Movie to See Right Now

Leonardo DiCaprio and Armie hammer in J. EDGAR

There are some good choices on the long holiday weekend.    Like Crazy is a romance, pure and not so simple.

J. Edgar, Clint Eastwood’s interesting take on J. Edgar Hoover’s twisted psyche has some fine performances, but draaaaags. In contrast, Margin Call is a taut financial meltdown drama with superb performances by Jeremy Irons, Paul Bettany and Stanley Tucci. Pedro Almodovar’s The Skin I Live In is a beautiful and disturbing thriller – Out There as only Almodovar can do. The Ides of March is a fine political drama with Ryan Gosling, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Paul Giamatti and George Clooney. Drive is a stylishly arty and ultraviolent action film, also with Ryan Gosling.

On the lighter side, 50/50 is an engaging cancer comedy with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Seth Rogen. The raunchy comedy A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas is filled with lots of jokes and hilarious cameos by Neil Patrick Harris and Danny Trejo.

PBS is featuring the top rate British spy drama Page Eight on this week’s Masterpiece Contemporary.

If you can still find it, don’t miss Take Shelter, Jeff Nichols’ brilliant tale of a psychotic breakdown with Oscar-worthy performances by Michael Shannon and Jessica Chastain. One of the Best Movies of 2011 – So Far.

I haven’t yet seen the The Descendants or Into the Abyss, which open soon. You can see trailers of upcoming films at Movies I’m Looking Forward To.

My DVD of the Week is a threesome from my Best Movies of 2011 – So Far:  the wonderfully sweet Beginners, with Ewan MacGregor and Christopher Plummer,  Incendies (the year’s best movie so far) and Errol Morris’ gutbustingly funny documentary Tabloid.  Other recent DVD picks have been the Jenna Fischer dramedy A Little Help , the heartwarming documentary Buck, and Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy (1979).

Late November at the Movies

Promising films coming out in the last part of November include:

The Descendants with George Clooney, director Alexander Payne’s first film since Sideways.

Into the Abyss:  Werner Herzog’s documentary exploring American capital punishment.

My Week with Marilyn:   Reputedly dazzling performance by Michele Williams as Marilyn Monroe.

You can see trailers of upcoming films at Movies I’m Looking Forward To. Here’s the trailer to My Week with Marilyn.