A Couple of Movies

I have been having a terrible week in grad school, mostly all to do with how much improvement I need as a teacher, so instead of focusing on work when I get home, I have been spending time watching movies. Admittedly, this is probably not the best decision that I could have made, but that's what I've been doing.

First, I finally got to see Guillaume Canet's French thriller Ne le Dis à Personne (Tell No One) starring François Cluzet and Marina Hands among others. The film is a very American-style movie (at least to my mind), but it is an exciting murder mystery and I found it always interesting and often very, very cool. I should also point out, that the movie kept me guessing until the end and there was at least one point in the film when I looked at my friend and said "I have no idea who those people are or what they are doing": usually a good sign when a movie is filled with creepy villains. The film also stars Marie Josée-Croze, Nathalie Baye (fabulous) and Gilles Lelouche. But my favorite performance in the movie is from Kristen Scott-Thomas (love her) who plays the very cool lesbian best friend of the male lead. She is wonderful as usual, and her glances say a million things at once, sometimes even negating what she happens to be saying, She is amazing and I can't wait to see her in her next 2008 movie, Il y a Longtemps que Je T'aime, for which there is already talk of an Oscar nomination.

It is probably best that we say very little about the fact that I saw Dennis Dugan's You Don't Mess with the Zohan. Even less should be said about the fact that I actually thought it was mildly funny and interestingly antihomophobic.

And I found Adam Sandler kinda sexy. Even with that ludicrous haircut. OK I will stop. It's too much.

The other movie I saw recently was another movie I should probably be ashamed of: the low-budget gay comedy The Mostly Unfabulous Social Life of Ethan Green. It looks like it was shot over a period of two weeks, the plot is ridiculous and predictable, the acting is less than brilliant, but...

the lead boy is very cute and, well it's really a rather lovely little comedy; my roommate and I loved it. We laughed out loud several times, and Meredith Baxter plays a great supporting character. If you are not gay, you should definitely skip Ethan Green, but if you are, you should probably rent it, because I can bet that you will like it.