If last week was a downer in terms of new movies, this weekend is definitely not. Basically, this is start of the big run of movies for Christmas/Oscar season so we'll start seeing the big, serious movies. Good thing it's going to rain.

Up first is the movie that's the talk of everything, Apocalypto. You know, we actually kind of want to see this movie. And yeah, we are fully aware of the fact Mel has an iffy relationship with our people. Our attitude, though, is if we stopped seeing/listening to art made by people with who do or say stupid things, there wouldn't be that much art out there for us to appreciate. Walt Disney wasn't down with the Jews either but that hasn't stopped us from seeing Cinderella a dozen times or so. Wait, did we just admit to that?

Anyways, we're kind of into this movie because it's not often you see something about the Mayan culture, even more so when you add the fact it's in the Mayan language. We also absolutely loved Braveheart. Still, we have a feeling this is a big, self-indulgent, mess of a movie, the kind that can ruin a director's career or make him go back to doing safe, Hollywood romantic comedies because the studio won't let him go near a big budget again. Rumor has it he went a little nutty in the jungle so this movie has sort of Apocalypse Now feel to it, the creation of a man slowly having his brain fried by the heat.

Also up this week is Blood Diamond which has Oscar Bait written all over it. It's got big stars, some of whom have the official Oscar logo complete with TM logo by their names, and it's made by a director, Edward Zwick. who does nice liberal homilies, the kind the Academy loves. Which is why we don't like Zwick's movies. Glory was a typical Hollywood "white man leads noble black people" flick, the kind that made the mighty P.E. sing "Burn, Hollywood Burn" and we thought The Last Samurai’s politics were totally daft (white American goes to save reactionary Japanese from electricity and trains). In other words, we're staying away from this one.

And speaking of movies we're going to stay away from, there's The Holiday, a romantic comedy starring Kate Winslet (who we love), Cameron Diaz, Jude Law, and Jack Black. We have a feeling the entire impetus for this movie was the movie pitch when somebody said "Winslet! Diaz! Law! Black! How could it miss?" To which the answer is very easily.

Truth be told, the coolest thing we're seeing out there right now is the preview for 300. That looks AWESOME.