The Nanny Diaries

Posted on December 3, 2007 at 10:17 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	PG-13 for language
Profanity:	Some strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking, smoking
Violence/ Scariness:	Emotional turmoil and confrontations
Diversity Issues:	Economic, racial, and cultural diversity
Date Released to Theaters:	August 24, 2007
Date Released to DVD:	December 4, 2007
Amazon.com ASIN:	B000VKL6T8

Oh, we all love to feel superior to rich people, don’t we? It makes us feel so nice and smug. They may have the fancy apartments and couture, but we have a lock on authenticity and unpretentiousness, right? That’s what “The Nanny Diaries” wants to tell us, anyway. Its talented cast and some inspired visuals cannot enliven a superficial story.

Annie (Scarlett Johansson) has just graduated from college with a degree in business. Her mother, a nurse, wants her to get a job on Wall Street. But she bungles the interview. Later, in Central Park, a wealthy woman referred to only as Mrs. X (Laura Linney) from Manhattan’s tony East Side offers her a job as a nanny. No one on Wall Street may be interested in her, but she learns she is “the Chanel bag of nannies,” the ultimate accessory, because she is white, single, and has a college education.

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Arctic Tale

Posted on December 3, 2007 at 9:51 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	4th - 6th Grades
MPAA Rating:	G
Profanity:	None
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	Nature-style violence, some graphic footage of animals killing and eating each other, some disturbing images of the effects of climate change
Diversity Issues:	Diverse species
Date Released to Theaters:	July 30, 2007
Date Released to DVD:	December 4, 2007
Amazon.com ASIN:	B000WZAE0O

The people behind “March of the Penguins” have put together another endearing story of life in the coldest place on earth. This time, it is the story of two newborns, a polar bear called Nanu and a walrus named Seela. “What seems forbidding to us is home to them,” says narrator Queen Latifah, whose affectionate tone brings warmth to the frozen landscape. The story is not as linear or involving as “Penguins,” and it is overcast with more forboding, as the effects of climate change pose a greater threat to these new lives than temperature or predators.
arctic%20tale.jpg

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Love in the Time of Cholera

Posted on November 15, 2007 at 3:03 pm

B-

Lowest Recommended Age:	Adult
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for sexual content/nudity and brief language
Profanity:	Brief strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking, smoking
Violence/ Scariness:	Some violence including (offscreen) murder
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	November 16, 2007

In the most incongruous mismatch of literature and movie treatment since Demi Moore flounced around in “The Scarlet Letter,” director Mike Newell has taken a lyrical meditation on love, patience, devotion, loss, betrayal, and fever and turned it into a South American version of a Hugh Grant movie. He seems to think it is supposed to be a lightweight romantic comedy. The result is not without its pleasures, but every so often there is something so out of synch, so dissonant that it takes you out of the movie entirely.

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Lions for Lambs

Posted on November 7, 2007 at 3:21 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	MPAA Rating: R for some war violence and language
Profanity:	Some strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	Brief graphic battle violence
Diversity Issues:	A strength of the movie is strong, loyal relationships between diverse characters
Date Released to Theaters:	November 9, 2007

It is more op-ed than movie. “Lions for Lambs” is a well-meaning attempt to encapsulate and move forward one segment of our current political debates. But it is mostly speeches, not stories.
Lions%20for%20Lambs.jpg

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O Jerusalem

Posted on October 21, 2007 at 10:28 pm

Lowest Recommended Age:	Mature High Schooler
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for some war scenes
Profanity:	None
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking, smoking
Violence/ Scariness:	Battle violence including war atrocities, references to Holocaust, many characters injured and killed
Diversity Issues:	A theme of the movie, very strong women characters
Date Released to Theaters:	October 17, 2007

Good intentions often make bad movies.

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