Review: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest

Review: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest

Rating: **1/2

Nonna's Rating: $$

Rotten Tomatoes: 51%

Audience: 68%

If you have not read all three of Stieg Larsson's Millennium novels and/or seen (and enjoyed) the first two movies of the trilogy, don't see this film. It just won't make any sense. For those of you who overlooked the flaws of the novels and the previous films because Lisbeth is one of the most compelling literary and screen presences ever, go see it. Blessedly, some of the most plodding story lines of the third novel are omitted from the movie: e.g., Erica's sojourn as a newspaper editor and Mikael's affair with Officer Figuerola. However, even with those edits, when Lisbeth is off screen, all we do is long for her return. And, although Lisbeth, when present, is largely silent for most of the film, we can't take our eyes off her as we puzzle about what's going on in her once bullet-riddled brain.

Hollywood is remaking these movies for the subtitle-averse. I have no doubt they can improve on the script, cinematography, and editing of these films, but I pity the poor girl (Rooney Mara) who will play Lisbeth. I can't imagine a tougher act to follow.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Hereafter

Review: Hereafter

Rating: **

Nonna's Rating: $

Rotten Tomatoes: 48%

Audience: 47%

One friend told me Hereafter was the most boring movie she'd ever seen: "Nothing happens." Another friend said she was deeply moved from the first, powerful scene all the way to the end. I had to see for myself. My assessment? It's somewhere in the middle of those two viewpoints, and it tends toward the former. The film certainly has the right credentials: directed by Clint Eastwood and starring the talented Mr. Matt Damon. All it needs is a decent script. The first scene, which focuses on a young woman caught in the power of a tsunami, is indeed masterful and terrifying, but it's all downhill from there. The story movies slowly and we're told (*spoiler alert* -- but who cares?) that there has been a vast conspiracy which has withheld scientific information about the afterlife from all of us (an afterlife which seems, BTW, incredibly boring). Religious institutions are, of course, involved in the cover-up. However, this conspiracy is mentioned and then dropped like a hot potato. I was expecting at least a little DaVinci Code mystery and mayhem to ensue -- but no such luck. So, don't bother with this film. Instead, watch The Sixth Sense again -- another view of the afterlife which is anything but boring.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1

Review: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1

Rating: ***1/2

Nonna's Rating: $$$$

Rotten Tomatoes: 79%

Audience: 91%

The penultimate Harry Potter film, Deathly Hallows, does not disappoint. It is, of necessity, a cliff hanger with the best yet to come; however, there's plenty of action and drama. The script follows the book closely, covering about 3/4 of the last novel and giving the filmmakers the ability to focus on those marvelous final chapters for the last film of the series -- due out next summer.

The focus in this film is on the three principal characters: Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), Hermione (Emma Watson), and Ron (Rupert Grint). These three young actors carry the movie while the older English heavyweights: Alan Rickman, Maggie Smith, Jim Broadbent, and Michael Gambon (whose character Dumbledore is, of course, dead), have only small to virtually nonexistent roles. But the three Hogwarts students do a fine job, and Grint deserves a "most improved actor" nod. All three began as young, relatively inexperienced actors; we've watched them develop from childhood through adolescence and, now in this latest film, to young adulthood -- they're on their own with the weight of the world on the shoulders.

This film is dark and definitely not for younger children. My six year old grandson still panics whenever his brother watches a Potter DVD with Dobby the house elf in it. BTW, Dobby comes into his own in this film, stealing scenes and full of confidence, determination, and fierce loyalty to Harry.

The weakest part of the movie is also the weakest part of the book: the camping episode. It drags and seems as unnecessarily protracted in the movie as it is in the text. In another initially strange scene, Harry endeavors to raise Hermione's spirits by dancing with her. As he invited her to dance, the audience laughed nervously at the awkwardness of the moment, but somehow the scene transforms into one of ineffable sweetness as one friend cares for the needs and hurts of the other.

The movie is, in short, "Brilliant."

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Megamind

Review: Megamind

Rating: ***

Nonna's Rating: $$$

Rotten Tomatoes: 67%

Audience: 79%

Max and Eli give "thumbs up" to Megamind. I stole glances at them several times during the movie and saw big smiles on their faces. And I wasn't bored or sleepy: I enjoyed it too. It passes the biggest tests of movies aimed at children: whether or not the kids were delighted and whether or not the adults are trying to read their watches in the dark. The animation was clever (we did not see it in 3-D) and the writing was diverting enough that adults could laugh too. The "message" was subtle but clear: "It's what's good in us that matters. You don't have to be buff and beautiful to be loved."

It also didn't hurt to have Tina Fey (Roxanne Ritchi) and Will Ferrel (Megamind) feverishly delivering lines that adults could chuckle at. On the other hand, the characters inevitably found themselves in situations that made the kids giggle. Brad Pitt does a nice turn as Metro Man, a stereotypical superhero, and David Cross is reliably funny as Minion, Megamind's, well, minion.

The film begins with ironic homage to the Superman origin story and continues that theme in Ferrell's uproarious sendup of Marlon Brando as Jor-El. It's certainly not Toy Story 3, but it was worth the trip.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Catfish

Review: Catfish

Rating: ****

Nonna's Rating: $$$$

Rotten Tomatoes: 78%

Audience: 65%

Every once in a great while, a film pushes the current boundaries of the medium. Think Brazil and 12 Monkeys and The Big Lebowski and Kill Bill and Fight Club and Moulin Rouge. Catfish pushes those boundaries hard and couples itself to social media and virtual lives in a way that makes us sit back and say, "Where the hell are we headed?"

The movie is a documentary (maybe, probably not, but it doesn't matter) about Nev Schulman, a charming, engaging, naive young man who has fallen in love online with Megan, the sister of Abby, an 8-year-old girl who has asked Nev for permission to paint one of his photographs. Nev, in fact, falls in love with Megan's whole family.

He, his brother Ariel, and another friend, Henry, travel to the UP to meet Megan and her relatives. And now, like every other critic, I will refrain from going any further lest I spoil the story for you.

Suffice it to say that this movie will probably make you uncomfortable, but you won't want to stop watching it for a minute.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Secretariat

Review: Secretariat

Rating: ***

Nonna's Rating: $$

Rotten Tomatoes: 67%

Audience: 78%

I've resisted going to see this movie for about a month. I could only imagine how horribly it would be Disneymogrified. (Never forget Hunchback of Notre Dame.) But I was pleasantly surprised. It is, first and foremost, a great story. (I'm a sucker for horse movies.) And even though I have a vivid memory of watching the jaw-dropping Belmont Stakes in 1973 on TV, the depiction of the race still sent chills running down my spine.

My only criticism is that Diane Lane is just a bit short of being the steel magnolia I would expect in Penny Chenery. Still, her performance is more than adequate. John Malkovich has been accused by some critics of overplaying the part of Lucien Laurin, Secretariat's trainer. Au contraire, he's truly "a character"; he only needs a few lessons in pronouncing French. My one quibble with the film is that the "Where are they now?" blurbs at the end of the movie were a bit Disneyfied in that, children that we are, we're not told that Chenery and her husband John Tweedy divorced in 1973, the year Secretariat won the Triple Crown. Even though I did not know this fact when I was watching the film, the conflict in the marriage was obvious in the movie. We're adults. We would have survived a bittersweet ending.

Note: The picture above is of the real "Big Red," not the very fine horse who played him in the film. Can't find his credit. Now, he deserves a best supporting actor nod!

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: RED

Review: RED

Rating: *

Nonna's Rating: $ (Maybe)

Rotten Tomatoes: 71%

Audience: 78%

Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, Mary Louise Parker, John Malkovich, and, wait for it, Helen Mirren. Hard to imagine a cast more promising. And they do their best, but good actors aren't good unless they have a good script -- and that is sadly absent in this film. All that acting talent is wasted. And the action of this "action-sort of-comedy" can't save us from the boring stretches of inane dialog that come between firefights. I'm not wasting any more time on this one.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Nowhere Boy

Review: Nowhere Boy

Rating: ***

Nonna's Rating: $$

Rotten Tomatoes: 82%

Audience: 70%

I admit I was predisposed to love this movie. It is, after all, about John Lennon. But then, my expectations were high too. I wasn't disappointed. The film focuses on Lennon's late teenage years: between being the bad boy 15-year-old at school and his sojourn with Paul and George to Hamburg from 1960-62. They are, needless to say, formative years -- years complicated by Lennon's discovery that his birth mother lived close to him and that she was alternately a free spirit and a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

Lennon's adolescence is, in a word, troubled. He is recalcitrant, obnoxious, ungrateful, and arrogant. He is is also painfully insecure, desperate for his mother's love, and delightfully witty. The film does not present us with a teenage Beatle; instead it gives us glimpses and hints of the brilliant, creative man he would become. Kristin Scott-Thomas delivers a convincing performance as Lennon's Aunt/Mother Mimi, and Aaron Johnson as Lennon grows into the man Lennon would become in a subtle performance. Thomas Sangster (Liam Neeson's young blonde son in Love Actually) joins the film near the end as 15-year-old Paul McCartney. In contrast to Lennon, he projects solid confidence in his abiltities and self-assurance. I thought Paul could never have looked that young, but, at the end we see actual pictures from that time period and Sangster looks remarkably similar. Not a great movie, but definitely worth your time.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Cairo Time

Review: Cairo Time

Rating: **1/2

Nonna's Rating: $$

Rotten Tomatoes Critics: 80%

Rotten Tomatoes Public: 58%

Cairo Time is a good movie. Not a great one. It misses the mark, seems a bit less than, but Patricia Clarkson's performance kept pulling me back into the film. As always, she is fascinating, delivering a subtle, complex performance.

Taking a cue from the film's title, I believe that Ruba Nadda, the director and writer, wanted to jolt our western sensibilities a bit, that she wanted to recreate the experience of suddenly being alone in a culture very different from our own. Clarkson's character, Juliette, has traveled to Cairo expecting to meet her husband, Mark, a U.N. official who works in refugee camps in Gaza. Developments in the camps prevent him from joining her for three weeks. Indeed, we come to understand that Mark's missing their rendezvous is typical of their relationship. The demands of his job are intense.

Nadda is successful at making us understand the experience of Juliette's anomie; it's somewhat frightening, but Juliette is more just a fish out of water than she is in any real danger. Her husband has asked his friend and former security officer, Tareq (Alexander Siddig), to keep an eye on Juliette. Their relationship unfolds ever so slowly. Too slowly. And that's the major problem with the movie. Nadda wants us to understand that time in Cairo is not western time, but, unfortunately, that translates into a slow-moving story.

Alexander Siddig could also have been better used. He's a fine

actor (Syriana and Deep Space Nine). His passivity and his

reticence are probably true to his character, but they don't

move the plot along very well.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: The Social Network

Review: The Social Network

Rating: ****

Nonna's Rating: $$$$

Rotten Tomatoes Critics: 97%

Rotten Tomatoes Public: 81%

Finally, a terrific movie for adults. It's Animal House for the second decade of the third millennium --Harvard-style with a boatload of entrepreneurship. All wrapped up in Aaron Sorkin's rapid-fire, deliriously delightful dialog. Who knew that transcripts of depositions could be the source of such material!

The Social Network tells the origin story of Facebook. It may or

may not be true, but that's not important because it approaches

the status of 21st century myth. It's truer than truth. Jesse

Eisenberg plays Mark Zuckerberg, a wily young anti-Ulysses

bent on getting the girl and getting in the right final club. He

betrays everyone around him, tricking the tricksters, outsmarting

the Winklevi (twin brothers played by Armie Hammer, Jr.). He

falls prey to a modern Mephistopheles (Justin Timberlake as

Napster founder Sean Parker) and abandons his one friend

Eduardo Saverin (Andrew Garfield) who provided his moral

compass.

Lest I make this all sound too serious and too pretentious,

prepare to laugh. The scene in the office of Harvard's

president with the Winklevi, the President, and his

Assistant is nearly perfect. I felt as if I were listening to

the brilliant repartee of Howard Hawk's His Girl Friday.

Well, for once I don't end a review with "Go see this

classic movie instead: [fill in the blank with a great

movie]." No, go see this classic movie.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: The Town

Review: The Town

Rating: **1/2

Nonna's Rating: $$

Rotten Tomatoes Critics: 95%

Rotten Tomatoes Public: 89%

Here I go again, not liking a film that the critics love. Of course, now that Rotten Tomatoes is publishing how much the audience likes a film as well as the critics, I'm pretty far from that mark too.

So, forgive me. Yes, the film held my interest. Yes, Ben Affleck proved that he can act whenever he has a Boston accent. Yes, Jon Hamm was worth the price of admission. Yes, Jeremy Renner is one scary dude. But . . but . . . there are plot holes that accommodate trucks. Too much just didn't make sense.

Now, at my back I hear my brother, Tony, and my friend, Linda, telling me not to think so much, that this isn't the kind of movie I should over-analyze, that I should just sit back and go along with it all.

Well, I can't. But don't let me stop you from seeing the movie for yourself and delivering your own judgment. As you probably know, it's a bank robbery movie. Affleck (Doug MacRay) plays a man raised in the Charlestown area of Boston, an area which spawns and nurtures bank robbers, car thieves, and kidnappers. Doug's life becomes complicated when he decides to make his next robbery his last, and when he finds himself falling in love with a hostage from his last bank job who is unaware of who he is. Go see it and tell me what you think. Or rent Inside Man or The Bank Job, two really terrific bank robbery movies.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: The Concert

Review: The Concert

Rating: **

Nonna's Rating: $

Rotten Tomatoes: 58%

The Concert is the story of a former conductor of the Bolshoi Orchestra, Andrey, who was fired during the Soviet regime for hiring Jewish and Roma musicians. All this occurred 30 years before the action of the film. In the post-Soviet Russia of the movie, he's the janitor of the Bolshoi. One day he intercepts a request from Paris inviting the orchestra to play there. Andrey decides to gather his former musicians and take them to Paris to give the concert. He also requests that Anne-Marie Jacquet, a stellar young musician whose star is on the rise, play a concerto with the orchestra.

Pulling this all together is easier said than done -- and that's exactly where my problem with this movie resides. There is an unevenness of tone in the film that is jarring. It is at times melodramatic, at times romantic, at times tragic, and at times like watching a Three Stooges short. The broad portrayal of hyper-emotional Russian stereotypes was distracting and unnecessary. Quite a few critics have noted that, as flawed as the film is, the emotionally satisfying ending makes up for all its sins. I wish I could agree. This movie just didn't work for me at all. I'm thinking about watching Ninotchka as an anecdote.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: The American

Review: The American

Rating: **

Nonna's Rating: $

Rotten Tomatoes: 64%

Another disappointing movie in an extremely disappointing summer of movies.

Imagine George Clooney spending most of his time putting guns together and doing his best to avoid being shot. Now, imagine him doing this without his God-given charm or playful sense of humor. No twinkles in his eye in this film. It's a slow-paced snooze with George's pecs and Violante Placido's (someone had to make that name up) lovely nakedness providing totally unnecessary and irrelevant eye candy.

There is one redeeming feature of this movie. It was filmed in the Italian hills of the province of Abruzzo, just east of Rome and the land of my ancestors. The ancient towns perched on the mountains all reminded me of Capestrano, the town from which my great-grandparents left for America. I did love the scenery, but it's definitely not Tuscany. No lush green fields; no vines heavy with grapes (although Montepulciano is from this area). It's rugged, arid rocky land in the summer and wet and dreary in the winter -- and that's why so many people emigrated over 100 years ago.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Get Low

Review: Get Low

Rating: ***

Nonna's Rating: $$$

Rotten Tomatoes: 86%

It's a simple, little story set in the Despression -- hardly enough to make a movie. Robert Duvall portrays a Tennessee recluse, a man who has stayed as far away from people as possible for 40 years. Nearing the end of his life, he decides that he will use his savings to throw himself a funeral -- which he plans to attend. He does this hoping that the people who have known him will tell stories about him; he wants them to tell the one story he can't bear to tell.

Bill Murray plays the funeral director who assists him in his plans. Again, Murray shows us his considerable acting talent. I found it impossible not to imagine his character's likely colorful backstory: a series of careers cut short by a series of indiscretions, I'm sure.

At the end of the film, Duvall makes a speech which reminds us why we have loved to watch his movies for the past 50 years. He makes a confession and, in turn, is given grace and redemption.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: The Girl Who Played With Fire

Review: The Girl Who Played With Fire

Rating: ***

Nonna's Rating: $$$

Rotten Tomatoes: 66%

The second installment of the Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy manages to distill a sprawling novel into its essential narrative. That said, I'm not sure if someone who has not read the book would be able to follow the story. There is that proliferation of characters which is confusing enough to those who have read the book: in the movie many central players are not even identified. We are left to deduce who they are and how they function in the film's narrative. In addition, the ending, a true cliffhanger, will likely dissatisfy those who have not read the second and final books.

So, why care about this movie? Easy. Noomi Rapace. She embodies the character of Lisbeth Salandar as convincingly as Vivien Leigh did Scarlett O'Hara. And that makes up for lots of cinematic sins. In this film, Salandar finds herself accused of a triple murder. She uses her preternatural computer and survival skills to escape the long arm of the Swedish police. While evading the law, she contends with the real murderers using her own brand of vigilante justice.

You may have trouble finding the film. It has not been released as widely in the Chicago area as the first movie. Its box office does seem to be on pace with the first film, however, in spite of its limited release. You just may have to wait for the rental market. This is unfortunate because the final film, sure to be an art film blockbuster, will be released in October.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: The Kids Are All Right

Review: The Kids Are All Right

Rating: **

Nonna's Rating: $

Rotten Tomatoes: 94%

Here I go again. Not liking a film almost every notable critic likes. Let me say some positive things first. Annette Bening does a great job portraying a driven professional woman with control issues. And Julianne Moore also does a fine job as a bright woman who finds herself at loose ends as her oldest child goes off to college. Both these excellent performances, however, are undermined by the annoying subtext of the movie: "What every woman needs (even if she's a lesbian) is a good man." I just didn't buy it. That, combined with dialog in California-style babble-speak, made the movie much less than it could have been. (I do realize that there might have been gentle satire at work with the annoying script, but, if that's so, it didn't work for me.)

Bening and Moore portray a lesbian couple with a long-standing relationship. Each of them has had a child by the same anonymous sperm donor. The kids want to find and get to know their dad. Into their lives marches Mark Ruffalo, a funny, passionate free-spirit destined to wreak havoc in their lives. It's a great basis for a story, but, in the end, it only strains our credibility.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Eat Pray Love

Review: Eat Pray Love

Rating: **

Nonna's Rating: $

Rotten Tomatoes: 39%

It's not horrible. It's not great.

And, it is most definitely a chick flick. Julia Roberts plays Liz Gilbert, a woman who walks away from her marriage and then walks away from a relationship with a younger man (James Franco -- who would walk away from that!) in order to find herself. I realize that by using those last two words in my previous sentence, I've trivialized Liz's experience, but, honestly, I have to. Liz is a woman who leads a privileged life -- and whines about it. She travels to Rome (to eat), to India (to pray), and to Bali (to love). In Bali (not giving away much here), she finally learns that she must move outside her solipsistic world and give of herself trusting fully, no strings attached. Not exactly a profound or unusual insight, but it works.

As always, Julia is endearing. And there are excellent performances by Javier Bardem, Billy Crudup, Viola Davis, James Franco, and the always surprising and compelling Richard Jenkins. It's just that when all is said and done, the story seems very superficial -- easy spirituality in a summer of mediocre movies.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: I Am Love

Review: I Am Love (Io sono l'amore)

Rating: ***1/2

Nonna's Rating: $$$

Rotten Tomatoes: 81%

Suddenly this summer. a terrific film. Tilda Swinton has a lock on an Oscar nomination -- and she does it in Italian and Russian. In this film, she plays Emma, the Russian wife of a rich Milanese textile manufacturer. She has three grown children, but we're told little of her earlier life or her present state of mind. Through her nuanced and subtle performance, however, and scenes of a family gathering early in the movie, we learn all we need to know and fill in the blanks ourselves: Emma has given her life and her very identity to her husband and his family. She dissolves into the corners of her stunning, but cold, Milanese villa.

After she meets and begins an affair with her son's friend, Antonio, her life and her world open to color and sensuality. The rest of the story surprises, complemented by stunning cinematography and sophisticated editing. Not to be missed.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: The Sorcerer's Apprentice

Review: The Sorcerer's Apprentice

Rating: **

Nonna's Rating: $$

Rotten Tomatoes: 41%

The Sorcerer's Apprentice is a prime example of what's wrong with this summer's movies. Clearly, a pack of studio executives (in this case, at Disney) got together and said, "Let's take the most beloved scene from Fantasia," (Mickey Mouse's silent celebration of Paul Dukas' symphonic poem, based, in turn, on Goethe's poem of the same name) "and turn it into a movie." Could the film be more derivative! (Yes, it turns out.) The iconic out-of-control mops and pails do make an appearance in the movie, but because that sequence lasts only a few minutes, much more has been added, all derived from yet more sources: Arthurian legend, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and Star Wars (borrowing a moment so lifted from Episode IV: A New Hope that one of the characters feels the need to point out that the scene has been stolen from that movie).

My grandson Max also noticed how derivative the film was; in spite of that, however, he liked it (the special effects are rather good). So I'm going to recommend the movie to parents of older children.

Whenever I'm ready to pan a film aimed at kids, I say to myself: "Compared to Shortz," (which was pure agony to sit through), how bad is this film really? It's Citizen Kane next to Shortz.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it

Review: Inception

Review: Inception

Rating: ***

Nonna's Rating: $$$

Rotten Tomatoes: 86%

Some movies beg to be viewed twice: Usual Suspects and The Sixth Sense come to mind. What we thought had unfolded as we watched these films, in the end, was very different from what had really happened. We watched again to notice the clues we missed the first time around. We watched again to make sense of the world contained in the space of a movie.

Inception seems to be such a movie. I indeed do want to see it again to try to make sense of it all, to notice the clues. My grandson Max and I had an intense discussion after we saw the film. We tried to put the pieces of the puzzle together and figure it out. We sorted out most of the plot, but there were still too many questions and loose ends. We consulted the myriad of Internet discussions of the film and discovered that our read of the plot was in line with the online explanations. Most of those loose ends, however, just weren't tied off.

Now, I have no problem living with ambiguity in a movie, but there's a fine line between creative ambiguity and sloppy storytelling -- and I'm afraid there's a bit of the latter in this film. I wouldn't lodge that complaint against Usual Suspects or The Sixth Sense. Second viewings of those films elucidated much tighter plots with no troubling loose ends.

Nevertheless, do see Inception. Movies have been so disappointing this summer. It's a relief to have one to recommend. Fine performances abound: Leonardo DiCaprio (Dom Cobb), Ellen Page (Ariadne), Joseph "I-hope-we-see-more-of-him" Gordon-Leavitt (Arthur), Tom Hardy (Eames), and the always reliable Michael Caine (Miles). DiCaprio plays a dream thief, skilled at stealing corporate secrets. His latest assignment is not to steal an idea, however, but to plant one in the brain of the rival of a corporate client: to complete a heretofore impossible inception.

The special effects in the movie dreams are not always as dream-like as one would expect. The most stunning scene actually appears over and over in the trailers: the streets of Paris fold over themselves in delightful fashion. My favorite dream movie, however, is still Peter Weir's The Last Wave.

Nonna's Ratings:

$$$$ = Worth paying the Friday evening price
$$$= Worth paying the Matinee price

$$= Worth a rental
$ = Wait for cable
# = Skip it