Sherlock Holmes (2009)

Despite my feelings about The Lovely Bones' failings, I wish more adaptations were as freewheeling as this one. Sherlock Holmes, as you know him, probably isn't close to what Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote anyway. Deerstalker and calabash pipe? Never. Boxing? Why yes, Watson did describe Holmes as an "expert" boxer.

It seems as though screenwriters Michael Robert Johnson, Anthony Peckham, and Simon Kinberg combed through Doyle's stories for the best quips and least used traits (beyond the obvious, of course) and tried to tackle the character from a fresh angle. Since they have Robert Downey Jr. in the role, it worked. I hope nothing ever happens to that wildly expressive face. How does he get emotions to travel as currents under the surface of his skin? He can hold an expression for a ghost of a second, and you feel it yet never feel the work. It's extraordinary.

But I think my feelings about Downey are (too?) well documented at this point (no, seriously. He makes a basket case whose neuroses are only held at bay by mysteries and cocaine look like fun), so let's move on to Jude Law, as this movie made me like him again. This is the first role I've seen him in since . . . forever? that didn't rely on or even make reference to his looks as a part of his character. Instead they slapped a mustache on there and let him go to town, and it's lovely town to visit. His Watson is lithe, elegant, and precise but with a rough and dangerous edge. Watching the two of them together -- arguing over a vest, walking through evidence, or even sitting at home with their shirt sleeves rolled up -- casts such warmth that it's hard not to want to curl up in their scenes.

Despite their chemistry, the movie isn't all fun, games, and hotties. It's slow to get moving, a farting dog is used as a punchline, Mark Strong is underused, and Kelly Reilly has too much dark eye make up on (what? A lot of dark eye make up on light-haired ladies makes me think the character is evil because you see two black pits where the eyes should be, and Mary isn't evil). While the movie is more interested in building a franchise than telling the story at hand at certain points, the plot is decent, and director Guy Ritchie obviously put the emphasis on fun. It worked. Now if I can only find an opportunity to remark, "Now that we have a firm grasp of the obvious" or yell, "No girl wants to marry a doctor who can't tell if a man's dead or not!", that would be ideal. B+

Sidebar: Down with advertising campaign! Pretty much every scene you've sees of Rachel McAdams in the ads is not in the movie. She's great in the scenes she does get, but that's not the point.

Pop Culture Round Up: January 16 - 22

On Language - Movie Misquotations

Valery Gergiev slows the tempo

American Library Association presents kids lit awards

'Drag Me to Hell' for best picture?

Billy Baldwin Is Serena's Home-Wrecking Father on Gossip Girl

Marc Webb to direct 'Spider-Man'

Twilight graphic novel set for March

Bafta nominations pitch Avatar against An Education and The Hurt Locker

Why we love TV's anti-heroes

The Lovely Bones (2009)

My Book vs. Film came out today, but it's not one of my long, detailed ones (phew?). It's more in line with Time Traveler's Wife, under a 1000 words because I have so little to say. When the credits rolled, I remarked to one of my viewing companions that I felt like I saw half a movie.

I wonder how I would feel if I wasn't familiar with and attached to the source material. I read it years ago during a period of unemployment when I was devouring books. Best of all, all I knew about the book was that it was popular and well liked by a handful of my peers. I knew nothing about the plot, and, since I'm not much of a book jacket reader either, I was completely surprised and shocked by what followed. Moreover, there are bits that have stuck with me over the years: Lindsey borrows something from Susie's closet to wear to the memorial service, but it was something that Susie had borrowed from her best friend Clarissa, who opens her mouth to say something but decides against it. There are other, more germane to the plot elements of the book that I remember as well (including the metaphysical WTF that appears late in the story), but things like that -- the details that don't need to be included -- are what make books memorable and reading worthwhile.

I mentioned in the book vs. film Mark Wahlberg's hyper-earnest performance, which is a drag, but not Stanley Tucci's, which is so over the top that I briefly wondered if it were a joke. To be honest, there's not a lot of sense and coherence behind the casting of the adult characters. Rachel Weisz is underused (I really feel like she could sell me on why Abigail leaves, but the movie doesn't give her a voice), and Grandma Lynn is so reduced that Susan Sarandon (great though she is) comes off as misplaced.

Saoirse Ronan, on the other hand, is so expressive and available as an actress that it's impossible to imagine anyone else in a role once she inhabits it. She's funny and beautiful as Susie, and you just want to give her a hug long before anything happens to her. If the entire movie were Ronan, the quietly strong Rose McIver, the sensitive Carolyn Dando, and the impossibly adorable Reece Ritchie, it might have been something. The rare moments of emotional impact (Susie's attack, Lindsey's break-in) are so few and far between and the rest of the movie so fussed over, that it doesn't live up to the promise of its star. C

Pop Culture Round Up: January 9 - 15

“Oh, I’m chasing this guy? No, he’s chasing me.” 34 essential uses of voiceover in film
Knowing my opinion of voiceovers, this list contains a few of my favourites.

U.K. Unveils First-Ever Double Prince Portrait!
So cute!

Marilyn Manson has proposed to his actress girlfriend Evan Rachel Wood
WTF? What happened the last summer's rumour that she was banging the Viking?

Watching TV shortens life span, study finds
I'm effed.

Spider-Man 4 Unravels as Franchise Moves On Without Tobey Maguire, Sam Raimi
At first I was annoyed, but I've started to come up with some pretty cool reboot ideas.

UseMyAccent Helps Actors Talk Like an Egyptian

Mystery at the Philharmonic: Who Was That Clarinetist?

Jeff Bridges's 10 greatest performances
Everyone's going to pick The Dude, but what about Seabiscuit?

Depp gets life-sized statue in Serbia

Anxious or sexually competitive? Try God

James Cameron rejects claims Avatar epic borrows from Russians' sci-fi novels
But what about Pocahontas?

Daybreakers (2009)

Daybreakers should be exactly the kind of palate-cleansing fluffy actioner that comes out in January. For large swaths, it is. Unfortunately, it's also a metaphor about dwindling resources that never quite gets out of the gate.

A 2009 plague has turned the vast majority of Earth's human population into vampires, and, by 2019, the world is on the brink of devastating blood shortage (by extermination the human race). Chief Hematologist Edward Dalton (Ethan Hawke) has been tasked with finding a suitable blood substitute, but he gets caught up with a group of rebel humans (led by Willem Dafoe and Claudia Karvan) first. Turns out they have something better on offer: a cure.

Yes, twin writer-director team Michael and Peter Spierig, the world needed another golden-eyed vampire named Edward who doesn't drink human blood and wants to be human again and (maybe) falls for a brown haired lady. Okay, he's not really like that Edward. I just found it momentarily distracting.

Though the vampires are actually kind of pathetic (aside from arresting the aging process and accelerated healing, they have no special abilities to speak of. At only ten years on, immortality's not even guaranteed) and the dialogue, particularly Dafoe's, is often ridiculous, it works out. The filmmakers hosted a contest on Worth1000 to come up with the design for a world were vampires ruled, resulting in a sleek, modern 1930s twist (not unlike personal Hawke fav Gattaca), and it's filled to the brim with cool ideas about how such a world would work: specially tinted windows and small cameras allow vampires to drive in daylight and see themselves without mirrors, the subwalk connects the city for easy pedestrian travel, blood is treated like cream for coffee.

But for all this, there's little actual thrill or action to suspend the viewer in this world, and many of the connections between characters aren't drawn well enough to keep the viewer's attention there either (though one fight between Edward and his brother Michael Dorman smarted). Still, it's awfully cool to think about. And did I mention that when the vampires are staked, they explode? C+

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009)

It's a rare movie that manages to have a completely understandable plot and still make next to no sense.

Here's what I get: a millennium ago, Mr. Nick (Tom Waits) showed up at Doctor Parnassus's (Christopher Plummer) monastery, where the monks continually tell the eternal story because the universe would cease to exist if they didn't. Nick stops them from telling the story, and the universe continues to exist, but it doesn't sway the good doctor's faith. Nick makes Parnassus a bet: first one to 12 disciples wins. Parnassus gets immortality as a reward, which turns out to be a curse. 1000 years later, Parnassus falls in love with a young woman but can't woo her as a homeless old man. Nick strikes a new deal: Parnassus is young and more powerful than ever, and all he has to do give up any offspring at the age of 16. The woman and Parnassus are happy together for years until she's pregnant at 60 and dies in childbirth. Parnassus raises the girl, Valentina (Lily Cole), alone, and we join the story a few days before her 16th birthday, where she is part of Parnassus' traveling magic act, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, along with Anton (Andrew Garfield) and Percy (Verne Troyer). Nick shows up to make new bet: first one to five souls wins Valentina.

Pretty straightforward, right? I mean, magical and all that, but nothing you can't follow. But you may have read that whole thing and thought, "Wait, isn't this Heath Ledger's last movie? Didn't they hire three other dudes to also play him?" Yes, and I'm glad to tell you that with only a minor bit of re-writing by Gilliam and Charles McKeown, having Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell step in as Tony does make sense. Each time he enters the imaginarium (basically your imagination amplified so that you can walk into it), he does so with others, and thus must compete with their imaginations.

That part, surprisingly, is the part that makes sense. Everything else about Tony, particularly and mostly importantly to the story his motives, remains essentially unknowable. That's not a crack on Ledger's acting -- he plays Tony as unknowable and each of the other three actors tasked with taking up the part do manage to pick up elements of his performance and weave it into their own (though Law's, in particular, seems at first oddly hammy). But why Tony has to be such a mystery and why it must remain unsolved is as unclear as the character. Ledger's a slippery, charming con artist who seems equal parts self-serving and selfless with a rather unhealthy interest in a 16 year-old girl, and I had forgotten how fantastic his voice is. The whole thing -- light but rich -- makes his death feel unreal.

There are other details that don't entirely add up (why is Percy also an immortal?), but for everyone of those there are mitigating circumstances, like the delightful Garfield who absolutely shines as the put upon Anton or Cole, who's just the right amount of radiant to make everyone fall in love with her.

But I don't get it. The movie's in a class by itself: stunning to watch, utterly impossibly to comprehend. What's real? What's fake? What does it matter? Like the movie suggests, the story isn't critical. It's the telling.>B+

"They never have rat exhibits in the zoo. I could start a new trend!"

I normally find a quote that utilizes the month's theme, but it turns out that "liberation" quotes didn't go that well with my latest (Cult)ure article. It's a handy checklist to the trends behind the movies that defined the decade. It will also help explain why your favourite movies from 2000-2009 didn't make anyone's top of the decade list.

Also, I believe I forgot to tell you about the interview I did with writer-director David J. Garfield last month. Enjoy!

Pop Culture Round Up: January 4 - 8

It's not like I've been keep tabs over the holiday break.

The noughties in cinema

‘The Lexicographer’s Dilemma’ - Jack Lynch Explores English

Rule #1: 'If You Want To Be A Great Writer, Be A Man'

Baby-Sitters Club books to be revived

Christopher Lee to release 'symphonic metal' album

Villain dispute could delay Spider-Man 4

Vampires really are everywhere!

Alice Guy Blaché, Cinema Pioneer, at the Whitney Museum

In Praise of Infidelity

Heirs get settlement in dispute over Picassos

The Young Victoria (2009)

In a small way, Jean-Marc Vallée's The Young Victoria is the movie that Sophia Coppola thought she was making with Marie Antoinette. Both tell stories of young, independent-minded, and head-strong royals thrust to the throne when they were perhaps too young to rule. Of course, Kirsten Dunst's Antoinette was a naïve twit caught up in circumstances beyond her control, and Emily Blunt's Victoria is anything but. Nonetheless, both movies have a rock 'n' roll vibe to match their protagonist's youth and enthusiasm. With Coppola, it's literally the soundtrack, but Vallée somehow got it to pump through Blunt's veins.

Though it takes her uncle's (a delightfully loopy Jim Broadbent) death to break her free from her mother (Miranda Richardson) and her mother's comptroller's (Mark Strong) shackles, Blunt's Victoria is a passionate, sparkling, and willful queen, not at all what we've come to associate with the royal we. When Prime Minister Lord Melbourne (Paul Bettany) sets out to pull her under his spell, you almost worry for him.

Victoria, you see, has only one love, and it's the swooniest, most romantic love affair committed to celluloid in years. Victoria's cousin, Albert (Rupert Friend), is coached to win Victoria's heart at the behest of his uncle, King Leopold of Belgium (Thomas Kretschmann), but chafes at the notion. Shortly after meeting her, he stumbles in his charade and decides to try being himself instead. It works in no small part because Friend as Albert is one of the handsomest creatures you could ever lay eyes on. He's announced as His Serene Highness, and Friend took the cue for his performance from that title. Instead of a smouldering sex appeal meant to draw Victoria in like a magnet (surely what Melbourne had planned), Friend exudes intelligence, patience, and serenity, on the likes of which you could build a lifetime of love. Blunt and Friend glow when they are together.

Though screenwriter Julian Fellowes (who also gave us the glorious Gosford Park) takes some liberties with the history, he's also created one of the richest, most rewarding romances ever. The movie around them doesn't always shine the way they do, and its chess metaphor is a little too spelled out, but oh, well. The idea that Victoria had Albert's clothes laid out every day after his early death at the age of 42 used to strike me as daft, but now it's heartbreaking. A-

Invictus (2009)

Invictus is a rare movie that is wondrously more than the sum of its parts. You'd expect something directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon to be good, even great. Film starts rolling, and nothing spectacular happens. Every moment, every frame, every action feels obvious. Good for Freeman and Damon on the accents -- South African accents are notoriously tricky -- and that's about it, you start to think.

But much like Nelson Mandela's gamble that a symbolic victory could be just as valuable in healing his fractured nation as political policy, Eastwood's gamble on telling the story so straight it could slide into boring any second manages a rousing pay off.

Set in 1995, when Mandela apparently up and decided that winning the rugby World Cup would be great for South Africa even if their team was terrible, he called up Francois Pienaar and gave him just that job. And then they do. I really couldn't tell you how: they get a new coach who ensures that even if they're not the best team in the league they will surely be the fittest, but there's no indication that they develop a bunch of great new plays or become better at their positions. They just . . . try really hard? I don't know. I didn't even realize that they were playing the final match until after it was over.

Even so, it's nearly impossible not to be drawn in. It's not an underdog story so much as a story about people whose belief is so strong it can give the rest of us hope. Despite the rote filmmaking, that's enough to make the movie soar. B

Up in the Air (2009) and Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009)

I feel almost guilty about how much I dislike Up in the Air. I went into it initially thinking I might not like it, and perhaps that sent me down the wrong path. The performances are terrific, particularly Anna Kendrick, who was so funny in her one scene in New Moon, and now gets to chafe and struggle as a bright upstart confined by her work and her workplace. There's something about her you just want to love even when her character is maddening.

George Clooney and Vera Farminga are also lovely and positively glowing together. But this being co-writer and director Jason Reitman's third feature length film, I've noticed a pattern: Thank You for Smoking, Juno, and our current entry all have third act twists that don't line up with the movie that came before. There is one scene of foreshadowing, and poof! Massive character change! It's neither shocking nor realistic, so it ends up feeling empty. Change for change's sake, like someone in the editing room suddenly remembered that there should be a plot, and it should go somewhere.

There is the additional problem that -- and I know I'm going out on the limb here -- Clooney is miscast. He's not bad in the role in any way, so don't think that. He's great. It just that he's so convincingly satisfied with his life before his spiritual awakening, and his life is in no way made better after it that you are left with the feeling that maybe he was right all along. Maybe moving is living. Maybe this is a rebirth. Maybe . . . I don't know, exactly. The movie's ambiguous ending might just be the best part. B

It doesn't help that Wes Anderson's Fantastic Mr. Fox might just be the perfect deployment of Clooney. Three movies out this fall, and the one where he's an animated character from a Roald Dahl novel might be his best work ever. Somehow without the olde tyme good looks he's extra-charming, as well as vain, generous, loyal, cunning, smart, and sneaky. There's even a gentle waft of self-mockery. The whole thing just feels like so much fun.

Of course, it helps that the movie around him is so wonderful. The setting and colour palette might be autumnal, but the movie feels like a burst of refreshing springtime air. Anderson's fussy compositions get new life when filmed to deliberately resemble Rankin-Bass holiday specials (think Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer).

All the old Anderson cronies are there -- Owen Wilson, Jason Schwarztman, Bill Murray -- as well as delightful new voices like Meryl Streep's subdued take on Mrs. Fox. For a movie that had to be carefully fussed over to be created at all, Anderson achieves a magical sense of joy and freedom in his proceedings. Subsequent viewings may prove Fox his best film yet, but for now we'll have to agree that it's simply fantastic. A-

Pop Culture Round Up: December 12-18

Portman takes on Pride and Prejudice and Zombies film

Movie stars break the song barrier

A titanic duo: Gibson, DiCaprio join forces for Viking film
I refuse all Vikings that are not Eric.

Hollywood's missing 'Voice'

Are directors overrated? Filmmakers shed light on their real power

Portrait of a Multitasking Mind

Can Anybody Make a Movie for Women?

Pop Culture Round Up: November 21 - December 11

Progressive Detective: Am I socially obligated to get the flu shot?
Quick answer: yes.

Hip-Hop’s New Steps - Jerking
I thought jerking had been around for a long time . . .

Philip Glass on His Latest Opera, Kepler, and Where Music Meets Science

Magazine Publishers to Build an Online Newsstand

Thanksgiving box office record blown away despite absence of new hits

How do movie blurbs work?

Rogers launches Hulu clone

Is Loneliness Contagious?
But is it also underrated?

Coronation Street's Maggie Jones dies at 75
Sad! Can't imagine the show without Blanche.

Want To Get Your Audience Out Faster? Put Something In Their Way

Film composers lose luster
Enjoy variety while you can! They are gradually instituting a pay wall as of yesterday.

Dogs vs cats: The great pet showdown
Ooo, science to back up a preference!

Brothers (2009)

Tobey Maguire, Natalie Portman, and Jake Gyllenhaal are some of the best young actors you can working today. It's a shame for them that director Jim Sheridan and writer David Benioff's adaptation of the 2002 Danish source movie gives them so little to go on.

The movie's publicity campaign hasn't helped in the slightest. The trailer and TV spots give away so much of the movie's action and plot that there's little left to see. Of the two things that are left (what goes on between Portman and Gyllenhaal and what Maguire "had to do to get back"), only one of them actually happens.

The one that does happen, what Maguire did, occurs in the second act. You spend the rest of the movie knowing exactly what's going on with him, and it lends the movie exactly zero tension or drama. It's all very well acted and shot: Maguire's skin seems to barely contain a coiled intensity and sublimated grief that previous roles never so much as hinted at, and Sheridan's camera is sometimes so intimate that you feel compelled to look away from the screen.

Non-spoiler alert: nothing happens between Portman and Gyllenhaal. Their affair, if you want to call it that, is similar to the one in Cairo Time: an emotional bond develops, and its existence threatens other bonds. Again, Maguire just knocks it out, flailing against the thing he can see and knows is lost to himself without ever being able to come out and say exactly what it is. And, man, are he and Gyllenhaal phenomenal together on the screen. From the first barely heard interaction to the picnic table confrontation wherein Gyllenhaal can't bring himself to directly answer the questions he's been asked to their final climatic blow out, every note is right. And to see Gyllenhaal play someone so down trodden he can barely get his words out? Wow.

Portman is equally lovely, refusing to stand and gape in her grief, to make it a living thing. Sam Shepard, as the patriarch, and Carey Mulligan, as a fellow war widow, are so vivid in their lamentation that their screen time practically cuts.

All are under-served by a movie where nothing happens. There's a plot, to be sure, but it feels so empty and motionless that it only barely hints at a story. I've seen plenty of movies where nothing or next to nothing happens and that fact doesn't matter (e.g. Before Sunrise and Before Sunset), but Brothers is not one of those movies. It's a fantastic showcase for actors (particularly Shepard) and not much else. B

Pirate Radio (2009)

Pirate Radio's trailer would like to deceive you into thinking that it's about a ragtag crew of radio rockers and The Man (Kenneth Branagh, having the most fun I've possibly ever seen him have) trying to bring them down. It is about that, don't worry, but what the trailer fails to inform you is that it's also about Carl (Tom Sturridge), an adorable little moppet who gets kicked out of school, so his mom (Emma Thompson, briefly and fantastically) sends him to his godfather (Bill Nighy, at his most charismatic when he's at his most languid), who just so happens to own and operate a pirate radio ship. So in addition to pirate radio shenanigans, there's also coming of age drama. It's kept to a minimum, and, like I said, Carl's an adorable moppet.

Writer-director Richard Curtis, who was also responsible for the adorable moppet and ragtag crew of Love Actually*, has a knack for gathering delightful British comedians (and one notable American) and letting them have at it. It's a good thing, too, as there's otherwise nothing striking in his direction or his script.

The notable American is, of course, Philip Seymour Hoffman. The Count is very similar to what I like to imagine Hoffman is like in real life (there are also similarities to his character in Almost Famous), and he's also responsible for the movie's only real emotional moment.

Pirate Radio the kind of movie that's exceedingly pleasant to watch, the kind that you put on when you're bored or in need of a little cheering up. There are worse things to be. C+

*I constantly want to put a comma between those words. What is that?

The Twilight Saga: New Moon (2009)

My Book vs. Film is already out, so maybe you want to start there and work back. I don't know. It's downright exhaustive, so I'm not going to get into the strength of the adaptation here. Let's focus on the movie as a movie.

I've got a complicated relationship with composer Alexandre Desplat, but let me tell you this much: he damn near ruined the movie for me. A lot of my other complaints about this movie are very much based in a comparison with Hardwicke's Twilight, which is just too bad for New Moon director Chris Weitz, but I am certain I would have found this score egregiously overwritten at every turn no matter what. He actually dings! when someone is supposed to have a moment of recognition. For all I know, there were dun-dun-duns, but I was probably working overtime to block it out. It's the most obvious and attention seeking score I have heard in years.

In talking it over with my viewing partner, she noted that there is a time and a place for a full orchestra, and New Moon is not it. Truer words, people. I liked Carter Burwell's work well enough last time around (okay, I do feel that the conspicuously-absent-from-New-Moon lullaby was not quite right), but I never realized before how his electric guitar and tribal drum driven work was modern, sexy, dangerous, and cool. Exactly what the score for our teen vampires and werewolves in love should be.

Regardless of the DP, director, or composer, these movies are bound to rake in a ton of coin. But does that mean that aesthetic concerns don't matter? Of course not! While cinematographer Javier Aguirresarobe does lovely work in the lush coastal rain forests of Vancouver, he's sort of at a loss when people are in the frame. Aguirresarobe and Weitz make sure that Edward (Robert Pattinson)'s first real appearance is held long enough for fangirls to get in a good squee (there is a fan involved, I'm pretty sure), but they lose it shortly thereafter. To wit:

1. Carlisle (Peter Facinelli) sows up Bella (Kristen Stewart)'s arm in candlelight while pulling her close and listening to opera. Wait, who is she supposed to be dating? Because I just thought, "Kiss! Kiss!"


2. A tilt to suggest Bella is thrown by Edward breaking up with her? Is this Doubt?


3. The camera pushes in on her lying down in the woods, and I thought, "Why wouldn't the camer pull out to show how alone and vulnerable she is?"
   
   
4. Bella tosses Jacob a slice of pizza during a fixing-up-our-bikes montage, and he catches a socket wrench (montage!). Not only does the wrench catch look completely fake, but it comes in from a completely different height and angle than the pizza through to what looks like a different area of the garage. Intentionally funny?*
   

It's like they're not sure what story they want to tell. Hardwicke clearly wanted to tell a story called, "The Cullens are cool, and now you want to join their cult, too." If Weitz's angle was supposed to be, "The wolves are cool, and now you want to join their cult, too," he really didn't hit the mark.

Don't get me wrong; the wolves are pretty cool. You're not going to get a lot of arguments from me against good looking guys with their shirts off, and New Moon has those aplenty. They're also a lot less openly hostile toward Bella in the movie than they are in the book, which I appreciated. Taylor Lautner's baby-face doesn't quite match the 25-year-old man Jacob is meant to morph into, but he's got Jacob's tenderness, heartbreak, and barely suppressed rage down pat. It will certainly be interesting to see what he does with Eclipse and Breaking Dawn. Plus, unlike others, aging will work in his favour.

Others being Pattinson, of course. Not that he looks markedly older to me, but there's something in his aspect this time around that's less boy and more man. I already thought he was perfectly cast as Edward, and he certainly brings exactly what's necessary to the role, cutting through Stephenie Meyer's florid prose to the human underneath. Yes, human. While Edward's beyond obsessed about his status as a vampire, Pattinson manages to play him in such a way where you can see how, for Bella, that would be just one thing about him but not the main thing. There's a man there. That said, this change I see makes the decision to rush through production slightly more reasonable.

Stewart's also doing some more lovely work (I was especially cheered by the face she makes right after she makes a pointed remark. It's a great "Get it?" face), though not all her choices work out that well. Even so, I see her growing into the character as well as making Bella grow up with her. It's the kind of thing that just might be worth study over time.

All the usual suspects are back, and they're just as great and underused as they were before (although what is up with Jasper's hair? Why can they not make it work?), and, though Fanning might try to steal the show as Jane, it's all about Michael Sheen as Aro when it comes to supporting players because it is fantastic to watch him pull a dude's head off and then gleefully cheer happy endings a few scenes later. I always liked Aro, but I just might love him now. I can only guess what's in store for Sheen now after playing a werewolf and a vampire. Frankenstein's monster? Dr. Frankenstein? Zombie? Angel? Demon? The sky's the limit!

Limited, I hope, will be Weitz's involvement in any future installments of this series. He and his team just aren't a good fit. Harwicke gets teenagers better than most directors (she's like John Hughes that way), and Weitz just doesn't seem to have the same respect/understanding of the source material. I mean, it's the same screenwriter (Melissa Rosenberg) either way, so it's hard to place the blame/credit there. Overall, the experience is satisfactory but nothing more than that. C+

*Point number four was added on the 24th after I remembered it.

Pop Culture Round Up: September 26 - November 20

Van Gogh's personal letters debut online in English

Stars + time + box office = franchise hit

Forget Rule No. 1 - Still Talking About ‘Fight Club’

Technology increases chances to see porn in public

New Brain Cells May Knock Out Old Memories

You want fries with that rap?

Mistakes in Typography Grate the Purists

Overdue library books returned half century later

Screen Memories

Was a WWII Classic Too Gay?

Scientists nose out clue to preserving books: their smell

Contact lenses to get built-in virtual graphics

Women living in 'Twilight' will not apologize for loving Edward, Bella and Jacob

Noises off: The rules of being a theatre critic | Stage | guardian.co.uk

Bare Breasts Don't Translate into Big Box Office

Spoiling for a fight

Stars lined up for new audio Bible

Montreal to see terracotta warriors

Hollywood's 10 Most Overpaid Stars - Hollywood's 10 Most Overpaid Stars

Artist Jeanne-Claude dies; co-created 'The Gates'

Taylor Lautner Denies That He Suffers From Restless Leg Syndrome

"People don't realize this, but loneliness is underrated."

The only reason Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who uttered that line, doesn't appear on my Underrated List is time. If I had more time, each letter would have multiple entries. Even so, my A to Z guide to everything in movies you've been missing should have enough to pique your interest.

This Is It (2009)

I was one of those that were mildly disgusted when news broke of the plan to release This Is It, rehearsal footage from the London concert prep meant for Michael Jackson alone. Then Dana Stevens admitted to weeping, and I wondered if maybe there was something I had missed. For years now, every time a new scandal or court case hit the news, I wondered why people were still interested in what Jackson was doing. Now that I've seen the movie, though, I understand.

While Jackson (or MJ, as those on the set refer to him) had a director, vocal coach, and choreographer, it's obvious that he is all those things on stage. The precision with which he moves his body at 50 (far finer than mine at 26 or any age, no doubt) is astonishing. By "Smooth Criminal," the fourth or so song in set list, I had a huge grin on my face and had to warn myself not to get too emotional. MJ describes the jazzy behind the beat take on the opening to "The Way You Make Me Feel"* to his piano player "like you're dragging yourself out of bed."

He never quite belts it out the way you wish he would and know he can (saving his voice for the performance that will never be), and there are a couple of diva moments scattered in there. But the respect with which he treats his company and the awe they show him in response are palpable. When he says it's "for the fans," you actually believe him. It's clear the man was more performance than person. For the fans was all he had to give.

By now we know what happened and seeing how dangerously thin MJ was on stage gives you pause, but This Is It still contains lovingly captured footage of an artist we'll never see again. B

Also, I don't mean to jump the gun or anything, but Orianthi and I are in love.

*Personal favourite.

Cairo Time (2009)

Patricia Clarkson has a way of opening up a character to you. With her voice and the way she moves her body, she suggests a life far beyond what a script can give you. Where other actors develop ticks so distracting they're ultimately pointless, Clarkson is elegant.

Good thing, too, because aside from the performances and the stunningly captured setting, there's little to distinguish Cairo Time. There's nothing extraordinary about a woman on vacation who finds herself drawn to the local (Alexander Siddig) acting as her guide. Clarkson and Siddig are restrained and beautiful in their roles, and Luc Montpellier's cinematography makes the most of Cairo's bustle and haunting surrounding dessert.

Though the main actors do their best, the movie is too sedate. It's the the kind of movie that you leave on low volume in the background while you work at home, providing a welcome rest for your eyes when you look up. C