Will Donner (Tom Sturridge) didn’t have a home. He wandered from place to place, often hitchhiking because he didn’t have a car, because he was set on following Emma Twist (Rachel Bilson), an actress and a childhood friend, like a love-sick puppy. People were often touched of his stories about how much he loved Emma and how he planned on marrying her. The fact was the two haven’t spoken to each other since they were kids. Written by Steve Adams and directed by James Keach, if I could describe “Waiting for Forever” in one word, it would be “misguided.” I wasn’t convinced that it was a love story even though it tried desperately to be one because the sentiments were heavily one-sided. Emma, like myself, was creeped out by Will because his rationalizations involving why they should be together felt completely detached from reality. The screenplay begged us to feel sorry for him instead of identifying with him. His parents died when he was little, his brother (Scott Mechlowicz) looked down on his nomadic lifestyle, and he always wore the same pajamas. I guess he didn’t have any other clothes. His excuse was the pajamas felt comfortable. I found it insulting that the majority of the women melted after hearing Will’s stories. I agreed with the men: Will needed some help, possibly a one-on-one session with a counselor or a psychiatrist. It was difficult to judge him this way because the filmmakers confused child-like and childish. An adult’s child-like quality tends to momentarily sprout from its hiding shell. It happens without a person being aware of it. An adult is childish when he jumps on chairs, tables, and counters just to be “cute.” Will was certainly the latter. Sturridge was partly to blame. He needed to tone down his character’s ticks so we could focus more on his personal struggles instead of how hyper he was or how well he could juggle. The only believable people on screen were Emma’s parents, Richard (Richard Jenkins) and Miranda (Blythe Danner). Richard had terminal illness and Miranda hid her sadness by overcompensating with happiness. There was dramatic weight in the way they interacted with each other. Some words were ugly, some looks were undeserved but I felt like there was history between them. There was a memorable scene in which Miranda finally exploded at the man she no longer thought was the man she married. The way the camera was so close to their aging bodies and the way the purging of emotions was handled, it felt like I was intruding in their very personal moment. I wished the movie had been about them. I liked the last line in the movie because the joke had a punchline. That and the painful experience of constantly wondering why the characters chose to do what they did was finally over.

When Isabella was a child, three members of the church attempted to perform an exorcism on her mother, Maria (Suzan Crowley), which led to a tragedy. Maria telephoned for help and confessed to killing two priests and a nun. Years later, Isabella (Fernanda Andrade) now in her mid-twenties, felt that she needed to understand what really happened to her mother. Along with Michael (Ionut Grama), the cameraman, the duo decided to make a documentary of their entire trip to Italy. Their first assignment was to visit Maria who’d been transferred to Centrino Mental Hospital. The biggest problem with “The Devil Inside,” written by William Brent Bell and Matthew Peterman, was not its utter unoriginality when it came to presenting the basics of demonic possession and exorcism, but its slothful execution and poor control of the camera. The filmmakers strived to create a realistic mood in the most elementary and lazy manner: by shaking the camera so vigorously and aimlessly, I began to get very angry because the images that were supposed to inspire audience reaction were reluctantly shown. Keep in mind that this is coming from a person who can withstand a decent amount of camera convulsions. Because certain images were so evasive, perhaps the intention was to tease us into looking closer at the screen. It would have worked if the tension was established in varying rates and actually allowed horrific scenes to reach several zeniths punctuated by creative freedom by means of a sense of humor or false alarm. The picture was deathly one-note and I sat in my chair unmoved, possessed by boredom. Furthermore, since the material spent much of its time with distractions, like whether or not Fathers Ben Rawlings (Simon Quarterman) and David Keane (Evan Helmuth), priests who performed exorcisms without permission from the church, ought to continue to support Isabella’s project. Suddenly, the picture became more about Father Ben’s ego of wanting to capture every moment on film–evidence, he called them–and Father David’s concern for losing his job. Isabella was relegated to a typical one-dimensional character who had nothing to do but scream at the right moments, only there was nothing worth screaming over due to a drought of genuinely scary scenes. The material touched upon the relationship between mental illness and demonic possession, so I was surprised that there weren’t more scenes between mother and daughter. Some psychological disorders like schizophrenia are known to be genetically linked which means it can be passed on from parent to offspring. Why not explore that connection between science and religion? Should we trust our protagonist completely? The picture could have been more interesting if had been a little more ambitious. Personally, I’m not scared of demonic possessions. What I am a little bit more apprehensive about, however, is the possibility that it’s real. As a person of science, I am willing to believe that science doesn’t hold all the answers. If it did, the universe, in my eyes, would be less captivating. “The Devil Inside,” directed by William Brent Bell, could have used a little bit of mystery, an edge that would allow it to stand out from the rest of the exorcism movies. But since it lacked inspiration, it’s just another nondescript writing on the wall created by a madman.

Andrew Nichol (Chase Ellison) was paired up by his English teacher, Mr. Simon (Ed Harris), with Stanley (Alexander Walters) to work on a final project. Andrew was embarrassed to work with Stanley because the latter was a social outcast. Stanley was known as Big G, G for ginger, due to his red hair, massive ears, and he stood at least a foot taller than everyone else. Andrew, like most middle school students, just wanted to get by and being paired up with a Frankenstein-like geek garnered a lot of negative attention. Mr. Simon wanted to teach Andrew that passively watching another get bullied didn’t free someone from taking responsibility. Written and directed by Michael Pavone, I wanted to like “That’s What I Am” for its intention but it wasn’t as strong as it could have been because there were plenty of instances when it lost its vision. Andy’s quest to finally go steady with Mary Clear (Mia Rose Frampton), a girl who had kissed every boy in their grade except for Andy, could have been somewhat cute in another movie but bullying is such a serious issue that the two forces didn’t belong in one project without the other feeling like a strange appendage that was better hacked off. The picture also gave us other scenes with elements of bullying like a boy (Camille E. Bourgeois III) inflicting deep cuts on a girl (Sarah Celano) using a metallic zipper on his jacket because he wanted to give her back her “cooties.” (They bumped into each other earlier that day.) If Pavone’s intention was to provide comic relief from intense moments in a form of puppy love, the work felt leaned toward mere silliness. Instead of continually highlighting the consequences of bullying, more relevant than ever with the rate of youth suicides nowadays, the issue was somewhat marginalized. I wasn’t sure how to feel about the writer-director feeling the need to introduce homophobia in the 1960s. Rumors went around the school that Mr. Simon was a homosexual. Since he wouldn’t deny it because he believed that one’s ability to teach should matter more than one’s private life, a boy’s parents’ threatened to create a controversy. On one hand, homophobia and bullying had prejudice and intolerance in common. It inspired the kids to ask questions about what homosexuality meant and some of them, like Andrew, learned how to be a little kinder. On the other hand, the issue of whether or not Mr. Simon was gay overshadowed the issue of bullying. I wondered why the school officials failed to take action if someone being robbed of their lunch or getting punched in the stomach happened every day. Surely it wasn’t just because it was the 1960s. Being bullied is not a rite of passage as a lot of people, to my surprise, tend to argue. The film was designed for children and I was surprised that it didn’t offer solutions that made sense. Kicking bullies in crotch may keep them at bay for about a day but they’re bound to retaliate with more hatred than ever. “That’s What I Am” was a missed opportunity. I can overlook the weak acting by some of the young supporting actors, but what I cannot overlook is when a serious topic is not given the attention it deserves.

Harold (Bud Cort) had a predilection for the macabre. When he got up on a chair, positioned a rope around his neck, and kicked off his feet’s remaining support between life and death, his mother (Vivian Pickles) entered the room, glanced at her son’s discolored face, and calmly used the telephone. But not to call for help. This so-called suicide attempt was not a first. Harold was a young man so fascinated with death, he even attended funerals for fun. When he met Maude (Ruth Gordon), an ebullient seventy-nine-year-old woman who also enjoyed attending other people’s funerals, the two formed a complicated bond. Written by Colin Higgins, “Harold and Maude” was a strange but heart-warming dark comedy, equipped with excellent and perfectly placed Cat Stevens songs, because it took elements that were wrong and refrained from making them right. Instead, the filmmakers captured issues that could have been awkward and made them rather beautiful, one of which was the vast age difference between Harold and Maude. Cort excelled in playing a character who was reticent, almost a loner in every aspect of living. He spoke in a low tone of voice, slow, almost muffled, apathetic to the pleasures and advantages of being financially well-off. Gordon’s spicy voice and vibrant ways of moving her limbs provided a refreshing contrast against Cort’s depressed character. When the two occupied the same room, Gordon was almost minx-like but never creepy, as a bee is unable to help itself from landing on a specific flower. In Maude’s case, age came with experience and she often reminded him to live, that it didn’t matter if he wanted to take life seriously or foolishly as long as lived it the way he wanted to. Harold and Maude, standing between a precipice of being several generations apart, completed each other in the most touching ways. Expressing disgust that the two eventually shared a bed, sans an actual sex scene though nonetheless implicated, is a sign of immaturity. For me, it was only normal that the two would eventually feel the urge to explore each other physically considering they’d grown to know each other so well. That’s more than I can say for random hook-ups during drunken college nights and sweaty Vegas clubs. Much of the humor stemmed from Harold’s mother, the controlling Mrs. Chasen, happily inviting young women into the mansion just so Harold could finally choose a wife. She thought marriage would bring him to life through learning to take up real responsibilities. Although the arranged dates were very amusing, there was a real sadness in the relationship between mother and son, too. Her idea of happiness was so far from his, the two didn’t seem at all related. Notice that each of their conversations revolved around the son being told what to do in order to be a happier person. Their relationship became so unnavigable, the mother was even willing to contact Uncle Victor (Charles Tyner), a veteran who lost an arm in a war, to force Harold to join the military. Maybe she’d rather have a dead son than a son who likened the idea of death. I didn’t understand her nor do I think we were supposed to. The picture astutely used her as a symbol of what society expects from each of us. The biggest accomplishment of “Harold and Maude,” directed by Hal Ashby, was its unabashed celebration of differences. The next time I feel like doing somersaults on the beach, I’ll do it without giving a damn.

Benjamin Mee (Matt Damon) was able to make a living as an adventure addict and a writer. But when his wife, Katherine (Stephanie Szostak), passed away six months ago, he was forced to reassess his exciting career because of his children, Rosie (Maggie Elizabeth Jones) and Dylan (Colin Ford). While Rosie seemed to be adapting to the new structure of the household, Dylan had just been expelled from school, the fourth strike involved an inappropriate mural of a beheaded man, a hint of the teen’s possible mental state. Benjamin figured his family needed a change. After visiting several houses, the one that ended up exactly as he envisioned for his family happened to be a part of a crumbling zoo. To say that “We Bought a Zoo,” based on the screenplay by Aline Brosh McKenna and Cameron Crowe, was obvious would not be considered as misleading. After all, there was a clear parallel between the struggling family eventually finding a proper footing in order to move on from grief and the zoo’s staff desperately putting together the necessary pieces in order to pass an inspection test and be open for business by summer. For every victory, there was another roadblock but the characters somehow found solutions through external resources and personal courage to overcome such challenges. While the picture had a certain level of predictability, I enjoyed it nonetheless because most of the emotions felt true. Although the story took place in a rundown zoo, it was about the people who inhabited the space instead of the cute and ferocious animals. I was particularly interested in the relationship between father and son. There was a lot of tension that accumulated between them because they found it difficult to communicate with one another even though they wanted to. When the inevitable screaming match finally arrived, I found myself very moved because it reminded of a time when my relationship with my parents wasn’t so good. They didn’t yell at each other to be cruel. It simply had to be done so the relationship could have a chance to start anew. For me, that scene was an excellent reminder that a family is really a wonderful treasure to have. You can scream at each other like there’s no tomorrow but at the end of the day, the voice living in the basement of your brain knows that all of you will be okay. Like Dylan, I was–or still am–a secretive person with a lot of thoughts but prone to compartmentalizing especially when a situation is far from the ideal. Dylan was not happy about the move but he knew it wasn’t his place to say something to his dad. Despite the picture’s consistent portrayal of the teenager as sensitive and moody, since it was based on a true story, I think the real Dylan knew the crux of what his father was attempting to accomplish. On that level, I wish the film had given him more depth. Furthermore, while the scenes between Benjamin and Kelly (Scarlett Johansson), the zookeeper, were cute, it felt slightly underdeveloped. I didn’t need to see them go out on a date because a mutual understanding was established between them, but the later scenes relied too much on clichés to generate a reaction from the audience. Based on a book by Benjamin Mee and directed by Cameron Crowe, “We Bought a Zoo” needed less cloying flashbacks designed to show us how happy the family was before Katherine passed away. I found it superfluous because we already had an idea about how happy they were before the death through the grief they wrestled. Nevertheless, I found its honesty and simplicity delightful.

In introductory Neurology courses, we were taught that our brain filters out most of the information our senses absorb. That is why, for example, when we’re in the middle of a big city during rush hour, most of the sounds tend to blend together. The only sounds our brain process, at least in a conscious level, are the ones we will ourselves to pay attention to or a sound that is really loud to the point where our brain translates it as something threatening. Our relationship with sound was tackled in a smart and mature way in “Blow Out,” written and directed by Brian De Palma, about a soundman named Jack Terry (John Travolta), who recorded an assassination of a potential presidential nominee as the car skidded off the road and plunged into the icy river. Jack managed to rescue Sally (Nancy Allen), but the police wanted to cover up the fact that the political figure, married and with kids, had a female escort. Rumors about the politician drinking and driving spread like wildfire but Jack wanted to reveal the truth. The film wore its influences on its sleeve. The more serious side, the spying scenes, reminded me of Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Conversation.” On the other hand, the more comedic side was in the form of a slasher flick à la John Carpenter’s “Halloween” as we saw the murders from the killer’s perspective. The funniest running joke involved the filmmakers’ inability to correctly dub the scream of an actress who was about to get stabbed in the shower. The B-movie director and his associates were stuck in a Goldilocks and the Three Bears conundrum. The women hired tend to have screams that were either too deep or too shrill. Both sounded ridiculous and laughable without, but especially with, the shower scene image. Even though it didn’t have anything to do with the big picture, I was glad that De Palma didn’t remove those scenes. It showed me that he was confident with his work. The comedic scenes were solid tension-breakers and they never wore out their welcome. The film was almost obsessive with its images. Only in the last thirty minutes did we see the assassin’s face (John Lithgow) straight-on. And when we did, his dark intentions and strange fixations filled every frame. He moved like an animal; he knew about timing–when to hold back and when to go for the jugular. But the assassin’s meticulous nature was somewhat familiar. We saw it in Jack as he rewinded his tapes over and over again to find the most minute details of the crime. We learned about his past and his redemption arc came in the form of Sally, a girl who never watched the news because it was too depressing. He loved her but I loved that I wasn’t sure if she loved him back. I knew the film did a wonderful job because it made me want to know more. The ending was powerful but far from heavy-handed. When it comes to exposing the truth, sometimes you win some, sometimes you lose some.

A truck smashed into a couple’s car while on their way home from a romantic night out. Leo (Channing Tatum) suffered a few injuries, but Paige (Rachel McAdams) had severe brain hemorrhaging so the doctors thought it would be wise to keep her in a coma until her brain had a bit of time to recover. When Paige woke up, she had no memory of Leo, including getting married to him and moving to the city to pursue her career as an artist. She remembered being in law school, being engaged to a man named Jeremy (Scott Speedman), and living a completely different lifestyle prior to the accident. Inspired by a true story, “The Vow,” based on the screenplay by Abby Kohn and Marc Silverstein, offered several good scenes because it was able to capitalize on the chemistry between Tatum and McAdams, but certain plot mechanisms were so obviously designed to make us feel sorry for the couple and angry toward everyone else. Take Rita (Jessica Lange) and Bill (Sam Neill), Paige’s parents, as an example. We were given background information that Paige hadn’t spoken or seen them in years for reasons yet unknown to us. When the parents arrived at the hospital, it was difficult to get to know their characters, as if the material wasn’t at all willing to give them a chance. They were so serious, tight-lipped, and stern. Every time they opened their mouths, it was about chastising Leo for not calling and letting them know that their daughter had been involved in a terrible accident and attempting to get their daughter to live away from her husband. Because that scene–and others of its type–was so manipulative, it was difficult not to consider more realistic reactions. While the parents would still probably be angry with Leo for not being informed, wouldn’t they also have felt some sort of relief knowing that Paige was still alive? Since the parents were pigeonholed as villains for the majority of the time, the script lost the necessary complexities in the human drama: the disapproving parents seizing a new chance to lead a new life with their wayward daughter at the cost of Leo and Paige’s marriage and Paige’s personal struggle to put together the pieces of a life she had great trouble remembering. If the relationships had been messier, like life, it could have been much more compelling. However, the film was not without moments of truth. This may sound kinky but I found the scene where Leo passed gas in the car and Paige, to my horror, actually pulled up her window so she could bask in the stink. While most people would consider such a thing as downright disgusting, I found it romantic because it felt real. It may not have been subtle but it was an effective symbol of complete acceptance. If your partner is willing to sit with you during the good, the bad, and the unsavory vapors, I say your partner is a keeper. And why shouldn’t there be more unpleasant scenes like that portrayed in serious romantic dramas? I’d rather watch a well-placed fart scene than a series of monotonous seriousness where I find myself sitting passively, desperately waiting to be surprised. “The Vow,” directed by Michael Sucsy, was at times too constrained by what people come to expect from a romantic drama, punctuated by bright moments when it seemed free to do whatever felt right for the material. Because of the push and pull, the film was uneven but it was far from a mess.

Ben (Nicolas Cage) was an alcoholic intent on traversing a destructive path. His wife and child left him and he was recently fired from his job so he decided to go to Las Vegas to drink himself to death. Sera (Elisabeth Shue) was a prostitute and Yuri (Julian Sands) was her pimp. When she didn’t make enough money for a night, he took pleasure in beating her. She didn’t seem to mind. For her, being hit was a better feeling than being lonely. When Ben hired Sera, it wasn’t a regular night on the job. He just wanted someone to talk to and listen to his sometimes incomprehensible words. In just one night, she seemed to have fallen for her client. Based on a novel by John O’Brien and directed by Mike Figgis, it’s easy to classify “Leaving Las Vegas” as a romance film, but I didn’t see it from that perspective. In my opinion, for there to be romance, two people had to be relatively functional and emotionally available. Ben was far from functional and he was definitely not emotionally available. I wasn’t convinced that we knew his true self. In each scene, he was either drunk with confidence or he was going through ugly withdrawals. Cage’s performance was very impressive because he had control of such an uncontrollable character. He had an organic way in terms of shifting from one intense emotion to another without ignoring the subtleties requisite to make us believe that we were still watching a person worth saving even though the beast inside him had almost completely taken over. For instance, while having dinner, Sera suggested that Ben go see a doctor. With bulging eyes, he said he wasn’t going to see any doctor with such authority in his voice, but at the same time I felt that the longer I looked in those eyes, there was nobody there. I cared for Ben but there was something about that moment that scared me. It reminded me of those times when I was about four and my father, who drank alcohol profusely at the time, would return home and act like a damn fool in the living room and my mom and I stayed out of his way. The fear I felt as I looked in Cage’s eyes was similar to the fear I felt when my father’s monster would throw furniture around the house. Was there love between Ben and Sera? I thought so. But I wasn’t convinced Ben and Sera were really in love with one another. Ben depended on alcohol and Sera depended on the feeling of having someone there. They enabled each other’s disease. One of the most beautiful things about “Leaving Las Vegas” was love, like addiction, encompassed many forms. Depending on our experiences, we were able to take a unique magnifying glass and interpret why certain scenes unfolded the way they did. But one thing was certain. It was accurate in portraying alcoholism: the temporary and fleeting illusions of joy, the ticks when the mind was hungry for alcohol, the self-loathing because loved ones left, and the crippling depression. Those who’ve never had experience with an alcoholic should see this film. It was scary in its realism.

Cops knocked on the Brennans’ door and claimed that Lara (Elizabeth Banks) was under arrest for the murder of her boss. Evidence was against her: a co-worker saw her leave the scene of the crime, the blood on her jacket matched the victim’s, and her fingerprints were on the murder weapon. But John (Russell Crowe), Lara’s husband, was convinced that she was innocent. In a span of three years, the community college professor did the best he could to get his wife out of prison. When the judge sentenced her to a life in prison, John turned to illicit means. His first move was to ask an ex-convict (Liam Neeson) how he managed to escape prison seven times. “The Next Three Days,” directed by Paul Haggis, was enjoyable for half of its running time. I liked it best when it focused on John’s increasing irrationality. There were times when I was convinced all the planning would ultimately amount to nothing because I figured by the time he was ready to execute his ambitious plans, he was already neck-deep in his obsession. When he made mistakes, the consequences were high. One particularly suspenseful scene was when he created a bump key, a key that could open most locks, and decided to test it on a prison elevator. It didn’t work and when he tried to force it out, it broke. An alarm went off a couple of seconds later. Worse, the room had a camera and it recorded every move. We were left to wonder how he was going to squiggle his way out of the complicated situation. However, the tension wasn’t consistent. If the tension isn’t consistent, the momentum doesn’t build. Worse, the movie ran for about thirty minutes too long. There were scenes between John and Nicole (Olivia Wilde), a single mother who was always at the park with her daughter, which suggested that there could be romance between the two. While Nicole was a key figure in John, Lara and their son’s (Ty Simpkins) eventual attempt to get out of the country, there wasn’t an effective moment between John and Nicole where we would be convinced that something was going to happen between them. Most of those scenes should have been edited out to make room for scenes from Detectives Quinn (Jason Beghe) and Collero’s (Aisha Hinds) point of view. Instead, we mostly saw the duo spying on John while in their car or just sitting at their desks. How were we supposed to take them seriously, to feel that they were a threat to John’s plans, if we didn’t know how their minds worked? Lastly, I wished that the picture kept some of its mysteries from us. In the end, it showed us whether or not Lara’s sentence was deserved. It didn’t matter. What mattered was we rooted for John’s plans to outsmart the system.

Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill) sent C-3PO (Anthony Daniels) and R2-D2 (Kenny Baker) to collect Han Solo (Harrison Ford), encased in carbonite, from the gangster Jabba the Hutt (voiced by Larry Ward), but the droids were unsuccessful in their mission. Later, they discovered that Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew) had also been captured. It was up to young Skywalker, Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher), and Lando Calrissian (Billy Dee Williams) to rescue their friends. Meanwhile, the rebel groups found out that the Emperor (Ian McDiarmid) and Darth Vader (David Prowse and voiced by James Earl Jones) were building a new Death Star. Word went around that it was still non-functional so it was best to attack as soon as possible in order to end the rule of the evil Empire. Based on George Lucas’ original story and directed by Richard Marquand, “Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi” had some serious problems in terms of pacing. The first third of the picture was exciting. Although it ended in violence, Han Solo’s debt to Jabba the Hutt had finally been settled. Luke facing a truly ugly Rancor, strong but not very smart, was a joy to watch as well as the battle on the flying ships that hovered over a desert monster. Everyone who fell off the ship was eaten in a gruesome fashion. The ships rocked back and forth and crashed into each other which sent our lovable protagonists up in the air and near the mouth of the hungry creature. But when our heroes reached the forest moon of Endor, the story became painfully stagnant and, at its worst, cloyingly cheesy. I had difficulty believing that the cute Ewoks could be menacing. The most critical misstep was allowing the Ewoks to be front and center while Han Solo and company were brushed to the side. What I found highly enjoyable about “Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope” and “Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back” was the fact that the rebel groups were constantly outnumbered. Using sheer creativity and determination, they somehow disentangled themselves, while making some key sacrifices, from sticky situations. In this installment, the Ewoks did most of the work in defeating the Stormtroopers while Luke faced Vader and the Emperor in the new Death Star. In the latter, there was a lot of talk about going to the Dark Side but I felt no tension among the three powerful characters. Without tension, the one-dimensionality of the dialogue became apparent. The director failed to take advantage of the relationship between Luke and Vader, the push and pull of the way they felt toward each other versus their loyalty for their cause, and what being a Jedi meant to them. Still imaginative and exciting but noticeably less effective, “Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi” needed less of the Ewoks’ cuddly warmth and more epic adventures designed to tie together the series’ overarching themes.

Mallory Kane (Gina Carano) thought she was safe in a diner, at least for a while, until she looked outside and saw Aaron (Channing Tatum) approaching. He took a seat in front of her and commanded her to get inside the car. Mallory was not to be persuaded this way. After she mentioned Barcelona, Dublin, and the name Paul, Aaron realized he had no choice but to force her, through extreme violence, despite customers watching. We needn’t worry, though, because Mallory Kane was a former Marine. As a private contractor, she was more than capable of defending herself against colleagues about twice her size. “Haywire,” written by Lem Dobbs, had a simple plot yet quite labyrinthine at the same time because we were dropped in the middle of whatever was going on and we didn’t have a clear understanding of the characters’ motivations. Two-thirds of the picture focused on a flashback sequence involving two assignments in Barcelona and Dublin, respectively: the extraction of a kidnapped Chinese man (Anthony Brandon Wong), in which Mallory was the leader of the on-site operation, and Mallory serving as an escort of a British agent (Michael Fassbender). As pieces fell into place and the plot made more sense, the film was still able to keep a high level of excitement and mystery. Perhaps it was because the fight and flight scenes were equally compelling. Whenever Mallory faced an enemy and both had to inflict incredible amount of pain to each other, there was a lack of score. The sounds–heavy blows delivered to the body, furnitures cracking due to uneven distribution of forces, posh glass breaking–were magnified and they made the visual experience much more visceral. At one point, I found myself wanting to get up and engage in a one-sided fight against a punching bag. It was a great decision to allow the one-on-one matches to play out. Most of the time, Mallory’s enemies were experienced fighters so I found it believable that it would take time for one of them to make a critical error or reach exhaustion. The escape scenes were quite impressive, too. Mallory’s stint in attempting to evade a tracker in the streets of Dublin was almost suspenseful on a Hitchcockian level: a beautiful woman in a foreign country suspecting that a stranger was observing her from afar and following wherever she went. The chaos that Mallory experienced was complemented against the chaos happening under the jurisdiction of Coblenz (Michael Douglas), an influential United States official for various discrete operations. Kenneth (Ewan McGregor) and Rodrigo (Antonio Banderas) were the puppeteers of the game, the reason why Mallory seemed to have gone rogue. Directed by Steven Soderbergh, “Haywire” was at times weighed down by desultory technical artistry. Most of the scenes were in color but select scenes were in black and white. I found it inconsistent and I got the impression that the director was trying too hard. Nevertheless, the film was fun due to its energy and well-choreographed duels. It doesn’t require much brain power to sit there and watch it all unfold.

Kate (Franka Potente) was supposed to go to a party with a friend, but as it turned out, the friend left without Kate. Although she was disappointed that she didn’t have company, Kate decided to go by herself because meeting George Clooney at a party was too epic to give a pass. In order to get there, however, she had to use the London subway. With five more minutes until the last train arrived, Kate fell asleep on the platform. When she woke up, everybody was gone and she found herself locked inside the station. Written and directed by Christopher Smith, “Creep” used every cliché in the horror manual and beat us over the head with it, creating a very frustrating and maddening experience. When Kate woke up from her alcohol-induced nap, we were forced to observe her running around in her stilettos, banging on metallic gates, and screaming for help. It was interminable; for girl who was supposedly used to city life, I got the impression she didn’t know anything. I was at a loss on why she insisted on looking for a security guard after Guy (Jeremy Sheffield), a lascivious acquaintance from work who followed her to the subway, tried to rape her. Why didn’t she just pull the fire alarm so hunky firefighters, eager cops, and charming medics would come running for her assistance? When she eventually found Guy covered in blood because someone or something attacked him, Kate’s expression more or less remained the same. The director should have taken his actor aside and asked her to exaggerate a bit more. If she still couldn’t pull it off, another actor should have been called on set. Allowing the camera to keep recording was a bad decision. Ultimately, one of the main reasons why the rising action did not work was because of the dearth of variation in Potente’s acting. When something appeared from the darkness, naturally, she screamed. She screamed rather well, but it wasn’t enough. Considering that the camera focused on her face for the majority of the time, when she saw something from afar or when she had to look down from a certain height, because her performance was so one-note, I didn’t feel like I was stuck in the subway with her nor did I feel like she was genuinely terrorized. Another reason for the picture’s lack of tension was the poor screenplay. The villain (Sean Harris) was not at all interesting. Although it hinted at the terrorizer’s past using pictures and babies in jars, it left us nothing but vague glimpses. There was no way for us to put the pieces together in a way that made sense because there was a plethora of missing information. The audience could put them together several different ways but they wouldn’t explain why he felt the needed to kidnap people on the subway and sewers and kept them in cages. There was one very ugly scene when the villain held a saw and thrusted it in a woman’s groin. Since there was no background for the violence, I found it exploitative, shot for mere shock value. It was a cheap shot to scare us. It didn’t scare me. I was just disgusted.

A hunter named Judd Travers (Scott Wilson) was not very kind to his dogs. Yelling at the dogs, hitting them on the head with a rifle, and kicking them in the stomach was, to him, just a part of the job. By treating his animals in such a way, similar to the manner in which his own father treated him when he was a child, Judd believed his dogs would toughen up and become more effective hunters. One night, a beagle ran away from him. The next morning, it crossed paths with Marty Preston (Blake Heron), a kid searching for a summer job because he wanted a bike. But the moment he laid his eyes on the dog, naming it Shiloh, a bike suddenly felt less important. Based on a novel by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor and directed by Dale Rosenbloom, “Shiloh” was a real treat for children and adults who had a pet they loved when they were kids. It was an atypical film about a friendship between a boy and his pet because it wasn’t afraid to face certain truths. Some reviews cited the fact that the picture didn’t need to show acts of animal cruelty. They argued it was too violent for children. I beg to differ. I thought it was important, especially for kids, to know that mistreatment of animals do exist in many forms. We may not like seeing it but the reality is that it’s there and, as the picture showed, we do have the power to protect animals from being treated like they’re objects. The harsh reality was balanced with real tender moments. The way Marty pet and held the dog, his many attempts to earn enough money so he could buy Shiloh from Judd, and his reasoning behind lying to his parents (Michael Moriarty, Ann Dowd) about not knowing the dog’s whereabouts showed a lot of love. There were real thoughts in Marty’s head; it wasn’t just about owning a dog like one would own a bike. For him, it was about rescuing a living being who he believed was being treated unkindly. In a way, he wanted to stand up for the dog because it didn’t have the words to express how it felt about being abused. To say that Marty was a young hero would not be an understatement. But there were moments of comedy, too. Sam (J. Madison Wright) was a girl, adopted by the Wallaces (Rod Steiger, Bonnie Bartlett), around Marty’s age who was brave enough to show Marty that she liked him. Marty, still not at an age where he was interested in (or comfortable admitting to liking) girls, either ignored her affections or told her to “not be gross.” I wish they had more scenes together. “Shiloh” had an old-fashioned story and execution but it a big heart and, more importantly, real lessons to impart about responsibility, growing up, and fighting for what one believes to be right.

The Tesseract, a cube with the potential energy to destroy the planet, was obtained by the egomaniacal Loki (Tom Hiddleston) from S.H.I.E.L.D., Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistic Division, led by one-eyed Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson). Overpowered by Loki’s strength and otherworldly powers, Fury sought help from Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Captain America (Chris Evans), The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), with Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) eventually joining the party. Based on the screenplay by Joss Whedon, comprehensive character development in “The Avengers” was simply out of the question because each superhero contained an interesting personality filled with quirks and unique sense of humor. The main question was how to keep the story interesting apart from massively entertaining explosions and jaw-dropping action sequences. I found that the film was similar to a great swimmer. Because of Whedon’s direction, the film knew how to pace itself so it didn’t drown in its own ambitions. When the movie kept its head underwater by delivering the intense and often breathtaking battle scenes, they were allowed to play out to our satisfaction without overstaying their welcome. For example, the duel between Iron Man and Thor was simply wonderful to watch. Out of the six, not only did the two of them have the biggest egos, they were my least favorite characters compared to the rest. (Personally, listening to Thor speak is as boring as reading about the history of differential equations hybridized with Shakespearean lingo.) Yet it didn’t matter because I was so involved in what was happening. Their brawl, and of those to come, was within the story’s context. Thor, prior to joining the group, wanted to convince his adopted brother against enslaving Earth while Iron Man worked for a cause and had to deliver Loki to the proper authorities. When the movie gasped for air, they were quick and memorable. The sense of humor stood out because the script played upon the elementary personalities of each hero or heroine. For instance, the material had fun with what the audience expect of Black Widow and her sex. The script was balanced in subverting the typicalities of women’s roles in superhero movies, given that they’re usually the romantic interest or object of desire, and remaining loyal to her character as a woman on a global and personal mission. Since she, along with Hawkeye, did not have a stand-alone movie, having not read the comics, I appreciated that her character was given a little bit more depth than her counterparts. While there were still unanswered questions about her history and the intricacies of what she hoped to gain by joining S.H.I.E.L.D., by the end, I felt like I knew her as well as the other guys. I felt like she had her own stamp in the dynamics of the group, that they wouldn’t be complete without her. Naturally, the film’s climax involved a lot of extirpation of expensive skyscrapers. But the main difference between the destruction seen here as opposed to, say, Michael Bay’s “Transformers,” was the action didn’t feel incomprehensible. Things blew up but the quick cuts weren’t injected with multiple shots of epinephrine. Each jump of perspective had something enjoyable to offer instead of relying on a false sense of excitement. In other words, the destruction was actively made interesting instead of allowing it on autopilot. “The Avengers” could have used more Pepper (Gwyneth Paltrow), less speeches between Loki and Thor, and an explanation on how The Hulk became more manageable toward the end. Nevertheless, such negatives are so small compared to the cyclopean roller coaster ride that the filmmakers had given us. When I was a kid, I played with a lot of action figures. Some even revolved around crazy narratives I made up, one of which involved a live caterpillar and beetle destroying Legos that stood for Gotham City. I must say, the sight of The Hulk tossing Loki around like a piece of spaghetti made me feel like a kid again.

Curtis (Michael Shannon) was a hardworking construction worker who was suddenly struck by intense nightmares about an upcoming storm. In the dream, rain had the properties of motor oil and people threatened to inflict violence on him and abduct his daughter (Tova Stewart). Experiencing them every night, Curtis suspected that they were more than just recurring bad dreams. He felt an overwhelming need to clean out and prepare the storm shelter in the backyard because something terrible was coming. “Take Shelter,” written and directed by Jeff Nichols, successfully placed us into the mind of a possible paranoid schizophrenic. Although our protagonist’s dreams were strange, violent, and horrific, the material sympathized with Curtis by focusing on how his family, friends, and co-workers reacted to his increasingly unexplainable behaviors. Since not one of them knew what he was going through, the tension was embedded in how Curtis desperately tried to keep hiding his affliction. As his condition worsened, people just assumed it was either due to stress or lack of sleep. Shannon did a wonderful job juggling unmentioned details of his character by simply using his solemnly desperate eyes and tall, somewhat lanky figure. While it was practical that Curtis would be ashamed to be the topic of small town gossip, the cover-up, I think, was for the purpose of protecting his family. Having gone through the shame of having a mother who was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, Curtis didn’t want for his wife and child to experience what he went through many years prior. Furthermore, Samantha (Jessica Chastain) and Curtis’ daughter was a deaf child on the verge of receiving a cochlear implant. As we all know, most people tend to hold a certain idea toward “handicapables.” While the nightmares commanded a magnetic realism, I was most fascinated with and craved more of the scenes where Curtis tried to seek help from professionals. The look they gave him as they assessed what was wrong and the look he gave them when they admitted there were no easy solutions was an emotional roller coaster. The screenplay was smart in maintaining an unclear position relative to Curtis’ condition. Certain signs, like delusions and hallucinations, led to an undiagnosed mental illness, but portentous images, like birds flying as though they’ve gone crazy, pointed to the possibility of the world coming to an end. While what was really happening to Curtis could and did spark rousing debates, it doesn’t matter to me which camp is right. And the way I see it, you shouldn’t either. The first point the film wanted to make was for us, like most schizophrenics, not to be able to descry between fantasy and reality. Since we couldn’t, reflected by different interpretations of what “really” happened, the writer-director successfully placed us into a mentally ill person’s shoes. The second point is the social angle from the fear of being considered an aberration by one’s community, yes, even one’s family, and having to live with a label for the rest of one’s life. If anything, the picture subtly argues that we should learn to be more sympathetic of other people’s plight; it’s easy to judge but it takes a bit of effort to understand.