When I Stop Dreaming

You learn something every day. One day, you know nothing about a Canadian heavy metal band named Anvil, and suddenly you learn that they’ve recorded twelve albums (and are working on numbers 13 and 14) and were considered to be a contemporary of metal legends like Metallica, Anthrax and Motorhead. You might not have known that Slash of Guns ‘n’ Roses was a teenage fan and that, once in their youth, they met with head-banging reverence by festival crowds. And, surprisingly, you learn that a documentary about a past-their-prime Canadian heavy metal hair band on a long, long losing streak …

2009. Directed by Louis Psihoyos. I put off watching The Cove because I knew what I was going to see. Sometimes you need movies to escape the depressing aspects of life, rather than focus on them. But witnessing what happens in this brave documentary is important. The debut of this film was the first I’d heard about the dolphin capture and slaughter in a hidden cove near Taiji, along the coast of Japan. From September to March of every year, dolphins are detoured from their migratory route, chased by boats with men aboard banging on pipes, and herded into shallow …

2009. Starring George Clooney, Vera Farmiga, Anna Kendrick. Directed by Jason Reitman. The irony is thick in Up In The Air. Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) is a happy air warrior who specializes in firing employees for timid employers all over the country. He is summoned back to HQ for a change in direction — a young colleague (Anna Kendrick) has devised a means of firing people through videoconferencing, effectively terminating Bingham from the profession he has perfected. Bingham sees the benefit of a face-to-face dismissal for every kind of unwanted employee, a way to soften the blow and minimize the …