Mini Film Reviews: last week's watchings
About A Boy; I've had this movie on DVD for years but never got around to watching it until last week. It was great - cute and genuine and funny. Hugh Grant was quite charming in it - I guess I should own up and admit that I'm a bit of a fan of his.

The Oxford Murders; interesting but typical. Elijah Wood's accent/voice was really unnatural and a lot of the dialogue was either awkward or downright embarrassingly cliche. Not horrible, I guess I would recommend it to people who like murder mysteries (but it's definitely not a shining example of the genre).

Black Snake Moan; I watched this right after I watched The Oxford Murders, and talk about a mind trip. It was literally going from academic babble to the backwaters of America. OK, the premise for this film is ridiculous. A lot of it is very politically incorrect, and underneath it all, it's just a morality tale. But it IS well made, and the performances were good, and a lot of it was entertaining. Even Justin Timberlake did a decent job (though I have to admit I couldn't take him seriously because he's... well, Justin Timberlake). I think what I liked best was the fact that Samuel L. Jackon's character found love in the end with the nice pharmacy lady.

+ 24/50 in 2008

I started watching a quirky film called Turtles Swim Faster Than Expected (which stars Ueno Juri as a bored housewife who becomes a spy) but didn't manage to get more than 20 minutes in because my stupid computer died on me. Hopefully I can somehow salvage the drive and save all my documents and files off it. Such a pain in the ass.

***Note to self - older doramas to check out when I get bored:

-The Queen's Classroom (hear nothing but rave reviews of this one)
-Last Christmas (Tamaki Hiroshi pre-Nodame!)