"Up in the Air," Jason Reitman's saocial satire, features George Clooney in his best (Oscar-caliber) performance to date.  Set for Christmas release by Paramount, it's one of year's best pictures.

"Up in the Air" is a movie that cruises, like its lead character Ryna Binghm, played with panache by George Clooney, from city to city, hub to hub, airport to airport, never quite grounded, always speeding towards an uncertain destination…

 

 

Best Picture Nomination for Serious Man

Click here to see the Serious Man trailer.

With their new film, "A Serious Man," a sharply observed serio-comedic Jewish fable, Joel and Ethan Coen again prove that they are nothing if not original and unpredictable. Having won the Best Picture and Best Director Oscars for "No Country for Old Men," their most accomplished work to date, the siblings then followed with "Burn After Reading," an underestimated comedy. And now comes their most personal and intimate work to date, "A Serious Man," a period piece that sees Joel and Ethan in top form as storytellers, with the kind of darkly humorous and poignant narrative that's deeply grounded in their own biography. Going back to their roots, "Serious Man" may be the Coens' most overtly and explicitly Jewish film, not least due to the use of Yiddish, Hebrew, and specific Jewish mores and humor.

 

Spike Jonze's third film, "Where the Wild Things Are," is an adaptation of the popular Maurice Sendak children's book of 1963. The film is released October 16, 2009 by Warner.

Click here the see the Where the Wild Things Are trailer and a featurette with Spike Jonze and Maurice Sendak.

"I didn't set out to make a children's movie; I set out to make a movie about childhood," says director Spike Jonze, whose big-screen adaptation of the captivating Maurice Sendak classic Where the Wild Things Are was truly a labor of love."It's about what it's like to be eight or nine years old and trying to figure out the world, the people around you, and emotions that are sometimes unpredictable or confusing–which is really the challenge of negotiating relationships all your life," he says. "It's no different at that age."

 

 

Click here to see the Precious trailer.

 

At the recently concluded Toronto Film Fest, the People's Choice Award, voted on by regular audiences, went to Lee Daniels's Precious: Based on the Novel “Push” by Sapphire, a vibrant, honest and resoundingly hopeful film about the human capacity to grow and overcome hardships.

"Precious" would have had good chances to be nominated for the Best Picture, even if the Academy continued its tradition of selecting five movies for the top award.  There was always a room for one "small" indie, made outside the system.  However, now that.…

Please read our review and Oscar Prospects for Mo'Nique in the Review and Oscar Alert Sections.