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<title>Marty Meltz - EzineArticles Expert Author</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Marty_Meltz</link>
<pubDate>Wed, 15 Feb 2012 02:50:49 -0600</pubDate>
<image><title>Marty Meltz - EzineArticles Expert Author</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Marty_Meltz</link>
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<copyright>Copyright 2012 EzineArticles.com - All Rights Reserved.</copyright>
<description><![CDATA[36-year published film reviewer, 30 of those just ended (budget cuts) with the award-winning Portland (Maine) Press Herald and the statewide Maine Sunday Telegram.]]></description>
<lastBuildDate>Sat, 20 Mar 2010 21:14:31 -0500</lastBuildDate>
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<title>&quot;Diary of a Wimpy Kid&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3962674</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3962674</guid>
<pubDate>Sat, 20 Mar 2010 21:14:31 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Funny if you'll let it be, original in its sincere desire to give an energetic collective personality to the time of the middle-school boy, it grew on me in painful memories. The kid audience may not be as interested in this as one might think, much of its energy turning on the dynamics of what the world expects of this troubled time. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Green Zone&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3920471</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3920471</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 15 Mar 2010 10:35:54 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Bang! Boom! Rat-a-tat-tat! Steeped in the beginnings of the Iraq War, right about when Bush made his famously naive "Mission Accomplished!" speech, "Green Zone" is a brutally spectacular thriller that makes its point by meaningful mega-action. That speech, which we may recall was made in the wishful-thinking aftermath of a massive U.S.-led coalition crushing of the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq, supposed that because Hussein had been defeated militarily, peace had descended upon the country. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Brooklyn's Finest&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3877727</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3877727</guid>
<pubDate>Fri, 05 Mar 2010 20:44:15 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Gushing with bloody shootings, with enough of it to satiate even the most bloodthirsty violence aficionado for the next year, "Brooklyn's Finest" is immersed, almost drowned, in its gripping delivery. This is by director Antoine Fuqua who did the similarly mega-powered photographic juggernaut, the 2001 "Training Day," a film which set a fairly unreachable standard of shadowy visual embellishment of everything falling within the reach of the camera. Again, drugs are the basic generators of all the evil, and desperate humans are the drivers of a plot that amounts to little more than a wearisome cliche in itself but is buried under character close-ups of such scorching intensity that your attention is riveted mercilessly. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Alice in Wonderland&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3877779</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3877779</guid>
<pubDate>Fri, 05 Mar 2010 20:30:14 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Totally formula, completely politically corrected, but it'll dazzle you with the supercharged power of special effects. In terms of pure entertainment value, by the sheer brute force of computer effects, "Alice in Wonderland" will not leave you indifferent, especially not in 3-D. And for sure, Johnny Depp's wonderfully imaginative interpretations are good for a major draw. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Crazies&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3841135</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3841135</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:07:34 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Intriguing idea. A wholesome little Midwestern town in which all the sweet and nice folks have been turned into bloodthirsty killers by a runaway virus. Hey, ya gotta love it. And what else? Well, it's powerfully filmed with impactful, supercharged skill and technique.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Shutter Island&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3798297</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3798297</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 22 Feb 2010 13:36:38 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A superior crime thriller of the first magnitude, "Shutter Island" is a masterpiece of exquisite depression, creative bleakness, relentless twists and a surprise ending to end all. This is master director Martin Scorcese outdoing himself. Mostly known for the recent "The Departed," his classics were "Gangs of New York," "Age of Innocence" and, of course, "Goodfellas." Here he designs a mercilessly dreary story of a remote island hospital for the criminally insane whose vivid characters -- staff, inmates and federal investigators -- and their secret motivations become hypnotically fascinating. Scorcese's constant balance between clues, schemes and tinderbox violence develops into a welling suspense tale which proceeds to an ingenious ending that wraps up the unwrappable.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Percy Jackson &amp; the Olympians - the Lightning Thief&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3754497</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3754497</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 15 Feb 2010 09:55:02 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Hey, big surprise. "Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief" is almost totally fun for everybody, with enormously imaginative and spellbinding digital effects, has a pretty decent script and is terrifically educational while being never less than top entertainment. Critically, it's being compared unfavorably to Harry Potter. Unfair. This is not Harry Potter and isn't supposed to be. It has its own singular delights and its concepts of what Greek gods do are often very humorous. Granted, by virtue of its attractive and appealing leads, it's pitched hard to teenagers, but its attractions are numerous and never cheap. In fact, if one wants to push the Harry Potter qualities, it must be said that "Percy Jackson" is more intellectually accessible and won't bother you with attracting pseudo-sophisticated analysis. It's just easy, visually jolting fun with solid family values and worthwhile ancient mythology elements. It's another of those many movies which you pick apart afterwards but you know darned well you were spellbound through most of it.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Crazy Heart&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3708265</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3708265</guid>
<pubDate>Sat, 06 Feb 2010 08:22:50 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A modestly moving spin-off on the classic 1983 "Tender Mercies," "Crazy Heart" is a strongly performed story of redemption of a debilitated alcoholic. This reflexively lauded critics' favorite is actually more a salute to one of America's longest high-standing stars, Jeff Bridges, than a commanding entry into the film scene. Hollywood politics may even move it into Oscar nomination.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;When in Rome&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3666609</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3666609</guid>
<pubDate>Sat, 30 Jan 2010 08:40:10 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A featherweight confection for those moments in which you just don't want your brain to be disturbed, it really tends to give chick flicks a bad name. It won't annoy you at all, unless you regret the loss of 88 precious minutes of your time in this life. On its rapid way to DVD, "When in Rome," which simply appropriates the lamest, most trivial aspects of much more legitimate romance comedies since the classic 1953 "Roman Holiday," begins its tiptoe around the country for an undiscriminating female audience. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Edge of Darkness&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3666582</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3666582</guid>
<pubDate>Sat, 30 Jan 2010 08:35:04 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[With gripping gravity and a driven sense of deep drama, Mel Gibson is back in bloody action. A steady urgency and a welling motive of uncompromised revenge fuels the basic but well detailed plot development, earning the film a decent nod of respect in its accomplishment of condensing a six-hour British TV serial into a two-hour movie. Gibson, it is obvious from his character's breathtaking, burning will toward retribution against very bad men, wants this to work.]]></description>
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<title>Extraordinary Measures - Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3631510</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3631510</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 25 Jan 2010 14:37:49 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Feels like a TV movie, in which a commercial can be popped in anywhere without making you feel interrupted. Great story, boring treatment.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Book of Eli&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3598636</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3598636</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 19 Jan 2010 11:15:02 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A very, very strange movie. And it surely holds your attention. With Denzel Washington doing lots of super-heroic hand-to-hand against awful baddies, how could it be otherwise? "The Book of Eli" offers yet another post-apocalyptic scenario, this one apparently happening after, we're told, a great hole, a "Flash," opened in the sky during a war, called a Solara.]]></description>
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<title>The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3552216</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3552216</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 11 Jan 2010 15:12:48 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A marvel of hallucinatory images in director Terry Gilliam's best tradition, it nonethless is no match for his famously bizarre "Time Bandits" and "Brazil." It must first be understood that the film was well into production when Heath Ledger, its star, met his death. So writer-director Terry Gilliam had to improvise the second half of the film by bringing in Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell to fill in for Ledger. That fact enters a bit of inherent distraction, obviously, because you're constantly watching his character on-screen for just how the substitutions are handled although, you see, by Gilliam's ingenious narrative device, they don't necessarily have to look like Ledger.]]></description>
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<title>Youth in Revolt Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3552194</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3552194</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 11 Jan 2010 15:10:17 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[High humor literacy level, a cornucopia of sophisticated quips, and original concept in delightfully deadpan delivery makes this a ribald laughfest for smart, quick-witted and hip adults. For teenagers? Only if you're unusually perceptive and culturally aware. "Youth in Revolt" is an exceptionally clever poker-faced comedy which is meaningless by plot description but everything by its delivery. It proposes to show that teenagers, in thinking of themselves as considerably smarter and more savvy than grown-ups, inevitably, being ill-equipped in doing that, wind up as selfish, short-sighted bunglers who show themselves as precisely the opposite.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Up in the Air&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3484315</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3484315</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 28 Dec 2009 13:48:23 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[One of the dialogue smartest, wittiest modern films I've seen, this is cleverly gripping tragicomical entertainment with countless, fast-developing laughs for the over-35 audience. Under-25s need not attend. This painfully contemporary, immediately relevant theme, based on men and women of long-standing employment getting fired because of the economic downturn, plays George Clooney at his best and most natural demeanor along with coolly sensuous Vera Farmiga matching him point for point in male-female flirtation games playing between 40-something characters. Also catchy is young Anna Kendrick as a fresh young efficiency expert pushing a cost-saving yet heartless new project. ]]></description>
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<title>Nine - Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3484370</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3484370</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 28 Dec 2009 13:45:17 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[But, you've noticed, the critical reviews nationally haven't been great. Why? Well, y'see, if you must measure the quality of a movie by its plot and character depth, don't even bother checking in on this one. That ain't what it is. This is style, not substance, and whether in movies, theater, politics, or just personal communication, guess which one always wins.]]></description>
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<title>It's Complicated - Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3484355</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3484355</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 28 Dec 2009 13:41:00 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A subtly, quietly moving comedy-romance, "It's Complicated" interests you, but after awhile you wonder why. Then you realize why: Meryl Streep and her intrinsic, immortal screen appeal. And if you're a baby boomer, you know why at a much deeper level. ]]></description>
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<title>Sherlock Holmes - Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3484331</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3484331</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 28 Dec 2009 13:36:15 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[The screenplay department apparently saw no need for updating Holmes' romantic desires, which he never exhibited in any of the classic stories. He has no attachments that are overly obvious here although there is a hint that he is, after all, a human male and may have engaged in something with Irene.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Avatar&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3452391</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3452391</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 21 Dec 2009 13:51:22 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Take the most spectacular sci-fi special effects space epic you've seen so far since the first Star Wars -- and "Avatar" transcends it, in visuals and concept, by light years. Five years in production and with a new concept in technology. So what's that mean to you?]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Invictus&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3415221</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3415221</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 14 Dec 2009 12:35:05 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Nelson Mandela for sports fans? Sounds unlikely but history and "Invictus" do it. It's not a biography, just a great story. But, truth be told, as dynamic movies go it's uninspired and, except for the crowd shots, wooden and without a compelling flow. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Everybody's Fine&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3376563</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3376563</guid>
<pubDate>Sat, 05 Dec 2009 12:02:05 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[I loved every second of it. Much to the denials of the critics, for whom sentimentalism has always been the knee-jerk no-no of all film plots, "Everybody's Fine" succeeds in bringing it to a high tide of respectability and makes for an absorbing study of compelling relationships. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Brothers&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3376577</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3376577</guid>
<pubDate>Fri, 04 Dec 2009 22:08:48 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Powerful theme, major moral questions, but marred somewhat by uneven dramatic pacing. "Brothers," in timely fashion, is the first film to deal with the effects of the Afghanistan war on our Marines. Hesitate before going to see it due to a few scenes of mind-bending atrocity. As long as the film is into its sequences of anger and fury, it's horrendously well done. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Fantastic Mr. Fox&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3342851</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3342851</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 30 Nov 2009 19:02:36 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Not for the kids. At all. Repeat: NOT, that is NOT for the kids. Truth be told, it's not really for any general audience but rather, for intellectuals who fancy themselves students of the art of film. For those guys -- and this guy just a little -- it's an offbeat masterpiece. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Blind Side&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3302656</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3302656</guid>
<pubDate>Sat, 21 Nov 2009 18:24:46 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A just-plain well-made sports movie with superb audience appeal, charming personalities, a sprightly demeanor and totally entertaining. "The Blind Side" is Sandra Bullock's best performance ever. Her sassy and brassy character's dynamics depend entirely on insightful, professional interpretation and she proves consummately skilled at every line, every nuance and a consistently on-target southern accent. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;2012&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3267542</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3267542</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 17 Nov 2009 10:18:27 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[I d'no. Is there really any room to criticize a movie when it's so much illuminating fun? Take the words Gargantuan Colossus, upgrade them into outer orbit beyond the capabilities of mere words, and you've got "2012." But it's so big, SO big, that its attempts to introduce the human element fall well into the realm of pitiful. The spectacle is so humongous, so plausible, that in itself it is terrifying. Then come the attempts at human relationships and how they deal with the impending catastrophe, and that effort is pure silliness. At times embarrassingly so. Director Roland Emmerich, who did "Independence Day" and "The Day After Tomorrow," now raises the ante, daring all other filmmakers in the known universe to ever approach this new level of motion picture cataclysmic fury.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Pirate Radio&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3267577</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3267577</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 16 Nov 2009 22:25:39 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[What to expect? Nostalgia, that's what. Hey, having been a part of the '60s, I can love it. But only for the music memories, nothing else. What we've got here in "Pirate Radio" (originally "The Boat That Rocked" in its openings abroad) is mindless, disorganized comic rambling amid colorful characters, well-performed, but with a hopelessly lame plot. God, the memories are sure there. But that's all. Loaded with solid Brit performers and one terrific Yank, flowing with major energy on a course to nowhere, the film just hands all responsibility for audience communication to its great pop songs of the day. It sports an effervescent, boundlessly charming impudence with in-your-face jokes, avoiding even a mild attempt at a dicey relationship. It's good beatin' feet for those who were 60s teenagers, with a fair share of potty humor. The film also has a burdensome amount of screen time, overestimating its primary value as a partyin' movie. There is no consistent tone. It is aimless except as a portrayal of youth turning against a pretentious, pompous world of adults by integrating a new form of music that not only defined, but was their very being.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Men Who Stare at Goats&quot; Film Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3230687</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3230687</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 10 Nov 2009 11:14:01 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Ok, yeah,... I can see the creative poker-faced comedy it's shooting for, but it most definitely does not have the plot energy or momentum to sustain itself. It's a bore. "The Men Who Stare at Goats" is all George Clooney, who does a marvelous comedic effort with a film that courts yawns all over the place.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Fourth Kind&quot; Film Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3230680</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3230680</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 10 Nov 2009 11:13:43 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Beats me why "The Fourth Kind" is getting knocked critically. It's downright OK for what it tries to be and only the super-cynical will let their disbeliefs interfere with artistic criticism. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;A Serious Man' Film Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3182899</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3182899</guid>
<pubDate>Fri, 30 Oct 2009 21:22:23 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[The Coen Brothers' major mistake, in terms of audience communication, was in failing to use those quotes as captions at beginning and end. Their film, "A Serious Man" was inspired by Job.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Amelia&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3149018</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3149018</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 27 Oct 2009 13:38:44 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A fine and continuously entertaining, if not inspirational, life story, depicted with superb and measured visual design. "Amelia," about the incomparably courageous "lady of the air" Amelia Earhart (July 24, 1897 - missing July 2, 1937) is a film which, from a historical biography viewpoint, is illuminating enough, but from an involving director's grip on the most absorbing methods of film audience engagement, it's outstanding. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Law Abiding Citizen&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3108798</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3108798</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 20 Oct 2009 14:46:01 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Bizarre in its action, audacious in its kill devices, powerfully dramatic in its visual design, begrudgingly effective.  "Law Abiding Citizen," proceeding with the full confidence of decades of Hollywood's most lurid spectacles of gory violence as its base, strides forward on seven-league boots, supported by a cleverly conceived basic story concept and spectacular, if only barely credible, action events.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Invention of Lying&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/3047069</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/3047069</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 12 Oct 2009 08:49:08 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Lotsa laughs for about 25 minutes, then just good, then fair comedy. Good substance, however, intriguing theme and glittering performances.         Offering a world in which the ability to tell a lie has never evolved, not even a little white-lie fib, "The Invention of Lying" can be enormously funny but, without writer & co-director Ricky Gervais noticing that it's not enough to sustain an entire film, it falters about mid-way along. Still, I got more than enough laughs and went away happy.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Pandorum&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2990117</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2990117</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 28 Sep 2009 16:33:34 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Cleverly conceived in its plot, "Pandorum" is nonetheless sensually overbearing in its treatment. The outer space probe theme is delivered with endlessly tumultuous metallic noise pervading at ultra-high decibels, clanking and crashing to distraction. The atmosphere is endlessly dark, hardcore intense, with lethal confrontation the word. The high level anger and raging hostility churns the climate of violence. Characters yell, growl, groan and shriek at each other, not always in an enlightening manner. While the story does justify itself over the long haul, this does not alleviate its relentless pounding from possibly sending you out of the theater for some relief.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Informant!&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2948514</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2948514</guid>
<pubDate>Thu, 24 Sep 2009 08:45:54 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Two considerations: A) How ready are you to accept a smartly performed movie that's kind of boring for about an hour? B) How much can you care about corporate executive crimes against each other?]]></description>
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<title>&quot;In the Loop&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2875244</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2875244</guid>
<pubDate>Fri, 11 Sep 2009 14:42:50 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Major British comedy, but for the connoisseur only. And be aware, dialogue may be missed at times under heavy British inflections. This is humor at a very high level of sophistication for the acutely aware political satire filmgoer, designed for those who seek the most subtle of ironies in high-level government caprice and indifference. Seekers after obvious jokes, quips and in-your-face comedy need not attend. The absurdities and clumsy stumblings of modern Western world governments in matters of war, with particular emphasis on those of Great Britain and the U.S., is what the comedy "In the Loop" is all about.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Taking Woodstock&quot; Film Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2838390</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2838390</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 01 Sep 2009 16:30:07 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A devastatingly difficult challenge and a reasonable success. As an interpretation of the greatest, most defining event of the "The Soaring Sixties."]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Inglourious Basterds&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2803849</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2803849</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 24 Aug 2009 21:51:24 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[He's finally come of age, his "Inglourious Basterds" being a matured grasp of some of the most dramatic of modern devices, strategies and tactics of the cinematic arts. Its European feel in some parts, blessed with a full Hollywood budget and greatly sophisticated Tarantino technique and style expand rapidly and organically, indeed inexorably, into a treatment of spellbinding suspense at many levels. His choice of allowing each character to speak in his and her own language, thus preserving the special emphases and cultural feel, was superb.    ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;District 9&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2764409</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2764409</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 18 Aug 2009 11:56:07 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Grisly in the extreme, strikingly original, perversely intelligent. Steeped in male energy, peppered with surprise turns on old themes, the visually cruel "District 9," probably nauseating for some, spiritually desolate for others, but of macabre fascination for still others, is destined to re-shape the sci-fi concepts of modern film. Rising briskly out of the initial monotony of its descriptive array of  desolation, the film treats its morbid substance with such weighty detail and relentless illumination that you are struck with how real this high concept becomes.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Julie &amp; Julia&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2729393</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2729393</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 11 Aug 2009 22:32:13 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[One of the chick-flickiest of chick flicks, with superb intelligence and refreshing respect for its audience's intelligence. Expect to be surprised that you could ever, after the very, very dramatically soft opening sequences, get caught up in this. Effortlessly and unassumingly, leisurely rather than reaching for flash and witty dialogue, "Julie & Julia" disarmingly eases its way into your interest, then into your beguilement.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Hurt Locker&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2729378</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2729378</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 11 Aug 2009 22:28:23 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A superior war film, and the very best of the Iraq-themed, "The Hurt Locker" radiates breathtaking suspense in countless quality moments.               With surprise bombs as its center focus and and the anatomy of  anger pervading everywhere, the film awaits only the details of the basic mission to elevate it to special status among insightful war movies. Its illuminating aspect, that of filling an enormous void that all of us but Iraq War vets have as to the blood-curdling essence of moving among roadside bombs and suicide-wired bombers, is emotionally scorching.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Funny People&quot; - Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2692922</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2692922</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 04 Aug 2009 07:44:10 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A very good movie, ruefully admitted. Best appreciated as a view of a little known but entirely unattractive sub-culture called the L.A. stand-up comedy scene, "Funny People" covers its ground vigorously.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2628305</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2628305</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 21 Jul 2009 08:46:46 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[No surprise. "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" needs one rating for the ardent Harry Potter student and follower and an entirely separate one for the casual filmgoer who just wants to see an entertaining movie.  For the former, it's a magnificently detailed and textured, faithful film interpretation from the J.K. Rowling books.  For the latter, it's over-indulgence in the above at the expense of a need for a compelling narrative.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Proposal&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2499308</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2499308</guid>
<pubDate>Fri, 19 Jun 2009 15:39:53 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Yes, it's old, old material but as always, it ain't the joke, it's the way it's delivered.  "The Proposal" is solid entertainment, well-romanced by reasonable but not sizzling chemistry between Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds. I can't, however, really give it a "good" rating because it's fairly devoid of any romance-comedy imagination and a bit loaded with shaky contrivances.   ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Taking of Pelham 123&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2469171</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2469171</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 15 Jun 2009 15:47:36 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Yeah, right -- loud, bombarding your senses, brute force entertainment -- but it works. You're used to this by now, right? Brash, breathtaking action suspense with spectacular dynamics in every department, making the national critics call it trash, but god, can you ever love it? You came and paid your good money to be entertained intelligently, and wow, you got it! "The Taking of Pelham 123" is astute, concentrated stuff by actionmeister director Tony Scott which steamrolls objections by the application of professional competence, updating an older film and lining it with modern thrills.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Up&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2412646</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2412646</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 01 Jun 2009 15:58:47 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A masterpiece of adult-level art and craft of animated films, not to say a wonderfully refreshing plot quality exploring seriously the trials and tribulations of our lives. The points of praise for this film cannot be overdone. It's a landmark.]]></description>
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<title>Star Trek Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2331147</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2331147</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 12 May 2009 15:15:30 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[I'll flat out call the prequel "Star Trek" the most stupendous, breathtaking sci-fi spectacle ever. Some nit-picking is in order, to be sure, but everybody of all ages -- go for it! Yep, they're all there and they're all believable! And everything the beloved characters say and do in their younger years seems right and the spectacle has been ratcheted up to the current state of the art and a good deal beyond. Most impressive is the terrific attention shown to the scripting and directing levels to expanding on every sci-fi concept. This is a film that wants to be, and succeeds in being, enormous in scale in all astronomical vision.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Ghosts of Girlfriends Past&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2294342</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2294342</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 04 May 2009 13:55:00 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A silly implementation of a workable premise is saved by loads of terrific, snappy one-liners in "Ghosts of Girlfriends Past." Matthew McConaughey, aided by a hip and catchy Michael Douglas, manages to deliver a performance so immersed in funny lines that you can stay with the film just anticipating what he's going to say next. The concept of a promiscuously womanizing Vanity Fair photographer, whose only dedication is dumping women after he's convinced them that love is on the way, is in itself ultimately fertile in bringing up many issues of the deeper meanings of a married life versus lifetime bachelorhood. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;X-Men Origins Wolverine&quot; - Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2294332</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2294332</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 04 May 2009 13:52:35 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[An intellectually dead movie, "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" survives, perhaps unsurprisingly, entirely on its action thrills, all of which are satisfactory even for the connoisseur. Quite uninvolving emotionally, the revenge motive now having long-ago played out its impact in modern film, the whole scenario, like many retro-fittings of thrillers of the past 35 years or so, will spellbind only the video game set who demand little beyond eye candy.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Obsessed&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2273203</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2273203</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 28 Apr 2009 16:17:36 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA["Obsessed" is unusually usual. For a spell, you'll be a wee bit annoyed. But darn, its eventual suspense, long awaited, is surprising.  The theme is old enough. Hell hath no fury like a temptress frustrated.  It was exploited to DVDs.  The current film works it over more simply using an almost old-fashioned style -- no hard-nosed camera movements, no slo-mo, no compulsive close-ups. OK, no complaint there, but then what is its hook? No, Mr. director Steve Shill, you're not going to satisfy us with leading music that overwhelms the routine action. I assure you, we do notice that.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Soloist&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2273187</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2273187</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 28 Apr 2009 16:17:15 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Commendable ambition but largely unrealized as entertainment.  "The Soloist," a highly emotional drama, is an Oscar-bound performance showing for Jamie Foxx which goes begging for compelling events to maintain its forward movement.]]></description>
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<title>All the Critics Agree!</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2236577</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2236577</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 20 Apr 2009 16:17:06 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Never happened. Never. Yet with some new film releases, that's an oft-seen proclamation. True in some film publicity department's dreams, maybe. But in no way is it in the range of the real.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;17 Again&quot; Film Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2236444</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2236444</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 20 Apr 2009 12:16:18 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Quite a collection of cliches. Misfit teens, misfit dads, boys with no understandings of girls. The plot? Recycled but hardly retrofitted.         So if you're close to middle-age and you could return yourself to your teen years to start adult life all over again, how would it be?        Hey, the theme's OK, if a bit facile in the way that happens, but umm . . . shouldn't a screenwriter and director be a bit inventive about that?             ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;State of Play&quot; Film Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2236435</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2236435</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 20 Apr 2009 12:16:14 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[The theme is the desperation of greed and power. The method is to crush them together into a critical mass on screen. Well done, dynamically entertaining.             Ruthless and merciless Washington politics in a presidential race is the focus element in this thriller. Up front is the great arena of infighting in which power has a life of its own and seekers after it never get a chance to make the same mistake once.      The riveting drive in the handsomely mounted "State of Play," with its uniformly powerful cast, stems from the quality in the energy charisma of almost every scene.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Observe and Report&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2213360</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2213360</guid>
<pubDate>Wed, 15 Apr 2009 08:37:08 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[What in the world is "Observe and Report" trying to be?  Erratic in its comic timing, awkwardly serious and mean in its drama, totally unconvincing in its basic premise, wildly improbable in its lead character, starkly unappealing in the man's obnoxious personality, stumbling and bumbling in its plot progress; this is, well, incomprehensible.  Comic scenes never get a chance to develop into a joke, the gaps between moments of failed gags being filled in by f-words...]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Adventureland&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2185779</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2185779</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:47:16 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[What? What?  A film about early-20 youth that does not make the boys look and sound like air-headed balls of libidinous ego preoccupied with fashioning obscenities into a monument to the generation?  And guys actually have, wha'dya-call'em, "feelings?  This, my friends, is a daring movie.  Oh, this is rare. And what a breath of fresh air. Greg Mottola, the director who made the admirably funny and decent quality "Superbad," now gives us the continuously amusing romance comedy "Adventureland" in which things happen because, in the ingenious way in which the situations unfold, they have to happen. They just grow naturally out of  a virtual garden of fertile small conflicts.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Monsters Vs Aliens&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2166848</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2166848</guid>
<pubDate>Thu, 02 Apr 2009 13:16:05 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Dazzling action for the kids, easy plot to follow, appealing monsters. Frankly, though, except for the sexy 50-foot tall heroine of Barbie-like proportions and the longest legs in the known universe, nothing really much for adults.   The film's action motif is high-ratcheted stuff, with every motive apparently directed to very short attention spans. The scale is kept grand, the goals simple.  The general concept imagination level is not impressive.  Dialogue is primarily for the tots, with just a few gratuitous references at adult level.  One gets the distinct sense that at the scripting level, nobody really tried very hard at this.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Duplicity&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2129623</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2129623</guid>
<pubDate>Wed, 25 Mar 2009 09:35:53 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Smart. Very smart. Indeed, it is so sophisticated, loaded with mazes of mazes of plot turns and dazzling wit that, y' know, you may not even like it. I'll observe that if you truly comprehend and follow every scene, you're at major league level rocket scientist level. It is best, you realize after a bit, if you just let it all flow as long as you understand what the key characters' basic motivations are. "Who was that?" and "What's s/he mean by that?" are just too complex to deal with continuously. To make matters even more challenging, time periods are mixed freely, although captions do advise you as to when you are where you are. Roberts and Owen are absolutely electric together, drawing, repelling equal and opposite energies, radiating a crackling romance undertone. Their dialogue is so peppery and provocative that you're just handling one retort when two more overwhelm you. At the same time, the sizzling dynamic of corporate greed chillingly overruns the schemes.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Knowing&quot;  Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2129610</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2129610</guid>
<pubDate>Wed, 25 Mar 2009 08:27:17 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Just don't bother to analyze it or let your cynical sense get in your way and this is a darn good sci-fi film. Just when you thought you'd seen the most dazzling apocalyptic special effects of all, here goes Hollywood ratcheting them up again. But the film very efficiently and competently picks up on its quirky hook about a large set of cosmically derived numbers which forecast disasters and goes on to build some solid suspense all the way up to its supercharged ending. For an experience that turns out to be an almost spiritually grandiose concept of how and where we're headed in a uniquely splendiferous, gargantuan final scenario that'll leave you in a shock spellbound state, I will very much recommend this.]]></description>
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<title>Race to Witch Mountain</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2107549</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2107549</guid>
<pubDate>Thu, 19 Mar 2009 08:38:48 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Good family fun with almost non-stop action.  And most of the time it actually works at many levels.           Brazenly starring a 12-year-old boy and girl as space aliens in order to help market the film, "Race to Witch Mountain" has enough time-tested Walt Disney technique and basic content to make it a very manageable family sci-fi flick. Saturated with big-scale EFX and demolition derbies, much of it is almost monotonously repetitive in tone. There is fantasy, magic, telekinesis, molecular manipulation and all the usual inconsistencies of supernatural power manipulation.               ]]></description>
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<title>The Last House on the Left</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2107534</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2107534</guid>
<pubDate>Thu, 19 Mar 2009 08:31:28 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA["The Last House on the Left" is a recollection of horrormeister Wes Craven and Sean Cunningham's 1972 film that launched a grisly genre of fright flicks for the next generation. The Craven film was an ugly theme of kidnapping and sadistic rape which subsequently set off  filmmakers' imaginations, giving birth to slashing and bodily mutilation galore in near-future movies.        ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Watchmen&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/2073162</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/2073162</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 10 Mar 2009 09:29:52 -0500</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Grandly eloquent, gruesomely grisly and breathtakingly spectacular in what it wants to say, but clumsy and amateurish in its wrap-up.       The much anticipated "Watchmen" deserves a lot more artistic accolade than the knee-jerk criticisms are allowing it. It is, quite frankly, the most wildly ambitious comic book expression on the big screen ever, superior to "Dark Knight," "Sin City" and other attempts. Measured in terms of sheer creative input and explosive output, it absolutely had me hypnotized by its total audio-visual force all the way up to an ending that you can easily see is sputtering badly, headed for an unstoppable letdown in intelligence and imagination.            ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Confessions of a Shopaholic&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1994869</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1994869</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 17 Feb 2009 15:53:13 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Hey, I kinda liked this. One of the chickiest chick flicks I've ever seen, I'll not go with the critical community which is generally calling it air-headed and valueless.          Uh-uh.  What I liked about "Confessions of a Shopaholic" is, first of all, the overwhelmingly, effervescent and infectiously sparkly. Isla Fisher who does a full-capacity performance in an ambitious film that roams and romps over the high-end Manhattan magazine publication and journalism world in substance and style that keeps you on-edge, off-edge and almost always smiling.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The International&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1994781</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1994781</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 17 Feb 2009 15:39:30 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Y'know, in a movie, you can have stakes set so high that they're insurmountable. This sort of thing deprives it of suspense. But if Clive Owen is your hero, it can work modestly.          So how about a bloody -- really bloody (you know, like when they gush blood long after they're dead) -- world class shoot-out in Manhattan's Guggenheim Museum in which a dozen or so shooters are all armed with the Israeli Uzi (the sequence was entirely staged on a massive, re-creation in an old railway roundhouse in Berlin).  Sure, that's just fine, but what's the plot here?  ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Coraline&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1969370</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1969370</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 10 Feb 2009 13:43:16 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Animation visual imagination of the first magnitude!  Terrific.  And, one with an irresponsible rating as PG. Watch out, parents.  I am not being facetious when I say that "Coraline" should most definitely be rated R. Seriously, your kids may come away with a whole batch of persistent nightmares. They may be set up for therapy bills in later life. This is not the way kid entertainment should be.      ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Revolutionary Road&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1969333</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1969333</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 10 Feb 2009 13:21:45 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Emotionally violent, relentlessly probing, "Revolutionary Road" is a tenaciously gripping movie. Its performances are sculpted perfection.       That is, depending on whether you have any kind of memory of, or understanding of, the particular new American society of the early 1950s. That important, but not indispensable, element is one reason why the film has been in only limited release, there being some doubts as to audience numbers. Yet another is that this is a boldly offbeat entry which relies, to an audacious degree, on conversation almost alone.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Taken&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1943662</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1943662</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 03 Feb 2009 10:44:38 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Yes, it's absurd. But gosh, is it ever fun absurd! Give it an 8 out of 10 just because it has lots of intelligence and breathtaking action along with its Hollywood-nutsy thrill rides and constant, pulsating rhythm that just won't let you find peace, or, given the plot's urgencies, even caring about it.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;New in Town&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1943689</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1943689</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 03 Feb 2009 10:29:16 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Rene Zellweger, what are you doing -- and why?     You can't handle, and are not constituted to portray, this kind of role in "New in Town."        In ever-more-absurdist Hollywood tradition, here goes yet another of those wearisome long-hackneyed cliches about how city slickers are bad and small town hicks are all wonderful.  It might even have settled in as a tolerably sweet confection with a less effusive star, although why any would sign on to this automatic setback to their career is unclear.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Uninvited&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1943675</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1943675</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 03 Feb 2009 10:28:40 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[So ordinary at first that it's painful, and so ho-hum through its midsection, it surprisingly manages to explode into welling suspense and one heck of a supercharged twist at the end, one you'd never expect, granting it some semblance of rescue.       A film that has remarkably little original or inventive, is annoyingly flat in its forward movement, "The Uninvited" allows itself some serviceable dialogue over most of its time and is gratifyingly clear of most horror film cliches.You'll be forgiven for random yawns and occasional wonderment as to why this movie wants you to be there.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Inkheart&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1915552</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1915552</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 27 Jan 2009 08:51:20 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Lotta detail.  Little involvement.  Fun to watch. So easy to forget. In "Inkheart," a wildly ambitious fairy tale fantasy, a lot of people move around among a lot of objects and things, threatening each other, victimizing, controlling and, each time they do that, we're left with a shrug. Not that it hasn't been neat to watch. This film is just bristling with flawlessly done special effects, endless and countless.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Wrestler&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1915543</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1915543</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 27 Jan 2009 08:49:35 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Wow. Imaginative cinema art, garishly virile sport, red-blooded personalities of the first magnitude.  Yes, go for this, an uncommonly dramatic movie with jolting power of personality. A film of advanced megawattage in its energy, sure of its film technique, it frankly forsakes any profound plot and instead creates a story made up of crackling images and vibrant individuals, not events, although those events are done up with the most creative audio-visual power.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Frost Nixon&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1915527</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1915527</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 27 Jan 2009 08:45:27 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Tight, compact history in riveting, magnetic interactions. For viewers who don't care about Richard Nixon?  Yes. Fascinating.  "Frost/Nixon" is, plainly speaking, daring, innovative and mesmerizing.  Daring, I say, because it's very much a talky movie. It dares to rely on powerful, conflicting personalities to generate screen voltage. For two hours.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Defiance&quot; Film Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1892124</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1892124</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 20 Jan 2009 13:22:22 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Mercifully, the sentimentality is slight and forgivable. More importantly, however, is the natural suspense and tension that fires up organically between people facing life-and-death crises. It is the cruelty in people's choices of resolving problems between them -- and, indeed, their failure to own the fact that a choice is precisely what it is -- that is so moving.  There are the details of family and community as individuals are faced with horrendous decisions of survival even as they are hunted down like beasts.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Last Chance Harvey&quot; Film Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1892109</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1892109</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 20 Jan 2009 13:21:18 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Hollywood has plodded for so long and so ineffectually in the matter of middle-age and older-age romance that it now takes two of filmdom's most eloquent and theatrically beautiful players to get the chemistry together and do it. "Last Chance Harvey," the film, is not flawless but it is eminently honest, wonderfully satisfying to behold in the integrity of its two stars, and a joy to watch. We are talking here about two movie stars who are fine-tuned like two concert violinists picking up and interpreting each other's vibes instantaneously.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Bride Wars&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1866589</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1866589</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 13 Jan 2009 08:53:09 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Silly slapstick meets sloppy and shrill comedy. What you see is all you get from this less-than-skin-deep insult to modern femaledom. Indeed, "Bride Wars" is the first chick flick that immediately and totally rules out even the tiniest male interest and spreads its premise so thin, with such empty characters, that the entire screen space and vibration is left to squeals of "Oh, my God!" (several dozen of those).      ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Gran Torino&quot; Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1866580</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1866580</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 13 Jan 2009 08:32:05 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Here is Clint Eastwood, at 78, again the manly man who needs no feats of physical strength to vibrate masculinity.  And his film itself? No need for modern styling, pounding close-ups and manipulative pacing for today's limited attention-span audiences.  No. He owns every scene.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Valkyrie&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1824385</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1824385</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 29 Dec 2008 15:18:25 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[In "Valkyrie," one of history's most famous assassination attempts is celebrity-ized, thus diverting it from its intended impact. The film is continually running its story, in all of its strategies, tactics and anxieties, its heroism, fright and courageous individuals, with its brakes on. For although Tom Cruise performs dutifully, he is without the full subtlety of unique personality force required. And since he is critically deficient in conveying this brave man's inner force -- he's much more Cruise than Stauffenberg -- our attention, again and again, regresses to the actor, not the character.  Tom's not projecting on this one, just being the actor.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Bedtime Stories&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1824417</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1824417</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 29 Dec 2008 13:54:38 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Hey, cool job, Adam Sandler.  We all knew you wanted this change. You got it, man.  A really amusing, lotsa laughs, imaginative movie for any age.  And just shrug off all the national critics on this; they're missing the point.      "Bedtime Stories' is just plain fun.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Marley &amp; Me&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1824413</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1824413</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 29 Dec 2008 13:53:00 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A fairly harmless tearjerker for doggie-lovers, "Marley and Me" has virtually no romantic intrigue or other conflicts, therefore no discernible drama. Its humor is generic, not clever but workable, its emotional values superficial but easily accepted, all surrounding the 13-year dog life.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Spirit&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1824396</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1824396</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 29 Dec 2008 13:51:33 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Can camp and caricatures get tiresome?  Well, yeah, they can, if that's all there is.  "The Spirit" shows that not all comic strips translate well to the big screen.  But Frank Miller's attempt at throwing the late great Will Eisner's The Spirit onto the screen is never as large as its artwork tries to make it. His "Sin City" or a few years ago was genius; The Spirit is less so.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Curious Case of Benjamin Button&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1824392</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1824392</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 29 Dec 2008 13:51:20 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Nationally,  "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" is getting a score, on the basis of 100 to 0, scores of 100 down to 25, "A timeless masterpiece" to "Unbearably excruciating." I tend toward the latter. Director David Fincher overindulges himself. In this understandably long, long story, he nonetheless continuously loses a sense of priority as to which scenes need longer times. As a result, so, so many scenes dwell on the screen way beyond their point.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Yes Man&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1810200</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1810200</guid>
<pubDate>Wed, 24 Dec 2008 22:56:05 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Fabulous idea but, for the talents of Jim Carrey, not nearly up to his capacity.      "Yes Man,"  which essentially suggests that saying yes to everybody and everything every time is bound to get funny results, forgets that the immense comic potential of Carey does nonetheless need situations with critical mass, that is, powder keg ingredients.  Lots of them.  His "Liar, Liar" had them. This doesn't. It surely evokes many a chuckle but Carrey isn't about chuckles; he's about raucous bellylaughs.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Seven Pounds&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1810192</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1810192</guid>
<pubDate>Wed, 24 Dec 2008 22:54:50 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A melancholic story that doesn't seem to know how to be a film. Never, in fact, has so long a screen time been taken to say so little.          "Seven Pounds" is a mournful, unmoving movie which does indeed have a plot but which also does indeed flop almost totally for lack of emotional draw. In a word, it's just plain uninteresting. Royally so. Its dramatic devices are not only as old as the hills but it seems to be ashamed of exploiting their potential.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Slumdog Millionaire&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1810188</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1810188</guid>
<pubDate>Wed, 24 Dec 2008 22:53:44 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Let's just say that as far as motion picture drama goes, this is total drama. It is far beyond anything you have ever seen before. It will be a landmark movie experience for you  -- a classic.       "Slumdog millionaire" has picked up considerable acclaim countrywide, all totally deserved.  Shot in Mumbai and Maharastra, India on an unlimited budget, it absolutely stuns you right from the opening frame with its megawatt-plus dynamics, in a sense, starting out on after-burners then blasting beyond. Oh, yeah, you say in knee-jerk response, I know, another of those stylistic visual dazzlers.  No, you don't know.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;The Day the Earth Stood Still&quot; Movie Review</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1784846</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1784846</guid>
<pubDate>Wed, 17 Dec 2008 16:02:05 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Good message.  Clumsily handled.  Compared to the unforgettable 1951 classic on which it's  based: Forgettable. Eminently watchable for its gorgeous special effects, the  spectacular new "The Day the Earth Stood Still" is a dumbed-down re-make gussied up in digital magic.  Hey, give it its due:  it's very absorbing in spots.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Nobel Son&quot; Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1762141</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1762141</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 09 Dec 2008 13:37:43 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Too fast with its fury, too laborious with its logic.  "Nobel Son" is a bit of a mess. Its most glaring failing is in its rash moves toward action thrills which need as their launching pads a much more deliberative plot development. That is, they're too soon, too sensational. Not organic, just overt. And when those action capers run into the film's obsessive twists, they do so without really clear reasoning.]]></description>
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<title>Rachel Getting Married Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1754862</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1754862</guid>
<pubDate>Fri, 05 Dec 2008 13:53:28 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Rapid-fire, many-leveled anger and raging recriminations fuel a well-oiled pre-wedding rocky relationships film guaranteed to keep you as as uneasy as you will be fascinated. To call "Rachel Getting Married" a high mark in provocative wedding films can easily be justified. ]]></description>
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<title>Transporter 3 - Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1736036</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1736036</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:26:48 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Dumb but fun, over the top with never a stop, super-duper thriller "Transporter 3" is one long caricature of everything and everybody it touches. Some of its derring-do gives new meaning to "ridiculous." And as to Jason Stratham's Frank Martin who's being compared to Daniel Craig's James Bond, he's got the bod but not the face. A partially balding nondescript can't really compete with large high cheekbones.]]></description>
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<title>Four Christmases - Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1736023</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1736023</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:21:59 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Well, if Christmas is not a holiday for the family, then what is it?  Pretty dismal, says "Four Christmases" and so is the movie, a futile effort at designing family dysfunction as a normal part of our complex society.  It's saturated with slapped together, bumped-up inanities guaranteed to change cheers to jeers.]]></description>
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<title>Australia - The Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1736010</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1736010</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:18:28 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Lotta courage here. It took moxie, daring and dedication to produce a two-and-a-half hour film saga set in Australia which, very deliberately, has all the sentimentality, ideal romance, plainspoken heroism, Aboriginal spiritualism, fantasy ending and flavor of the old-timey Western. And one of its recurring themes is the music and even Judy Garland visuals from "The Wizard of Oz."  And now throw in the climax, the Japanese bombardment of Northern Australia on February 19, 1942.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;What Just Happened&quot; Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1716822</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1716822</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:03:45 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Not hilarious, but it's definitely dry humor at a sophisticated level. And the subject matter is delicious. It's been said that after all financing, technical, directorial, casting, editing, film politics and personalities are taken into account, it is a miracle that any motion picture film ever gets completed and released. ]]></description>
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<title>The Boy in the Striped Pajamas Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1716806</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1716806</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:02:28 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA["The Boy in the Striped Pajamas" presents itself as an 8-year-old boy's viewpoint, but the level of the story treatment is, a bit disconcertingly, that of an adult. Yet this very unusual Holocaust tale tenaciously holds to a slowly welling suspense. ]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Bolt&quot; Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1716795</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1716795</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:00:14 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA["Bolt," playing in 3-D in some theaters, will also keep parents reasonably amused. It's devoid of any special new style. Rather, this is yet another talking animal animation movie with ultimately flawless technique, if not the Pixar Studio productions finesse. Its action is so smooth and real.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;Twilight&quot; Movie</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1716774</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1716774</guid>
<pubDate>Tue, 25 Nov 2008 10:38:58 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[Vampires lite.  A teenage chick flick. What director Catherine Hardwicke is dealing with here, or is trying to, is how teenage girls' rising and directionless sexuality would confront a handsome, mentally tortured vampire teenage boy.  I won't even make an attempt at commenting on how effective that is in the movie. But I rather believe that teenage girl audiences will have to read their own meanings into this.]]></description>
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<title>The Secret Life of Bees</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1687718</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1687718</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 17 Nov 2008 16:01:32 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A moving theme in a largely unmoving film. The book on which it's based must have been so much bigger.     You can laud the beauty of emotional values in a movie endlessly, but most of us just want to be entertained. Emotions in themselves are inside of each of us; a good movie is supposed to take you over, to own you, and so to draw those emotions out.  Once there, its emotions are your emotions.  ]]></description>
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<title>Max Payne</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1687777</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1687777</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 17 Nov 2008 16:00:25 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[The rating was changed from R (rightfully) to PG-13 when the production's marketing dept. realized that the only likely audience for this is teenagers. It's actually well into the R range for ugly violence.          This is a real shame for Mark Wahlberg who is totally wasted in a highly intelligence-challenging film of shooting effects and a monotonous atmosphere.  Also, Wahlberg should never be given humorless roles.]]></description>
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<title>How to Lose Friends and Alienate People</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1687769</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1687769</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 17 Nov 2008 15:59:45 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[This is a comedy without a personality.  The substance is there, the plot is there. But the will to entertain is not. Basically, the movie has little emotional direction. For involvement, you feel an ongoing void.]]></description>
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<title>Body of Lies</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1687725</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1687725</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 17 Nov 2008 15:58:57 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A Middle East spy thriller tense without suspense.  That is, until the end.  A film highly attuned to current events in the region, its personalities, poignant dialog and compelling mean streets and grand desert vistas dominate an only moderately interesting plot.  Urgency, sometimes mortal, being the driving force over all the interactions, the constant interactions between individuals who trust not a word the other is saying generate electricity that draws you in by short and  long arcs. With deftly chosen scripting of the words of each key character, you can be riveted.]]></description>
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<title>Beverly Hills Chihuahua</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1687751</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1687751</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 17 Nov 2008 15:58:13 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[The real eye-opener in "Beverly Hills Chihuahua" is the astonishing perfection in the talking animal technique, something which in itself is a marvel to behold. This does allow adults and animals to circulate within their own realities seamlessly, virtually giving the animals equal, if not greater, life and spirit. And importance. This being accepted, it's now up to the plot, with equal energy coming from human and nonhuman.]]></description>
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<title>Appaloosa - Current Film</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1687742</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1687742</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 17 Nov 2008 15:57:20 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[In this old-timey Western, here are two well-togged roving lawmen, Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch (Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen). They're fancy types, these two, and reckon as how they might not shine up to being called guns for hire.  Well now, here they are moseyin' into a little New Mexico town right after the local marshal and two of his deputies have been gunned down by gang leader Randall Bragg (Jeremy Irons). Bragg has in mind the total control of a major part of the territory.]]></description>
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<title>&quot;W&quot; Currently Playing</title>
<link>http://EzineArticles.com/1687694</link>
<guid>http://EzineArticles.com/1687694</guid>
<pubDate>Mon, 17 Nov 2008 15:55:38 -0600</pubDate>
<description><![CDATA[A powerful story about a very sad man. A tragic man who dragged his country down into that tragedy. This is one totally, relentlessly fascinating movie.
]]></description>
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