..but other than that, Paul Proulx's 7-minute montage of the films of the 2000s is remarkably well done.

Holy cow that Dark Knight scene is amazing.

Thanks for the heads-up, MetaFilter.

Paul Constant says:

District 13—a French sci-fi film about a multicultural Parisian ghetto and the daring young men who will fight to save it—was a shockingly good potboiler. It's remembered as the film that popularized parkour (and seriously: Leave it to the French to turn running away into a martial art), and it was a huge international box-office success. And because producer/writer Luc Besson never conceived of a sequel he didn't like (see also: Transporter 3), the original District 13 gets a second installment.

Read the whole thing HERE.

Meet Matthew Cooke, a Stranger reader who has vowed to do everything The Stranger suggests for the entire month of February. Look for his reports daily on Slog. —Eds.

I admit I’m starting to feel a little unsteady here on day five of the “Yesterday” gauntlet, which scares me, given how many more days there are yet.

Luckily, last night’s movie was at the Grand Illusion—one of my favorites, and I hadn’t been in forever. Susan and I went out to dinner beforehand, since the Grand is on Seattle’s most delicious corner for ethnic food. Dosas at Chili’s, two other Indian joints, Filipino, Greek, Hawaiian, delicious schwarmas, sushi… you name it.

But how was the flick? There were problems, starting with the chunks of missing back story from the Kesey book, which I could tell were missing even though I haven’t actually read it; character motivations were hard to pin down sometimes.

There were good things too. Newman and Henry Fonda, two of the most likable actors in the history of cinema, play a couple of miserable sons of bitches. The character/casting dichotomy made it hard to know where one’s loyalties should lie, and I appreciate films that respect my intelligence enough to handle ambiguity.

The obstinacy of the Stamper family in the movie reminded me of the clearcut wars in the early ‘90s. I remember the stubbornness of those loggers. It went beyond jobs. It was about a way of life. Tradition had so much more psychic value for them than the idea of change, a worldview that baffles me to this day.

So it made me think. Hence, I’ll give this recommendation a pass, and you should consider seeing it… but not on a Friday. Hey Stranger writers: Why are you making me use my brain? Friday night should be for goofy fun stuff, not making me think about goddamn clearcuts!

Kiley’s definitely right about one thing (even though it was a major spoiler): The severed arm on the mainmast totally rules.

"More like Awesome Face!" says Brendan Kiley (not really):

Nordwand, the original German title of this wrenching mountaineering movie, fits the film better than North Face—it sounds more ominous, like gray rock and gray skies, storms and disaster. North Face sounds like an urban wuss wearing a fleece jacket. And there is zero fleece (or wussery) in North Face. It's all wool and canvas and other 1936 climbing technology, plus lots of bad luck, bad decisions, hubris, bleeding, screaming, and desperation.

Read the whole review HERE.

Hello. I'm taking over for Kyle Regan. And who am I? Just a man, married, living in the north end, gainfully employed (for now), and somewhat wistful of younger Cap Hill days when I would go out every night. So doing everything The Stranger tells me to do for a month could be called a pathetic attempt to relive the past. Call it a midlife crisis, I don’t care. Also, the wife is leaving town for three weeks to see family on the East Coast, and I get bored and lonely when she’s not around. So here we are.

The first thing I must say is that I am not, and could never be, Kyle Regan. I share the doubts expressed in comments by other Sloggers yesterday about the wisdom of repeating this experiment, the unlikelihood of lightning striking twice, etc. Really, my efforts are most likely doomed to disappoint. But Savage wants somebody to hold the feet of Stranger writers to the fire and I need something to do. So you’re stuck with me, at least until I regain my sanity and bail after a week or so.

• Shhhhhh....

The last 20 minutes almost redeemed the film. Almost. I won’t describe this portion of the movie since it’s the only portion worth seeing, but suffice it to say that the drudgery which precedes it is given additional meaning, via some pointy-headed but not-entirely-annoying philosophizing.

Go ahead and see it; just be sure to be fully alert when you walk in.

Remember how this is the year the Academy ups the number of Best Picture nominees from five to ten?

Boy does it look weird.

Find a full list of this year's Oscar nominees (Mo'Nique! Gabourey Sibide! Colin Firth! Up! Streep!) here.

What is the meaning of all of this?

The meaning is a broken marriage. This is the story of a marriage that began in love and quickly ended in hate.

Bigelow was named best director at the Directors Guild of America for The Hurt Locker - the first time a woman had been given the honour in the ceremony's 62-year history.

She will now battle it out with ex-husband Cameron in a David vs Goliath type race to the Academy Awards in March.

Kyle Regan—a masochistic Stranger reader—has vowed to do every single thing recommended by the Stranger Suggests (movies, galleries, bars, concerts) for the month of January. Look for his reports daily on Slog. This will be his final dispatch as Our Man in Suggestsland. —Eds.

What the hell, The Stranger. Tooth Fairy? I was picturing what kind of thing might be up your sleeve for my last day. Today the Stranger Suggests: hitchhike to Idaho/attend an S&M expo/convert to Catholicism/whatever. I would have vastly preferred any of those to the fucking Tooth Fairy. Do you how hard of a sell that is for friends? “Hey dude, wanna go see a movie... yea, it's, uh, an indie flick about a fall from grace... deep shit.”

After returning to Metro Cinemas (where I first began this month of things-vastly-better-than-Tooth-Fairy) I settled into the completely empty theater. Fine, I thought, at least I don't have to worry about being judged for my movie choices. That is until a fucking elementary-school aged girl came into the theater alone. So now it's me and this 4th grader watching Tooth Fairy. I'm sitting in the back row, in a gray jacket, slowly sipping water during a children's movie with a single child as my company. Dial C for creepster. As icing on the cake, I drop my phone and bang my head trying to catch it. The phone noisily shatters. Now the kid thinks I'm an idiot.

Quick and skinny: Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson commits fantasy murder by trying to tell a little girl that there is no tooth fairy, so the magical courts make him do two weeks of tooth fairy duty. If you like tooth wordplay, then boy is this the movie for you. They don't even have to make sense. (“I pledge allegiance to the tooth”) And shouldn't Johnson be acting? Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson played Derek “Tooth Fairy” Thompson. Wow, dunno if I'll be able to suspend my belief for that one...

Tooth Fairy is a kid's movie, but I'm not a kid. I spent the whole movie looking for plot holes. Wouldn't parents freak out if someone already took little Lisa's tooth? How do tooth fairies get government-printed currency in the first place (shady as hell)? Or why doesn't making The Rock forget everything at the end turn him back into a dream-hating egomaniac? And there's the weird ableism discrimination against Stephen Merchant's character because he doesn't have wings. Their solution is to give him a badge that basically says: “There. Now we'll pretend you're equal to us normal fairies.”

In the end, I'm a nerd on the internet bitching about a children's movie. Big man for being snarky towards a plot for seven-year-olds. Doesn't get much more pointless than that. Besides, there were guiltily enjoyable moments. Johnson and Merchant are such opposites that their bromance was genuinely likable. Merchant's goofy passive-aggressive attitude was a saving grace. Smiles crept up.

Which, of course, turned me into a grinning man in the back row, wearing a gray jacket, slowly sipping water during a children's movie, with a single child as my company.

Ugh.

Here is the trailer for Oliver Stone's sequel to Wall Street, titled Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps.

I am not a fan of the LaBoeuf, and the prospects for this film are not so good*, but this is a really good trailer. It gives the flavor and the hook of the movie without spoiling anything.

* Also: Have you seen Wall Street lately? Talk about a movie that is a product of its time. I feel as though people who criticize modern-day comedies that are set in the 80s for laying on the 80s too thick have never seen Wall Street. Criticswho reviewed the film in the 80s should have criticized Wall Street for laying on the 80s too thick.

Are foreign children cuter than domestic children by default? Because seriously—if someone told me that I could get knocked up right now and a little Dutch boy holding a baby frog and a magnifying glass would come out and run around pretending to be an airplane and then fall in a mud puddle all Dutch-style, then, um, direct me to the nearest, well, penis, I guess. (That's how it works, right?) Anyway, this is a movie about a little Dutch dude whose asshole brother tells him that frog spawn is the only cure for a tonsillectomy. So he is all, "PEACE, BITCHEZ," and runs for the countryside and makes a new best friend and eventually arrives (frog spawn in hand) at the house of his grandma—a hilarious old gal who cooks pancakes and nurses meadow animals back to health. WHY DIDN'T I HAVE ONE OF THOSE?! God, Europe makes me angry.

Read the whole thing HERE.

Zombie Girl is a movie about the making of a movie—specifically, about a 12-year-old girl making a feature-length zombie movie. It plays tonight at Central Cinema at 7 pm, and it looks pretty goddamn adorable.

Here's the trailer:

I will never miss an opportunity to direct someone toward Woody Allen's Love and Death:

This has got to stop:

The Children's Film Festival opens today! The Children's Film Festival is ten days long, and it is fun, whether you are a child or a manchild or just a child enthusiast. I wrote about it last year here (not really relevant anymore, but read it if you want to hear about a weird lump I had on my neck!).

The complete schedule is HERE.

Opening night (that's tonight!) is Lelavision:

Science will take center stage in "The Accumulation of Change," a world premiere performance by Lelavision Physical Music. Blending choreography, original video, DaVinci-esque musical sculptures and lots of audience participation, Lelavision founders Leah Mann and Ela Lambin will explore the origins of life, aided by the observations of Dr. David Lynn, chair of the biochemistry department at Emory University.

Tomorrow is the pancake breakfast, but it's sold out. Because it is awesome.

I apologize for using the phrase "child enthusiast" earlier. If you are the wrong kind of child enthusiast—you know who you are—please do not attend the Children's Film Festival.

And you can belatedly celebrate the occasion this Monday at Central Cinema, when Bad Movie Art screens Linda's 1979 stinker Roller Boogie, in which she plays a bechopsticked flautist who finds her soul via roller disco. Here's the preview!

It's gonna be terrible! See you there!