POTC

I'll second (well, Nth, really) dkapell's recommendation to go see Pirates of the Caribbean. As in right now.

Saw it last night with tpau, ladysprite, jducoeur, msmemory, umbran, laurion, asdr83, outlander, and three people who haven't been eaten by LJ yet (an impressive majority, there). The film is excellent in every way. It has good acting from all the main players, but especially superb work from Johnny Depp and Geoffrey Rush. It is beautifully balanced between macabre drama and clever physical and verbal comedy, each twisty enough to surprise me most of the time. It is thoroughly original, which is a rarity in the modern movie industry. As a final touch of coolness, it contains a number of visual references to the Disney World ride of the same name (on which the film is "based"). I would watch it again right now. Go see it.

Oh, yeah

Forgot, I also saw another movie yesterday.

tpau, dkapell, knobhdy, and I saw The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. It was a McMovie, part of the growing trend of churning out homogeneous ensemble action films nominally adapted from something else. X-men the first, Ocean's Eleven, and The Italian Job (which I saw on Wednesday and thought was quite enjoyable) are other examples of this problem. Even LOTR has clearly been straining against hollywoodism. I thought that LXG was a particularly egregious case in that they mangled such an erudite source. Why not have Justice League: The Film if you are going to be vapid about it? The original comic is subtle and victorian, where the film could be modern day, with modern characters for all the style they impart. I disrecommend it. Even more strongly, if you are ever interested in reading the comic, don't see the movie. Some have said they would rather see the movie first so that they aren't disappointed by it, but this film is not worth such sacrifice. The comic is in large part a puzzle, with many persons' identities kept mysterious for a long time. If you see the movie that will be ruined for you.

As a side note, I've noticed that modern movies have shockingly bad fight scenes. They tend toward choppy, close-up, and incoherent. It's frequently very hard to tell who's killing whom. LXG is certainly a good example of this, but by far not the worst. My suspicion is that Gladiator, which as you may recall was praised for its "fantastic" action sequences, may have been a major influence in this area. Seeing Pirates of the Caribbean drove home that it is indeed possible to make complex but interesting film combat.