ANOTHER WOMAN (1988)

Reminiscent of Bergman's WILD STRAWBERRIES, ANOTHER WOMAN tells the story of a professor who is in her 50's and beginning to reexamine her life.  Taking a leave of absence from work to write a book, she rents an apartment next door to a psychiatrist's office, but soon discovers that through some "acoustical oddness" she can hear all of the patients quite clearly.  She tries to ignore them, but one patient in particular (Mia Farrow) captures her attention and brings back sad memories from her own past.  Failed relationships, estranged siblings and parents, her decision to not have children, her current dead end marriage to Ian Holm which began with him cheating on his wife with her, her turning down a suitor (Gene Hackman) who was clearly in love with her.

Needless to say, ANOTHER WOMAN is not a happy film.  It's not as depressing as Allen's last film, SEPTEMBER, but it's no walk in the park either.  Intimate photography by Sven Nykvist, a steady pace, strong performances by a great cast, interesting story.  ANOTHER WOMAN has a lot of the ingredients to make an outstanding film, but for some odd reason it just falls into the "above average" category.  I'm not sure exactly what it is, but it just doesn't have that magic spark to it.  Still, it's 100% worth watching.

THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW (2004)

Paleoclimatologist Dennis Quaid has a bad feeling about global warming. He spends a lot of time attending conferences and trying to warn people that the human race is eventually gonna get wiped out by a new ice age. But even paleoclimatologist Dennis Quaid can't predict that it's gonna to happen...the day after tomorrow! Yikes!

Even worse than the world ending the day after tomorrow is paleoclimatologist Dennis Quaid's son, Jake Gyllenhaal, is in NYC for a school activity and he hasn't had a chance to knock boots with supersexy Emmy Rossum yet. Ohhh, the humanity! Is there no God?!!! Multiple hailstorms, tornadoes, tidal waves, supercooled superstorms and wolf attacks later Jake is trapped in NYC and it's up to paleoclimatologist Dennis Quaid to come save him.

And, of course, he does. Oops! Did I ruin the ending for you? I'm sorry. One of the things that gets old in these disaster movies is no matter what, no matter even if you have a superstorm the size of Australia breathing right down your neck, the hero always seems to live through it all with only a few scratches to show for their troubles. I guess that's what's expected, but still it'd be nice if every once and awhile some of the main characters died.

Still, despite the we've-seen-this-shit-a-million-times-before script THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW is entertaining. The CG destruction looks nice, the pace is quick, Jake Gyllenhaal proves that even with a lame script he's still a good actor, Emmy Rossum's smile created such a warming glow in my loins that it could've thawed out a woolly mammoth's carcass from 60 paces, ice age-proof wolves, paleoclimatologist Dennis Quaid, that guy from "Riptide" as the President, Ian Holm's in a role that is beneath his talents and a completely unexpected Friedrich Nietzsche reference...wow.

Recommended for fans of cheesy disaster movies...like me.  I cannot get enough of these things.