Well folks, the 2006 year is now officially over now that the Oscars honoring films from that year have come to an end. It was an exciting and unusually unpredictable ride -- a bunch of films like All the King's Men tanked early, the no-doubt-about-it-lock Dreamgirls got snubbed for a Best Picture nomination, and the film that took home the top prize was supposed to be a non-Oscar-baiting popcorn flick.

Other fond memories of the year? Little Miss Sunshine got picked up at Sundance for a near-record ten million dollars near the beginning of the year; of course, at that point, no one had any idea for the road that lay ahead of it. Then at the Cannes Film Festival, Oscar hopeful Marie Antoinette got famously booed. The studio did some quick damage control and blamed it on the hard-to-please French audience, but the film was met with something even worse stateside: complete indifference. Hey, at least it managed to pick up the Oscar for costume design.

Into the fall season, pricey period crime dramas bombed at the box office, squelching their chances of Oscar attention: Hollywoodland and The Black Dahlia. (Luckily, both failures were overshadowed by the complete ravaging that All the King's Men took.) Then a present-day crime drama killed -- The Departed, of course. Other high-minded fare opened to various results but got surprising cold shoulders from the awards groups -- movies like The Painted Veil, The Good Shepherd, and The Good German. Even the mighty Clint Eastwood fell victim to the bad box office of Flags of our Fathers, even though he still had Letters from Iwo Jima up his sleeve.

Which leads us to the Oscar ceremony itself. Sunday night ended with my joy at The Departed walking away the winner (it was my #1 film of the year) being heavily mixed by my severely wounded pride. Yes, I had my worst-ever predictions year by FAR, which is so painful I almost don't even want to talk about it. But I guess I have to tell you...I went 12 for 24. A whopping fifty percent. In other words...



Still. All is not lost. I did, after all, correctly predict the most unpredictable category of them all, and also the most important: Best Picture. But so many mistakes...fine, here's the chart:

CATEGORIES	MY PREDICTIONS	THE WINNERS
Picture	The Departed	The Departed
Director	Martin Scorsese	Martin Scorsese
Actor	Forest Whitaker	Forest Whitaker
Actress	Helen Mirren	Helen Mirren
Supporting Actress	Jennifer Hudson	Jennifer Hudson
Supporting Actor	Eddie Murphy	Alan Arkin
Original Screenplay	The Queen	Little Miss Sunshine
Adapted Screenplay	The Departed	The Departed
Animated Feature Film	Cars	Happy Feet
Foreign Language Film	Pan's Labyrinth	The Lives of Others
Documentary	An Inconvenient Truth	An Inconvenient Truth
Film Editing	Babel	The Departed
Original Score	The Queen	Babel
Original Song	"Listen," Dreamgirls	"I Need to Wake Up," In. Truth
Cinematography	Children of Men	Pan's Labyrinth
Art Direction	Pan's Labyrinth	Pan's Labyrinth
Costume Design	Marie Antoinette	Marie Antoinette
Makeup	Pan's Labyrinth	Pan's Labyrinth
Visual Effects	Pirates 2	Pirates 2
Sound Mixing	Dreamgirls	Dreamgirls
Sound Editing	Pirates 2	Letters from Iwo Jima
Live-Action Short	Eramos Pocos	West Bank Story
Animated Short	The Little Matchgirl	The Danish Poet
Documentary Short	Two Hands	The Blood of Yingzhou District

Yup. 12 for 24. 50%. And yes, it still hurts. But you can bet I'll be bragging about Best Picture for as long as possible. Heck, costume design was a wide-open category too, and I nailed it. Yes.

Just for the record, here are the tallies of each film to win more than one award:

The Departed - 4 (Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Film Editing)
Pan's Labyrinth - 3 (Art Direction, Cinematography, Makeup)
Little Miss Sunshine - 2 (Supporting Actor, Original Screenplay)
Dreamgirls - 2 (Supporting Actress, Sound Mixing)
An Inconvenient Truth - 2 (Documentary, Original Song)

As for the ceremony itself, it was overall a fun night. I wrote a lengthy piece at TheCinemaSource that was specifically on the ceremony; you can read the full article here. But here's most of it:

The night got off to a good start with host Ellen DeGeneres appearing as always completely relaxed. After a brief movie reel of many of the nominees being interviewed (the highlight was Eddie Murphy blankly staring at the screen silently), the ceremony was off and running with Ellen's monologue. She didn't necessarily kill; her jokes seemed more designed to put the audience at ease. Well, except for her remark toward the nominees: "It’s my job to relax you, to make you forget that it’s a make or break night, for you...and there's a billion people watching." Her suggestion that acceptance speeches should include made-up tales of a childhood spent living out of cars in the Bronx was great, though.

Unlike in previous years, the Best Supporting categories were held off until later in the ceremony, supposedly to boost late viewership. It didn't necessarily work: everyone's tired by the second half of the broadcast anyway, and clip-montage after clip-montage got a bit old. Yes, folks, this was another long night at the Oscars. For my money, they could've especially done without the pointless "American movies" montage assembled by director Michael Mann. The screenwriters-in-film montage was much better, although really, just as superfluous. Why restrict most speeches to 45 seconds and then cram in as many pointless tributes as possible? And speaking of speeches, the Sherry Lansing tribute was nice, until we had to listen to her recite the driest speech imaginable.

Still, the ceremony had its moments - plenty of them. Early on we were treated to a Will Ferrell/Jack Black duet about how comedians never get nominated for Oscars. It was funny enough when they were catcalling nominees: "Ryan Gosling, you're all hip and now -- but I'm going to break your hip, right now!...Mark Wahlberg! Where are you! I won't mess with you. You're actually kind of badass...Helen Mirren! You're just hot. What party are you going to?" It became even more riotous, however, when John C. Reilly joined the song from the audience, proclaiming they still have a chance, because "I've been in both Boogie AND Talladega Nights." It was a definite high point.

Other nice touches -- that sound effects choir ensemble? Incredible. Jack Nicholson's inexplicable bald head? Nice. And then there was the funniest moment of the night. Before a commercial break, backstage host Chris Connelly was running one of his pointless segments when Tom Hanks, fresh from presenting an award, wandered through the back of the shot. Immediately, Connelly thrust the mike in Hanks's face: "More fun to come, right?" Without missing a beat, in the drippiest sarcasm possible, Hanks shouted "You bet, Chris, more fun!"

Another theme at this year's Oscars? Al Gore. Lots and lots of Al Gore. His film, An Inconvenient Truth, picked up awards for Best Documentary and Best Original Song. But then there was also a special salute to him in which Leonardo DiCaprio thanked him for his work on global warming, to raucous applause. It was the biggest "look-at-liberal-Hollywood" moment of the night.

As for the awards themselves, it didn't take long for some big surprises to rear their heads. First, sentimental favorite Alan Arkin won Best Supporting Actor over Eddie Murphy. Then, the acclaimed Pan's Labyrinth, which had been racking up the technical awards, lost the Best Foreign Language Film category to The Lives of Others.

Late into the night, it was still unclear which frontrunner would emerge. Babel picked up the Best Original Score statue, implying that it may have deep support, but then lost the pivotal Film Editing category to The Departed. After that it was a heavy Departed night. Many suspected Martin Scorsese would finally land his much-awaited Oscar, but the Best Picture win made it clear that that was no sympathy vote. It was a resounding win.

That about wraps it up except for one thing: talk of next year. Yes, at this point it's completely futile and will be 95% wrong; nonetheless, here's some random movies to look out for:

Charlie Wilson's War. A political drama starring Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Written by Aaron Sorkin and directed by Mike Nichols. Frankly, how could this not be a major contender? (We'll see.)

Sweeney Todd. Another Tim Burton/Johnny Depp pairing, this time to make the famous musical. It co-stars Helena Bonham Carter (of course), Alan Rickman, and Borat himself, Sacha Baron Cohen. Musicals are always incredibly hit-and-miss when it comes to audience and critical reception; remember the one-two punch of The Producers and Rent?

Hairspray. Another musical based on a stage show; this one stars John Travolta in drag, along with plenty of other stars. Either hugely successful or hugely embarrassing. (Or in between?)

Things We Lost in the Fire. Probably not a Best Picture contender, but watch out for the performances in what could be one of those "small human drama" successes. (I read an early version of the screenplay.) It stars Halle Berry and Benicio Del Toro, both no strangers to Oscar.

The Savages. Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman star as a bizarre married couple in this hit from Sundance. Also making a splash at Sundance was Grace is Gone, which John Cusack got great notices for.

In the Valley of Elah. Paul Haggis wrote and directed this -- yeah, the guy responsible for Crash and the screenplay to Million Dollar Baby. Pedigree cast? Check. (Tommy Lee Jones, Susan Sarandon, Charlize Theron.) Important Themes? Check. (The investigation of an Iraq War veteran who went AWOL upon his return to the US.) Oscar contender? You'll just have to wait.

Onward!

After the Juliet flashback return episode and the crazy mindtrip departure that was Desmond's flashback, Lost was back in (somewhat) familiar territory with a Jack flashback episode. And as is usual for his episodes, the present drama trumped the flashbacks easily. The episode was called "Stranger in a Strange Land," a shout-out to Robert Heinlein's classic sci-fi novel (or maybe the book of Exodus, but I'll go with Heinlein) about a man who returns to Earth after being raised by Martians. I'm sure you could try to work out plenty of hidden parallels and theories, but chances are much better than it simply referred to Jack's flashback of an extended trip abroad.

Which was somewhat boring. I could tell what they were trying to do, sure. The whole crazy "American doctor away in a foreign land experiencing crazy stuff he never tells anyone about" thing. But they could've made it a heck of a lot more interesting. Bai Ling was - let's see, what's the best way to put this - way more creepy than tantalizing. And the tie-in to the present-day drama - something about how Jack's tattoo basically reinforces that he's the hero - was pretty cloudy. Or did anybody else get more out of that than I did?

The rest of the episode was solid. Some could call it a filler, but structurally, you need these, and there were plenty of good character moments. Back in the present (I can't really say "on the island," since this episode took place on both islands plus the ocean in between), Jack got put in another cage, this time Sawyer's previous quarters. Before that happened, he got to have another chat with Tom, in which he again didn't ask any of the questions any of us would, but did bring up how the Others have a tendency to kidnap pregnant women and children, and hang people from trees. That was encouraging -- it's nice to know that the writers aren't trying to hide the fact that the Others used to give off a much worse impression than they do now. Remember when Tom was the creepiest guy you've ever seen? "Thing is...we're gonna have to take your boy." Now he's a happy-go-lucky heavy guy who likes flannel shirts. Or does the dichotomy make him more creepy?

The episode also marked the glorious return of Cindy the Flight Attendant! And the children! Turns out all those people kidnapped by the Others are alive and well and "here to watch." I really hope that has a significant meaning that we don't understand right now and isn't just more Cryptic-Speak. But the scene was still quite cool, especially when the little kid asked Cindy to ask Jack how Ana-Lucia's doing. It also revealed that Cindy was, in fact, taken by the Others, which I should remind you was never officially explained.

We also get the advancements of a few relationships -- Jack stuck his neck out pretty far for Juliet to stop her supposed capital sentencing. Personally I think it would be much cooler if the entire thing was a ruse -- a total ploy to make Jack fall in closer with her -- but then again, she did kill Pickett.

As for Sawyer and Kate, it wasn't really so much of an advancement; Sawyer assumed that Kate only slept with him because she thought he was a dead man. While its clearly an attempt by the writers to keep a relationship from fully forming, they have the right idea, especially since its wholly in Sawyer's character to try to back away like that. He also had a bizarrely humorous heart-to-heart with Karl, Alex's star-crossed love. Aside from revealing that he had probably lived on the island all his life like Ben -- he had never heard of the Brady Bunch -- Sawyer took pity on him and let him go, back to what we can only assume is the Others Neighborhood we saw in the season premiere.

Next week, we finally leave the Neilsen-ratings craphole that is time on the Others Island; all the Others and Jack are headed back, presumably to the same place as Karl. That's another good sign for the show. As is the fact that Kate and Sawyer finally join back up with the rest of the castaways -- in our time, may I remind you, for the first time in nine months. It's about time.

Hey everybody, just a quick post to apolgize for the delays (Lost recap + post-Oscar reaction). Both should be up by late tonight, although in the meantime I'll direct you to my post-Oscar article at TheCinemaSource, which is quite lengthy and fun to chew on. It also has about a billion pictures painstakingly uploaded by yours truly.

Also you'll notice that this site looks a little different...I was experimenting a bit. It's a work in progress (as always).

More soon.

Well, the Oscars are tomorrow, so here’s my annual big preview of the ceremony, and more directly, my official predictions for every category. There’s no point in shooting the breeze – let’s get down to business.

BEST PICTURE
The Departed

This year is really rather thrilling because the Best Picture race itself is the most wide-open in years. The consensus seems to be at this point that it’s a three-way race between Babel, The Departed, and Little Miss Sunshine (although even that isn’t certain – pro Oscar prognosticator Kris Tapley over at In Contention is predicting Letters from Iwo Jima). Babel has the most nominations of any movie with seven, making it a strong bet, but the box office is still slacking – the movie’s just plain not in the public consciousness whatsoever (which may not matter to the Academy). That’s the opposite of crowd-pleaser Little Miss Sunshine, which many people inside and out of the Academy want to award. But do more people just view it as a simple little movie that’s not Best Picture material?

That leaves The Departed. On the plus side, it’s a critical success (although with the Oscars around the corner, naysayers are coming out in full force as well), and it’s a bono fide box office success – the biggest for Scorsese ever. On the downside, many people view it as a popcorn flick, it only captured one acting nomination (for Mark Wahlberg), people may be turned off by the violence, and then there’s that strange streak of Martin Scorsese snubbing that the Academy is well known for. I really wouldn’t be that surprised if Letters from Iwo Jima went all dark-horse on us and took the top prizes. Babel, which many people see as the frontrunner, would come as even less of a surpise.

So why am I choosing The Departed? It’s all about the package. If Babel wins the big award, what other awards does it have to round it out? Probably Editing and that’s it – although if it wins Original Screenplay, its chances for Picture shoot up through the roof. Little Miss Sunshine is in a better position, with decent shots at both Original Screenplay and Supporting Actor – but the lack of a Director nomination is very telling. The Departed, meanwhile, is at this point fairly strongly locked on Director and Adapted Screenplay (again, as long as Letters doesn’t spoil). That makes a much better package; therefore I think it will eek out the win.

DIRECTOR
Martin Scorsese, The Departed

Even if Babel or Little Miss Sunshine takes home the top prize, it looks like it’s finally Martin Scorsese’s year. Like Ang Lee last year, he’s the frontrunner whether or not his film ends up winning the big prize. Ironically, unlike in years past, Scorsese did no Oscar campaigning this year. It’s looking like it paid off.

ACTOR
Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland

Whitaker has been the frontrunner forever and it’s highly unlikely to change now. The only two things going against him are sympathy votes for eight-time nominee Peter O’Toole, and some really bad acceptance speeches at previous awards shows like the Golden Globes. Hopefully tomorrow night he won’t get up to the podium, scratch his head, grin nervously, and speak in a rambling whisper.

ACTRESS
Helen Mirren, The Queen

She’s even more of a lock than Whitaker and Scorsese. I cannot think of any conceivable way she wouldn’t win.

SUPPORTING ACTOR
Eddie Murphy, Dreamgirls

In recent weeks, a lot of people have jumped ship and are now predicting Little Miss Sunshine’s Alan Arkin for the win. But even though Norbit is obnoxiously playing at a theater near you, I still think Murphy will win the Oscar. He’s become the “less popular frontrunner”; a similar thing happened a few years ago when many people hopped on the Bill Murray bandwagon, but Sean Penn still walked away the winner.

SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Jennifer Hudson, Dreamgirls

No one else is strong enough to overtake her. I’ve heard whispers about Adriana Bazzara from Babel, but she’ll most likely still split with costar Rinko Kikuchi.

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Peter Morgan, The Queen

This is my big gamble. Many people still consider this category an open race, but conventional wisdom says that Little Miss Sunshine will take it. A surge of support for Pan’s Labyrinth could make that the surprise winner, while Babel could take it on its way to Best Picture.

So why The Queen? Simply put, a hunch. Frankly most of me screams that I’m wrong and that I should go with Sunshine. But you can’t follow the consensus all the time, right? That’s boring. The Queen was the surprise winner at the Golden Globes, and perhaps the stuffy Academy will appreciate an upper-class British story rather than a popular crowd-pleaser – which is exactly what happened when Gosford Park won over Memento.

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
William Monahan, The Departed

The clear frontrunner. Aside from the fact that Monahan’s script is great, there doesn’t seem to be a nominee that could garner more votes. Despite Borat’s popularity, I still refuse to believe they would give this award to a movie that was vastly unscripted. Children of Men is more a directorial achievement over a writing one, and the Academy rarely awards a movie with too many credited writers (Men has five). Meanwhile, Little Children and Notes on a Scandal will most likely split the small-movie vote, although Children has its ardent supporters. Look for Departed to win.

FOREIGN-LANGUAGE FILM
Pan's Labyrinth

The only movie giving this one a run for its money is The Lives of Others, which has got some great notices. Still, the Academy liked Pan’s Labyrinth enough to nominate it six times, and its displayed surprisingly strong box office power. Unless too many people are put off by the dark-fairy-tale nature of the story, it will win.

ANIMATED FEATURE FILM
Cars

Pixar is usually a good decision. Happy Feet was more recent, but Cars made more money; for every person who thought it was sub-par (like me), there were plenty of people shouting “Pixar’s done it again!”

DOCUMENTARY
An Inconvenient Truth

Deliver Us from Evil is the haunting, well-reviewed alternate, but c’mon. There is no way an institution that prides itself on being liberal will not finally let Al Gore win at something.

ART DIRECTION
Pan's Labyrinth

They could go with Pirates 2 or Dreamgirls, but they probably won’t.

CINEMATOGRAPHY
Children of Men

Have you seen those tracking shots? The movie looks incredible, and it has a few other nominations confirming its popularity. Pan’s Labyrinth is the other possibility.

FILM EDITING
Babel

Convention wisdom usually means the Academy will think the movie with intertwined stories automatically has the best editing. This is United 93’s best shot at an award, but they’ll probably go with a Best Picture nominee.

ORIGINAL SCORE
The Queen

Frankly, I have no idea on this one. I’m taking Entertainment Weekly’s advice.

ORIGINAL SONG
"Listen," Dreamgirls

Ditto. It’s got to be something from Dreamgirls, right? Or will the three nominations split?

VISUAL EFFECTS
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Despite the bad reviews, it was the special effects extravaganza of the year. Oh yeah, and it made pretty much double the money of the next-highest-grossing movie last year.

SOUND EDITING
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

They do like war movies in this category, but Eastwood’s two movies will probably split the vote. Give it to the #1 movie of the year. It’s not going to be Apocalytpo, I can tell you that much.

SOUND MIXING
Dreamgirls

The main sound category should go to the musical, right? I’m assuming that’s what most Academy members will think, too.

COSTUME DESIGN
Marie Antoinette

This is a surprisingly tough category, because you don't know which way the Academy will swing: modern with The Devil Wears Prada, exotic with Curse of the Golden Flower, British with The Queen, or musical with Dreamgirls. Once again, I’m hedging my bets and going with Entertainment Weekly’s bet that they’ll go for the old period piece.

MAKEUP
Pan's Labyrinth

Apocalypto and Click are its competitors.

ANIMATED SHORT
The Little Matchgirl
DOCUMENTARY SHORT
Two Hands
LIVE ACTION SHORT
Eramos Pocos (One Too Many)

You think I have any idea about those three? Those predictions seem to be general consensus, so why not?


That’s it. That’s all the categories. But who knows? Chances are I’m completely underestimating Little Miss Sunshine, right? Well, whether I am or not, I don’t really mind. It’s nice to not have best Picture a foregone conclusion for once. That’s why you should tune in this year – plus all that glitz, glamour, stars, and fashion stuff. Everybody knows the host is Ellen DeGeneres, but here’s a tentative list of presenters courtesy of Oscarwatch.com:

Jack Nicholson
Meryl Streep
Philip Seymour Hoffman
Leonardo DiCaprio
Robert Downey, Jr.
Gael Garcia Bernal
Emily Blunt
Catherine Deneuve
Al Gore
James McAvoy
Jerry Seinfeld
Greg Kinnear
Helen Mirren
Clive Owen
Ken Watanabe
Naomi Watts
John Travolta
Jodie Foster
Queen Latifah
Gwyneth Paltrow
Jennifer Lopez
Diane Keaton
Jessica Biel
Abigail Breslin
Jaden Smith
Tom Cruise
Kirsten Dunst
Kate Winslet
Ben Affleck
Cate Blanchett
Steve Carell
Penelope Cruz
Tom Hanks
Rachel Weisz
Daniel Craig
Nicole Kidman
Reese Witherspoon
Will Ferrell
George Clooney
Cameron Diaz
Eva Green
Hugh Jackman

Well, this about wraps it up for me. You can check out a chart full of a lot of people’s predictions, including mine, on Oscarwatch’s prediction round-up here. And you can check out our Oscar article at TheCinemaSource here.

Sunday night, February 25th, 2007. 8pm Eastern, 5pm Pacific. ABC. Be there.

As a break from all of the Oscar hype thats growing in the days until the ceremony on Sunday, here's a review of the most non-Oscar-ish movie...ever. That's right, folks, Reno 911!: Miami. The three word verdict? Very, very funny. I'm not saying you should necessarily rush to the theater with eleven dollars in hand, but hey, I hear theaters outside of Manhattan aren't normally that expensive, so who knows. At the least, it's rental material. Check it out here.

UPDATE 2/22/07: My predictions have gone up on OscarWatch's great big predictions chart, along with a link to the article on TheCinemaSource. Sweet.

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Before I unleash my major Oscar predictions article on y'all (ceremony's on Sunday night, remember) I posted my main predictions up at TheCinemaSource in our staff's Oscar article. You can check that out here. In the next few days you'll get my personal article on here.

In related news, one of our spotlights -- Ben Lee's interview of Samuel L. Jackson -- got noticed up at my own personal favorite Oscar site, www.oscarwatch.com. Seems Jackson was game enough to speculate on the Academy awards, too (he thinks Little Miss Sunshine could win the big one).

So after a less-than-stellar return for Lost on the 7th, last week's show that aired on Valentine's Day slumped even lower. Is the panic substantiated? You be the judge as I present two opposing articles:

1. Lost Ratings Hit Record Low

Notable excerpts:

• "The show's Feb. 7 return was heavily promoted and drew nearly 14.5 million viewers. But the bounce didn't last, with the show slumping this week [to 12.8 million]."
• "...well off the peak of more than 20 million for the drama that became an instant sensation when it debuted in September 2004."
• "The show, named best drama at the 2005 Emmy Awards, was shut out at the 2006 ceremony."

2. Lost's Future is Bright, Despite Ratings Decline

Notable excerpts:

• "The defense to LOST's dip in th ratings that makes the most sense is that there was a universal decline due to Valentines Day festivities. What reinforces this defense is that all shows from 9:00pm on suffered a pretty proportionally lateral decline in ratings on heart day."
• "ABC is heralding LOST as bringing an unheard of share of the coveted 18-49 demographic to 10pm. Again, citing numbers that can be backed up across the board against any other show in the slot, any day of the week."
• "A couple of factors that aren't so widely discussed is the fact that the two episodes since the return focused on characters who were not central to the LOST core. 'Not in Portland' focused heavily on Juliet's back story, while 'Flashes Before Your eyes' was dominated by Henry Ian Cusick's Desmond character."

Me again. I would like to add to the latter argument that the ratings are never quite as low as they seem because ratings reports don't reflect "live plus seven" data, meaning viewers who watch the shows off their DVR within seven days of the airing. The ratings go up an average of 4-5%. Also, the Nielsen ratings have dubious methods for counting away-from-home college students. Finally, internationally Lost is still doing quite good (although I believe most countries are still at some point in season 2).

Still, there's no doubt that the numbers have gone down. Obviously I'm a gigantic Lost fan and this site will always give Lost every conceivable benefit of the doubt because I still think that its the highest quality show on television. I just hope the ratings balance out so we can finally stop dedicating our time to talking about Lost's supposed downfall, and start dedicating it to the actual show.

TheCinemaSource, the website I work for, just debuted an entertainment news section.

On the front page it's in a news-ticker format near the top of the page:



To the right of the ticker is a link to the list of all recent stories, so you don't have to sit there waiting for them all to scroll through:



The goal is to put up numerous stories each day; obviously, since it just debuted there may or may not be a few kinks to work out, but soon it'll be a well-oiled machine.

Personally I'm particularly excited about this because it's something most major-league movie sites have, and it gives people an incentive to keep coming back to the site. (Aside from reading my reviews, of course.)

Hey, as promised, I just put up a review of the cheesefest superhero movie known as Ghost Rider. I can't think of anything else to say, so to tantalize you, here's a brief excerpt:

"Quite simply, there is nothing that can be taken seriously about this movie. At all. First of all, Nicholas Cage as a superhero is just…funny. Have you seen the ads? 'I'm good. I feel like my skull's on fire, but I'm good.' Hearing that come out of Cage's mouth is, for some reason, priceless."

Check it out here.

Desmond once again takes center stage with his tale of hatch implosions, star-crossed love, and now, trippy time-travel theories. This episode was probably the biggest structural departure of the show since the "Other 48 Days" Tailie episode last year; the entire middle was devoted to an uninterrupted Desmond flashback. Only it wasn't a flashback exactly -- and suddenly I realize trying to explain this on paper makes it sound a lot more confusing than it was. It was a flashback of what happened to him after he turned the hatch's fail-safe key, which was itself a journey back in time to when he was in London with Penelope. Only he still had memories of being on the island. Got it?

Cool, we're all good then. Do to the episode being very Desmond-centric, and the plot diving deeper into the rabbit's hole of time travel, it felt at times like not an episode in a series, but a stand-alone thriller about a man journeying through time to try to get things right with the one he loves. Think about it -- you extract Desmond's story from everyone else's, make a few changes, and you got an above-average feature-length sci-fi thriller of a screenplay on your hands (with the ending as yet unwritten). That's my screenwriting mind talking. But still. It'd be cool.

I'm always in favor of giving as many cast members as much screen time as possible -- the ridiculously heavy focus on Jack/Kate/Sawyer in the fall in part led to the loss of viewers they're experiencing now -- but I respected this episode's focus. Still, it would be nice to get more than one line from Sayid.

Anyway, I'm not going to bother summarizing what happened with Desmond's flashback because you've already seen the episode, right? Let's get right to the theorizing:

• The white-haired woman explained that the universe has a way of snapping back if you attempt to change things -- you can save the man in the red shoes from death now, but he'll die later from something else. I seem to recall learning this as the Elastic Theory of time travel, but apparently it's also called Determinism. In other words, fate is pre-decided -- but Desmond can change things and make choices -- so does free will exist or not?
  

• The good folks at EW also noticed this, but unlike me, actually drew some conclusions from it. In their own Lost recap they provide insight into Desmond with respect to the philosopher he's named after, David Hume. According to them:
  "Basically, Hume's theory of compatibilism posits that free will and determinism both exist, and that what we do with our lives is essentially the result of these two concepts butting against each other. In other words...Desmond Hume is living one of David Hume's theories."

• Me again. Borrowing a page from our dear departed Mr. Eko, compatibilism actually sounds a heck of a lot like the general version of Christianity, especially as explained by St. Augustine (who unfortunately has yet to have a character get named after him). Free will exists (if it didn't, there would be no faith, and therefore no God, the reasoning goes), but God also has a "plan" for everyone that guides them through life. Will the parallel be made, or is it lost forever along with Eko and his haunting monologues? Either way, it's pretty cool.

• 100 points to you if you've noticed that the last three bullets have all been the continuation of one though, therefore making the bullets completely unnecessary.

• To me, the white-haired woman was a deus ex machina of the best possible order. I really hope they don't try to explain her, and I really hope fans don't expect them to. She shows up in a mysterious way, explains to Desmond what's going on, and disappears. It was a well-done example of a normally arbitrary device. But to the curious: who exactly was she? She knew about the island, etc, but that doesn't mean she was in any way associated with Dharma or the show's mysteries -- she knew the red-shoed man's future, too. I'm perfectly content to say that she was a deus ex machina literally -- a god in the machine.

All right, enough of the ruminations. What do you guys think about the ending shocker? Is Charlie really doomed? Or will determinism be proven wrong? And exactly how much do you think we'll find out about the Others next episode? At least the sporadically-appearing and previously-kidnapped flight attendant is back, right?

Instant prediction: a few episodes down the line, an integrated and seemingly-fine Karl shockingly kills Charlie because of the programming he was subject to during his brainwashing. Hey, it'd be a cool moment.

As promised, here's the Music and Lyrics review. It kind of acts as a critique/begrudging acceptance of the romantic comedy genre as a whole. I originally thought it was being released Friday, which is why you're getting it this late at night...silly me, I failed to realize it's probably a good idea to release a chick flick on Valentine's Day.

I know what you're thinking: "Gee, Michael, when are we gonna get a new review from you? I simply can't go on much longer without one." Well step back from the ledge, my friends: I got some coming at you.

Today you get a DVD review of Hollywoodland, an unfairly overlooked gem of a period noir that hit theaters in the early fall. Ben Affleck's two-year break from filmmaking seems to have worked -- he's excellent here, in a supporting role in a low-key movie. (By the way, Robin Tunney, left, is really good looking. How come nobody noticed before? Well, she is looking all seductive and vampy and sleeveless-black-dress-y...but...still...)

Anyway, that's not all. I'm ALL OVER this weekend, with reviews of both Music and Lyrics and Ghost Rider (the latter pending a screening on Friday morning). Personally, I would much rather see Bridge to Teribithia, or even Breach, but I suppose (presumably) sub-par reviews are good for the soul.

Oh well. Maybe I'll catch Teribithia on HBO On Demand down the road, and try to get my roommates to watch it, as they stare at me strangely, like I've done with Because of Winn-Dixie lately. Hey, I like live-action kids movies.

It's lately been a dark time for TV. Out of the other shows I watch, Studio 60 and Veronica Mars are both tanking in terms of quality, and on Thursday nights I have a class that gets out too late for me to be able to watch The Office. And then while Lost was on its infinite hiatus, I kept reading all these articles about how the show has LOST quality or maybe it's LOST it's way, and while I appreciate puns a lot more than the next guy, this crap made me angry. The six-episodes-followed-by-a-break was an experiment, and it was an experiment that didn't quite pan out due to the fractured nature of the storyline at that point -- one episode on Other Island, one episode with Sun, Jin, and Sayid, one episode with Locke...and then whoops, we're just about done. But I kept telling everybody to hold their horses, because they'd be crapping their pants at the awesomeness of 16 back-to-back episodes when the show returned. If said episodes were any good, that is.

Guess what? The first one was awesome.

I don't want to jump the gun and say we're set for the rest of the season, but this was one darn fine solid hour of television last night. Let's review what makes a good episode of Lost great:

1. Solid answers that still leave the door open for more storytelling. Juliet's backstory was great, both the trademark twist-at-the-end-of-the-teaser -- hey look, it's Miami -- and the story of how she was recruited onto the island in the first place. Plus a reappearance of Ethan! Sweet.

2. Some teases on a few mysteries. Tom the Other started explaining something to Jack about "when the sky turned purple" when Ben's surgery interrupted them. Also, in The Brainwash Room -- Room #23, by the way -- one of the messages on the screen that Karl was being forced to watch mentioned Jacob -- presumably the same Jacob that Pickett mentioned last fall; in both instances the reference seemed like Jacob was someone higher up than Ben -- maybe the "real" leader of the Others, the Him that was mentioned in Season 2.

3. Action! Sawyer and Kate's mad dash through the woods, the Karl prison break-out (with the help of the "Wookie Prisoner Routine" as Sawyer mentioned), and Juliet's cold-blooded killing of Pickett. Sweet.

4. A Mean Girls reference. Well not exactly. And that's not exactly sound advice on how to make a good Lost episode. But when Juliet's ex-husband got hit by the bus -- totally called it, by the way -- all I could think of was Mean Girls. Is that sad?

5. Cool moments. The climax, in which Kate recites Jack's story to him, while Jack is faced with a similar situation at hand, and then he stitches Ben back up, and that Pensive-Lost-Theme-Music plays, that was just some solid writing.

6. A promise to return to form -- and by that I mean the story taking a decided path back toward the real island. Sawyer and Kate are going back. I have a feeling that should make a lot of people happy, and hey -- I've missed Hurley and Charlie and Claire, et al, too.

7. Random explanations that I shouldn't buy but totally do anyway. Ben wakes up during surgery? What? "Jack's a spinal surgeon, not an anesthesiologist," Tom tells Juliet. Oh. Okay, then.

One final note. I looked up the fast national ratings data and last night it's estimated that Lost averaged about 14.7 million viewers last night -- great for most TV shows, bad for Lost. (It's average during the first part of Season 3 was around 17 million, I believe.) I have a feeling a lot of people at ABC are very worried today. Mostly I think it's because of the disillusionment (and plain forgetfulness) a lot of people have had with the show over the past three months. But since tonight's episode was so strong, the word-of-mouth machine should theoretically start chugging along, and thanks to the no-more-repeats schedule and the newfound avoidance of American Idol, it stands a good chance to slowly climb up -- as opposed to Season 2, when the second half of the season found ratings going slowly down. It will be interesting to see how next Wednesday's episode fares.

I missed the first 25 minutes of this episode. Actually, I would've missed the whole thing thanks to a new class this semester, but I got out of it a bit early.

So how was it? Eh. It's been two days and I already have a very vague memory of it. Apparently Veronica dumped Logan again...wow, original storyline. And except for Weevil, nobody else seemed to be in the episode except for the typical threesome of Veronica, Keith, and Logan - all great characters who've miraculous turned into bores. No Wallace, Piz, Mac, Lamb, Parker...oh look there's Dick, yay...I'm getting tired of voicing this exact same complaint every time.

At least Weevil got to have a great line: "The next time I need my literature compared, I'll come to you."

I could talk about the intricacies of the plot, which involved something about somebody forcing some girl to have a miscarriage, and how the girl's dad was a famous TV-evangelist, but he was actually kind of a nice guy in the end...but I won't. The show has gotten boring and tedious, plain and simple.

In honor of Lost coming back on the air tonight, here's some fun random Lost-related stuff:

• An interview with showrunners Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse that showed up on EW.com this morning...it's actually pretty revealing, to the point that I would recommend not reading the answer to the second question (there's a spoiler concerning tonight's episode). But it is kind of fascinating to hear two writers talk about how they try to run this thing, with an eye toward the overarching story arc and how the many mini-mysteries fit into it.



• Another EW article...that serves as a "catch-up" to viewers who might've gotten a little fuzzy on the characters. But really it just exists for a quite hilarious first two paragraphs.



• A New York Times article about Lost and NBC's Heroes...which is fairly fluffy. It actually has no reason to exist except to provide fodder for this post, but is entertaining nonetheless.



• Lost on Youtube...and no I'm not providing a link. It should be easy enough to find the myriad of ads and exclusive scenes that have appeared on ABC over the last month.

So ready for this. Dude.

I enabled the atom.xml feed for the site. If you don't know what that is, it totally doesn't make any difference at all. If you do know what it is, I linked to the feed, plus some newsreaders, down near the bottom of the sidebar. You're welcome, geeks.

Also, in order to (theoretically) reach a larger audience, I've imported this blog into Facebook Notes on my Facebook profile. That means whenever I post something new here, it will show up there, too.

Just a friendly reminder/preview that Lost is back for a 16-week run this Wednesday, February 7th. The newest episode is called "Not in Portland." The good people at Entertainment Weekly have the scoop (ABC sent out screeners of the episode about a week ago). The fairly spoiler-free column can be found here.

Also from EW, they officially reviewed the episode in their "What to Watch" section of their newest magazine issue. It goes as follows:

I'm not going to screw around. It's good. Really good. Like season-0ne, stuff-gets-answered, can't-wait-for-the-next-episode good. To recap: Ben is bleeding out on the table. Jack is demanding the release of Kate and Sawyer. And the fan base is demanding some frickin' forward movement. Well, how about the full-on Juliette backstory? Information about how the Others ended up on the Island? Super-creepy Dharma experiment sequences? Yeah. You know you want it. And by the end, you'll be begging for more. Well, that, and praying that this isn't just another tease from a show that always seems to start strong out of the gate. A -Daniel Fierman

Screw the Super Bowl - this is appointment TV.

UPDATE: Ain't it Cool News also posted a preview of Lost's return episode. It's definitely more revealing than what EW posted, but luckily we still don't get anything substantial. Read it here.