Fans of “The Office” and “30 Rock,” rejoice! The stars of NBC’s Thursday night comedy lineup team up for the action-comedy “Date Night,” a movie with more laughs than its flimsy premise deserves.

Steve Carell (aka Michael Scott of “The Office”) and Tina Fey (aka Liz Lemon of “30 Rock”) star as Phil and Claire Foster, an exhausted married couple with loud kids, time-consuming careers and a limp love life. Their evening routine involves the application of snoring strips and retainers, and their weekly date night typically culminates at a sleepy restaurant serving salmon and potato skins.

Sounds pretty nice, actually.

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While The Mad Hatter wonders why a raven is like a writing desk, audiences of the new “Alice in Wonderland” might wonder what director Tim Burton was hoping to accomplish with his live-action reimagining of the Lewis Carroll classic.

The twisted visionary behind “Edward Scissorhands” and “Ed Wood” has no problem getting another strange and enchanting performance out of his frequent collaborator, Johnny Depp. The actor’s Mad Hatter, boasting Carrot Top hair and the occasional Scottish accent, certainly tickles the imagination. So why can’t the rest of “Alice in Wonderland” do the same?

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Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin host the (something annual) Academy Awards at 5 p.m. Sunday on ABC. It should be a big test for the industry’s most celebrated award show. While some see the 10-nominee Best Picture race as detrimental to the Academy’s reputation as the authority on quality filmmaking, others believe the stuffed category will boost ratings for the fledgling ceremony telecast.

Those are discussions for other days. For now, let’s focus on the big night: Who will win, and perhaps more importantly, who should win. On with the predictions!

Best Picture
The most heated battle of the night comes down to mega-blockbuster “Avatar” and the low-budget war drama “The Hurt Locker.” The two films couldn’t be any more different. One is good, and the other is an overblown rip-off of “Pocahontas” with cool special effects.

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No matter how great the filmmaker behind the camera, a movie is only as good as its screenplay.

Martin Scorsese may be the best director working today, but even he can’t steer “Shutter Island” away from its fundamental story problems. Moody atmosphere, convincing period art direction and an island stocked of A-list actors just can’t save the film from a predictable, tedious plot.

Based on a novel by Dennis Lehane (“Mystic River”), “Shutter Island” takes place in 1954 at a hospital for the criminally insane located on a remote, Northeastern island. A disturbed murderer has disappeared from her cell, so two U.S. Marshals (Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo) are called in to investigate. A couple immediate warning signs for the officers: The guards won’t let them bring in their firearms, and the hospital doctors (Ben Kingsley and Max von Sydow) exude a level of vague creepiness typically reserved for villains on “Lost” island.

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I finally got around to seeing "The Invention of Lying" tonight (Thanks, Netflix, for delaying its availability four weeks after its regular home video release date).

The film isn’t as hilarious as you might expect from writer/director/star Ricky Gervais, the man behind the British version of "The Office" and the HBO series, "Extras." Still, “The Invention of Lying” has quite the intriguing premise: Gervais plays a man who can lie in a world where everyone else can only speak the truth, no matter how harsh.

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Pick of the Week: “Cold Souls”
Paul Giamatti made a perfect wino in “Sideways” and a rather effective boxing coach to Russell Crowe in “Cinderella Man.” In his latest acting challenge, Giamatti plays Paul Giamatti, a semi-famous actor tackling a soul-sucking role in a Chekov play.

That’s only the start of “Cold Souls,” a bizarre but thoughtful independent film that was quietly released late last summer. When the character of Giamatti grows tired of his heavy emotional load, he visits a doctor (David Strathairn, “Good Night, and Good Luck.”) who can remove souls from the human body and store them in a facility until patients want them back. Without his soul, Giamatti can add some much needed levity to his dreary stage role. (more…)

The North Idaho lifestyle has its benefits. Diverse moviegoing is not one of them. Some of the best movies of any given year never play in our area, and many take their sweet time getting here.

“Crazy Heart,” the indie drama starring Oscar hopeful Jeff Bridges, finally opened in Spokane last week after months of media buzz.  Bridges stars as has-been country singer Bad Blake, a raging alcoholic who survives on the crumbs of a few good, sad songs. It’s a performance that will no doubt earn Bridges a long overdue Academy Award.

Blake travels hundreds of miles in his beaten truck to play half-empty bowling alleys and dive bars. Still a great musician (in between puking up his whiskey meals), Blake hasn’t written anything new in years. Too bad, because former protégé Tommy Sweet (a terrific Colin Farrell) has hit the big time and wants the industry’s best drunken songwriter to pen a few hits.

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Casual moviegoers finally have a reason to watch the Academy Awards ceremony.

When the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences decided to expand its Best Picture category from five nominees to 10, many hoped it would lead to a more diverse and audience-friendly awards show. They got their wish, and it only desecrated the Oscar image a little bit.

The expanded category gives blockbusters “Avatar,” “The Blind Side,” “District 9,””Inglourious Basterds” and “Up” a chance to compete against the smaller, award-friendlier films, “An Education,” “The Hurt Locker,” “Precious,” “A Serious Man” and “Up in the Air.”

Voters should be commended for such solid choices in the first year of this 10-nominee experiment. “Up” becomes only the second animated feature to ever compete for Best Picture, and surprise nominee “District 9” proves that Academy voters are finally beginning to understand the craft of science-fiction. Yeah, yeah, “Avatar” proves that too.

The only real misfit here is “The Blind Side,” a movie with almost no Oscar precursors to its credit. Most of its buzz has circled star Sandra Bullock, who is now the likely frontrunner in the Best Actress category.

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Science-fiction isn’t all about space battles, lightsabers and really tall Smurfs. Occasionally, filmmakers can utilize futuristic settings to tell fascinating stories of personal struggle.

Such is the case with “Moon,” a haunting indie sci-fi starring Sam Rockwell as the sole astronaut working a three-year stint on a remote moon base. This is Rockwell’s show, with only small roles reserved for other humans. Kevin Spacey provides the nurturing voice of the base’s computer system.

Don’t you dare watch the theatrical trailer or read the film’s synopsis.The less known about the twists and turns in “Moon,” the better.

The essential info: Rockwell’s character is only days away from returning home to Earth. When he crashes his lunar rover on a routine assignment, he discovers something completely mind-blowing.

Directed with a sure hand by Duncan Jones, “Moon” lacks the requisite action sequences of flashier sci-fi tales, but the script remains stuffed with tension, especially as the lonely astronaut discovers the secrets of his lunar home. The terrific performance by Rockwell makes you forget he’s the only one onscreen for 90+ minutes.

Taking on nothing less than the significance of human existence, “Moon” stays with the viewer not because of revolutionary special effects, but because of thoughtful, exhilarating storytelling. Please, please, please, don’t read any else about it. Just see it.

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Everyone else can love it, but the mega-blockbuster “Avatar” is certainly NOT one of my favorite movies of 2009.

James Cameron’s science-fiction epic continues to shatter box office records, and three weeks after its worldwide release, word of mouth seems to be stronger than ever. Critics have gushed over it, and many consider it to be the front runner in this year’s expanded Best Picture race at the Academy Awards.

To all of this, I say, “Eh.”

I’m not here to bash the popular kid. I’ll give “Avatar” the credit it deserves in that it’s easily the most spectacular looking movie I’ve ever seen. The special effects are seamless, and the motion-capture animation is revolutionary and realistic. Gollum in “Lord of the Rings” is nothing compared to the subtle performance by Zoe Saldana as Na’vi warrior Neytiri.

The problem is everything else.

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