I should have been a pair of ragged claws

This post includes complete, fun-negating spoilers. Do not read if you haven't seen Wall-E yet! The first two thirds of Wall-E (until the Captain starts talking) is amazingly great. Pixar's greatest work, including the Incredibles. They have effectively a silent movie with a robot on a destroyed, garbage-filled Earth that is compassionate, warm, and endearing. Before Wall-E, Lucas owned robots. Wall-E makes R2 look like a 8-bit hack. His bazillion-points-of-articulation eyes, insanely clever physical design, and his collection, organization, and adoration of unique human garbage makes him brilliant. Pixar excels here because I believe robot humor is all about making you think the robot is a human, then doing something unexpected to remind you it's not. Pixar's creativity shines brightly through constant surprises. The first 2/3rds played out beautifully because they relied on the roots of Chaplin movies; an instantly beloved protagonist and inventive physical comedy. My...

"That was like a dream." said my brother as we climbed in the car after seeing Miyazaki's latest film. An apt description; the sheer amount of creativity and incredible vision Howl's Moving Castle presents is often only available in our dreams. But like our dreams, Miyazaki's movies tend to stop intead of end, leaving us scratching our heads and wondering what it all meant. Attempting to reconstruct the plot into a coherent whole is frustrating and futile. Yet why would we? Are our dreams any less beautiful because they lack a fitting conclusion? While I prefer watching Studio Ghibli films with the subtitles instead of dubbed voices, I can't imagine seeing Howl's Moving Castle without Billy Crystal's Calcifer. His wry, sarconic delivery perfectly suits the character and, like his performance as Mike Mike Wazowski in Monsters Inc., it just wouldn't be the same without him.

Wow. It hurts me to say that since I'm such a snob of the mainstream, but the biggest Hollywood blockbuster this summer is well written, well directed, and well acted. I found the first movie to be uneven; interesting moral quandaries for Spiderman but Dafoe's Green Goblin was overplayed and unsatisfying. My hope for the sequel came from Peter Parker's closing monologue about the struggle to choose to do good. The second movie dives right into these issues with Peter Parker struggling to maintain his personal and financial life while performing the endless tasks required of a superhero. The conflict hinted to at the end of the first movie erupts to a climax, making for a gripping internal struggle. The super-villains in Spiderman movies are nearly footnotes; they are physical threat that forces Spiderman to make the decisions that make the movie emotionally fulfilling. Everyone knows Spiderman will win the day and die only when the movies fail to be profitable, but the choi...

Master and Commander is fantastic. Directed by the Truman Show's Peter Wier , it's a period fiction piece about a British ship and it's brave crew engaging a larger, faster Napolean galleon that hunts them like a phantom. Think Das Boot with sunlight, humor, and movie-star charisma. I actually enjoy the movie more than the German classic. M&C is a thinking guy's action movie. The film is beautifully shot, visual poetry of 19th century sea vessels and the men that sailed them. The cast is fantastic, especially the two leads, Russel Crowe and Paul Bettany as the ship's captain and doctor, respectively. The sea battles are logical and visceral. Unlike most war movies, the scenes between the battles are no less captivating. Master and Commander is of my favorite movies released this year, along with Lost in Translation .