Layer Cake

2004 • Director: Matthew Vaughan
Sony New Line Pictures
Starring: Daniel Craig, Colm Meaney

A mid-level coke distributor, Mr. XXXX, decides he's going to go legit. His supplier has different ideas, though, and the viewer is swept along as one duplicity after another is revealed. It works well as a crime thriller, but watch and listen closely or you'll lose the thread. Rating: B+

Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay

2008 • Directors: Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg
New Line Cinema
Starring: John Cho, Kal Penn

While viewing, sleepiness sets in. The culprits? Purposely offensive humor and forced gags. And then Neil Patrick Harris appears in a demented role, shocking and hilarious with strident vulgarity. The squeaky-clean doc shines as an über-hetero, psychedelic mushroom munching maniac. I doubt any of this made it to his journal. Rating: B–

I Heart Huckabees

2004 • Director: David O. Russell
Fox Searchlight Pictures
With Jason Schwartzman, Mark Wahlberg

I am sure the doctoral candidate in philosophy who wrote this laughed uncontrollably to himself while penning the script. I didn't laugh. Nor was I prompted to ponder the theories of Sartre or Heidegger––I instead wondered how so many famous people agreed to participate in this overdrawn mess.  
Rating: C