Mike Vilensky's Mini-Movie Reviews

Once
A love story about two lonely, unloved people who find each other and don't really fall in love. Interspersed with boring music, this film is only for the weak of heart who want to watch a story about uninteresting people.

No End In Sight
This critically acclaimed documentary examines what went wrong with America's invasion of Iraq. It's a fully comprehensive and fascinating - albeit unnerving - look at the Bush administration's steps and missteps in the Mideast. But, as the title suggests, it doesn't conjure up much of a resolution of its own.

2 Days in Paris
The 21st century Woody Allen and Diane Keaton - Adam Goldberg and Julie Deply - find their perfect romantic comedy in this smart and side-splitting movie about an American trying to keep his relationship alive in his girlfriend's alienating French city.

Eastern Promises
Crazy cult director David Cronenberg lends his suspenseful and unsettling tone to this drama/thriller starring Naomi Watts and Viggo Mortensen that looks like Memento and 21 Grams all at once - but not without its own originality. The story about a compassionate midwife who, through one of her patients, accidentally gets involved in the Russian mafia and takes the audience through London's seedy underbelly towards possible, though unlikely, retribution in what is sure to be a critic favorite.

The Brave One
Jodie Foster stars as, still, one tough chick in this film about a woman seeking revenge on an assailant who wounded her and murdered her fiancé. While the story seems to add little nuance to the revenge genre, which has been increasingly popular this summer, it still stars Jodie Foster as, again, one tough chick, and is therefore worth watching.

Mr. Woodcock
Why is Susan Sarandon in this movie? The sexual innuendo in that title is no accident, nor is the placement of two basketballs on either side of Billy Bob Thornton on the movie poster in this, er, film about a boy trying to stop his mother from marrying his gym teacher, which actually makes me uncomfortable to even write about.

Across The Universe
Two kids of the 1960s fall in love and are then torn apart in this metaphysical, multi-colored musical of Beatles songs, which is a lot more impressive and less ridiculous than it suddenly sounds in that description.

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