IN: Review: Riding Giants is an amazing movie. It really shows how these people lived back then just to surf. Their lives were basically surfing, living, breathing, and having fun. They didn't care about money, jobs, girls or any thing. To them the waves were their girls. I have never been on a surf board, and it looks so hard, I don't understand how they can stay on them, it makes no sense at all. This is an awesome movie and if you love surfing then you should really see this movie. If you're a surfer and you want to find out who started surfing, how it came into life, who is really famous at it or what ever, then you should really see it. It might be a documentary, but it is really good. -Tara F.-
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OUT: positive

IN: Review: I enjoyed The Night Listener very much. It's one of the better movies of the summer.

Robin Williams gives one of his best performances. In fact, the entire cast was very good. All played just the right notes for their characters - not too much and not too little. Sandra Oh adds a wonderful comic touch. Toni Collette is great as the Mom, and never goes over the top. Everyone is very believable.

It's a short movie, just under an hour and a half. I noticed the general release version is nine minutes shorter than the Sundance version. I wonder if some of the more disturbing images were cut from the movie.

The director told a story and did it in straightforward fashion, which is a refreshing change from many directors these days who seem to think their job is to impress the audience rather than tell a story and tell it well.

Do not be sucker punched by the previews and ads. It is not a Hitchcockian thriller. See The Night Listener because you want to see a good story told well. If you go expecting Hitchcock you will be disappointed.

My only complaint with the movie was the ending. The director could have left a little more to the audience's imagination, but this is a minor quibble.
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IN: Review: There are many illnesses born in the mind of man which have been given life in modern times. Constant vigilance or accrued information in the realm of Pyschosis, have kept psychologists, counselors and psychiatrists busy with enough work to last them decades. Occasionally, some of these mental phenomenon are discover by those with no knowledge of their remedy or even of their existence. That is the premise of the film entitled " The Night Listner." It tells the story of a popular radio host called Gabriel Noon (Robin Williams) who spends his evenings enthralling his audiences with vivid stories about Gay lifestyles. Perhaps its because his show is losing it's authentic veneer which causes Noon to admit he is no longer himself. Feeling abandoned by both his lover Jess (Bobby Cannavale) and his and best friend (Joe Morton), he seeks shelter in his deepening despair and isolation. It is here, a mysterious voice in the night asks him for help. Noon needs to feel useful and reaches out to the desperate voice which belongs to a 14 year old boy called Peter (Rory Culkin). In reading the boy's harrowing manuscript which depicts the early life and sexual abuse at the hands of his brutal parents, Noon is captivated and wants to help. However, things are not what they seem and Noon soon finds himself en-wrapped in an elusive and bizarre tale torn right out of a medical nightmare. This movie is pure Robin Williams and were it not for Toni Collette who plays Donna D. Logand, Sandra Oh as Anna and John Cullum as pop, this might be comical. Instead, this may prove to be one of William's more serious performances. ***
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IN: Review: Thre isn't a single Scorsese movie I'd place on a list of my favorite movies. But this is the best thing I've run through my DVD player in about five years. Scorsese's patient elucidation of favorite film moments, and how Hollywood works is incredibly gracious, calm and intelligent.

It's 3 DVD-sides worth of material. It would have to be a British production, since everything about American corporate culture would have trampled the quiet, methodical, no frills, put-the-focus-on-the-content approach that is taken here. And an American production would have demanded he say he liked only movies that were popular favorites. I wish everyone took a page from his love of movies. You should love the movies you do for personal, idiosyncratic and specific reasons. Not just more "Me-too" votes for The Godfather, etc.. People have no clue what ideas are being explored in their favorite movies. If they did, movies would be more interesting than they are. Scorsese DOES know what ideas are being explored, and that makes him a compelling, involved speaker on the topic. I really appreciate his articulate, generous interviews over the last decade.

On a negative note, Scorsese is best when he's excited to show you some obscure movie, rather than when he's didactically teaching you something well-established about film history. And I do wish he pluck those three hairs out of the bridge of his nose. It's very distracting.
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positive