House of "D" (lame name) I'd call it "Running back"

Or Erykah does New York.
The film looks like and Indie right from the welcome screen. What do they call that screen in the biz i wonder?
David Duchovny is Tom Warshaw, an "american artist in Paris" He has a secret. And you're thinking "who doesn't?". Well his secret, is an explanation, of why, he is late, on his son's 13th birthday, and why he is who he is, still not grown up, since the day he turned 13.

Living in new york, his momma was a pill popping nurse, his dad had passed away from cancer. I know the feeling of having a sad momma. He would hide under her bed and paint pictures. I just wrote mine a few letters.

Robin Williams plays the retard (movie's description). Pappas-and his daddy is an alcoholic whose momma drunkenly stumbled in front of a car and died. His pops is summed up in his wise was "you can't drink, you don't drive. when you can drive, then you can drink."

Tommy and Pappas ride through Greenwich village delivering meat. They just walk in and drop the bags off (1970's) and collect the fee and tips. The tips they bury (barry?) in front of the house of D , a detention center for women.

That's when Erykah Badu takes over. And yes she does sing. I know why the caged bird sings, she wants a dime bag... "Hey Lady" becomes yooung tommy's relationship advisor. "Girls like boys who dance, even if they dance bad, so long as they try."

So tommy has a new girl (melissa), money saved, great frind in Pappas, his mom is doing ok, school is great, he even gets a kiss!

And everything was going so well...

"that's not bullshit, that's love!"

We should all have an inmate sage and a retard for a friend.

Tommy kinda chooses the girl over the friend, and Pappas makes a bad choice, or something, and Tommy takes the rap. Next thing you know, mom is in serious condition, melissa is suddenly mia, some creepy cousins come to visit, Lasy (bernadette) tells him to run (not like forest) and after stealing from an old lady!
He does.

Tommy runs.
"How many sleeps till you come back?" "promise me you'll do good things"
We should all be compelled to make such a promise.

So back to the present. Tom tells us he is a coward, he avoided his past. He had wanted wanted to share with his wife, but he waited so long, he thought his wife would leave him. she left him anyway. "That's what we in America call...irony"
Tommy goes back to NY. He visits Bernadette and Pappas.

Do you forgive me pappas? "Yes...for what?"
We should all be so quick to forgive our friends.

The real meat of the story:
Erykah Badu is awesome. Pappas is special not retarded. French people are eavesdroppers.
Mean people might be nicer when they are mostly dead. The move scenery is sparse but beautiful. The pimp is weak and gratuitous. Tommy cries like a wuss. This move has some strong women in it. Don't hold on to stuff you hide from the past. Why did Bernadette want Tommy to run?
"A man is a man only when he can be himself wherever he is"

Tommy as an adult obviously has no friends-but he found a good wife, a good kid, and himself. I only wish life was so hard and so wonderful as House of D.

We are simple creatures.

Yet for simple creatures we have an endless yearning for answers. We wage war, betray those we love, and sell our souls and to what end?

The Kingdom of Heaven
Certainly one of my new all time favorites. Epic in a way that touches the heart more than Hobbits and Wizards and just barely more than Gladiators and Slaves in Rome. Ridley certainly built on the best of Gladiator, unvieling the story of Jersualem embodied in Balian, a man in search of himself, finds himself mired in politics and religion, and stands as just a man for men.

As a sucker for hero movies, this one certainly yanks on my guts. Balian's wife had just committed suicide when she lost her child in birth. A father he had never known that same day comes to ask his forgiveness, and he murders who priest who speaks against his wife. Hell of a day. His father is a Lord, a great man and servant of teh king of Jerusalalem. He dies defending Balian from the bishops men. He makes Balian a night, and Lord in his passing, charges him with doing right, serving the king, the people, and the weak.

Balian earns the respect of his enemies with his spirit, his sword, and his mercy. The Christians and the Muslims have a tenuous relationship, one that politics is soon to unravel. While Balian serves the king, a dying leper played by ed norton, the templars are provoking a war that would soon engulf them all.

At the King's passing, his sister reluctantly and foolishly chooses her husband, a templar, as King. So begins the epic battle. As the King and his templar army are slaughtered by the Muslim horde, Balian prepares to defend the people in the "castle". He knights those able to fight, and when asked if doing so makes them better fighters, he replies. "Yes."

When he holds the muslims back after days of bloody battle, they agree to terms. He would surrender the city for the safe passage of all the people. The honorable muslim king offers these terms, with respect for Balian, his cultures, beliefs, and a distatse for more killing.

Balian is most certainly a man of great character, who finds that those with great power, political or religious, yield it for themselves. Instead Balian, yields his authority, to be a man. His place with God, still in question. And as any movie with religious themes will do, it leaves us with questions too.

Well done, scinematic, epic, beautiful.