More Than a Game - I really don't understand how this movie went under the radar. It stars arguably the biggest athlete in professional sports right now (with apologies to Mr. Manning and Mr. Woods) who was arguably the biggest prep athlete of all-time. Let's go back in time a little bit. LeBron James was a big name in basketball circles until a Sports Illustrated cover and a couple of prime time games on ESPN blew him up into a teenage celebrity.

Now, back to present day. We can take a look back at the last 8 years of LeBron (final two in HS, first 6 in the NBA) and we can see the incredible success he's become despite all of the obstacles regarding fame at an early age he's overcome. Now, unbelievably, we've got all of this documentary footage that was put together by then-college student Kris Belman and really quite an incredibly story. If I wrote the following story, you'd tell me that it was too cliched.

First act - a group of neighborhood guys come together to play AAU basketball. You've got the superstar (Bron), the short kid with a short temper (Dru Joyce III), and the big kid who wasn't very good but was just bigger than everyone (Sian Cotton). You've got the coach who seems to live his life through his kids (Dru Joyce II). Most of the kids haven't even left Akron, but take a trip to the AAU National tournament as 8th graders where they make it to the championship game. They are losing by two points when the future star LeBron takes a three pointer at the buzzer that rims out and they lose.

Act two - The team gets better. They win two state championships in a row with a goal on winning a National title. Their coach leaves for a new job and they are coached by their former AAU coach who they don't listen to or respect. They start to get complacent and as a result, they get beat by inferior teams. This is similar to when Rocky gets knocked out by Clubber Lang or when Daniel LaRusso gets kneed in the junk.

Act three - Recommitted, the LeBron-led St. Vincent-St Mary team starts knocking off all of the big dogs. They eventually play a team from Mater Dei California mostly made up of the same players that beat them in the AAU championship in 8th grade. The winner of this game is going to be fast tracked to a national championship should they remain unbeaten. The good guys of course win. Then, LeBron is suspended for a combination of the Hummer incident and the jerseys. The team has to beat a tough team without their superstar. LeBron is allowed back in time for the state tournament. Fast forward to the championship game... the Irish are down to a inferior team at halftime. Cue inspirational halftime speech and watch the better team go on a run celebrating their third state title and first national title.

Inglourious Basterds - People have gone borderline crazy trying to rank the Tarantino films from 1 (Pulp Fiction) to 7 (Death Proof - which is easily the best "worst" we've ever seen from a director with more than a handful of movies). How they fall in between these two is usually quite subjective, but after seeing Inglourious Basterds, I'd say that it probably has to rank in the upper half of his films.

Obviously, if you have wanted to see this film, you've probably gone out and watched it already. If not, I'd ask you the following questions. 1) Are you somewhat squeemish? If yes, you can skip QT's entire film library all together. If no, I'd ask "Have you seen any of QT's past films?" If the answer is no, I'd say stop what you are doing immediately and go watch Pulp Fiction. If the answer is yes, I'd ask "did you enjoy it?" If the answer is yes, obviously I'd recommend Inglourious Basterds. If the answer is no, you aren't going to like this one either.

Brad Pitt is great and I thought Diane Krueger, Eli Roth (the Bear Jew - great nickname), and Til Schweiger were solid. Christoph Waltz steals the show as Hans Landa (aka the Jew Hunter). If he doesn't win an Oscar on Sunday, I promise you that I will shut off the tv and go to bed immediately. No lie.

QT manages to re-imagine the ending of WWII and it's somewhat believable and enjoyable. As with most Tarantino movies, we are reminded that stories of revenge are the best. You find yourself cheering for Shashonna even though she's an entirely fictional character. I've seen real stories that are less believable than this story that, on paper, is INCREDIBLY non-believably. Kudos to Tarantino on another fine film (as if there was ever any doubt as to whether or not it was going to be good or not).

LOTR - Return of the King - Over the past few weeks, I've watched the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy (extended editions, thank you very much). As I was watching this, I realized that I think I only watched this movie the one time in the theaters. Of the three Lord of the Rings flicks, Return of the King won the most awards at the Academies (Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Set Decoration, Best Costume Design, Best Sound, Best Editing, Best Visual Effects, Best Song, Best Score, and Best Makeup). And deservingly so...

Again, if you have wanted to see these movies, you've seen them by now, so you obviously have your own opinions. A few things I forgot. One - somewhere in this movie, Frodo replaced John McClane as the all-time leader in escaping movie deaths in a trilogy. Of course, Bruce Willis had to come out of retirement and make a very average Die Hard 4 film to reclaim the lead. Second - I forgot that once the ring was tossed into Mount Doom, the movie didn't immediately roll credits. There actually was quite a bit of film left. I don't know if some of that was extended version versus theatrical version, but it was still kind of nice.

Final thoughts on the series... it's hard to believe that three movies that are nearly four hours each can feel like two hour movies. How can I sit through a four hour movie and instantly be tempted to pop in the next one even though it's already midnight. However, each episode of The Bachelor runs about one hour and twenty minutes when you fast forward through commercials yet it feels like watching Gone With the Wind (..."on the next episode of the Bachelor, the most dramatic rose ceremony EVER"). If you haven't re-watched these movies in a while, do yourself a favor and check them out. They're infinitely better the second time around than they even were the first.