INCEPTION

The film begins with a CIA internal memo being typed across the screen. It states that a man named Arlington Steward has recovered from severe burn wounds and is delivering units related to the Mars project.

The film then opens up in 1976 with Norma and Arthur Lewis cuddling in bed and awaking at 5:45 am as the doorbell rings. Norma goes downstairs and looks through the peephole, seeing a black car drive off. Upon opening the door, she sees a package on her doorstep. Inside, she and her husband find a wooden box with a button protected by a glass dome, locked with a key, and a note, reading Mr. Steward will come at 5:00 pm. Norma and Arthur then enjoy a nice breakfast with their son, Walter.

Arthur goes to work at NASA, where he works in optics, and helped in designing the camera on the Viking Mars probe. He finds he has been rejected from the astronaut program due to the fact that he failed the psychological exam. Norma goes to her job as a teacher at an elite private school teaching literature, where they are discussing Sartre's vision of Hell. One of her students remarks on her limp, after which she shows her class her disfigured right foot, missing four toes. After class Norma is informed by her boss that she will no longer be getting a discount for tuition and wont be able to pay for school for her son. Later that day Norma returns home and Arlington Steward appears at their door. Half of his face is missing. Norma looks at the clock and realizes it is 5:00 pm.

Arlington says that if she or her husband pushes the button, someone in the world that they do not know will die, and they will receive one million dollars. Arlington hands Norma a $100 bill from the brief case of money, and says she gets to keep it if the button is pushed or not. Arlington leaves and tells her she has 24 hours. Arthur returns and Norma tells him what has happened.

After much discussion about whether or not they should press the button, and some tinkering with the box (Arthur finds nothing inside it), Norma suddenly jerks forward and hits it. The button rises slightly.

Arlington returns and presents Norma and Arthur with the million, without asking whether they pressed the button or not. He informs that they will not know who will receive the offer next, and implies that Arthur, Norma, or their son will be the ones to die. Arthur storms after Arlington and attempts to return the million, but Arlington drives off. Arthur gets his license plate number.

A 911 call is shown, where someone has been shot. The police enter the house and find a woman shot through the heart, and a little girl locked in the bathroom upstairs.

Arthur and Norma then attend a wedding rehearsal dinner, where Arthur is instructed to select a present from a table (secret Santa). A waiter (who happens to be the student of Norma's who prompted her to reveal her disfigurement), holds up two fingers to Arthur. Arthur then sees a box much like the one left on their doorstep, with the button in it, and chooses that one. He and Norma find a poor quality picture of Arlington inside.

Norma's sister tells Arthur that the student Arthur saw was the one who made fun of his wife's foot. Arthur meets and asks Norma's dad (who is a police officer) to run the license plate number of Arlington's car. Norma receives a phone call (she is informed by a waiter whose nose begins to bleed as he's leading her to the phone). It is Arlington, who scolds her for allowing her husband to make contact with the police (Arlington somehow knows Arthur has spoken to Norma's father). Arthur angrily approaches the student from Norma's class and yells at him for making fun of Norma. He then storms out of the party, with Norma following him. As they start their car, they see "No Exit" (the title of the Sartre play they went to see earlier) written into the frost on their windshield.

When they get home, Arthur takes their babysitter, Dana, home. Dana had earlier gone down into the basement with their son Walter, to see Arthur's Mars collection. She notices the picture of everyone who worked on the development of the camera. As they are driving, Dana acts strangely, asking Arthur strange questions such as "Whats pushing your buttons?" and comments like "Look into the light." Her nose begins to bleed and she passes out. Arthur attempts to wake her up and finds her driver's license, which shows her name is not Dana, but Sara, and she is from Boston. He reaches the motel, where "Dana" has been staying and she wakes up with a start. She tells Arthur it's not safe for him there, and to look in the mirror because that's the only place with the answer. She then hurries away. In the motel, every door she passes opens and a startled looking person stares her down. She reaches her room, where she has a large map and pictures of Arthur, Norma, and Walter.

At home Arthur looks at the large picture in the basement, and sees that Arlington (prior to his injury) is in the photo.

At a supermarket, Norma is approached by a panicked woman who tells her to look up a certain call number in the library, and not to trust her husband, before passing out with a bloody nose. Arthur finds out that Arlington's license plate is registered to the NSA. He asks Norma's father if he can go with him to see the house where the shooting mentioned earlier took place. Once there, he finds pictures of Arlington and a picture of a Human Resources book, and a library call number. Arthur learns that the woman was shot at 4:45 PM, the same time Norma pushed the button.

Norma and Arthur both visit the library, separately. Norma avoids Arthur, as instructed by the woman in the supermarket. Norma find a film reel, which shows Arlington prior to his disfigurement. Arthur is followed by a crowd of startled looking people. He finds himself in a large hall filled with more scared looking people. He approaches a woman he learns is Arlington's wife, and she tells him to follow her. He is presented with three "gateways," made of hovering water. Two lead to eternal damnation, one to salvation. Remembering the student who held up two fingers, Arthur picks gate two. He enters the water and finds himself whirling through whiteness.

Norma is also led by two hollow looking women to Arlington. He asks her how she felt when she saw his disfigurement, and she says she felt love, because of her foot. She says that she felt bad for herself because of her foot, and seeing someone with a face disfigurement made her realize she would never feel sorry for herself ever again. Many years ago, her brother had dropped a barbell on her foot and when she went to the doctor he put it in an X-ray machine and forgot about her, destroying the tissue in four of her toes. Arlington informs Norma that he was struck by lightning, and can now communicate with "those who control the lightning." Norma begins to cry and Arlington takes her hand.

Norma is suddenly lying on her bed, with Arthur suspended above her in the same hovering water he stepped into earlier. Norma moves away just before Arthur falls out of the water. The water falls too, going all the way down their stairs. When cleaning up, Walter demands to know what is going on. Norma and Arthur do not answer him.

More drama occurs and eventually, at the wedding of Norma's sister, their son Walter is kidnapped. Arthur is taken away by a gun-toting former employee of NASA. He is the same man who shot his wife, as earlier seen in the 911 call. He reveals to Arthur that he had to choose between his wife or his daughter. He asks if it was him or Norma that pushed the button and he replies that his wife also pushed the button. He shows Arthur the book seen earlier in the picture, and the water portals or "triptychs." The book is some sort of manual. They are then stopped by a man in a Santa Claus uniform, ringing a bell. As the two men are trying to figure out what is going on, they are hit by a large truck.

We then see Arthur emerge from a NASA warehouse, which has been surrounded by military. He is taken away and told by his NASA friend that everything that happens next will have great ramifications. Arthur and Norma return home and see Arlington in their kitchen. He informs them they face two final options. Their son, Walter, is now deaf and blind. They can either live on with their million dollars, and their disabled son, or Arthur can shoot Norma through the heart, at which point Walter's sight and hearing will be restored and the million will be placed in a high interest bank account for Walter to be held in trust until his eighteenth birthday.

We learned earlier in a warehouse full of startled people, when Arlington's minion questioned him, that Arlington's employers are testing the human race to see if they are worth keeping.

Arlington leaves, telling Norma and Arthur on his way out that their son is in the bathroom, locked upstairs. The two of them run upstairs and try to get him out, but cannot because he cant hear them pounding on the door.

They decide that they must make a choice, and Norma leads Arthur downstairs.

Another couple is sitting at a table with a box unit, starring at it with content, wondering whether they should push it. Walter and Norma are crying and hugging each other, and say goodbye.

Walter shoots Norma, and the police arrive. He runs upstairs and sees his son is back to normal. It is implied that this process will go on and on.

Arlington arrives at the other couples house and hands them the million.

Arthur's NASA friend informs him he and his son will be taken care of, as Arthur is escorted away by men in uniforms, who put him into a black car before driving off. Arthur's son looks down at Arthur leaving in that black car. Arlington then comes out of the house of other couple to whom he had given the $1 million, and the film ends.
(Source: imdb.com)

AVATAR
Sypnosis:
In 2154, the RDA corporation is mining Pandora, a lush, Earth-like moon of the planet Polyphemus. Parker Selfridge (Giovanni Ribisi) heads the mining operation, and it employs former marines for security. The corporation intends to exploit Pandora's reserves of a valuable mineral called unobtanium. Pandora is inhabited by the Na’vi, a blue-skinned species of sapient humanoids with feline characteristics. Physically stronger and taller than humans, the Na'vi live in harmony with Nature, worshiping a mother goddess called Eywa.

Humans cannot survive exposure to Pandora’s atmosphere for very long and use oxygen masks. In an attempt to improve relations with the natives, scientists create human-Na’vi hybrids called avatars, controlled by genetically-matched human operators. Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), a paraplegic former marine, becomes a last-minute replacement for his murdered identical twin brother, a scientist trained to be an avatar operator. Dr. Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver), the head of the Avatar Program, considers Sully an inadequate replacement for his brother, and relegates him to a bodyguard role.

Jake escorts Augustine and biologist Norm Spellman (Joel David Moore) on an exploratory mission in their avatar forms to make contact with the Na'vi, in order to help establish diplomatic relations, solve the problem of resources and end the threat of violence. The group is attacked by a predator, and Jake becomes separated and lost. Forced to survive the night in Pandora’s dangerous jungles, he is rescued by Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), a female Na'vi. Neytiri brings Jake to Hometree, which is inhabited by Neytiri’s clan, the Omaticaya. Mo'at (C. C. H. Pounder), the Na'vi shaman and Neytiri's mother, shows interest in the warrior "Dream-walker" (their term for the Avatars), and instructs her daughter to teach Jake their ways. Colonel Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), leader of the security forces for RDA, promises Jake his "real legs" in exchange for intelligence about the natives and what it will take for them to abandon Hometree, which rests above a large deposit of unobtanium.

Over three months, Jake grows close to Neytiri and the Omaticaya and begins preferring their lifestyle, eroding his loyalty toward RDA's agenda. He is initiated into the Omaticaya, and he and Neytiri choose each other as mates. Jake's change of loyalty is revealed when he disables a bulldozer's cameras as it destroys the tribe's "Tree of Voices". Col. Quaritch disconnects Jake from his avatar and presents Selfridge and Augustine with a vlog in which Jake admits that his mission is fruitless; the Omaticaya will never abandon Hometree. Selfridge is convinced that negotiations will fail and orders Hometree's destruction.

Augustine argues that the destruction of Hometree could affect the vast bio-botanical neural network that all Pandoran organisms are connected to, and Selfridge gives Jake and Augustine one hour to convince the Na’vi to leave Hometree. When he reveals his mission to the Omaticaya, Neytiri accuses him of betraying them, resulting in Jake and Augustine's imprisonment. Quaritch’s forces destroy Hometree, killing Eytucan (Wes Studi), Neytiri's father and clan chief, and many others. Jake and Augustine are disconnected from their avatars and detained for treason along with Norm. Trudy Chacón (Michelle Rodriguez), a security force pilot who is disgusted by the violence, breaks them out. During their escape Quaritch shoots Augustine. With Augustine dying, Jake turns to the Omaticaya for help. To regain their trust he tames the Toruk, a powerful flying beast that only five Na'vi have ever tamed. Jake flies to the Omaticaya, who have gathered at the sacred Tree of Souls, and pleads with Mo'at to heal Augustine. They attempt to transplant her "soul" into her avatar, but her injuries are too severe and she dies before the ritual can be completed.

With the assistance of Neytiri and Tsu'Tey (Laz Alonso), the new leader of the Omaticaya, Jake assembles thousands of Na'vi from other clans. Jake prays to Eywa to intercede on behalf of the Na'vi in the coming battle. Quaritch, noting the mobilization of Na'vi clans, convinces Selfridge to authorize a preemptive strike on the Tree of Souls. Because it is a center of Na'vi religion and culture, its destruction would leave the Na'vi too demoralized to resist further human encroachment.

As the corporation's army attacks, the Na'vi retaliate but suffer heavy casualties, among them Tsu'Tey and Trudy. When the Na'vi are on the verge of defeat, the Pandoran wildlife suddenly attacks the corporation's forces, overwhelming them. Neytiri interprets this as Eywa answering Jake's prayer. Jake destroys the main bomber before it can reach the Tree of Souls. Col. Quaritch escapes and finds the avatar interface pod where Jake's human body is located and attacks it, exposing Jake to Pandora's atmosphere. Neytiri kills Quaritch and saves Jake. With the attack repelled, Neytiri and Jake reaffirm their love as she sees his human body for the first time.

Selfridge and the military personnel are expelled from Pandora, while Jake, Norm, and the scientists studying Pandora are allowed to remain. Jake is seen wearing the insignia of the Omaticaya leader. The film ends with Jake's consciousness being transplanted into his Na'vi avatar permanently by the Tree of Souls.

Cast: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Stephen LangDirector: James CameronRated: PG-13
Genre: science fiction epic film
Producer: James Cameron, Jon LandauDistributor: 20th Century Fox

BRAZIL

TERRY GILLIAM'S ''Brazil,'' a jaunty, wittily observed vision of an extremely bleak future, is a superb example of the power of comedy to underscore serious ideas, even solemn ones. ''Brazil,'' which was not scheduled for 1985 release until the Los Angeles Film Critics Association voted it best film of the year, was slated, as of yesterday, to open on Dec. 25 for one week in order to qualify for Academy Awards consideration. However, the opening was suddenly advanced, and it began its weeklong engagement today at Loew's New York Twin. It is scheduled to reopen on Feb. 14.
''Brazil'' may not be the best film of the year, but it's a remarkable accomplishment for Mr. Gilliam, whose satirical and cautionary impulses work beautifully together. His film's ambitious visual style bears this out, combining grim, overpowering architecture with clever throwaway touches. The look of the film harkens back to the 1930's, as does the title; ''Brazil'' is named not for the country but for the 1930's popular song, which floats through the film as a tantalizing refrain. The gaiety of the music stands in ironic contrast to the oppressive, totalitarian society in which the story is set.
The plot itself, from a screenplay by Mr. Gilliam, Tom Stoppard and Charles McKeown, is rather thin; it exists mainly as an excuse to lead the viewer into various corners of an unexpectedly humorous Orwellian world. Mr. Gilliam's answer to Mr. Orwell's Winston Smith is one Sam Lowry, a gray-suited bureaucrat who has a forbidden love, a lively fantasy life and a socialite mother. Ida Lowry (played hilariously by Katherine Helmond), who is constantly in the company of her in-house plastic surgeon, spends most of her time lunching with lady-friends and a bit of it worrying about her son's limited career. So Ida - whose fashion sense dictates that she wear hats that look very much like upside-down shoes - arranges a promotion for Sam. He winds up in an office so small that he has only half a desk and half a poster sharing both with the bureaucrat next door. This change somehow propels Sam into a romance with a woman who may be a terrorist and into a series of hellish nightmares.
Much of the cleverness of ''Brazil'' has to do with its tiny details, the sense of how things work in this new society. Signs glimpsed in the background say things like ''Loose Talk is Noose Talk'' and ''Suspicion Breeds Confidence,'' while television advertisements are for things like fashionable heating ducts ''in designer colors to suit your demanding taste'' (the production design makes sure that heating ducts are everywhere). Politeness counts for everything, as in an early scene where one hapless Mr. Buttle is arrested in his own living room, stuffed into what looks like a large canvas bag, and led away, never to be seen again. At least Mrs. Buttle is given a written receipt for her confiscated husband.
Harry Tuttle, the man the police were actually after until a large bug dropped into a computer and caused a typographical error, is played by Robert De Niro as a combination repairman and commando. Mr. De Niro has only the briefest of roles here, but he makes it count for a lot, as does Bob Hoskins as a sinister fellow passing himself off as a rival repairman. The friends of Sam's mother are also nicely played, particularly Shirley (Kathryn Pogson), who tells Sam shyly that she doesn't like him at all. Michael Palin is both ominous and funny as Sam's friend Jack Lint, and Jonathan Pryce is especially good as Sam. Giving his regards to Jack's twins and learning that they are triplets, Sam responds by saying ''Triplets! How time flies.''
Also in ''Brazil'' is Kim Greist as the pretty young woman who fascinates Sam in reality and in his dreams; in the latter, she has angelic blond hair and he appears as a magnificent winged silver creature swooping through the skies. Earlier in his career, Mr. Gilliam might have staged such a scene more facetiously, but here it has a real poignance. For all its fancifulness, ''Brazil'' and its characters seem substantial and real.

(Source: Review by JANET MASLIN in an article of the NY Times)

“This film is a surrealistic wonder that causes incredulity and marvel in spite of its long footage. It is a futuristic fable of basic human traits such as romance, imagination, man’s dreams, need for freedom, etc. It is a reality where the oniric world is constantly present and intertwined in a fantastic whirl of emotions that leads to a non conclusion. By many critics judged as a master piece and by none something less than an excellent showing of the seventh art.
I truly recommended Brazil to the blog author who, in spite of being a film lover, was not aware of the existence of this film and, as a matter of fact this is a not well-known movie. But it is impossible to remain untouched by it as it is dense and deep in content and meaning. For all these reasons my friend decided to add in her blog a space dedicated to this marvelous movie.
I hope you remain baffled by these few words and decide to watch one of my favourite films and, maybe, feel the urge to comment on it."

Written by L. F.

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE wins Oscar 2009 for Best Picture

Slumdog Millionaire is the story of Jamal Malik (Dev Patel), an 18 year-old orphan from the slums of Mumbai, who is about to experience the biggest day of his life. With the whole nation watching, he is just one question away from winning a staggering 20 million rupees on India s Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?But when the show breaks for the night, police arrest him on suspicion of cheating; how could a street kid know so much? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the story of his life in the slum where he and his brother grew up, of their adventures together on the road, of vicious encounters with local gangs, and of Latika (Freida Pinto), the girl he loved and lost. Each chapter of his story reveals the key to the answer to one of the game show s questions.Each chapter of Jamal s increasingly layered story reveals where he learned the answers to the show s seemingly impossible quizzes. But one question remains a mystery: what is this young man with no apparent desire for riches really doing on the game show?When the new day dawns and Jamal returns to answer the final question, the Inspector and sixty million viewers are about to find out.

(Source: Imdb.com)

OSCAR ACCEPTANCE SPEECH TRANSCRIPT

"Thank you so much to the Academy. As you can see, our film was a collaboration between hundreds of people, and I am so happy that so many of them could be with us here tonight to share this moment. Together we've been on an extraordinary, extraordinary journey. When we started out, we had no stars, we had no power or muscle. We didn't have enough money really to do what we wanted to do. But what we had was a script that has inspired mad love in everyone who read it. We had a genius, for a director. We had a cast and crew who were unwavering in their commitment and whose talents are up on the screen for all of you to see. We had partners in Film4 and Celador. In Pathe and FOX Searchlight, who had the courage to support us. We had a shared love for the extraordinary city of Mumbai, where we made the movie. Most of all we had passion and we had belief and out film showed that if you have those two things, truly anything is possible. I want to thank on a personal note, my mum and my dad for their support over the years... And I want to thank all of you very much indeed. Thank you."

(Source: mahalo.com)

The Widow of Saint-Pierre / La veuve de Saint-Pierre (La viuda de Saint-Pierre)

Synopsis

LA VEUVE DE SAINT-PIERRE is an emotionally-charged romantic epic about an extraordinary woman poised between two extraordinary men at a pivotal moment in time. Set in 1850 on the desolate and intensely beautiful island of Saint-Pierre, a remote French territory off the coast of Newfoundland, the film is a powerful and provocative examination of grand passions and their consequences. A single twist of fate sets the plot in motion, establishing that the twin forces of character and destiny can work together to alter lives in unexpected and even unimaginable ways.One night, a man is senselessly murdered during a drunken altercation. The immediately remorseful killer, Neel Auguste (Emir Kusturica) is condemned to death. But in remote Saint-Pierre, there is neither a guillotine (in old French slang, the guillotine was called "the widow") nor an executioner. The French government promises to remedy the situation but warns that there will be a long wait since a guillotine must be brought from overseas.During the months that follow, Neel is placed in the custody of the island's enlightened French military commandant (Daniel Auteuil). The Captain's wife (Juliette Binoche), a beautiful, wise, and empathetic woman who is worshipped by her husband and who worships him in return, starts to question the justice of the death penalty in this particular situation as she begins to understand that the prisoner is a decent man who has made a terrible mistake. She makes Neel her protégé, convinced that he can live out his remaining time productively and be redeemed by his good deeds. In time, the Captain shares his wife's compassion, insight, and faith in Neel. Little by little, with the help of his benefactress, the condemned man grows indispensable to this tiny community, His noble and heroic acts, including a dramatic rescue, cause him to become the most popular and the most respected man on the island. Only a handful of narrow-minded bureaucrats resent Neel's new status. Determined to uphold the law, even if the law is wrong, they scheme to punish the murderer and his supporters.When the guillotine finally arrives and an executioner is found, the Captain's wife frantically tries to stop Neel from being executed. Her passion for justice causes her to risk everything. Her husband, whose passion for his wife is the most powerful force in his life, embraces her mission, knowing that the righteous course they have chosen will lead only to tragedy.