Shortly after arriving in Shanghai, I saw the trailer for this spy thriller in the subway, and of course immediately decided that this would warrant my first trip to the cinema here. Back at home, I was shocked to find no trailer on Apple's site and hardly any information about it on IMDb, not even a poster. John Cusack, Gong Li, Chow Yun-Fat, Ken Watanabe, David Morse, and Franka Potente, produced by the Weinstein Company, apparently already finished two years ago and sitting on the shelves ever since. Last week world premiere at the Shanghai film festival, releases this year in selected European and East Asian markets, but still no US release date. No idea why, I cannot see anything wrong with this picture.

7 points (only the fifteenth vote on IMDb !)

Tim Burton's take on this classic story sees a nineteen year old Alice run off at her own engagement party to chase a well-dressed rabbit down a rabbit hole. As it turns out, the rabbit has been sent to find her, as Alice has been prophesied to lead an uprising against the cruel Red Queen, thus freeing Underland from her oppressive rule.

We saw the film in 3D, and all the trailers were also in 3D. Hollywood seems to have gotten really behind this idea, but I am already tired of it.

6 points

Same movies on the return flight, and I did not want to see Up on the tiny screen, had already seen Two Weeks Notice, Serendipity, and Million Dollar Baby, failed to get English subtitles for the Korean movies, and did not feel up to The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. So ...

• The Day the Earth Stood Still (5 points)
• The Happening (3 points)

Ever since winning immortality in a bet against the Devil (which of course was a trick and turned out to be more of a curse than a blessing), Doctor Parnassus (Christopher Plummer) is touring the world with his little theatre troupe. Unfortunately, the style of the performance has not aged very well and it is hard for them to attract an audience. Their fortunes seem to pick up when they find Tony (Heath Ledger, Johnny Depp, Jude Law, Colin Farell), hanging from a bridge with a rope around his neck.

6 points

The problem with watching movies on the plane's onboard entertainment system is that the pilot turns off the screen before landing. On today's flight to Tokyo that cost me the last twenty minutes or so of Crash.

• Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant (7 points)
• District 9 (9 points)
• Crash (8 points)

Fortunately, I am staying at Imai-san's place, and his extensive DVD collection did indeed include Crash (which actually he got from me), so I was able to enjoy the conclusion.

In the opening scene, legendary detective Sherlock Holmes and his partner, Dr. Watson, help the rather dimwitted Scotland Yard investigators to arrest the serial killer Lord Blackwood. After that, several months pass without a new case, and a depressed and bored Holmes hardly leaves his messy apartments. Worst of all, Watson is planning to move out and get married. But then, Lord Blackwood, who has been hanged for his crimes, appears to have risen from the dead, and taken control of a well-connected secret society. It is up to Holmes and Watson to track him down and dispel his apparent supernatural powers.

Too much action, too big a villain, too much Dan Brown, and too much setup for future sequels, but fortunately, the magical tricks do get explained by the end (I was worried), and the dynamic between the two leads (Robert Downey, Jr. and Jude Law) keeps the film entertaining.

6 points

James Cameron has reportedly been working on Avatar since 1994, and wanted to start filming directly after finishing Titanic. Unfortunately, he felt that technology needed to catch up with his vision, and production slipped ten years. Even though the story is nothing new ( take your pick of Pocahontas, Dances with Wolves, or Last Samurai), and a bit thin for 162 minutes, the result is spectacular. All the new camera, editing, and CGI technology that Cameron has created for his movie have really paid off. Seasoned critics have compared Avatar to seeing Star Wars for the first time. I am too young to make such comparisons, but it is definitely up there with Jurassic Park. The computer-generated actors in particular are so much more life-like than for example in Beowulf two years ago.

Many of the tools and techniques pioneered by Cameron here will very soon trickle down into other productions and become mainstream, but I remain doubtful about 3D. It is very well done in Avatar, but it still seems to be more of a silly gadget and a desperate marketing ploy. I cannot see it working outside of big action movies, and even there, people will probably soon tire of it. If studios want a more immersive experience, they should look at higher resolution instead. Or invest in better storyboards.

8 points

While the cinema in the Plaza Indonesia (a shopping mall immensely larger than the one I live in) has eleven screens, they chose to allocate seven of them to be able to show a certain vampire drama for teenagers in fifteen minute intervals. As such, choices were limited and the director to bring me back in front of the silver screen AFTER FOUR MONTHS turned out to be not Quentin Tarantino, not Wes Anderson, but Roland Emmerich.

A rare alignment of planets leads to unusually strong solar flares, causing the Earth's crust to become dislodged and shift around. Emmerich follows up Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow with an even more thorough destruction of our planet. If he intends to top it in the future, he will have to blow it up entirely. Emmerich has assembled a very likable cast of actors, but unfortunately he also demonstrates that action sequences can be overdone. There is only so many times in a single movie that you need to see an airplane take off from a world that is falling away under it. In addition to being repetitive and ridiculously overblown, the constant assault also violates the premise that an action movie should build towards a climax.

5 points

SNAPE KILLS DUMBLEDORE!

7 points

After three films shot in London, Woody Allen continues his European tour in Spain with his current muse (Scarlett Johansson) in tow. It is the story of two young American women (Johansson and Rebecca Hall) on a two-month summer trip to Barcelona, where their encounter with a charming local artist (Javier Bardem, who is quite handsome without Anton Chigurh makeup, in fact, he looks a lot like Robert Downey Jr.) has a lasting impact on their outlook on life and love, especially when he is later joined by his mentally unstable ex-wife (Penelope Cruz).

7 points

Where can I sign the petition for making a full season with this team? I am ready to pre-order the DVD boxed set unseen right now.

8 points

While Dan Brown's book Angels and Demons relates Robert Langdon's first high-speed murder-mystery chase across important cultural and religious locations in European capitals, and is hence the prequel to the Da Vinci Code, the timeline has been reversed for the movie. Some of the more outrageous stunts that Brown pulls in the book have been scaled back, too, and Ewan McGregor's character is no longer Italian, but Irish. Other than that, this is a very faithful adaptation, which unfortunately took away the suspense for me (Cissy had forgotten who would turn out to be the bad guy and was genuinely surprised at the end).

Discovery of the day: Nikolaj Lie Kaas as the assassin.

6 points

Production on the Vietnam War epic Tropic Thunder (the movie in the movie) seems doomed: Costs are sky-rocketing, the schedule is slipping, and the director is unable to control his three prima-donna stars (the ageing action star, the Australian method actor, and the flatulence comedian). When the studio threatens to pull the plug, the director, the author, and the special effects guy come up with the plan drop the actors into the middle of the jungle, and let real fear inspire their acting. Unfortunately, they stumble into the territory of real heroin smugglers, and mistake them for scripted Vietcong.

Tropic Thunder (the movie about the movie in the movie) is written, produced, directed, and starred by Ben Stiller. As a big Ben Stiller fan, I have to agree that his recent offerings have been entertaining but not very memorable. With Tropic Thunder, however, he is back on the top of his game. I am also an aficionado of movies about movies, and it does not do shame to that genre, either. Wonderful cast, too, starting with the actors (Stiller, Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black, and the excellent Brandon T. Jackson and Jay Baruchel), but also the director (Steve Coogan), the agent (Matthew McConaughey with weird hair) the Vietnam vet author (Nick Nolte), and a delightfully deformed and foul-mouthed Tom Cruise.

8 points

The are basically two very different types of X-Files episodes, the mythology shows, that make up the main story arc about the government conspiracy to hide an alien invasion, and the monster-of-the-week shows that stand on their own and feature a wide variety of paranormal situations. The monster episodes are also quite often very funny.

The first X-Files movie falls into the first category, and because of the fact that it was meant to fit in between seasons five and six, it did not really work as a movie.

I Want To Believe shows Mulder and Scully several years after the X-Files division has been disbanded. Mulder has been disgraced and lives in isolation, Scully is a physician at a Catholic hospital. When a defrocked priest claims to have visions that could help save the live of a missing FBI agent, the Bureau calls them back in.

This one is definitely a monster show: There are no aliens, and the mythology is not even mentioned (which would have been difficult after the apparent dead end at which the final episode arrived, what with almost everyone dead and the destruction of humanity imminent). Most importantly, the film stands on its own: You do not need to know anything about the X-Files, no other characters from the series other than Mulder and Scully (and a bit of Skinner) appear, and the plot is in its entirety contained in the film's 104 minutes, including a real conclusion, something that many Hollywood movies aiming for a sequel intentionally obmit. On the other hand, there is not too much fodder for the X-Philes, although the depiction of the relationship between Mulder and Scully is nicely done.

It is not a funny one, though, quite the opposite. There are also no computer-generated monsters, massive special effects, larger-than-life supervillains, or a great many action sequences. It is a serious thriller, with just a sprinkle of the paranormal.

7 points

Mr. Fletcher (Danny Glover) runs a video rental store in Passaic, New Jersey. Business is slow (probably because he still only offers VHS) and is unlikely to be able to pay for building repairs to avoid demolition, so Fletcher decides to take a few days off to spy on a successful DVD store and learn their business secrets. He leaves his store in the hands of his adopted son Mike (Mos Def) and his paranoid friend Jerry (Jack Black). Unfortunately, a freak accident at the local power plant has left Jerry magnetized and his mere presence erases all the tapes. The only solution is for Mike and Jerry to quickly reshoot the movies themselves, starting with Ghostbusters and Rush Hour 2. Their sweded films turn out to be a big success.

8 points

First movie in a long time!

Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr) is a genius inventor, both incredibly wealthy and totally irresponsible, who has made his fortune creating and selling military weapons. During a kidnapping he suffers a severe heart injury that forces him to attach a power generator to his chest. His kidnappers try to make him build a missile for them, but instead he crafts a metal combat suit and turns into Iron Man.

Pretty much the only thing going for this comic book adaptation is the banter between Stark and his personal assistant (Gwyneth Paltrow), and with his buddy in the military (Terrence Howard). The plot is not all that inspired, and it does of course set up sequels (and tie-ins to other Marvel characters), and the action sequences are mostly forgettable (I did like the scene with the two fighter planes, though).

I had heard that the extra scene after the end credits gives a whole new angle to the movie (and it was even announced in the Japanese subtitles so that everyone stayed in their seats), but it was nowhere near an important last shot (think Prestige), just a teaser for the likely sequel.

5 points

The crime lords of Gotham City are having a tough time against the combined forces of Batman (and Batman wannabes), the police squad led by Lieutenant Gordon and the new District Attorney Harvey Dent. So they turn to the Joker, an anarchist super-villain, who seems competent and crazy enough to take on Batman, but who is also mostly interested in wreaking as much havoc as possible in the process. To quote Butler Alfred, some men just want to see the world burn.

Of all the recent superhero movies, Nolan's Batman is definitely the darkest. Possibly the best one, too, and if they want to give Heath Ledger his posthumous Oscar for the Joker, I am fine with that, but the film is not as great as its current IMDb ranking (which hopefully will average out over time) would make you think. I'd put it ahead of Batman Begins, but behind Memento and Prestige.

8 points

After Obi-Wan Kenobi, Rocky Balbao, John McClane, John Rambo, and Ellen Ripley it is Dr. Henry Jones, Jr.'s turn to bring an iconic movie trilogy and his aged self back to the silver screen. The film is getting a lot of harsh criticism from die-hard fans, who are always quick to compare it to the widely reviled Star Wars prequels and blame George Lucas for the use of CGI, for the presence of aliens, for unrealistic action sequences, and a silly plot. But I think Indy is doing okay, and also keeping to the style of the series. The biggest difference between Kingdom and the earlier films may not be Soviets instead of Nazis, or extraterrestrial instead of religious artefacts, but the fact that, just like Indy himself, his original audience is twenty years older now.

7 points

After a year back in London, the four teenage heroes of the first Narnia movie (and book) are thrust back into their fantasy kingdom when Prince Caspian, on the run from his evil uncle, sounds a magic horn. During their absence of more than a thousand years, Narnia has been overrun by human invaders, the Talking Beasts driven into the wilderness and near extinction.

5 points

Hunting for deer in the Texas desert, Llewellyn Moss (Josh Brolin) stumbles upon the bloody aftermath of a drug deal gone wrong, including a suitcase full of money, which he decides to keep for himself. Unfortunately, the Mexican bosses find out about him and send deranged killer Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem) after him (strangest name since Keyser Soze, you say? Well, he is equally creepy, too). Ageing third-generation sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) can do little to stop the rampage that follows and starts seriously thinking about retirement.

This is the Coen Brothers back in Blood Simple mode. All the violence of Fargo, without any of the comedy pieces. And for some reason they refuse to give us a satisfying ending. The typical Hollywood movie would have seen Brolin and Jones overcoming Bardem in a big shootout at a motel (wrecking the place in the process). A darker version would have Bardem win. In either case, the whole movie (which is after all kind of a western) was building up towards that epic showdown. Well, does not happen. Or rather, does happen, but we don't get to see any of it. Is this the Coens telling us that violence does not pay, not even for movie-goers?

8 points