1. Scorsese film to focus on George Harrison

["The two surviving Beatles, Sir Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, are expected to participate, and Harrison's widow, Olivia, will co-produce, according to movie trade magazine Variety."]

["Highlighted international titles include the German-Turkish film The Edge of Heaven; Romanian film 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days; and Iranian Persepolis, all of which have won major awards at the Venice Film Festival and the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year."]

["A single image from The Kingdom's opening credits effectively summarizes the entire film to follow. An animated timeline serves to enlighten the audience as regards the history of Saudi Arabia, from its formation as a country to the discovery of oil to the involvement of fifteen of its citizens as hijackers in the 9/11 terrorist attacks. This final point is illustrated—in cheap thriller effect with pulse-pounding musical accompaniment to boot—with the all-black image of a jet en route to its soon-to-be-collapsed targets, the screen cutting to black just before the moment of truth, because, well, that would be going too far. There isn't intended malice in this image, just insensitivity. In other words, The Kingdom isn't evil—it's just fucking stupid."]

["Despite its questionable politics, Peter Berg's busiest film yet, The Kingdom, blows up a lot of stuff, and kills a lot of people, really well. Which is to say it never bores however bull-headed it may bluster. The flip side, of course, is that the film assaults its audience as much as its villains (and its heroes)."]

["Based on a 54-page short story that Eileen Chang started writing in the 1950s and finished in the '70s, Ang Lee's latest foray into forbidden love is as monotonous and disaffecting as Brokeback Mountain was gripping and immediate."]

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