Movie Review: "Silent Light (German/Plautdietsch)" (B+) January 7, 2009

I feel bad for the poor souls who saw "Silent Light" without knowing anything about it first and came away hating it. They were probably expecting a movie that was, well, normal. You know, with a plot and stuff. A movie where things happen.

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Eric's Blog January 6, 2009

Go ruin someone else's pizza!

I snapped a photo of this sign posted on the door at The Huddle, a sports bar near my apartment:

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Eric's Blog January 5, 2009

Monday things that aren't 'Snide Remarks'

Apparently I didn't write a "Snide Remarks" column this week. Huh! Weird.

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Eric's Blog January 5, 2009

Winter TV premiere dates

Here is a list of season premiere dates for your winter TV shows, followed by a list of when the shows that premiered in the fall will return from their winter hiatuses with new episodes. All information is swiped from E! Online's handy schedule; omissions or errors should be addressed to the good people at E! Online, not me. An asterisk indicates a new series.

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Eric's Blog January 2, 2009

Friday movie roundup - Jan. 2

And a happy new year to you too! Allow me to direct your attention to my end-of-the-year features, The Best & Worst Movies of 2008 and Eric's Media Inventory: What I Watched and Read in 2008, to help you remember that long ago era of last year.

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Movie Review: "Marley & Me" (C) January 1, 2009

Marley, me & lotsa dull marital drama

"Marley & Me" would probably be a fine man-and-his-dog film if it actually were a man-and-his-dog film. But it isn't. It's an anemic comic-drama about a dull couple searching for happiness, and they happen to have a dog. Sometimes the dog takes over the movie, and the movie perks up for a while. Then the dog becomes a background character, and the movie flatlines. The lesson we learn: Either be a dog movie, or be something else, but don't try to be both.

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Miscellaneous December 31, 2008

The Best and Worst Movies of 2008

As 2008 gets taken off the Current Events shelf and moved to History, let us contemplate the seismic changes the year has brought us. The United States elected its first black president. The economy took its worst turn in decades. A stripper won a screenwriting Oscar. And a movie about a rubber-clad sadomasochist earned $531 million.

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Miscellaneous December 31, 2008

Eric's Media Inventory: What I Watched and Read in 2008

For the fifth consecutive year, I kept careful track of everything I watched and read. As always, this inventory may not be of interest to anyone other than me, and you are excused if you don't want to read it. For the rest of you, it will be like being granted access to my diary! A really boring diary that only lists names of movies, TV shows, and books!

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Movie Review: "Defiance" (C) December 31, 2008

Nazis, war, sad. Got it. Next!

Every year, Hollywood produces about a dozen movies about Nazis, and every year there's one that stands out as being the one that you can just disregard altogether. This year those honors go to "Defiance," an unengaging, emotionally distant drama from socially conscious director Edward Zwick.

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Movie Review: "Doubt" (B+) December 30, 2008

As in, beyond a shadow of a

You should take the title "Doubt" seriously. Uncertainty hovers over nearly every part of this riveting, mature film, including the central question of whether a priest did or did not behave inappropriately with a young boy. Doubt is the point, you see: So much of what all people, but particularly people with religious convictions, do is based on what they're sure is correct. But how certain can we ever really be?

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