Secret Window is Stephen King done right (the film is based on a King novella.) Johnny Depp plays the role of Mort the author very well, and John Turturro is excellent as the dark one who appears accusing Depp of stealing his story and publishing it as his own. I cannot say more without giving things away. The genre is horror/psychological thriller. Look for Hitchcock and Alice in Wonderland references and all the usual suspects and ingredients. I think you... Read more

Hidalgo is a long movie about a man (half-Native American, half-Anglo) at the end of the cowboys and Indians era who takes part in a race across 3,000 miles of the Middle East for a prize of $100,000. It is supposed to be based on a true story but if you search the Internet, you will find out it more like “flavored” by a true story. I liked the film, even though it didn’t blow me away. The hero, Norton... Read more

Well folks, writer/director of Dogma, Kevin Smith, has grown up. A lot. Jersey Girl is a classically constructed story of a high-power Manhattan publicist, Ollie (Ben Affleck) who gets married only to have his wife die in childbirth. He gets fired when he loses it at a press event for the Will Smith – and has to move back to Jersey to live with his dad. Lots of Catholic imagery and some Catholic culture references, (along with the typical bathroom,... Read more

Twisted, a San Francisco cop-thriller, should have been toned down a little and been a made-for-TV movie. I figured out who done it very soon. There wasn’t enough character development to make me care about the people… even though we can always have empathy for someone’s despair. Wait for the video/DVD if you must. Read more

Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights is an embarrassing film when placed side by side with the original 1987 Dirty Dancing. For serious folk, the original had plenty of moral issues that were dealt with in very ambivalent ways, indeed objectively contrary to Catholic moral teaching. But you cannot fault the dancing! Havana Nights was a disappointment on every level. And the dancing wasn’t good at all. They should have spent a little more money and blown us away with dancing that... Read more

Confessions is fun for young teens and there is a lesson to be learned about telling the truth. Read more

The Passion of the Christ is Mel Gibson’s long-awaited, highly-promoted film about the last 12 hours of the life of Jesus. It is without doubt a masterpiece, but it is violent, graphic, and in my opinion, it belongs in the horror genre. Why? Because it is about chaos in one’s personal universe, the cosmos, and loss. Gibson uses all kinds of cinematic devises related to the genre as well. These are intense and at times shocking. The vicious violence of... Read more

21 Grams is supposed to be how much weight a body loses when it dies. It’s a great title and premise for a movie, but this complex, non-linear film isn’t really about that. It’s about death, dying, mistakes, despair, sorrow in a totally non-linear moral universe. The lives of three people converge in very harsh ways. One man kills another in a hit and run, the dead man’s heart is transplanted into the third man’s, and that man gets involved... Read more

This is amateur writing and acting and fabulous hip hop. The dance “battles” are amazing. Wait for the last twenty minutes. Just when you are thinking what a non-story this is, the contest begins. I think it gave me a respect for hip hop as an urban art form – and the film’s explicit message is: use dance not violence to solve differences. That’s a good message. Read more

Monster is not named for the woman who became the first serial killer in America, but for the ferris wheel she wanted to ride as a child. Charlize Theron will win the Academy Award for best actress I think. This is a new Hilary Swank – and for a film that is similar in many respects to Boys Don’t Cry. This is not a pretty story; read the reviews at www.imdb.org because all I can tell you is that it’s... Read more