nostalgia that hits right after you've ended a relationship and can't really remember why it had to be over. Plus, there's the added fun of fate forcing you to fall in love with the same person over and over. Most people do that by dating lots of different people who are really variations on a theme, but our heros, Joel and Clementine, do it by falling for each other after their memories are erased.

Men are jerks and women are crazy...

The theme of He's Just Not That Into You is pretty clear and straightforward - if a guy wants to date you, he'll try to date you. If a married couple isn't sleeping together, one or both of them are sleeping with someone else. Most guys, or all guys, don't plan every detail of their interactions with a woman, thus women shouldn't pay that much attention to the details. This movie is a crazy amalgam of stories of twenty to thirty somethings in various stages of relationships and how men and women react differently to relationships. There were no revelations about the modern status of relationships, though they tried to say something about how new technologies makes us always available and yet there are hidden meanings (supposedly) to all the different types of interactions (e-mail vs voicemail, eharmony vs myspace vs facebook). The acting was pretty good by everyone, particularly Ginnifer Goodwin (Walk the Line and "Big Love") and Justin Long. I didn't like Bradley Cooper's character at all (though he was REALLY funny on Saturday Night Live last week) and Scarlett Johanssen was just annoying. Overall, not a great reflection on society, dating or men or women. 2 Lambs/stars

Gran Torino Review

I've read lots of reviews of this movie, and I'm pretty far behind the curve on seeing it, but as the only non-horror/kiddie comedy available yesterday I finally got to see it. It was terrific. Clint Eastwood was definitely overlooked when it came to the acting nominations. I'm guessing he's #6 in the list, with only 5 getting nominated. Clint plays a retired blue-collar worker in the mid-west living in a neighborhood that has transformed into an area of mainly immigrant families around him. He's the curmudgeon who thinks kids don't respect their elders or themselves. The movie starts with his wife's funeral and his grandchildren arrive in a Lions jersey, a midriff baring shirt and texting during the funeral. Clint spends much of the movie growling at the disrespect and unraveling of society he sees around him. One night he wakes up to find the neighbor kid, Thao, trying to steal his beloved Gran Torino. Clint chases him and the gang off with one of his many guns. In return, Thao comes to work for him, because in his Hmong family he's dishonored the family with his actions. Clint gets him to do all kinds of things, both for him, and for the neighborhood. Thao's father recently passed away, and the exposure to a strong male role model helps transform Thao a bit, but in return Clint also has to let go of some of his racism.

Overall, this movie has lots of funny bits, which surprised me. Clint's character, Walt Kowalski, is incredibly racist, but he's a fairly equal-opportunity racist. Everyone he meets, black, white, asian, etc. are subjected to some sort of racial slur. There were so many, I'll admit I'd never heard some of them. Eventually, he's able to use some of the stereotypes and racial slurs as jokes with Thao's sister, Sue. Between them, humor takes the sting and insult out of some of what Walt says - Sue does a good job of turning around Walt's racism into ignorance with humor. He's such an ornery character that it seems he only uses slurs, not because he necessarily believes them, but to get a rise out of the other person so he can be tough and manly. There's a lot of humor in that.

Ultimately, it's a story of sacrifice and standing up for yourself and for what's right, and I really liked it. There were a few moments of strange direction/cinematography, but hardly worth mentioning. 4.5 stars/LAMBS.

The Wrestler, Bruce Springsteen

Bruce Springsteen won the Golden Globe for his song, "The Wrestler" from the movie of the same name, that also appears on The Boss' new album, "Working on a Dream". This LA Times article describes how this travesty could have happened, but I still don't believe anyone who heard it wouldn't want it to win something. Hopefully the grammys will award him next year for the entire album.

Lamb devours the Oscars: Best Make-up

It's my turn. Check out the review I wrote for Best Achievement in Make-up for the LAMB event.