100部美国搞笑电影，可以顺便练英文了1,魔法灰姑娘〔超级推荐〕（安妮海瑟薇主演）
2,贱女孩〔超级推荐〕（林赛罗汉主演）
3,灰姑娘的玻璃手机〔超级推荐〕
4,美人鱼〔超级推荐〕（里面音乐也很好听）
5,舞出我人生〔超级推荐〕（励志的！刚出了第二部）
6,录取通知书
7,水瓶座女孩
8,倒霉爱神（2006林赛罗汉主演）
9,儿女一箩筐
10,冰雪公主〔超级推荐〕
11,我的朋友是明星〔超级推荐〕
12,辣妈辣妹〔超级推荐〕（林赛罗汉主演）
13,物质女孩〔超级推荐〕
14,疯狂金龟车（林赛罗汉主演）
15,平民天后〔超级推荐〕
16,公主日记(不用说勒)〔超级推荐〕（还有第二部哟！）17,歌舞青春〔超级推荐〕[很热的电影！]（Ⅰ和Ⅱ都喜欢）18,律政俏佳人
19,麻辣宝贝〔超级推荐〕
20,恋爱刺客
21,美少女啦啦队〔超级推荐〕
22,12月男孩〔超级推荐〕（哈利波特演的哟）23,足球尤物
24,魔法双星
25,超完美男人〔超级推荐〕
25,劲歌飞扬〔超级推荐〕
26,纽约时刻
27,奶牛美女
28,穿PRADA的恶魔〔超级推荐〕
29,天生一对
30,高校天后〔超级推荐〕
31,像乔丹一样
32,牛仔裤的夏天〔超级推荐超感人～〕
33,初恋的回忆〔超级推荐欣慰～〕
34,甜心辣舞〔超级推荐〕
35,花豹美眉
36,女兵报道
37,女生向前翻〔超级推荐很立志！〕
38,小姐好辣
39,欧洲任我行
40,留级之王
41,风云才女(希尔顿酒店继承人之一尼克?希尔顿首部主打影片！这是一部有关大学女生校园生活的喜剧，影片描述大学校园里一群正处于青春叛逆期、蠢蠢欲动的特权阶层少男少女平日里生活的点点滴滴…… 有点点SEX)〔超级推荐I LOVE HILTON SISTERS〕
42,谁领风骚〔超级推荐女生的可怕和可爱〕43,SAVED
44,疯狂有理
45,初露锋芒
46,美丽坏宝贝〔超级推荐(很有教育意义)〕47, 新欢乐满堂
48,几乎正常
49,总统千金欧游记
50,辣妹保镖
51,我爱猫头鹰
52,朋友一场
53,偶像有约
54,彻夜狂欢
55,窈窕美眉
56,第1女儿〔超级推荐〕57,被拯救者
58,对此承诺〔超级推荐〕59,魔法保姆
60.对面恶女看过来
61,变装拍档〔超级推荐〕62,虚拟偶像
63,新丁驾到
64,怪女孩出列〔超级推荐〕65,一吻定江山
66.篮球兄弟
67,流行教母
68,魅力四射
69,美国甜心
70,超完美夺分〔超级推荐〕80——86美国派1——6 87，小王子（韩）
88，不设防都市（韩）
89，科洛弗档案
90，十诫
91.恋爱假期（急速推荐）
92.乔治亚法则（林赛罗汉）
93.美女与丑姑（风流女帕里斯希尔顿新作）
94.附注我爱你（新片！唯美爱情）
95.珍妮朱诺（韩国，有关怀孕少女和纯情少男的）
96-100惊声尖笑1-4（美国超级讽刺好莱坞大片大搞笑电影，极力推荐）
100部欧美校园喜剧电影 1,魔法灰姑娘〔超级推荐〕 (安妮海瑟薇主演) 2,贱女孩〔超级推荐〕(林赛罗汉主演) 3,灰姑娘的玻璃手机〔超级推荐〕 4,美人鱼〔超级推荐〕 (里面音乐也很好听) 5,舞出我人生〔超级推荐〕 (励志的！刚出了第二部) 6,录取通知书 7,水瓶座女孩 8,倒霉爱神(2006林赛罗汉主演) 9,儿女一箩筐 10,冰雪公主〔超级推荐〕 11,我的朋友是明星〔超级推荐〕 12,〔超级推荐〕(林赛罗汉主演) 13,物质女孩〔超级推荐〕 14,疯狂金龟车(林赛罗汉主演) 15,平民天后〔超级推荐〕 16,公主日记(不用说勒)〔超级推荐〕(还有第二部哟！) 17,歌舞青春〔超级推荐〕[很热的电影！](Ⅰ和Ⅱ都喜欢) 18,律政俏佳人 19,麻辣宝贝〔超级推荐〕 20,恋爱刺客 21,美少女啦啦队〔超级推荐〕 22,12月男孩〔超级推荐〕 (哈利波特演的哟) 23,足球尤物 24,魔法双星 25,超完美男人〔超级推荐〕 25,劲歌飞扬〔超级推荐〕 26,纽约时刻 27,奶牛美女 28,穿PRADA的恶魔〔超级推荐〕 29,天生一对 30,高校天后〔超级推荐〕 31,像乔丹一样 32,牛仔裤的夏天〔超级推荐超感人～〕 33,初恋的回忆〔超级推荐欣慰～〕 34,甜心辣舞〔超级推荐〕 35,花豹美眉 36,女兵报道 37,女生向前翻〔超级推荐很立志！〕 38,小姐好辣 39,欧洲任我行
40,留级之王 41,风云才女(希尔顿酒店继承人之一尼克??希尔顿首部主打影片！这是一部有关大学女生校园生活的喜剧，影片描述大学校园里一群正处于青春叛逆期、蠢蠢欲动的特权阶层少男少女平日里生活的点点滴滴……有点点SEX)〔超级推荐I LOVE HILTON SISTERS〕 42,谁领风骚〔超级推荐女生的可怕和可爱〕 43,SAVED 44,疯狂有理 45,初露锋芒 46,美丽坏宝贝〔超级推荐(很有教育意义)〕 47, 新欢乐满堂 48,几乎正常 49,总统千金欧游记 50,辣妹保镖 51,我爱猫头鹰 52,朋友一场 53,偶像有约 54,彻夜狂欢 55,窈窕美眉 56,第1女儿〔超级推荐〕 57,被拯救者 58,对此承诺〔超级推荐〕 59,魔法保姆 60.对面恶女看过来 61,变装拍档〔超级推荐〕 62,虚拟偶像 63,新丁驾到 64,怪女孩出列〔超级推荐〕 65,一吻定江山 66.篮球兄弟 67,流行教母 68,魅力四射 69,美国甜心 70,超完美夺分〔超级推荐〕 80——86,美国派1——6 87，小王子(韩) 88，不设防都市(韩) 89，科洛弗档案 90，十诫 91,恋爱假期(急速推荐) 92,乔治亚法则(林赛罗汉) 93,美女与丑姑(风流女帕里斯希尔顿新作) 94,附注我爱你(新片！唯美爱情) 95,珍妮朱诺(韩国，有关怀孕少女和纯情少男的) 96-100,惊声尖笑1-4(美国超级讽刺好莱坞大片大搞笑电影，极力推荐)
Journey to the Center of the Earth（地心游记）2008 There is a part of me that will always have affection for a movie like "Journey to the Center of the Earth." It is a small part and steadily shrinking, but once I put on the 3-D glasses and settled in my seat, it started perking up. This is a fairly bad movie, and yet at the same time maybe about as good as it could be. There may not be an 8-year-old alive who would not love it. If I had seen it when I was 8, I would have remembered it with deep affection for all these years, until I saw it again and realized how little I really knew at that age. You are already familiar with the premise, that there is another land inside of our globe. You are familiar because the Jules Verne novel has inspired more than a dozen movies and countless TV productions, including a series, and has been ripped off by such as Edgar Rice Burroughs, who called it Pellucidar, and imagined that the Earth was hollow and there was another world on the inside surface. (You didn't ask, but yes, I own a copy of Tarzan at the Earth's Core with the original dust jacket.) In this version, Brendan Fraser stars as a geologist named Trevor, who defends the memory of his late brother, Max, who believed the center of the Earth could be reached through "volcanic tubes." Max disappeared on a mysterious expedition, which, if it involved volcanic tubes, should have been no surprise to him. Now Trevor has been asked to spend some time with his nephew, Max's son, who is named Sean (Josh Hutcherson). What with one thing and another, wouldn't you know they find themselves in Iceland, and peering down a volcanic tube. They are joined in this enterprise by Hannah (Anita Briem), who they find living in Max's former research headquarters near the volcano he was investigating. Now begins a series of adventures, in which the operative principle is: No matter how frequently or how far they fall, they will land without injury. They fall very frequently, and very far. The first drop lands them at the bottom of a deep cave, from which they cannot possibly climb, but they remain remarkably optimistic: "There must be a way out of here!" Sure enough, they find an abandoned mine shaft and climb aboard three cars of its miniature railway for a scene that will make you swear the filmmakers must have seen "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom." Just like in that movie, they hurtle down the tracks at breakneck speeds; they're in three cars, on three more or less parallel tracks, leading you to wonder why three parallel tracks were constructed at great expense and bother, but just when such questions are forming, they have to (1) leap a chasm, (2) jump from one car to another, and (3) crash. It's a funny thing about that little railway: After all these years, it still has lamps hanging over the rails, and the electricity is still on. The problem of lighting an unlit world is solved in the next cave they enter, which is inhabited by cute little birds that glow in the dark. One of them makes friends with Sean, and leads them on to the big attraction -- a world bounded by a great interior sea. This world must be a terrible place to inhabit; it has man-eating and man-strangling plants, its waters harbor giant-fanged fish and fearsome sea snakes that eat them, and on the further shore is a Tyrannosaurus rex. So do the characters despair? Would you despair, if you were trapped miles below the surface in a cave and being chased by its hungry inhabitants? Of course not. There isn't a moment in the movie when anyone seems frightened, not even during a fall straight down for thousands of feet, during which they link hands like sky-divers and carry on a conversation. Trevor gets the ball rolling: "We're still falling!" I mentioned 3-D glasses earlier in the review. Yes, the movie is available in 3-D in "selected theaters." Select those theaters to avoid. With a few exceptions (such as the authentic IMAX process), 3-D remains underwhelming to me -- a distraction, a disappointment and more often than not offering a dingy picture. I guess setting your story inside the Earth is one way to explain why it always seems to need more lighting. The movie is being shown in 2-D in most theaters, and that's how I wish I had seen it. Since there's that part of me with a certain weakness for movies like this, it's possible I would have liked it more. It would have looked brighter and clearer, and the photography wouldn't have been cluttered up with all the leaping and gnashing of teeth. Then I could have appreciated the work of the plucky actors, who do a lot of things right in this movie, of which the most heroic is keeping a straight face. 1
Seven(七宗罪)1995 David Fincher's classic tale of inventive serial killing and urban degredation, with Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman on excellent form Who'd have thought? An absurd-sounding tale of a serial killer basing his crimes around the seven deadly sins, directed by the man behind the mess that was Alien3, turning out to be one of the most chilling and original thrillers of the 1990s. From the outset, through the film's brilliantly designed deliberate under-lighting - we see very little blood and guts - and muffled sound, the audience is encouraged to lean towards the screen, immerse itself in the film's unbearably grim world. Pitt is in career-making form as Mills, a simple cop moving with his sweet young wife (Paltrow) to a grim, anonymous city, determined to make a difference, to do some good. He is assigned to track down a vengeful killer, and works alongside Somerset (Freeman), a jaded, wise policeman on the verge of retirement. The two are that modern movie cliché -the mismatched pair thrown together by circumstance, who gradually learn mutual respect. But Fincher and Walker take these hackneyed ingredients, play with them in the context of a brilliantly cohesive plot, and present something consistently fresh - the police finding themselves with too much evidence, the premature unmasking of the killer - and very, very dark. 1
全球电影史上100部经典电影推荐 1、《教父》The Godfather 1972年科波拉黑帮经典《教父》的首部，派拉蒙公司最成功的影片之一，坐稳IMDB头把交椅应属众望所归。虽然评论界一致对《教父》系列的第2集推崇有佳，但大多数影迷似乎还是对《教父》情有独钟，这可能与马龙·白兰度极具个人魅力的表演有关，直到今天他那种含糊沙哑的声音与神秘莫测的表情都依然叫人着迷。 2、《肖申克的救赎》The Shawshank Redemption 1994年这部被称为《刺激1995》的影片在中国影迷间也有极好的口碑，可见电影超越国界的神奇之处。 3、《辛德勒的名单》Schindler’s List 1993年斯皮尔伯格在《大白鲨》、《夺宝奇兵》、《外星人》、《紫色》四次与奥斯卡失之交臂后，终于在辛德勒和无数犹太难民的帮助下捧得金像。 4、《公民凯恩》Citizen Kane 1941年无需多言的电影里程碑，神童奥逊·威尔斯可一不可再的惊世之作。 5、《卡萨布兰卡》Casablanca 1942年永远的《北非谍影》，永远的英格丽·褒曼 6、《教父续集》The Godfather: Part II 1974年《教父续集》中科里昂尼家族兴起的历史与麦克血腥的奋斗形成了完美的对仗，这种平行蒙太奇的运用深得评论界的赏识，此片的成功也巩固了艾尔·帕西诺和罗伯特·德尼罗两位意裔影帝的地位。 7、《七武士》Shichinin no samurai 1954年这可能不是大师黑泽明最出色的作品，但确实是他最好看的作品，它对世界电影的影响早已不是一个简单的东方武侠故事。 8、《星球大战》Star Wars 1977年对每个出生于50到70年代的美国人而言，他们几乎都喜欢被人被称作"Star Wars Generation"（《星球大战》的一代），星战系列应该是拥有影迷人数最多的系列电影了，还记得99年推出《星战前传》时掀起的狂潮么？ 9、《美国美人》American Beauty 1999年这部电影能入选到TOP10有点叫人惊讶，美国特有的中产阶级影片。 10、《飞跃疯人院》One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest 1975年米洛斯·福尔曼和杰克·尼克尔森两人共同的颠峰，一堂影视表演的必修课。 11、《奇爱博士》r.Strangelove 1964年库布里克讽刺冷战的黑色幽默经典，"未来三部曲"的首部，对一个没有那段历史经历的中国观众而言，此片未必会得到这样的高分。 12、《卧虎藏龙》Wo hu zang long 2000年李安真的拍了部了不起的电影。 13、《后窗》Rear Window 1954年8.6 希区柯克的经典，詹姆斯·斯图尔特和格蕾丝·凯莉的搭配就如同现今布拉德·彼特和朱丽娅·罗伯茨合作一样抢眼。
Tess(苔丝)1979 Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles, which Roman Polanski has turned into a lovely, lyrical, unexpectedly delicate movie, might at first seem to be the wrong project for Mr. Polanski in every way. As a new biography of the director reports, when Tess was shown at the Cannes Film Festival, the press pointed nastily and repeatedly to the coincidence of Mr. Polanski's having made a film about a young girl's seduction by an older man, while he himself faced criminal charges for a similar offense. This would certainly seem to cast a pall over the project. So would the fact that Hardy's novel is so very deeply rooted in English landscapes, geographical and sociological, while Mr. Polanski was brought up in Poland. Finally, Tess of the D'Urbervilles is so quintessentially Victorian a story that a believable version might seem well out of any contemporary director's reach. But if an elegant, plausible, affecting Tess sounds like more than might have been expected of Mr. Polanski, let's just say he has achieved the impossible. In fact, in the process of adapting his style to suit such a sweeping and vivid novel, he has achieved something very unlike his other work. Without Mr. Polanski's name in the credits, this lush and scenic Tess could even be mistaken for the work of David Lean. In a preface to the later editions of Tess of the D'Urbervilles, Mr. Hardy described the work as "an impression, not an argument." Mr. Polanski has taken a similar approach, removing the sting from both the story's morality and its melodrama. Tess Durbeyfield, the hearty country lass whose downfall begins when her father learns he had noble forebears, is sent to charm her rich D'Urberville relations. She learns that they aren't D'Urbervilles after all; instead, they have used their new money to purchase an old name. Tess charms them anyhow, so much that Alec D'Urberville, her imposter cousin, seduces and impregnates her. The seduction, like many of the film's key scenes, is presented in a manner both earthy and discreet. In this case, the action is set in a forest, where a gentle mist arises from the ground and envelops Tess just around the time when she is enveloped by Alec. Alec, as played by Leigh Lawson, is a slightly wooden character, unlike Angel Clare, Tess's later and truer lover, played with supreme radiance by Peter Firth. Long after Tess has borne and buried her illegitimate child, she finds and falls in love with this spirited soul mate. But when she marries Angel Clare and is at last ready to reveal the secret of her past, the story begins hurtling toward its final tragedy. When Tess becomes a murderer, the film offers its one distinctly Polanski-like moment—but even that scene has its fidelity to the novel. A housemaid listening at a door hears a "drip, drip, drip" sound, according to Hardy. Mr. Polanski has simply interpreted this with a typically mischievous flourish. Of all the unlikely strong points of Tess, which opens today for a weeklong engagement at the Baronet and which will reopen next year, the unlikeliest is Nastassja Kinski, who plays the title role. Miss Kinski powerfully resembles the young Ingrid Bergman, and she is altogether ravishing. But she's an odd choice for Tess: not quite vigorous enough, and maybe even too beautiful. She's an actress who can lose her magnetism and mystery if she's given a great deal to do (that was the case in an earlier film called Stay As You Are). But here, Mr. Polanski makes perfect use of her. Instead of a driving force, she becomes an echo of the land and the society around her, more passive than Hardy's Tess but linked just as unmistakably with natural forces. Miss Kinski's Tess has no inner life to speak of. But Mr. Polanski makes her surroundings so expressive that her placidity and reserve work very beautifully. Even at its nearly three-hour running time, Mr. Polanski's Tess cannot hope for anything approaching the range of the novel. But the deletions have been made wisely, and though the story loses some of its resonance it maintains its momentum. There are episodes—like one involving Tess's shabby boots and Mercy Chant, the more respectable girl who expects to marry Angel—that don't make the sense they should, and the action is fragmented at times. That's a small price to pay for the movie's essential rightness, for its congruence with the mood and manner of the novel. Mr. Polanski had to go to Normandy and rebuild Stonehenge to stage his last scene, according to this same biography. As is the case throughout his Tess, the results were worth the trouble. 1
100个经典美国喜剧电影推荐 类别:我的文章评论(0) 浏览(11822) 2010-09-13 13:13 标签：100个经典美国喜剧电影推荐 1、魔法灰姑娘〔超级推荐〕（安妮海瑟薇主演） 2、贱女孩〔超级推荐〕（林赛罗汉主演） 3、灰姑娘的玻璃手机〔超级推荐〕 4、美人鱼〔超级推荐〕（里面音乐也很好听） 5、舞出我人生〔超级推荐〕（励志的！刚出了第二部） 6、录取通知书 7、水瓶座女孩 8、倒霉爱神（2006林赛罗汉主演） 9、儿女一箩筐 10、冰雪公主〔超级推荐〕 11、我的朋友是明星〔超级推荐〕 12、辣妈辣妹〔超级推荐〕（林赛罗汉主演） 13、物质女孩〔超级推荐〕 14、疯狂金龟车（林赛罗汉主演） 15、平民天后〔超级推荐〕 16、公主日记(不用说勒)〔超级推荐〕（还有第二部哟！） 17、歌舞青春〔超级推荐〕[很热的电影！]（Ⅰ和Ⅱ都喜欢） 18、律政俏佳人 19、麻辣宝贝〔超级推荐〕 20、恋爱刺客 21、美少女啦啦队〔超级推荐〕 22、12月男孩〔超级推荐〕（哈利波特演的哟） 23、足球尤物 24、魔法双星 25、超完美男人〔超级推荐〕 25、劲歌飞扬〔超级推荐〕 26、纽约时刻 27、奶牛美女 28、穿PRADA的恶魔〔超级推荐〕 29、天生一对 30、高校天后〔超级推荐〕 31、像乔丹一样 32、牛仔裤的夏天〔超级推荐超感人～〕 33、初恋的回忆〔超级推荐欣慰～〕 34、甜心辣舞〔超级推荐〕
35、花豹美眉 36、女兵报道 37、女生向前翻〔超级推荐很立志！〕 38、小姐好辣 39、欧洲任我行 40、留级之王 41、风云才女〔超级推荐〕 42、谁领风骚〔超级推荐女生的可怕和可爱〕43,SA VED 44、疯狂有理 45、初露锋芒 46、美丽坏宝贝〔超级推荐(很有教育意义)〕 47、新欢乐满堂 48、几乎正常 49、总统千金欧游记 50、辣妹保镖 51、我爱猫头鹰 52、朋友一场 53、偶像有约 54、彻夜狂欢 55、窈窕美眉 56、第1女儿〔超级推荐〕 57、被拯救者 58、对此承诺〔超级推荐〕 59、魔法保姆 60、对面恶女看过来 61、变装拍档〔超级推荐〕 62、虚拟偶像 63、新丁驾到 64、怪女孩出列〔超级推荐〕 65、一吻定江山 66、篮球兄弟 67、流行教母 68、魅力四射 69、美国甜心 70,超完美夺分〔超级推荐〕 80——86、美国派1——6 87、小王子（韩） 88、不设防都市（韩） 89、科洛弗档案 90、十诫 91、恋爱假期（急速推荐）
The Pursuit of Happiness（当幸福来敲门）2006 With a title like The Pursuit of Happiness, you expect the characters to get to the promised land. They do, but if the journey matters more than the destination, this is a movie to skip. The Pursuit of Happyness is long, dull, and depressing. It expands into two hours a story that could have been told more effectively in one. This is not the feel-good movie of the season unless you believe that a few moments of good cheer can redeem 110 minutes of gloom. Sitting through The Pursuit of Happiness is a chore. Downbeat movies aren't inherently bad (in fact, many are powerful), but this one provides artificial characters in contrived circumstances. How is it that movies "inspired by a real story" often feel more fake than those fully embedded in the realm of fiction? Will Smith has generated Oscar buzz for his portrayal of Chris Gardner, the real-life guy whose rags-to-riches story forms the basis of the movie. (Impoverished guy becomes capitalist poster boy.) While it's fair to say that this is one of the best straight performances of Smith's career, it didn't blow me away. In and of itself, the acting, while effective, is not Best Actor material, but it wouldn't surprise me if the movie's prestige factor and Smith's popularity earn him a nod. Meanwhile, his female co-star, Thandie Newton, isn't going to be considered for any award. Newton spends about 90% of her screen time doing an impersonation of a harpy: screeching, bitching, and contorting her face into unpleasant expressions. Smith's son, Jaden, is okay as the movie's child protagonist; it's unclear whether his occasional deficiencies are the result of his acting, Steven Conrad's writing, or Gabriele Muccino's direction, but there's not much personality behind the cute features and curly hair. Chris Gardner (Will Smith) is down on his luck. It's 1981 San Francisco and his self-employed business of selling portable bone density scanners isn't doing well. His wife, Linda (Thandie Newton), does nothing but yell at him and give him a cold shoulder, and the lack of domestic harmony is impacting the disposition of his beloved son, Christopher (Jaden Christopher Syre Smith). That's when Chris' life turns into a country song. His wife leaves. He is evicted from his home. He goes to jail, neither passing GO nor collecting a much-needed $200. He gets hit by a car. He is robbed. He makes his son cry. He alienates a friend over $14. He gets to spend a night in the cleanest public restroom in the history of public restrooms. But there's a bright spot, although you need a dark-adapted eye to find it. Despite having no experience, Chris applies to enter an internship program at Dean Witter. He would appear to have no chance to get in until he amazes the head of the program (Brian Howe) by solving the Rubik's Cube puzzle in the back of a taxi cab. It's a blessing that the movie doesn't use a stock villain to impede Chris' herky-jerky trip to the top, because that would have tipped the movie into the empire of the unwatchable. However, the lack of a strong conflict makes the two-hour running length seem very long. Thankfully, there's also not much in the way of overt melodrama, but that could be a byproduct of having characters who are not deeply realized and have narrow emotional ranges. It's tough to connect with Chris and his son. Although they are played by a real-life father and son, there's no chemistry between them. We're constantly told how desperately Chris loves Christopher, but it takes a long time before we begin to buy it. Most of the time, Christopher seems like an annoying piece of baggage that Chris drops off at daycare when he has other things to do. The film's most compelling scenes are those that show Chris struggling to enter the rat race. Granted, this is no Glengarry Glen Ross, but it shows the pressure these salesmen are under and how important the contact lists are. In the overall scheme of things, however, these sequences are background noise. They are neither plentiful nor lengthy. The movie spends more time following Chris on his futile sales rounds for the bone density scanner than it does accompanying him during his broker training. The moral of the story is as trite as they come: don't let anyone convince you to give up on your dreams. Disney animated films have been doing this better for decades. The Pursuit of Happyness concludes with a caption that tells us what happens to Chris after the end of the movie; it promises a better story than the one we have just watched. The film is also marred by a persistent (although not verbose) voiceover that adds nothing to the story while frequently jerking us out of the experience of watching it. I don't need Will Smith telling me: "This part of the story is called 'riding the bus.'" This is the English-language debut of Gabriele Muccino, who has made a name for himself in Italian cinema. The Pursuit of Happiness has the kind of slow, drab tone one occasionally associates with a director raised outside of the Hollywood system. What can be an asset in some circumstances is a detriment in this one. The Pursuit of Happiness isn't enjoyable, and its meager pleasures, including the eventual "payoff," aren't enough to justify the unrelenting misery. The Pursuit of Happiness is competently made and gets lots of the details right, but when it comes to the emotional core of the story, it loses the pursuit and misses the "happiness."