Shame on you billy for not seeing "The Sundowners" when we had _your_ Zinnemann Forum.

Were you not able to get a copy then?

Can't believe I didn't at least allude to The Sundowners during that forum, since I like it better than any other Zinnemann except High Noon. For instance, I like it and Kerr far better than From Here to Eternity, and her performance in it.

I thought Apocalypto was a singular piece of bravura film making. Yes, the plot managed to be both simple and contrived, but one has to admire Mel Gibson's vision and independence of thought.

Pineapple Express is constantly funny and/or over-the-top violent, in the style of The Three Stooges on crack. Seth Rogen and James Franco are wonderful as two stoners who get involved with drugs, shootouts, and death and destruction. It's like a parody of Quentin Tarantino melded with slapstick comedy and rather one-of-a-kind. Gary Cole and Rosie Perez, usually noted for their comedy, are the straight man/woman here, the outright villains who start the cycle of hilarious violence when they commit a killing witnessed by the hapless Rogen. A great supporting cast features SNL's Bill Hader and other semi-familiar faces including my friend Joe Lo Truglio as a moronic high school teacher.

I thought Apocalypto was a singular piece of bravura film making. Yes, the plot managed to be both simple and contrived, but one has to admire Mel Gibson's vision and independence of thought.

Meanwhile, the A-list director Marc Forster (Monster's Ball, Finding Neverland) directs an action flick, the James Bond Quantum of Solace, and makes a fiasco of it. (It's one of the two or three worst James Bond movies in history.)