One Week Per Year

That's about the average nowadays for seeing films that are actually worth talking about.

And I've just had mine. Hopefully, it won't be the only one in 2006 (there are a lot of presumably worthwhile movies scheduled for release over the the next three months). But recent experience tells me that it will.

Golly and gee, though, it's been great to have serious conversations after screenings for a change. Most of the movies I've seen this week won't open until October, and none of them were perfect, so it would be unfair of me to go into too much detail about any at this early a stage. But let's just say that the thematic and artistic issues they've brought up are what make film criticism a fun and exhilarating job.

For at least one week per year.

Things did not appear to get off to a good start with "All the King's Men," the one movie that did open this week and, therefore, I could discuss at length here. Turns out, though, that this well-intentioned piece has more to say about how not to make a thoughtful movie than any film in recent memory. The talks I've had about its wrong across-the-board presentational decisions have almost been like a reverse-engineered course in filmmaking. And, of course, they've been great snarky fun to boot.

Things took a definite turn for the better when I saw an ufinished print of Martin Scorsese's "The Departerd" (opening October 6). Perfectly crafted, down-and-dirty entertainment about rival undercover moles in the Massachusetts State Police and a Boston Irish crime gang, it puts recent efforts by fellow underworld auteurs Brian De Palma and Michael Mann to shame. And it marks the first sign of the old, vibrant life in Scorsese's work since, well, he started getting lost in ponderous Oscar bait like "The Aviator" and "Gangs of New York." But is it great Scorsese or just great, nasty fun? The debate is getting lively.

As for a different kind of Oscar bait, suburban angst drama "Little Children" (also 10-6) recalls "American Beauty" and "The Graduate" in about equal measure, but then heads in its own wayward direction. I came out of the film uncertain if it wanted to subvert puritanical values or reinforced them. After long conversations (in which I, admittedly, did most of the talking), I'm as bewildered as ever. Somehow, that makes the film seem more impressively right.

Thursday morning I saw "The Last King of Scotland" (opens next Wednesday), or as I call it, the good version of "All the King's Men." It's about real life Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, and while much of it is fictionalized, a good deal is factual. Most yak about the movie justifiably centers on Forest Whitaker's portrayal of Amin - the best such thing since Jamie Foxx's Ray Charles, though it's about to be eclipsed by both Helen Mirren's Elizabeth II and Michael Sheen's Tony Blair in "The Queen" (ditto 10-6; wow, what a weekend to look forward to). But there's much more to say about how "Last King" does the usual white-man-with-Africa-problem thing differently, and for the most part better, than the hand-wringing, self-important norm.

But for the most profoundly cinematic/ thematic take on our shared global dilemma, nothing compares to "Babel" (10-27). It's the apotheosis of the multi-story, meta-tragic approach Mexican director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu and writer Guillermo Arriaga have been perfecting with "Amores Perros" and "21 Grams." Here the scope is wider, the craftsmanship gives Scorsese a run for his money, and the emotional, political and philosophical implications are devastating yet, in their simple, honest ways, reassuringly humanistic as well.

Great stuff to talk about, all. I hope I have more weeks like this, and soon.

In other news, the big hit this weekend is expected to be "Jackass Number Two."