Much Ado About Nothing...

If you go along for the ride this movie is hilarious. If you want to try to figure out story plots and find a deeper meaning of life from a film, try something else. The Coen brothers have once again taken the ordinary and given it a quirky twist in their latest film, Burn After Reading.

The premise: Linda (Frances McDormand) and Chad (Brad Pitt) are two fitness trainers who find what they believe to be top secret CIA files in the gym and try to use the information as blackmail to get money for Linda's plastic surgery. Once they have set plans in motion with the rightful owner of the disk, Osbourne Cox (John Malkovich), several others find themselves being pulled in, including Cox's wife, Katie (Tilda Swinton) and her lover Harry (George Clooney). Trying to keep things from escalating are the gym manager (Richard Jenkins) and CIA Superior (J.K. Simmons).

This could have been played out as a simple act of mistaken identity and fraud. However, the plot forms circles upon circles to show that nothing is as it first appears and while things are discovered, nothing is understood. There might not be a lot of sense to what you see, but it is enjoyable to just sit back and watch.

A Couch Vacation That Will Have You Tripping

This weeks featured rental, Wes Anderson's meandering road trip through India, The Darjeeling Limited, might not make a lot of sense, but it is interesting. Combined with some take-out Indian food, this will make for a relaxing beginning to another stressful week. Owen Wilson plays Francis Whitman, the oldest of the 3 Whitman brothers, who decides after a near fatal motorcycle accident to take a religious journey through India and asks his estranged siblings, Peter (Adrian Brody) and Jack (Jason Schwartzman) to come along. The brothers have not spoken since their father's funeral, a year ago, and Francis has a goal to have them become brothers again, like they used to be. In order to do this he brings along an assistant with a computer, printer, and laminate machine.

Each morning the brothers are to find a laminated itinerary in their train compartment that they are to follow in order to successfully complete their enlightened spiritual journey. Soon enough they discover that these kind of journeys cannot be planned and the real enlightenment begins once they encounter unforeseen obstacles on their path.

There is a lot of symbolism throughout the film, as well as an in-depth look at the nature of sibling rivalries and human behavior. If you are looking for a film with a lot of structure, this is not it. If you have not been a fan of Anderson's previous films (Rushmore, The Royal Tenebaums) you will probably find this to be more of the same. However, if you are looking for something a little different, pop this movie into your DVD player and enjoy a trip to India sans Bollywood hype. Oh, and be sure to watch the short film Hotel Chevalier before the main film, it will give you a good preview of what to prepare for and is the most (quite literally) that you will see of Natalie Portman.

Hairspray : It's Afro-tastic!

I'll admit right up front that I'm not a big fan of musicals. Sure, The Wizard of Oz is my favorite film, but it is a fantasy; I don't expect to be greeted in a foreign land by a Lollipop Guild (though how fun would that be?!) so I'm not thrown off by spontaneous songs in the land of Oz. My normal issues with musicals occurs when serious plots are interspersed with random acts of singing. This should have made me hate Hairspray, a musical about a girl trying to stop segregation on her favorite local dance show; but despite all my own prejudices, I found myself toe-tapping along for most of the two hour sixties explosion.

The main reason this third installment works (first was John Waters 1988 movie starring Ricki Lake, followed by a Broadway show still running) is that it doesn't apologize for being a bit ridiculous and over the top. There are serious issues brought to the forefront; mainly discrimination of others due to their appearance, whether it be the color of their skin or size of their waist; but it doesn't become overly preachy on the subject. Lighter in satire than the original film, there are still plenty of tongue-in-cheek comments and song lyrics that are refreshingly never spelled out, regardless of whether the teen or preteen target audience will get them.

Corny is as corny does for James Marsden, who plays the host of the "Corny Collins Show" except on "Negro Day", the last Tuesday of the month hosted by Motormouth Maybelle (Queen Latifah). Tracy Turnblad (newcomer and recently arrested Nikki Blonsky) and her best friend Penny Pingleton (Amanda Bynes) can hardly make it through the slow clicking of the school clock before they can race to Tracy's house to watch the teenage dance show. Tracy's mother Edna (played surprisingly sweet and ladylike by John Travolta) doesn't enjoy listening to them squeal in delight as they see the head heartthrob Link Larkin (Zac Efron) but doesn't consider it quite the abomination that Penny's strictly religious mom does (hilariously played by Allison Janney). Tracy's dad, played by Christopher Walken, loves his big-haired, big-bodied beauties and supports whatever will make them happy.

Helping Tracy keep the beat without denting her 'do are the kids she meets in detention (for inappropriate hair height, of course), especially Seaweed (Elijah Kelley) who teaches her some moves that would make "pelvis Elvis" jealous. Along with his sister Little Inez (Taylor Parks), he shows her what life is like on the other side of town. Tracy enjoys it so much she wishes "every day could be Negro day" on Corny's show. Talk like that makes her enemy number one for the antagonists looking to stop progress from happening.

The villains of the film are ice queen mother/daughter duo Velma and Amber Von Tussle (Michelle Pfeiffer and Brittany Snow respectively) who make it real easy to dislike them. Luckily this is a musical, so all will end well and they will get their comeuppance (not really a spoiler...could the feel good summer hit of last year really end any other way?)

When the heat is up and your mood is down, this is a perfect video to rent to lift your spirits and keep you out of the summer slump at the August box office.