Shameless Self Expression

Mara Wilson plays Matilda Wormwood, the largely forgotten daughter of a shonky car salesman (Danny DeVito, of course) and his insipid wife (Rhea Perlman), who along with their other child are brainless TV addicts. Matilda is different. She yearns to learn, spending hours a day at the local library, having been left to fend for herself by her thoughtless family. She also has unusual powers, such as telekinesis, not that her dopey parents bother to notice. Matilda, at age 6, decides she wants to go to school. Her parents, who actually angrily protest and believe that she’s only 4 years old, decline, until DeVito comes into contact with Miss Trunchbull (Pam Ferris), a fearsome former shot-put and javelin thrower turned headmistress of the oppressive and decidedly Gothic-looking Crunchem Hall. Once there, Matilda encounters a place full of children (and teachers) frightened of setting off the tempestuous, impossibly strong Trunchbull, who is fond of throwing children out of classroom w...

Set in a small rural Virginian town in the early 30s, we follow a family of moonshiners during Prohibition. They are the Bondurant brothers, headed by imposing, taciturn eldest brother Forrest (Tom Hardy), who along with youngest brother Jack (Shia LaBeouf) and middle brother Howard (Jason Clarke) run a restaurant that is really just a front for their less reputable business. Into their happy little arrangement involving bribed local cops comes federal agent Charlie Rakes (an incredible Guy Pearce), an effete-looking but seriously brutal man from Chicago intent on bringing the Bondurants down. Gary Oldman plays the head of a rival outfit, Jessica Chastain plays an out-of-towner who is hoping to seek quiet refuge and employment with the boys, Mia Wasikowska plays a quiet girl from a religious family whom Jack tries to woo, and Dane DeHaan plays a sweet-natured family associate/accomplice who isn’t quite right in the head.   Although it’s about lesser criminals and the much l...

Bella (Kristen Stewart) is now a vampire, as Edward (Robert Pattinson) tries to teach her to control her bloodlust, as they also care for their child Renesmee. Things get a wee bit complicated when vampire Irina (Maggie Grace) reports to the Volturi about Renesmee’s existence, under the mistaken belief that she is an abomination, a vampire child, i.e. A human child who has been turned and therefore will stay as a child forever and never mature. However, she is in fact half-human by birth, and apparently that doesn’t make her a sick, freaky abomination who will bite the shit out of your neck in the middle of the night to satiate her uncontrollable bloodlust. The Volturi, led by Michael Sheen and Dakota Fanning see this as reason enough to go to war (why didn’t they just get her birth certificate?), and the Cullen clan (including Peter Facinelli, Ashley Greene, Nikki Reed, and Kellan Lutz)set out across the globe to gather forces, vampires who will testify that Renesmee is a half-hum...