1. Surprisingly, I enjoyed "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow" more than Andy did, although he generally prefers this sort of thing. By "this sort of thing," I mean sci-fi action flicks, but Andy objected to the very thing I found fun and exciting: the special effects that made it seem like a '40s-era comic book. The script was really atrocious and the acting not much better, but the camera effects and computerized stuff made up for it—for me, anyhow.
2. "To Live" was so unrelentingly depressing that it would be hard to recommend it despite the amazing acting of Gong Li. It tells the story of an average Chinese family and what they must go through just "to live" from the '40s through the Cultural Revolution. There's no plot per se; it's just the story of their lives. Really well done but crushingly sad.
3. Harrison Ford should be ashamed of himself (when he's not busy counting all his money) for making "Firewall." What a good idea, what a lousy movie. Ford is in charge of IT security for a big bank; bad guys hold him and his family ransom and force him to transfer lots o' cash to an offshore account; mayhem ensues; loopholes abound (We'll bring the dog with us when we kidnap the family! We won't actually hurt the family because we're really good people, if a bit greedy!); the ending is predictable to the letter. I don't mind formulaic shoot-em-up fun, but this ended up feeling like a waste of time.
4. Having enjoyed "Scoop" (Woody Allen's latest movie), we decided to try "Match Point," his previous London-based Scarlett Johansson vehicle (although he doesn't appear in this one). It treads the same ground as "Crimes and Misdemeanors" (a masterpiece, as far as I'm concerned) but takes much longer to get going. I kept wondering when the "Hitchcockian" stuff was going to kick in. I like Scarlett Johansson's looks, and I thought she was terrific in "Girl with a Pearl Earring" and just fine in "Lost in Translation," but she certainly didn't shine in either of these movies. This was good, just overlong. I liked the ending very much. But you might as well just see "Crimes and Misdemeanors."
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