SHRINK

SHRINK IS DEFINITELY IN

"Henry Carter: It's all bullshit and then you die."

Henry Carter is a lost man. He is a therapist to a great many of the Hollywood used and broken but he himself is in pain, although you wouldn't know it by how much pot the guy smokes.

MOON

MOON: IT'S 2010 NOT 2001

This is not your parent's space oddessy. Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) is an astronaut who has a three year contract with a private company to "mine" the moon as a newfound source of electricity. Look closely at the great shots of the moon with square mined areas taken out. Brilliant. He is joined only by Gerty (Kevin Spacey) the intentionally sounding Hal-like robot who attends to his ever need. Director Duncan Jones (David Bowie's son) puts a few references in the movie to 2001 as well as Danny Boyle's Sunshine (clue, it's in the music) and has fun with the use of the flow-bee and the clapper. After an accident while on duty attending to a machine Sam is knocked unconscious. When we see him next he is waking up in the infirmary with Gerty informing him that he had an accident. After a while of paranoia, we soon find out that Sam is still unconscious, left for dead in the range rover only to be rescued by Sam. Confused?

21

21 WINS HIGH STAKES

"I had a 1590 on my SAT, I got a 44 on my MCAT, and I have a 4.0 GPA from MIT. I thought I had my life mapped out, but then I remembered what my non linear equations professor once told me, always account for variable change... I let down my good friends, but as it turns out, they weren't too bad at simple math either. I scored the prettiest girl in school. I got beaten down by an old school Vegas thug who was having trouble accepting his retirement, but I worked out a deal with him that got him a nice pension... And I lied to my mother, but I confessed a lie and well, she still loved me... So my senior year of college I joined this team and I learned this new skill. I went to Vegas 17 times to use it. I made hundreds of thousands of dollars counting cards. And then I had it all stolen from me, twice... How's that for life experience professor? Did I dazzle you? Did I jump off the page?"

No need to summarize when the monologue from our main character, Ben (Jim Sturgess) does it for me. Think Ocean's Eleven meets the Breakfast Club. What could be easier than to be smart, count cards and win money? Well, I think we all know what happens to young people and big money. Ben is sucked into the high life faster than a Hoover with a fresh bag. We all know things won't last, but how they happen and when is still a mystery. This is a very well executed movie. It had an entertaining pace; not too fast and not too slow. Spacey does a lovely job as the charismatic yet deeply selfish professor who takes advantage of his wiz kids. Sturgess makes believable the wide-eyed, amazing naive "nerd" who turns into "McLovin" the pimped out mac daddy. Strong supporting cast, especially Aaron Yoo as Choi, who makes for good comic relief. No masterpiece, but certainly worth a look.

PICK: Well done; entertaining and fun to watch. Sturdy work all around.