Saturday night we watched Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007,PG) (ScreenIt! Review).  From the ScreenIt! review:

A struggling songwriter thinks he's hit pay dirt when he finds himself in the company of three chipmunks who can not only talk, but also sing in perfect, if high-pitched harmony.

It was OK.  I wondered if they skimped on the special effects because the munks at times didn't seem as well done as I'd have expected.  The boys enjoyed it, especially when someone was shaking his booty or making a rude noise.

I give it 3 out of 5.

- Jonathan

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Saturday night we watched Babel (2006,R) (ScreenIt! Review).  From ScreenIt!:

Various strangers' lives are affected and become intertwined by an act of violence.

I usually dig films like this, but this one not so much.  I give it 3 out of 5.

- Jonathan

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Tonight we finished watching World Trade Center (2006,PG-13) (ScreenIt! Review).  From ScreenIt!:

Family members worry about and rescuers try to find victims buried in the rubble following the attacks of 9/11 and subsequent collapse of the World Trade Center towers.

The depiction of the anguish of the families of the missing first responders was remarkable and  brought Lisa to tears.  Somehow I didn't care for Nicholas Cage's performance.  I give it 3 out of 5.

- Jonathan

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Last night we watched Children of Men (2006,R) (ScreenIt! Review).  From the Wikipedia:

Set in the United Kingdom of 2027, the film explores a grim world in which two decades of global human infertility have left humanity with less than a century to survive. Societal collapse, terrorism, and environmental destruction accompany the impending extinction, with the United Kingdom, perhaps the last functioning government, persecuting a seemingly endless wave of illegal immigrant refugees seeking sanctuary.

I'm surprised I hadn't heard of this one before.  It was fantastic.  I never would have guessed it was a "companion piece to Cuarón's Y tu mamá también."  You couldn't help but think of The Road and also 28 Days Later, and it was interesting for many of the same reasons...but also because so much of it felt so familiar...pervasive anti-immigrant sentiment, soldiers with German shepherds, hooded prisoners, etc.

I give it 5 out of 5.

- Jonathan

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Friday night we watched Alpha Dog (2007,R) (ScreenIt! Review).  From the ScreenIt! Review:

A group of wannabe suburban gangsters must deal with the repercussions of kidnapping an associate's 15-year-old brother.

This had potential (and it was interesting to learnt that it was based on a true story), but in the end it seemed kind of flat.  The most interesting part to me was the way the Jake Mazursky character pretty much left Truelove with no options.

I give it 3 out of 5.

- Jonathan

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Another race-related documentary film I watched today was Banished, from PBS' Independent Lens series.  From the Independent Lens site:

From the 1860s to the 1920s, towns across the U.S. violently expelled African American residents.

Today, these communities remain virtually all white.

As black descendants return to demand justice, BANISHED exposes the hidden history of racial cleansing in America.

At least 12 different counties in eight states banished their black populations. More than 4,000 black residents were expelled from their homes.

The film takes the approach of visiting four of the counties where this occurred, discussing the historical events as well as examining the towns today.  What it finds is that the counties remain almost completely white and that they are generally of two minds regarding blacks: either they still aren't welcome or they are (even though somehow that doesn't translate into any residents of color).  I tend to think about this kind of thing as being long ago in the distant past.  However, the film shows footage of  a visit to Forsyth County Georgia in 1987 (75 years after blacks were driven out) by a group of whites and blacks who planned to march in honor of MLK and in memory of what had happened in that county.  They were met by huge crowds of people from the KKK and other racist organizations who made it abundantly clear with signs, shouts, and even thrown rocks how unwelcome their visit was.  This was only twenty years ago.  It was also interesting to see the difficulty in coming to resolution about what happened...the conflict between the fact that these black folks basically had their land and property stolen when they were driven out long ago and the fact that the current owners were not the wrongdoers but rather just people who happened to buy land that at some point in the past was stolen.  Like the documentary about the Little Rock high school, this film left me depressed about where we came from and how far we apparently still have to go.

I give it 5 out of 5.

- Jonathan

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I recently watched a documentary from HBO Films titled Little Rock Central: 50 Years Later.  From the HBO web site:

The wave of desegregation that transformed the South during the 1960s began in Little Rock in September 1957. After Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus defied the Supreme Court's 1954 Brown v. Board of Education ruling and ordered the National Guard to prevent nine black teenagers from entering Central High School, President Dwight D. Eisenhower responded by sending troops from the 101st Airborne Division of the U.S. Army to protect the students as they entered the building.

But what is the legacy of the Civil Rights struggle for equal education today? To mark the 50th anniversary of the forced integration of Central High School, Little Rock natives Brent and Craig Renaud provide a candid look at the lives of contemporary Central High students in the documentary LITTLE ROCK CENTRAL: 50 YEARS LATER.

Brent and Craig Renaud followed the lives of contemporary Central High students, teachers and administration, as well as community leaders, over the course of a year for this intimate documentary, visiting classes, school meetings and assemblies, teenagers' homes and community events. Sharing the stories of both black and white students, the special reveals the opportunities and challenges facing them in and out of the classroom.

There are many interesting aspects to this film.  One of the most striking was how the school that was forcefully desegregated 50 years ago is today voluntarily segregated on the common line of race and wealth.  Another was hearing some of the black kids face the realization that their black peers don't care about school and neither do their parents, and they don't try very hard to succeed.  Another was how many of the black kids resent the advantages that the wealthy white kids have (which, admittedly, they do have) without acknowledging how hard the white kids work to succeed in their advanced coursework.  Another was a segment of a black kid admitting how prejudiced he is against whites.  In the end, the film was pretty depressing...both in terms of the situation we were in 50 years ago and the ones we are still in today.  We're certainly moving in the right direction...but it's obviously a long, slow process and we're nowhere near the end.

I give it 5 out of 5.

- Jonathan

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In an article of the same title, the USA Today has a list of the TV shows that (now that the writers' strike appears to be near its end) are expected to return with new episodes this spring, which are expected to return but not until later, which are in doubt, and which ain't coming back.  I was glad to see that several new shows that we've been watching will survive: Pushing Daisies, Dirty Sexy Money, Chuck, and Life.  It was also nice to see that a couple of the shows that are dead were ones that I sampled but wasn't hooked by: Bionic Woman and Journeyman.   I was disappointed to see Reaper on the questionable list, and I wonder about Aliens in America (I guess I'm not too optimistic).  There is one dead show that I had been watching and thought was OK despite it being panned by most: Cavemen.

- Jonathan

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Tonight I finished watching My House in Umbria (2003).  From Rotten Tomatoes:

Based on the novella by William Trevor, MY HOUSE IN UMBRIA is set in the sprawling Italian countryside. After a tragic train accident, four survivors find solace in the villa of an English writer, Mrs. Delahunty (Maggie Smith).

This was a bit dull and never really grabbed me, though it certainly makes hanging out in the Italian countryside look attractive.

I give it 3 out of 5.

- Jonathan

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The third (and best !?!) film that I watched on the flight back from Germany was Balls of Fury (2007,PG-13) (ScreenIt! Review).  From ScreenIt!:

A former child ping-pong prodigy is recruited by the FBI to lead them to a mysterious crime figure with an obsession for the sport.

You don't start watching a movie like this with your expectations too high, but I was pleasantly surprised.  It was goofy and funny and pretty consistent throughout...never running out of gas.  Maybe it was the mood I was in, or lack of sleep, or something, but I really enjoyed it.

I give it 5 out of 5.

- Jonathan

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