Film round-up

Quicksand: An interesting enough premise-- Michael Keaton as an auditor who goes out to Monte Carlo to investigate a possible case of money-laundering using a film studio as cover, and finds himself framed for corruption and murder-- let down by an unbelievable ending. Co-stars Michael Caine as a has-been film star making bad movies for the money, and includes, cheekily, a clip from the Michael Caine film Shadow Run as the film the bogus studio is supposedly making.

Fantastic Mr Fox: Every bit as good as the reviews have been saying-- cute and funny, with a bit of bite and lovely attention to detail.

In Which We Serve: It's not a title so much as a description of the plot, and the film is not so much a British war film as a Noel Coward vanity project. Coward writes, directs, and plays a dashing naval captain surrounded by a collection of jolly working-class stereotypes who love both him and his ship (one of which is a very young Sir John Mills), and various naval wives who never let their upper lips unstiffen as the casualties mount around them. A little unusual for the genre in having a non-linear narrative, but otherwise fairly undistinguished. Probably given more attention than it deserves due to the fact that David Lean co-directed it.

Movie count for 2009: 96