Watched in 2013

The Plot:When Rodney Baze mysteriously disappears and law enforcement fails to follow through, his older brother, Russell, takes matters into his own hands to find justice.

Director:Scott Cooper

Starring:Christian Bale,Casey Affleck,Woody Harrelson,Zoe Saldana,Willem Dafoe,Forest Whitaker

My Rating:7/10

The Plot:It's Christmas time and the Griswolds are preparing for a family seasonal celebration, but things never run smoothly for Clark, his wife Ellen and their two kids. Clark's continual bad luck is worsened by his obnoxious family guests, but he manages to keep going knowing that his Christmas bonus is due soon.

Director:Jeremiah S. Chechik

Starring:Chevy Chase,Beverly D'Angelo,Juliette Lewis,Johnny Galecki

My Rating:7/10

The Plot: George Bailey spends his entire life giving up his big dreams for the good of his town, Bedford Falls, as we see in flashback. But in the present, on Christmas Eve, he is broken and suicidal over the misplacing of an $8000 loan and the machinations of the evil millionaire, Mr. Potter. His guardian angel, Clarence, falls to Earth, literally, and shows him how his town, family, and friends would turn out if he had never been born. George meant so much to so many people; should he really throw it all away?

Director:Frank Capra

Starring:James Stewart,Donna Reed,Lionel Barrymore

My Rating:10/10

The Plot: "Get ready for fun!" (Leah Rozen, People) with the "feel good movie of the year!" (Clay Smith, Access Hollywood) Love Actually is the ultimate romantic comedy from the makers of Bridget Jones's Diary and Notting Hill. Funny, irresistible and heartwarming, an all-star cast (Hugh Grant, Liam Neeson, Colin Firth and Emma Thompson, to name a few!) will take you on a breathtaking tour of love's delightful twists and turns. Fall under the spell of Love Actually and share the laughs and charm again and again.

Director:Richard Curtis

Starring:Hugh Grant,Bill Nighy,Alan Rickman,Emma Thompson,Colin Firth,Liam Neeson,Keira Knightley,Chiwetel Ejiofor,Martin Freeman,Laura Linney,Rodrigo Santoro,Rowan Atkinson,Andrew Lincoln,Kris Marshall

My Rating:10/10

The Plot:Frank Cross runs a US TV station which is planning a live adaptation of Dickens' Christmas Carol. Frank's childhood wasn't a particularly pleasant one, and so he doesn't really appreciate the Christmas spirit. With the help of the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future, Frank realises he must change.

Director:Richard Donner

Starring:Bill Murray,Karen Allen,John Forsythe,Bobcat Goldthwait

My Rating:7/10

The Plot:A weather man is reluctantly sent to cover a story about a weather forecasting "rat" (as he calls it). This is his fourth year on the story, and he makes no effort to hide his frustration. On awaking the 'following' day he discovers that it's Groundhog Day again, and again.

Director:Harold Ramis

Starring:Bill Murray,Andie MacDowell,Chris Elliott,Stephen Tobolowsky

My Rating:9/10

The Plot:Laura Manion returns home to tell her husband she's been raped. Lt. Manion kills the rapist and then claims crime of passion as a defense. At least that's his story. Paul Biegler agrees to defend him and must unravel a case in which the motivations of the murderer, his wife, and the victim are all in question.

Director:Otto Preminger

Starring:James Stewart,Ben Gazzara,George C. Scott,Lee Remick,Arthur O'Connell

My Rating:8/10

The Plot:On Christmas Eve, Scott reads The Night Before Christmas...then receives an unexpected visitor on his roof. When he's startled by Scott's calling out and falls, the impersonator disappears, leaving only an 8-reindeer sleigh and a suit.

Director:John Pasquin

Starring:Tim Allen,Judge Reinhold,Wendy Crewson

My Rating:6/10

The Plot: It has been three years since the most important Nazi leaders had already been tried. This trial is about 4 Judges who used their offices to conduct Nazi sterilization and cleansing policies. Retired American Judge, Judge Dan Haywood has a daunting task ahead of him. The Cold War is heating up and no one wants any more trials as Germany, and allied Governments, want to forget the past. But is that the right thing to do is the question that the tribunal must decide.

Director:Stanley Kramer

Starring:Spencer Tracy,Burt Lancaster,Richard Widmark,Marlene Dietrich,Maximilian Schell,Judy Garland,Montgomery Clift

My Rating:10/10

The Plot: It's Christmas time and there's only one thing on Ralphie Parker's Christmas list this year: a Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-Shot, Range Model Air Rifle, but many obstacles stand in the way of his dream because every adult that he confronts keeps telling him he'll shoot his eye out. Meanwhile The Old Man just got a major award (a lamp shaped like a woman's leg), and Mom is making sure The Old Man doesn't come near her turkey, Ralphie's friend gets his tongue stuck to a flag pole, and Ralphie utters the f-word infront of his father. Christmas is drawing nearer and Ralphie visits Santa at the department store in hopes of asking him for his dream gift. Will he receive it? Let's hope so.

Director:Bob Clark

Starring:Melinda Dillon,Darren McGavin,Ian Petrella

My Rating:7/10

The Plot: A modern-day Frank Capra story. Jack Campbell, a successful and talented businessman, is happily living his single life. He has everything, or so he thinks. One day he wakes up in a new life where he didn't leave his college girlfriend for a London trip. He's married to Kate, lives in Jersey and has two kids. He, of course, desperately wants his life back for which he has worked 13 years for. He's president of P. K. Lassiter Investment House and not a tire salesman at Big Ed's. He drives a Ferrari and not a mini-van that never starts. And most importantly he doesn't wake up in the morning with kids jumping on the bed. After a bad start, day by day he's more confident in his new life and starts to see what he's been missing. Turns out money's good to have but that's not everything.

Director:Brett Ratner

Starring:Nicolas Cage,Tea Leoni,Don Cheadle,Jeremy Piven

My Rating:6/10

Director:Renny Harlin

Starring:Holly Goss,Matt Stokoe,Luke Albright,Gemma Atkinson

My Rating:3/10

The Plot:Diego, Manny and Sid return in this sequel to the hit Ice Age. This time around the Ice Age is over and is starting to melt, which will destroy their valley. So they must unite and warn everyone about the situation.

Directors:Carlos Saldanha

My Rating:5/10

The Plot:With the impending ice age almost upon them, a mismatched trio of prehistoric critters, Manny the woolly mammoth, Diego the saber-toothed tiger and Sid the giant sloth, find an orphaned infant and decide to return it to its human parents. Along the way, the unlikely allies become friends.

Directors:Carlos Saldanha,Chris Wedge

My Rating:7/10

A Boston man kidnaps the person he suspects is behind the disappearance of his young daughter and her best friend.

Director:Denis Villeneuve

Starring:Hugh Jackman,Jake Gyllenhaal,Maria Bello,Melissa Leo,Paul Dano,Viola Davis,Terence Howard

My Rating:8/10

The Plot:David Charhon

Starring:Omar Sy,Laurent Lafitte

My Rating:4/10

The Plot:On September, 11th 2001, four United Airlines American domestic flights are hijacked by terrorists. After the collision of two planes against the World Trade Center and one against the Pentagon, the passengers and crew of United Flight 93 unsuccessfully decide to struggle against the four terrorist to take back the control of the airplane.

Director:Paul Greengrass

Starring:J.J. Johnson,Gary Commock,David Alan Basche,Trish Gates

My Rating:7/10

Director:Anthony Marciano

Starring:Alain Chabat,Max Boublil,Sandrine Kiberlain,Mélanie Bernier

My Rating:6/10

Director:Ram Gopal Varma

Starring:Nana Patekar

My Rating:6/10

The Plot:Description: On December 8, 1980 Mark David Chapman shocked the world by murdering the beloved purveyor of peace, 40-year old musician and activist, John Lennon, outside The Dakota, his New York apartment building. Chapman’s motives were fabricated from pure delusion, fueled by an obsession with the fictional character Holden Caulfield and his similar misadventures in J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye. In one instant, an anonymous, mentally unstable 25-year old, socially awkward Beatles fan who had fluctuated between idealizing Lennon and being overcome with a desire to kill him - altered the course of history. Jared Leto, 60 pounds heavier for the role, bears an uncanny physical resemblance to the real Chapman, who to this day, is incarcerated in Attica Prison, on a guilty plea. Aside from a Larry King interview in 1992, he has not spoken with the media. However, Chapman did reveal the mechanics of his unraveling during those three fateful days in New York City, to crime journalist Jack Jones. The interviews were published in 1992 as Let Me Take You Down: Inside the Mind of Mark David Chapman, a book of Chapman’s recollections of his unthinkable act of violence. From this text, the film CHAPTER 27 is based. The film takes its title from the idea that through his actions in New York, Chapman was attempting to “write” his own additional, 27th chapter to Catcher in the Rye (which ends with chapter 26). Leto’s embodiment of a man whose painfully restless mind thrashes about uncontrollably between paranoia, socio-pathic lying and delusion is summed up in such character revealing comments as “I’m too vulnerable for a world full of pain and lies” and “Everyone is cracked and broken. You have to find something to fix you. To give you what you need. To make you whole again.” From his lies to cab drivers (identifying himself as the Beatles sound engineer) to his socially unacceptable behavior around Jude (Lindsay Lohan) a young fan he meets outside the Dakota — to his argument with paparazzi photographer Paul (Judah Friedlander), Leto’s Chapman keeps the psychoses bubbling below the surface as his grasp on reality deteriorates into a completely misguided rage.

Director:J.P. Schaefer

Starring:Jared Leto,Linsday Lohan

My Rating:5/10

The Plot:Details the actions of New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison, who takes it upon himself to investigate the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, in 1963.

Director:Oliver Stone

Starring:Kevin Costner,Gary Oldman,Joe Pesci,Sissy Spacek

My Rating:8/10

The Plot: Master chef Kate Armstrong (Academy Award winner Catherine Zeta-Jones) lives her life like she runs her kitchen at a trendy Manhattan eatery—with a no-nonsense intensity that both captivates and intimidates everyone around her. Kate’s perfectionist nature is put to the test when she “inherits” her nine-year-old niece Zoe (Abigail Breslin), while contending with a brash new sous-chef who joins her staff. High-spirited and freewheeling, Nick Palmer (Aaron Eckhart) couldn’t be more different from Kate, yet the chemistry between them is undeniable.

Director:Scott Hicks

Starring:Aaron Eckhart,Catherine Zeta-Jones,Abigail Breslin

My Rating:5/10

The Plot:Coming of age: Heidi, 15, runs away from home after her mom sees her kissing mom's boyfriend. She goes to a Snowy River resort where a vague job offer doesn't pan out. She manages to find a place to live and a job at a convenience store. She's between childhood -- nursery rimes and a scrapbook of glittery unicorns - and adulthood - working, sorting out emotions and sexuality, and dealing with social slights and false charges of bad behavior. She's attractive and her loneliness makes her vulnerable. She sleeps with Joe, the son of local ranchers, and she awakens in him feelings he can't express. Is there any way she can put off adulthood and be a kid awhile longer?

Director:Cate Shortland

Starring:Abbie Cornish,Sam Worthington

My Rating:7/10

Τhe Plot:A guidance counselor mistakenly sends out the wrong transcripts to Stanford University under the name of an over-achieving high schooler.

Director:Jake Kasdan

Starring:Colin Hanks,Jack Black,Schuyler Fisk

My Rating:4/10

The Plot:A child, sent to Earth from a distant dying planet, is adopted by a couple in rural Kansas. But the hero in him must emerge and use his extraordinary powers to protect his new home from an insidious evil, and become the symbol of hope for all mankind.

Director:Zac Snyder

Starring:Henry Cavill,Russell Crowe,Amy Adams,Diane Lane,Michael Shannon,Kevin Costner

My Rating:6/10

The Plot:Three college friends hit the biggest party of the year, where a mysterious phenomenon disrupts the night, quickly descending into a chaos that challenges their friendships and whether they can stay alive.

Director:Dennis Iliadis

Starring:Rhys Wakefield,Logan Miller,Ashley Hinshaw,Natalie Hall

My Rating:6/10

The Plot:When an alien attack threatens the Earth's existence, giant robots piloted by humans are deployed to fight off the menace.When legions of monstrous creatures, called Kaiju, start coming out of the sea, starting a war that will kill millions of lives and resources consumed mankind for endless years. To fight the giant Kaiju designed a special type of weapon: huge robots, called Jaegers, which are controlled simultaneously by two pilots whose minds are locked into a neural bridge. But even the Jaegers provide little defense against the relentless Kaiju. On the verge of defeat, the forces defending mankind have no choice but to resort to two unlikely heroes: a former pilot finished (Charlie Hunnam) and an apprentice who has not yet been tested (Rinko Kikuchi). Both come together to bring a legendary but apparently obsolete Jaeger from the past. Together, they are the last hope of humanity against the coming apocalypse

Director:Guillermo del Toro

Starring:Charlie Hunnam,Idris Elba,Rinko Kikuchi,Charlie Day,Ron Perlman

My Rating:6/10

The Plot:Two salesmen whose careers have been torpedoed by the digital age find their way into a coveted internship at Google, where they must compete with a group of young, tech-savvy geniuses for a shot at employment.

Director:Shawn Levy

Starring:Owen Wilson,Vince Vaughn,Max Minghella,Rose Burne

My Rating:5/10

The Plot:While attending a party at James Franco's house, Seth Rogen, Jay Baruchel and many other celebrities are faced with the apocalypse.

Directors:Evan Goldberg,Seth Rogen

Starring:Seth Rogen,James Franco,Jonah Hill,Jay Baruchel,Craig Robinson,Danny McBride

My Rating:4/10

The Plot:A former sports star who's fallen on hard times starts coaching his son's soccer team in an attempt to get his life together.

Director:Gabriele Muccino

Starring:Gerard Butler,Jessica Biel,Uma Thurman,Dennis Quaid,Catherine Zeta-Jones

My Rating:5/10

The Plot:When Brent turns down his classmate Lola's invitation to the prom, she concocts a wildly violent plan for revenge.

Director:Sean Byrne

Starring:Xavier Samuel,Robin McLeavy,John Brumpton

My Rating:7/10

The Plot:After being robbed of a week's take, small-time pot dealer David is forced by his boss to go to Mexico to pick up a load of marijuana. In order to improve his odds of making it past the border, David asks the broke stripper Rose and two local teenagers to join him and pretend they're on a family holiday.

Director:Rawson Marshall Thurber

Starring:Jason Sudeikis,Jennifer Anniston,Emma Roberts,Will Poulter,Nick Offerman

My Rating:7/10

The Plot:Two mysterious women seek refuge in a run-down coastal resort; Clara (Gemma Arterton) meets lonely Noel (Daniel Mays), who provides shelter in his deserted guesthouse, Byzantium. Schoolgirl Eleanor (Saoirse Ronan) befriends Frank (Caleb Landry Jones) and tells him their lethal secret: they were born 200 years ago and survive on human blood. As knowledge of their secret spreads, their past catches up on them with deathly consequences.

Director:Neil Jordan

Starring:Gemma Arterton,Saoirse Ronan,Caleb Landry Jones,Sam Riley

My Rating:6/10

The Plot:Three unhappy teenage boys flee to the wilderness where they build a makeshift house and live off the land as masters of their own destiny. Or at least that’s the plan.

Director:Jordan Vogt-Roberts

Starring:Nick Offerman,Nick Robinson,Gabriel Basso,Moises Arias,Erin Moriarty

My Rating:8/10

The Plot:A crash landing leaves Kitai Raige and his father Cypher stranded on Earth, 1,000 years after events forced humanity's escape. With Cypher injured, Kitai must embark on a perilous journey to signal for help.

Director:M. Night Shyamalan

Starring:Will Smith,Jared Smith

My Rating:6/10

The Plot:When the Davison family comes under attack during their wedding anniversary getaway, the gang of mysterious killers soon learns that one of victims harbors a secret talent for fighting back.

Director:Adam Wingard

Starring:Sharni Vinson,Wendy Glenn,Nicholas Tucci,AJ Bowen

My Rating:6/10

The Plot: Gary King is determined to reunite his friends from his youth in an attempt to recreate an epic pub crawl from 20 years ago. Their target: "The Golden Mile" in their town of Newton Haven. Their plan: five friends, twelve pubs, twelve pints, a few random shots, maybe some action with the ladies. Their first attempt failed miserably as they failed to make it to The World's End with the entire crew intact. This time around, they're older, wiser, and ready to get drunk - that is except for Gary's friend Andrew, who has gone sober. Starting with the The First Post, they realize the town may have changed, and they as individuals have changed, but there's something fishy about the town - the main factor is that the residents don't seem to quite recall the events of that epic night. As they hit the next bars on their list - The Old Familiar, The Famous Cock, The Trusty Servant, The King's Head, and so on, they discover that there's something really unusual about the citizens that now inhabit the town, and as they hit each pub, another piece of the conspiracy unravels. However, Gary is determined to make it to the Worlds' End if it winds up killing his whole group, and most of humanity in the process. But does the fate of mankind rest in his hands?

Director:Edgar Wright

Starring:Simon Pegg,Nick Frost,Martin Freeman,Paddy Considine,Ediie Marsan

My Rating:7/10

An Arab surgeon living in Tel Aviv discovers a dark secret about his wife in the aftermath of a suicide bombing. Based on a novel by Yasmina Khadra.

Director:Ziad Doueiri

Starring:Ali Suliman,Karim Saleh,Uri Gavriel

My Rating:7/10

Director:John Roberts

Starring:Tony Shalhoub,Gena Rowlands,Jay Mohr

My Rating:5/10

The Plot:A story centered on an eccentric art auctioneer and his obsession with an heiress/collector.

Director:Giuseppe Tornatore

Starring:Geoffrey Rush,Jim Sturgess,Sylvia Hoeks,Donald Sutherland

My Rating:8/10

The Plot:A financial executive who can't stop his career downspiral is invited into his daughter's imaginary world, where solutions to his problems await.

Director:Karey Kirkpatrick

Starring:Ediie Murphy,Thomas Haden Church,Yara Shahidi

My Rating:4/10

The Plot: Raimund Gregorius is a Latin teacher from Berne. When he encounters a book by the Portuguese poet and doctor Amadeu de Prado, he drops everything and takes the night train to Lisbon. He is determined to find out more about this writer who appears to have been obsessed by the very same questions that plague him: the purpose of human deeds and the unrealised potential of each and every life. His restless quest across Lisbon uncovers a contradictory portrait of a clever and brave yet conflicted man who lived at the time of Salazar’s dictatorship. Amadeu is the son of a conformist judge. His closest friend is Jorge, the son of a persecuted officer from the opposition. Their friendship almost comes to an end when Amadeu is obliged to follow his oath and save the life of one of the regime’s thugs. But then he too is forced to go underground. There he meets and falls in love with the beautiful and intelligent Estefania – who also happens to be Jorge’s girlfriend … As Gregorius pieces together the writer’s puzzling life, his investigations become a journey of self-discovery. Night Train to Lisbon is the screen adaptation of Pascal Mercier’s best-selling novel.

Director:Bille August

Starring:Jeremy Irons,Mélanie Laurent,Jack Huston,Martina Gedeck,Bruno Ganz,Lena Olin,Charlotte Rampling,Christopher Lee,August Diehl

My Rating:9/10

The Plot:An Alaska State Trooper partners with a young woman who escaped the clutches of serial killer Robert Hansen to bring the murderer to justice.

Director:Scott Walker

Starring:Nicolas Cage,John Cusack,Vanessa Hudgens,Dean Norris

My Rating:6/10

The Plot:The Four Horsemen, a magic super-group led by the charismatic ATLAS (Jesse Eisenberg), perform a pair of high-tech magic shows, first astonishing audiences by robbing a bank on another continent, and then exposing a white-collar criminal and funneling his millions into the audience members’ bank accounts.
FBI Special Agent DYLAN (Mark Ruffalo) is determined to make the magicians pay for their crimes—and to stop them before they pull off what promises to be an even more audacious heist. But he’s forced to partner with ALMA (Melanie Laurent), an Interpol detective about whom he is instantly suspicious. Out of desperation he turns to THADDEUS (Morgan Freeman), a famed magic debunker, who claims the bank heist was accomplished using disguises and video trickery. One thing Dylan and Alma agree on is that the Horsemen must have an outside point person, and that finding him (or her) is key to ending the magicians’ crime spree. Could it be Thaddeus? Or Alma? Or could it really be…magic?
As pressure mounts and the world awaits the Horsemen’s spectacular final trick, Dylan and Alma race to find an answer. But it soon becomes painfully clear that staying one step ahead of these masters of illusion is beyond the skills of any one man—or woman.

Director:Louis Leterier

Starring:Jesse Eisenberg,Mark Ruffalo,Woody Harrelson,Isla Fisher,Mélanie Laurent,Morgan Freeman,Michael Caine,Dave Franco

My Rating:6/10

The Plot:George and Nina Banks are the parents of young soon-to-be-wed Annie. George is a nervous father unready to face the fact that his little girl is now a woman. The preparations for the extravagant wedding provide additional comic moments.

Director:Charles Shyer

Starring:Steve Martin,Diane Keaton,Martin Short,Kimberly Williams-Paisley,George Newbern

My Rating:7/10

The Plot:Ten years after the human victory over the world wide Zombie epidemic, referred to as World War Z, Max Brooks scours the world collecting the stories and experiences of those who have survived the conflict that almost eradicated humanity.

Director:Marc Forster

Starring:Brad Pitt,Mireille Enos,Daniella Kertesz,James Badge Dale,David Morse

My Rating:5/10

The Plot:The costumed high-school hero Kick-Ass joins with a group of normal citizens who have been inspired to fight crime in costume. Meanwhile, the Red Mist plots an act of revenge that will affect everyone Kick-Ass knows.

Director:Jeff Wadlow

Starring:Aaron Johnson,Chloe Moretz,Christopher Mintz-Plasse,Jim Carrey,John Leguizamo

My Rating:7/10

The Plot:A family is held hostage for harboring the target of a murderous syndicate during the Purge, a 12-hour period in which any and all crime is legalized.

Director:James DeMonaco

Starring:Ethan Hawke,Lena Headey,Rhys Wakefield,Max Burkholder

My Rating:5/10

The Plot:When Christian, an LA trust-fund kid with casual ties to Hollywood, learns of a secret affair between Tara and the lead of his film project, Ryan, he spirals out of control, and his cruel mind games escalate into an act of bloody violence.

Director:Paul Shrader

Starring:Linsday Lohan,James Deen,Nolan Gerard Funk,Gus Van Sant

My Rating:3/10

The Plot:A pair of childhood friends and neighbors fall for each other's sons.

Director:Anne Fontaine

Starring:Naomi Watts,Robin Wright,Xavier Samuel,James Frecheville,Ben Mendelsohn

My Rating:6/10