Weekend Notes: January Jones was host of "Saturday Night Live" and if Taylor Swift "nailed" her hosting duties a week ago then Jones did at least as good of a job. The key difference was the writing and the writing was definitely better for the November 7th show. Could it have been a better show? Yes, but not from anything January Jones could have done. It was so painfully obvious that the show had no idea what to do with her - most of her sketches were variations on her "Mad Men" role and most weren't very good. After an hour and a half, we still don't know if Jones is a good comedic actress, c'mon "SNL". more ›

While I think that the cruelly funny Bruno will suffer a precipitous decline in its box-office fortunes once people realize it isn't another Borat, enough unsuspecting Americans bought tickets to the cock-heavy mockumentary this weekend to give it a narrow triumph ($30.4M) over Ice Age 3: More Ice Age ($28.5M | $120.5M). The vile Transformers 2: Racist CGI Moron Porn finished a close third ($24.2M | $339.2M), well ahead of a not-quite-there Public Enemies ($14.1M | $66.5M) and a resilient The Proposal ($10.5M | $113.7M). more ›

While reviews have been strong for Bruno, a few outliers have raised objections to the very narrow range the film straddles between exposing homophobia and promoting it. On the old Da Ali G Show, I never thought Bruno was as strong a character as Borat, but I expect to laugh for a solid 90 minutes at the sheer verve of Sacha Baron Cohen. The cute Hayden Panettiere from the first season of Heroes is quickly morphing into the annoying girl of I Love You, Beth Cooper. This adaptation of the superb book is being rightly savaged. more ›