Opening this weekend is George Clooney’s The Monuments Men, a film originally scheduled for a Christmas award season release but was unexpectedly pushed to this obscure February release.  A movie being pushed is usually a bad sign for the quality of a film and initial reviews haven’t been very kind.  Unfortunately I won’t be able to catch Monuments Men until the following Friday.  You may call me a sucker but I’m still holding out hope for this film, I mean with Clooney, Damon, Blanchett, Murray and Goodman, how bad can it really be?  Please, please don’t be famous last words…

The other wide release this weekend that surprisingly interests me is Warner Bros. latest animated effort, The Lego Movie.  A slew of star actors including Morgan Freeman lent their vocal cords to create an action comedy that looks rather humorous.  The little town I’m relegated to has a tiny 3-plex, but one of the films available this week just happens to be The Lego Movie.  I expect to make my way over there sometime this week to see if it is worthy of all the positive buzz.

August: Osage County is another late 2013 release that I was surprised stayed in local theaters this week.  My initial plans are to catch August Friday afternoon, so I should have a review posted shortly after.  Ron Howard’s formula 1 drama Rush and Joseph Gordon Levitt’s directorial debut Don Jon are two recent DVD releases that are now available in Redbox, my hope is to have a chance at finally catching them as well this weekend.  We’ll see how many of these films I get to see. Stay tuned as reviews will hopefully be coming soon…JL

Tonight I’m happy to get the chance to revisit director Noah Baumbach’s 2013 film Frances Ha.  I was able to catch this quirky little Black & White last summer in a beautiful old theater in downtown Portsmouth, NH, but have wanted to see it one more time.