We're showing American Teen at my theatre and after reading the comments on imdb and Alexandra Dupont's review on AICN I have no idea what to tell guests who ask about it. It's getting great reviews from the critics but I think I agree with Alexandra when she says it's basically just another reality TV show- totally manipulated.

I finally saw TDK (with Amyth and Smonster). Eh. Liked it, didn't love it. I'll come down on the side of those who found it too long. By the end I'd totally fallen out of any emotional engagement and was sitting there thinking about the special effects and makeup, and considering whether the director had achieved what he was going for thematically. As Brecht wasn't involved with the production, I'm thinking this isn't what the makers intended.

saw Pineapple express last night. Mucho fun. James Franco is adorable and so freaking funny. The film kinda falls apart in the last half-hour, but it's a great ride up until then.

I watched Sunshine last night. I have to agree with everyone else that it's good until it stops being good.

I watched Sunshine last night. I have to agree with everyone else that it's good until it stops being good.

It was such a fascinating, intriguing movie about restarting the sun, until it turned into that other thing and got not just narratively incoherent, but visually as well. There was stuff at the end where I literally couldn't parse out what was happening. Maybe that was supposed to represent the characters' POV, but I didn't get that sense either.

movie about restarting the sun

?????

Que?

I haven't even *heard* of this movie! I need to engage with the outside world once in a while.

Yeah, I agree, Frank. And up until that point, I was actually musing to myself that I really appreciated intelligent sci-fi because it showed that it doesn't all have to be like SciFi Channel Original Movies. And then it became a SciFi Channel Original Movie with better special effects.

Teppy, it's the latest movie from genre-hopper Danny Boyle. Oddly enough, it sort of reminded me of Mission to Mars in that the real point of the movie is the mission/journey and the kinds of decisions you have to make when the fate of all mankind is on the line.

I bought Sunshine on a special deal and am really glad I did. I liked it even more on second viewing but more than that, the commentary by the consulting physicist is hugely entertaining and informative. The informative I expected, but he's also really funny, earnest and honest. 'We just made that bit up, sorry.' He clearly has a cute little mancrush on Cillian Murphy too.

Boyle's commentary was much more technical but it explained some things that just flew past me in the theatre.

I'm s huge lover of the dvd extra but I know that a film should not be made better by being explained. It really should be coherent on the screen, but knowing stuff I know now, I like the movie even better.

Has anybody ever heard of a movie called Afterlife by Joss Whedon? It appears to be an unproduced thing from a while back, but there's very little info I can fish out online.

Finally caught up to TDK. I did like it to the extreme, but I don't know if I'd go so far as to say I love it and want to have its babies.

I absolutely loved Heath Ledger as the Joker. It wasn't just the creepy tongue moves and physical twitches, it was his eyes, too. I tended to concentrate on watching his mouth most of the time, because of the way it was painted on and what he does with it. But if you paid attention to his eyes, you could see he had no connection to humanity in there. Most of the time his eyelids were at half mast, he rarely looked at people when he was talking to them. When he did look at people, he still never completely opened his eyes. He looked alternately sly, disinterested, avoidant, and sometimes, almost naive or at least childishly excited. And what was most interesting was that the expression in his eyes was often at distinct odds to the expression on the lower half of his face or the tone of his voice. Very, very creepy.

I felt the build up to Two Face wasn't as well-done as it could have been. And the reveal to the nickname happened way too late in the movie. People who have read the comics didn't need it, so it felt like a throwaway and those who haven't read them really could have used that information much earlier, when Gordon and Dent were talking about the Internal Affairs stuff. It would have given greater depth to their disagreements, provided more insight to it and maybe even made Dent's decision to go after the bad cops more meaningful. That if he'd done a better job then, the Joker wouldn't have been able to use those cops against Rachel. Maybe he hadn't been two-faced enough to do a throrough enough job. So, now was his chance and he's going to take it.

I didn't find the relationship between Dent and Rachel at all believable. Perhaps, because we come into it fully formed and so we have to be told about it, not shown or, at least, not shown enough. And because I don't remember her from the first movie at all. Not that it was Maggie Gyllenhall instead of Katie Holmes, but that Rachel didn't make enough of an impression on me in BB for me to give a rat's ass about her in this movie and couldn't understand why Bruce Wayne or Harvey Dent would, either.

Loved all the special effects, I think because they really were much more grounded in reality and because they remind you that while Batman is more-or-less considered a hero, he is not a super-hero. I loved that he kept getting bitten by dogs. He can smack around bad guys to his heart's content, but dogs will lay him low. They're his kryptonite, hehe.

I ♥ Alfred. Always.