Posted 1:20 p.m. Tues., 03.09.10 - Most people not only take the earth beneath their feet for granted, they tend to treat it like ... dirt. But the documentary by Bill Benenson and Gene Rosow can help educate people in how to care for soil and the basic fact that good dirt contains a lot of life.

Updated 11:38 p.m. Sun., 03.07.10 -"The Hurt Locker" wins six, including best picture and best director -- the first for a woman. Jeff Bridges and Sandra Bullock also win.| Los Angeles Times

Click through to see earlier Oscar predictions (mostly right) from Beacon movie reviewer Harper Barnes, Beacon issues and politics editor Susan Hegger, Cinema St. Louis head Cliff Froehlich and Beacon contributor Nick Otten.

Posted noon Thurs., 02.25.10 - A movie set in a German village on the cusp of World War I paints a psychological portrait of people ready to follow a promising ideology. That is, children who grew up in the vituperative and abusive atmosphere of the village, with the threat of a terrible war on the horizon, would become the adults who embraced the Nazis two decades later.

Posted noon Thurs., 02.18.10 - This look at the last days of the life of Leo Tolstoy doesn't develop the characters enough to make us care about them and look beyond larger-than-life bickering. Helen Mirren and Christopher Plummer have been nominated for Academy Awards.

Posted noon, Thurs., 02.11.10 - The movie that's tied with "Avatar" for the most Academy Award nominations was withdrawn from general release in the fall. But Plaza Frontenac will give area residents another chance to see 'Hurt Locker' on the big screen.

Posted 12:10 p.m. Thurs., 02.02.10 - Large chunks of the movie - an hour or more out of a little under two hours - consist of a policeman watching a group of students. The surveillance goes on for so long over such a limited landscape that we come to recognize landmarks. The landmarks are visually arresting but a movie needs to be more than a series of striking images.

Posted noon Fri., 01.22.10 - The plot is more an extended country song than what you'd expect in a feature film. But the compelling performances take you along for a heartfelt and funny and sad ride made even more memorable by the music.

Posted 6 p.m. Thurs., 01.14.10 - The first half of "The Book of Eli" unfolds in an interesting fashion but it becomes increasingly distant from any sense of reality, even science-fiction reality. "The Lovely Bones" includes well-wrought Hitchcok-style elements of suspense but reveals a limbo no one would want to leave. 

Also reviewed: "A Single Man"