We just back from three fab nights at the Paris Casino & Hotel on the Las Vegas Strip. This was one of those times we had free in-room movies.


Seven Pounds Will Smith appears to be stalking people as he tries to figure out whether they are worthy of a life-changing gift he plans to give them. Through meager flashbacks we slowly understand that he caused a bad car accident in which 7 people die, including his beautiful fiance and going forward we figure out that he plans to donate his organs to these people he is stalking; he just wants to make sure they deserve it. In the process he meets a young woman with a heart condition and falls in love, but when it becomes apparent that because of her rare blood type, which he shares, he is the only possible donor, so in order to save her, he has to kill himself so he does. This was a pretty good movie with an unusual story, but sad.

Yes Man Jim Carey. I know, I know, he's a goofy ham, but once I recovered from the extremes in The Mask, I've been entertained by his movies. In this one he goes to a seminar and makes a promise that he will only say yes to any request. Short term it doesn't look good, like the bum who asked to use his cell phone and ran down the battery, asked for all the cash in his pocket and left him stranded out of gas far from civilization. But in the process he met the love of his life and made some new friends. One of my favorite things was when he and his girlfriend decided to just fly wherever the next plane was going, so they ended up in Lincoln, Nebraska at a Huskers game.

Milk Harvey Milk's message (aside from "I'm Harvey Milk and I'm here to recruit you") was that all gays should come out of the closet because then everyone else would realize that we know some gay people - maybe even family members, and they aren't that scary. Sean Penn deserved the Oscar he received for this role. One of my biggest impressions was how hard-won any gay rights have been, and how easy for there to be set-backs.

The Reader This is about a woman played by Kate Winslet on trial for Nazi war crimes: she was a prison guard, but we don't know that right away, all we know is that a teenage boy had an affair with her one summer and she liked him to read to her. She disappears and years later when he is law school he attends her trial. This is not a funny movie, but I liked the way they showed us how this woman really believed she was doing her job as a prison guard, and it was all black and white, no gray areas. One of my biggest impressions was that Kate Winslett has really ugly feet.

Revolutionary Road Kate Winslett again, and towards the end we had another good look at her feet, so those must be hers and not some ugly foot model, because the appearance of her feet has nothing to do with the story, so why would they bring in a ringer. What you must think of me for noticing this.

Anyhow, this movie also stars Leonardo De Caprio and I remember hearing something on TV about them recreating the chemistry from Titanic. I don't know about that, but on the other hand they weren't supposed to be happily married, so maybe they were good at conveying that. This is set in the mid-1950s and I loved seeing the cars, their furniture, and the work culture at his New York City office. Lots of smoking everywhere, and martini lunches and nooners with secretarial pool 'girls.' Meanwhile, Kate is out there in the Connecticut 'burbs losing her mind feeling trapped. She comes up with this idea that he'll quit the job he hates and they will move the family to Paris where she will get a good-paying job as a secretary for NATO or some other govt agency and he will find himself. But she finds out she's pregnant plus he gets offered a promotion at work, so the whole thing falls through and she's trapped in the 'burbs.

Remember Joanne Woodward's movies? She always seemed so sturdy, not the best-looking woman on the screen, but a beautiful personality. That's how Kate Winslett seemed in both movies I just saw her in. Those wide-screen TVs don't do the width of a person's rear-end any favors, and 1950s fashions for men or women both weren't always the most flattering by today's standards, but she looked healthy and true to the characters she was portraying.

To be continued.