You've tracked the rotating light-cycle billboards on Santa Monica & Westwood all year. You've listened to the Daft Punk-composed soundtrack all month. You've visited the pop-up shop at Royal/T. You may have even stole a peek at San Fernando Valley spoof Pron. Finally, Tron: Legacy bursts off the screen this weekend! The blockbuster sequel to the cult sci-fi hit screens in 3D, but to really get in the game, try and catch an IMAX 3D screening or the props exhibit at El Capitan. more ›

Many weeks, there can be slim pickings on the DVD aisle. And then there are weeks like this where three, er, fantastic movies top the list. Fantastic Mr. Fox may not rise to the absurd and lunatic levels of Rushmore or The Royal Tennenbaums, but it's a wonderful re-telling of Roald Dahl's seminal children's book. It's that rare thing -- something both children and adults can enjoy (albeit for different reasons). Plenty of critics piled on The Men Who Stare at Goats, but I thought it's daffiness totally worked. The interpretative dance sequence on the Army base was one of the funniest scenes in any movie this year, and I'll say it -- Jeff Bridges did his best work in this movie, not Crazy Heart. While it was mostly overlooked during awards season, Brothers was a solid and depressing piece of drama. Tobey Maguire has never been better, and Natalie Portman solidified her reputation as the best young actress working in studio pictures. Especially in this. Supervan! more ›

While Disney's A Christmas Carol won the weekend with an underwhelming $31M, the real story at the box-office was Precious. The darling of this year's Sundance Film Festival earned an astonishing $100,000 per theater, breaking the record for the largest opening EVER for a specialty film (A Christmas Carol, by contrast, earned a little over $8400 per venue). Michael Jackson's This Is It had a solid second weekend ($14M | $57.8M), just topping the fantastic The Men Who Stare at Goats ($13.3M) and the weird and phony The Fourth Kind ($12.5M). Not surprisingly, Paranormal Activity continued to print money ($8.6M | $97.4M). more ›

If you like movies filled with whimsical, daffy humor (think Wes or Spike or Charlie) then you will probably dig The Men Who Stare at Goats as much as I did. It concerns our military's experimentation with paranormal phenomena as epitomized by the Jedi Warriors of the First Earth Battalion stationed at Fort Bragg, NC (yep!). Best of all, most of it is true. I like that Bob Zemekis is always pushing the boundaries of the technical aspect of filmmaking, but I'm motioned-captured out at this point! I'll see Christmas Carol but with gritted teeth. more ›

How is it that every Pixar film is an absolute gem, yet every other animated movie from every other large American studio is just okay? Oh right -- John Lasseter. I watched The Wizard of Oz plenty of times when I was a kid, and I admire it as an important film in the American film canon...but...would I ever watch it again? Probably not. Man, Jennifer Aniston just can't seem to pick good movies in which to star, huh? Management was a dud despite the presence of the great Steve Zahn (see him in Rescue Dawn and Safe Men). Away We Go has more of an Eggers feel to it than a Mendes stamp, huh? Does anyone not like John Krasinski? more ›

Other than The Cove, I didn't see a better film this year at the Sundance Film Festival than Humpday (review here). It's inventive; it's challenging; it's odd but, most of all, it's funny. Very, very funny. The premise may scare some away -- two straight friends decide to have gay sex for a porn film festival -- but the treatment of the material is so perfect that I can't imagine anyone not loving it. While not quite as laugh-out-loud funny as Humpday, In the Loop is as smart a comedy as you will ever see (review here). A barely-veiled satire of the run-up to the 2003 Iraq War, In the Loop features at least a half-dozen brilliantly venal performances, especially Peter Capaldi as Malcolm Tucker (nee the Prince of Fucking Darkness!) See these two movies!! more ›

Actor and producer (okay, and sometimes director) Kevin Spacey has purchased a unit in Downtown's Biscuit Lofts for a cool $1.2 million. more ›

Brutal Massacre: A Comedy more ›

A Word or 20: No network or cable channel has made a compelling reason to stay inside this Memorial Day Weekend and watch TV. Tonight - Friday - May 25, 2007 Cubs @ Dodgers (Prime, 7:30 p.m.) The Henry Rollins Show (IFC, 8:00 p.m.) Steve Buscemi pushes new films Interview and Delirious, and discusses his years as a firefighter and working at Ground Zero. In a 'Letter' to Michael Chertoff Rollins reflects on the... more ›

This still May/September romance STILL disturbs me - TMZ I wonder what Whitney will think when in less than two weeks, Vivid Video is set to release video of poor little rich girl Kim Kardashian getting dirty with Whitney's boy toy - Bumpshack Salma Hayek is not only engaged, but preggers! Her soon-to-be hubby is uber rich Frenchman Francois-Henri...is it me or does he look a little like Kevin Spacey? - poponthepop We all felt... more ›

A Word or 80: Spent the weekend in Canada, my first visit, in the province of Quebec to be exact. I found the radio programming to be innovative and excellent but television sucked. I'm sure there's some good programmes (please give me cred for the spelling) out there but in a first glance/overview kind of perspective it was wanting. Dear Canuck friends, don't take it personally, American TV sucks for the most part as... more ›

There's nothing worse than a bad movie. There's nothing worse than wasting the beauty of Kate Bosworth, the asshole just below the surface in Kevin Spacey, or the wide range of possibilities of the Superman universe. more ›

If you're gonna see a movie in this town, there really is no better place to do that than at Mann's Chinese Theater. They've had a digital projection system for awhile now, the sound is great, and the experience is just incomparable. Now we know people will wave their Arclights and their The Bridges in our face, but to them we say, "Bite us." more ›

Kick off the evening with a few drinks, courtesy of Book Soup, when mixologist Nick Mautone presents and signs Raising the Bar: Better Drinks, Better Entertaining at 7:00 PM. more ›