Some people use their spare time wisely, writing future best-sellers, online dating, or both. I, on the other hand, am making sure that I am getting my money’s worth from my Blockbuster Online subscription. Here are some recent rentals:

Drillbit Taylor - like many other younger actors, Owen Wilson always plays the same role. I guess the years when actors used the Stanislavski’s system are long gone. I’ll still take Owen Wilson over retarded Will Ferrell any day. The movie is probably pretty funny if you are anywhere between ages 11 and 15. Otherwise it’s mildly amusing. I watched it anyway, it’s not like I have something better to do.

Rambo- I am pretty sure that some of the previous incarnations of this movie were banned in the USSR, especially the one where Rambo defeats the Soviet Army in Afghanistan all by himself.  This one seems to be especially gruesome and bloody. After all, while Sylvester Stallone aged by about 20 years, the special effects greatly improved the way we see exploding bodies and ripped off heads and other body parts. As always, Rambo is a man of a few words, and not much acting is involved, but none was expected. It wasn’t bad, so if you are in a mood for some war crimes go ahead and rent it. The ending suggests that if there is ever a next installment, Rambo will be fighting on the home front.

The Bucket List - for all I care, Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman can sit for an hour and a half and crack sunflower seeds - I’d still watch the movie. After watching the movie I looked at some reviews and  many of them were negative: predictable, tear-jerker, bad acting… I actually liked it and, sure enough, cried at the end. Note to self: if I ever get a date -comedy only! The movie is about two terminally ill old guys who met at the hospital and became unlikely friends. They cram a lifetime worth of experiences into their remaining few months of life. Not a groundbreaking idea, most of us thought about it, but most of us are not Jack Nicholson or Morgan Freeman. Good movie with sad ending, but so is life…

The Devil’s Advocate - another movie where I disagreed with reviewers, most people thought this one was great. I wasn’t too excited about it, maybe it’s not my type of movie. Al Pachino, Keanu Reeves, Charlize Theron -pretty good cast, just all that devil stuff turns me off. Nevertheless, the movie raises fundamental question, which always interested me: does a lawyer knowingly do “devil’s work when he/she defends a known criminal. What if the person becomes a repeat/even worse offender after the lawsuit is won. It happened many times and while the lawyer has to do the best he/she can I wonder if they always have to struggle with this or do they get numb after a while. Recommended if you like somewhat mystical movies.

The Mark of Cain - a documentary about Russian prison life and meaning of tattoos in the Russian criminal world. Read my post on the subject here.

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The Take - another heist movie. This one is not a lighthearted semi-comedy like some others. John Leguizamo and Rosie Perez are both better known as comedians so they are unlikely picks for this drama but both do excellent job in the movie. The main character finds himself in the position where he has to take the safety and future of his family into his own hands. Not bad.

The Onion Movie - I thought this was one of the funniest, cleverest, satirical movies I’ve seen in recent years. According to some of the reviews, many of the sketches were previously seen in the Onion but they were new and funny to me. There is not much of the storyline, just a series of sketches loosely linked to each other. This movie highlights how sad and unfunny SNL has become.
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Barton Fink -Reading about Coen Brothers’ movies is even more fun than actually watching them. People pick up on minute details, any hint, sound, color combination - all have some meaning or linked to movie or historic trivia. Some people interpreted this movie as a metaphor for a rise of fascism in Europe.:

The Coens mean this aspect of the film, I think, to be read as an emblem of the rise of Nazism. They paint Fink as an ineffectual and impotent left-wing intellectual, who sells out while telling himself he is doing the right thing, who thinks he understands the “common man” but does not understand that, for many common men, fascism had a seductive appeal. Fink tries to write a wrestling picture and sleeps with the great writer’s mistress, while the Holocaust approaches and the nice guy in the next room turns out to be a monster.

I wonder if the Coens themselves are laughing quietly or did they really mean it that way? Damn you, Roger Ebert! Excellent acting by John Turturro and John Goodman.

The Sea Inside - When Javier Bardem won an Oscar for No Country for Old Men many people suggested The Sea Inside as a movie that truly shows Bardem’s acting abilities beyond just running around in a bad haircut and with scary face killing people. If you read any of my reviews you know that I am a sucker for the “based on a true story” movies. This one is about a Spanish quadriplegic who fought for years for his right to die.  Being unable to move, he had to rely on someone else to give him poison and that person would have been charged with murder under Spanish law. The movie is very dramatic and Bardem does an amazing job acting just with his face while his body is motionless. Recommended if you can handle subtitles.

Atonement - WWII British drama romance about how one reckless lie can ruin lives and relationships, and cause lifetime suffering in a person who perpetrated that lie. I girl testifies falsely to get back at her childhood crush and set off a chain of events that affected the rest of her life as well as lives of others. All her life she seeks atonement for what she had done. I liked the movie and Keira Knightley is as beautiful as ever.

Adaptation - This movie is weird, funny and quirky, has fresh premise and excellent writing. Nicolas Cage and Meryl Streep are pretty good, and all of the above makes this movie 2 hours well spent (if you like these kinds of movies of course).

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Brief Encounter- I have no idea how this movie ended up on my list. This movie is a romance drama made in 1946 in Britain, so if you have trouble with British accents like I do you can use subtitles. Two people meet by accident and fall in love while being torn by the inappropriateness of the whole affair. Hiding their innocent meeting becomes too much to handle for both and their romance ends just as abruptly as it started. The movie is restored black-and-white and the DVD has some materials about the restoration process.

This frame is shown at the beginning of the movie. Notice that there is a signature of the actual censor at the bottom.