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I wasn't sure what to expect from The Constant Gardener; I knew that Rachel Weisz won the Oscar for best supporting actress for her role, but that was about it. Both my husband and I ended up thinking that it was pretty good, but neither of us loved it. I thought the camera work was interesting--a nice parallel between the Quayle's webcam and the actual cinematography of the film--but the home-footage nature of much of it (albeit an imitation of home-shot movies that far surpasses all of them in quality) made it difficult to love. The shift in colors between the scenes in Africa and the scenes in Europe was also notable, particularly because of the marked lack of green in most of the shots of Africa. Quite fitting with the metaphor of Justin Quayle as the gardener, trying to create a perfect, orderly world, and finding it impossible in Africa. Although the movie was billed as a love story, that wasn't what it was really about--it was about something much larger than the two main characters, something that forces the viewer to look at those that society thinks of as disposable and holds us accountable.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5

There were things about The Piano Teacher that I thought were really well done. Isabelle Huppert's performance as Erika, an emotionally distant piano teacher, is amazing. I think she smiles once during the whole movie, and you keep waiting for her to do it again. She does a fantastic job at showing how the tension is building inside her, with the bare minimum of facial expression. I also really appreciated how director Michael Haneke added to the building tension in the movie with his long, slow shots of Erika walking, a door closing, or Erika or Walter (her pupil/love interest played by Benoît Magimel) simply looking at something. It's slowly paced, but always building as a steady crescendo. I also loved the way Erika talks about music, as if it's something personal and significant to everyday life--for her, it absolutely is. But the darker aspects of the movie, particularly the drawn-out (although not visually graphic) sex scenes, were a bit too disturbing for my taste. I realize that they were key in developing Erika's character, but I got the same idea from the understated, yet also horrible scene with her pupil Anna. The shift in focus in the movie from music performance in the first half to sex in the second does draw an interesting parallel between the two, though.

Rating: 3 stars out of 5

Glory Road was almost exactly what I thought it would be. Forget that. It was exactly what I thought it would be. Some of the Southern accents were a bit corny, but the story of Don Haskin (played by Josh Lucas) as a no-name basketball coach in the 60s who takes a bunch of black basketball players to the NCAA championships is a fun, easy-to-digest, heartwarming rags-to-riches story. But therein lies my criticism of the movie as well. It goes down too easy. The viewer sees these black basketball players and wants them to win, because that's what the movie tells us to do. And so when people in the movie act racist, we are outraged, because they're hurting "our" team. But it also makes us think that we aren't like that anymore. The movie ends happily, all the players on the team go on to glorious futures, and everything is ok. (I'm sorry if I spoiled the ending, but c'mon--it's a movie produced by Disney. Surely you could see it coming?) And in writing the ending this way, the movie makes racism in America something of the past, which it so clearly is not. Not every movie has to be Crash, but whitewashing things isn't the way to go either.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5

I didn't read any reviews of The Interpreter before renting it, so I went in completely unbiased. And I really liked it. I was constantly kept guessing by Nicole Kidman's character, who is an interpreter at the U.N. who overhears something she shouldn't. Because it's Nicole Kidman, I trusted her, but Sean Penn's character, who is a secret service agent assigned to protect foreign dignitaries, did not--he kept trying to figure out what she was lying about. For me, this was enough of a hook to keep me interested in the rest of the plot. And Sydney Pollack does a good job of making the viewer flip-flop in what she thinks several times throughout the film. And details keep falling into place at a nice pace throughout the film, which kept me engaged. As far as the cinematography, several scenes were very well-done, the double chase/tailing scene in particular. Also, it was exciting to see the actual inside of the U.N. being used for many key scenes in the movie. I thought the ending scene was weak, although it was a lot less lame than it could have been if Pollack had gone for the stereotypical ending. When I looked up reviews of the film after I watched it, I was really surprised to see that people were so harsh on it--I thought it was very good.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5