Any die hard movie musical fan knows that MGM produced most of the greatest musicals of all time in the 1950s. The Arthur Freed Unit became the touchstone of musicals with productions ranging from The Wizard of Oz in 1939 to Bells Are Ringing in 1960. While the 1940s was a productive decade for Freed, the 1950s gave us some of the most beloved, classic musicals of all time.

Now, Warner Brothers Home Entertainment has taken two of these MGM classics, plus one from the Warner Brothers library, and has given them a good scrubbing for Blu-ray and the results are astonishing. Best of all, you can purchase your favorite film as a stand-alone disk or get them all in the new Musicals: 4-Movie Collection. The three new titles are The Band Wagon, Calamity Jane, and Kiss Me Kate. Warners has added Singin’ in the Rain as a bonus to the 4-disk set.

The first movie in the collection is The Band Wagon (1953) starring Fred Astaire, Cyd Charisse, Nanette Fabray and Jack Buchanan. The story follows a nearly washed up Hollywood actor (Astaire) who decides to head to Broadway to see if he can untarnish his star in a big stage musical (shades of the Oscar-winning Birdman!). An egotistical director hijacks the frothy musical and turns it into a depressing version of Faust, ensuring a huge flop but the cast bands together to save the show.

The film is very entertaining, and it allows Astaire to take on a different character than we’re used to seeing from him. No top hat and tails this time around, but his dancing is still on point, especially in the scene where he dances with a shoe shine man (who was a real shoe shine man in New York). Cyd Charisse is stunning as always and is simply magnificent to watch in what was her first real starring role. The film also introduced Broadway star Nanette Fabray to movie audiences in what was, surprisingly, her only MGM musical. The movie also has a great score, but it’s most well-known for introducing “That’s Entertainment” as THE song about showbiz, supplanting the standard “There’s No Business Like Show Business.”

The film looks terrific on Blu-ray. The image is bright and colorful but still has a film-like quality to it with an appropriate amount of film grain. The 1080p image(presented in its original 1.37:1 aspect ratio) has not been completely scrubbed of any detail, and the soundtrack has been given a nice DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 remix that keeps the dialog and singing front and center, allowing the orchestra to swell, but never overwhelm, from the surrounds.

Bonus features include:

• Commentary by Liza Minnelli and Michael Feinstein
• Get Aboard! The Band Wagon (37:09) — A vintage “making of” looking at the production of the film with many behind-the-scenes anecdotes from the film’s stars, crew and family members.
• The Men Who Made the Movies: Vincente Minnelli (58:25) — An episode of the WNET series focusing on Minnelli.
• Jack Buchanan with the Glee Quartet (6:00) — Comedic musical short film starring Band Wagon c0-star Buchanan.
• The Three Little Pups (6:46) — MGM cartoon featuring Droopy Dog in a variation of The Three Little Pigs.
• Theatrical Trailer (3:14)

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There was a run of teen movies in the late 90s and early 2000s that were cheap, simple, and harmless. Films like Whatever It Takes, Mean Girls, and  She’s All That. Take these movies, sprinkle a little Easy A in and run them through a blender and you get The Duff, a cute but harmless entry into the teen makeover comedy category.

The Duff is about a smart, quirky girl named Bianca (played by Arrested Development‘s Mae Whitman), who is a bit of a tomboy, she loves cult movies and excels at her studies but is completely lacking in style, fashion, and popularity. While not the most popular girl in school, she does have two best friends who happen to be two of the hottest and most popular girls. Of course no teen comedy would be complete without the mean popular girl and The Duff is no exception: the beautiful and popular Madison (Bella Thorne), the queen bee of the school and all around bitch. Bianca is approached by her neighbor and childhood friend, sorta, kinda (the film briefly mentions they used to play together as small children but never expands on it), named Wesley (Robbie Amell), and he informs Bianca that she is a D.U.F.F or Designated Ugly Fat Friend. From there Bianca decides to change her station in life and Wesley agrees to help her in exchange for math tutoring.

A lot of old ground is retread in The Duff, from the neighbor/ love interest having a bedroom window facing the lead’s (Whatever it Takes), to the nerdy ugly girl getting turned into the hot popular girl (She’s All That), the bitchy high school queen character reeks of Mean Girls, and the parent who curses and is just like a best friend is straight out of Easy A. Yes The Duff is a hodgepodge of the standout parts of many more memorable teen comedies, and while it does a fine job with what it’s emulating, the end result is fine … just fine.

This is probably the biggest problem with the film; it never becomes anything more than just okay. Some gags will make you groan, a few are genuinely funny, but not much is particularly special or memorable about The Duff. The leads have surprisingly good chemistry but the screenwriters were so worried about getting as many clichés in that they could, that the story and character development suffers as a result. There are certain moments where the film shows another side of itself that could have really been something special. A couple of fantasy sequences, including one that parodies old porno tropes, were laugh out loud funny. Ken Jeong is also a highlight as one of Bianca’s teachers but he’s criminally underused. There are just so many directions this movie wants to pull you in that it short-changes all of its subplots as a result.

The film has a strong focus on cyber-bullying and social media’s effect on today’s high school experience. While this angle gives some of the more cliché elements a slightly fresher feel, you can’t help but roll your eyes at other points that are surprisingly unsavvy with technology in a movie that concerns itself with the internet so much. These moments are brief and few in number but they feel oddly out of touch with the twelve to twenty target audience. Moments like YouTube videos being pulled from the internet by teenage hacker girls in a matter of seconds, teenagers carrying multiple cellphones, and kids sharing videos around school while declaring out loud that they’re going to make them “go viral.” No one shares other people’s videos with their friends to make them viral, they just share it and it becomes viral organically. These story beats feel clunky and out-of-place.

The happiest surprise in this film is Robbie Amell. The young actor is surprisingly likable even when filling the traditional high school jock/ jerk role. He has a very Daniel Tosh-like quality both in look and in ability to say terrible things with a wink and a smile that keep him endearing. This almost undermines the films attempts to set his character up as the traditional dumb jerk with more under the surface. The movie starts off trying to convince us how mean he is and how he’s just another stupid jock but they quickly forget this thread entirely and just let him be a pretty stand-up and awesome guy for the majority of the film. Had they let him be a bit more unlikable at the start, there could have been a nice arc to his character development.

It’s also worth noting that from Arrested Development through The Duff, Mae Whitman has now spent eleven years playing a high schooler. Luckily she’s in good company. The Duff keeps the teen movie cliché of having almost no actual teenagers playing teenagers and instead we get a bunch of twenty-somethings playing the bulk of the high school parts.

As it is, The Duff is a funny, though uneven film. If only it had taken the time to decide what it wanted to be, there could have been a real classic here, instead we get another average entry into the teen comedy genre. While it’s worth the time and money to check out, it’s likely you’ll have a hard time remembering it soon after you leave the theatre.

The problem with true stories is that they are rarely simple. When you construct a fiction, you can add in story beats as you like, emphasize some themes and minimize others. If you don’t like a character, you don’t need to include them. But when you are writing about reality, it’s different. It’s impossible to be comprehensive, to discuss every real life facet of whatever event you’re talking about. So no matter what, some things get left out. And the “based on a true story” line is sometimes even more dangerous, because there’s always the temptation to throw in some “Hollywood friendly” story elements that aren’t really relevant, or drama that may overlook legitimate problems. This is sort of a long way of saying that it’s easy to screw it up. And … that’s sort of the case here.

Spare Parts is based on the real life story of four undocumented Mexican American students in Phoenix, Arizona. There are two primary characters here, the teacher and student, although there is just a bit, just a bit, of the other three students. Oscar (Carlos PenaVega) is a proud member of the ROTC in high school, but discovers that the military isn’t really interested in enlisting an undocumented immigrant, even one who’s basically grown up in the US. Not only that, but it may draw unwanted attention from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). We hear a few times about how deported family members hurt and impact these characters. Sometimes we even feel it instead of being literally “told” it.

But back to it; now that Oscar’s chance to help support his family the way he planned is gone, he stumbles across the idea of entering a contest. Apparently NASA is sponsoring a national robotics competition and is looking for the best water robot around (by high school or college students). So this first part of the movie is about the trials and tribulations of Oscar building his team of misfits and oddballs while also letting co-producer George Lopez do a quasi-dramatic, mildly comedic role as a teacher/mentor. George plays Fredi Cameron, a combination of the two real life teachers (scriptwriting for you) and Marissa Tomei plays a random female teacher that provides plot-required assistance. Her character was useless, because she was merely there to increase drama or attempt (and fail) romantic tension. Nothing against her, but the two have no chemistry and her character is written very flat.

Jamie Lee Curtis plays the “Lady Principal” who’s “Tough But With a Heart,” and she has some funny lines. But these are the background characters. There are three other boys on the team: brainy, weird Cristian (David del Rio), bad boy mechanical whiz Lorenzo (Jose Julian), and really big guy Luis (Oscar Gutierrez). Luis has no real story arc to speak of, and Cristian is basically just the nerdy bullied kid who gets slowly minimized as the movie continues. We do see some character beats between Lorenzo and his difficult father (Esai Morales), predictable but mildly moving. There’s some artificial drama, and some drama that feels real. The more interesting stuff (to me) is watching these kids struggle through low budgets and technical limitations to achieve great success.

But man, I didn’t think George Lopez had the “chops” for the character he was playing. He was okay, I guess, but I didn’t really buy it. Plus his romantic subplots were pointless and meh. Oscar is the primary point of view of the kids, driving the story forward because he has a legitimate desire to achieve something for his family. But unfortunately, although we get some “hitting over our heads” political talk about the problems of undocumented immigrant children, it’s really subsumed by the overly melodramatic story beats. I did some research after seeing the movie, and discovered that the real life kids had some significant problems due to current laws, but that’s only slightly touched on in a postscript note. That’s the difficulty here; you want that happy (true) ending, but you also want the “message” — undocumented kids deserve a chance too — to sink in. With all that, this movie is too forgettable for anything real, and will be quickly forgotten until it comes out on Netflix.

It’s not bad, but it’s not special.

When you have created something, you have an attachment to it. For art, that is just as true. Not only that, but there is a conflict inherent in the creation of art; money versus substance. Sometimes you are lucky enough to have something that touches a nerve or interests a crowd, and that’s a great thing. But it’s easy to fall into enjoying success without thinking about why you were successful in the first place? Some might say that success implies quality, but others may assert that money isn’t everything. Sometimes art doesn’t stand the test of time because it wasn’t that good to begin with, or because it just only meant something once, but never again. Even so, every artist has one thing in common: They want people to know they were the creator.

Big Eyes is the latest movie from director Tim Burton and tells the true story of Margaret Keane, the artist of a very popular series of paintings of children with unusually large eyes. However, her husband Walter Keane (Christoph Waltz) specifically took credit for the art and sold it under his name when the pieces came out in the late 1950s and 1960s. Up until his death, Walter insisted that he was the true artist, although the evidence against him was staggering. Margaret starts the story leaving her first husband and traveling with her daughter to San Francisco, seeking something she can’t yet define. Her work is noticed by Walter, who claims to be a fellow artist. After her work gets a lot of attention, Walter decides that nobody will buy a painting drawn by a lady. Heaven forbid!

So they sold work under his name, Walter schmoozing up the elite and monetizing the art, while Margaret slaved away in anonymity and craved acknowledgment of her own. Of course, art critics panned the drawings, but most people loved them and the Keanes became quite wealthy. Until Margaret could take no more of it, and no more of Walter’s increasingly unstable behavior. The movie tells this story, showing Walter to be a charismatic man with some serious, deep-seated issues, with Margaret trying to escape her mentality as a 1950s housewife.

Tim Burton’s interesting and unique visual aesthetics are nowhere to be found here, except for one particular scene that I won’t spoil. But in many ways, this could be directed by anybody of talent, because the movie doesn’t really have a recognizable style. Perhaps there’s something to that in the take on the big eyes children, but perhaps not. The story itself is dramatized, but interesting. I didn’t know exactly what would happen, so seeing the crazy twists and turns that actually happened were quite entertaining. There are moments of real drama here, watching Amy Adams do that “silent soulful” thing she does so well.

I particularly enjoyed her performance, although I also liked Christoph Waltz. I’ve heard some people complain about it, but I don’t get that myself. His character was odd, sociopathic at times, and the performance reflected that. I guess I just don’t get people sometimes. There are a few smaller parts filled by enjoyable, talented actors, like Krysten Ritter as Margaret’s best friend who’s being pushed away, and Jason Schwartzman and Terrence Stamp as art critics that despise the big eyes children pieces.

In the spate of two hour long prestige pictures at the end of the year, I was glad to see a movie under two hours that had a decent pace and kept me interested, for the most part. Perhaps we could’ve dipped more into the depth of certain parts of Margaret’s struggles and less on Walter’s marketing, but to me it works quite well. A few dramatic moments, some lightness, and a satisfying ending. Perhaps it’s not as interesting to look at as Burton’s other movies, but that’s really okay with me.

In 1965, the Voting Rights Act was passed, ensuring protection for minorities and preventing any racial discrimination when voting. But it wasn’t an easy journey. Although desegregation had been outlawed by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, this didn’t prevent corrupt government officials from creating essentially impossible hurdles for blacks to go through just to register to vote. The city of Selma in Alabama was 57% black, but only 1% were registered, making it of particular concern for civil rights activists. In order to attempt to change the law, many demonstrations were held, but this still hadn’t changed anything significantly.

Selma begins with a tragedy, showing immediately the horrors of racism in an instantly personal and understandable way. Although the tragedy really happened, it also serves as a way to demonstrate the importance of the civil rights efforts past anything political and to the personal and human. The movie tells the story of what happened as protestors attempted to march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama and the brutality they were subjected to during that attempt. We see what happens as Martin Luther King Jr. (David Oyelowo) works to coordinate the efforts, dealing with difficulties from all sides.

He must attempt to convince President Johnson (Tom Wilkinson) while simultaneously managing the explosive personalities in the movement, all the while trying not to be influenced by the actions of the FBI to ruin him and his marriage. We see the entire story of these marches, from the intentional failure of the first brutal march to the final triumphant one. I dare anyone not to feel choked up when you see the march of people from all walks of life gathered together as they walk across the bridge to face the Alabama state troopers. The movie is beautifully directed and scored. But it would all fall apart without the right performance of MLK.

David Oyelowo is brilliant here, using a touch of makeup to transform into the legendary leader. Apparently the studio was unable to license Dr. King’s speeches, which makes the actual dialogue they end up using more impressive by how accurate it all seems. The movie is smart enough to show MLK as both a fiery speaker and a real person with real problems when it’s just him and his wife, played by Carmen Ejogo, who also does an excellent job in a historically difficult role. Tom Wilkinson does a great job as the complicated LBJ, and Tim Roth plays the truly terrible George Wallace, governor of Alabama. Even Oprah Winfrey has a small but affecting part as Annie Lee Cooper, who’s real life story I won’t give away if you don’t already know.

Although MLK wasn’t the only one of note in those times, he is the one people will remember. That said, I think the movie does a fair job of showing a bit of the other people who helped the marches succeed, some more than others. When I see movies like Selma, they reaffirm the knowledge that although people can be terrible and violent, scared and reactionary, they can also be empathetic and brave, clever and persistent. I don’t know whether or not this movie will strike a chord with anyone, or if anyone will even notice with all the problems we still face today. But it is worth going to see how far we’ve come, and how far we’ve yet to go.

Captivating is the word that may immediately come to the minds of individuals who take a gander at Warner Brothers’ The Good Lie. As a matter of fact, awesome and fascinating may also be suitable words. Academy Award winner Reese Witherspoon is the sole headliner in a film concerning a few smart and determined survivors of the civil war in Sudan back in the 1980s. The film was screened at the Toronto Film Festival earlier this year before opening on October 3. The Good Lie was met with positive reviews from critics and that’s the same thing it’s going to get here.

Simply put, the film was intriguing. The cinematography was pretty solid in the prologue set in Sudan. It seems the production team set out to capture the harsh realities of war and that was certainly what was on display. There was something a little disturbing about seeing adult soldiers chasing little children with rifles and shooting them if caught. However, perhaps this is what the director wants the viewer to feel. It was certainly effective. I watched this movie with my aunt who, up until that scene, was half asleep on the couch. However, she was jolted awake and stayed awake for the duration of the film.

“Some folks just have to grow up so fast,” she said with sadness. And she’s right. It seems we both received a bit of a history lesson … in addition to some top notch video quality. The film is presented in 1080p high definition and comes with DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (English) and Dolby Digital (French and Spanish). Subtitles come in English, French and Spanish. It’s also worth mentioning that the Blu-ray does come with a DVD as well which is a nice touch. The special features are typical but not boring – a feature with Witherspoon and director Philippe Falardeau sharing the challenges and triumphs of creating the motion picture, and a few deleted scenes.

There are some things that I did enjoy about The Good Lie. For starters, I loved the teamwork amongst the children in the tribe back in Sudan and I particularly enjoyed how devoted they were to reading the Bible and using it as a source of perseverance. I also liked how things were portrayed after the 13-year time jump that took place towards the second act of the film. I’m a sucker for camaraderie and it was nice to know that these friends stuck together after humanitarian efforts brought them to the America.

However, what I really enjoyed was seeing Witherspoon bring warmth and humor to her role as an assistant of sorts to the people of Sudan. It was funny seeing her help them get acclimated to American culture (i.e. introducing them to phones, light switches and even Jell-O). All in all, she did a great job and reminded viewers why she nabbed that Academy Award a few years ago.

Warner Brothers has another hit on their hand with The Good Lie. If movie lovers are looking for quality then this is definitely the way to go. That’s not a fib, folks. It’s a good truth.

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Although it’s been nearly five months since Robin Williams died, the devastating ripples his death left on the entertainment industry – and really the world at large – are still being felt. Ever the busy entertainer, Williams had five films released posthumously, the latest being 20th Century Fox’s Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb. I think the only other film with Williams that has not yet been released is Absolutely Anything, which is due in February according to IMDb but he is credited for voice work only in that film. To my knowledge, Night at the Museum marks the final time one can view him on the silver screen, which makes it somewhat special despite what other film critics are saying about it.

I’ve been a longtime fan of the Night at the Museum franchise since the first installment came out in 2006 for several reasons. One, I really love that it makes history come alive in a fun, meaningful way that children especially can relate to (for if we don’t learn from the past, we’re doomed to repeat it). I know I’ve said this before, but anything we can do to get kids interested in – and actually revved up – about history from an early age should be done. When I was a kid, one of my favorite TV shows was a Canadian children’s program titled Today’s Special, which featured a department store at night. The main characters were Sam Crenshaw, a night security guard, Muffy the talking mouse, Jodie the store’s window dresser and a mannequin named Jeff who magically came to life each night as long as he was wearing his special magic hat. The premise of the Night at the Museum franchise has always reminded me a lot of that old TV show. Each night, the magic of Ahkmenrah’s tablet brings all the inanimate objects in New York’s American Museum of Natural History to life and only the night security guard Larry Daley gets to witness it all.

Secondly, these films feature great casting, from Ben Stiller as the affable Larry Daley and Williams as a stoic President Teddy Roosevelt to Ricky Gervais as Dr. McPhee (the museum’s stuffy, not-a-clue director), Patrick Gallagher as a hilariously over-the-top Attila the Hun, the hunky Rami Malek as Ahkmenrah and Owen Wilson and Steve Coogan as the miniature best buds duo Jedidiah and Octavius. Finally, the special effects are amazing each time. In my opinion, the third film is no exception. This time I was blown away by the constellations in particular. Being able to see Orion the Hunter and the various other star clusters that make up the zodiac dance over the heads of the museum benefit-goers was nothing short of bedazzling.

Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb welcomes back all your familiar favorites, including Dick Van Dyke, the late Mickey Rooney and Bill Cobbs as former museum security guards Cecil, Gus and Reginald, who give helpful advice to Stiller. Even Dexter (Crystal the Monkey) is back for the final curtain bow. The only characters noticeably missing are Amy Adams as the plucky pilot Amelia Earhart, Bill Hader as George Armstrong Custer and Christopher Guest as Ivan the Terrible. It also introduces a few new characters that I instantly loved – Rebel Wilson as Tilly, the London museum’s night security guard, Dan Stevens as Sir Lancelot and Ben Kingsley as Ahkmenrah’s pharaoh father Merenkahre. Skyler Gisondo has stepped in as Stiller’s now grown-up son Nick. Also look for Stiller portraying an additional character – one of the cavemen named Laaa. At times, this character can grate on your nerves, but I think your kids might love him.

The plot is a relatively simple one. We learn that the power of Ahkmenrah’s tablet is fading and Stiller and crew must travel to the museum in London where Ahkmenrah’s parents’ mummies are located to discover the secrets of the tablet from the only person who knows them all (his father), including why it was created, how it works and what can be done to prevent its power from fading away completely.

There’s a finality about the third film that makes me believe it was planned to end the trilogy long before Williams’ unexpected death. The goodbye that Stiller’s character delivers to Williams’ Roosevelt in the end felt painfully real to me. It brought tears to my eyes, along with the dedication. It was fitting that the series began with Williams and ended with him. Williams was Stiller’s right-hand man, always there to dole out kind, intelligent words of advice when things looked despairing or particularly out of hand. I honestly can’t visualize anyone else filling the role of Roosevelt, so I hope the powers-that-be leave this franchise alone. It felt like it came full circle with the trilogy and I don’t need to see another Night at the Museum. I’m afraid they might wear out the magic and wonderment of it all if they did so.

There’s a dedication at the end to Rooney and Williams that brought fresh tears to my eyes as the credits rolled, mostly because of Williams. Don’t get me wrong, Rooney is equally missed, but he lived a long, rich life. His death wasn’t quite as shocking as that of Williams. He also only appeared in the film in one brief scene. No, it was the touching tribute to Williams that made me shed more tears. I believe it said something like, “And for Robin Williams … the magic never ends.” It’s Stiller and Williams – their chemistry and their heartfelt performances – that make this franchise shine. While I don’t feel this film is the strongest of the three, I enjoyed it for what it was – the ending to an imaginative trilogy that made being a dork who revels at the prospect of visiting a museum seem so much cooler. Although Williams may have departed this Earth, his memory will live on in the lives of all those he touched with his prolific acting career, and especially, in all those children who grew up watching this magical series.

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Historical biopics are tricky, as I’ve mentioned several times before. I don’t much care for ones that screw it up, and I care even less for ones wholly meant for getting some awards. And perhaps, just perhaps, I’m a bit sick of Benedict Cumberbatch everywhere. The man is a good actor, but I did not like his performance in Star Trek Into Darkness or August Osage County, plus he was unrecognizable CGI in The Hobbit movies. Now he’ll be starring in a new Marvel movie as comic book magician Dr. Strange? He’s getting on my nerves a bit. But on the other hand, that doesn’t mean I should necessarily judge the movie he’s in based on his Jude Law penchant for being in movies.  No, no, it’s just better to judge the movie instead.

The Imitation Game tells some of the story of famed World War II technological innovator Alan Turing’s life, based on the book Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges. Alan Turing, played by the omnipresent Benedict Cumberbatch, is essentially responsible for pioneering advances that led to the first digital computer. The movie utilizes a limp wristed and ill-advised wraparound device, starting in 1952 with Turing’s home mysteriously robbed but seemingly with nothing of value lost. By virtue of a sort of flashback induced by a police inspector interrogating Turing, the rest of the movie is shown. Now, if you ask me, this device did not work. It made no sense, and served no real purpose, because it tried to create a mystery of “why did he get robbed,” but the question is not answered. Instead, we get barely anything on what really happened; but I’ll get back to that in a minute.

During World War II, England is in bad shape. We see several scenes of bombings and crowds huddled in shelters, which does add an interesting level of pathos to the movie. Does it make sense with that narrative device I mentioned? No! Not in the slightest. But I’m harping on that. So the movie jumps back and forth between little scenes of the future investigator trying to discover the truth, a few bits of Alan’s past in boarding school, and the actual content and story of the movie. Alan Turing joins an elite group of men working to break Nazi codes, specifically the Enigma code machine. The military commander Denniston (a superb Charles Dance) does not care for Turing’s awkwardness or odd way of doing things, but his hands get tied when Turing goes over his head. So Alan works, or tries to work, with his group of fellow codebreakers. But he doesn’t get along well with people.

Eventually, he is permitted to hire someone new who might be smart enough to assist, and he hires Joan Clarke (Keira Knightley), although in real life several women worked on the Enigma breaking project. In any event, Turing and Joan have a connection of sorts, their intellects, although Turing stumbles and stutters his way through most human interactions. It all leads up to whether or not they actually break the Enigma and help win WWII. SPOILERS! They do. There are others on his team, but they aren’t that interesting. But unfortunately, despite Alan helping to save the world, he is arrested in 1951 on charges of “indecency,” which means he admitted to having a homosexual relationship. The movie barely touches on this terrible tragedy, and basically only hints on how Turing committed suicide after having been chemically castrated. In fact, only in 2013 did the British government finally grant an official pardon. That’s ridiculous.

Now, it is true that there are some excellent performances in this movie. Charles Dance, as I mentioned is great and amusing as the intimidating military officer. And sure, Keira Knightley is lovely here too, even if her part is underwritten, like everything is in the movie. The various other whos and whats in the movie are forgettable and not really important for anything the movie cares about. Cumberbatch does a pretty good job as a man with a high intellect but other problems, although he plays it like a man on the autistic spectrum, which is … debatable about the real Turing. The movie is mostly paced pretty well, but there are very slow parts. There are some really great scenes, building up the tension and despair as they fail and fail again to crack the codes. Although the actual way they figure it out seems … well I won’t give that part away.

In this time of the year, with all the fancy schmancy prestige flicks coming out, The Imitation Game is nothing close to the best of the bunch. Alan Turing may be an important historical figure who deserves to be remembered, but I don’t think this is the movie that will accomplish that.

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Big, expensive, all-star Biblical epics were all the rage back in the late 50s and early 60s, most likely due to the fact that Cinemascope was the new thing in movies to bring couch potatoes, who had become fixated on their newfangled television sets, back to the theaters. The first widescreen epic was, in fact, a Biblical movie, The Robe (1953), and the fad had reached a climax with Cecil B. DeMille’s The Ten Commandments (1956).

Since then, television has done more with Bible stories – most notably the History Channel mini-series The Bible and it’s upcoming sequel, A.D., on NBC – but now director Ridley Scott feels it’s time to tackle the story of Moses once again in his new film Exodus: Gods and Kings starring Christian Bale as Moses and Joel Edgerton as Rhamses.

In Scott’s film, we forego the whole baby floating down the river to be found in the bullrushes, instead meeting Moses and Rhamses as grown men, only knowing each other as brothers. A prophecy foretells that one of them will face death in battle but the other one will save him and take Pharaoh Seti’s throne. This doesn’t sit too well with Rhamses, but Moses assures him he has no desire to become the ruler of Egypt. Just the same, Rhamses tells him not to save his life as they head into battle. Moses does, which freaks Rhamses out just a bit, and then Moses finds out something about himself … he’s actually Hebrew.

Spies overhear this news, take it to Rhamses and thus sets the stage for Moses to want to free his people from slavery. Rhamses refuses and, well, if you’ve seen The Ten Commandments then you know the rest. Seven plagues, Passover, the Red Sea … all the greatest hits are on display with the best digital effects money can buy. Scott changes things up from the way we’ve always known them to be (at least from the movies) by not having Moses use his staff to turn the river to blood or part the Red Sea! It just kind of recedes until the Egyptian army shows up.

But even with touching on all of these things that scream “SPECTACLE!” the film feels like it’s missing quite a bit, especially since there is never any real denotation of time passing except for once or twice at the beginning of the story. When Moses finally goes up to Mount Sinai to receive the commandments (which he chisels himself as a vision of God watches), he’s middle aged. By the time he comes down a few minutes later, he’s old and gray and we have no idea how much time has passed (unless you really know your Bible) … and then it feels like there’s more story to tell but Scott refuses to give it to us. The whole worshiping of the golden calf barely registers.

Exodus: Gods and Kings is a very well-made movie, to be sure, and it looks epic with some truly astounding effects sequences (the mountainous road scene is particularly harrowing). The 3D process also looks sharp and clear, and while it gives depth to the scenery, there’s not really much use for it (except for those pesky seagulls which make you go a little cross-eyed when they pop off the screen). The casting of the film has been controversial with Caucasian actors playing Egyptians (and black actors playing slaves), but I didn’t have a problem with that. It just made it feel more like an old-fashioned Biblical film where all the Middle Eastern characters spoke with British accents.

Christian Bale is fine as Moses, working to the best of his ability with what he’s given, bringing some realism to the scenes where he’s conversing with God, whom only he can see, and taking on the role of action hero once again. Edgerton has a little more to sink his teeth into as he goes from loving brother to sworn enemy of Moses, stopping at nothing to destroy him. It was strange seeing John Turturro as Seti, taking several minutes to even recognize him with his bald head and guyliner, and if you blink you’ll pretty much miss Sigourney Weaver who is in the movie for maybe five minutes and has two lines.

Exodus: Gods and Kings is a movie with good intentions, and it’s not a bad movie by any means. Its cardinal sin is just being adequate. The Ten Commandments was interesting, at the time, because of the huge cast of stars that populated the film and the, for the time, state of the art special effects. Over time, it’s become a bit campy mainly because of the casting (Edward G. Robinson’s thick New York accent is hilariously out of place), but even at almost 4 hours it still manages to be entertaining even all these years later. Exodus: Gods and Kings takes itself much too seriously, and while it’s good, I don’t think it will stand the test of time with its Biblical predecessors.

There’s been an interesting trend lately with art describing itself. Sometimes a movie, TV show, or book is obvious about it; this is when you have a character that is clearly either an author insert or mouthpiece. Or perhaps it’s the opposite, a straw man character meant to suffer the attacks of unsubtle jabs to provide a suitable target for the artist’s rage or frustration. I don’t always think it’s necessarily a bad thing; it’s problematic when it becomes pretentious or dreary. The worst offense is to be obvious, but that isn’t so common. So when you have a movie about a young girl torn between wanting to be herself and being influenced into becoming a media sensation to push a message, it’s not the craziest idea to think that maybe there’s something there. Except of course, that the original material wasn’t about that — or was it?

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1 is the third in a series of four Hunger Games movies, with the final Part 2 out next year. The final book, as we saw with Harry Potter and Twilight, is being split into two movies. I haven’t read Mockingjay, but Twilight didn’t have the material for one movie, let alone two, and I think Harry Potter would’ve worked better as few short British-style seasons of television instead of movies. The material for this movie is mostly paced well, with only a few obviously padded scenes. The story is simple, continuing on from the fallout of the last Hunger Games movie. Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence, of course) destroyed the gaming arena in the last movie, escaping from the clutches of the evil Capitol with fellow tributes Finnick (Sam Claflin) and Beetee (Jeffrey Wright), but also, incidentally, an accidental friend and ally in Elizabeth Banks’ bizarre Effie Trinket. And also the home of Katniss, District 12 has been brutally bombed, but her old friend/boyfriend/ex-boyfriend Gale (Liam Hemsworth) managed to survive with her mother and sister Primrose. Yes, the names aren’t much better this time either.

But they have still left the cowardly but lovable scamp Peeta (Josh Hutcherson) and angry tribute Johanna (Jena Malone) behind to be held by the minions of the sinister President Snow (Donald Sutherland). So Katniss and company have been relocated to the secret hideout of the survivors of District 13, led by an austere President Alma Coin (Julianne Moore), although former propagandist Plutarch Heavensbee (Philip Seymour Hoffman in one of his final roles) and drunken Haymitch (Woody Harrelson) are also helping out. That may seem like a lot, and it is, but the good thing about this series is that the characters have always been quite memorable, and the movie is no exception. Katniss finds herself in a difficult situation, seeing Peeta as a mouthpiece for the Capitol but not really wanting the attention herself. She’s also worried about her sister and people dying, etc.

This is one of the great things about Jennifer Lawrence’s performance, because she acts as a girl who cannot act at all, yet when it is needed, she experiences strong and sincere emotions. She’s the draw here, at least for me. That’s not to say that the acting from the others aren’t good, nor is it that the characters don’t seem fleshed out. With the lone exception of Gale, who is boring and seems simply to be “handsome guy,” all main characters are interesting to watch.

Obviously Philip Seymour Hoffman is awesome, wringing laughs from little subtle touches and elevating lines a lesser performer couldn’t touch. Julianne Moore is obviously great, all hard lines and serious business, contrasted against the unstoppable force of personality that Elizabeth Banks pushes nearly off the screen. Donald Sutherland is effortlessly sinister here, but you knew that much. We also get a new character, Cressida, played by Natalie Dormer making a flat character instantly intriguing because she’s awesome. Even adorable little Josh Hutcherson won me over with his portrayals of pain and confusion.

Now, the story here is paper thin, having many scenes of dialogue that are mostly interesting with a few tense action scenes. The themes are still fascinating, the contrasting ideals of freedom and security, the line between fascism and safety, and the omnipresent political narrative through the lens of art and media. All that is interesting, without adding in parallels to the real Jennifer Lawrence’s struggles to stay likable despite how hard that is for anyone, especially women in Hollywood. The action is mostly shot carefully, but sometimes it goes cinematically and that is far more interesting. This is a sci-fi world after all, and sometimes it’s nice to see the scope of things beyond small rooms that could exist in a simple soundstage.

My overall feelings were positive, and I thought that the stopping part, the setup for the final part next year, worked well enough. Better than the cliffhanger from the second movie in any event, and that was just one book’s story. Perhaps there isn’t quite enough material for the 123 minute running time, but it’s almost enough. At this point, I’m more interested and curious about the next movie than desperately wondering for it, like say, I was with the Harry Potter books or even a few TV shows out there. That’s enough for me to recommend this movie, but I will really be curious how well it’ll work paired with the final movie. As for that, we shall have to wait and see.

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