Movie News: British Independent Film Award Winners

* denotes winner

Best British Independent Film
And When Did You Last See Your Father?
*Control
Eastern Promises
Hallam Foe
Notes On A Scandal

Best Performance By An Actress
Anne Hathaway (Becoming Jane)
Tannishtha Chatterjee (Brick Lane)
Sophia Myles (Hallam Foe)
Kierston Wareing (It's A Free World...)
*Judi Dench (Notes On A Scandal)

Best Performance By An Actor
Jim Broadbent (And When Did You Last See Your Father?)
Sam Riley (Control)
*Viggo Mortensen (Eastern Promises)
Jamie Bell (Hallam Foe)
Cillian Murphy (Sunshine)

Best Performance by a Supporting Actor or Actress
Colin Firth (And When Did You Last See Your Father?)
Samantha Morton (Control)
*Toby Kebbell (Control)
Armin Mueller Stahl (Eastern Promises)
Cate Blanchett for (Notes On A Scandal)

Most Promising Newcomer
Imogen Poots (28 Weeks Later)
Matthew Beard (And When Did You Last See Your Father?)
*Sam Riley (Control)
Bradley Cole (Exhibit A)
Kierston Wareing (It's A Free World...)

Best Screenplay
David Nicholls (And When Did You Last See Your Father?)
Matt Greenhalgh (Control)
Steve Knight (Eastern Promises)
Ed Whitmore, David MacKenzie (Hallam Foe)
*Patrick Marber (Notes On A Scandal)

Best Director
Anand Tucker (And When Did You Last See Your Father?)
Sarah Gavron (Brick Lane)
*Anton Corbijn (Control)
David Cronenberg (Eastern Promises)
David MacKenzie (Hallam Foe)

Best Achievement In Production
*Black Gold
Control
Exhibit A
Extraordinary Rendition
Garbage Warrior

The Douglas Hickox Award
Mark Francis, Nick Francis (Black Gold)
*Anton Corbijn (Control)
Oliver Hodge (Garbage Warrior)
David Schwimmer (Run, Fat Boy, Run)
Steve Hudson (True North)

Best British Documentary
Black Gold
Deep Water
Garbage Warrior
In The Shadow Of The Moon
*Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten

Best Technical Achievement
Enrique Chediak (28 Weeks Later)
Trevor Waite (And When Did You Last See Your Father?)
Martin Ruhe (Control)
Colin Monie, David MacKenzie (Hallam Foe)
*Mark Tildesley (Sunshine)

Best British Short Film
A Bout De Truffe: The Truffle Hunter
Cherries
*Dog Altogether
The Girls
What Does Your Daddy Do?

Best Foreign Independent Film
Black Book
La Vie En Rose
Once
Tell No One
*The Lives Of Others

The Raindance Award
Exhibit A
*The Inheritance
Tovarisch: I Am Not Dead

The Richard Harris Award
*Ray Winstone

The Special Jury Prize
*Robert Beeson, Pamela Engel, Andi Engel (Artificial Eye)

The Variety Award
*Daniel Craig

Movie News: Spirit Award Winners

*denotes winner

Best Feature
The Diving Bell And The Butterfly
I'm Not There
*Juno
A Mighty Heart
Paranoid Park

Best Director
Todd Haynes (I'm Not There)
Tamara Jenkins (The Savages)
Jason Reitman (Juno)
*Julian Schnabel (The Diving Bell And The Butterfly)
Gus Van Sant (Paranoid Park)

Best First Feature
2 Days in Paris
Great World of Sound
*The Lookout
Rocket Science
Vanaja

John Cassavetes Award
*August Evening
Owl And The Sparrow
The Pool
Quiet City
Shotgun Stories

Best Screenplay
Ronald Harwood (The Diving Bell And The Butterfly)
*Tamara Jenkins (The Savages)
Fred Parnes & Andrew Wagner (Starting Out In The Evening)
Adrienne Shelly (Waitress)
Mike White (Year Of The Dog)

Best First Screenplay
Jeffrey Blitz (Rocket Science)
Zoe Cassavetes (Broken English)
*Diablo Cody (Juno)
Kelly Masterson (Before The Devil Knows You're Dead)
John Orloff (A Mighty Heart)

Best Female Lead
Angelina Jolie (A Mighty Heart)
Sienna Miller (Interview)
*Ellen Page (Juno)
Parker Posey (Broken English)
Tang Wei (Lust, Caution)

Best Male Lead
Pedro Castaneda (August Evening)
Don Cheadle (Talk To Me)
*Philip Seymour Hoffman (The Savages)
Frank Langella (Starting Out In The Evening)
Tony Leung (Lust, Caution)

Best Supporting Female
*Cate Blanchett (I'm Not There)
Anna Kendrick (Rocket Science)
Jennifer Jason Leigh (Margot At The Wedding)
Tamara Podemski (Four Sheets To The Wind)
Marisa Tomei (Before The Devil Knows You're Dead)

Best Supporting Male
*Chiwetel Ejiofor (Talk To Me)
Marcus Carl Franklin (I'm Not There)
Kene Holliday (Great World Of Sound)
Irrfan Khan (The Namesake)
Steve Zahn (Rescue Dawn)

Best Cinematography
Mott Hupfel (The Savages)
*Janusz Kaminski (The Diving Bell And The Butterfly)
Milton Kam (Vanaja)
Mihai Malaimare, Jr (Youth Without Youth)
Rodrigo Prieto (Lust, Caution)

Best Documentary
*Crazy Love
Lake Of Fire
Manufactured Landscapes
The Monastery
The Prisoner Or: How I Planned To Kill Tony Blair

Best Foriegn Film
4 Months, 3 Weeks And 2 Days (Romania)
The Band's Visit (Israel)
Lady Chatterley (France)
*Once (Ireland)
Persepolis (France)

Robert Altman Award
*I'm Not There

Movie News: Gotham Award Winners

* denotes winner

Best Feature
Great World Of Sound
I'm Not There
*Into The Wild
Margot At The Wedding
The Namesake

Best Documentary
The Devil Came On Horseback
Jimmy Carter Man From Plains
My Kid Could Paint That
*Sicko
Taxi To The Dark Side

Breakthrough Director
Lee Isaac Chung (Munyurangabo)
Stephane Gauger (Owl And The Sparrow)
Julie Loktev (Day Night Day Night)
David Von Ancken (Seraphim Falls)
*Craig Zobel (Great World Of Sound)

Breakthrough Actor
Emile Hirsch (Into The Wild)
Kene Holliday (Great World Of Sound)
*Ellen Page (Juno)
Jess Weixler (Teeth)
Luisa Williams (Day Night Day Night)

Best Ensemble Cast
*Before the Devil Knows You're Dead (tie)
The Last Winter
Margot At The Wedding
The Savages
*Talk To Me (tie)

Best Film Not Playing At A Theater Near You
August The First
*Frownland
Loren Cass
Mississippi Chicken
Off The Grid: Life On The Mesa

Movie Review: I'm Not There

Todd Haynes has come a long way in 20 years. Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, his 1987 biopic about the late singer, starred Barbie dolls and featured music that Haynes failed to secure the rights to. (Not surprisingly, the film still cannot be screened legally.) Since, the director has made movies that have been good (2002's Far From Heaven), bad (1991's Poison, 1995's Safe) and ugly (1998's Velvet Goldmine), but at the very least, all of them are original and have proven that Haynes has a style and vision all his own. He now returns to the unconventional-rock-biopic game with I'm Not There, though this time he has an A-list cast (Cate Blanchett, Christian Bale, Richard Gere, Heath Ledger and others) and a better grasp of the phrase "copyright infringement." I'm Not There features six different actors -- the four mentioned above, plus Marcus Carl Franklin and Ben Whishaw -- playing Bob Dylan (though none is actually named Bob Dylan), and while this conceit might sound like Haynes is just trying to be weird because he can be, that's not the case at all. The real Dylan is an enigma, an artist who's played so many characters over his 45-year career that his fans have no idea who he really is. A straight-forward biopic (a la Walk The Line or Ray) about Dylan would be a disservice to everybody. Instead, Haynes intertwines -- and names -- seven periods of the musician's life: "poet" (Whishaw), "prophet" (Bale), "outlaw" (Gere), "fake" (Franklin), "star of electricity" (Blanchett), "rock 'n' roll martyr" (Ledger) and "born-again Christian" (Bale again). Haynes tells the story out of order, stretches the truth, makes stuff up and generally manipulates things as he sees fit, and the result is a heady collage that perfectly captures all that's good (and bad) about Dylan and his music. It's a beautiful mess, and I wouldn't change a thing about it. The six main actors are all great, especially Blanchett (whose channeling of Dylan is absolutely astonishing) and Franklin (a young black child who brings an amazing depth to his character), but Haynes is the real star here. Some of the visuals he adds to Dylan's music are capable of changing the way you hear songs you've known most of your life. But I'm Not There's real feat is that somehow Haynes made one of the most mysterious and iconic figures of the 20th century absolutely human. And I can't remember the last time I saw a biopic that came close to doing that.

Movie Review: Margot At The Wedding

If you found Noah Baumbach's last movie, 2005's The Squid And The Whale, difficult to watch because of how badly its characters behaved, steer clear of Margot At The Wedding. Like Squid, Margot is a 90-minute snapshot of a family in crisis, but Baumbach's new film is much darker and cuts far closer to the bone. It's also shot and edited in a choppy manner and uses natural light, which gives the movie a feel that's both hyper-real and artificial. Margot begins with the titular character (played by Nicole Kidman) and her son Claude (Zane Pais) riding on a train and ends with them riding on a bus. This bookending gives you the sense that everything that happens in between, while important to everyone involved, won't really have any affect on their lives; they will keep moving on, doing what they want regardless of what harm it causes to those around them. As the movie opens, Margot and Claude are on the way to the Hamptons to reconnect with Margot's estranged sister Pauline (Jennifer Jason Leigh), who's set to marry Malcolm (Jack Black). Margot is a Manhattan-based writer with a cult following; Pauline feels that her sister ruined her first marriage by incorporating very personal aspects of it into one of her stories. Pauline, who lives in the house where she and Margot grew up, is pregnant, a fact that she's kept hidden from Malcolm, an unemployed musician/artist, and her daughter Ingrid (Flora Cross). You can feel a lifetime's worth tension within this dysfunctional family the second the two sisters re-enter each other's lives, and Baumbach keeps this awkwardness and anxiety front and center throughout the whole film. None of the characters, with the exception of Claude and Ingrid, is the least bit likable, and all of them are so self-involved and bitter that you hope that bad things continue to happen to them. But you can't take you eyes off any of them, thanks to Baumbach's effortless script and across-the-board great performances (especially from Kidman and Leigh). Baumbach has made a film so true to life that it's cringe-worthy, but in the best possible way, and I don't think it's any coincidence that Margot opened the day before Thanksgiving, a time when many families across the country come together and bring out the worst in each other.

MVP!

10 Albums Coming Out Next Year That I'm Already Digging

Beach House Devotion (Carpark)
More gorgeous, atmospheric and dreamy pop from this Baltimore duo.

Evangelicals The Evening Descends (Dead Oceans)
These hyperactive weirdos from Oklahoma make their neighbors in the Flaming Lips seem normal.

The Helio Sequence Keep Your Eyes Ahead (Sub Pop)
This Oregon twosome won't have to worry about those shoegaze comparisons anymore; this is practically a pop album.

Marah Angels Of Destruction! (Yep Roc)
Marriage, sobriety and new members thankfully haven't changed these rough-and-tumble Philly rockers at all.

Eric Matthews The Imagination Stage (Empyrean)
The former Cardinal member decided to add some synths and loops to his orchestral pop, and the result is beautiful.

Bob Mould District Line (Anti-)
He'll obviously never top the glory days of Hüsker Dü or the first Sugar album, but this is almost a return to form.

Nada Surf Lucky (Barsuk)
The best album yet from these NYC pop-rockers.

Photon Band Back Down To Earth (Empyrean/Transit Of Venus)
These guys have long been been one of the top bands in Philly, and their first album in four years doesn't disappoint.

The Raveonettes Lust Lust Lust (Vice)
The fourth LP from this Danish duo is more mellow, minimalist and mature then their previous work.

Sons & Daughters This Gift (Domino)
Album number three finds these Glaswegians adding a pretty pop sheen to their country/rockabilly/Americana mix.

Today's Two Beers

Mendocino Imperial IPA
The Mendocino Brewing Company began life in 1983 as a brewpub; as hard as it is to fathom now, they were the second one in the entire country. (Could it be any more appropriate they started life in a California town called Hopland?) I've had a number of their ales and can say these guys know what they're doing. Their Imperial IPA is a winter seasonal, and its 7.5% alcohol helped warm me up on a cold, rainy night watching football.

Rock Art Magnumus Ete Tomahawkus ESB³
First things first: This decade-old, Morrisville, Vt., brewery has the worst Web site I've ever seen. But they make a pretty good beer. Magnumus Ete Tomahawkus is a strong (8% alcohol) ESB (extra special bitter) that comes in a 22-ounce bottle. It's relatively easy to drink for a medium-bodied beer, but the faint of heart might find it a bit overwhelming. Hopheads will dig it, though.

Today's Two Beers

Full Sail Pale Ale
Full Sail Brewing Company is based in Hood River, Ore., and is employee owned. I've had about 10 of their beers and have never been disappointed. Their Pale Ale -- one of their three core brands -- is 5.4% alcohol and not overly hoppy. This would definitely be am enjoyable beer for people who think a lot of craft brews are too much work. It's also one that could be consumed over a whole evening of drinking.

Cisco Brewers Whale's Tale Pale Ale
Hadn't heard of this Nantucket, Mass., brewery until I saw this at The Foodery yesterday. They also seem to make spirits (under the name Triple Eight Distillery) and wine (Nantucket Vineyard), which is damn impressive. Whale's Tale Pale Ale is a hoppy, malty beer, but like Full Sail Pale Ale, it's not too extreme for the non-beer-enthusiast crowd. This comes in 750-ml bottles, but mine, unfortunately, was a 12-ouncer.

Five Things I'm Digging

Various Artists The Brit Box: UK Indie, Shoegaze, And Brit-Pop Gems Of The Last Millennium (Rhino)
This four-CD boxed set has a number of questionable choices, but it does include all of the important easy-to-abbreviate bands (MBV, JAMC, TFC, SFA, etc.). The Brit Box also unearths some under-the-radar classics (Eugenius' "Breakfast," Chapterhouse's "Pearl," the Dylans' "Mary Quant In Blue") and has plenty of guilty pleasures (Suede's "Metal Mickey," Ned's Atomic Dustbin's "Grey Cell Green," Inspiral Carpets' "This Is How It Feels"). Too bad I threw out all of my horizontally striped T-shirts.

North Star Orchard
This Coatesville, Pa., family farm has a booth every Saturday at the Rittenhouse Square Farmers' Market, and every Saturday I go there and buy a week's worth of their hosui pears, which are the greatest fruit known to man. Sadly, they close up shop for the winter tomorrow, so I'm gonna purchase lots of pears.

SlimSlimmy Minimalist Ultra Thin Wallet
OK, I'm completely ashamed it's leather, but other than that, this thing rules. I used to carry a wallet that was George Costanza-ish in its bloatedness and hurt my ass whenever I was sitting, but this little guy goes in your front pocket and can hold more than you would think.

Carbon/Silicon The Last Post (Caroline)
Mick Jones never really got the credit he deserved for his contributions to the Clash. (If you disagree, check out 1985's horrible Cut The Crap, the only Clash album made without him. Better yet, don't.) Carbon/Silicon is Jones and Tony James (Gen X), and The Last Post is a socially conscious debut LP that's far better than I thought it would be.

Trident Minty Sweet Twist
I was a long-time Original, Peppermint and Spearmint guy, but after trying this new flavor, I can't go back. This had better not go the same way as my beloved Diet Mountain Dew Code Red (RIP).

Ain't Life Grand

Now that Pat Robertson (who believes God let the September 11 attacks happen because America is full of abortionists and gays) is endorsing the pro-choice/pro-gay-rights Rudy Giuliani and the National Right To Life Committee is endorsing former abortion-rights lobbyist Fred Thompson, I think it's only a matter of time before white-supremacy groups start endorsing Barack Obama and Bill Richardson.

Today's Two Beers

Boulder Cold Hop British-Style Ale
Boulder Beer was founded in 1979 and is Colorado's first craft brewery, which in and of itself is pretty impressive. I was first introduced to them via their Mojo IPA, which I got as part of a beer-of-the-month club and loved. Ever since, whenever I see one of their beers, I buy it. Part of their Looking Glass Series of specialty brews, the 22-ounce Cold Hop is a fruity, hoppy ale that's very easy to drink. I'm not sure what the alcohol content is, but since this is an English-style IPA, I'm betting it's not too high.

Clay Pipe Hop-ocalypse IPA
Clay Pipe Brewing is based in Westminster, MD., and although I've had a handful of their beers, I don't know much about the five-year-old brewery. Hop-ocalypse is an IPA that's 6% alcohol and not as hoppy as you would think, given its name. Nothing really makes this beer standout, but as IPAs go, you could do much worse. I remember liking Clay Pipe's Pursuit Of Happiness Winter Warmer a lot, though, so hopefully I can track one of them down this holiday season.

The Eight Movies I'm Most Looking Forward To For The Rest Of 2007 (Alphabetically)

Atonement Everyone seemed to really love the book, and I have to say that I've become a James McAvoy fan (though the trailer for his forthcoming Wanted looks pretty, pretty, pretty bad).

Charlie Wilson's War Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams and Ned Beatty working with director Mike Nichols and writer Aaron Sorkin? This probably won't suck.

The Diving Bell And The Butterfly The trailer for Julian Schnabel’s third film absolutely floored me. Here's hoping Butterfly turns more Americans on to great French actor Mathieu Amalric, who's probably best known here for his small-yet-pivotal role in Munich.

Grace Is Gone The people I know who've seen this have said it's very good and very depressing, which is fine by me. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that John Cusack is as good in this as I think he'll be.

I’m Not There I'm not a huge Todd Haynes fan, but I am quite the Bob Dylan admirer. Christian Bale, Heath Ledger and Richard Gere are inspired choices to play the man, while the footage I've seen with Cate Blanchett as the mid-'60s Dylan has made me realize that the actress is capable of anything.

Juno Ellen Page's amazing performance in last year's polarizing Hard Candy means I will probably go see any movie she's in, and the trailer for this is as funny as any I've watched in 2007.

The Savages I would pay to see Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman read the phone book, so this one is a no brainer. Plus, the enjoyable Slums Of Beverly Hills proved writer/director Tamara Jenkins knows her way around a dysfunctional family.

There Will Be Blood The reactions I've read to P.T. Anderson's new film have been extremely passionate (from "masterpiece" to "I wish I hadn't seen it"), so I'm just glad that there's a movie this year that elicits that kind of response.

Movie Review: No Country For Old Men

The plot of the latest Coen brothers film is almost as old as movies themselves: A down-on-his-luck nobody stumbles upon a huge quantity of cash, takes it against his better judgment, then spends most of the rest of the film running from the person whose money he took. This time around, it's 1980 in rural Texas, and Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) is a Vietnam vet who, while hunting antelope, finds the remnants of a drug deal gone bad: half a dozen dead men, one hanging on for dear life, a bag stuffed with $2 million's worth of hundreds and an enormous quantity of heroin. Moss takes the money, but in the middle of night, he feels guilty about leaving the injured man, so he drives back to the scene. Oops. The bad guys spot him and chase after him, guns blazing, but Moss barely manages to escape on foot. (The sequence with him and the pit bull is one of my favorites of the year.) Moss knows his identity will be revealed via the truck he left at the scene, so he sends his wife Carla Jean (Kelly Macdonald) to stay with her mom and takes off with the money. Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem), a psychopath who's never without his cattle gun, shows up to find out who took the money so he can kill him and recover his cash. When Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) begins to figure out what's going on, he enters the fray to try to save Moss from his certain death. Like I said, this is a plot (here based on Cormac McCarthy's acclaimed novel) you have seen before. But what the Coens do with it is nothing short of brilliant. Where most filmmakers gradually build toward climaxes that are a movie's centerpieces, the Coens have, effectively, eliminated the climaxes. By not showing what would be the money shots in a typical film, they've made every second of what they do show that much more engaging. In lesser hands, this could have been a mess, but the Coens get everything right, and what's most impressive is that it looks effortless. While Fargo and The Big Lebowski remain my favorites of the brothers' movies, No Country For Old Men is still essential viewing.

Movie Review: Wristcutters: A Love Story

After his girlfriend Desiree (Leslie Bibb) breaks up with him, 20-something Zia (Patrick Fugit from Almost Famous) slits his wrists and ends up in a purgatory inhabited only by people who've committed suicide. Zia soon befriends Eugene (Shea Whigham), a Russian rocker who lives with his entire family. (Yes, all suicides.) When Zia finds out Desiree killed herself after he did and is in this afterlife as well, he and Eugene hit the road to find her. Along the way, they meet up with a collection of characters, including Mikal (the gorgeous Shannyn Sossamon), who's searching for the "people in charge" of this bizarro world because she says she didn't kill herself and wants out, and Kneller (Tom Waits), a commune-living guru/weirdo who's looking for his dog. This is essentially a road movie, and what makes it work is that world the characters are exploring is similar enough to ours to engage us and different enough to keep things genuinely absurd. But mostly, Wristcutters is, like its subtitle says, a love story. (Think Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind or Defending Your Life, though this is far less ambitious.) For a movie about a bunch of people who killed themselves, Wristcutters ends up being very uplifting.

Today's Two Beers

Flying Fish Grand Cru Winter Reserve
New Jersey gets a bad rap, and it mostly deserves it. But it does have some stuff going for it: It's close to Pennsylvania and New York. It has a turnpike. Springsteen is from there. And it's home to the Flying Fish Brewing Company, which is based in Cherry Hill. A perennial "best place to live" in the Delaware Valley area, Cherry Hill is about five miles west of Philadelphia. In my 23 years living here, I've never felt any any desire to step foot in Cherry Hill. (There's something about the suburbs that creeps me out, especially the ones in Jersey.) Which I guess is why I've never taken a tour of Flying Fish, despite they fact they produce some really nice local brews. Their bottle-conditioned Grand Cru Winter Reserve is a Belgian-style golden ale that's 7.2% alcohol. There's a lot going on in this beer, but it's not overwhelming. Grand Cru isn't my favorite Flying Fish offering, but it tasted good after a long walk on a chilly night.

Tröegs HopBack Amber Ale
This is the flagship beer from Tröegs, a cool 11-year-old brewery based in Pennsylvania's capitol city of Harrisburg. I'm not usually a big fan of amber ales, as most of them don't have a whole lot of flavor, but this one is an exception. While HopBack has a sweet hoppy aroma with malty hints, it's not at all overwhelming. This would be a perfect choice for someone who thinks IPAs are too hoppy but still likes a beer with some flavor. Tröegs only distributes its goods to places within a three-hour drive of the brewery, so this one might be tough to get outside of the Mid-Atlantic region.

Today's Two Beers

Stone 11th Anniversary Ale
Based in Escondido, Calif., Stone Brewing Co. makes a number of delicious, high-alcohol big beers, including their infamous Arrogant Bastard Ale. In addition to their year-round brews, they do a handful of special releases. This 22-ounce anniversary IPA is 8.7% alcohol ... and pitch black. Yep, pitch black like a stout, which is something new to me. Color aside, this is very hoppy and has tasty malty hints; it's also surprisingly easy to drink, so non-hopheads would probably dig it as well. I have never had a Stone beer that I wouldn't recommend highly.

Great Divide Fresh Hop Pale Ale
Another brewery that has never disappointed me is Denver's Great Divide, and they also know a thing or two about big, hop-heavy beers. This seasonal 22-ounce pale ale is 6.1% alcohol and has an amazing hoppy complexity. They call this Fresh Hop because the hops that are added to the beer while it's being made are just-picked cones, as opposed to aged pellets. I don't know enough about the brewing process to explain the subtle difference this creates, but I sure like the way it tastes.

Movie Review: American Gangster

Calling a movie American Gangster immediately sets it up for comparisons to mob classics like The Godfather and GoodFellas. But Ridley Scott's real-life portrait of Frank Lucas, a Vietnam War-era Harlem drug lord, and Richie Roberts, the Jersey cop obsessed with taking him down, isn't that kind of film. Instead, American Gangster is a character-study/police-procedural hybrid that's complex and compelling over its deliberately paced two-and-a-half hours. While Lucas (Denzel Washington) and Roberts (Russell Crowe) both share a desire to excel professionally, the similarities stop there. Lucas, as family oriented as any Mafia boss, is a guy with enough self-confidence to shoot a colleague to death on a busy sidewalk in broad daylight; Roberts, a failed husband and father who spends his nights with a bevy of different women, is so scared of public speaking that he can barely address the handful of cops working under him. Lucas supposedly had three-quarters of the NYPD narcotics officers on his payroll; Roberts alienated himself from his fellow cops when he found a million dollars in a suspect's car and chose to turn the money in rather than keep it. American Gangster tells the story of how Lucas, with the savvy of a Wharton graduate, came of with a revolutionary business plan for selling heroin on the street: Eliminate the middle man (by traveling to Vietnam to buy the uncut drug and smuggling it back via U.S. military planes), give the product a catchy brand name (Blue Magic), and make it better than your competition's (twice as strong but for only half the price). When his closet-junkie partner OD's on Blue Magic, it becomes personal for Roberts. The cat-and-mouse games that follow allow director Scott to develop the two characters (both Washington and Crowe are typically superb) and recreate '70s New York in all its pre-Giuliani gritty glory. That Washington and Crowe only share the screen briefly toward the end of the film is slightly disappointing, but it's watching the separate journeys their characters take to get there that makes Scott's movie so engrossing.

Today's Two Beers

Bison Barleywine Ale
The Bison Brewing Company is one of my very favorites. They are based in Berkeley, Calif., and all of their beer is organic. (Even if you're a luddite who couldn't care less what happens to our planet after you depart it, you'll love Bison's beer, though I doubt they want the likes of you drinking it.) In business since 1989 (at the time, I was a college freshman and only drank Rolling Rock and malt liquor), Bison recently ran into some zoning red tape, so they started a co-op with fellow organic brewer Butte Creek and are now making their beer in Chico. (Note to self: You really need to get your ass to Chico to drink some local beer.) I'm not a barleywine guy, but I like Bison so much that any time I see any of their beers available, I buy them. This one is 9.5% alcohol, and you can really taste it. I am confident in saying that I couldn't have more than one of these at a time (after 22 ounces of any barleywine, I am ready to move on to a different style of beer), which is certainly not the case with any of their other brews. I have a bottle of their Belgian Ale on hand, so I will write about that soon.

Starr Hill Pale Ale
This is the first beer I've had from this eight-year-old Charlottesville, Va., brewery, and it's everything an American pale ale should be. It's hoppy enough for my liking, but not overwhelming so. I guess it's kind of a cliche to call a beverage crisp and refreshing, but this one is. I also have their Amber Ale and Jomo Lager somewhere and will try them in the near future.

Knock The Vote

"You need a license to buy a dog, to drive a car. Hell, you even need a license to catch a fish. But they’ll let any butt-reaming asshole be a father.”

So said Keanu Reeves' character in Ron Howard's underrated 1989 dramedy Parenthood. These days, they’ll let any butt-reaming asshole be a voter.

I didn't vote until I was in my 20s. My rationale was this: I was not informed enough to give a politician the power to make decisions that would impact the rest of the world. So I got informed and immediately regretted the elections I skipped because I was too occupied with meaningless shit to take advantage of a privilege that people in other countries die for. Immediately, I became one of those guys who pushed voting on everybody. I was outraged that half the U.S. population that could vote didn't. Why didn't these fools want to take part in democracy, the greatest form of government of all time?

I've since flip-flopped. In the very entertaining current issue of Rolling Stone, Bill Maher is quoted as saying that "there should be some sort of test" people need to pass in order to vote. It's an excellent idea, and not because I have been saying the same thing for the last seven years. Close to three million people voted for Ralph Nader in 2000, and I bet most of them never once researched George Bush's political record before they did so. Had they, they probably would have voted against Bush rather than for Nader. (They deny that, of course.) Four years later, Nader got less than half a million votes. What was the difference? People were now educated about Bush and made their decision based on that knowledge.

What got me thinking about all this was yesterday's elections in Philadelphia. A man named Willie Singletary got about 150,000 votes in his bid to be a Traffic Court judge. That was enough to ensure that he'll be presiding there for six years, making $480,000 over that period. I don't know much about Singletary, but here's what I do know: His driver's license is suspended through 2011. He won the Democratic primary while owing more than $11,000 because of violations including reckless driving, driving without a license and driving without insurance. (His dad paid the fines, so Singletary wasn't arrested.) He was captured on videotape trying to raise money with the line "you're all going to need me in Traffic Court, am I right about that ... Now you all want me to get there, you believe I'll hook up, right?" He has no law degree. I only know these things because they were in -- on multiple occasions -- the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News.

I know it would be unconstitutional to not allow people the privilege to vote because they don't read a newspaper. But I do hope that the 150,000 people who elected Singletary end up in his court. But even that won't be that bad. After all, he'll hook them up, right?

Today's Two Beers

Baron Oktoberfest
Baron is a four-year-old brewery located in Seattle that makes German-style beers. I only recently heard about them and bought a few of their brews. This 22-ouncer is the first I tried, and I liked it, though I'm not a huge Oktoberfest fan. It was pretty mild and easy to drink, but I tend to like beer with more kick.

Nectar Red Nectar
When I decided that I was gonna start trying as many different craft beers as I could, I joined one of those beer-of-the-month clubs. After a month or two, I realized that I could do much better on my own, so I didn't renew my membership. The one cool thing about those clubs, though, is that you sometimes get to try a beer you didn't even know existed. That was the case with my first beer-of-the-month package, which contained two beers each from two breweries I was unfamiliar with: Nectar Ales and Pony Express. While I have still yet to see the latter again, the former is now sold in Philly, so I decided to retry an ale from the Buellton, Calif., brewery. Red Nectar is a solid, quite-drinkable amber ale that has more heft than I remembered. Like the other Nectar brews I've tried (including a hemp one that a MAGNET intern snuck back for me while visiting California), this is a beer pretty much anyone would like.

Movie Review: Before The Devil Knows You're Dead

Sidney Lumet has directed some of my favorite films: Dog Day Afternoon, Serpico, Prince Of The City, Network, 12 Angry Men. While I'm not quite ready to put Before The Devil Knows You're Dead in that company, it is one of the best movies I've seen this year and one I look forward to seeing again and again. Lumet, perhaps tipping his director's hat at Quentin Tarantino, tells this story out of chronological order and from different perspectives, allowing him to gradually feed the viewer information that changes the meaning of earlier scenes and the characters' motivations for doing what they do. And what characters they are: Philip Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke are as good as they have ever been, playing siblings who, for very different reasons, are in desperate need of quick money. It doesn't take long for Andy (Hoffman), a wheeler-dealer used to getting what he wants, to convince younger brother Hank (Hawke), who can't hide his need for Andy's approval, that they can solve their cash-flow problems by robbing a mom-and-pop jewelry store. The catch? It's owned by their mom and pop. When the robbery goes horribly wrong, the lives of Andy, Hank and everybody around them are ruined beyond repair. Lumet gets excellent work from the rest of his terrific cast (led by Marisa Tomei, Albert Finney, Amy Ryan and Rosemary Harris), but you get the impression that the director had something to do with just how great the acting here is. No 83-year-old director a full half century into a film career should be able to make a movie as taut, vital and alive as Before The Devil Knows You're Dead.

Today's Two Beers

Victory V-Twelve
Though Yards is currently the only production brewery in Philadelphia proper (sad given the city's rich beer history), the surrounding area is home to a bunch of great ones, including Dogfish Head, Weyerbacher, Flying Fish, Lancaster, Tröegs, Sly Fox, Stoudt's, River Horse and Downingtown, Pa.-based Victory. The 11-year-old Victory might be best known for their Storm King and Hop Devil (one of my favorite local brews), but they make some great Belgian-style beers. The seasonal V-Twelve (the name comes from its alcohol percentage) is a Quadrupel that comes in a 750-ml corked bottle. It's a fruity amber ale that's very subtle given its high alcohol content, so it's very drinkable. I would age this in my cellar -- if I had a cellar.

Saranac Chocolate Amber
Another Saranac after only four days? Well, I've never had this one before and saw it at The Foodery (a deli with an amazing beer selection located less than two blocks from my apartment), so I bought it. This seasonal is a European-style dark lager that's chocolate-ty, malty and nutty. Not my favorite style of beer, but I did like this one.

Today's Two Beers

Avery Salvation
This 14-year-old Boulder, Colo., brewery specializes in big beers. The 22-ounce Salvation is a Belgian-style golden ale that's fruity and easy to drink despite being 9% alcohol. The Santa Rosa, Calif.-based Russian River Brewing Company also has a Belgian-style beer called Salvation, but rather than fighting over the name, the two breweries decided to combine the two beers and release a limited-edition brew called Collaboration Not Litigation Ale. I had a bottle of it a little less than a year ago, and I loved it.

Breckenridge Small Batch: 471 IPA
Denver-based Breckenridge started life as a brewpub in 1990, and six years later opened a brewery. This double IPA is a limited-edition brew that's 9.2% alcohol and very hoppy. (This, of course, is a good thing.) It's not overwhelming, however, and is the kind of strong beer you can have more than one or two of. I've had similar beers than I liked better than this, but I wouldn't hesitate to get this one again.

DVD Review: Red Road

The debut feature from director Andrea Arnold, Red Road won the jury prize at last year's Cannes Film Festival. Kate Dickie (an actress who has done mostly Scottish TV) is breathtaking as Jackie, a single Glasgow woman who works as a surveillance operator. She spends her shifts on the job watching people live their lives and most of her off time alone in her apartment. Something has obviously stolen her lust for life, and she seems more interested in the men and women she's monitoring on the street than her real-life friends and family (including a married man with whom she's having an unfulfilling affair). At work one night monitoring the seedy Red Road district, Jackie catches a glimpse of the face of a man having sex outside with a prostitute, and from her reaction, you immediately realize that he's probably the reason she's so unhappy. She becomes obsessed with watching his every public move to the point that she neglects her job, and her behavior and actions only get weirder and weirder. (To go into any specifics would spoil the many plot twists.) Arnold rarely lets the viewer see anything that Jackie doesn't, creating a sense of claustrophobia that only adds to the building tension between Jackie and the man who consumes her every thought (played with perfect intensity by Tony Curran). Arnold's only misstep is the too-neat ending, which is a bit jarring given how organic and real the rest of the film feels. While not at the same level as similarly themed movies such as Rear Window, The Conversation and the more recent The Lives Of Others, Red Road is nonetheless an engaging thriller.