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Category archive: Movies

Review: Inkheart (movie)

As many of y'all may recall, a year ago I committed the sacrilege of disliking Inkheart (the book). One of... (More...)

Mean Disney Girls

If you've seen Mean Girls and you like Disney stuff at all, you must go watch this two-minute mini-remake of... (More...)

Review: She's the Man

Kam and I watched She's the Man last night. And loved it. For those who haven't heard of it (as... (More...)

Disney-songs deathmatch, day 22

Miggy's Disney-songs tournament proceeds apace. Do you care which Disney song gets declared the best of all time? Then go... (More...)

Who does whitewashing hurt?

Ellen Oh, a Korean-American writer, is one of many people who've blogged about the shameful whitewashing of the cast of... (More...)

Classics recast into high school settings

I recently learned about another modern movie that takes a Shakespeare play and reworks it to set it in a... (More...)

Westerns and science fiction

The opportunity of a Western is that it takes issues of our culture—conflict, racial conflict, economic injustice, what is... (More...)

Movies & TV lately

Here's what I've been watching: Watched the first two episodes of Glee 'cause everyone's talking about it; interesting and often... (More...)

Four reasons to watch FlashForward

I've now seen three episodes of FlashForward. So far, I'd say it's an interesting show; not brilliant, but intriguing. (I... (More...)

Maurice Sendak is so gay

Happened across a passing reference this morning to Sendak having come out last year (at age 80); looked it up... (More...)

Push

Saw previews for Push some months back, and it looked intriguing: guys with telekinesis fighting each other. I came away... (More...)

Heist movies are meta-movies?

Nice line from an article about Steven Soderbergh's films: [...] nearly every heist movie—predicated on an elaborate and improbable plan... (More...)

9

I thought I'd been hearing good things about the new movie 9, and I certainly liked the look of it... (More...)

Ponyo

Various friends have seen and liked Ponyo lately, but it was barely on my radar. And I must confess that... (More...)

Juno

Finally saw Juno tonight. It's fabulous: charming, funny, sweet, smart, and with just a bit of an edge. It has... (More...)

Whiteout: The Movie

Ten years ago, Oni Press published a graphic novel called Whiteout, written by Greg Rucka and drawn by Steve Lieber.... (More...)

Weak, summery

Quick recap of last week: Saturday night: Returned from Acadia to Boston. Sunday: Hung out at Michael & Lisa's. (Thanks... (More...)

R.I.P., John Hughes

Just happened across the news that John Hughes has died of a heart attack at age 59. I never saw... (More...)

Mrs. Henderson Presents

Saw Mrs. Henderson Presents with Twig last night. Quite good, very much worth watching. Judi Dench is fabulous as always.... (More...)

My recent movie- and TV-watching

Some mini-reviews of movies and DVDs I've watched lately. (More...)

Real-person roleplay

I recently saw Natalie Portman live (well, on a screen, but in realtime, from a nearby location). Which gave me... (More...)

Pixar, girls, and awesome girl-movie titles

Excellent open letter to Pixar from Linda Holmes, asking for a movie featuring a girl who is not a princess.... (More...)

Up!

Just saw Up. Lovely movie. Thoroughly charming. Contains a zeppelin. Made me cry, made me laugh. Too sleepy (and have... (More...)

How do you recognize a One True Pairing?

In conventional romance novels, you can always tell who the female main character is supposed to (and going to) end... (More...)

Placeholder entry: Watchmen (no spoilers)

Saw Watchmen on Friday. No time for full discussion, but here's the short version of my reaction: Despite some flaws,... (More...)

Review: Igor

A few months back, I saw previews for an animated movie called Igor. It looked like fun: the premise was... (More...)

Watchmen opening imminently

I'm tempted to attend the Thursday midnight showing of Watchmen. The theatre a five-minute drive from my house is showing... (More...)

Alternate-reality teen comedy

I'd like to see a John Hughes-style high school comedy set in a universe in which it's the smart kids... (More...)

Coraline

We went to see Coraline tonight. I probably wouldn't have gotten around to it this weekend on my own, but... (More...)

Coraline and Burton

I know at least two people who thought that the Coraline movie was directed by Tim Burton; it's an easy... (More...)

Free Oscar-nominated animated short

The list of Oscar nominees was released a couple days ago. Among the nominees for best animated short film is... (More...)

Coraline movie

Just learned that Henry Selick (Nightmare Before Christmas, James and the Giant Peach) is directing a movie based on Coraline... (More...)

Slumdog Millionaire

I wasn't planning to see this movie, but somehow over the past couple days it started sounding more and more... (More...)

The Tale of Despereaux (movie)

I'd been seeing somewhat intriguing previews for this new animated movie The Tale of Despereaux, so it was already on... (More...)

Transamerica

Finally got around to watching Transamerica, which I've had out from Netflix for months. I kept thinking I might see... (More...)

Over the Hedge

After Xmas dinner this evening, Kam and I decided to watch something silly and fluffy, and it just so happened... (More...)

South Bay events: a cappella concert, movie outing

Tough choice between things to do in the South Bay Area next Friday evening (nine days from now): Talisman A... (More...)

Movies for blind people

I just happened across a site called Blindspots, featuring movie reviews that grade movies on the basis of how accessible... (More...)

Fun interview with Roger Moore

Happened across an interview titled "Roger Moore: I'm the worst Bond, apparently" at the Telegraph just now, while looking for... (More...)

Weekend

Friday evening, Kam and I watched National Treasure 2. It was fun and silly; perhaps not quite as much fun... (More...)

Watchmen trailer!!!

The Watchmen trailer is out, and it's gorgeous. A few tiny false notes, and a few smallish things that make... (More...)

Jumper and Jumper

As I mentioned the other day, I saw the movie Jumper back in March. Back when we saw it, all... (More...)

Prince Caspian

Went to the late showing of Prince Caspian last night, 'cause I figured it may not be in theatres much... (More...)

Top movies

Having finally watched Das Boot recently, I'm now a step closer to having seen the top 75 of the IMDB's... (More...)

Heathers revisited

The other night, Twig and I were trying to decide what movie to watch, and I remembered that we'd talked... (More...)

The Big Snit

Somehow I seem to have failed to link to Canadian animator Richard Condie's 1985 short film "The Big Snit," one... (More...)

Jane Austen Book Club (movie)

Finally saw the movie of The Jane Austen Book Club. For some reason, I had gotten the impression that it... (More...)

Romantic comedy recommendations?

About six and a half hours from now, I'm heading for the airport, whence I'll fly to Chicago for a... (More...)

A few notes on women in fiction

tacityhydra just mentioned the Mo Movie Measure in passing; I was going to post this comment in response to that... (More...)

Two movie questions

Two questions re movies in the '80s: 1. Summer of '96 (I think), I decided to introduce Repo Man to... (More...)

Review: The Golden Compass (movie)

Kam and I saw the movie of The Golden Compass tonight. There may be some minor spoilers in this entry.... (More...)

Watchmen movie notes

They've started shooting the Watchmen movie! For a March, 2009 release! A blog entry on the official site shows some... (More...)

Meta-review: The Triplets of Belleville

The two things that everyone mentioned about The Triplets of Belleville back when it came out were that the movie... (More...)

Review (sorta): Picnic at Hanging Rock

Last night I was in the mood to watch a movie. The only one of my Netflix movies that I... (More...)

Still here

A couple of people have remarked on my silence of late--I've posted only five journal entries in the past two... (More...)

Forthcoming movies

At the last movie I saw in a theatre (one of this summer's part-three installments--maybe Spider-Man 3?), I saw a... (More...)

Week, movies, socializing, books, travel, etc

I never did get around to writing here about the tall ships. I would still like to, but the chances... (More...)

Howl's Moving Castle inventiveness

One quick note about the commentary on Howl's Moving Castle: A bunch of people in the supplemental materials on the... (More...)

Review: I, Robot (movie)

I liked it quite a bit. (More...)

Assorted updates

I once again find myself struck with blogging paralysis--too many things I want to write about, not enough time to... (More...)

Snakes in no pain

I have no interest in seeing Snakes on a Plane, but I've been amused and/or interested by some articles related... (More...)

Video roundup, part 1

It's been a while since I've posted a collection of videos, and the links keep rolling in. So here's a... (More...)

What you should know ahead of time about Superman Returns

The following is a spoiler, of a sort; kind of a meta-spoiler. But I nonetheless claim that almost everyone will enjoy Superman Returns more if they know this than if they don't know it; knowing this will help you set your expectations appropriately (and most of you probably know it already anyway). However, I know some people won't want to know it, in which case don't read the rest of this entry.

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Review: The Da Vinci Code

Kam and I saw The Da Vinci Code a couple weeks ago. A few thoughts and comments: I haven't read... (More...)

More parkour

I coulda sworn that I posted at some point about parkour, the French sport/skill involving urban running, jumping, climbing, and... (More...)

Review: Fantastic Four

Kam and I finally saw Fantastic Four. It was, pretty much as expected, fun fluff. Better than Daredevil (which I... (More...)

About spoiler warnings

(This is another case where I wrote most of the entry months ago but didn't get around to posting it... (More...)

Ghibli Earthsea trailer

Studio Ghibli has released a second trailer for Gedo Senki, a.k.a. Tales from Earthsea. You may have to right-click that... (More...)

Five-minute summaries

Peter W. pointed to the Five-Minute "Battlestar Galactica: The Miniseries" comic. Sort of in the style of the old Fotonovels,... (More...)

Journaling paralysis (and general update)

And after all that fuss about how I was going to flood y'all with entries, I ended up not posting... (More...)

Long week

Assorted bits and pieces from the past week or so (some good, some not): (More...)

Items: Video

Links to a bunch of cool online video items, for your delectation and enjoyment. Some of these require Flash; some... (More...)

Earworm: Somewhere That's Green

The other day the song "Somewhere That's Green" (from Little Shop of Horrors, though I have the movie soundtrack rather... (More...)

Africa, the Other, and sf

Some items that may or may not add up to more than the sum of their parts: Okay, so there's... (More...)

Review: King Kong

Finally got around to seeing the new King Kong. As usual, this won't be so much a review as a... (More...)

Economy and efficiency as motivations in fiction

Something I see quite often in both submissions and published fiction (including movies) is plots that hinge on people taking... (More...)

Star Wars misconceptions

While checking the quote in that last entry, I stumbled into a forum thread on The misconceptions you had about... (More...)

Productive

Here are some of the things I've done in the past week, in no particular order: finally washed some dishes... (More...)

Outline of Narnian history, plus nitpicking

I'm continuing to re-read the Narnia books. Will have more to say about that sooner or later, but for now,... (More...)

Superman Returns

Last month, Nick pointed to the teaser trailer for what he called Jesus Christ, Superman, for reasons that will become... (More...)

Review: Rent

It's been Jed's movie week. Narnia last weekend; Æon Flux Monday night; Brokeback Mountain last night (review to come later).... (More...)

Review: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

The Narnia movie was splendid. I went into it with very high hopes and a lot of trepidation. The hopes... (More...)

Review: Aeon Flux

Watched the new movie of Æon Flux after work this evening. The first third or so was every bit as... (More...)

Items: Comics, videos, photos

Assorted comics and comics-related items, plus a few cat and lizard photos, and some other stuff. Nifty comic strip in... (More...)

Review: It Should Happen to You

I've been hearing for years about It Should Happen to You: directed by George (My Fair Lady, Philadelphia Story) Cukor,... (More...)

Last Unicorn movie

A couple years ago, I found out that there were plans for a live-action movie of one of my favorite... (More...)

Forthcoming movies

Been meaning to post about these for weeks. Aeon Flux! Starring Charlize Theron, a welcome addition to the hot female... (More...)

This and that

(Yikes! No wonder the comment-spam levels have dropped precipitously—I broke the comments-display pages for my and Mary Anne's journals a... (More...)

Things done and undone

I started reading a submission just now and realized that I wasn't awake enough to read it, even though it... (More...)

Visual entertainment, party, etc

(This entry cobbled together in spare moments between bouts of magazine work over the past day or two.) In the... (More...)

Items: Movie, gullibility, names, androids

I've been posting a lot of personal stuff, and occasional sf-related stuff, but not very much Links To Cool And/Or... (More...)

Items: Shifting paradigms

Feeling a little better than yesterday, but still not up to going to work. Yesterday I didn't do nearly enough... (More...)

Robot Stories

We're back from Robot Stories. I'll write a real review of it at some point, but I wanted to briefly... (More...)

Three Laws rephrased

The fake robot-ad trailer for the upcoming I, Robot movie came out a few months ago, but now there's a... (More...)

Spellbound (the spelling bee movie)

Various people told me I would love this movie, but I think I just don't like documentaries much. I spend... (More...)

Review: Adaptation

Hmm—one of the few drawbacks to the tabbed browsing in the new version of Safari is that it's too easy... (More...)

Bend it like a unicorn

Last night Kam and I went to a lovely Burmese/Chinese restaurant in downtown Palo Alto, a place called Rangoon that... (More...)

Review: The Sum of All Fears

Watched The Sum of All Fears tonight. A surprisingly good movie, at least if you don't care about being true... (More...)