Movies and Such

Thanks to Blockbuster Online, I saw a couple of decent movies in the last few days:

Apocalypto - Quite a brutal, but interesting, story (directed by Mel Gibson) that takes place during the heights of the Mayan civilization. You see the grandeur and celebration at the temples but also the way the most powerful rulers pillaged villages in the surrounding forests to find human sacrifices. It's pretty bloody and graphic, but also quite suspenseful as, of course, one man gets away from his captors and spends most of the movie trying to outrun them. Oh, and it's done entirely in subtitles, which I didn't know ahead of time but didn't mind. [Actually, when I looked up the link on IMDB, I found out it had been nominated for quite a few movie awards - and won a handful]

Ocean's Thirteen - Yes, the third in the clever "ring of thieves" movies with a star-studded cast: Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Andy Garcia, Al Pacino, Don Cheadle, Casey Affleck, Bernie Mac, Matt Damon (who's hilarious, by the way, as the geeky kid who really wants to be a cool cat like Pitt and Clooney but isn't)... In this one, the group works to steal profits from a hotel/casino owner who double-crossed one of their own. It was good, not as good as the first one, but OK. I figured out the twist at the end before it happened, while Ocean's Eleven and Ocean's Twelve surprised me, so enough said.

And there are actually a couple in the theaters I wouldn't mind seeing: Atonement, Juno, I Am Legend, National Treaure 2. It's just a matter of finding the time (sigh). Seen any good ones lately that you'd recommend?