I admit it. I have a crush on Steve Coogan. You might know him as the adorably soft-hearted Roman companion to Owen Wilson’s miniature cowboy in the “Night at the Museum” series, or as the bumbling but charming Phileas Fogg across Jackie Chan in “Around the World in 80 Days.” But long before his Hollywood career began, the comedian was entertaining British audiences with his popular faux alter ego, the TV and radio personality Alan Partridge (YouTube him, you won’t be sorry). When “Philomena,” a biographical drama Coogan co-wrote and co-starred in, was nominated for four Oscars last year, the time seemed ripe to share my Coogan fixation with the world — or at least the greater Kittitas County. And that’s when I discovered a little gem on Netflix called “The Trip.” Its sequel, “The Trip to Italy,” was released in the U.S. last month on DVD and Netflix after playing the Sundance Film Festival last year. Premiered originally as 30-minute episodes on the BBC, the series was turned into two feature-length films for international markets, bequeathing a combined three hours and 35 minutes of unadulterated Coogan — paired with equally hilarious travel mate Rob Brydon — to the appreciative home viewer (me). “The Trip” The first film opens on Coogan in a swank London apartment phoning fellow comedian Brydon to accompany him on a paid trip to the north of England to review restaurants for The Observer newspaper. Brydon eagerly accepts the plum job, despite Coogan’s insinuation he was basically his last resort as companion.​​ It’s our first glimpse into the duo’s laugh-out-loud rapport. Coogan’s cynicism and general bad humor are pitted against the enthusiasm and good cheer of Brydon, famous for his “Small Man Trapped in a Box” voice (again, YouTube it — no regrets), and the two endlessly needle one another. The tagline for the film reads, “Eat, drink and try not to kill each other.” Many of their funniest confrontations concern whose impersonations are more authentic (watch especially for Michael Caine, James Bond, Al Pacino and Hugh Grant). Their banter touches on everything from English poets and ABBA lyrics to the prickly realities of careers, aging and relationships. The catch here is that the entire endeavor is a set-up. In the long tradition of self-satirizing comedians playing exaggerated versions of themselves, what we see on screen is largely fiction. Events that take place on the trip are outlined in advance and secondary characters, including family members, are played by actors. The premise of the culinary tour is a front for director Michael Winterbottom’s true objective: stick the two wits together and eavesdrop on their improvised exchanges over long car rides, several-course meals and overnight stays at luxury inns. Having worked with the two actors before, Winterbottom knew the mix would make magic. “The Trip to Italy” If in the first film Coogan gamely plays a somewhat disgruntled caricature of himself as a pretentious philanderer slouching toward middle age, in the sequel, “The Trip to Italy,” it’s Brydon who seems adrift, waxes melancholic and ultimately cheats on his “wife.” Coogan, in turn, seems to be enjoying a sweeter moment in both his career and his relationship with his teenage “son.” Though Coogan worries they’ll face “second album syndrome” with a new voyage, the sequel successfully continues the formula, sending the duo this time to trace the Romantic poets’ footsteps across Italy. They zip from mountain to coast in a Mini Cooper in homage to the Caine classic “The Italian Job,” singing along, naturally, to Alanis Morissette. To enjoy not just one, but two “Trips,” I’ll admit you have to find Coogan and Brydon eminently watchable. There’s not much action, or even plot, to accompany their banter. But there is a healthy dose of food porn as Winterbottom’s cameras follow the meticulous preparation of the many lovely dishes served to the two actors at every stop. The settings are also beautifully captured: Northern England’s bucolic, overcast terrains are reminiscent of a Jane Austen novel (now with Coogan wandering the hills in search of cell phone coverage), and Italy simply dazzles. Curiously it may be the quieter moments of both films that stay with the viewer, offsetting the hilarity with an introspection that is perhaps that much more poignant because it’s both contrived and unexpected. We see this especially at both trips’ conclusions — the contrast between Brydon’s familial homecoming and Coogan’s empty apartment in “The Trip,” and Brydon’s cheater’s guilt versus Coogan’s warm father-son communion in “The Trip to Italy.” At one point in the first film as Coogan attempts to cross a river on stones only to get stuck midway and plunge into the water, Brydon shouts, “It’s a metaphor!” You might find yourself wondering what other metaphors you missed amidst the laughs. Or you might just enjoy watching Coogan. This column originally ran in The Daily Record.

Among the Academy Award nominations announced this week, the one that generally gets a lot more attention abroad than it does Stateside is the International Oscar. The category receives its fair share of criticism. For starters, its name switch in 2019 to "International" was an admission that its former title – "Foreign-language" – was outdated and ethnocentric. But the language component of "international" is still sticky – the requirement that dialogue be "predominantly non-English" has elicited frustration in countries where English is an official language, like Nigeria, whose 2019 entry was disqualified on this basis. Some have also critiqued the Academy's policy that each country – even autocratic ones that might repress critical voices – appoint its own nominating jury or committee. Those committees are tasked with choosing one film meant to represent their entire country and film industry at the global awards ceremony. When South Korea's "Parasite" became the first non-English-language movie to win Best Film (as well as Best International Film and four other Oscars) in 2020, it seemed the tide might be turning. This year, several "foreign-language" films earned nominations in other main categories, including Japanese director Ryusuke Hamaguchi's "Drive My Car," Spaniard Pedro Almodóvar's "Parallel Mothers" and Norway's "The Worst Person in The World." The final five nominees for the International Oscar this year were largely predicted, with critical darling "Drive My Car" competing alongside three films from Europe – Joachim Trier's "Worst Person," Italian Paolo Sorrentino's "The Hand of God," and Danish animated feature "Flee." The fifth nominee was more of a wildcard: from Bhutan, "Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom." From "Yak" to "Flee" The first film from Bhutan to be nominated in 23 years, according to Variety (the same film was disqualified last year over a committee technicality), "Yak" knocked other, more likely choices out of the running – like two-time Oscar-winner Ashgar Farhadi's "A Hero." This feel-good film by director Pawo Choyning Dorji is about a cynical man who learns life lessons when he is assigned to teach in a rural location among a yak-herding community. Meanwhile, "Flee" could be a surprise strong contender, even though last year's International Oscar winner was also Danish (the tour-de-force dramedy "Another Round," about a group of men experimenting with daily drinking). The real-life tale of a gay Afghan refugee recounting his journey to Denmark, "Flee" is an animated documentary, unusual for this Oscar category. It also garnered nominations for Best Animated Feature and Documentary Feature. The use of animation allowed anonymity for the film's subject, a high school friend of director Jonas Poher Rasmussen, but the voice is his. The filmmakers told The New York Times they are hopeful the movie's positive reception could impact the divisive immigration debate in Denmark and elsewhere. "Worst Person" / Best Actress Norwegian actress Renate Reinsve was widely expected to get a nomination in the Best Actress category for her first feature leading role in "The Worst Person in the World," but she did not. Reinsve is in nearly every scene of this captivating film, about a young woman facing weighty decisions in life's small moments. Her demeanor and look shift subtly as her character grows and ages, and the film presents her as fully human and alive, neither perfect nor the "worst." Split into chapters, the story packs a lot of commentary about aging, life, death, relationships, and finding one's place in the world. Director Joachim Trier considers it the third in a trilogy, which started with "Reprise" and 'Oslo, August 21." A Japanese "Masterpiece" and "God's Hand" in Italy The four Oscar nominations "Drive" earned are a testimony to how well it's been received, from three awards at the Cannes film festival to topping "best of" lists from a handful of critics' associations and multiple reviews calling the three-hour drama a "masterpiece." The minutely staged piece, full of poignant silences and interwoven stories, turns on a theater director's process of bereaving his wife and the people who come into his life after her death. Italy's Oscar entry also revolves around relationships and loss. In this case, the autobiographical tale concerns a young man who must piece his life back together after losing his parents. Soccer, films and family play outsized roles in his life. It's a tough but uplifting story in a beautiful setting, and it has more of a clear-cut story that Sorrentino's previous Oscar winner, 2014's "The Great Beauty." Sorrentino likes to explore human contradictions, forcing us to grapple with our own moral discrepancies. All of this year's contenders for the International Oscar ask us to confront some of life's harder realities, but they do it in ways that are surprisingly uplifting -- and varied, as the category deserves. Click on the image below to see original coverage in The Daily Record.

This is a film for every kid who's ever felt different, imagined their name in lights, or was sure they were cut out for bigger things but hadn't yet discovered what they were. Nate, the titular character of the charming Better Nate Than Ever, and best friend Libby are so sure they're meant for more than their Pittsburgh middle-school lives that they're willing to take chances and even put themselves in potential danger to pursue their dreams. What makes this movie special is the single-mindedness with which a 13-year-old main character follows his passion, and the innocence and sweetness the story retains despite portraying realistic life challenges. Nate (charismatic newcomer Wood) is delightfully irrepressible. The script and direction capture this in ways both big and small -- his Axe body spray moment after maddening his brother with song and dance at 7:30 in the morning, his triumphant look upon returning to complete a purchase in dimes and quarters earned busking in Times Square, his riveting monologue from Designing Women. Not every scene lands perfectly, and curiously, his first big imagined musical number, meant to be Golden Age Hollywood fabulous, has less spark than his emotional, climactic singing audition. When the director tells him that musicals allow us to say the things we can't actually say in real life, we totally get it -- thanks to Nate. Read the full review at Common Sense Media.

This entertaining, semi-autobiographical film is brimming with nostalgia for a simpler time when kids were left to their own devices and society had a reason to come together for a common cause. Have we lost the ability to so broadly share communal emotion, like neighbors did in 1969 when a man first walked on the moon, captured so eloquently in Apollo 10 ½: A Space Age Childhood? Richard Linklater seems to be asking the question without posing it directly, just as he wistfully depicts aspects of the late 1960s that were truly less than idyllic, like canned meals, indoor chain-smoking, and social inequalities. The film intentionally plays with the idea of memory, as Stan's recollection of participating in the Apollo mission suggests, though this is ironically the least engaging part of the tale. The film also combines animation technologies to evoke the time period in a way that is both realistic and simulated. The first half "let me tell you about life back then" exposition is riveting, and viewers of a certain age, in particular, will be transported. Its first-person narration (voiced by Jack Black) is reminiscent of The Wonder Years. Will younger viewers grasp the chills of what it was like to see the first photo of earth from space or watch men walk on the moon on live television? Maybe not, but animating the story and telling it from the perspective of a child represents a remarkably valiant effort at translating a mood across time and, well, space.as;ldjadslfj Read the full review at Common Sense Media.

While this romantic tragedy involving two young creative professionals has some original ideas and an attractive setting, the genre has been done before in much more authentic and engaging ways. Love Like the Falling Petals fails to create enough of a relationship between its two lead characters to infuse its dissolution with sufficient significance. This is so much so that their overly-dramatic responses to situations come across as awkward, as do a couple of unnecessary close-ups, off-tone music, and the hoodie-and-sunglasses get-up the girlfriend sports while ill. The cherry blossom theme and the film's Tokyo setting add some originality to the predictable story. The boyfriend's growth as an artist as he struggles to find his own voice is also an interesting idea, and fans of the Japanese actor-singer Nakajima will appreciate his dramatic turn here. But it's not enough to carry a two-hour film about love and loss. Read the full review at Common Sense Media.

The real surprise in this fun, layered, time-traveling action mystery is the tenderness with which family relationships and sentiments are handled. The Adam Project gives its characters the opportunity to go back in time to right misdirected relationships and fix missed chances to fully express their feelings for each other. While the concept of time travel is nothing new (Young Adam's blue puffy vest could be a direct nod to Back to the Future's Marty McFly), the way it's handled here as a device for a more intimate character study is compelling. An especially moving scene is when Big Adam encounters his mom in a bar and helps her understand her son's feelings, as well as her own. The action scenes and visual effects are of course well done (though the de-aging of Keener is a little creepy), and they're set to classic rock and choreographed with character-revealing dialogues. A memorable example is when Young Adam repeats Big Adam's condescending tough-guy advice back to him when the latter is in a vulnerable position. The actors here are cast to type: Reynolds as a wise-cracking reluctant hero, Garner as a mom, Saldana as a brave action hero, and Ruffalo as a scruffy sage. The discovery is Walker Scobell as Young Adam. He manages to match Reynolds' sarcasm, smarts, and knowing looks, rather than the other way around, acting that was necessary to make their oneness as versions of the same character believable. While the setting doesn't play a huge role, the lush forest right outside Adam's house is magical and vaguely reminiscent of scenes from E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial. Read the full review at Common Sense Media.

This mellow album documentary adds a welcome complement to others in the genre. This could be chalked up to Rodrigo's young age, or the way Olivia Rodrigo: driving home 2 u is filmed as a combination of road trip and walk down memory lane. The languid pace and lull of expansive scenery -- drone shots capture lonely highways and fluffy clouds reflecting off placid water -- evoke the feeling of resting against a warm window on a long car drive. The film has a decidedly vintage look, attractively capturing the orange-red sunsets, neon-lit diners, and mid-century motels of the American West. This '70s aesthetic is almost ironic considering Rodrigo was born in 2003. Her album also revolves around young love and (public) heartbreak. She comes across as genuine, a young woman barely a foot's length out of childhood, trying to figure life out. She talks about being a child actor, suffering a fear of failure, being overly critical with herself, and feeling inferior. She mentions the role her dad has played as a truth-teller for her. It would have been nice if the film had incorporated more of her family and friends, and some background to how she trains and improves her craft, to give viewers a more well-rounded view of the performer. Read the full review at Common Sense Media.

This intentionally Hitchcockian mystery successfully builds a stifling atmosphere of tension that doesn't resolve until the very last scene. The threat of violence hovers over Windfall like the hot air you imagine imbues the dry California setting. But when it comes, it still takes you by surprise -- and that would seem to be the point. Windfall's script is constructed in such a way that not a lot happens and even less is revealed about the characters, yet it draws you into the mystery of what you do know. Who is the burglar, why has he chosen this house, and what's behind the added layer of tension between the couple? The film's title hints at further themes of economic injustice -- coming into serious money in unethical if not illegal ways. Early on, it's hard to know how dark the film will get. The characters -- backed by understated performances -- are surprisingly relaxed and even agreeable at moments, and there are fleeting hints of comedy. The gorgeous, sun-filled vacation home -- with its white-washed walls, luxuriously rustic pool and gardens, and seemingly infinite citrus orchards -- conveys an openness and lightness despite the claustrophobic setup of characters stuck together against their will. Opening scenes set to ambient noise capture the setting from a series of unusual angles and show a man wandering around enjoying the amenities. From this start, a feeling of unease is underscored by the contrast of setting and story, puzzling characters, and suspenseful instrumental music. While the combination may feel too studied or too intentional for some viewers, it works if you settle in and go along for the ride. Read the full review at Common Sense Media.

This movie's heart is in the right place, but the latest version of this familiar concept is a bit of a clunker. Right from the start, something feels off in Cheaper by the Dozen. The film bounces from family scene to family scene, not getting to any serious story or conflict until at least a third of the way in. Are the kids cute? Of course, and some of their antics are heartwarming and/or funny. A few sequences hit their mark, like when dad Paul tries to dress cool in his kids' clothes for a business meeting (and he walks right out of his son's too-big sneakers), but many of the attempts at comedy will entertain only the very youngest of viewers. This makes the repetition of serious and justified themes of racism incoherent, as they're not tailored to such a young audience. There are also a few places where actions don't seem to match the values that this film aims to convey, like parents regularly giving kids very expensive gifts. Braff and Union are both solid actors, but they don't have any real chemistry together and feel miscast (especially Braff). The kids are unrealistically compliant, and the extravagant new life the family builds overnight using business seed money is dubious. The secondary cast is fine, with a few of the child actors standing out. The dozen have been done better before. Read the full review at Common Sense Media.

This well-meaning documentary offers an inspiring glimpse into the world of teen robotics teams and will certainly have its niche, but general audiences may find it slightly long. It's a shame too, because the last 15 minutes of More Than Robots are worth the wait. An hour run-time would have been perfect. When the pandemic shut down their competition, teams from around the world pivoted to serve others instead. The growth, spirit, and values on display here are truly inspirational. This film suggests there's hope for the future in the hands of these young people. Read the full review at Common Sense Media.

Even if you think you already know everything there is to know about the celebrity power couple behind I Love Lucy and Desilu Productions, this documentary will keep you entertained. But chances are you'll also learn a few new things in Amy Poehler's engaging documentary Lucy and Desi. And, you'll probably hear and see new things as well, thanks to Poehler's blend of audiotape recordings and archive footage. Lucy and Desi is fast-paced, smoothly editing together dozens if not hundreds of clips into a chronological arc backgrounding both stars' childhoods and unlikely rise to fame, their professional careers and personal lives, and finally their later years and deaths. There is never a dull moment. Interviews with the couple's children, the children of regular collaborators, archivists, and female comedians like Carol Burnett and Bette Midler, among others, help flesh out and add perspective to the details of their lives. At its core, Lucy and Desi is a grand love story between two people from very different walks of life, a pair who loved and were devoted to each other even decades after their divorce. It's also a celebration of two individuals who truly made history in mid-century America, from their mold-breaking cross-cultural marriage to the early feminist narratives of their shows to the power they wielded and the barriers they broke at the head of a major production studio. Read the full review at Common Sense Media.

This character-driven Italian dramatic comedy remains wholly engaging from start to finish. The Invisible Thread does a great job balancing heavy themes (like gay rights, artificial insemination, extramarital affairs, and teen drug experimentation) with lighter moments. When Paolo and Simone go crazy and tear up each other's prized belongings, their pain is clear -- and difficult to watch -- but their actions are also quite humorous in their emotional fragility and cruel intentionality. Another scene played for laughs but which conveys an important message is when a mother walks in on her son and his male friend coincidentally undressed together in a bathroom. The son takes advantage of her confusion to finally and proudly confess he is gay, leaving the male friend to explain he's actually there with the sister. The juxtaposition of teenage Leone's first love against the recriminations and dying relationship of his parents is subtle and symbolic. The graphics on a closing scene, which then carry through to the end credits, creatively illustrate the "invisible thread" that connects family. Read the full review at Common Sense Media.