- Little Children
Another biting and really uplifting comedy about child molestation. Seriously. The movie takes the position, if perhaps a bit unsubtly, that everyone is strange. People who seem the most normal are masturbating with panties over their heads and cruising for anonymous gay sex at truck stops. In this milieu of oddity and pretense and secrets, a child molesters direct acceptance of his psychosexual disturbance makes him genuine and, in a creepy way, likable. As in Happiness, Jane Adams is brilliant.

- Fur
Billed as an Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus, it's more a vehicle for Nicole Kidman in the title role. She's captivating, as always. The movie shares some of the sexual tension of Secretary, but ventures off into more bizarre pastures. There's some effort to make the subjects of Arbus portraits come alive, but in an odd way it seems to share an aesthetic with HBO's ill-fated Carnivale (as well as a period).

- Babble
An amazingly international story, it weaves plots across the San Diego/Mexico boarder, Morocco, and Tokyo into a coherent whole. The interleaved stories are not temporally synchronized, which can be a bit confusing, but overall there is a good payoff for paying attention. The known stars (Pitt, Blanchett, etc) put in great performances, but the Moroccan kids (apparently non-actors) steal the show.

- Charmed Lives
A nice overview of the history of Kordas, made special by the Q&A with Michael Korda who's recollections were stronger than the film.

- Severence
A brilliant spoof of a slasher film that sustains the genre while making fun of it. The Shaun of the Dead of slasher films. Enjoyable, light hearted, entertaining. Good gore, good suspense and surprises, jokes and characters never went too far into intolerable.

- The Italian
A Russian film about orphans and child prostitutes who live in abject misery and yet, in a brutal way, care deeply for and support each other. The story follows one orphan's amazing journey to find his mother. The child was brilliant - just exceptional - with amazing facial expressions seemingly beyond his years.

- Volver
As part of a tribute to Penelope Cruz, who was on hand to get her medal, Volver was screened. Perhaps one of Almodovar's best, and the furthest he's departed from his sexy, funny roots; about multi-generational child abuse. Cruz is quite wonderful in the film, putting in an excellent performance that convinced me her medal was warranted. The movie is, as is Almodovar's tendency, filled with powerful, interesting, well conceived women, yet not above a good fart joke.

- The Last King of Scotland (excellent)
The story of Idi Amin's unlikely friendship with a somewhat adrift young Scottish physician and his decent into madness. Forest Whitaker is one of my favorite actors ever - always a pleasure to watch, usually demonstrating a calm cool that's just captivating. In this movie he is quite frightening. His performance is astonishing - Academy Award-Worthy. So far, I think the best movie I've seen here.

- Passio
An experimental film, a visual rhythm piece, meant to be accompanied by 21 live musicians. A bit of an endurance test without the live music. Though beautiful, and somewhat hyptnotic, it ran too long unaccompanied.

- The U.S. vs. John Lennon
A strong documentary that creates a vision of Lennon as a social activist coming to an awakening, fighting the good fight, and getting stomped by a heavy-handed Nixon government. Lots of great footage and excellent interviews, but a reliance on Geraldo Rivera somewhat taints the film. Any Geraldo is too much, but he acts as if he is sympathetic to Lennon's goals and tribulations, a position entirely at odds with his position in Fox news as a cheerleader for the right attacking Jon Stewart. G. Gordon Liddy, also absurd but genuinely so, is more apropos.

- Catch a Fire (excellent)
Philip Noyes really amazing and powerful story of Patrick Chamusso, a solid working class guy who keeps his nose clean and supports his family well, and the villiage soccer team, and his girlfriend and son. Until a poorly timed attack on the gas plant where he works brings the full evil of Apartheid down on him and his family and he rises to the challenge. Tim Robbins plays the Afrikaans police chief in a surprisingly human way and together they do an excellent job of showing a slice of the complexity of South Africa.

- The Lives of Others (excellent)
Another excellent film about dictators and repression, this time a story of a bureaucratic hero of the Stasi who risks life and career to help a playwright who's become at risk as his beautiful girlfriend caught the eye of a high-ranking Stasi official. The characters are well-formed and believable and the story complex, interesting, compelling and suspenseful.

- Civic Life
Seven short films about civic life, apparently created to showcase different towns. Some were surreal and funny, others fairly tedious. One or two at a time would be fun. 7 was more challenge than we were up to.

- 12:08 East of Bucharest
A sweet, funny character study revolving around a small town talk show's theme on the anniversary of the revolution that overthrew Ceausecscu. The host got a drunken professor and a quirky old man to tell their stories. Callers disputed them. Hilarity ensued. Very funny in the ironic, Eastern European way.

- Ghosts of Cite Soleil
An amazing documentary of two gang chiefs of the most dangerous place on Earth, the slums of Cite Soleil in Haiti, on the eve of the overthrow of Aristide. Unbelievably lucky documentary film makers happened to pick two men who ended up being important in the flow of events around Aristide's last months. The bravery of the film makers is almost unthinkable, surrounded by constant violence and gunfire with very little footage of feet running in terror.

- Page Turner
A story of revenge served cold. A talented pianist is crushed by the careless and callous act. She gets even. And then some. Wonderful acting and very compelling and subtle performances create real tension, sexual and otherwise.

- Indigenes
The story of the first French troops to reach Alsace, who happened to be North Africans. The were treated like second class citizens by colonial France, an injustice that continues to this day as the pensions of the brave men who served are still frozen. A good war movie, with a lot of character development, and successfully exploring the consequences of prejudice.