Oh Marky Mark...

Shooter(dir. Antoine Fuqua)
A rather dull action drama. Mark Wahlberg's is quite boring in comparision to an action hero like John McClane. There's really no sense of fun to the action and the drama isn't that compelling. The protagonist never feels endangered at any point to really create a compelling experience.
** out of ***
Dogville(dir. Lars von Trier)
This viewing experience was quite unpleasant due to the actions that happen on screen to the protagonist and the actions the protagonist intiate. Grace's change of heart is bewildering and puzzling probably due to how Nicole Kidman plays her. Her reasoning seems relatively logical, but the way she acts seems to contradict and make her change of heart feel contrived and unnatural. Her actions create a thematic richness. The final moments of the film could be von Trier critiquing America for milking 9/11 and using it as a rationale for going to Iraq. America switching roles from victim to victimizer much like Grace. The images during the credits show poor people who have been oppressed by society. The actions the characters inflict on Grace is oppression and it's not very faltering. This could be von Trier critiquing America for not looking out for the welfare of the poor since all the characters are all selfish and never think of the emotional damage they are causing Grace. The town itself is oppressed since it is alone and secluded. Grace allows the town to free their frustrations and oppress some other being. With all this thematic richness, you would expect an equal amount of emotional richness, but it doesn't. Or it did until Grace's final actions since Grace is the only sympathetic character in the film and then she becomes as dog-like as the other characters. Her actions are more justified, but they still feel off-putting and out of place. It all comes down to Kidman's performance and I feel if she handled the character's final moments better, this would have been really good or even great, but as it is, it gets
*** out of ****