Author Archives: Susan

I seem to have had my fix of Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, this past weekend: first in “The Social Network” and then in an interview of him on “60 Minutes.” The 26-year-old billionaire is doing quite well, thank you very much. He seemed a bit more relaxed in the “60 Minutes” interview than in past ones and wasn’t sweating it as much over the security of people’s info on the Facebook site as he was in Kara Swisher’s longer, tougher interview with him in June. Though it still remains the biggest concern for users.

On “60 Minutes” he said Facebook doesn’t sell your info and advertisers don’t get access to it. Though applications on Facebook have been known to. “It’s really an important thing for everyone to just be thinking about. Privacy and making sure people have control of their information is I think one of the most fundamental things on the Internet,” Zuckerberg said. He went on to discuss Facebook’s newest projects, which are steering the company to get more involved in your life: in sharing more activities, grouping your friends more around your interests, and in getting the real you more out there etc.

As for “The Social Network,” it’s an entertaining look at the start-up of Facebook. Aaron Sorkin’s script hums along with fast-paced dialogue of Mark’s character and his buddies at Harvard and the beginnings of the site. At the crux of the film, are the snags and enemies Mark’s actions make along the way, notably one lawsuit that accuses him of stealing the site’s idea and another for ditching his CFO. The film switches back and forth entertainingly between the two lawsuits and Mark and Facebook’s rise. The best part seems to be Jesse Eisenberg’s portrayal of the prodigy, which is convincing and at times quite amusing. I’m not sure it’s really the very best movie of the year, which others claim, but it’s a timely hit on an Internet craze that’s still exploding all around us. Continue reading →

When news came out that Valerie Plame was outed as a CIA operative by Robert Novak in a Washington Post op-ed in July 2003, it was a terrible feeling. I worked at The Post and was surprised that editors hadn’t caught it and/or didn’t take it out. Novak was beyond the pale to have named her because of what some administration official had leaked. I had sympathy for her life and ruined career but didn’t know much beyond that. For sure, Plame and her husband Joe Wilson’s fight against the Bush administration for being, they believed, the source of her outing (presumably as payback for his suggestion that White House intelligence was false) was an uphill, unpopular battle then. And many criticized their “conspiracy” theory and the Vanity Fair article and photo of them sitting in a convertible with Plame in scarf and sunglasses. But in the end their firestorm did eventually unearth who exposed her: the deputy secretary of state at the State Department.

Regardless where you stood then, “Fair Game” is a captivating and powerful movie. Part spy thriller and part political expose, it holds one’s attention from start to finish. Following events leading up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003, it reminds us of the trumped-up charges on weapons of mass destruction that the Bush administration made as its reason for going to war. Reliving it will make you feel as mad as hell but should be required viewing for all Americans.

With good performances from Naomi Watts and Sean Penn (even Sam Shepard makes a small appearance!), director Doug Liman’s taut film moves beyond a typical pulled-from-the-headlines story to being an intriguing chronicle of the times and story of an agent’s life blown. I hesitated to see the movie, since it had been so prevalent in the news, but it turned out to be more than just a plodding recap, delving deeper behind the intense consequences at stake.

ps. Check out Valerie Plame’s comments on the movie here and The Washington Post’s thrashing of it here. Continue reading →

“Restrepo” is author Sebastian Junger and photographer Tim Hetherington’s war documentary of a year with an American Army platoon at an outpost in the Korengal Valley, one of the most dangerous places of fighting in the Afghanistan war. It’s been mentioned as a real-life kind of “Hurt Locker,” in reference to this year’s Oscar-winning war picture. But “Restrepo” isn’t about a bomb squad; it’s about a platoon setting up and defending a remote mountainous outpost called “Restrepo,” named in memory of a medic killed there.

I was a bit nervous to see it before going to the documentary, but I wanted to get a real slice of the war and what these soldiers are going through. The film made me jumpy for sure; the enemy isn’t really ever seen, but the gunfire comes from anywhere at any time. The U.S. soldiers there endured on average four firefights a day and at times thought their outpost, Restrepo, would be overrun by the Taliban. When the platoon goes on a mission outside of their fort things get scarier and I jumped in my seat at one point.

The soldiers’ narration and their lives at Restrepo are revealing and draw viewers into their world, making you feel as if you’re experiencing war firsthand. The view the film leaves of the Korengal Valley, where more than 40 soldiers have been killed since 2005, is disheartening; The mountainous region and the relentless enemy make the war seem futile in Afghanistan. Ultimately, the military decided to pull out of the Korengal Valley in April 2010. Will the rest of the American troops in Afghanistan soon do the same? Continue reading →

The news this week that actress Rooney Mara, at far left, has won the role of Lisbeth Salander in the Hollywood movie version of “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” is a tad mind-boggling since no one much has heard of her work, unless you saw this year’s version of “A Nightmare on Elm Street.” Apparently the director of “Dragon Tattoo” met her during the upcoming movie about Facebook and says she’s great. After reading two of the books in Stieg Larsson’s triology, I have to say Rooney Mara doesn’t exactly come to mind as playing the whip-smart, computer hacker ruffian that is the heroin Lisbeth Salander. I’ve seen the Swedish movie version of “Dragon” and actress Noomi Rapace, above right, comes across as highly believable. I couldn’t believe how much Rapace seemed to embody the tough Salander. Will Rooney Mara be able to transform? Or is the U.S. version just going to be a cotton-candy adaptation of the book?

Remember there was a time when author Anne Rice was livid that Tom Cruise got the part of Lestat in 1994’s “Interview With the Vampire.” She said he was obviously “no” Lestat. But apparently after seeing the movie, Rice changed her mind and thought Tom was great with ole Brad Pitt as Louis. Perhaps she was just rolling with the publicity machine. But perhaps an open mind should be kept with Rooney as Salander. Sigh. If only it were that easy. Continue reading →

Maybe it seems a bit surprising that “The Expendables” ($35 million) beat out “Eat, Pray, Love” ($23.7 million) this past weekend at the box office – just because the place was packed to the gills even a half hour before the show. Gosh weren’t there more chicks there than Lilith Fair? And besides how many weeks was Elizabeth Gilbert’s 2006 memoir on the bestseller list anyways …. like forever? I mean Sly’s “Expendables” looks from clips rather expendable, doesn’t it? Bunch of action-guy old farts. Sure, give me the animated “Super Friends” any day; you know, Aqua Man, Wonder Woman, Superman, Batman and Robin etc. (Especially Aqua …) But Sly, Arnold and Willis? — oh I’ll take a pass.

Anyways, “Eat, Pray, Love” was not really a painful affair, guys. It was quite entertaining to a point. I sat in an aisle where a number of women were heard to say they had read part of the book but not the whole (whiny) thing. I had read part of it too and I really did mean to finish it. Anyways, Julia Roberts does a good job as “Liz,” and the cinematography of Italy, India and Bali were quite fetching. I guess I liked Italy and India but started to tire around the Bali part. Perhaps, I admit, James Franco early in the pic did more for me than Javier Bardem near the end; I know that’s not the popularly held view among women in the age group of the book’s fanbase, but it’s sort of true. After all there’s good reason the young-ish Franco was on “General Hospital” and why Sean Penn kissed him in “Milk.” Think about it.

Anyways, the “E, P, L” soundtrack is a pleasant surprise. Two Neil Young songs! Two Eddie Vedder songs! One Sly and the Family Stone, and one Marvin Gaye! When you hear “Heart of Gold” come on during the movie – it’s just awesome.

I know some critics have clobbered “E, P, L” for being whiny, priviledged, soft, simplistic, self-absorbed etc. Peter Travers of Rolling Stone called it “torture” to watch. I could think of other movies much more tortuous. I’m sure it wasn’t as full a picture or as witty as the book. But the movie followed the remnants: a women’s journey after her painful divorce. Like the book, I found some authentic substance and some good chick flick escapism to it. Continue reading →

Inception is definitely the blockbuster action thriller of the summer, and is raking in at the box office, especially with the Gen X’ers etc. It’s built around the clever plot of an undercover gang who wire themselves up to people sleeping in order to get into their unconscious minds (their dream space) to extract and plant information. The movie looks and plays out pretty cool and the visual effects are great. Leo DiCaprio, and especially Marion Cotillard, are effective as the married couple in dream limbo.

It’s quite an involving, semi-complicated movie, where paying careful attention helps, while you try and figure out what’s going on. It’s not That difficult, but it keeps you working at it. I was trying to listen intently but found some of the dialogue drowned out by the pounding background music. And half way in, I started to daydream about my stay at the beach and what else I had to do, and sooner or later I realized I wasn’t concentrating about the movie anymore, and had missed a couple of scenes. But the movie goes on for so long, it doesn’t seem to matter. The pounding continues! And the ending and dream finally, finally come around. Awake, I say, let me out of here. Continue reading →

So what did I think I’d get out of it “Splice” — the movie about a biotech experiment gone awry? Was it that I thought this lab-manufactured creature was good for a summer scare? Or that it would be an escape from everything on the mind?

True, I don’t normally see many of these kinds of flicks. But my spouse helped narrow it down among choices and I thought it might be fun to be scared with some alien type creature or a test-tube deviant. The local newspaper gave it 4 out of 5 stars. I repeat 4 out of 5 stars. And after all, hadn’t I seen and liked the sci-fi movie “District 9” with the prawn-like creatures forced to live in slum conditions on Earth? I could handle seeing the prawns!

I was aware too that the talented Canadian actress/director Sarah Polley was in “Splice”; she had been heralded as far back as 1997 for her performance in “The Sweet Hereafter” and even directed Julie Christie(!) in 2006’s “Away From Her” (yes that Julie, the one and only LAR-a from “Docter Zhivago”). Both Polley’s films are sad along with her other tear-jerker film “The Secret Life of Words” with Tim Robbins in 2005. Good luck seeing that without a Kleenex. But alas, what held her to this DNA scare flick? Wasn’t she Oscar material? I didn’t realize Adrian Brody was in it, too. I haven’t been moved by a performance of his since 2002’s “The Pianist.”

But here they both were in “Splice,” playing a scientist couple who go over the bio-ethical line to make a part-human, part-creature species in the race to solve diseases. They and viewers should know better! It’s no use! The scientific egos and calamities! The lab concoction too often than naught goes amiss or falls on the floor. Then all hell breaks loose. Didn’t they see “The Fly” from 1986? … where Jeff Goldbloom grows some mean back hairs and starts to buzz after dabbling around on a science experiment. Apparently they didn’t because Dren, their beloved spliced DNA creature, made in secrecy, sends them a bit over the edge. Dren, Dren, Oh Dren …. !

But this movie lacks opportunities of intrigue and suspense. More disturbing and creepy than truly scary and riveting, “Splice” throws together a little bit of everything: gils, wings, tails, stingers, co-mingling species and biotech companies with nefarious aspirations, even a sequel tie-in; it’s a slippery ride but comes off a bit too loopy without enough spine. Continue reading →