In the history of serious documentary film, there are two strains, it seems fair to say. One has been on the recent upswing: the advocacy documentary, propelled along by Michael Moore and that Al Gore-with-a-deadly-PowerPoint movie, which, TL;DW. (Really, I remember thinking when that came out: The planet's going bad? Just send me a position paper, and if I want to watch Al Gore I'll turn on C-Span 2 or whatever, and, no I probably won't, I'm just being polite.) The advocacy documentary is probably good for the world, as with all kinds of advocacy projects, whether they be litigation or burning cop cars on Rue d'Whatever in favor [...]

I have seen the last four Paul Greengrass movies and the latest, "Green Zone," which I've finally watched, made me want to give up consuming fiction entirely. This is a story that in its key points intentionally sticks close up front to some very real, very serious issues-the great political lie of the invasion of Iraq, the falsification or at least very extreme inaccuracy of military intelligence regarding the Hussein regime's weapons and also the outrageously damaging involvement of major newspapers in spreading that misinformation. One of the most important topics of our time, right? And Paul Greengrass took those facts and made a lone hero cowboy shoot-em-up.

Somehow, we ended up at this movie over the weekend, just us and some girls who were really lonely. And a few really angry boyfriends. You guys. Little Kristin Bell, barely there. Josh Duhamel, a lunk with a nice brow. A plot (magic love fountains!) that not even Annie Hathaway could paste together with her face. And, what's more, a ghostly drive-by from Judith Malina. Born in the 20s, the daughter of German rabbi who emigrated to America in 1929, the twice-widowed avant-garde theater superstar has not had a film or TV role since the 69th episode of The Sopranos, broadcast in April of 200-as Paulie's nun-aunt who reveals [...]

'Precious' has been in theaters for a week now, but since it's Mo'Nique's birthday today, we feel it is now time to finally get to it!

Natasha: Girl, how did you feel about going into this movie?

Kia: Well. I didn't even want to see it. The trailer made me cry, so, I wasn't really looking forward to a full length version of that. It looked like that emotional porn? You know, downtrodden person going through trails, tribulations, strife, set to uplifting music and/or a gospel song, etc.

Natasha: I wanted to see it for two reasons 1. Oscars, natch. 2. I wanted to dislike it. BUT GURL I [...]

Natasha: Pareene!

Alex: Natasha!

Natasha: Can we talk about the motherf'ing Bad Lieutenant??

Alex: Yes. Yes we can.

Natasha: Pareene, tell me why this is a great movie.

Alex: Well. I think, first of all, that it is indeed about a Bad Lieutenant. I think that while Abel Ferrara's original movie was about a bad person who happens to be a Lieutenant, Nic Cage, in this film, was just not ever very good at being a Lieutenant. And I admired that, making a police procedural where none of the policing is ever very competent.

Maurice Sendak said it first: "I thought it was never going to end." If you've ever been through family therapy, you've had the same thought. And this is what director Spike Jonze and screenwriter Dave Eggers have reduced Where The Wild Things Are to-a glum ninety-minute session where emotions are projected onto big fuzzy creatures who look like nested Russian dolls bleached of color, blown up and covered in hairy mildew. The creatures serve therapy, not dreams or fantasy. They embody the vexations of a boy named Max, but none of his desires or imagined ecstasies. And if you've read Where The Wild Things Are, you probably think it [...]

GI Joe is a movie about an ugly girl who is mechanically brainwashed to hate her dumb boyfriend. The ugly girl is played by a former model. The dumb boyfriend is sooo dumb. She is brain-washed by a snooty downtown actor named Joseph Gordon Levitt who used to have a huge art-school hipster attitude and I wonder if he still can pull that off after appearing in this sweating trash heap of a dirty catbox of a movie. This film made me yearn for the forthcoming masterpiece called Viewmaster. But most importantly, beyond issues such as the Speed Racer level of characterization, what happened to Sienna Miller's face? She [...]

"The main thing about money, Bud, is that it makes you do things you don't want to do."

Wall Street 2, better known as Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, was the top-grossing film in the nation this past weekend.

The hero of the original Wall Street, Bud Fox, was torn between siding with the unionized "working man" or the corporate-raiding embodiment of capitalism. The sequel no longer even bothers with the question, its hero a trader fully invested in working within the system of finance as our savior. The ostentatiousness of the first Wall Street film was found in the characters' ideals. The ostentatiousness of the sequel is all [...]

Now that he is tasked for real with directing the adaptation of The Emperor's Children, we must take Noah Baumbach for serious again. And so….

Natasha Vargas-Cooper: What was it like for you to go on a Bromotional journey into Ben Stiller's Acting cred? How was it spending 2 hours with a character you HATED?

Julie Klausner: It was better than dating one! But I did like the movie.

Natasha: Have you dated a G-berg?

Julie: YES!!

Natasha: Ok, Explain what a G-man is.

Julie: Somebody who thinks honesty is not only a value, but THE MOST IMPORTANT VALUE. But honesty should be a [...]

This movie makes me emo. Thinking about it makes my nose do that chloriney thing you get right before you start crying. I am SO GAY for this movie that I can't stand it. And you know what? Having finally seen it, I don't even care what the haters have to say. I am a happy meniscus that your spite sauce slides off of. I'm lifted.

I waited three hours in July San Diego sun to watch 27 minutes of this movie. I had to cross the street from the convention center to where the line serpentined to the water by the Hilton to catch the Cameron panel at [...]

You should know that this exchange on the topic of 'A Single Man' contains vague but vigorous discussions of the endings of both the film and the book on which it is based. This semi-spoilery stuff, if it can be called that, is noted below in bold, before it occurs. There are also vague discussions of some plot points. (If they can be called that.)

Choire: Dear Dan, I have asked you here to discuss with me the issue of the new Tom Ford movie, "A Single Man." Actually, I'm lying! You totally asked me here!

Dan: Nay, I DEMANDED it! This movie made me so angry that I needed [...]

Of the three important movies opening today, our coverage of one of them will be handled elsewhere, by Mr. Joe MacLeod of the Baltimore City Paper: Do you like Nicolas Cage? He ate a bug once, for real, in a movie. Do you think Nicolas Cage is a fucking weirdo sellout who maybe used to be an actor who could have done something with his career other than make movies such as Con Air or that piece of shit Ghost Rider? Do you ever find yourself wondering about Nicolas Cage's physical appearance or the provenance of the hair on his head? Remember Nicolas Cage in that remake of Kiss [...]