Paul Giamatti was robbed

Robbed, I say. Last night I saw Barney's Version and it was a terrific movie. Great cast, great story (though not so much the story I remember from the Mordecai Richler novel), beautifully shot in Rome and Montreal and some lake in the woods.

Giamatti, who I've loved as an actor forever (remember him in Bottle Shock and The Illusionist?), plays Barney with a frumpy anger and internal dislike of himself that's absolutely true to life. Barney must be the saddest man on earth and, though he's embarrassed by it, he often cries. His aging process - and kudos to the makeup artists in this film - is absolutely believable. It may be that he wouldn't win an Oscar - but he absolutely 100% deserved to be nominated. I'm sad for him and for us, because I'd love to see him get the spotlight he deserves for this movie.

The rest of the cast is just as good - the men who play his friends both as young men and then aging are terrific. You watch them drink and do drugs and party in the 70s and then you see them as they age into (in most cases) people with lives and careers. And the women who play his wives - astonishing. Minnie Driver does a terrific job as a wanna be sexpot and Rosamund Pike is absolutely true to life as a woman who loves Barney and learns to live - for a very long time - with his eccentricities.

And Dustin Hoffman as Barney's father? He's great - as good as I've seen him. He takes what might, with another actor, be a small role and turns it into something absolutely central to the movie and to Barney. Barney's self loathing are tempered by his relationships with his father and his long-time third wife (Rosamund Pike) and, towards the end, by his children. This is a story about family - the family we are related to and the family we choose.

This is a movie worth watching.

Kate

Monday movie review - LAST CHANCE HARVEY

This was a great movie starring three of my favourite actors - Dustin Hoffman, Kathy Baker and Emma Thompson.

It's not your average romance, that's for sure. First of all, neither Hoffman nor Thompson is in the prime of youth anymore and their characters don't pretend to be either.

They're both disillusioned with their jobs and their lives and they're certainly not convinced that anything is going to get any better.

Hoffman is in London to see his daughter get married. He hasn't seen much of her and the relationship is strained. His estranged wife, played by Kathy Baker, and her husband, played by James Brolin, are perfect parents and, although she's invited her dad, she's not too pleased to see him especially when his cellphone rings constantly.

The rest of the story - it is, after all, a romance - is delightful and honest. Relationships aren't easy when you get older and the lovely homage to An Affair To Remember just shows one of the ways that a new relationship can go wrong when you're older.

Thompson and Hoffman inhabit their roles as if they were playing themselves - and perhaps they were.

You'll definitely enjoy this movie. I did, as did my partner (a man who tends to like action films) and my movie going friend Heather.

Kate