Poor Ron Paul. The esteemed doctor cum 2008 presidential candidate with a dedicate following thought he was being interviewed on the issue of Austrian economics (who knew he was so keen on it?). What awaited him instead when a light suddenly ‘broke’ mid-interview was a flaming homosexual entrapment. Brüno dropped his pants in a seductive dance, and Dr. Paul stormed out of the interview

Wolke Neun (Dresen, 2008), Germany At the first sight of exposed wrinkly flesh, someone in the audience I was with said out loud “what the heck is this?” That was about seven minutes into the film, and the characters were about to engage in some naked, older adulterous affair, one that has not been seen [...]

SPOILERS ALERT 3:10 to Yuma (Mangold, 2007) could have been great. It could have been about a perverse desire of the Good Man to be the criminal he sought to bring justice to, the man who could take what he could and feel free of judgment or ties to a simple life. At one point, [...]

Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others; von Donnersmarck, 2006) Germany This German film won the Academy Awards for Best Foreign Picture the year it released (2006). It came out of nowhere and beat out the front-runner Pan’s Labyrinth for the prize. It shocked me at the time, but having seen the film now [...]

Grindhouse (Rodriguez & Tarantino, 2007) Watching Grindhouse, it was clear to me who was the one with the big ego: his name wasn’t Robert Rodriguez. While Rodriguez settled for a blast-from-the-past film-to-film transfer, Tarantino made a Tarantino film – probably his most peculiar one yet, and one that, if anything, established once and for all [...]

Grizzly: So, Aurens, I’m gonna cut straight to the chase and ask you; what’s your prediction for Best Picture and why? Aurens: At this point, I think I should just spin the bottle and kiss whatever film it points to. WHO THE HELL KNOWS? I used to think Babel got it in the bag, but [...]

Oscar snubs are more often than not of the horrible kind – great works overlooked for more middling affairs seems like the norm. However, we often forget that Oscars also makes some smart decisions (we’ll talk as though it is of one mind, even when it really is just a voting body). This year, that [...]

Pan’s Labyrinth (del Toro, 2006) Spain You know there’s something wrong with the world when a child’s paradise is the dark and sinister underworld. In this horrifying fairytale from the Spanish director, del Toro (who seems to be following Peter Jackson’s career path), a little girl – Ofelia, played with heartbreaking grace by a relatively [...]

Caché (Hidden; Haneke, 2005) France Oh boy. Haneke really dropped a bomb on us with this sneaky picture. As with any psychological thriller that’s worth its price of admission, the thrill is beside the point. Although the ending leaves us hanging as to who the culprit(s) is (or are), what is even more astonishing is [...]

Special Report By Elle They-Call-Me-Awesome A. Toronto (Reuters) It is no longer enough to just send her flowers by the dozens or strum a song from your worn-out emo guitar. With the advance of the internet age, you need to be able to sweet talk in proper syntax, or you’d risk ridicule, a life of [...]

Standard City (Reuters) – A local politician will consider a proposal by an area woman to create Workolympic. The plan would involve setting up various stadiums throughout different cities for blue and white collar workers to compete with each other while spectators jeer or cheer them on. “You know how people always complain how unfair [...]

While homosexual attraction and homosexual acts have existed as far back as history cares to count (the bible, other historic writings such as Greek literature and myths, and the natives’ traditional culture all have referred to a third sexual category of either a hermaphrodite or a two-spirits person), homosexuality is actually a relatively new term. [...]

McCabe & Mrs. Miller (Altman, 1971) U.S.A. Sometimes, life hands you a wild card. A stranger comes into your life and slowly but surely makes his presence felt. You may not feel it at first, but slowly this presence occupies your very being. Before you know it, you are riding a one-way express pass the [...]

Miami Vice (Mann, 2006) U. S. A. How to take Miami Vice? Since it’s a procedural film, perhaps a detail discussion of what worked and what did not work would be appropriate. Let’s start with what worked. Everyone talked about the dream-like cinematography – which, I suspect, would look even better on a High Definition [...]

Mabel Longhetti is just a little bit different, her husband insists. The extent of this difference, like a pendulum, swings back and forth throughout the film. When we first meet Mabel, unless we look carefully at the way she would get on her kid’s scooter, there seems to be little that would distinguish Mabel from [...]

The poster of The New World, interestingly, is shot from the perspective of a Native American, or as referred to in the film, a Natural. In this revealing shot, Malick establishes The New World as The Western Civilization, and The Old World as, by default, The Naturals’ World, where human feet are firmly planted in [...]

“To begin… To begin… How to start? I’m hungry. I should get coffee. Coffee would help me think. Maybe I should write something first, then reward myself with coffee. Coffee and a muffin. So I need to establish the themes. Maybe a banana nut. That’s a good muffin.” The writer in me instantly recognized the [...]

London, Ontario – Recently scientists have mapped the DNA of a bacterial mutation that gives its hosts – mostly men – the inclination to find White Girls most date-able. This monumental work will help scientists find a cure for a disease that, up to now, has been attributed to racism, uncultured ignoramus, or blindness. Whitegirlitis [...]

Children are like three legged puppies or desperate baby seals: they are so well equipped with the ability to tug at your heartstrings that you either reject them outright for the sake of your sanity or you make disgusting googly noise at their every turn. Because of this uncanny ability, films with children as central [...]