The Kids Are All Right
The best thing about Lisa Cholodenko's sweet-natured but uneven comedy-drama is the movie's casual regard for its central characters, a lesbian couple raising their two children in Los Angeles. Years earlier, Nic (the excellent Annette Bening) and Jules (Julianne Moore) each conceived a child using the same anonymous sperm donor (Mark Ruffalo), and no one finds this family especially unusual. If only the plot weren't so heavily reliant on typical Hollywood clichés: Fifteen-year-old Laser (Josh Hutcherson) persuades his sister, Joni (Mia Wasikowska), to reach out to the sperm-donation clinic in hopes of connecting with their biological father.
The Last Airbender, director M. Night Shyamalan's adaptation of the popular Nickelodeon cartoon Avatar: The Last Airbender, is cluttered with so much gobbledygook exposition and confusing action that it is impossible to grasp what is supposed to be going on for more than 15 seconds at a stretch.
Disney's A Christmas Carol is directed by Robert Zemeckis using the same computer-animated style as in his Beowulf and The Polar Express. The characters look cold and alien, and there isn't a hint of emotion to be found on the screen.
