This post comprises a quartet of movies that I have recently seen for just the first time.  The four of them are an eclectic lot, but not particularly awe-inspiring.  Maybe I need better taste in motion pictures?  Maybe, I have just run out of good movies though.  The first two movies were rented from iTunes and watched on my iPhone, on the road and the second two were checked-out DVDs from the library.  So Maestro, drumroll please, here they are:

• In Iron Man 2, Robert Downey Jr. reprises his role as Tony Stark and The Man in the Iron Mask.  As with the original movie, he must contend with deadly, deadly issues all the while making new friends (Scarlett Johansson and Samuel L. Jackson) and a new enemy (Mickey Rourke).  Gwyneth Paltrow remains content to just decorate any scene that she appears in.  Other than watching Scarlett Johansson kick bad-guy butt as Natasha Romanoff (Do I smell spinoff?), this sequel has little else to offer.
• With Predators, a group of hardened killers are hunted on an alien planet, mercenaries, murderers, and convicts, oh my!  But now they’re a long way from home, and when the alien predators arrive, these human predators become the prey.  Adrien Brody is tapped to fill the shoes of Arnold Schwarzenegger who is still appearing in that long running musical, The State of California.  Adrien, stick to The Piano music, please!
• The Fountain is an odyssey about one man’s eternal struggle to save the woman he loves.  Beginning in 16th-century Spain, as a conquistador, he (Hugh Jackman) commences his search for the Fountain of Youth.  As a modern-day scientist, he desperately struggles to find a cure for the cancer that is killing his beloved wife (Rachel Weisz).  I like Hugh Jackman as an actor and I love Rachel Weisz as an actress, but the flashbacks and flash forwards that permeate this film builds a crescendo of confusion that only its ending can surpass with even more perplexities.  I was disappointed.
• Night Train to Munich is a 1940 war drama.  It has Rex Harrison playing a British secret agent and Paul Henreid playing a Nazi double agent.  Margaret Lockwood is their mutual love interest, but British tweed wins her heart and the day over German jackboots.  In 1942, just two short years later, Paul Henreid would play the resistance leader, Victor Laszlo in Casablanca.  Welcome back to the fight, Paul, this time I know our side will win.

Le Marquis, as your psychiatrist, I prescribe elimination of all of your adolescent fantasies and their comic book movie antecedents.  And please, stop dwelling upon Nazis.  About Rachel Weisz and her movie, “The Fountain”, watch it again, maybe you’ll get it next time.  I’ll see you next Tuesday and try to smile more.

Have you noticed, that it has started to snow?