87%  Winner:   The Departed  151 min,  R,  [Crime, Drama, Thriller]  [Martin Scorsese]  [06 Oct 2006]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 85%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 91%,   Metacritic: 85%,   External Reviews
Awards:  Won 4 Oscars. Another 92 wins & 135 nominations.
Actors:  Jack Nicholson, Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Wahlberg, Matt Damon
Writer:  William Monahan (screenplay), Alan Mak, Felix Chong
External Links:  Wikipedia  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb  Website     Language:  English, Cantonese    Country:  USA, Hong Kong
Plot:  In South Boston, the state police force is waging war on Irish-American organized crime. Young undercover cop Billy Costigan is assigned to infiltrate the mob syndicate run by gangland chief Frank Costello. While Billy quickly gains Costello's confidence, Colin Sullivan, a hardened young criminal who has infiltrated the state police as an informer for the syndicate is rising to a position of power in the Special Investigation Unit. Each man becomes deeply consumed by their double lives, gathering information about the plans and counter-plans of the operations they have penetrated. But when it becomes clear to both the mob and the police that there is a mole in their midst, Billy and Colin are suddenly in danger of being caught and exposed to the enemy - and each must race to uncover the identity of the other man in time to save themselves. But is either willing to turn on their friends and comrades they've made during their long stints undercover?
Rotten Tomatoes:   Legendary director Martin Scorsese takes the helm for this tale of questionable loyalties and blurring identities set in the South Boston organized crime scene and inspired by the wildly popular 2002 Hong Kong crime film Infernal Affairs. As the police force attempts to reign in the increasingly powerful Irish mafia, authorities are faced with the prospect of sending in an undercover agent or seeing their already frail grip on the criminal underworld slip even further. Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) is a young cop looking to make a name for himself in the world of law enforcement. Collin Sullivan (Matt Damon) is a street-smart criminal who has successfully infiltrated the police department with the sole intention of reporting their every move to ruthless syndicate head Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson). When Costigan is assigned the task of working his way into Costello's tightly guarded inner circle, Sullivan is faced with the responsibility of rooting out the informer before things get out of hand. With the stakes constantly rising and time quickly running out for the undercover cop and his criminal counterpart, each man must work feverishly to reveal his counterpart before his identity is exposed by the other. Martin Sheen, Alec Baldwin, and Ray Winstone co-star, and writer William Monahan adapts a screenplay originally penned by Alan Mak and Felix Chong. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

71%  Nominee:   Babel  143 min,  R,  [Drama]  [Alejandro G. Iñárritu]  [10 Nov 2006]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 75%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 69%,   Metacritic: 69%,   External Reviews
Awards:  Won 1 Oscar. Another 41 wins & 134 nominations.
Actors:  Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Gael García Bernal, Mohamed Akhzam, Peter Wight
Writer:  Guillermo Arriaga, Guillermo Arriaga (idea), Alejandro G. Iñárritu (idea)
External Links:  Wikipedia  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb  Website     Language:  English, Arabic, Spanish, Japanese, Berber languages, French, Russian, Japanese Sign Language    Country:  France, USA, Mexico
Plot:  4 interlocking stories all connected by a single gun all converge at the end and reveal a complex and tragic story of the lives of humanity around the world and how we truly aren't all that different. In Morocco, a troubled married couple are on vacation trying to work out their differences. Meanwhile, a Moroccan herder buys a rifle for his sons so they can keep the jackals away from his herd. A girl in Japan dealing with rejection, the death of her mother, the emotional distance of her father, her own self-consciousness, and a disability among many other issues, deals with modern life in the enormous metropolis of Tokyo, Japan. Then, on the opposite side of the world the married couple's Mexican nanny takes the couple's 2 children with her to her son's wedding in Mexico, only to come into trouble on the return trip. Combined, it provides a powerful story and an equally powerful looking glass into the lives of seemingly random people around the world and it shows just how connected we really are.
Rotten Tomatoes:   The tragic aftermath of human carelessness travels around the world in this multi-narrative drama from filmmaker Alejandro González Iñárritu. Richard (Brad Pitt) and Susan (Cate Blanchett) are a couple from the United States who have traveled to Morocco in Northern Africa on a vacation after the death of one of their children has sent Susan into a deep depression. Richard and Susan's other two children have been left in the care of Amelia (Adriana Barraza), their housekeeper. Amelia is originally from Mexico, and her oldest son is getting married in Tijuana. Unable to find someone who can watch the kids, or to obtain permission to take the day off, Amelia takes the children with her as she travels across the border for the celebration. Around the same time, in Morocco a poor farmer buys a hunting rifle, and he gives it to his sons to scare off the predatory animals that have been thinning out their goat herd. The boys decide to test the weapon's range by shooting at a bus far away; the shot hits Susan in the shoulder, and soon she's bleeding severely, while police are convinced the attack is the work of terrorists. In Japan, Chieko (Rinko Kikuchi) is a teenage deaf-mute whose mother recently committed suicide. This despairing, confused girl experiences such rage and frustration that she causes her volleyball team to lose a match, and later yanks her underwear off and begins exposing herself to boys in a crowded restaurant. Chieko's father then struggles to reach past the emotional distance which separates him and his daughter. Babel earned Alejandro González Iñárritu the prize for Best Director at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

86%  Nominee:   Letters from Iwo Jima  141 min,  R,  [Drama, History, War]  [Clint Eastwood]  [02 Feb 2007]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 79%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 91%,   Metacritic: 89%,   External Reviews
Awards:  Won 1 Oscar. Another 23 wins & 37 nominations.
Actors:  Kazunari Ninomiya, Ken Watanabe, Ryo Kase, Tsuyoshi Ihara
Writer:  Iris Yamashita (screenplay), Iris Yamashita (story), Paul Haggis (story), Tadamichi Kuribayashi (book), Tsuyoko Yoshido (book)
External Links:  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb  Website     Language:  Japanese, English    Country:  USA
Plot:  The island of Iwo Jima stands between the American military force and the home islands of Japan. Therefore the Imperial Japanese Army is desperate to prevent it from falling into American hands and providing a launching point for an invasion of Japan. General Tadamichi Kuribayashi is given command of the forces on the island and sets out to prepare for the imminent attack. General Kuribayashi, however, does not favor the rigid traditional approach recommended by his subordinates, and resentment and resistance fester among his staff. In the lower echelons, a young soldier, Saigo, a poor baker in civilian life, strives with his friends to survive the harsh regime of the Japanese army itself, all the while knowing that a fierce battle looms. When the American invasion begins, both Kuribayashi and Saigo find strength, honor, courage, and horrors beyond imagination.
Rotten Tomatoes:   After bringing the story of the American soldiers who fought in the battle of Iwo Jima to the screen in his film Flags of Our Fathers, Clint Eastwood offers an equally thoughtful portrait of the Japanese forces who held the island for 36 days in this military drama. In 1945, World War II was in its last stages, and U.S. forces were planning to take on the Japanese on a small island known as Iwo Jima. While the island was mostly rock and volcanoes, it was of key strategic value and Japan's leaders saw the island as the final opportunity to prevent an Allied invasion. Lt. General Tadamichi Kuribayashi (Ken Watanabe) was put in charge of the forces on Iwo Jima; Kuribayashi had spent time in the United States and was not eager to take on the American army, but he also understood his opponents in a way his superiors did not, and devised an unusual strategy of digging tunnels and deep foxholes that allowed his troops a tactical advantage over the invading soldiers. While Kuribayashi's strategy alienated some older officers, it impressed Baron Nishi (Tsuyoshi Ihara), the son of a wealthy family who had also studied America firsthand as an athlete at the 1932 Olympics. As Kuribayashi and his men dig in for a battle they are not certain they can win -- and most have been told they will not survive -- their story is told both by watching their actions and through the letters they write home to their loved ones, letters that in many cases would not be delivered until long after they were dead. Among the soldiers manning Japan's last line of defense are Saigo (Kazunari Ninomiya), a baker sent to Iwo Jima only days before his wife was to give birth; Shimizu (Ryo Kase), who was sent to Iwo Jima after washing out in the military police; and Lieutenant Ito (Shidou Nakamura), who has embraced the notion of "Death Before Surrender" with particular ferocity. Filmed in Japanese with a primarily Japanese cast, Letters From Iwo Jima was shot in tandem with Flags of Our Fathers, and the two films were released within two months of one another. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

83%  Nominee:   Little Miss Sunshine  101 min,  R,  [Comedy, Drama]  [Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris]  [18 Aug 2006]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 78%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 91%,   Metacritic: 80%,   External Reviews
Awards:  Won 2 Oscars. Another 68 wins & 107 nominations.
Actors:  Abigail Breslin, Alan Arkin, Greg Kinnear, Paul Dano, Steve Carell, Toni Collette
Writer:  Michael Arndt
External Links:  Wikipedia  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb  Website     Language:  English    Country:  USA
Plot:  In Albuquerque, Sheryl Hoover brings her suicidal brother Frank to the breast of her dysfunctional and emotionally bankrupted family. Frank is homosexual, an expert in Proust. He tried to commit suicide when he was rejected by his boyfriend and his great competitor became renowned and recognized as number one in the field of Proust. Sheryl's husband Richard is unsuccessfully trying to sell his self-help and self-improvement technique using nine steps to reach success, but he is actually a complete loser. Her son Dwayne has taken a vow of silence as a follower of Nietzsche and aims to be a jet pilot. Dwayne's grandfather Edwin was sent away from the institution for elders (Sunset Manor) and is addicted in heroin. When her seven-year-old daughter Olive has a chance to dispute the Little Miss Sunshine pageant in Redondo Beach, California, the whole family travels together in their old Volkswagen Type 2 (Kombi) in a funny journey of hope of winning the talent contest and to make a dream come true.
Rotten Tomatoes:   When a pudgy, bespectacled seven-year-old, Olive (Abigail Breslin), voices her desire to take home the coveted Little Miss Sunshine crown at an upcoming beauty pageant, her wildly dysfunctional family sets out on an interstate road trip to ensure her a clear shot at realizing her dreams in former music video directorial team Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris' quirky feature debut, starring Greg Kinnear, Steve Carell, and Toni Collette. Despite early career success as an outspoken motivational speaker, family patriarch Richard (Kinnear) continues to cling to his "Refuse to Lose" philosophy, much to the chagrin of his increasingly annoyed spouse, Sheryl (Collette). Add into the mix a Nietzsche-reading teenage son (Paul Dano) who has taken a vow of silence until he finds his fate as a fighter pilot; a horny, heroin-happy grandfather (Alan Arkin) with a penchant for creative profanity; and a suicidal genius (Carell) and Proust scholar still reeling about losing both his male lover and his MacArthur Foundation genius grant -- and the stage is set for a road trip in which sanity is sure to take the back seat. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

87%  Nominee:   The Queen  103 min,  PG-13,  [Biography, Drama, History]  [Stephen Frears]  [17 Nov 2006]
Ratings & Reviews:  IMDb Reviews: 73%,   Rotten Tomatoes: 97%,   Metacritic: 91%,   External Reviews
Awards:  Won 1 Oscar. Another 94 wins & 95 nominations.
Actors:  Alex Jennings, Helen Mirren, James Cromwell, Michael Sheen, Roger Allam
Writer:  Peter Morgan
External Links:  Wikipedia  Rotten Tomatoes  IMDb  Website     Language:  English, German, French    Country:  UK, USA, France, Italy
Plot:  Diana the 'People's Princess' has died in a car accident in Paris. The Queen and her family decide that for the best, they should remain hidden behind the closed doors of Balmoral Castle. The heartbroken public do not understand and request that the Queen comforts her people. This also puts pressure on newly elected Tony Blair, who constantly tries to convince the monarchy to address the public.
Rotten Tomatoes:   This is the story of the death of Princess Diana of Wales and the relationship between British Prime Minister Tony Blair and the British Royal Family upon hearing of her death.