‘Ted,’ the directorial debut of Family Guy’s Seth MacFarlane, is a comedy about a guy named John Bennet (Mark Wahlberg) and his talking teddy bear, Ted (voiced by MacFarlane). They’ve been best friends since John wished for him to come to life as a kid, but their friendship is tested when John’s girlfriend, Lori (Mila…

‘Brave’ is the latest film from Pixar, and tells the story of a free-spirited Scottish princess named Merida (voiced by Kelly McDonald), who resists her mother’s (Emma Thompson) attempts to turn her into a ‘lady.’ When she finds out she’s going to be married off in order to keep the peace in their kingdom, Merida turns…

‘Absentia’ is a new horror film about a woman struggling to move on with her life after her husband’s mysterious disappearance seven years ago. After her younger sister moves in, she finally brings herself to declare him ‘dead in absentia.’ Meanwhile, her sister is strangely drawn to a tunnel near their…

Magnolia (1999)

I thought I was gonna hate this movie at first: the first hour was very noisy and hard to sit through. It’s a three hour film, and it goes a mile a minute. But as it went on, it grew on me. Though the performances were good and I was interested in some of their stories, I didn’t feel that attached to most of the characters. Paul Thomas Anderson’s direction is great, and I respect the film’s ambition. Interweaving stories about one day in the lives of…