Deep Something

Clareece “Precious” Jones is an overweight, illiterate African-American teen in Harlem. Just as she’s about to give birth to her second child, Jones is accepted into an alternative school where a teacher helps her find a new path in her life. It’s still not a fun film to watch, but it’s worth watching to see real struggles protrayed in such an authentic story by excellent actors who nail their parts.

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Jeff Bridges stars in this drama based on Thomas Cobb’s first novel about an alcoholic country singer. The musician’s career is going downhill as he watches his protégé’s star ascend, but his encounters with a journalist might just keep him from hitting rock bottom. This one was worth the ticket price, and Jeff Bridges gives a well-deserved Oscar Winning performance.

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After becoming the first woman to fly across the Atlantic, Amelia was thrust into a new role as America’s sweetheart – the legendary “goddess of light,” known for her bold, larger-than-life charisma. Yet, even with her global fame solidified, her belief in flirting with danger and standing up as her own, outspoken woman never changed. Lay and I were both disappointed with this one.

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Based on two true stories, “Julie & Julia” intertwines the lives of two women who, though separated by time and space, are both at loose ends until they discover that with the right combination of passion, fearlessness and butter, anything is possible.It’s not the movie of the year, but Streep and Adams and outstanding, and all the supporting characters are excellent. The screen play is very interesting, and the two stories are woven together nicely. This is is a movie well worth watching.

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Susie Salmon, a young girl who has been murdered, watches over her family — and her killer — from heaven. She must weigh her desire for vengeance against her desire for her family to heal. Lay and I watched this several weeks ago. I really wanted to like it, and while there was good tension, I was overall disappointed.

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When a priest is murdered in Boston, the MacManus brothers abandon their secluded life in Ireland to look into the case. Don’t let the lack of promotion for “Boondock Saints 2″ fool you. The plot picks up in Ireland where brothers Connor (Sean Patrick Flannery) and Murphy (Norman Reedus) McManus are hiding out after the events of the last movie. A priest shot in Boston, in the same style the brothers are known for, makes them the prime suspects. Writer/ director Troy Duffy is going for the old-school Charles Bronson-style vigilante movie, and achieves something pretty close to that.

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What happens when the people we count on to hold us together are barely holding it together themselves? Henry Carter is a psychiatrist with an A-list clientele, including a once-famous actress, an insecure young writer, and a comically obsessive-compulsive super agent. Henry is not in a good place, however. Watch it but don’t expect too much.

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Welcome to Adventureland, where the worst job imaginable is about to inadvertently turn into the summer that changes everything. Adventureland, a self-professedly “funtastic” Pennsylvania amusement park, appears to be the bane of recent college graduate’s James Brennan’s existence. He previously had big plans to spend the summer on a life-altering trek through Europe that would initiate him into real adult life. But when his family suffers an economic downturn in the middle of the Reagan 80s, James’ only summer trip is straight to a minimum wage job manning a game booth so existentially bankrupt, no one is even allowed to win the giant stuffed panda. Yet, Adventureland isn’t quite what it seems on the surface. And the movie itself, while very good, is not what you expect based on the marketing.

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Once the high school cheerleading captain who dated the quarterback, Rose Lorkowski now finds herself a thirty something single mother working as a maid. Her sister Norah is still living at home with their dad Joe, a salesman with a lifelong history of ill-fated get rich quick schemes. Desperate to get her son into a better school, Rose persuades Norah to go into the crime scene clean-up business with her to make some quick cash. Lay and I both agreed it is probably the best film we’ve seen recently.

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This is the story of “E” Easy Company, 506th Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division from their initial training starting in 1942 to the end of World War II. They parachuted behind enemy lines in the early hours of D-Day in support of the landings at Utah beach, participated in the liberation of Carentan and again parachuted into action during Operation Market Garden. They also liberated a concentration camp and were the first to enter Hitler’s mountain retreat in Berchtesgarten. A fascinating tale of comradeship that is, in the end, a tale of ordinary men who did extraordinary things. Worth everyone of it’s 705 minutes.

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We watched this movie on DVD last night. Liam Neeson, as “Bryan Mills,” reminded me of Denzel Washington’s role in “Man On Fire.” In that film, Washington played a relentless-and-brutal bodyguard who did what he had to do to get kidnapped Dakota Fanning back to her parents.

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A posting a couple of weeks ago by a friend on Facebook reminded me that I had failed to write a review of the movie Frost/Nixon which Lay and I watched as an Amazon download nearly a month ago. I thoroughly recommend this film.

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Ben Thomas is an IRS agent (?) with a fateful secret who embarks on an extraordinary journey of redemption by forever changing the lives of seven strangers.

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Theater director Caden Cotard is mounting a new play. His life catering to suburban blue-hairs at the local regional theater in Schenectady, New York is looking bleak. His wife Adele has left him to pursue her painting in Berlin, taking their young daughter Olive with her. His therapist, Madeleine Gravis, is better at plugging her best-seller than she is at counseling him. A new relationship with the alluringly candid Hazel has prematurely run aground. Worried about the transience of his life, he leaves his home behind. He gathers an ensemble cast into a warehouse in New York City, hoping to create a work of brutal honesty. Worth watching, but be prepared to have to think. I’m still trying to decipher the meaning of the burning house.

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Detective Dave Robicheaux is trying to link the murder of a local hooker to New Orleans mobster Julie Balboni. But during his investigation Robicheaux is led into a series of surreal encounters with a troop of Confederate soldiers.

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When a sudden plague of blindness devastates a city, a small group of the afflicted band together to triumphantly overcome the horrific conditions of their imposed quarantine.

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The story of Jamal Malik, an 18 year-old orphan from the slums of Mumbai, who is about to experience the biggest day of his life. With the whole nation watching, he is just one question away from winning a staggering 20 million rupees on India’s “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?” But when the show breaks for the night, police arrest him on suspicion of cheating; how could a street kid know so much? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the story of his life in the slum where he and his brother grew up, of their adventures together on the road, of vicious encounters with local gangs, and of Latika, the girl he loved and lost. I know I’ll be taken to the wood shed by some, so let me get this over with right away. I don’t think it was the best picture of the year.

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Archie Bunker meets Dirty Harry: Walt Kowalski is a widower, grumpy, tough-minded, borderline-hateful, unhappy old man who can’t get along with either his kids or his neighbors, a Korean War veteran whose prize possession is a 1973 Gran Torino he keeps in cherry condition. When his neighbor Tao, a young Hmong teenager, tries to steal his Gran Torino, Kowalski sets out to reform the youth. Drawn against his will into the life of Tao’s family, Kowalski is soon taking steps to protect them form the gangs that foul their neighborhood. It’s worth seeing, just wait until it is out on video.

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Randy “The Ram” Robinson, a 1980s-era pro wrestler, has become a burnt-out shell of his former self. After he has a heart attack during a small-time match, a doctor tells him he could die if he fights again. In an effort to build a new life, Robinson takes a job at a deli, But the prospect of a rematch with his old nemesis, the Ayatollah, proves too tempting to resist, even if it means risking his life.

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A tragic tale of an Asian youth’s gang life in South East Los Angeles, set during the mid 80’s to the early 90s.

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