YEDI KOCALI HURMUZ

Walked out. It looks like a freak show. Only a woman with a beard is missing. Or maybe not. I didn't wait that long.

THE STEPFATHER

Watchable. A typical psycho killer movie but well made, well acted and Amber Heard as Kelly is really hot (ultra-feminine features and shapes).

CARRIERS

Watchable. A typical film about an epidemics decimating humanity. No ending. Chris Pine with facial hair doesn't look even half as sexy as in "Star Trek". The only interesting thing in the film is the distrophy of human solidarity - Brian abandoning his infected girlfriend on the road was powerful and it's not the only example.

ROCKET SINGH - SALESMAN OF THE YEAR

Recommended. Bullied at work idealist starts his own business and competes with his employer - the film is funny and full of suspense.

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE

Walked out. Your own children will be more interesting. Or if you don't like children, you won't like the film anyway. Either way don't bother.

DAS WEISSE BAND (THE WHITE RIBBON)

Walked out. Michael Haneke is making worse and worse movies. "Funny Games" were brilliant, "La Pianiste" ("The Piano Player") still good, "Cache" ("Hidden") watchable, while "Das Weisse Band" ("The White Ribbon") is slow, with no musical score, shot in black and white, with an annoying narrative.

THE BOX

Recommended. A couple has to decide whether to sacrifice a stranger's life to get badly needed cash. But that's only the beginning...

ME AND ORSON WELLES

Walked out. You really have to be into the theatre to enjoy this cinematic production.

PAA

Walked out. An irresponsible and unreliable man leaves his pregnant girlfriend, whe gives birth to a son who suffers from progeria. The disease isn't very enticing visually and you don't need to go to the cinema to find irresponsible and unreliable men. The guy in the film becomes a politician.

CRACKS

Recommended. Worthy of a few oscars: beautifully acted, a subtle yet powerful story of dangerous love.

GLORIOUS 39

Recommended. It's political but the feeling of being cornered is as powerful as in the original "The Stepford Wives". Its realism only makes it more scary.

NATIVITY

Watchable. Starts with teacher bickering, then becomes a beautiful, albeit sad, tale about hope and ends with a spectacular performance with a fantastic use for the spire of the Coventry Cathedral -well worth seeing. They are taking the movie off now so get it on DVD and fast forward to the ending.

THE DESCENT: PART 2

Walked out. The cave is nothing special so the pre-horror descent has no impact and then you get rats crawling out of corpses and alien-rip-off monsters.

PLANET 51

Watchable. A nice take on aliens with their every day problems and fear of human invaders. A funny film, playing with the genre (e.g. quotes like: "In space no one will hear you scream" or "Hasta la vista, baby") but it's not laugh-out-loud funny. More for children than for adults. "The Incredibles" it isn't.

LAW ABIDING CITIZEN

Watchable. A really good action movie. And nothing more than that.

BUNNY AND THE BULL

Walked out. It looks lower budget than it was, full of tacky props. The plot is rubbish and one bit was so disgusting (a guy sucking a dog's tit) that I just couln't stand it any longer.

DE DANA DAN

Watchable. Like all comedies of errors, it's entertaining, with some good gags and lines (e.g. "So go, die and come back") but the errors pile up confusingly fast. The music is OK.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY

Watchable. The shaky camera makes the viewing of the film more difficult than of a home video. Interesting relatioship dynamics - the guy is terribly childish. One scare at the very end.

KURTLAR VADISI - GLADIO (VALLEY OF THE WOLVES - GLADIO)

Walked out. Elderly spies shoot each other, discuss patriotism and are so secretive they they won't reveal what's it all about.

HEER RANJHA

Watchable. There's little of a story, more of folklore, tradition and romantic songs. What I found interesting was the cultural difference. I'm independent above European average and in my eyes marrying a daughter off to someone because of his wealth and status is akin to pimping. In the film the girl from an Indian Muslim rural community is called "a shameless wretch" when she refused to marry a man she doesn't love. What's scary she believes she is.

A SERIOUS MAN

Walked out. A bunch of weirdoes doing things that make no sense.

THE TWILIGHT SAGA: NEW MOON

Watchable. Again, better than the book. Good CGIs. Jacob's werewolf persona is so cute you want to pet him. Again, very well acted. Shame the lines are mostly murmured hardly audibly in a crowded cinema, I had to see it again on a weekday matinee. The music is awful: the fairy-tale tones clash with the dark story and rubbish songs make the film feel lengthy.

THE INFORMANT

Walked out. His desk job isn't any more interesting than yours.

KURBAAN

Walked out. If relationships are so boring that you need a blast, it's better to stay single. The terrorists are stereotypically portrayed and there's no music and dancing even in the romantic beginning.

TAKING WOODSTOCK

Watchable. It's hard to warm up to the mean villagers but when the festival takes place the two worlds clash spectacularly.

AMELIA

Walked out. Amelia Earhart was fanatical about flying which everyone knows without seeing the movie. Her life and character don't bring in any surprises.

TUM MILE

Watchable. Indians know how to write beautiful love stories. They only ruin the ending with the girl getting pregnant.

AN EDUCATION

Recommended. Fantastic dialogues, acting, a fascinating story and a good life lesson.

2012

Watchable. What a beautiful catastrophy! Not that it makes any sense but it is entertaining.

BRIGHT STAR

Walked out. Poets are notorious for being poor, untidy, of poor health and having weirdo side-kicks. Keats appears to have been no different. In addition the actors can't decide whether to be theatrical or casual, cinematic it isn't.

THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS

Watchable. It's full of New Age weirdness but with some brilliant humour, e.g. "He tapped him and he died of death touch." "There and then?" "No, 18 years later."

THE FOURTH KIND

Watchable. Archive footage often shown together with dramatised scenes and mixing Dr. Abigail Tyler's life traumas with her patients' make it hardly comprehensible at first. Once you get used to the strange form of the film, it gets spooky. I was trembling when I left. No idea if it's true or a hoax just like "Blair Witch Project". I do hope it is fiction.

HARRY BROWN

Watchable. The police fight with organised crime is so boring that you get to understand why they don't normally bother in real life. Once the OAP starts his own mission it gets really good with interesting twists of action. The portrayal of junkie degenerates is unforgettable.

COLD SOULS

Watchable. The science fiction layer of soul trafficking is meticulously created but you'd expect some changes in the characters changing souls instead of blabbing about how awful their soulless lives are.

JAIL

Watchable. A fascinating complex story about a wrongly accused with rising star Neil Nihil Mukesh in the main role. A bit stereotypical though.

1 DAY

Watchable. Nothing special about the story maybe apart from the main character - the guy is barely adult but already has 5 children with 5 different girls. He's in a gang so he's going to live-fast-die-young but he's already ensured the survival of his genes. The acting and hip-hop are top-notch.

A CHRISTMAS CAROL 3D

Watchable. Form over substance. The exquisite CGIs put the story in their shadow but convey the Christmas message in the end.

AJAB PREM KI GHAZAB KAHANI

Walked out. A bunch of morons having adventures full of gags and lines that just fail to be funny.

JENNIFER'S BODY

Watchable. The tongue-in-cheek beginning and ending are fun but in between you get a trashy horror with a bleeding demon asking for a tampon. I also don't understand why Megan Fox is considered the ultimate hottie. She looks like any other woman.

TWILIGHT

Seen 5th time. I still find it incredibly well acted by Billy Burke (police chief Charlie Swan), Robert Pattinson (Edward Cullen) and Kristen Stewart (Bella Swan). Other than that, after reading all 4 books, I'm a bit fed up with the series.

AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON

Watchable. A peculiar film acted so theatrically that all actors pronounce their lines clearly which is a nice change from the mainstream but feels fake nevertheless.

The sequel to "Blue" is going to focus on the sky instead of the sea. So, basically, there will be nothing to watch. The only enjoyable thing about "Blue" were the underwater scenes.

NATIONAL LAMPOON'S ANIMAL HOUSE

Walked out. You don't need to go to the cinema to see and hear a bunch of morons singing and smoking weed. Come over and experience my neighbours.

DEAD MAN RUNNING

Walked out. A run of the mill gangster story where the only novelty is the looking and talking more like an Oxford professor than a gangster.

VATAN SAGOLSUN (NEFES - LONG LIVE THE FATHERLAND)

Walked out. Daily lives of philosophical soldiers on the front.

ALADIN

Walked out. This adaptation focuses on communication problems between Aladin and the genie. The music could be better too.

9

Walked out. I failed to see anything fascinating in 2 rag dolls in a vehicle scrap heap.

MICHAEL JACKSON'S THIS IS IT

Watchable. The enjoyment of watching the film is directly proportional to your adorement of MJ. I went to Madonna's concert but never intended to go to MJ's and the film didn't "convert" me. It basically shows how meticulously the greatest prepare their shows.

Psychologist Dr Peter Lovatt discovered that high-testosterone people dance more dynamically than their low testosterone counterparts (www.dancedrdance.com). Go and see the 11 highest-testosterone people in the world!

LONDON DREAMS

Watchable. A stereotypical but well acted, with Salman Khan sensational as a Punjabi simple mind on a plane to London, rags-to-riches story of pop stars, with good music and some humour (especially Salman Khan mentioned above).

ALL THE BEST: FUN BEGINS

Walked out. A guy scams money from his step-brother to play bad music with a band and then starts dealing with a mute gangster communicating through clinking a glass. I'm not sure what this movie is trying to be, let alone what it is.

BLUE

Watchable. A silly gangster movie full of car chases and shoot-outs, with a cameo by fatso Kylie Minogue. Lovely views of Thailand acting as the Bahamas and the actual Bahamas with spectacular marine life.

THE GOODS: LIVE HARD, SELL HARD

Watchable. It isn't funny at all. I only watched on curious what other selling tricks they will come up with.

ONG-BAK: THE BEGINNING

Walked out. The cinematography is shameful: dull colours and whatever is close or far is blurred. The story? A kid is trained in martial arts, then grows up and fights.

MAIN AUR MRS KHANNA

Watchable. Early on it was intriguing: a husband tries to save his career going to Singapore, takes his wife with him to the airport and then... tells her he's flying her to a different destination than his. Later on it's some romantic rubbish with music below high Bollywood standards.

LOVE HAPPENS

Watchable. A ridiculous title for a film about dealing with grief. I expected a romcom and ended up crying for 2 hours. But at least it felt catharctic after leaving the cinema.

CIRQUE DU FREAK: THE VAMPIRE ASSISTANT

Walked out. Awfully badly acted and with a ludicrous script, e.g. the main protagonist sees a huge arachnid in national colours and is delighted: "She's beautiful". And he's the least freaky character.

FANTASTIC MR. FOX

Walked out. It's that annoying animation where the characters look like dolls and here they also move in a quirky, twitchy way. It's a film noir about antropomorphic foxes in burglers' gang - it is as stupid as it sounds.

THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASUS

Walked out. Incoherent, mostly poorly acted, with every character speaking in a different accent, and full of freaks.

SAW VI

Watchable. Part I was a masterpiece, part II watchable, part III equalled part I, part IV was watchable for fans, part V was so bad that even I walked out, part VI is really good. It's slower than over-packed part II, IV and V. It retains the best of Saw scares. The murder motivation is clearly explained and better "justified" than ever. It's below excellent just because part VI is repetitive by definition.

In SAW VII next year it's going to be the young lad killing people. He's really young so may last a few sequels.

COUPLES RETREAT

Watchable. I don't know where they shot it but I want to go there! There's incredibly blue water with colour fish and a pool-side club spinning great music that is open-air and where no one smokes. Never mind the plot is lousy and unfanny, even containing a joke about being marked by sharks for later that I heard in a different film before. Jean Reno of "Le Grand Bleu" fame is aptly cast as the owner of the marine paradise. Now, where's my snorkel?

TRIANGLE

Watchable. The beginning was so boring that I switched off and really started paying attention when they boarded the ghost ship. A great mistake. The subsequent puzzle was so intriguing that I ended up going to another screening to see the beginning once more. The time loop makes it feel lengthy but the mystery stays with you after you leave the cinema.

PASSAGE

Watchable. While it's historically revealing, the film attempts to be too artistic to be a decent documentary. It's incoherent with: casually dressed actors reading roles, the same performers acting in period costumes, an explorer following Ray's footsteps in the Arctic, the same investigator talking to people in Scotland, the crew discussing history, visiting places - all loosely stitched together. Many scenes could do with shortening too.

BEFORE TOMORROW

Watchable. A powerful and moving story of resilience, set in an exotic environment of the Arctic where any rush decision may result in death. Some scenes, including an underwater one, are beautifully shot. Having said that, it's more of a series of images rather than a coherent story.

The talk preceding the one-off screening at Canada House highlighted that nowadays anyone can make a movie but few can get it distributed. Couldn't agree more. The stunning independent Japanese film "Thunder Fish" was shown at 2008 Raindance Film Festival only because a scheduled film had to be dropped due to its pornographic contents. The makers of the "Thunder Fish" masterpiece struggled to get it distributed even in their own country. Hardly fair taken how many generally released movies are too rubbish to sit through the screening.

UP 3D

Walked out. It's flat - without the 3D glasses it's exactly the same just slightly blurred. It's also really sad: A couple waste their lives away never doing what they have always dreamed about. Then, as an old man, the protagonist injures a contractor while defending his property and gets summoned to court. He runs away to his dream Paradise Falls and faces lots of obstacles on his way. It's just so depressing.

HALLOWEEN 2

Walked out. The killer walks and chops.

PANDORUM

Watchable. There were just a few good scenes:

1. Normally films, even documentaries, show astronauts striding confidently from the spacecraft towards the camera. The reality, as far as I know, is different - they are taken out on stretches as their muscles need to readjust to gravity. Hibernation in movies is also glossed over - they just come to. In "Pandorum" it was impressively more realistic: they shiver, their faces are red, then their bodies cover in sweat, their hair is greasy, they are disoriented and suffer a temporary memory loss.

2. The scene showing a few stories high shelving full of genetic samples needed to colonise a planet.

3. The "historic" account of "the worst catastrophy of space flights" when two flight team members come down with a mental disorder resulting in them believing the spaceship is evil and "evacuating" 5000 passengers sending their hiber beds into the outer space "like flying coffins".

4. The vision of future Earth where the protagonist stands close to the Brandenburger Tor in Berlin with goggles on his face and a turban-like scarf around his head to protect him from the dust of extreme pollution.

5. The 2 views of the alien environment towards the end of the movie.

All the rest should be entitled "Zombies In Space". The mythical reference in "Pandorum" implies more intelligence.

Funnily the next film on my list was

ZOMBIELAND

Watchable. I'm really fed up with the recent zombiemania among movie-makers. How many aggressive corpses dripping of blood and green saliva can you watch? At least it was well acted and funny. Woody Harrelson is better than ever before - a natural born zombie killer. And the jokes are good, e.g. after being mugged by the same two girls in one day: "You are thinking about fucking Wichita?! The two girls have been fucking us the last 24 hours!"

BUGSY MALONE

Walked out. The film is full of lolitas. How come it's re-released at the time of a supposed crackdown on paedophiles?

DRIVING APHRODITE

Recommended. A feel-good movie. Kept me cheerful and patient with public transport all the way back home from Enfield to Central London. Hilarious too, e.g. a Greek guy asks "How do you call this game: a guy stand in front of people waving his dick?" which turns out to be his poor pronounciation - he meant a conductor waving his stick in front of an orchestra.

TOY STORY 3D

Walked out. The film is flat and the toys talk like boring adults holding meetings on plastic toxicity.

WAKE UP SID

Recommended. A beautiful story about starting an independent life that is sometimes sad, sometimes funny and thoroughly involving. Every viewer either has already or will at some point go through the same so it's easy identify yourself with the characters.

DO KNOT DISTURB

Watchable. This comedy is really silly and often downright stupid but so light-hearted that it is fun. It's not supposed to be treated seriously after all.

THE INVENTION OF LYING

Watchable. An insightful vision of a world where people only tell the truth and never refrain from doing so. But why is it advertised as a comedy? Let me tell you the truth about this movie: it's really sad and pessimistic, whether with or without lies.

THE GODFATHER

Recommended. Good it's been re-released. I finally saw the classic. And a classic it is. A powerful story of loyalties, the family, life choices, power and trust.

SURROGATES

Seen second time. It still strikes me how complete a portrayal of a future world it is. The film ingeniously winks towards SF fans with its hints at "Gamer", "Terminator", "G.I.Joe" and "Last Action Hero". And it's pure pleasure to see the streets full of supermodel-lookalikes.

CREATION

Walked out. It's not about Charles Darwin procrastinating to announce his theory. It's about the script writer putting off the main story. Well, if there is any later on. My patience ran out.

SURROGATES

Recommended. Good science fiction comes up with a new scientific idea and puts it to a test in a fictitious medium. A good film is well scripted, filmed and acted. This movie meets all these conditions.

FAME

Recommended. Bereft of the original's gloom and fatalism, it's retained the most valid plots and fantastically modernised the whole. Of course it's kept the hit song "I'm gonna live forever".

In the meantime I've set four nights out free of charge for myself for this week only. I'm gonna dance forever...

THE SOLOIST

Watchable. It starts with people, whether sane or mentally ill, talking rubbish and it feels like sitting on a London bus having to hear strangers' boring conversations. but soon it gets so much better. The portrayal of the community of mentally ill people is just surreal and the bits putting you into the mind of a schizophreniac just show how it feels to hear voices.

WHAT'S YOUR RAASHEE?

Watchable. The comedy is brilliant (e.g. "How did you like the girl?" "She's nice but she argues a lot." "You won't argue after marriage." "Why?" "By then you will learn to shut up."). What detracts from the movie is too Western music.

MEET THE ROBINSONS

Watchable. I don't like animation making cartoon characters look like dolls. But time warp movies tend to be good and this story doesn't disappoint.

Hilarious: Icelanders have made their first slasher movie ever. The title is "The Whale-Watching Massacre".

THE CRIMSON WING

Watchable. Interesting visual effects show that truly only the best material of the 13-month shooting has been selected. The commentary sounds so monotonous that it's hard to focus though. Still, what I can see clearly from the film is that I will need new feathers for my collection. Not all flamingoes are totally pink. Some have white feathers with crimson tips - really beautiful.

THE FIRM

Walked out. Boring are lives of football hooligans. And expensive (£80 for a tacky tracksuit in the 80s).

I skipped the preview of "The Soloist" with full conscience - if the proceeds go to a charity, I'd better leave it to normal ticket payers to attend the screening. I guess my Unlimited pass wouldn't help much.

JULIE AND JULIA

Watchable. I like to cook and it's a very uplifting movie about the joy of cooking and eating. Still, it's not exactly mouthwatering and the kitchen disasters could be funnier.

THREE MILES NORTH OF MOLKOM

Watchable. It's about an obscure event full of rituals reminiscent of paganism. But it's shown with irreverent humour (e.g. a cool Australian has heard about a festival while travelling through Europe and disappointingly found himself stuck with tree-huggers, the camera captures his and others' faces commenting on the goings-on).

The screening was preceded by a lengthy comedy show by Russell Howard. I don't get much of his humour but a few jokes were good. One had me in stitches: A girl at school is doing some calculations and whenever her calculator refuses cooperation, she bangs it against the desk. The noise is so annoying to the teacher that he says to the underage girl: "How would you like it if I banged you against the desk?"

FISH TANK

Watchable. A gritty look on daily lives of chavs: kids that drink, smoke and steal like it's no big deal, a young mother that hardly tolerates her children. It is unpleasant but fascinating to watch for an outsider. Very convincingly made and acted.

MISS MARCH: GENERATION PENETRATION

Watchable. It is gross but funny, like "American Pie".

CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS 3-D

Watchable. The story is about as clever as the title indicates but when ice-cream fell down on the village I just couldn't help fantasising about a downpour of pancakes with wild blueberries and whipped cream. The movie is quite funny. Just see the inventor's father face when his son asks him to find a file and email to his mobile.

WANTED

Watchable. The music and dancing is really good and that means a lot in Bollywood. The storyline is ingeniously contrived. Salman Khan acts at his best. Just the gang dealings feel a bit lengthy.

Trailers promise a number of good movies this Diwali. "Blue" is particularly intriguing - diving, sharks, Bollywood top actors.

DIL BOLE HADDIPA!

Recommended. The music and dancing is absolutely top-class. Shahid Kapoor and Rani Mukherjee act and dance just so well that I checked their names. Truly rising stars. The comedy is also hilarious.

IN THE REALM OF THE SENSES

Watchable. It's about sex so, obviously, it's exciting to watch. But it's about nothing more than sex.

(500) DAYS OF SUMMER

Watchable. A beautiful love story with an annoying commentary (by an old prick's voice), a nonsense film in the film and ridiculous and confusing going forward and back in time.

DISTRICT 9

Watchable. Poor direction and acting combined with a boring mockumentary style (really, TV talking heads discussing trivia) detract from a good storyline. "Enemy Mine" it isn't.

THE HURT LOCKER

Walked out. Day-to-day work of soldiers in a war zone. For fans of army machinery only. Even "Jarhead" was better.

WHITEOUT

Watchable. A spotless and spacious station in Antarctica, much better than the one whose replica I saw at an exhibition at Science Museum, is the background to an almost-slasher-movie. While the balaclava-clad figure running with a dagger looks ridiculous, the frozen dead bodies and investigators' struggle with the weather conditions are more involving.

LOS ABRAZOS ROTOS (BROKEN EMBRACES)

Watchable. A usual multi-layer Almodovar story, with the characters somewhat subdued. The farther in the movie, the better. The comic bit of "Girls and Suitcases" should be developed into a full-length film - vibrant characters and perfect acting.

GAMER

Watchable. The movie builds on "The Running Man", with Gerard Butler taking Arnold Schwarzenegger's place. The clownish-acting inventor would suit "Batman" better but the vision of future entertainment is plausible and attractive to watch. A bit chaotic though.

AWAY WE GO

Walked out. People in their thirties try to sort their lives. I decided sorting out my own life was more interesting and left.

DORIAN GRAY

Watchable. The 1970 film was one of the creepiest of my childhood. This one relies on ominous noises and worms rather than dosing the menace. It's also really poorly acted, even Colin Firth acts half-heartedly. Good it retained some of Oscar Wilde's brilliant observations (e.g. "I didn't exactly propose. I just said I loved her and she said it was her dream come true to become my wife." "Women are so wonderfully practical.")

SORORITY ROW

Watchable. The title indicated a chick flick so I was surprised to see them killing each other. As slasher movies go, this one doesn't stand out. It's fast-paced so you can't get bored but no major scares.

ADVENTURELAND

Watchable. A sad story about ordinary lives entangled in strong emotions. With amazing Bill Hader as the theme park manager.

APNI BOLI APNA DES

Watchable. The story of love, family and debt is involving but it starts with half an hour of people talking jibberish about wedding plans. Mediocre music. Punjabi.

MR. MAGORIUM'S WONDER EMPORIUM

Recommended. Saw it twice. The story is full of magic and wonders indeed.

THE FINAL DESTINATION 3-D

Recommended. Finally real 3D! It starts with a mind-blowing 3D car race and doesn't relent for a minute. The storyline is intriguing too: are we destined to die at a specific time or can we get away with it?

FUNNY PEOPLE

Walked out. What an unfunny movie about comedy.

TINKERBELL AND THE LOST TREASURE

Walked out. Tinkerbell manipulates everyone around her by being cute and sulking.

MESRINE: L'ENNEMI PUBLIC NO. 1 (MESRINE - PART II: PUBLIC ENEMY 1)

Watchable. Surprisingly. I walked out from Part I but this one is much more fun. Lots of humour (e.g. the criminal drinking to being No. 1 when declared public enemy). It could be shorter though. The scenes that are supposed to increase tension are so lengthy that they increase sleepiness rather than the heart rate.

KISAAN

Watchable. A run-of-the-mill social economic rural family story with a good criminal plot. The music is mediocre: pleasantly melodious songs throughout the film with the best one saved for the credits.

KAMINEY (SCOUNDRELS)

Walked out. Lame gangsters argue and fight between one another and a girl gets knocked up because she didn't want her boyfriend to use a condom. The two stories are supposedly somehow connected.

DR NO

Watchable. Good that nowadays action movie heroes and heroines are young. This 60s movie is full of aged spies seducing middle-aged women. The atomic plot is intriguing enough and Jamaican coast pleasing to watch.

SIN NOMBRE

Watchable. Yet another "City Of God" rip-off. Still, the complex characters compel you to sympathise with them and the action is fast and twisted remaining clear to the viewer.

SHORTS

Walked out. A film that shows that stupid people wish for silly things and dull people wish for ordinary things. If I had a wishing rock, I would wish for a better script.

IMAGINE THAT

Watchable. The childtalk is annoying. I wasn't that stupid even as a kid. The adult business plot is much better.

BANDSLAM

Walked out. About nerds with bad music tastes.

THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE

Walked out. Brad Pitt must be really aging if he felt any need for producing this sentimental bore about passing time.

A PERFECT GETAWAY

Watchable. It starts with a serious of bland conversations on the trek. It's only towards the much faster ending that you wish you had listened carefully. All the hints were there.

ALIENS IN THE ATTIC

Watchable. Cheerful family science fiction like in the 80s. Brilliantly acted inventive kids stop an alien invasion. Only the aliens disappoint - they look and talk like Shrek.

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS

Recommended. Tarantino's best movie. Stunningly acted, stylishly shot and most of all perfectly scripted. Even the slow beginning is compelling and later you get one twist after another. Absolutely superb.

LIFE PARTNER

Watchable. A cheerful family comedy with ingeniously over-the-top characters, including a divorce lawyer breaking people's marriages. Good music. While it never fails to be funny, it doesn't cut the edge. Only tried and tested comedy rules have been applied.

LOVE AAJ KAL

Walked out. A boring guy breaks up with a boring girl (doesn't surprise me) and then their love starts to blossom. There's also another love story thrown in, played by the same insipid pair of actors.

COCO AVANT CHANEL (COCO BEFORE CHANEL)

Watchable. To achieve fame you have to come from a dysfunctional family like I heard from a psychologist on telly. It is certainly true that people from broken families fare better in life. My 3 best friends are living examples: stable relationships, jobs, sometimes really good while I'm out of work and single (coming from a good home obviously). Coco has what it takes. She is pushy but she was also pushed and shoved a lot. An inspiring movie of making your own destiny. Still, some bits were so slow that I drifted away once in a while only to find that when I regained full focus I didn't miss any bit of the plot .

MESRINE:L'INSTINCT DE MORT (MESRINE: KILLER INSTINCT)

Walked out. More about a degenerate husband beating his wife, incapable of controlling his anger and misjudging people's life choices rathen than a killer. Mesrine was clearly a psychopath deprived of empathy and looking for the shortest way to his goals but the movie focused on family issues instead.

ADAM

Watchable. I don't find brain disorders particularly fascinating but the love story was moving: a guy with no social skills struggles to understand the world around him and you wonder whether his impediment dooms him to loneliness. Is everyone able to find love?

Just finished Stephenie Meyer's "Breaking Dawn" - the best of the four "Twilight" books. It's still annoyingly exalted but at least things happen!

A girl has told me she had only watched the last 20 minutes of "Orphan" to spare herself time. Brilliant!

G-FORCE 3D

Watchable. Unlike previous 3D releases this year, the film is mostly 3D indeed. The plot is rubbish but I sympatised with the animals so stayed watching. The music is really good.

THE UGLY TRUTH

Watchable. An involving story, well acted and shot but a bit of other romantic comedies' rip-off ("He's just not that into you" most of all). Great music.

ORPHAN

Watchable. A merciless rip-off of other obsessed-killer stories but with a brilliant twist that immediately makes it more credible. Also a great study of manipulation and invariably futile attempts of defence, very true psychologically. It was all really brutal so afterwards instead of watching "Mesrine: Killer Instinct" I went to see comic-book adaptation

G.I. JOE: THE RISE OF COBRA

Recommended. I don't know what it's about but it looks spectacular. A feast for the eye and the ear even if not the brain. The shonky plot doesn't distract from mind-blowing CGIs and ideas behind future warfare (e.g. nanomites excreting poison out of the body or electronic fish). Science fiction in the true meaning of the words. With some brilliant lines too (e.g. "Are you spying on me?" "If I were spying on you, you wouldn't know.")

LAND OF THE LOST

Walked out. One weirdo follows another. The same rule applies to absurds and distasteful attempts at humour.

HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE

Watchable. No film is capable of giving the books justice. This one, just like all the predecessors, has extracted the most important events skipping all the rest. Luckily it has retained the humour of the book (e.g. Ron Weasley in love or Hermione remarking: "Excuse me, I have to vomit."). Emma Watson as Hermione and Rupert Grint as Ron are getting better and better from one movie to next. Special effects disappointed just as much as in the previous movies althought the opening disasters in London are mind-blowing. The fairy-tale music score which matched the first film well, sounds terribly incongruous in this serious and grim tale. The whole film would have been scripted and acted better if it had been unaware of its expected greatness.

THE PROPOSAL

Recommended. Hilarious from the very beginning (e.g. Andrew bumping into people in the lift: "Is everyone OK? Me too." or staff emails about the boss: "It's here." and "The witch is on the broom."), later on transits into a weepy melodrama with some laughs thrown in here and there (e.g. the granny in the helicopter ambulance). Brilliantly acted and shot.

THE INFORMERS

Recommended. Based on a novel by Bret Easton Ellis - the author of "American Psycho". Good 80s music, lots of good-looking naked bodies. Feels light and entertaining until deep moral dilemmas see through the superficial, happy-go-lucky lives of people who have everything (e.g. Graham realising he can't tell the right from the wrong). Powerful stuff.

THE BLUES BROTHERS

Watchable. Even if some of the music isn't exactly to my taste, this comedy never gets old.

ANTICHRIST (ANTYCHRYST)

Watchable. The trailer was scarier, more mysterious and had scenes missing from the movie (!). It's a lengthy, slow tale leading to a "Hostel"- torture-style climax. Lots of graphic sex. If it weren't so boringly artistic, it could be easily classified as sado porn. Certificate 18.

MOON

Recommended. Feels like old good science-fiction, back to the core of the genre. Gripping, mysterious, scarish, well acted. With music by Clint Mansell.

THE TAKING OF PELHAM 123

Watchable. Fast action, well acted, especially by Denzel Washington. The beginning is about as interesting as a Tube breakdown but it gets really good when it's revealed who the two players actually are.

PUBLIC ENEMIES

Walked out. The typical bandits with typical robberies, a typical interest in brothels and having a typical affair shown in desultory scenes are bad enough but what really ruins this movie is the incongruos soundtrack. It sounds as if the composer had never seen the film or even had any idea what it was about.

LUCK

Recommended. It's as good as "Race" with good as ever Imran Khan. Films about rich people playing others' lives ("Trading Places", "Hostel", "Surviving the Game") are a good bet. This one is one of the kind, with top-notch Bollywood music and superb scenes (e.g. "bringing betting to such levels that even death seems inferior").

KAMBAKKHT ISHQ

Walked out. The premise of a male chauvinist pitted against a female chauvinist was promising but completely ruined by the stupid and unfanny "humour". Mediocre music doesn't help.

THE PRIVATE LIVES OF PIPPA LEE

Walked out. A dysfunctional family that is presented in such an ordinary and monotonous way that it only highlights how much more interesting normal life is.

BRUNO

Watchable. Without disgusting toilet humour it is actually better than "Borat" but of course it outrages all the same. Fast-paced and from time to time laugh-out-loud funny (e.g. the sticky suit).

BLOOD: THE LAST VAMPIRE

Watchable. "Blade" it isn't. The effects, choreography and music are no match. But the main characters of Sayo and Alice are cute and likeable. The high-school plot is fun. The magical part less so.

SHORTKUT - THE CON IS ON

Watchable. Entertaining music and plot. It only gets a bit funny in the second part though (e.g. a bad Bollywood star dancing on strings, being unable to master the steps). But the whole story of a script writer robbed off his movie is touching.

SUNSHINE CLEANING

Watchable. Deep, moving and charming. Non-typical girls with a non-standard job. Left me really sad afterwards though.

ICE AGE 3: DAWN OF THE DINOSAURS

Watchable. It has some funny bits (e.g. the weasel trying to milk a buffalo: "Sorry. I thought you were female." or the line: "You will also have a family. One day you will meet a girl with low standards, not many options and without a sense of smell") but not many. The family stories are endearing though. The 3D gives some depth but doesn't come out to the viewer.

YEAR ONE

Watchable. While some jokes are brilliant ("I don't feel like laying with her." "She's your sister." or "I wish you were dead too! Not that Abel is dead at all."), others are just scatological.

NEW YORK

Walked out. Yet another film about an innocent person detained for terrorism, with a lousy love story and bad music. The detention officer is played by the same guy who interrogated the "Slumdog Millionaire".

RUDO Y CURSI

Watchable. Funny, with good twists and some depth but also some disturbing bits (e.g. hazing).

MY SISTER'S KEEPER

Watchable. The film would have been much better as a courtroom drama as the subject of who your body belongs to is fascinating. This premise was ruined by too many melodramatic bits and hysterical Cameron Diaz.

"TWILIGHT" AND "NEW MOON" BOOKS BY STEPHENIE MEYER

Recommended. I loved the first movie and the first book got me hooked on the whole series. The second book mercilessly and fa-fetchedly rips off "Romeo and Juliet" but the movie may be just as good. I can't wait till November till it's released. I've yet to read "Eclipse" and "Breaking Dawn". You have to reserve the books at libraries. Then lend out straightaway. Waiting list for all of them everywhere in London. But the beautiful dreamy prose is worth the wait.

From "New Moon":

"I felt the smooth wooden floor beneath my knees, and then the palms of my hands, and then it was pressed against the skin of my cheek. I hoped that I was fainting, but, to my disappointment, I didn't lose consciousness. The waves of pain that had only lapped at me before now reared high up and washed over my head, pulling me under.

I did not resurface."

And now movies proper:

TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN

Walked out. Silly plot, lousy dialogues and far too long (2.5 hours).

TRAINSPOTTING

Recommended. Seen on DVD a couple of times and yesterday on the big screen for the first time. The best drugs movie ever. Over and over again. Exquisitely written, filmed and acted.

THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT

Recommended. So brutal that left me with a craving for sweets. I just burnt out all my sugar supplies watching it. Clever and tense.

POUR ELLE (ANYTHING FOR HER)

Watchable. The French movie lacks usual Hollywood glam but at least it's a realistic story of ordinary people wrongly accused or forced to break the law.

KAL KISSNE DEKHNA

Watchable. It's all mediocre. Unknown actors who play OK but no great, a silly plot that is fun but far from creative, danceable music that doesn't make your feet move while watching.

DOGHOUSE

Watchable. Surprisingly fun. while it is a wash-off of "Lesbian Vampire Killers" and "Severance", at least it has some good lines e.g. being attacked by female zombies: "Today is not the right time to stop objectifying women".

MANHATTAN

Walked out. Re-released digitally but sill in black and white. The story of an affair of a middle-aged guy with a 17-year-old is disturbing rather than funny.

LAST CHANCE HARVEY

Watchable. It's a very ordinary story but acted well and with subtle humour.

LOOKING FOR ERIC

Walked out. A loser sits home smoking and talking to his imaginary idol-friend or meets up with other losers at a pub where they discuss football. Most of them are fat so can only discuss sport.

RED CLIFF

Watchable. A bit long, you really don't need battles to last nearly as long as in real life. But the strategies are ingenious and it's full of compulsory chinese tradition.

THE HANGOVER

Watchable. Crazy and entertaining even though it's gross, vulgar and not laugh-out-loud funny.

SPARTACUS

Recommended. The 1960 version is amazing. You can sense the greatness from the beginning. And then you get action, depth, politics, moral issues - all leaving you in awe of what a person Spartacus must have been.

TERMINATOR: SALVATION

Recommended. The best of the 4 "Terminator" movies. Lots of plot and still good effects. Sam Worthington looks hot and an amazing CGI towards the end closes the loop in the storyline.

OBSESSED

Watchable. As a variation on "The Fatal Attraction" it's really good and mostly unpredictable. But the politically correct idea that a beautiful white and blonde girl falls for a black guy is really far-fetched. As a white blonde girl I can state with full certainty that normally it's the other way round.

SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK

Walked out. A loser revaluates his life.

DRAG ME TO HELL

Watchable. Kitsch but fast and well shot and acted.

FIGHTING

Walked out. Too ordinary. Even fights aren't exciting.

AWAYDAYS

Walked out. About anti-social and swearing youth.

JONAS BROTHERS 3D

Walked out. From time to time a microphone flies in your direction, other than that it's flat. And whoever has heard of the group music-wise?

FIREFLIES IN THE GARDEN

Walked out. Another dysfunctional family.

12 ROUNDS

Walked out. So fast and so furious that there's no time for any plot.

TORMENTED

Walked out. Goth bullies see a ghost of a fatso.

NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM 2

Watchable. Feels cosy and familiar after the first one but isn't any better. This one is livelier and more adventurous but still lacks in humour.

CHERI

Watchable. A beautiful stunningly shot love story that doesn't evoke many emotions in the viewer, maybe because the beginning and the ending are ruined by a narrator.

RAGING BULL

Watchable. This classic is so human-oriented that it's perfectly watchable even if you know nothing about boxing. Only the New York local flavours detract from its universality.

GHOSTS OF GIRLFRIENDS PAST

Watchable. The movie is really silly but as a take on life-changing visits of the ghosts of the past, the present and the future it doesn't fail. Sadly, only the old marine's wedding reception speech is funny.

STAR TREK

Watchable. Very well-made classical cheerful SF with hottie Chris Pine for extra flavour. Nothing new but the better-than-on-TV scenography merits seeing this re-envisioning. Feels like old good "Star Wars" without the depth.

ANGELS AND DEMONS

Watchable. Better than "The Da Vinci Code" but it still feels somewhat wooden, just with better paint.

FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE

Watchable. Charming old bright Technicolor and jolly old spirit but terribly sexist. The movie just glorifies sexual harassment. Appalling and disturbing.

HANNAH MONTANA: THE MOVIE

Watchable. A silly but cheerful family movie, quite funny.

CORALINE 3D

Watchable. This 3D is a scam. The movie is flat, you can watch most of it without the 3D glasses. But the story is truly enchanting.

IS ANYBODY THERE?

Walked out. Is anybody watching those OAPs? It's always the same old pricks in every movie. Here it's them and a kid which previously starred in equally rubbish "Son of Rambow".

3D PANEL DISCUSSION

3D, even in the latest flatish format, brings more revenue than the same films in 2D, well, at least until the novelty wears off. Having compared 2D with mainstream 3D and IMAX 3D, I came to conclusion that even the worst 3D is much more fun than 2D but the IMAX films are still the best. Basically mainstream films show you depth from the screen distance towards the screen depth while IMAX brings the picture out to the viewer. It's said to be just a creative decision how to shoot.

DEEP SEA 3D

Watchable. The squids are brilliant, the rest less so, a bit monotonous, like watching an aquarium.

THE UNINVITED

Watchable. The horror bits are naff but the story in the material world is gripping.

OBSERVE AND REPORT

Watchable. It's not funny but the sad story of a security guard whose life went downhill was compelling.

ZIFT

Watchable. Starts like a typical prison movie but then the frequently told allegories get more interesting and the twists of action better.

RENE

Recommended. Perfectly explains how we get perpetual criminal re-offenders.

X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE

Recommended. Wolverine has never been my fave character but "X-Men" don't disappoint. Wait for Weapon XI.

BAMBI

Watchable. Disney lovely as ever but films about growing up and about animals make me terribly homesick.

FREQENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT TIME TRAVEL

Recommended. A low-budget science fiction comedy full of brave new ideas.

GUNESI GORDUM

Walked out. A family in a remote village in eastern Turkey strives to survive where every boy grows up to become either a soldier or a guerilla. Then they move to Istanbul and things aren't any more cheerful or action faster.

OUTLANDER

Walked out. A standard alien hunk fights with a standard monster, loses his standard spaceship and ends up in a standard Iron Age village full of standard macho warriors and standard beautiful maidens.

SHIFTY

Recommended. A fascinating account of meaningful 24 hours in the life of a middle class drug dealer and people around him. Well acted and shot, realistic and insightful. I loved the line about it being a good time to do drugs with the government being so busy with the war on terror that no one cares about drugs any more.

CRANK 2: HIGH VOLTAGE

Watchable. Each and every scene is totally ludicrous but it goes so fast that it really takes your mind off things.

IN THE LOOP

Walked out. Brimming with lines that just aren't funny.

STATE OF PLAY

Recommended. Oscar-worthy, comparable to "The Departed".

17 AGAIN

Watchable. First you have a scene reminiscent of "High School Musical 3", from which I had walked out, then a loser in his 30s, then the same loser being 17 and about half hour in the film it finally starts being funny.

I LOVE YOU MAN

Walked out. How can such low and vulgar jokes be found funny by anyone?

FAST AND FURIOUS

Walked out. Ugly people chasing each other or being chased with mediocre music in the background.

LAT DEN RATTE KOMMA IN (LET THE RIGHT ONE IN)

Watchable. "Twilight" it isn't. Nothing romantic or alluring, just crude and raw gore with scenes slowly, I repeat, slowly developing plot in between but the whole story is compelling, impossible to stop watching without knowing how it ends.

FIFTY DEAD MEN WALKING

Watchable. Good action, an intriguing story of a secret operative but doesn't get you close to the characters, you just don't care why they do things they do.

DRAGONBALL: EVOLUTION

Walked out. I've seen the scenes and heard the lines in several other movies.

I've just read that they they are making a Bollywood version of "21" entitled "Teen Patti". I can't wait to see it:)

MONSTERS VS ALIENS 3D

Watchable. Nice graphics, especially the opening view of the outer space. Other than that nothing new, could be funnier too.

8 X 10 TASVEER

Watchable. It doesn't get straight to each point but once it does it keeps you hooked.

TERA MERA KI RISHTA

Watchable. Hilarious most of the time, the sad romantic bits a bit too long.

RACE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN

Recommended. Like a good science fiction movie from the 80s, with brilliant lines full of humour. Dwayne Johnson appears to have learned how to act. The blue-eyed blonde boy playing Seth is irresistably cute.

DUPLICITY

Watchable. Confusing chronology, far-fetched plot but with witty banter and really fast action. More like "Ocean's Twelve" than "Ocean's Eleven". Surprisingly, Cliwe Owen acts better than ever before.

GENOVA

Watchable. It's mostly enchanting views of Italy compensating for the slow pace, still the film is beautiful although sad.

TWO LOVERS

Walked out. It's about a love triangle of boring and ugly people.

THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT

Recommended. Finally a properly scary horror + based on a true story + the spookiest thing is not the ghost tale, it's what the actual researchers tried to do.

PAUL BLART: MALL COP

Walked out. If only it were at least a little bit funny...

KNOWING

Watchable. Involving and enigmatic but somehow lacking in mystery. 80s-style science-fiction reminiscent of my childhood.

THE DAMNED UNITED

Walked out. It was supposed to be about football management but there's little management in it and even less football.

THE BOAT THAT ROCKED

Watchable. An interesting story of the lives of radio pirates and their governmental persecutors but rarely funny and the pirates are a bunch of freaking weirdoes - hardly attractive.

LESBIAN VAMPIRE KILLERS

Walked out. Neither scary nor funny, quite bland in total.

ENTRE LES MURS (THE CLASS)

Recommended. Spotless. The film brings you to the subjects, both students and teachers, as close as it gets. I never expected I would enjoy a film about a school so much. But this one is more about decision making, difficult choices and responsibility. A real treat.

TRAITOR

Walked out. Movies about terrorism spring up like mushroom after rain. This one is painfully full of stereotypes, bad acting and FBI surrogating CIA in Yemen.

AA DEKHEN ZARA

Recommended. What a ride! No wonder Cineworld's "Unlimited" magazine compares it to "Race". Jehangir Surti's directoral debut is as mind-blowing as Aronofsky's "Pi" was in 1998.

MARLEY AND ME

Watchable. A lovely family-oriented story but nothing new to anyone who has ever had a dog.

FLASH OF GENIUS

Watchable. While courtroom dramas are normally interesting to watch, this one is about windshield wipers which makes for a boring beginning.

BRONSON

Walked out. Several scenes are absolutely disgusting, like in "Hunger" and this film doesn't even have any deeper sense.

HUSH

Watchable. The film had been sold to 25 territories before its premiere at last year's Raindance Film Festival. It must be down to the incredible twists and turns of action that keep you on the edge of your seat (and you really don't see them coming) as other than that it was filmed amateurishly.

In the meantime my freebie streak has reached its apogeum. Crussh is giving away free juice when you recycle "the london paper" this week. I disguised a "Metro" as "the london paper" to get an extra one at another store.

HORTON HEARS A WHO

Walked out. The story goes nowhere and elephants share the habitat with kangaroos.

FLAMMEN OG CITRONEN (FLAME AND CITRON)

Walked out. Philosophical and full of ugly men.

It was funny to recognise some of the viewers from another film the day before. They were even sitting at the same places! Did they stay overnight??

AMERICAN TEEN

Walked out. A typical American documentary that doesn't explain why it's been made. What is it with American film-making that puts commentaries in features but not docs? The presented teenagers aren't any different than anywhere else in the world. You see them every day. No need to pay for a cinema ticket.

SURVEILLANCE

Recommended. It's like "Natural Born Killers" but more perverse and with amazing twists of action.

THE GREAT ESCAPE

Walked out. This classic doesn't pass the test of time. Fake German, fake war prison full of Nazis with stiff upper lips and prisoners with styled hair wearing perfectly ironed clothes. Beside that nothing really happens.

WATCHMEN

Watchable. Visually irresistable, with brilliant one-of-a-kind characters including a superhero rapist. Outstanding attention to detail, e.g. TV news from all over the world include a screen with news in Polish. Great soundtrack including Nena's "99 Flugballons" that I would never expect to hear in an American movie. Unfortunately it's overlong - the film could do without the first half an hour. The heroes also chatter too much and when they fight it usually means fist brawls. Still, the infrequent superhero action is fantastic. Unfortunately one of the super women wears a ridiculous black and yellow costume making her look like a bee.

THE YOUNG VICTORIA

Watchable. Really good although short on Englishness and not exactly comprehensible unless you're familiar with the history of Britain. Still, German Prince Albert challenging the ways the palaces are run is brilliant. I also hear the same explanation whenever I point out something not working - "but it things have always been done this way".

THE UNBORN

Watchable. The storyline isn't perfectly consistent but it it quite scary. On return home I looked in a mirror to make sure my both irises were still the same colour.

FRANKLYN

Walked out. I couldn't make out what it was about in the first 40 minutes so I couldn't possibly care what was going to happen next.

THE INTERNATIONAL

Watchable. Action scenes have nice little twists but the action is constantly interrupted with talking. They just meet and drone on and on in between the shoot-outs.

NEW IN TOWN

Watchable. I always find Renee Zellwegger irresistably endearing so I watched through this silly, stereotypical, moralistic tale that isn't even funny.

Segregating my cosmetics yesterday I thought about my addictions again - normally addictions cost you money while I'm addicted to saving.

GRAN TORINO

Watchable. Inter-racial issues shown with a pinch of salt are brilliant but some scenes feel like watching your neighbours - you couldn't care less.

CHE - PART TWO

Walked out. I just couldn't stand another boring and desultory history lesson.

MY BLOODY VALENTINE IN 3D

Watchable. A run-of-the-mill slasher movie with good Real D action, gore and a bit of nudity that made me think they should start making 3D porn. The killer looks quite hot, by the way, when fully dressed but unmasked that is.

ANVIL - THE STORY OF ANVIL

Watchable. Americans aren't particularly good at documentaries and this one is no exception - plenty of behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with people you don't know and don't care about. The film about a metal band could do with more actual music by Anvil as that sounded great.

CADILLAC RECORDS

Walked out. According to the movie Chess Records were set up by two boring guys. The jazz music was unberable as well.

PUSH

Watchable. "X-Men" it isn't. While the characters have catchy superskills, it's scripted and acted, including utterly annoying Dakota Fanning, as if the producer had hired random people from the street to save costs.

DELHI 6

Walked out. Social realism with really bad music. What is Abishek Bachchan doing in this rubbish?

CONFESSIONS OF A SHOPAHOLIC

Recommended. This film has everything: glam, humour, tears, a bit of reality (shopaholism) and a bit of a fairy-tale (the career and the relationship) and it's all brilliantly scripted, acted and filmed. A real treat.

It made me feel uneasy about my addictions. I suddenly realised I had three:

Cinema - even if I have a foreign visitor staying with me just for a couple of nights, I will go to the cinema in the evening making them wait till midnight. So while this addiction doesn't ruin me financially, I lie what I'm doing (I'm not working that long) and ruin my social life.

Freebies - once when Clarins offered 3 samples per customer I went to different stores and collected 54 samples. It's free, useful, instead of ruining my social life makes me practise people skills - acting every time as if I hadn't collected a bagful of samples already. Still, it feels weird, no one else seems to scam samples the way I do.

Free press - I have accumulated piles of magazines and newspapers constantly given away and while it doesn't normally take long to browse them, I rarely get round to it and basically have heaps of rubbish in my room.

HE'S JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU

Watchable. A clever instruction film that is more disturbing than funny.

THE SECRET OF MOONACRE

Watchable. While I liked the Englishness of the tale, the fantasy bandits dressed and made up punk-style with Clockwork Orange-style bowler hats looked completely out of place.

HOTEL FOR DOGS

Watchable. The dogs are adorable but the story, with the evil Animal Control guys (do they really do it in the US?), really dark and depressing.

I've run out of the movies. Next review on Friday.

REVOLUTIONARY ROAD

Watchable. While I found it a bit too theatrical, I wish more people saw the film because it's about living the life you want.

PINK PANTHER 2

Watchable. It's really funny, I laughed a lot, still some scenes script-wise should have been hilarious but weren't, probably due to Jean Reno's wooden acting. Steve Martin, whom I never ever liked, was surprisingly amusing and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is getting better and better at acting.

FRIDAY THE 13TH

Watchable. The new version is a slasher movie without the supernatural ending of the original and while the superior old version shows just the murderer's boots, this one is full of straight in your face brutality. You can't get bored, you get startled once in a while and get lots of gratuitous nudity. Still, it's not scary.

BILLU BARBER

Watchable. A silly story enlivened by Shah Rukh Khan and his dance ensemble costume changes.

NOTORIOUS

Watchable. An interesting story of a fascinating life of some hip-hop star, whoever he was.

VICKY CRISTINA BARCELONA

Watchable. Slow and tedious, gets livelier with Penelope Cruz's fiery Oscar-worthy performance.

DOUBT

Watchable. The story would be quite silly if it weren't for everyone's superb acting. Oscar nominations (www.oscars.com/nominees) well deserved, still Penelope Cruz (above) should win.

Oops, looks like I can't add a link on the computer at work:(

BOLT 3D

Watchable. A silly, run-of-the-mill story with a compellingly cute dog in it.

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE

Recommended. Marvellous. Gripping, moving and unpredictable. The film, the director, the sound, the sound editing and one of the songs should win Oscars.

THE GOOD THE BAD THE WEIRD

Watchable. An interesting eastern (this is how I'd call a Korean film inspired by westerns). Cheerful and entertaining although not really lough-out-loud funny. Fantastic music - perfect in itself (combination of eastern and country) and very in line with the plot.

PUNISHER: WAR ZONE

Watchable. A perfectly standard plot but with great visual effects and characterful brutality.

LUCK BY CHANCE

Watchable. Lovely, vibrant, with cameos of Bollywood superstars. A bit too predictable. Music good but not really memorable.

RACHEL GETTING MARRIED

Walked out. The movie can't decide if it's about the addiction or the family. The family is hardly interesting to watch, mine own is better. The funeral-style speeches at the wedding rehearsal are completely incongruous. A white girl marries a black guy - unlikely in reality, enforced in the movie - the Obama syndrome I guess.

THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON

Watchable. Brad Pitt and Taraji P. Henson (Queenie in the film) should get Oscars for acting and Greg Cannom for make-up. Brad Pitt was incredible - even speaking with a perfect Afroamerican accent. Another movie with the Obama syndrome - a white boy raised by a black step-mother. Lengthy, the main story is slow enough and would be perfectly sufficient without the frame of the diary-reading or the story-in-story tale of "what if" when the car accident is recounted.

THE WRESTLER

Watchable. It lacks the bite that "Pi" and "Requiem for a dream" had. The linear plot with unremarkable music don't do Aronofsky any favours. Still, better than "The Fountain", at least makes you care for the main character.

THE LADY VANISHES (1938)

Watchable. Overrated Hitchcock's suspense, far-fetched plot but mysterious and full of Englishness.

VICTORY (FROM ASHES TO GLORY)

Watchable. Good, standard Bollywood fare about winning, losing and winning again. It would be more enjoyable if I hadn't seen a number of movies like that already. Music mediocre.

SEVEN POUNDS

Watchable. Quite a captivating film that could do without the overlong love story. The bath scene is hard-hitting though.

NICK AND NORAH'S INFINITE PLAYLIST

Walked out. An infinite lack of credibility. No real-life teenager acts and talks this way or tries to be cool so badly.

UNDERWORLD: RISE OF THE LYCANS

Walked out. Far-fetched even by fantasy standards, lame CGI and everything is tinted blue.

THE BROKEN

Recommended. Intense, mysterious, kept me on the edge of my seat.

FROST/NIXON

Watchable. Whoever needs all the behind-the-scenes? Filming the actual interview was gripping though.

CHANDNI CHOWK TO CHINA

Watchable. Humour and martial arts served in equal measures. Neither were spectacular but both were entertaining.

DEFIANCE

Watchable. Uninspiring at first soon becomes quite compelling. Good Russian and two arguing intelectuals' jokes (e.g. "You annoy me therefore I exist").

VALKYRIE

Watchable. Plenty of tension, a fascinating based on facts story. Acting could be better though. And the film would be more realistic if it had some German feel to it. Acting and lines are terribly English.

MILK

Watchable. I don't like narration in movies. Films are supposed to show things and not show some not always comprehensible scenes and then explain what you've just seen. It makes me feel like at a lecture. Indeed, I saw "Milk" just for its historic value. Other than that it's too American, too 70s and too gay for a straight European brought up in the 80s.


BEVERLY HILLS CHIHUAHUA

Watchable. I don't like films that make me cry and how can you not cry when it's about a lost dog and a few strays. Still, it's full of furry sweethearts who eventually find homes. All is well that ends well.

TWILIGHT

Third time. Just can't get enough of it. The two leads should have been nominated for oscars. They've taken if off already so I'm going to read the book while waiting for the obvious sequel.

Bad luck with cinemas. I've just come back from a holiday. Before leaving I didn't manage to get into the cinema at Haymarket to see "Slumdog Millionaire" - the movie hadn't started yet and people would be leaving 2.5 hours later but the staff apparently weren't working after 9 pm. How much are they paid that the cinema can't afford keeping one person 15 minutes longer to let in 6 paying customers?

Last night, after return I attempted to see "The Wrestler" at Chelsea. Another bad luck - the cinema suffered a power cut that very night.

In the meantime oscar nominations have been announced. Most films are yet to be released in the UK but so far my hopes are:
for "The Reader" to win the Best Picture award,
for "In Bruges" to win Original Screenplay or, failing that,
at least for "Happy-Go-Lucky" not to win anything,
for "Man On Wire" (Documentary Feature) to fail as well,
for "Hellboy" not to win Makeup.
As Bollywood usually has good music, "Slumdog Millionaire" could win Original Song.

SEX DRIVE

Watchable. The only scene at which I laughed out loud was when Ian looked like he was going to say "I love you" and what he said instead. Other than that, the action is so fast that you hardly notice the lack of humour.

TWILIGHT

Seen again. I still find it beautifully shot and acted. I might see it for the 3rd time;) Unfortunately I still don't understand why they can play basketball only in a thunderstorm. Can anyone enlighten me?

BRIDE WARS

Watchable. It's terribly cheesy and girlish but the warfare had good suspense.

ROLE MODELS

Watchable. It's full of weirdos but has some really funny bits in it, e.g. role players acting dying on the battle field.

I went all the way down to Ilford last night (1.5 hours from my workplace) to see "Silambattam" after checking with the cinema a week earlier if this Tamil movie was shown with English subtitles. I was pretty upset to find out on arrival that, contrary to what I was told on the phone, it wasn't. So I had a movie-less night but at least that cinema stocked "The Narnia movie companion book" so I could finally use my voucher to get the freebie.

My wake-up coffee today got me pondering about free stuff and more precisely about free coffee and that inevitably led my thoughts to the cinema again. Here is how:

In one of my previous jobs I had a colleague with a brilliant sense of humour. We lived close to each other so we often took the same bus to work. Once, after an argument about the fastest walking route from the bus stop to work, we made a bet. He took the escalator up to the walkway and I took the street to the downstairs entrance. On arrival I found him in the staff room standing in a relaxed pose preparing coffee with a triumphant smile: "You see, it gives me plenty of time: coffee".

My second coffee memory is from my coffee shop job. I would take customers' orders and shout them out to our incredibly good and fast barrista. Once I misheard an order, then corrected it but by the time the wrong type of coffee had been ready. When the queue passed the barrista came up to me energetically with a cup: "Your coffee".

And all these memories inevitably reminded me of one of my favourite movie scenes. Remember "Men in black"? The sceptic recruit doesn't believe in aliens. Then the agent nonchalantly opens the door to the kitchen full of extraterrestials and asks: "Are you sure you don't want some coffee?"

Never misunderestimate (quoting "W.") the humble drink. Coffee is meaningful stuff.

THE SPIRIT

Walked out. It took me ages to figure out what it was about and the storyline turned out to be lousy and full of sidetracking. Stylistically nothing to compare with "Sin City" - it's more like "The Pirates of the Caribbean".

CHE: PART ONE

Watchable. It's chaotic and not perfectly comprehensible if you aren't very familiar with the Cuban revolution or Ernesto Guevara's life - whatever was he doing before the rebellion? Also, the film could do away with many scenes. It's just painfully long. I watched it through because of the historically interesting personality.

YES MAN

Watchable. A comedy that goes from vaguely entertaining through funny to hilarious. Well-paced.

GHAJINI

Recommended. The movie takes just the main plot from equally brilliant "Memento" and then builds on it which results in many more twists and turns. Also, the storyline gets extended to show the beginning of the relationship and that is a proper comedy of errors.

TWILIGHT

Recommended. A sexy, dark, unusual, very sensual love story without a single love scene in it. Full of subtleties, suspense and mystery and with bits of humour here and there (my favourite is the scene when they first meet). Written and directed by women and based on a book by a female - a few guys walked out commenting it was crap, I loved the movie. A sequel is guaranteed - can't wait!

THE TALE OF DESPEREAUX

Walked out. Children's cartoons with a philosophical commentary and a depressing storyline, characters drawn to look ugly and it's all really, really slow.

THE SISTERHOOD OF TRAVELLING PANTS 2

Walked out. About superficial girls with stereotypical problems.

BEDTIME STORIES

Watchable. Guessing the outcome of the bedtime tales coming to life kept me watching but this movie tries very hard to be funny, yet it isn't. Adam Sandler as usual cast in the role of a lovable loser with no comedy skills.

READER

Recommended. Worthy of a few oscars. A gripping, powerful, moving, meaningful story, perfect acting.

AUSTRALIA

Watchable. This "southern" (an Australian equivalent of a western), with brilliant Hugh Jackman (the role as if written just for him) would be much better if it were faster-paced and shorter. Much faster and shorter. Recommended for watching on Fast Forward on DVD.