I had little recall of my own thoughts from my recent rewatch-in-a-trance screening, but P. Greg said it better than I would've anyhow: "It gave me chills to see people interacting so authetically. I don't think I have ever seen that so accurately portrayed before in my life."

Built brick solid on the foundation of Mortensen's miraculous, towering, best performance of the year. It's as if Cronenberg's chops, formerly courting the bizarre and outlandish, are even more effective on a film that's neither, but instead of pure genre and as muted as the object of its gaze: The Russian Mafia: So hard, so quiet and, frequently, so sadistic. Cronenberg gets out of the film's way and it shows: Eastern Promises is a creeping powerhouse.

The two act structure is more langorous than Tropical Malady, with the film content to drift and unfold. I spent less time overthinking and more time letting it wash over me. Loose premise concerns flounderers who bag social constructs and other woes to relax in the forest of berries, sex and sunlight. The endless shot of Ruong falling in and out of sleep encapsulates the mood of the film.

The very final twist seems awful fanciful but, then, most of the film is purposefully contrived. As a gangster comedy, it seems an odd pairing with Mamet's The Untouchables from the previous year; This is obviously the better film - the one that doesn't take itself seriously. William H. Macy with the bleach crew cut has burned my eyes out of their sockets.

Easier to sink another few inches into my seat this time around, find great comedy amidst the long patches of sudden violence. It felt more definitively Coen this outing (and, to be lazier still, I'm including this page in lieu of a quote of my own). I hope it wins all the marbles at the glamour awards on 2/24.

It never ceases to amaze me how much time I spend considering the family values, roles and so forth of John Hughes' universe.

Chatty and plotted with a day-to-day haze that feels very different, except that some of the histrionics - and some of the dialogue - seem so outlandishly theatrical (even for period and genre). It makes sense that something this seemingly low key would be sandwiched between Bringing Up Baby and His Girl Friday, my favorite two of his films.

Spartan in running time, but in storytelling as well (Feeling Mamet's reach even here?); I still get the sense that writer-director Carruth - who also plays the more villainous of the main characters - is a terrific example of the resilence of singular vision. This is a time travel movie that is neither hokey nor implausible, shudders with sterility, and casts a haunting, downright unsettling glow. A crying shame: It's been ignored and relegated to IFC's twice a day xerox programming.

You'd be nutso to expect to even imagine walking out of a Bresson film smiling (but not unmoved - most of his canon is built to sink you into a deep doldrum). Still, I never find myself questioning his instincts: It's plenty worthwhile to watch the fetishistic mechanics of the mise-en-scene butt up against the literally mechanical (or,  wooden) acting.

More of a celebratory lap for Tarantino's ode to stuntmen and hipster bands of tough-skinned ladies; Not, as so many of you may be premonitioning, a re-evaluation: It's still last year's best. Hands. Down.

Mann's film is still a magnificent pleasure to watch. Particularly if you start it at 12:30 a.m.

Warmed over like a Disney film - which is so unsettling, I might vomit - with only a few small tinges of the revelatory genius Bird hinted at in The Iron Giant and then flat-out displayed in The Incredibles. I found myself really wanting to believe my first screening had been a fluke. Alas and alack, this is minor Pixar.