Despite a few funny lines, oddball characters, embarassing situations and a Las Vegas location, this film is NOT much more than a grade-B (or C) movie, obviously shot on a tiny budget. It reflects the director’s lack of experience outside television and feels like it was produced for the small screen, from the trite Vegas street scenes to the poor lighting and stiff acting. So it goes.

Phenomenal casting got this production the Best Ensemble award at the 2006 Hollywood Film Festival, but I think the politics was just too raw for winning any majors like a Golden Globe or an Oscar. I was fascinated by Estevez’s vision of that fateful day when Bobby Kennedy was shot at the Ambassador Hotel … June 5, 1968. At the time, I was 16 and still in shock from MLK’s assassination just two months earlier. This makes a good reminder of the feelings and hopes of the 60s … sad, but well worth watching.

Screenwriter Tom Stoppard managed to condense Tolstoy’s 600-page epic into a 130-page script, and director Wright found a way to make it fresh through a unique approach to staging. Knightly and Law perform admirably in the lead roles, though I was less taken with the other characters. It’s certainly not what I expected … surprising in a good way, if not quite the Oscar-level production I’d hoped for (save the costumery, which won and deserved it).

Based on the character developed by novelist Lee Child, this story has all the elements one might want in a mystery thriller, from conspiracy, murder, betrayal, sleuthing and high-octane action to the possibility of endless sequels. Duvall’s supporting role is a good one, though Cruise (of course) gets all the best lines and most of the camera time.

Lots of quirky characters and a nice casting flip having Rourke as the good guy and Murray as the heavy. It’s a tale of a washed up jazz musician who runs into trouble with gangsters and seeks his salvation through Lily (Fox), a “winged woman” he encounters at a carnival side show in the middle of nowhere. Give the film some time to grow on you and it will reward your patience in the end. Unfortunately, for screen writer Glazer (Scrooged) who wrote the screenplay and made this his directorial debut, it was not successful at the box office. And, yes, the title has meaning.

Paltrow soars and the sound track is top flight in this film about the golden days of being a flight attendant … back when they were still called stewardesses. It’s a romantic comedy, so don’t look for any major insights, but Bergen has a stand-out part as Sally, the guru of the glamorous in-flight service industry, and Myers is a hoot as the head instructor. Nevada gets a nod, too, albeit sideways.

I had heard nothing but bad about this film, so it turned out to be a lot better than I had expected. An invasion of Earth is turned away thanks to a childhood game under license from Hasbro? Well, it was a bit more than that. A little love story and a lot of SFX, plus some up and coming actors recycled from TV shows like “Friday Night Lights” and “Numbers” with a real actor, Liam Neeson, at the helm. As action films go, it was not half bad.

Brilliant casting and an excellent update of John le Carre’s spy novel. I must admit, I found the opening 20 minutes rather disjointed and confusing so I watched it again after I had seen the entire film and, of course, it all made perfect sense. It was just the director’s way of tossing the audience in the deep end. In 1979, Sir Alec Guinness played the part of George Smiley in a TV mini-series and got several award nominations, but I actually think Gary Oldman was more believable in this version, for which he was on the Oscar shortlist for Best Actor.

Is finding love a function of fate, of will, of randomness, or something else? As an up-and-coming director Brad Anderson (“The Call”) examined possible answers in 1998 by following a lovelorn Boston nurse (Davis) in her search for Mr. Right. Some crisp dialog and fascinating characters make this a fun film to watch, even 15 years after it was first released.

So glad to see that working for Disney didn’t dull Burton’s edginess. There’s plenty of cutsie, but just enough macabre to balance it out. Look for homages to horror movies of the past sprinkled throughout, like Godzilla and Persephone’s “Bride of Frankenstein” hair highlights and archive footage of Christopher Lee as Dracula. Good fun!