Some reviews, after all that Oscar talk:

BUTTERFLY EFFECT: Yes, surprisingly good, although once again I find myself getting hung up on how time-travel movies seem to think that only your immediate circle of friends and family will be affected if you go back and change things. Once again, I mention how Ray Bradbury's "The Sound of Thunder" will forever be the model for me as far as time travel goes (the scientists step on a butterfly in the past, and the whole world has changed when they return). This movie actually rocks with good scares in the first hour, but then starts to become a little tedious and filled with plot holes. Kutcher is better than expected in a fairly demanding role.

THE PERFECT SCORE: After mentioning my latest actress obsession in the previous blog, now we can talk about one of her new movies. Scarlett Johansson cannot hide true beauty and winning charisma as a supporting character in this actually very fun movie directed by Brian Robbins, who did an alright fun movie with VARSITY BLUES and an outright awful movie READY 2 RUMBLE. I think when a movie mentions another movie, they generally are paying homage to it--in this case it's THE BREAKFAST CLUB, and that's the kind of feel you get. Perfectly watchable several hundred times in your lifetime. One of those, not-great-but-if-it's-on-I'll-watch-it movies.

And commenting on TAD HAMILTON, Jonathan, you're absolutely right. I was talking about this with someone at work last night, how Josh Duhamel, as Tad Hamilton, IS the better romantic choice and how the film tries much too hard to give the girl to Topher Grace, who is downright unappealing a lot of the time--it's a movie that wasted a golden opportunity to be more than typical January fare.