• Batman Begins
• Syriana
• Little Miss Sunshine
• Austen in Translation
• The Bourne Trilogy
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

A quick quip – Ridley Scott's director's cut of this film will be released on DVD in May, so if this review makes you somewhat interested, in the words of Chris Rock, "Wait."

From the reviews I've read of the director's cut, it is the masterpiece Scott was hoping for but 20th Century Fox made him cut due to length. I realize that the current version is 2 hours and 25 mintues, but if Scott's 3 hour plus mini-epic is as good as I've heard, I'm all for it (some critics have even been so bold as to say Scott's cut of Kingdom of Heaven is better than Gladiator). Balian's back story is much more fleshed out, including why his anger turned so vehemently on the priest as well as his complicated relationship with Sibylla and why she looks and acts the way she does at the end of the film (in the current version, her character does some inexplicable things without any reason why). More time is also given to other minor characters in the film, including my favorite, the leper king played by the excellent uncredited Edward Norton.

I agree with Rhett. With 20th Century Fox's edition of the film, it was hard to understand Balian's moralism, heroism and redemption. In order to not "bore us with details," the studio made Scott rush a "hero" to the action instead of allowing him to create a hero for the action. However, with the new cut of the film, I hope to see the underlying potential the current version hinted at and discover new revelations as to why and how Scott dreamed this fairy tale might have been possible.