Oscar Winners

[8] Brad Pitt, Anthony Hopkins, and Aidan Quinn star in this sprawling, family melodrama set in early twentieth century Montana, where the Ludlow family works their ranch in the untamed wilderness. Hopkins plays the patriarch, a pacifist and single father who is dismayed when his sons express desire to enlist in the first World War. Pitt and Quinn play the elder brothers, and Henry Thomas …

[9] One of the surest ways a film can win my heart is by letting me into the lives of characters aching for healing who achieve genuine, emotional human connection. It’s why I love films like Pump Up the Volume, The Breakfast Club, Sideways, or Little Miss Sunshine. Telling this kind of story convincingly and without too much sentimentality is an astonishingly difficult thing for …

[6] Cillian Murphy (28 Days Later) stars as the physicist credited with inventing the atomic bomb in this sprawling, rapid-paced, three-hour Best Picture Academy Award winner from director Christopher Nolan (Interstellar, Inception). The first hour of Oppenheimer focuses on the man’s life before the bomb, establishing him as a brilliant but difficult personality and a bit of a womanizer whose Left-leaning politics threaten to make …

[7] Arnold Schwarzenegger stars in this high-concept futuristic actioner about a blue-collar man who pays to have memories of a Mars vacation implanted in his memory — the next-best thing, and a cheaper alternative, to actually going there. But the procedure ends up triggering deeply buried memories of his time as a freedom-fighter on Mars, fighting against an evil corporation who owns and controls the …

[6] Writer/director James Cameron (Titanic, Aliens) returns to the world of Pandora thirteen years after the first Avatar film broke all box office records. Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) now lives completely among the planet’s tall, blue natives – the Na’vi. He and Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) are raising four children, including Kiri (Sigourney Weaver), who has a mysterious, powerful connection to all life on Pandora. They’ve …

[9] I never knew a Godzilla movie could be this good. Writer/Director/VFX Supervisor Takashi Yamazaki reinvigorates the venerable franchise with a combination of terrific visual effects, exciting action sequences, and a surprisingly emotional storyline. The film is anchored by its lead actor, Ryunosuke Kamiki, playing a World War II kamikaze (suicide) pilot who, over the course of the film, finds a reason to live. Or …

[7] James Stewart plays the son of a Wall Street tycoon whose father (Edward Arnold) is trying to force an eccentric family out of their home so he can pursue a major real estate development deal. Things get more complicated when Stewart realizes the family in question is his fiancĂ©e’s (Jean Arthur). You Can’t Take It With You is a quintessential Frank Capra movie, focusing …

[7] Director Adam McKay (Vice, Don’t Look Up) adapts Michael Lewis’ bestselling novel about the men who predicted the 2008 mortgage implosion and near-collapse of the world economy. If this sounds like dreary, heady, political stuff, that’s because it is. But McKay tackles the material with enough irreverence and off-beat humor to make it palatable… or as palatable as the triumph of capitalist greed can …

[7] Lauren Bacall finds herself in a love triangle with two best friends played by Rock Hudson and Robert Stack. She marries Stack, the rich playboy, while Hudson continues pining for her. After moving into the family home, Stack’s sister (Dorothy Malone), the town slut, tries to drive a wedge between them and blackmail Hudson into marrying her. Add to this storyline a heap of …

[8] Director Tim Burton (Batman, Ed Wood) followed his debut feature, Pee Wee’s Big Adventure, with this stylish fantasy-comedy about a young deceased couple (Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis) trying to haunt an annoying new family out of their quaint countryside home. When the new family ends up more amused than alarmed by their ghostly antics, they’re left with no choice but to summon the …

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