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Redbelt

Crit

This reminds me a lot of one of my favorite Mamet films, The Spanish Prisoner, except that in that film, Campbell Scott's Joe Ross was believably naïve, whereas in this one, Chiwetel Ejiofor's Mike Terry is positively Christlike.

Mamet's usual suspects Ricky Jay, David Paymer, and the versatile Rebecca Pidgeon (Mrs. Mamet has a small role but picks up the slack by co-writing and singing three samba-ish songs on the soundtrack) are on hand, but it's Ejiofer, Emily Mortimer, Alice Braga (niece of Sonia), and Max Martini as a cop almost as clean as Mike who jazz this one up.

Ultimately, it turns into a sports cliché movie--but Mamet even does that better than most.

Iron Man

Post

OK, look, let me just say it up front: Gwyneth Paltrow looks terrific with red hair; why the poster and newspaper ad show her in her usual blondness is beyond me. OK, now, what else positive can I say about the flick?

Well, it's true that Robert Downey Jr. plays it right by constantly showing that he knows this is a movie, and that no lives are really on the line. But come on, really. Hint to makers of a first movie about a superhero: (1) don't have the prologue last an hour, and (2) don't have the nemesis be just a souped-up version of the hero himself. Both of those tactics are OK for sequels, as a change of pace once you've already established a pace to change from, but both are just boring at the start of the sage. And I guess the weak box office pretty much proves my point.

If you do go, by the way, don't leave until the very end. Trust me.

Trailers

• Baghead--If anything, the trailer weakened my 4.
  The Happening--Who knows? But Zooey's hair's a mistake, that's for sure.
  The Love Guru--Still skeptical, very skeptical. Yes, Mike is charming, but is charm enough?
  Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull--First time seeing the full trailer rather than just a teaser, and I'm verging on a 5. In fact, let's face it: what are the chances I'll skip it, particularly if it opens downtown, as promised?