In a year already decorated with and defined by a strong, liberating output from female directors, Lone Scherfig’s An Education is a calculated and sophisticated work about a time when women were questioning and challenging their cultural boundaries. Opposed to Kathryn Bigelow’s magnificent war-drama The Hurt Locker or Jane Campion’s lush period drama Bright Star, Scherfig’s film is the first crowning woman’s achievement of the year that’s actually about women.

Set in suburban London in 1962 and adapted from Lynn Barber’s true-life memoir by screenwriter Nick Hornby, An Education charts the coming-of-age journey of 16-year old Jenny (slam-dunk Best Actress nominee Carey Mulligan), who is courted by a rich, slick traveler and his swooning red sports car on a rainy weekday afternoon. The striking fellow is David, a middle-aged smoothie with nice suits, played by Peter Sarsgaard with astonishing intrigue and mystery. He’s so much more mature and suave than Jenny’s long, lanky and more appropriately aged admirer, Graham, that the film decides to play up this dramatic disparity with welcome comedic results.

Miss Stubbs (Olivia Williams) adamantly dissaproves of Jenny's (Carey Mulligan) decision to continue seeing her middle-aged boyfriend

As a smart, book savvy teenage girl with an almost disobedient affection for French cinema and music, the promise of a life of fortune, fashion and adventure can prove to be too much to ignore. Not only for Jenny, but for her father (played by the wonderful Alfred Molina) who is equally hypnotized and spellbound by the allures of David’s protection as he weighs the cost of Jenny’s education at Oxford.

Such is the vulnerability and inadequacy of growing up a woman in 1962. For them, and for Jenny, your choices are to either lock up with the first rich and confiding man you see or work your heart out to live a life of harmless, but stable conformity – something Jenny sees in her English teacher, Miss Stubs, (Olivia Williams). Jenny describes the blank, expressionless educator as “dead” ever since her graduation from Cambridge, implying a disgracefully apathetic life of tedium opposed to her globetrotting affairs with David.

You could say that this film represents the end of an era where women were powerless and susceptible to an easy life of non-conformity, knowing the alternative. Similar to AMC’s hit series “Mad Men,” also set in the early 60’s, the movie represents an age of impending cultural revolution where women were just beginning to question their societal limitations.

David (Peter Sarsgaard) is a natural when it comes to meeting the parents (Alfred Molina and Cara Seymour).

It’s such an honest and perfectly framed film, quaint and classy, jazzy and refined. Nick Hornby’s script is both penetratingly exact yet opaque, without a wasted breath or scene in-between. Scherfig, meanwhile, uses her feminine touch to make the film resonate where it otherwise might not have – similar to the way Kathryn Bigelow’s unnatural masculinity enhanced The Hurt Locker. Also, John de Borman’s rich lensing gives An Education a pleasurable and alluring palette, like a cozy street-side café.

Carey Mulligan, a 24-year old English actress who will be a household name come Spring next year, gives a star-turn here as the perhaps ignorantly confident Jenny. She has such an immediate presence in the film that’s rare for a young actress and it’s easily the best in a top-to-bottom stunning ensemble. Dominic Cooper and Rosamund Pike, as David’s equally posh and carefree friends – plus Emma Thompson as the school headmaster – all contribute to the cause.

As Jenny finds her existential truths and her place in the world around her, An Education reverberates like no other coming-of-age drama of recent memory. “Action builds character,” she says, and although it’s not necessarily in the sense that she means at the time, the message fits regardless. Sometimes, the best education is the one that doesn’t have to be bought.

For the better part of a decade, Nicolas Cage has sauntered through a plenitude of dopey, dead-weight, mid-major action films. But like a true savior, Werner Herzog has turned Cage from the dark side – still sensing good in him – and given the 45-year old actor one of the greatest roles of his career as the reckless, off-kilter and just plain bad, post-Katrina Lieutenant Terence McDonagh.

After a rare bout of heroism during the opening scene in Werner Herzog’s crazily trigger-happy Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (an update of Abel Ferrera’s 1992 film), our titular subject and plainly described antihero suffers an evidently permanent back injury. His chest now slinks to one side, his gape more deliberate, his appearance more fatigued – the pain becoming impervious to the delicate relief of the merely prescribed pain medication. Such is the life of New Orleans’ most vulnerable powder keg of a police officer, and that’s before being placed in charge of a brutal quintuple homicide case.

Stevie Pruit (Val Kilmer) and Terence McDonagh (Nicolas Cage) -- New Orleans' finest.

With stress on the job and in his lower back, McDonagh takes advantage of his employee discount and acquires a taste for a more radical dose of painkillers. With the help of a cooperative yet cautious co-worker (Revolutionary Road’s Michael Shannon) and offenders who would like to avoid jail-time, McDonagh recklessly spirals into the life of a drug-addict. Of course, drugs lead to inebriated impulsions and our Lieutenant soon finds himself buried in debt to his regular bookie (Brad Dourif) and the target of a powerful city kingpin after an encounter with a non-paying customer of his prostitute “girlfriend” (Eva Mendes) turns sour. Then, when a break in the case is revealed, placing a cooperating witness in police custody, it’s McDonagh’s job to keep him in town and out of harm’s way.

But this police business proves to be tough sledding when you’re having to dodge your backwoods alcoholic father and sister or the precarious foot-long iguanas that aren’t actually there, if you’re listening to the advice of partner Stevie Pruit (Val Kilmer). There are no pulled punches in the provocation department, and like his main character of interest, Herzog proves to be an addict of the offbeat and the eccentric.

A renowned and legendary German director and documentarian, Herzog is best known for his 70’s/80’s masterpieces Aguirre: The Wrath of God (’72), Nosferatu (’79) and Fitzcarraldo (’82). The two of those films that don’t dredge in vampire legend are warped personal character studies about men who have lost themselves in an attempt to gain something (both played by Klaus Kinski). Here, decades later, Herzog is tapping into similar fundamental material – despite the fact that, at times, it’s unclear what Lieutenant Terence McDonagh actually wants – in a nevertheless, equally disturbing and fiendishly straight-forward study about a man in a serious crisis.

McDonagh doesn't resort to usual interrogation techniques at Deshaun Hackett's (Lucius Baston) home.

But this isn’t Aguirre, or Fitzcarraldo, or one of Herzog’s better films. Its maniacal tone and schizo-comedic shape outperform and upstage the film’s weaknesses and thematic shortcomings, resulting in something categorically auteurist in its own dark and comedically stimulating way. Shot with mostly handheld cameras on location in Louisiana and parts of Southern Mississippi, “Bad Lieutenant” looks like a post-Katrina doc on law enforcement insubordination. Interior lighting is limited to window streaks and only the wide-angle scene-setters of the New Orleans cityscape really glisten. It has all the spark and finish of a direct-to-DVD release.

What Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans has in manic energy and perverse excursions, it lacks in genuine artistry. It’s a pot-fumed, pass-the-joint cult classic in the making but it never calls itself out or gives any rhyme or reason to its motives to become anything more amply deserving. Neither does Terence McDonagh ever evolve over the course of the film, and even though Nicolas Cage is absolutely brilliant at this kind of pulsating, itchy and oddball acting, he’s never fully formed – there is never that moment. Still, it’s endlessly entertaining to watch an actor like this at the top of his game after such an Eddie Murphy-like drought of substance. Like McDonagh, Cage should apply to the theory that sometimes, it’s good to be bad.

With his modest looks, receding hairline and jolly, precarious smile, Michael Sheen is the “soup of the day” when it comes to playing historical figures on screen. In Tom Hooper’s The Damned United, which could be considered the final part in a trilogy of English biographical collaborations between Sheen and screenwriter Peter Morgan (The Queen, Frost/Nixon), Sheen plays the cocky, outspoken and infamous football manager of the 70’s and 80’s, Brian Clough.

Playing Prime Minister Tony Blair and talk-show host David Frost, Sheen has slipped into the shoes of these seemingly tepid yet charismatic and committed real-life figures with unobstructed ease and mild, respectable results – until now. Before the closing credits, we get to see archival footage of the real Brian Clough, where the resemblance between actor and subject is startlingly revealed. It only confirms what we were eluded to prior – that Sheen, for all of his previous workmanlike endeavors, has pulled off a performance that no other English actor could have inhabited with such clarity and reverberation.

Sheen plays Brian Clough, the fatally ambitious English football manager who took over for his arch rivals briefly in 1974.

The title, The Damned United – based on a novel by David Peace – refers to the 44-day period in 1974 in which Brian Clough (Sheen) took over as manager of his ruffian nemesis Leeds United after their beloved Don Revie (Colm Meaney) was beckoned by the national club to get England back to the World Cup. The board of the club, in their blind faith and desperation, turned to the rising star of the football world – the film explains why it never worked.

Manager Brian Clough, who would become one of the most renowned football managers in the history of English football, began his career as an easygoing, joyous and agreeable leader of the struggling Derby County in the late 60’s. When coincidentally handpicked to play mighty Leeds United in the 3rd round of the FA Cup in 1968, Clough saw himself and his club as more of a welcoming party than an opponent.

When Don Revie and his ferocious football club (known historically at the time as a group of “dirty” players who take after their manager) treat Clough and his players like an unsightly pest, refusing to shake this unknown manager’s hand, it ignites an unquenchable rage and ambition in the formerly passive manager, who will stop at nothing to gain football glory over Don Revie. Even when a close friendship with Peter Taylor (Timothy Spall) is in jeopardy or an unwilling chairman (Jim Broadbent) pleads him to use reason – ambition, like anything else, has its limits.

Don Revie (Colm Meaney) receives a hand from the Leeds United crowd, who disapprove of Clough's lack of results.

Through permissive spending, timely scouting and unmatched aggression and commitment, Clough turns Derby County from relegated bottom-dwellers to saintly underdog champions. As the film bounces back and forth from Clough’s Leeds fiasco in 1974 to the Derby County miracle story years earlier, the two sides of the manager’s stubborn, wildfire aspirations are plainly illustrated for what they are: an advantage and a detriment.

TV director Tom Hooper (“John Adams”) and director of photography Ben Smithard capture the rolling hills and cloudy temperament of the North English countryside with a green hue resembling the definable moments before or after a rainstorm. Each scene captures the muddy, wind-swept 70’s English landscape of gritty football, seamlessly co-existing with archival footage of the actual Derby County on the pitch.

The Damned United is a perfectly pitched – if shortsighted and modest – biographical account. In addition to Sheen’s terrific performance (in my opinion, the best of his career), it captures its era and environment with clarity and assuredness before surprising you with its insight and its emotion. At one point in the film, a highly noted and like-mindedly flamboyant and controversial American sports figure is seen on television calling on Clough, this spirited, talkative and contentious English football manager to, “stop it”. “There is only room for one Muhammad Ali in this world,” the greatest boxer of all-time touts.

The relationship is valid, but with one discernible difference. Ali, for all of his opinionated controversies and pre-match jeering, could always rely on the notion that he was, in fact, the greatest boxer in the world, without a flaw. Clough, on the other hand, revealed in a remarkably intimate later scene on a studio set, had to live with the fact that his unruly ambition, not to mention Don Revie, got the best of him.

As the decades turned over to the 70’s, it was time of international social and political unrest, where to rebel and to reject was to live. Some did it in a modest, harmless and nondestructive manner – innocuously listening to rock ‘n roll or experimenting with drugs – while others reacted in a more radical manner, heading straight to the source to confront it with unrelenting passion and hostility.

Che Guevara was trying to ignite a revolution in Bolivia, the United States’ intervention in Vietnam was ongoing and the Israelis and Palestinians were as volatile as ever, climaxing with the terrorist attacks at the 1972 Munich Olympics. Thus, rebellion was the order of the day, the college-age fad and the result of a tumultuous global climate. But it was one group in particular that impetuously took the next, seemingly appropriate step.

Uli Edel’s The Baader Meinhof Complex has been, and could fittingly be described as, the true story of the birth of terrorism. It chronicles the establishment and decade-long struggle of the Red Army Faction (a.k.a. “The Baader-Meinhof Group”) against the fascist, imperialistic state of West Germany and the general world order of governmental authority. This was a new generation of Germans, citizens who were adolescents or non-existent during the reign of the Third Reich. As Stefan Aust, a member of this generation and the author of the source novel, (which bears the same name as its adaptation) says, “The moment you see your own country as the continuation of a fascist state, you give yourself permission to do almost anything against it.”

The calm before the storm -- German communist activists protest the war in Vietnam.

The film traces the origins of the group through its leaders in the social unrest of West Berlin society, which reflected the worldwide anxiety and general disapproval of government power-flexing abroad and at home. (Protests and the resulting police brutality across the globe are shown in one of many news-style montages.) Ulrich Meinhof (Martina Gedeck) plays a well-known journalist who shares uncommonly radical, anti-governmental, views amongst her media peers. She meets Gudrun Ensslin (Johanna Wokalek) for an interview after an arsonist display in a high-rise department store, where she first hears of minor, premeditated terrorist attacks in an attempt to gain exposure and express distrust and disapproval. The arrogantly boisterous Gudrun and her cocky, confidently adamant counterpart, Andreas Baader (Mortiz Bleibtreu) form the foundation of the Red Army Faction (RAF), whose hierarchy and long-term business plan is hardly an envious model.

The first half of the film is a seductively rebellious political-bruiser. Our militant revolutionaries, with their wigs and aviator glasses and hip-hugging jeans, rob banks, bomb state buildings, break out their comrades when they’re in a tough spot and spread their anarchist views through writings and recruiting. As the stakes get higher and the tasks more extravagantly violent and reckless, The Baader Meinhof Complex takes on a more reflective tone, focusing on the consequences, influences and results of this initial wave of RAF expression. Baader, Ensslin and Meinhof, as well as the film as a whole, may not come to the conclusion that one would expect and it counteracts almost all of the flashes of glamour and bravura that came before it, hinting that these acts may have been impulsive, misjudged and underdeveloped.

Gudrun Ensslin (Johanna Wokalek) and Andreas Baader (Mortiz Bleibtreu) fight the power in West Germany.

A 2008 nominee for Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars but unreleased in the United States until this year, The Baader Meinhof Complex is a capably committed portrait of political unrest and a really good political action-drama. With its worldview and broad scope, it carefully and rightfully captures the era as an evolving, emerging and budding anti-political landscape and the foundations that were laid out to be felt to this day. Therefore, whether intentional or not, it gives the film an extra dose of relevance when viewed within the framework of our current society.

Pacing is a bit of an issue, but not in the immediate sense that you might be thinking. It moves at breakneck speed, actually, but to the film’s detriment. It’s a good deal of mischievous West Berlin RAF activity and when it isn’t focused on the key members of the group, it’s advancing the story through time-lapse montages or newscast footage reels. Spanning an entire decade, even at 154 minutes, the film is too condensed and it never breathes.

The performances, on the other hand, are top-notch, especially from Martina Gedeck (The Lives of Others) as one-half of the titular “Baader-Meinhof Group.” She starts out as a fighter and a revolutionary with her words before turning into the leader of this terrorist group, taking on a more physical, activist role. The fact that her ideals and agendas may have been lost in the translation is one of the film’s strengths.

The Baader Meinhof Complex is compulsively watchable in the way that a fascinating account of history or a gripping historical documentary would be. It’s extremely well-acted, well-crafted, uncompromising and fit for its subject, but it doesn’t ever completely take off. Similar to the result of the RAF’s futile acts of aggression, the film’s desired impact and effort is never truly felt by its audience. It’s a silenced handgun – it gets the job done, but it doesn’t resonate very loudly.

Back when the possibility of nuclear war was a hot topic in the 80’s, there were various visions of the apocalypse and what might be left of both the earth and humanity after the destruction.  Cormac McCarthy’s 2007 Pulitzer prize winning book “The Road” details the story of a few survivors of such an event.  The film adaptation, directed by John Hillcoat (The Proposition), focuses not on the event of the apocalyptic destruction, but instead on what is left in its wake.  The aftermath sees an earth in tattered ruins and those left alive, struggling (in the immortal words of Malcolm X “by any means necessary”) to spend more time on it.

The Road stars Viggo Mortensen as ‘the man’ and Kodi-Smit McPhee as ‘the boy’; a father and son roaming the remains of earth in a journey to the coast.  The coast is seen as a place where there might be more fruitful means of living, but this might indeed be conjecture by the father, as he is attempting to teach his boy how to navigate this new version of life on earth.  Armed with a revolver with two spare bullets, the man will protect his child at all costs, against all comers.  The bullets represent the last opportunity to leave the planet with their dignity in tact.  One bullet for each person, to take their own lives should the will to win finally be too small or a situation be too fraught with danger to chance it.  Earth is inhabited by a clear sense of the unknown.  Fear everything, trust no one.

"The Man" has his game face on.

Since there are few survivors scrambling for any remnants of food, trying to achieve a means to an end, cannibalism has become the most gruesome, and in some ways necessary, means of death.  Some survivors have bonded together in rebellious groups figuring that it’s best to be part of a team to make their way through the landscape.  Most of these people would kill for a Mickey D’s,  well, really they would kill for a lot less.  Their is no sunlight, earth is covered in a steady dust.  It is cold and often wet.  Those without wilderness skills of cunning need not apply.  Hope you got your boy scout training on lock.  Clothing is at a premium.  The value of fuel makes our displeasure with high gas prices seem absolutely trivial.  A dented, still full can of soda is to be cherished.  A cigarette, even more so.  The bottom line is, things aren’t pretty.  Our duo roam like low-class homeless people, not because they are, but not because they aren’t.  Everyone is homeless.

So, not a lot happens in The Road.  That is pretty much the point.  It’s not like you are going to catch a baseball game on TV or go to the cinema.  There is no currency.  Really, there is nothing.  Nothing but what you have inside of you.  The film, in my eyes, is the most realistic and brilliant depiction of what might be left after an apocalyptic event.  That being said, it’s nothing nice.

These guys think cannibalism does a body good. That depends on which body you speak of.

This is as faithful an adaptation of the novel as necessary, an amazing job by Hillcoat. He allows the destructed landscape to speak for itself and offers up some great camera angles to keep things visually interesting.  There is a clever working in (an expansion from the novel) of the mother/wife character – portrayed by the usually strong Charlize Theron – that plays a role in how our characters views on life are shaped.  All the while, Hillcoat lets the actors be the key our participation in this desolation. Hillcoat luckily scored the rights to the novel, six months prior to it even being published.  Long before it was a best seller, a Pulitzer prize winner and an Oprah book club pick.  His gain becomes our gain, with the result being a difficult, but important, film.

The film (and the novel for that matter) is about both survival and love in their purest forms.  It is an examination of what it means to guide, to teach, to share, to learn.  It’s also on my short list for movie of the year thus far.  It is a perfect chance for all of us to look both outside – and within – ourselves, to discover what we are really all about.  While The Road is one that nobody in their right mind would literally want to travel, it is one that most should take the opportunity to see.

From the moment you emerge from the vast darkness of the womb, your parents start teaching. “I’m Mommy.” “That’s Daddy.” “Stop crying.” “Don’t ever lie.” That last one is a particular stickler. In the case of one’s growth into an adult, when the inevitable screw-up occurs, it’s usually difficult, but somehow better to just tell the truth. You might get yelled at for screwing up in the first place, but lord help you if you lie about it and get caught later. Then you’ve screwed up twice. The key phrase to this end is, “honesty is the best policy.” But is it? Some people can’t handle the truth, as Jack Nicholson so eloquently put it. If you tell it to them, they refer to it as “brutal honesty.” Is it worth making something up just to make someone feel better? That’s the question asked in The Invention of Lying and it’s a curious one indeed.

Mark Bellison (Ricky Gervais) is a creature who inhabits a world not wholly dissimilar to our own. He works in an office. He has friends. He has enemies. He watches television. The difference between Mark’s world and the one we occupy is that nobody on Mark’s planet has evolved the ability to lie. In fact, they don’t even have words like “truth” or “fallacy” or “real” or “fiction.” People describe things only as they are without a hint of deceit. Believe it or not – though I would never lie to you, dear reader – all this honesty makes for kind of a dry palace, sans fun. It’s reminiscent of that kid in school who raises his hand during the last nanosecond of class and reminds the teacher she forgot to assign homework. People speak their minds. There is no fear of consequences.

Mark is set up on a date with Anna (Jennifer Garner), which almost immediately spells doom. He arrives too early when she was in the middle of something private, frustrating her. Next, she notices he’s fat, short and has a snub nose. How does he know this? She tells him straight up. No need for internal monologue. Voice-over be damned. Apparently when you are told nothing but fact for your entire life, what we know as “brutal truths,” no longer seems like jabs and digs shot straight at the heart. Instead, they are more annoying than anything. Just a day in the life.

When his assistant tells Mark she’s always hated him and he’s about to get fired, there’s perhaps disappointment, but no insult. Mark is a screenwriter for Hollywood films. In his world, screenwriters are the stars, because there are no actors, only people who read the script in front of a stable camera. Scripts are solely based on historical fact. The only stories which exist are about things which have already happened. There is no make-believe. The firing from his job naturally creates financial problems for Mark and when his landlord demands the payment of overdue rent, Mark finds himself in a bind. He doesn’t have enough money in his bank account to cover the full amount. In a spurt of inspiration, he lies. The world’s first. He is given the money needed, because everything said is believed. He now possesses a superpower. Whether he uses it for good or evil depends on his character.

If you lie well enough, you can eventually be like Hef.

When the film was first announced, it was immediately accused of being an inverse Liar, Liar, when in truth, it’s much more than that. The Invention of Lying is certainly a high-concept film, which if starring Jim Carrey would have turned into a wacky good time, but with Gervais at the helm, it’s interested in more than just delivering laughs. It tackles bigger issues at hand. A lot of the film’s humor stem from the unexpected bluntness of the way characters speak to each other. No secrecy is veiled or comment guarded. It’s an odd world indeed, but one devoid of much vibrancy. The strict adherence to truth makes for a bland artistic output and the film goes to show why most people prefer some sort of scripted fare over The History Channel. The film’s big idea covers the advent of religion and is perhaps its biggest argument for the necessity to create some kind of story, as opposed to sticking to complete fact.

Co-directed and co-written by Gervais and Matthew Robinson, the film visually offers little more than any standard romantic comedy and sadly has a third act which is mostly geared toward Mark getting the girl, but their intention for striving higher is what puts the film in a different category. They don’t put complete reliance on the hope that characters speaking “brutal truths” can carry an entire film of funny. Instead, they manage to insert the larger societal conundrums and prove a lot more can be done within a basic framework than most filmmakers are either unwilling or unable to do.

Gervais may still be a long way away from becoming the star in America that he is in Britain, but here he’s crafted another role tailor-made for his persona. Mark isn’t the nicest human being, but not a jerk, either. He’s more of a product of his non-lying environment. Gervais does surprise in a scene full of emotion, displaying a depth to the actor unseen to this point in his career. We shall continue to yearn for purely comedic performances, but this new turn gives Gervais the ability to delve deeper into a role, as opposed to skimming the surface. Jennifer Garner is given perhaps the most befitting role of her career in the film, as beautiful, but slightly dim-witted and superficial Anna. It’s nearly impossible to distinguish between the actress and the character and one wonders if this is more up her alley than her five-year stint on “Alias.”

The Invention of Lying, doesn’t ride high throughout, but given weight to a high-concept without relying on the initial idea to be the sole driving force of the film, makes it one of the more enjoyable movie-going experiences of the year. Hopefully Gervais can continue his ascent to stardom, and will undoubtedly do so if able to stay the course he’s currently on. He overtook the small screen and has Hollywood dominance eventually forthcoming. That’s the truth. Go ahead and run with it.

Ever since The Blair Witch Project (’99) and its lesser-known cousin, The Last Broadcast (’98) introduced the mockumentary “found footage” formula as a horror technique, the style has become almost a staple in the genre – capturing a sense of realism and voyeuristic terror in viewers unfazed by flimsy slasher flicks and creature-features. Able to be shot on a shoe-string budget, these films literally level the playing the field and can make anyone an overnight success, depending on how many people you can scare half to death. Such is now the case with director Oren Peli, who now has willing financiers after the early returns on his debut, Paranormal Activity.

The genre has taken on new life in the past few years as zombie icon George A. Romero caught on with his recent Diary of the Dead (’07), as are the Spanish with [REC] (’07) and its English-language counterpart, Quarantine (’08). Heck, even Hollywood is dipping its toes into the water with J.J. Abrams’ comparatively big-budgeted blockbuster, Cloverfield (’08).

So, Oren Peli’s Paranormal Activity may be a copycat of sorts, coming on the heels of the recent parade of mockumentary features and now being released nearly a decade after The Blair Witch Project became a cultural phenomenon. But what it lacks in originality it makes up for in pure unadulterated fear and unrest. Already gaining underground cult status with its midnight showings and slow-burning expansion, the film has all that it takes to become the new gold standard – in this case, lightning may strike twice.

Essentially, Paranormal Activity is a demonic-haunting film centering on a young San Diego couple, Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat (both playing themselves). All that we see is through Micah’s camera, who decides that he’s going to attempt to document “strange occurrences” that the two have been witnessing in the house – more specifically, while they’re sleeping. Micah carries the camera around wherever he goes during the day, but at night, he stations it on a tripod facing the bed, giving us an eerie angle out towards the hallway, which is exposed by the open bedroom door, so eternally creepy and inviting. The fact that the camera angle during these night scenes never changes gives the film a lingering creepiness and a strategical advantage. While most horror films attempt to throw you off and then pounce like a whack-a-mole game, Paranormal Activity tells you exactly where to look and the suspense is unbearably effective.

Appropriately, most of the scares come from this angle of Katie and Micha's creepy bedroom.

For the first couple of nights, we witness a few odd happenings – items being moved from their original location, swinging doors, etc. – before the two are consented by a “psychic” who advises that emotions like fear, paranoia and anxiety are an open invitation for the ‘spirit’. I don’t want to give anything away, but as time progresses, Paranormal Activity proves mightily frightening and unsettling in the best kind of way. It occasionally slips up here and there, but it’s mostly a genuinely horrifying surveillance-style freak-out. It isn’t the best “horror” film I’ve ever seen, that regard is reserved for more artistically qualified and rendered fare, but it could very well be the “scariest” movie I’ve ever seen. If unrest and fearful anticipation were measurables in a film, this one would grade quite nicely.

Perhaps the most ingeniously conceived and fundamentally portrayed aspect of the film is the way that it preys on the vulnerability of its victims, Micah and Katie, and then by extension, the audience later that night. By creating a spiritual haunting that is almost exclusively present after our two leads are slumbering, it’s similar to the way that Alfred Hitchcock made showers a defenseless, exposed area of weakness and a prime spot for a murder and subsequent clean-up. Or more directly, the way that Wes Craven made your nightmares a reality in A Nightmare on Elm Street (’84). So how do you protect yourself when your defenses are down and you are at your most vulnerable?

As I mentioned, the film does slip up a few times when genre conventions are employed into a generally unconventional film. There is an unnecessary backstory involving Katie’s past and possible situational relation to a former haunting victim, plus the ending, which apparently took several different forms, is a bit of a letdown in its predictability.

Nevertheless, with every midnight showing and small-market expansion, the movie is converting waves of curious horror fans into believers. Whatever problems it may have as a film, the packed-house that I saw it with who didn’t emerge until the wee hours of the morning didn’t seem to notice – they were too busy wondering how they were going to get some of that deadly, vulnerable sleep.

Michael Moore is undoubtedly the most polarizing filmmaker in America. There are just as many people who revere and laud both the man and his films as people who hate his guts. That’s no small feat for someone who’s primarily made documentary films. He’s popularized cinema verite so much that they’ve sometimes become blockbusters and any new release of one of his films becomes an event. It would be difficult for anyone to dispute that he’s a gifted filmmaker and a talented entertainer, but his insistence to push his opinions on people causes as much rebellion as it does followers. In Capitalism: A Love Story, he takes on the big and rich corporations that reside in America, which have played the villains in most of his films, but perhaps this time there will be more willing to care.

The top one-percent of America’s population is wealthier than the bottom ninety-five-percent combined. This is a well-distributed fact, which leaves the lower rung of people cash-starved. The fear that one day that less financially solvent group might snap and takeover is warranted and Moore builds it up that throughout the film. The opening credit sequence begins with loads of security camera footage of armed robberies. Masked men (or women) wielding shotguns and pistols, holding up liquor stores, banks and department stores of all shapes and sizes. What would normally be disturbing and unsettling images are juxtaposed with peppy rock music, creating an almost endearing quality. Violence is contained within, but coupled with the sonic overlay one realizes these people are just trying to make it in the country the same way victims of Hurricane Katrina were “looting” bread.

Moore then presents clips of a film about the fall of the Roman Empire, once the strongest in the world, creating likenesses to the current state of America. Moore makes it known he loves this country and wants to redirect its fate. The current struggle of oppression: capitalism. Much like Moore’s first film, 1989’s Roger & Me, he uses his hometown of Flint, Michigan as a stand-in for Anytown, USA, with numerous families being evicted from their homes due to failure to pay their rent. Some may find little sympathy for these people (Chris Rock’s line “I have two jobs, you can’t get one,” may apply here), but there are larger things at work and it stems from the economic system the United States has adopted as their own, allowing the richer to get richer and ensuring the poor stay where they are. One of the victim’s of the evictions says he fully understands why some people feel the need to point a gun in another’s face for money. Times are indeed tough.

Making matters worse, there are large corporations (representing “the rich”) in constant pursuit of keeping others down and profiting from their misery. Moore discovers a story about a widowed mother, whose husband had died of cancer. He worked for Bank of America, who knew about the illness. Out of the “kindness” of their hearts, they took out a life insurance policy on the ill-fated fellow, kindly naming themselves as the beneficiary. They were awarded $1.5 million upon his death. The widow, not a solitary cent. To further ram the point home, the company took out a second policy on their former employee. This one profited them a cool $3.5 million, for a nice $5 million take on the death of one of their workers. Not wanted dead or alive, but dead. However, a sliver of hope remains as CitiGroup sent a private letter to its most wealthy clients instructing them to be very afraid of the lowest common denominator, due to their power to vote. No one vote is more important than the other, and thus an uprising is very much in the cards.

Little known fact: the American flag has ears, but you have to speak into them really loudly.

Moore is a fascinating filmmaker in his ability to weave non-fiction stories into something wholly entertaining, educational and enduring. He seems to know how hard and just when to push the proper buttons, eliciting the exact emotional response he desires from his audience. Moore is invited into the home of another victim of “Dead Peasant” (the actual name for it) Life Insurance. This time, a 26-year-old woman with two children, now grown. The widowed father reads one of his final letters to his wife, which he authored while unable to see her as she laid in her hospital deathbed. Indeed this letter is extremely emotional, but Moore knows not to force another weepie on the audience. He just allows the viewer to be placed firmly in the viewer’s shoes, to appreciate the gravity of the situation.

Many of Moore’s critics lob accusations of his penchant for pointing out problems, but not offering solutions. It’s impossible to pretend this film is any different, but for all the films made to force-feed information to the audience, isn’t it refreshing to be given something to think about and marinate on long since the end credits roll? Typically, the measure of a good film is one which invites discussion or at least creates memories which grab you and hold on for dear life. Capitalism: A Love Story is full of such moments and creates a buffet of food-for-thought from its opening frame to its informational website epilogue. Some want to be fed answers, this film welcomes you to discover them.

Another criticism, which is easy to dispute this time around, is from those who feel Moore is too prevalent and “in-your-face” for them to handle. He’s certainly not the typical leading man, rotund and shaggy-haired, but he genuinely cares about his subjects and his objectives and is never short on creative ways to make a point. This isn’t a film about whining about the countries problems, it’s about labeling them so they can be corrected. All is not doom and gloom. There is plenty of uplift to be had even if there isn’t a fairy-tale ending. After all, this isn’t a tale made in Hollywood, it’s one made in America.

It was almost a year ago when this country voted for change by an astonishing margin. New developments have been hard to come by, but we’re able to rest easy knowing there’s always someone fighting with all his might for the U.S. to progress and not maintain status quo when things can always be improved. However, Michael Moore needs helps. Step one in the crusade is to see Capitalism: A Love Story. For step two, I’ll quote the late John F. Kennedy: “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.” The question is, what are you going to do about it?

There are several routes one can take when making a zombie film. The most widely used approach would be the serious take on the genre, such as Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later or Zack Snyder’s remake, Dawn of the Dead. The second approach, and the most fun, would be the comedic approach used in Shaun of the Dead and in Ruben Fleischer’s new zombie killing opus, Zombieland.

Zombieland follows a world overrun with the living undead. Everything we once knew has been destroyed, even the U.S. is no longer has a functioning government. The film opens with one of the most creative title sequences in recent memory. There are multiple slow motion zombie kills accompanied by Metallica’s “For Whom the Bell Tolls.”  After seeing the amazing title sequence, it’s obvious that first time director, Ruben Fleischer comes from a background of music video direction and title sequence design.

It's hard enough to find your car keys in the dark, let alone while being chased by flesh-eating zombies.

The film follows Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), a young man who has survived the zombie apocalypse by adhering to his own set of strict rules. His rules include helpful zombie survival skills such as – when shooting a zombie, use the double tap method, once in the chest and once in the head, to make sure they’re dead. He also has a phobia of getting caught with his pants down, so one must always be careful in bathrooms.  Columbus was a college student before the world was turned into a zombie land so he decides to travel back to his hometown. He knows the chances of his family still being alive are slim but he is starved for human interaction. While traveling across the country, he meets zombie-killer extraordinaire, Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson).

The two are complete opposites, Ohio is the shy, nervous kid; Tallahassee is the completely out there, zombie hunter. Even their views on zombies are completely different. While Ohio laments what the human race has come to, Tallahassee only wants to bash them to a pulp. The two travelers soon happen across another pair of survivors, sisters Wichita (Emma Stone) and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin). (Are you seeing a pattern with the character names?) The sisters, who initially trick Ohio and Tallahassee, soon realize that they are safer joining forces with the two men.  Wichita and Little Rock are heading to an amusement park in California, which they believe is in a zombie free town. The four survivors head off to the west coast, and on the way encounter many zombie infestations. The film includes several enjoyable zombie killing sequences but all are played for laughs. In the film’s most hilarious – and what will be its most talked about sequence – the crew, while traveling through Hollywood, decide to seek shelter at the home of Hollywood’s top star, Bill Murray. The star’s cameo is a hilarious one and it’s the best portion of the film.

The only thing scarier than a clown, is an undead one.

This being a zombie film, horror fans are probably wondering, “Yeah, but what about the zombies?” Well, in Zombieland the undead are mostly glimpsed while trying to attack the films protagonists. There are a few gruesome close-ups of them devouring flesh, but the film is more focused on delivering laughs than being a classic zombie film. The film does however feature zombies being dispatched with everything from bullets to banjos. It’s obvious the writers, Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, had a great time coming up with all the ingenious ways the film’s zombies meet their demise.

The performances here are uniformly good, and while we only get a little background on each character’s motivations, none of the roles are underwritten. Each actor gets numerous laughs and equal time to shine. Jesse Eisenberg has gone from Adventureland to Zombieland, and he perfectly captures Ohio’s neurotic tendencies and longing for a human relationship, as Ohio and Wichita begin to fall for one another. Even Little Miss Sunshine star, Abigail Breslin gets a lot of laughs, especially when we see the child star wielding a shotgun. Emma Stone is also worthy of mention as the tough, protective older sister to Breslin. Stone continues her rise after catching my attention in 2007’s Superbad.

The film’s best performance is easily given by Woody Harrelson. As Tallahassee, a cowboy hat wearing Zombie killer, he steals every scene he is in. The actor, who hasn’t been in much recently, could be in the position for a career resurgence with Zombieland (trailer), as well as the upcoming Defendor. He doesn’t just play Tallahassee as a one note joke; we also see the reason behind his zombie hatred. I also thoroughly enjoyed Tallahassee’s search for what could be the world’s last box of Twinkies.

Zombieland is sure to be a crowd pleasing film for one reason – it’s an exciting time at the cinema. While the film’s amusement park climax doesn’t quite live up to the buildup it receives, and the plot is pretty thin, Zombieland’s running time is a brief 80 minutes, so it never overstays it welcome. I’m sure this will be a hit with movie goers; the audience I saw it with loved it. If you’re in the mood for some zombie splattering mayhem, go see Zombieland. You might be a pulse-less zombie if you don’t get a kick out of this film.

By “The Film Nest” guest contributor Chase Kahn (see him in the comments section as well).

Young love is the subject of Jane Campion’s Bright Star, the New Zealand auteur’s first feature film since 2003’s In the Cut. After wrapping on the Meg Ryan thriller, the 55 year-old director decided to take four years off to be with her daughter, who inspired her to tackle the 19^th century story of Fanny Brawne and her romance with English poet John Keats, lasting between 1818-1821.

Already with Kathryn Bigelow’s searing war drama The Hurt Locker in theaters and the inevitable and impending praise for Lone Sherfig’s An Education, Campion appears set to fit in nicely into what is shaping up to be a banner year for women directors across the world. Campion is no novice to success, having won the Palme d’Or in 1993 for The Piano (the first and only female to win the coveted prize at Cannes). Now, she revisits the lush confines of the period drama for her gallant, yet unspectacular return to the screen.

To be young -- Ben Whishaw and Abbie Cornish looking quite posh.

Mrs. Brawne (Kerry Fox) moves her family to the Elm Cottage in Hampstead, England, where living next door is Charles Brown (Paul Schneider) and his co-worker and dear friend John Keats (Ben Whishaw). The eldest of Mrs. Brawne’s three children, Fanny (Abbie Cornish) immediately takes up an interest in John and his struggling work as a poet. When John’s brother Tom falls ill with tuberculosis, it provides the kind of tragic bonding that brings the two young lovers together. Despite the ill consent of his colleague Mr. Brown, John and Fanny develop an unshakeable connection, enhancing Keats’ artistry and Fanny’s appreciation for it, in equal doses.

Bright Star is a rather slight and minimalist kind of film, featuring only three significant characters and taking place almost exclusively in or around the Brawne family’s home or the residence of Mr. Keats. It enhances the aesthetic quality of the film, allowing concerns of genre conventions and banality to fall by the wayside. Campion is such a talented director, working with a first-rate crew, that the film is frequently an overwhelmingly well-polished production. It’s shot, cut and composed in a way that occasionally becomes levitational. With Mark Bradshaw’s gently subtle score and the soft, muted and gorgeous compositions (which are almost bashfully rendered) by Campion and cinematographer Greg Fraiser, the pedigree is never in question; the writing however, is.

Bright Star adheres strictly to the motto, “less is more”, which works great filmmaking-wise, giving it a distinctive touch, but unfortunately extends to Campion’s own screenplay. The relationship between Fanny and John is handled at arms-length and while the actors do their best, there’s never an authentic level of believability to the romance and as a result, it’s a cold, unemotional trip.

You can't read love letters in just any old flower patch.

Abbie Cornish (Stop-Loss) is a refreshing face for a movie of this caliber, bringing the emotions of Fanny Brawne front and center in an admittedly edgeless and underwritten role. But the way Campion captures the young Cornish’s face, frequently in profile, accentuating the actress’ natural features – her up-turned nose and defined brows – it’s hard not to be impressed with the physical work in her performance. Ben Whishaw (Perfume, I’m Not There) is another very interesting young actor who equally impresses with his reserved and remote nature; there are times when the two actors really make something out nothing. However, despite their charms and undeniable talent, the characters themselves, especially John Keats, are written as such infuriatingly distant portraits that by the time the emotional impact is clearly intended to take over, it doesn’t register.

Paul Schneider (The Assassination of Jesse James, Away We Go), however, is delightful as the self-centered, confounded, snarky and seemingly jealous curmudgeon, Charles Brown. Donning a heavy “scaw-ttish” accent, his disdain towards Fanny and John renders him as the villain, but he brings humanity to the role and has a really despondent moment in the closing scenes to bring Mr. Brown full circle. Schneider has proven to be a wonderful character actor over the last five years or so and his performance here will do nothing to harm that notion, but rather, only improve it.

John Keats, as portrayed by Jane Campion, was a man who feared that he would die before accomplishing all that he could as an artist and a poet. It seems ironic, given that Bright Star is a film that never reaches its true potential even when the results can be intermittently brilliant. For all it gets right, it’s too fundamentally distant and cold to resonate the way it was intended to and the tragic nature of its central love story is left untapped.