Through the Children's Gate - Adam Gopnik

About 180 pages into the book I certainly have a much different feeling than I did about 80 pages in it. The book seemed tedious and predictable in the beginning when Gopnik builds the tenor of New York. Being in the area for so long I found most of his notes rather lame. However, now that he is over that into the simple life issues specially relating to children, he is at what he does best. Drawing life lessons from a chess game his 7 year old son plays and the wonderful Charlie Ravioli, his daughter's imaginary friend who is too busy to play with her -- a typically New York phenomenon.

I am at a place where I can barely put the book down. Gopnik is the master of style and when form and substance match it, it is almost giddy how good he is.

The Black Dahlia

You know you cannot trust Brian De Palma, specially lately, as he does not seem to quite know what to do. He wants to make noir pictures and he wants to make these complex terrifying thrillers that make sense only to some and generally to none. In "The Black Dahlia", based on the novel by James Ellory (who's novel also led to the amazing "L.A. Confidential"), De Palma tries very hard to rebuild the magic of L.A. Confidential. Same gritty, action-packed, corruption soaked L.A where nothing is what it seems and the only thing you could be sure of is utter moral failure all around. While the film starts to work, it slowly generates into a confusing, occasionally tedious tale of police corruption and general Hollywood malaise. Aaron Eckhart and Josh Hartnett as buddy cops are generally very good while Scarlet Johansson just continues to bewilder with her utter lack of skill. The most impressive performance in the film comes from Hillary Swank who plays uncharacteristically negative but strong and mysterious role. This is her true calling. I cannot imagine her doing anything better than this.

Full of characters and plot twists, the Black Dahlia (based somewhat on a true story) is one of those films you wish was better than it is. You almost see it being fumbled away.

Hollywoodland

Hollywoodland is a biopic of 50s star George Reeves (Ben Affleck) who played Superman on TV but was much lesser man in real life. The film is about the investigation into his murder by a scrappy, loser detective Louis Simo played with unusual vigor by an even leaner Adrian Brody than you thought possible. Filmed in parched sepia, Hollywoodland is just interesting enough to keep you entertained until you get to the cop-out ending.