Recent films #1:
CHARLIE WILSON’S WAR: **, and a lot of that is for the interesting odd-couple of Philip Seymour Hoffmann and Tom Hanks as two inside connivers in the 1980s in Washington who managed to push hard enough with the right information and schmoozing to get the United States solidly behind the covert war against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. With Aaron Sorkin involved, I expected a more sleazy-side version of The West Wing (which we’re presently re-watching the whole series at home) - but it’s awfully hollow. The one point the film makes about how people could get fired up to militarily whale on the Soviets by proxy, but couldn’t come up with anything to win the resultant peace (letting the country go into the hands of the Taliban and bin Laden later). Not really recommended. Not for kids at all.
NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN: BOMB I have liked the early Coen brothers’ stuff, but their more recent stuff has left me flat, and this was a total bust. Highly bloody and violent, it’s the story of - well, a lot of people being killed over drug money, most by one of the most horrifying psycho killers I’ve seen in a while. The first half catches your attention and is moderately followable, but all of a sudden, a major character is killed and the plot goes to pieces - as does the movie, which wanders off to lots more gore and damn little sense. Tommy Lee Jones is totally wasted as a meandering folksy sheriff.