The 81st annual Academy Awards aired last Sunday, offering viewers a glimpse of Hollywood glitz and the abundance of films that never hit a High Country screen. Being respectful of our readership, your Mountain Times staff will not feign knowledge of unscreened films for review, though group editor Jason Reagan could likely offer a surprisingly accurate synopsis of Space Chimps. Instead, we’d like to tell you about some of the best films we’ve seen lately – films that are, or should be, accessible through your local video renting establishment.

Frank Ruggiero: In Bruges

Let’s face it. There’s always a bit of apprehension when going into a movie whose title you’re not 100 percent certain how to pronounce. Fortunately, I’d seen the preview enough times to know not only how to pronounce “Bruges” as “broozh,” but also that Bruges is a medieval city in Belgium with a tourism-based economy, wherein a movie was filmed to eventually offer a breath of fresh air into the tired hitman action-comedy formula.

Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson and Ralph Fiennes star in 2008’s In Bruges.

In Bruges, directed and written by English playwright Martin McDonagh (Six Shooter), stars Colin Farrell (Alexander, Miami Vice) and Brendan Gleeson (Cold Mountain, Harry Potter series) as Ray and Ken, two assassins sent by their boss, Harry (Ralph Fiennes of The English Patient and The Reader), to his favorite childhood vacation spot of Bruges to lay low after a horribly botched job. Ken is quite willing to enjoy the quaint town for all its picturesque worth, while Ray, responsible for the hit gone wrong, bears the full emotional brunt of his actions and loathes every waking minute of their compulsory holiday.

As the two begin interacting with the locals, Ray’s discontentment begins to draw attention, requiring some intervention from Ken, his mentor. Farrell and Gleeson bring a tangibly human dynamic to their roles, similar in candidness and humor to Tarantino’s Jules and Vincent from Pulp Fiction, but with a more realistic edge. The consequences of their actions weigh visibly upon them, and their perception of life and death is just as heavy. Add to that the dreamlike quality of Bruges, where the film was actually shot, and the superb cinematography that highlights the vivid setting, and viewers practically join Ray and Ken on their ethereal journey. Certain elements of a hitman story are naturally unavoidable, but the surreal quality of In Bruges handles them with dialogue-rich finesse and character-driven grace.

In Bruges is rated R for strong bloody violence, pervasive language and some drug use.

Jeff Eason: Atticus, Scout, Jem and Boo

If I’m surfing my way through the movie channels, there are a handful of movies that I’ll hardly ever pass up.

Despite giving remarkable performances in To Kill A Mockingbird, child stars Mary Badham and Phillip Alford did very little else in their acting careers.

Lately, I’ve stumbled upon the 1962 classic To Kill A Mockingbird a few times, and I always have to watch it through to the end. It is a movie of fantastic quotes that stay with me for days. Some of my favorites include Mayella’s courtroom description of meeting Tom Robinson, the black man accused of rape. She testifies, “I said, ‘You come in here, boy, and bust up this chifforobe, and I’ll give you a nickel.’” Then there’s Sheriff Tate telling Atticus how he’s going to handle a case by saying, “I may not be much, Mr. Finch, but I’m still sheriff of Maycomb County. And Bob Ewell fell on his knife. Good night, sir.”

Some of the best quotes are between the Finch siblings, six-year-old Scout and her 10-year-old brother, Jem. At one point, the kids are speculating about the Radleys, a mysterious family that lives in their neighborhood. Jem says, “He has a boy named Boo that he keeps chained to a bed in the house over yonder. Boo only comes out at night when you’re asleep and it’s pitch dark. When you wake up at night, you can hear him. Once I heard him scratchin’ on our screen door, but he was gone by the time Atticus got there. Judgin’ from his tracks, he’s about six and a half feet tall. He eats raw squirrels and all the cats he can catch. There’s a long, jagged scar that runs all the way across his face. His teeth are yella and rotten. His eyes are popped. And he drools most of the time.”

Despite the kids’ fear of Arthur “Boo” Radley (played by Robert Duvall in his first feature film role), the character turns out to be one of the heroes of the film, leading up to one of the greatest quotes in film history when Scout discovers him hiding behind a bedroom door and says, “Hey, Boo.” .

Scott Nicholson: No Don to Joe Don

I saw some movies that turned out to be popular, and some turned out to be so easy to forget that I forgot them. I believe the movie that stuck with me the most was “The Orphanage,” which was a poignant Spanish horror movie about lost children and lost childhood. For pure mindless entertainment, I would go for whichever Indiana Jones movie that was (the third or fourth?) that came out last summer. Or was that the year before? Sorry, I’m so out of touch with popular culture that I forget.

“Got any bacon? Go ahead on.”

The worst movie I saw was “Pineapple Express.” When a friendly stoner movie jumps the shark into over-the-top violence, you know the filmmakers have lost their way.

But that doesn’t count “Tropic Thunder,” which was so stupid in the first 45 seconds that we ran horrified from the theater, tried to get our money back, but then were ushered into “Pineapple Express.” Probably would have been better off bouncing from screen to screen, kind of like trying to read latter-day “Peanuts” comic strips where Charles Schultz’s panels were merely shuffled back and forth into random groups of three.

I love Akira Kurosawa, and you can get many of his DVDs at the public library. “Ran” is beautiful, as is “Dersu Uzala” and “Seven Samurai.”

I didn’t watch any movies with Bigfoot or Joe Don Baker in them, so I probably missed out, and I am pretty sure I didn’t have a single Samuel L. Jackson sighting in 2008. I told you I was out of touch. As one friend said, “The closest degree to Kevin Bacon you get is bacon.”

Melanie Davis: Marley and Me

My favorite movie of 2008 is the very same film that left me sobbing like a little girl. I seriously debated going to see Marley and Me before finally deciding I could handle it.

Melanie’s pets, Blue and Zebeba, are treated like human children.

The basic story follows the bond between a man and his dog over the years of the pet’s life. It follows from a puppy at the beginning of a marriage through three children and major career changes. To add to the comedic effect, the dog also happens to be large, unruly and very capable of terrorizing people, particularly dog trainers.
Owen Wilson and Jennifer Aniston did a wonderful job of making the characters real and someone the audience could relate to. It wasn’t a particularly action-packed film. It simply followed a family through a marriage. Wilson plays a columnist who desperately wants more out of his career. Marley comes into the picture to prepare them for children. As any pet-lover would attest to, he becomes their first child.

It is a sad fact of life that our pets do not have the life span we would hope for. I cannot remember a time in my life when I didn’t have a pet. Their lifetimes become chapters in ours. The film was definitely one I could relate to, as I am beginning my family and we deal with a 100-pound baby of our own. Fortunately, he grew out of the unruly stage quickly, though our house remains child-proof. There can’t be any breakable items within three feet of the floor due to tail-swinging.

I was sobbing to the point I expected to be shushed by the people behind me at the end of the film. The end of the characters’ chapter comes along. I went home to hold Blue in my lap for an hour.

Approximately three weeks ago, we lost one our babies, Zebeba, to a stroke. He was our youngest cat. They truly become children and to this day there is a void in our house – particularly on my chest when I am trying to sleep. I suggest everyone see Marley and Me. While you’re laughing as the dog tears the sofa apart, remember how much you’ll miss even that when they are gone.