MOVIE REVIEW: "The Great Debaters" podcast

MOVIE REVIEW: "The Great Debaters"

My friend Darryl Atwell and I are at it again. This time our target topic is "The Great Debaters".

Check out the podcast.

Movies to see ...

The movie list is stacking up too ... since Oscar season is in full swing, I will try to keep up this year as opposed to waiting for the awards to be handed out and then going to the movies.


So here's how things stack up:


"The Great Debate"

• I'm a fan of Forrest Whitaker and I like Denzel Washingto and Oprah (who produced the movie); nice to see those young people do their thing as well
• UPDATE: saw this one; just okay. too formulaic

"The Kite Runner"

• The book is on my reading list; but it looks as if I might see the movie before I read the book (my preference is for the opposite to occur), but I am just very anxious about this one

"I Am Legend"

• I do like Will Smith although it does not seem like my style of movie ... I will give it a go

"Look"

• Oooh, this is one I am definitely going to see! Adam Rifkin has hit the nail on the head w/a movie about how much of our lives is under surveillance - but he tells the story in a fictional way. Cool

"Juno"

• This one seems interesting; humor gets me every time

"Atonement"

• I've heard some Oscar buzz about this one, but I'm not a fan of period pieces, so I am on the fence about this one

"Charlie Wilson's War"

"The Bucket List"

• I like Jack Nicholson; I'm a little warm on Morgan Freeman ... so this one is not high up on the list (and it has not received much love from the critics)

Jennifer and Forrest and Oscar

How about those Oscars? It was a long and daunting program - I believe it was nearly four hours! I had my step-dad record it, but the program was only scheduled for three hours. So I did not get a chance to see a replay of the Forrest Whitaker acceptance speech, at least not on the digital video recorder (DVR). I did end up seeing it replayed on Oprah the day after the Oscars.

It was exciting to see both Jennifer Hudson and Whitaker win. They both delivered heartfelt acceptance speeches. How about Hudson nabbing an Oscar on her first movie out the gate? Whitaker's films have had such depth and it was wonderful to see him receive such a high achievement. Though I have still not seen "The Last King of Scotland." It is scheduled to be released on DVD in April.

Ellen Degeneres was okay as a host, the Dreamgirls performance was nice; I want to see "The Queen"; awesome to see Martin Scorese win - finally! And to be given the award by the three legendary directors: Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas.

It was not the best Oscars program that I've seen ... it moved along too slowly w/too many miscellaneous awards being handed out back-to-back.

**photo borrowed form vibe.com