I love Kanye West. I saw he posted his new music video for his song, Homecoming featuring Chris Martin on his blog today and really appreciated the black and white cityscape of Chicago. The silhouettes and shadows are a nice touch and weave together Chris’ piano playing and Kanye’s performance beautifully.

Saw Little Miss Sunshine last week and keep thinking about it. It was most definitely the funniest movie I’ve seen this year. Steve Carrell is absolutely brilliant and little Abigail Breslin was absolutely adorable. Crazy week this week but thought I’d post this for now. Go see it!

I love Zach Braff and am really excited to see his latest The Last Kiss which also stars the adorable Rachel Bilson as well as Casey Affleck and Blythe Danner. Written by Paul Haggis (of Crash fame), The Last Kiss is a remake of the Italian film L’ Ultimo Bacio. Can’t wait!

The trailer for Mira Nair’s The Namesake is out and it’s making me so excited. The film is based on the book by the same name by acclaimed writer Jhumpa Lahiri. The movie stars the amazing Tabu as well as Kal Penn and deals with the identity issues that a boy (Penn) has who grows up in America with a Russian name in an Indian household. See Penn’s blog, which was written during the shooting of The Namesake, here.

I saw the film, United 93 yesterday morning. I felt that it was very well done and although it still is a very sensitive recent event for many Americans, I urge everyone to see it. I keep thinking about it and cannot find the words to tell you all about this movie… Gripping. Powerful. Heartfelt. Paul Greengrass has made a film unlike any other. The film is largely unscripted and many of the personnel from the FAA and the US military who were working on September 11th are in the film, playing themselves. The families of the victims of the flights gave consent for the movie to be made and extensive research was done to find out as many details about each passenger, down to their clothing and what they may have been reading that day. Many of the flight attendants and the pilots are actual working attendants and pilots. The movie itself has not left my mind and thought I’d post it here today.

Edit: I read a wonderful review in today’s New York Magazine by David Edelstein.

Despite major roadblocks in production, Deepa Mehta’s Water is completed and slated for release in theatres this month. The story is about Hindu widows who live together in a “Widow House” in Varanasi during the time of Gandhi’s liberation of India. Widespread protests erupted in India, almost halting the filming of the production. Undeterred, filming was completed in Sri Lanka. So excited to see this.

After watching Spike Lee’s Inside Man last weekend (great movie) I have been listening to the track which opened and closed the film. The track, Chaiyya Chaiyya, is from the 1998 Hindi movie Dil Se and was one of the many soundtracks I have memorized by heart due to my parents’ undying love of Hindi filmi music. I have not been able to stop listening to the song all week and thought I’d post it here if anyone saw the movie and wanted the song. I have made the original 1998 version available for 48 hours here. Click the image above to watch the sequence in the movie where the song was sung. On top of a moving train. Yeah. Bollywood.

The opening title sequence for the movie, Thank You For Smoking is so wonderful with graphics reminiscent of vintage cigarette packaging. Each introduction gets it’s own “brand” and the typography is so beautiful. For more type nerdiness, check out this post on Typographica where each typeface in the opener is credited. I can’t wait to see this movie.

Idlewild takes place at a speakeasy in the South in the thirties and stars the men of Outkast: André Benjamin and Big Boi (aka Antwan A. Patton). The story is of the relationship between a piano player (Benjamin) and the club’s showy manager, played by Patton. The movie also stars Ving Rhames, Terrence Howard, Paula Patton, Patti LaBelle, Cicely Tyson and Macy Gray among others. Outkast also did the music for the movie which, judging by the trailer, sounds amazing. Can’t wait.