Let’s get the awkwardness out of the way first, shall we? This is 40 is essentially The Judd Apatow Story, written and directed by Apatow, with Apatow’s wife (Leslie Mann) playing his wife, Apatow’s two daughters (Iris and Maude) playing his two kids, and, well, Paul Rudd playing Apatow himself. And yes, there are sex scenes in this film. (Wonder if Apatow gave Rudd notes along the lines of: “No, that’s not actually how I do it.”) Okay, so it’s weird. Can we all just move on with our lives now?

Because, This is 40, which bills itself as the “sort of sequel to Knocked Up” is actually pretty great. It suffers from a lot of the same problems of Apatow’s other (also great) comedies: It’s overly long, a tad self-indulgent, and it never met a bit it didn’t want to milk to death. But it’s also sweet, smart, funny, insightful and, not surprisingly, feels remarkably lived in and real. (If I didn’t know better, I’d say that was an actual family up on that screen. Oh. . . wait.)

Indeed, the American film it most reminds me of is Parenthood (the Steve Martin version; not the TV series), which had a similar mix of insight into the joys and heartaches of...

Remember when that book The Secret came out? The idea behind The Secret was that positive thinking was the key to happiness and success. It literally suggested that if you wished hard enough for something, it would come true. Needless to say, it was wildly popular. Shortly after The Secret came out, I read a wonderful takedown of it that argued the book was a success precisely because it confirmed for Americans what they already believed to be true: That good things were coming their way. Americans aren’t pessimistic by nature. If anything, they are overly optimistic. They ALWAYS see the silver lining.

That, at its heart, is the essence of David O. Russell’s Silver Linings Playbook. It captures two fundamental qualities of the American psyche: Our obsession with football (and our conflation of football with life, family, and happiness) and our relentless, sometimes logic-defying optimism.

As the film starts, Pat (Bradley Cooper) has just been released from a mental hospital. He’s been diagnosed as bipolar, with serious anger management issues. The triggering event was catching his wife, a high school English teacher, having an affair with a colleague—Pat beat the...

In the Twilight world, becoming a vampire is like being permanently high on some really great ecstasy. Senses are heightened—colors brighter, blades of grade more detailed. Sex with your husband will blow your mind. And, if that's not great enough, you're super fast and strong and YOU NEVER DIE. Okay, so there's that pesky thirst for blood thing. But if you're new vampire Bella (Kristen Stewart) you have an amazing control over your cravings. To avoid snacking on a rock climber, you hurl yourself selflessly from the cliff.

And with that, the thing that I had been dreading since the first Twilight film has come to pass: Bella is a vampire now, totally subsumed by her love for Edward (Robert Pattinson), willing to sacrifice her very humanity for the man she loves..

A feminist parable this ain’t.

Anyway, the entire first part of Breaking Dawn: Part 2 all kinds of awkward—first with that whole Bella becoming a totally rad vampire routine, then meeting her creepy looking CGI-enhanced baby, Renesmee. (Not quite sure why they couldn’t use a real baby in these early scenes—I guess she’s supposed to have otherworldly beauty or somethin’. As it is, Renesmee...

This may be a bit controversial, but I don’t think Daniel Craig makes an excellent Bond.

Granted, my knowledge of Bond is limited to the films (I  haven’t read the books), but to me, Bond is supposed to be cool, elegant, sexy, mischievous, a touch hedonistic, with a sense of mirth and mischief behind his eyes.

Well, one out of six ain’t bad: Craig is cool. (Okay I suppose he’s sexy too, but he’s hardly a seducer. ) He doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who would luxuriate in a good martini, a beautiful woman, an elegant cut of a suit. (Although he does look good in a tux—and, uh, even better out of one.) If there’s anything hiding behind his eyes, it’s darkness, not mischief. Craig’s fairly good with a dry joke, which is one of his better, Bond-like qualities. But he doesn’t seem to possess a delicious secret, as all Bonds should. Indeed, inconceivable as this may be, he doesn’t seem to love being Bond, which is pretty essential to the Bond character.

Don’t get me wrong, I like Craig as an actor—I find his dark, hooded face endlessly fascinating. And I’ve enjoyed his work over the years, particularly in Layer Cake and Munich. But he’s third on my personal list of Bonds,...