Pieces of April This is a pretty funny story about a girl who is having her estranged family to her ghetto apartment for Thanksgiving dinner. It’s an indy film, so the camera work is a little shaky, and it’s a character piece, so it might not be for everyone. I enjoyed it, and it put the GF in a major weepfest (which means chicks will dig it too). B++

I Heart Huckabees (comedy?): If a professor assigned this to me for a philosophy class, I would think that he was the coolest teacher in town. Because I wasn’t, I felt like I was being dragged through a very heavy philosophy lesson punctuated by comedy. B-

Jersey Girl (drama): Oh Ben Afleck, how you deserve a kick in the balls for making this movie. Jennifer Lopez is married to Ben, and dies when their child is born. Ben doesn’t want the baby, until the end of the movie when he has a heart warming change of heart. If this were a sporting event there would be penalty flags all over the field for bad acting, intentional tear jerking, and for killing Lopez without once showing her largest asset. D-

Kaena: The Prophecy (animated): This was on for free on a free Starz weekend, so I sat through it. I knew that there was some sort of buzz about it, but I didn’t know why. It was about a giant tree in the sky that had some sort of alien power ball jammed in it or something. It was like I was watching something made by the Japanese, for the Japanese. Then, 3/4ths through the movie, the buxom cartoon gets naked. At that point, I realized what the buzz was about, and how much time I had cluelessly wasted on it. They were big, fake, animated jugs, that some lonely nerds created a buzz about. Get GF’s and stop chatting up the nude cartoons, freaks. D

Dirty Pretty Things (drama): Audrey Tautou from Amelie played an immigrant in England that sort of lives with some African dude who is on the lamb or some shit. Even though it involved kidney cutting and was free, this movie was boring as shit. I’m bored even mentioning it. C-

Ali G: Indahouse (comedy, innit?): Dis was de best movie, ok? Ali G is this white guy, who talks like a Jamaican guy with a British accent, wears yellow fubu sweat suits, drives a little yellow car with a big wing on it, has a 2 finger ring that says “EastSide”, and he wants to save the youth center by getting elected to Parliament. This was all dick and fart jokes, but I actually watched it twice in a row. B as in Booyaka!

Bringing Down the House (comedy): I use the term “comedy” loosely when categorizing this movie. I pretty much knew it would be crap, but it has Steve Martin and Queen Latifa in it, so I took a shot. There’s something about watching Eugene Levy trying to get jiggy with a big girl with the attitude of a fit girl that kept me from the stop button. C

Spanglish (romantic comedy): This is essentially a 2 hour exploration of the interactions between a wealthy family and their Mexican maid, as told by the maid’s young daughter. The characters in the movie were extremely believable and quirky, throwing you headlong into the story. Sandler did a surprisingly good job without relying on a schtick to float his performance, and Paz Vega, who plays the Mexican maid, did the entire performance without knowing how to speak English. To me, this made her performance all the more remarkable. Although I enjoyed the film, and Paz Vega is one salsarific fox, no matter which way you slice it, this is a chick flick. B.

Pirates of the Caribbean (stupid): Having a movie that’s a 2 hour long advertisement for a 30 year old Disney ride, isn’t exactly the best idea for a movie. Even though I thought that Johnny Depp did an excellent job, I have to fail it, because I shut it off after a mere half hour. It is interesting to note that Depp based his performance on Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, but not interesting enough to keep me watching. F

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