WindWoman3

This is a surprisingly emotional film - especially when you consider that the protagonists are a group of surprisingly macho guys. Their main qualities are extreme competitiveness, irony, and loads of dark humor that would make a lot of "normal" people cringe.

I, however, LOVED this movie . . . and I'm a non-athletic, flabby, able-bodied, middle-aged, Midwestern housewife! I would hang out with these guys any day of the week.

I found myself tearing up quite often during the film, especially the sequences concerning Joe Soares. I don't admire the route he took (a lawsuit) in dealing with his personal disappointment over being cut from Team USA, but I came to greatly admire his tough exterior and (subsequent to his heart attack) his tenderness with a son who couldn't be more UNLIKE him. Speaking of Joe's son: I have to take issue with a previous reviewer who referred to the boy as "effeminate." The boy is simply not athletic, that's all. He's not FEMININE, for heaven's sake! And I think Joe would probably be the first one to pound the sh*t out of anyone who said so.

The filmmakers did a great job of illustrating that these quad athletes (and by association, ANYONE wheelchair-bound) live lives as full - if not fuller than - the average able-bodied person, including dating and sex. I thought adding the material concerning the particulars of how quadriplegics go about having sex was interesting and quite brave. It's a subject a lot of filmmakers would have - and have in the past - shied away from. This aspect of the movie brought me closer to the guys, rooting for them to find love just as I would for any other young, virile man. And I'm not talking just about the 'Hallmark card' variety of love, either. Frankly, I just wanted them to - you know - "get some."

I found myself screaming at the TV during the rugby matches, and I hardly ever do that during the regular Olympics. I wasn't screaming and crying because of some kind of misplaced admiration for what these men have overcome - but because of the sheer level of fierceness in their hearts and just how much THEY wanted to win. Too many able-bodied, international-level athletes get caught up in the hoopla, the glory, the money, the mega-ego of it all. The quad athletes depicted in the film have their hearts and souls in the exact right place. They're in it for a pure love of the game. They want to move, they want to feel their blood pounding in their ears, they want to feel ALIVE. And they are. Oh, they really ARE.

I didn't want this film to end. I wanted to follow and cheer on these men and their friends/families right up to . . . this very minute.

I will be adding this DVD to my library as soon as possible. It'll take an honored place up right up there with my all-time favorite documentaries.

"Murderball" is a MUST-SEE for anyone looking for what's best in our all-too-human natures.

I didn't make an effort to see this film in the theatre, and I think now that wasn't such a bad thing. I watched it in the intimacy of my own bedroom, on the closed space of my PC, paying rapt attention to the dialogue coming from my small speakers.

This film is a contained universe about a handful of experiences and emotions that connect directly to the heart - which is, in the words of one character, "A fist wrapped in blood." There is plenty of verbal blood let here, trust me.

The four characters (essentially the entire cast) play a round-robin game of desire, but not a desire born of tenderness. This desire is a battle of power, with it's participants using sex as their favorite weapon. They want to love, but find themselves unable to meet it's stringent requirements. Instead, they settle for sex as a curdled substitute.

Clive Owen is visceral, cutting, bestial, and oh-SO-smart. He's a gladiator who wins more often than he loses. He may be cruel - but he's a WINNER - and his enemies will never be allowed to forget that.

Julia Roberts is perfectly adequate as a chilly photographer who casually takes, destroys, and doesn't seem to care much about the fall-out. She almost seems to play with men out of profound boredom. If any of these characters can be called amoral, it would be her.

Jude Law comes across as an overly sensitive and boneless jerk who can't decide if he loves anyone more than himself. His character behaves like a petulant child, thus in a key scene with Clive Owen's raging animal, one can practically see Law shrink both physically and emotionally. Indeed, he seems almost grateful for the clarity than Owens provides. Law's performance has been criticized, but frankly he plays a diminished character and I suspect that's not the easiest trick for someone as elegant and beautiful him. He deserves credit.

Natalie Portman is no longer a little girl. She is heartbreakingly beautiful and articulate, yet her character can't be pinned. In the beginning she begs to be loved, but as her character evolves over the course of the film she learns how to use what the Lord gave her - but perhaps not for good. She is excruciatingly aware of how she affects men. I'm not sure she truly enjoys that power. By the time she is betrayed for the final time, the coquettishness is gone - replaced by a woman who despises the men who desire her.

Portman is an actress to contend with. She has a long and bright future ahead of her - and I predict that she will join Roberts as an Oscar winner some day.

The final scene of the film, which focuses solely on Portman's character, left me in tears. Of course, those cellos in the beautiful, haunting, and anguished 'theme' song by Damien Rice went a long way toward turning on my waterworks, too.

This is a humanist movie. Okay, so it's not a movie that's going to make you feel GOOD about the human condition - but it is one that is truthful about the darker meanings of sex, love, and power.

"Closer" is a MUST-SEE for anyone who cherishes a meaty drama.

This film is so gorgeous and so memorable that I will be hunting down (pun intended) a copy of it TOMORROW! It's a "must-have" for any serious movie lover's collection.

"The Fast Runner" is unique. How many films have YOU seen that are spoken in the language of the Inuit? Or whose cast is 100% Inuit? OR recount a myth orally passed down within the Inuit community for eons?

I have a hard time believing that this movie runs almost three hours. I felt like I'd just begun to watch it and then - it was over . . . and I continued to sit there and absorb this amazing experience.

There are movies that cost millions upon millions of dollars and feature the biggest stars, yet "The Fast Runner" achieves something most of them can't: an effortless ability to haunt.

Prepare to be stunned by the people, production, locations, music, and power of "The Fast Runner."