Red Tails, written by John Ridley and Aaron McGruder and directed by Anthony Hemingway, is based on the true story of the Tuskegee Airmen, the legendary African-American pilots of World War II. The film was first developed over two decades ago by George Lucas, but faced many challenges because studios believed a movie with an all-black cast couldn’t be profitable. It’s quite fitting that a film about these heroes, who overcame prejudice and adversity, can serve as an example to Hollywood that it’s possible to make a successful film with an African-American cast. 

Red Tails tells the story of a few of the heroic airmen. There’s Easy (Nate Parker), the straight-shooting leader who hides a drinking problem, Smokey (Ne-Yo), who’s always quick with a funny remark, Joker (Elijah Kelley), Deke (Marcus T. Paulk), the religious one, Junior (Tristan Wilds), the young gun and Lightning (David Oyelowo), the cocky one who never does anything by the book. They serve under Major Emmanuel Stance (Cuba Gooding Jr.) and Colonel A.J. Bullard (Terrence Howard) in a segregated all-black squad. As the U.S. starts to loose bombers at a rapid pace, they are forced to give these pilots a try, believing them to be mentally and physically inferior because of their race. Beginning with their first mission, they prove to be some of the best flyers the military has ever seen and end up helping the war effort and becoming American heroes.

Lucas has said that he wanted this film to feel like something made in the 1940s and unearthed today. He succeeds in this regard. All visual effects and sweeping aerial shots aside, Red Tails does have a vintage vibe in terms of storyline and characters. Most will probably criticize the corny, one-dimensional nature of our heroes, but if we look back to old war movies, they didn’t contain complex, three-dimensional characters with rich backstories and motivations. The main characters were servicemen who fought for their country and became heroes, and that’s all we really needed to know about them. Here, we get a glimpse into each pilot’s life, but the main story takes place in the air.

All the airmen have their own unique qualities. Ne-Yo stands out with the voice and swagger he creates for Smokey. Oyelowo, shines as Lightning because he gives us Top-Gun-level cockiness while still being likable. Andre Royo and Method Man bring comic relief as mechanics Coffee and Sticks. Both Gooding and Howard pull their weight and show us that the Tuskegee Airmen were fighting more than just Nazis, they were fighting a culture of bigotry and racism.

One of the most fascinating elements about the film isn’t what takes place on the screen, but everything that had to take place before the cameras even started rolling. Lucas has said that he financed the film himself because of resistance from major studios who believed a film with an all-black cast wouldn’t be profitable overseas, where most films make the majority of their money. It’s very true that Hollywood places “black movies” on a different level than “mainstream” movies. Typically, these films have very low budgets and limited distribution. Lucas set out to change that and prove that a film with an almost entirely African-American cast can be mainstream. It’s very fitting that the tale he chose to break this barrier also happened to be about a skilled group of African-Americans who were told they were inferior by the mainstream military.

Cinqué Lee, despite the unique name he has, is probably someone who has a body of work more recognizable to you than his name. Lee, brother of acclaimed director Spike Lee, has worked in the film industry since the late 80′s wearing a wide variety of hats. From director to producer to actor and even wardrobe, the man has done it all.

Lee’s most notable works include co-writing the screenplay for Crooklyn and acting roles in Mystery Train and Coffee & Cigarettes, both films from director Jim Jarmusch. Lee’s most recent film is a sci-fi fantasy piece entitled Window On Your  Present. The film was actually Lee’s first, being shot in the late 80′s and just released on DVD from BrinkDVD.

Recently I was fortunate enough to catch up with Cinqué to discuss his latest release as well as the film industry in general.

Chris Coffel: What was your inspiration for Window On Your Present?

Cinqué Lee: I was in a public art high school in the early ’80s, Art & Design, making B&W super 8 shorts and had been scribbling these silhouettes of characters in bombed out churches with shafts of light and a couple arguing in a graveyard. I had squatted a couple of times with my skate punk friends and did see stuff like that. The funny thing is I knew I had these clothes,my deceased mothers clothes, I was putting in these sketches. My Mom’s fur coat, 1940′s leather pilot hat and googles and stuff…. I was also, and still am, into decaying abandoned buildings and back then there were tons of them that were beautiful. I didn’t know at the time that my sketches were my conceptual design for Window On Your Present.

This character and also one of my teachers turned me on to Roman Polanski’s B&W short films and some other silent films. So I really started obsessing over B&W and my sister’s boyfriend turned me on to Andrei Tarkovsky and his films flipped me the fuck out.

CC: Was the style and look of the film something that was done based on the budget, or was that your initial vision?

CL: I was already strung out on B&W and maintaining my fix by shooting B&W super8 shorts with the same style and look before I had to up it a notch to 16mm.

CC: The movie was shot in the 80′s but was just recently released, was there a specific reason for this? And if it were shot today, would it have been done differently?

CL: The movie took forever to make because I would change what I wanted or didn’t know what I wanted so I would put it away and come back to it years later here and years there. Having all the time I had to finish, I got what I wanted and so know I wouldn’t change anything.

CC: You’ve worked on many different aspects of the filmmaking process from composer to producer to director to actor and so on, is there a different mindset you have to get in for each one or do you just prepare the same way? Do you have a preference?

CL: Acting is the most difficult for me and that’s the only thing that feels like I have to separate my brain from what ever I’m doing. It’s like something triggers in my head like ‘oh crap, I gotta get in front of the camera now? I don’t want to go there, please don’t make me.’ So yeah acting has it’s own mindset. I can’t just switch over to as easily. As a matter of fact, I don’t feel anything sort of switch at all when I have to wear different hats. It’s that damned acting.

CC: Are there any specific filmmakers that have been a big influence on not only Window On Your Present but your career in general?

CL: Andrei Tarkovsky is the guy who rules my world when it comes to any influence as far as filmmakers go. But I also get inspired by music too. The Cocteau Twins are my favorite band.

CC: As somone that’s worked in the industry for a while now, you’ve seen lots of changes in filmmaking. The biggest change over the years seems to be the shift from using traditional film to the use of digital. Have you worked with digital at all and if so do you prefer one versus the other?

CL: I have worked with digital and it’s a pain in my ass. I worked on my brother’s film recently and I operated two cameras. A Canon 5D and a super 8 camera. Any time I had to use the Canon I dreaded it but when the Super 8 was called on I was like ‘I got this!’ I don’t like cards but I do love shooting on mini dv tape. I feel safer with tape, too many buttons and options on the Canon 5D for me. Hell I still cut on the old old version of iMovie. I just wanna pick up a camera and shoot.

CC: Any current projects you’re working on that you’d like plugged?

CL: I’m not a pluggy kind of person but I will say that I’m all over the place as usual. Been chiseling away on a graphic novel for years and also trying to bust out a whacked out kids show.

CC: And lastly, who is the better director, Spike Lee or Jim Jarmusch?

CL: Ha! That’s a good one.

To purchase Lee’s newest film, Window On Your Present, click here.

Visit Cinqué Lee’s IMDB page.

Window On Your Present is the new film from writer/director Cinqué Lee. By new I must clarify newly released on DVD by BrinkDVD, as the actual film itself was the first from Lee which he shot in 1988.

The fantasy film follows Europa, played by Maria Pineres, as she makes her way through a crumbling world stripped of color; imagine Snake Pliskin’s New York in black and white. In this world both color and love are things of the past. In this lackluster world with nothing to live for, people often resort to suicide.

This is an interesting and different take on a post-apocalyptic universe than we typically see in modern cinema. Two lovers meet and discover something special exists beyond the treacherous world they know. 

The cinematography from DP Leslie Mentel helps set the picture of a world that manages to be dreary and run down while still maintaining an interestingly beautiful look. This is key as Window On Your Present contains no dialogue between the characters, instead relying on the imagery combined with narration from Europa set to a score from acclaimed jazz bassist Bill Lee, who also happens to be Cinqué Lee’s father, to move the story along. This makes Window On Your Present feel less like a movie and more like a visual poem.

This isn’t a film for everyone, but cinephiles and art house theatre lovers will be drawn to it. It has a quick run time of just over an hour; an important thing to consider in this day and age for a film that is twenty plus years old, shot with techniques of yesteryear, but getting it’s first release now.

Lee has crafted a wonderfully enjoyable little film that relies on skill and technique rather than special effects and loud noises to keep the audience engaged. It’s rare and quite refreshing to see this from a modern American film.

Jim Jarmusch, the director behind such films as Down By Law and Coffee and Cigarettes, hailed Window On Your Present as a “true underground classic.” Jarmusch may have been onto something as the film is unique and certainly deserves to be seen. Kudos to both Cinqué Lee and BrinkDVD for making that possible.

Will Ables, Trashwire’s resident music writer, is a big fan of Tom Waits. In fact, he’s such a big fan that he’s compiled this list of reasons why no one will ever be as cool as Tom Waits. He’s even backed it up with video evidence.

10. Just watch. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C49H3aWdiK8

You‘ll need a cigarette and a cocktail. You just had sex with Tom Waits.

9. Xylophones. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnBzDD_O1Fg

Read that again:  Xylophones. An instrument that is entirely fucking useless with two exceptions: Scrabble and a Tom Waits Song. Waits rescues useless instruments from the refuse heap (what the hell is a Basstarda?!) and weaves them into a song where they stand out like melodic nails on a chalkboard or disappear into a wall of bizarre sound. It’s amazing.

8. Fuck Morgan Freeman.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHOHi5ueo0A

Tom Waits needs to narrate everything.

7. That thing with the LAPD.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHOHi5ueo0A

I’d like to tell you this story while quoting a reputable source (Mr. Waits is obviously not included in this for really fucking obvious reasons) but that just doesn’t seem like fun. This is one of those tales that has screamed past just being a “musician’s story” and become downright mythic. Tom Waits stands up for the common man? Tom was a little drunk and mouthed off to a pissed off cop? Who knows, who cares. There were guns involved. There was much violent poetry. And in the end the city of Angels had to write Mr. Waits a check.

6. He likes to win. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lX1qpcDchD4

Oh and then give it all away. Tom Waits will sue you if you’re a dick. He does not give a shit. Don’t use him in a god damn commercial, especially not without his permission, or you will be sending him money.  A very large amount of money. But do you know what Mr. Waits does with those checks he makes you write? He gives the money to charity. Who does that? Tom Waits does.

Although when you’re this charming, I feel like giving him money anyway.

5. Cookie Monster http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5X4N2exOsU

I know, it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen too.

4. Tom Waits Private Listening Party http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeTja7JXK9A

What the hell is that? Who can possibly be that weird? Why can’t I be like that?

3. Did I mention he can act? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yod51lr3F0U

Ok, he’s mostly played variations on Tom Waits but who really cares. Variations on Waits is brilliant. The man looks like he could break out a story at any moment, like he already knows all there is to know about you, and like there’s absolutely no getting away from him. He’s scary as shit and has a disturbing vulnerability about him. Like you couldn’t possibly mess this man up anymore than what he’s already done to himself. Plus cool chicks dig him, which helps.

Also, if I have to go to hell the Devil better fucking look, dress, and sound like Tom Waits. Otherwise he’s just doing it wrong.

2. Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers, & Bastards http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2bNMpAGfFQ

Songs that no one wanted, except not really. For anyone else nearly any song on here would have defined them stylistically. That or pretty much determined exactly the sort of thing everyone would expect from them from then on. But that’s just not Waits. He has played in every style and done it just about better than everyone else. He’s not ashamed to try something ridiculous and, even when he is being outlandish and just bizarre, the fact that he just loves every fucking minute of what he’s doing practically oozes out of the tracks. That’s what makes Orphans so brilliant. It’s a love letter to a career, to fans, to music. And these are the songs that didn’t make the cut. (“Walk Away” is a song off Orphans but I really just wanted an excuse to include that video.)

1. Pointy-fucking-shoes.

You can’t pull this off. Don’t bother; you’ll look like an idiot. He doesn’t. That’s all there is to it.

Shame, starring Michael Fassbender as Brandon Sullivan, is a very appropriately titled film. Mostly because I’m ashamed for having watched it; and I’m not ashamed because of the nudity in it. I’m an adult (kind of) and I can handle a little on screen penis. Mostly, I’m ashamed because I hated the movie. If it weren’t a press screening I probably would have walked out on the film. So if you’re still interested in seeing this film I’ll go into some details. 

MAUDE: Do you like sex, Mr. Lebowski?

DUDE: Excuse me?

MAUDE: Sex. The physical act of love. Coitus. Do you like it?

DUDE: I was talking about my rug.

MAUDE: You’re not interested in sex?

DUDE: You mean coitus?

MAUDE: I like it too. It’s a male myth about feminists that we hate sex. It can be a natural, zesty enterprise. But unfortunately there are some people–it is called satyriasis in men, nymphomania in women–who engage in it compulsively and without joy.

DUDE: Oh, no.

MAUDE: Yes Mr. Lebowski, these unfortunate souls cannot love in the true sense of the word.

So yes, I’m quoting The Big Lebowski here but this quote ran through my head multiple times during the watching of Shame and I think that it gives you a good definition of what Brandon Sullivan is going through during this movie.

Shame is about Brandon Sullivan, who has a sex problem. He seems to be able to court any women he wants into bed with him, he has sex with prostitutes and he is constantly watching pornography and masturbating. He even masturbates at work. While this seems like an interesting premise the film never tells you that this is a problem. Sullivan just seems like a guy with a strong libido. It’s an apparent problem because he can’t seem to focus at work (despite scoring a major sale), he can’t manage a relationship with his sister and he’s never been in a lasting relationship. His addiction with sex occupies his entire life.

Aside from the sex addiction Sullivan seems to have it good. He has a high-rise apartment walking distance from Madison Square Garden, he is succeeding at his job despite the lack of a computer, he gets along with his boss and he has a lot of sex. While he doesn’t get along with her, his sister is a very talented singer who sings regularly at upscale Manhattan bars. However, he can’t seem to control his urges and it leads him to have a destructive life.

Shame director, Steve McQueen, seems to have a 30 minute screen play on his hands that he wanted to turn into a full length feature. Instead of giving backstory on characters and building a plot he filled empty time with very slow scenes that added nothing to the story.  This is another film that had me wondering when the story would reveal itself, but found nothing. Near the end of the film McQueen adds some strong imagery and events that would normally be an epic climax to the film, but because he never made the audience care about the characters it just seemed like a tactic added to try to add substance to a meaningless film.

The strong imagery and events at the end of the film did add some entertainment and possibly a laugh or two, but they did not make the film worth seeing. Perhaps if they used some of their empty time to add substance and backstory to the main characters of the film it would have been thoroughly entertaining. But because of the amount of penis and sexual imagery during the film McQueen scored a rating of NC-17, which will likely get the film more viewers. If you must see this film, I recommend going to Red Box or Netflix instead of a theater.

Some people might think of Hawaii as a perfect place. The inhabitants of this group of islands don’t have any problems, heartache or stress. Why would they?  They live in Hawaii! The Descendents aims to disprove that theory. George Clooney stars as Matt King, a Hawaiian local who is a lawyer, a descendent of royalty and the main trustee of a large chunk of Hawaiian land. Matt, like anyone else in the world, regardless of where he lives, has quite a few problems. His wife is in a coma after a terrible boating accident, he is working with his cousins on a possible sale of the land, he has to try to take care of his two out-of-control daughters, and to top it off he found out his wife had been cheating on him.

Matt receives news that his wife would never wake up from her coma, and after finding out that she had been cheating on him, he decides to go look for his wife’s beau to inform him of her impending death so he can say goodbye. Matt takes his daughters and his older daughter’s boyfriend along with him on the trip, which turns out to be a learning experience for Matt and his daughters that will shape their future.

The Descendents could easily be a top choice for film of the year. It had striking imagery because of its Hawaii setting, strong emotion and a solid foundation of humor.  Clooney is perfect in this role and nails the character. He perfectly controls the mixture of tragedy and humor which are sometimes layered deeply in a single scene. His daughters, played by Shailene Woodley and Amara Miller, were excellent casting choices. They play perfectly off Clooney with their lovable yet crude behavior.

While my favorite aspect of this film was the humor it wasn’t all fun and games. The film provided very striking images of Matt’s bed-ridden wife. They show her throughout the film and as her condition deteriorates and she becomes closer to death she looks it. Matt is forced to tell his friends and family that his wife won’t be waking up. His daughters have to say goodbye to their mother and Matt has to come to terms with the fact that his wife cheated on him while never being able to confront her about it and try to send her to the afterlife.

The most appealing part of this film, besides the fact that it starred Clooney, was the mix of comedy and tragedy. The director, Alexander Payne, takes multiple serious subjects and gives them a real world context. Even though the problems that Clooney’s character faces are large and not something most people would deal with daily, Payne shows how people deal with their problems. And, like most of us, it’s done through humor.  The daughters use profanity and fight with each other and the boyfriend provides comic relief as a beach bum kid along for the ride. The score is also fun and lightens the mood during very tense moments. Payne also does a great job of setting the mood with shots of landscape and serene establishing shots.

Edward and Bella on their honeymoon in Brazil

If you have eyes and ears, chances are you’re familiar with the Twilight film series, adapted from the hugely successful books. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part I, the fourth of five films, is the beginning of the end for our sparkly vampire and his clumsy fiancée. This time, Edward (Robert Pattinson) and Bella (Kristen Stewart) are getting hitched and anticipating a steamy wedding night that results in an unexpected pregnancy. 

The film opens with the wedding, a dreamy affair that probably cost twice as much as the Kardashian nuptials. Bella’s friends, who like her despite the fact that she never seems to hang out with or talk to them, are in attendance and speculating why their awkward buddy is getting married at 18. Anna Kendrick shines in her all-too-brief moment of screen time and the wedding scene provides some much-needed humor in an otherwise overly dramatic film.

Brooding werewolves: making tweens swoon since 2008

Even though this is a vampire event, werewolf boy Jacob (Taylor Lautner) shows up to say his last goodbyes to the bride and ends up getting in a fight with Edward, essentially over Bella’s virginity. He can’t have sex with her while she’s still human! His super strength and speed will kill her! If only she’d chosen a warm-blooded American wolf boy instead! Let’s face it, vampires and virgins go together like peanut butter and jelly, so this classic debate doesn’t feel horribly out of place like the rest of the moral messages in the film.

The vows are exchanged and it’s off to the highly anticipated honeymoon. Edward whisks his bride away to a secluded island off the coast of Rio de Janeiro, and then it’s time to get down to business. Bella’s mini panic attach at the thought of having sex with her husband is a little weird; after all, she’s been waiting four movies for this. As she hyperventilates in the bathroom, the weird moral undertones (and sometimes flat out overtones) start to rear their ugly head. Bella and Edward finally consummate their marriage in a scene that will make all the moms in the audience blush. It gets so passionate that Edward breaks the bed, rips open pillows and leaves the room looking like Katrina hit it. Of course, all this takes place off screen, since this is a PG-13 movie and all.

Oh, Edward! You're so traditional!

The next morning, Bella sees that she’s all bruised up, but she’s raring to go again. Edward, on the other hand, is sure that it’s too dangerous (or whatever his ridiculous reason is) and refuses to touch her again for the whole trip. Instead, there’s sexually frustrated chess, sexually frustrated swimming and sexually frustrated hikes in the jungle. At one point, the poor girl literally begs her husband to bang her, but he still refuses. What message is that sending? I’m not actually sure.

Anyone up for a game of sexually frustrated chess?

Ah, but sex has consequences, kids, and one of them is becoming a teen mom. Bella discovers she’s pregnant, something that absolutely everyone thought was impossible despite the fact that vampire men have probably had sex with human women millions of times throughout the course of history and this has most certainly happened before. The rules of the supernatural world seem to bend to serve the plot, instead of serving as groundwork for the story.

Edward's too traditional for condoms, apparently.

Something’s not right, the baby’s too strong and growing too fast, it’s killing Bella from the inside out. This is when we get to the abortion discussion. No one actually utters the dreaded word (the whole PG-13 thing again). Instead, Bella’s rejected love interest Jacob pleads that “that thing” has got to go. Even Edward insists that they’ve got to get “it” out of her. It doesn’t matter because Bella’s made up her mind, she’s keepin’ her baby, even if it kills her. Spoiler alert: it does.

The scene of Bella giving birth is weirdly graphic, not what you’d expect from Twilight. Bella’s bones are cracking, her rail thin body looks more like she’s got a cancerous tumor than a growing half-vampire baby and, at some point, Edward drops between her legs and comes up with a mouthful of blood. Bella dies on the table, but Edward pulls a Pulp Fiction and injects her straight in the heart with vampire “venom” in hopes of turning her before she completely expires. That ought to terrify tweens away from getting knocked up.

Morality seems warped and out of place in the story. It can be so heavy-handed that it’s impossible to get past it, especially in the only film in the series that actually deals with sex at all. Vampire mythology is about seduction and temptation. Vampires are typically evil, but very appealing, often seducing young virgins. In this case, it’s Edward that’s the moral one and flipping that tradition doesn’t really work. Edward refuses to have sex with Bella before marriage, but it turns out he refuses to have sex with her after marriage too. That’s just taking it overboard.

I can’t help but compare it to something like True Blood and the Sookie Stackhouse books, which offer so much more character development and converging plots with causal relationships between events.

If you’re reading this in your Team Edward/Team Jacob t-shirt, pre-ordered Breaking Dawn tickets clenched in your fist like diamonds, then you won’t care what I have to say. This movie is going to make a bazillion dollars no matter the Tommatometer. I have no problem with the series as a guilty pleasure, but it bums me out that younger audiences are taught that this is the ultimate love story and that plot and character development really aren’t that important if you have two cute boys in your movie. If you’re over 16, you’re probably better off trying True Blood.

The Harold & Kumar series began with a witty jaunt to White Castle, landed the boys in Gitmo and now sees them decking the halls in A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas.

This time around, we find Harold (John Cho) happily married and successful. He and his wife, Maria (Paula Garcés), are celebrating Christmas in their immaculately decorated home with her entire family. Harold is eager to please his father-in-law (Danny Trejo) by having the perfect faux Christmas tree, which dear old dad immediately dismisses. He explains the significance of a real Christmas tree and that’s where this entire adventure begins.

Maria’s dad brings the perfect tree, one he grew himself on his own farm. The family leaves Harold alone in the house and Kumar (Kal Penn) shows up with a monster joint. The boys are no longer besties and Harold wants nothing to do with his slacker buddy. Of course, Kumar blazes up in the house anyway and the pristine symbol of Christmas perfection goes up in flames. Naturally, Harold and Kumar have to team up to get a new tree and this quest leads them through a series of dangerous encounters, bizarre situations, boobs, bongs and a little blow.

Harold resists the urge to revisit the first two films and parts ways with Kumar. Instead, he goes on a quest to find a new tree with his new best friend Todd (Thomas Lennon) while Kumar teams up with his stoner friend Adrian (Amir Blumenfeld) to replace the tree he destroyed.

Wouldn’t you know it! Things go completely wrong and they end up pissing off a Ukrainian gangster, giving cocaine to a baby, dancing in a Christmas gala with Neil Patrick Harris and shooting Santa in the face. Merry Christmas!

The plot is obviously nothing to write home about. It’s incredibly predictable and starts to feel like a live-action cartoon after a while. It’s a never-ending series of someone faced with a decision and making the worst possible choice. Sure, the original Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle had a lot of this diverging nonsense (a truck ride with a disgusting red neck, for one) but back then the idea still felt new. How many more times will they continue to use this premise? It’s funny for the first 20 minutes, but by the time we finally arrive at the NPH scene, it seems like the joke has more than run its course.

That being said, there are a few laughs, though mostly from single lines or delivery. The smaller characters add a lot of this flavor. Bobby Lee starts it off as Harold’s assistant, Lennon keeps it going as he tries to keep up with the new, tougher Harold and Blumenfeld delivers on stoned, nerdy humor. Eddie Kaye Thomas and David Krumholtz are back as Rosenberg and Goldstein and have an amusing scene with the guys in a White Castle. Even little cameos from Patton Oswalt and RZA generate some good laughs.

The humorous overuse of 3D is actually pretty amusing with loads of unnecessary objects including eggs, smoke and even a little cocaine flying towards the camera. It’s always played for a laugh, acknowledging the use of 3D technology in a film that is essentially about two dudes smoking weed and getting into trouble.

Harold & Kumar isn’t exactly marketed as being a terrific movie–and it isn’t–but it delivers on its promise of stoner humor, a few bare breasts and cartoonish antics. Most might find it just so-so, but fans of the series will love it, which is exactly why these movies exist. Harold and Kumar’s Christmas adventure is over, but I’m sure there are loads of comedic scenarios they’ve yet to explore. As NPH says, “I’ll see you in four.”

Your family isn’t there for you, the world has nothing to offer you and you’ve lost all hope. But while you feel like you’ve hit rock bottom you run into a group of friendly people who take you in. They live on a self-sustaining farm and call you family. They give you a job to do, a bed to sleep in–even if you have to share it with a room full of people–and they teach you about everything that’s wrong with the world. Sounds great right?  Well it’s not. You’ve just unknowingly entered into a cult!

The leaders brainwash the members to get them to do whatever they want. This involves rape of the mind and the body.  Also, this “self-sustaining” farm isn’t going as well as planned and now that the members have been brainwashed, they must help the leaders of the cult break into homes and steal the things they need to survive. Oh, and if someone catches you, you have to kill them… So now you have murder on your hands!

At this point, your average cult member is probably thinking, “whoa, I just wanted to have a family and do some farming, I never wanted to lie, cheat and steal! I’ve gotta get out of here!”

This is where we find Martha, played by the amazingly talented and beautiful Elizabeth Olson, in the film Martha Marcy May Marlene. The film begins with Mary leaving a cult then interweaves the story with how she is coping in the real world versus how she lived on the farm. In his debut as a feature director, Sean Durkin puts the audience in the shoes of someone exiting a cult. Mary feels a great deal of tension and apprehension after leaving the farm and Durkin does an amazing job of showing it.

Durkin really makes the audience empathize with Mary. You feel what she feels and ask yourself the same questions that Mary has after exiting the cult. She is uneasy and so are you. A great deal of tension is felt throughout the film which makes this a great movie to watch in theaters. Everyone watching seems to be waiting for what’s going to happen next. This film is also an eye-opening view into the very real world of cults.

Durkin worked on this script for several years; he studied cults and interviewed ex-cult members to create a story as close to reality (without actually entering into a cult) as possible. He purposely built a sense of ambiguity into the film and the films ending. Someone who has been in a cult may take years to readjust, if they readjust at all. Because those people may never have closure, Durkin left the audience guessing, which was a great move.

Time is money in In Time, starring Justin Timberlake and Amanda Seyfried. In this future society, everyone stops aging at 25 (when they’re at the height of hotness, coincidentally) and gets one year of time to “spend” trying to extend their lifespan. The super rich can live forever while the poor end up dying in the streets–yep, they’re dropping metaphors here–and someone’s got to shake up the entire system.

Thankfully, there’s Will Salas (Timberlake), a boy from the wrong side of the tracks who lives with his mother in a very modest apartment. They’re both living day-to-day, literally, and keep getting pushed further into poverty by an imbalanced system that penalizes all the people in the poor “time zones” with higher taxes, interest rates, prices and more.

One night, Will and his friend meet a man at a bar who’s holding on to over a century. That kind of time doesn’t roll into Will’s zone very often and the man is instantly at risk of being robbed by Minutemen, time gangsters who steal people’s hours, minutes and days. Will saves the man’s life and the man lectures him on the flaws to the time currency system. Why do the prices keep going up for the poor? How are people who only have hours to live supposed to earn more time? They can’t, because that’s how the system works.

Will awakens the next day to find that the rich man has committed suicide, but has deposited over 100 years of time on Will’s clock. Being new money, Will starts dishing out years to his friends and planning to cross into New Greenwich, the wealthiest time zone in the world.

His little rags-to-riches story doesn’t sit well with Timekeeper Raymond Leon (Cillian Murphy), a man who has seen too many time robberies to believe that someone would just give another person his century. Raymond tracks Will down, determined to find out how Will suddenly came into all this new time. Raymond’s dedication to his job, even after he’s seen that Will’s goal is to create equality, feels a little off. It’s established that Timekeepers don’t earn a lot and Will saves Raymond’s life at one point, yet Raymond is determined to bring him to justice? There’s no explanation of Raymond’s motivation here.

Will makes it to a casino where his risk-taking-bad-boy charm catches the eye of Sylvia Weis (Seyfried), daughter of Philippe Weis (Vincent Kartheiser), one of the richest men in the world who has so much time he can basically live forever. Sylvia is bored of her lifetime of being really, really careful–people can still die in accidents or be killed, they just don’t biologically die until their clock’s run out–and she longs to take risks and really live life like those cool, sexy, poor people who could literally die at any second. Her belief that the poor are the ones truly living feels a little patronizing because it never really proves to be false. The “glamorous” life of almost dying every few minutes seems like fun to her, but she never quite sees the reality of being that poor.

The overall metaphor of imbalance between classes and the vicious cycle of rich getting richer and poor getting poorer is thinly veiled, but somewhat effective. It’s very reminiscent of the ongoing healthcare debate. If you can afford healthcare, you can live a lot longer than someone who can’t afford it. Here, the rich have decades of boredom and excess while the poor are racing around to scrounge up a few more days.

The concept of time as currency keeps the film interesting and the pace racing. Things happen fast and Timberlake and Seyfried (who always seems to be wearing 7” heels) literally sprint through the film. The pace keeps it firmly in action movie territory and prevents it from getting too heavy or message-y, something that probably wouldn’t work in this film anyway. In Time is an entertaining ride as long as you buy in right from the get-go, otherwise you’ll end up scoffing at every time pun and underdeveloped character.