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I was very excited to hear this movie existed. I wanted to introduce my partner to Discworld and this seemed an exciting way to do so. Hogfather is a great book, so we decided to watch the movie.

All I can say is... don't do this.

While the movie is nicely executed visually and rather faithfully follows the story of the book, it also has some serious flaws. Visually, it leans (too) heavily on famous examples such as Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. The music seems composed by Danny Elfman for A Nightmare Before Christmas. Pacing-wise, it clearly suffers from being 3 hours long. From the sluggishly delivered introduction narration to the dialogs to the visual scenes -- everything seems to play in a universe where time is stretched by a factor two. Content-wise, it focuses strongly on the dramatic and substantially downplays the fun in the book. Finally, all actors seem keen on speaking English as incomprehensibly as possible.

All in all, we stopped watching after the first half. And we're the audience that probably would love this movie most. I'm a major fan of the Discworld novels; she's a major fan of aforementioned books-turned-into-movies, loves to read, loves endearing and humorous stories as well as exciting whodunits, and speaks English natively.

We've read that the other two movies (Going Postal mostly, but also The Colour of Magic) are much better. We'll try one of these. But ultimately I think the best way to introduce her to Discworld is by giving her a Discworld book.

READ THEM! THEY'RE FANTASTIC!

Brüno is a gay Austrian fashion reporter impersonated by the man that notoriously starred as Borat in... Borat.

(For those that have seen Borat: you probably know what to expect. If you did not like Borat for the painfully explicit content, stay away from Brüno. If you almost died of laughter during a certain hotel scene in Borat, go see Brüno immediately and prepare for almost certain death.)

Obviously, having made Borat, the producers of Brüno had a hard time to repeat the surprise effect. It should therefore not come as a surprise that the movie contains substantially less confrontations between the main character and innocent (famous) bystanders. Still, confrontations with a number of people, among which a few famous ones, seem sincere, and work on multiple levels, as in Borat. Others are clearly scripted, but not less funny for that (watch the ending credits for an example).

In general, compared to Borat, Brüno focuses more on a) effectively shocking it's viewers with the (sexual) misconduct of the main character and b) stunts of this main character in front of a large audience. Essentially, this time the shock effect is moved from the 'random' people that appear in the movie, to the audience looking at the movie.

For many, it will definitely be more shocking than Borat, given the shamelessly explicit content that exploits every possibility for jokes concerning men making out. For others, the never-ending provoked racism of Borat will have a longer-lasting impact.

All I know is that I laughed a lot during this movie. It will once again lead to lots of controversy and imitation at thousands of workplaces around the globe. Maybe it is therefore best if you know what it is about.

But be warned. If you are easily offended, you will be offended. Majorly.

Wall-E is a rare treat. The movie is incredibly beautiful, emotionally layered, genuinely touching, funny, and has an important message to tell.

I would rate especially the first half hour of the movie as absolutely brilliant, no reserves on that. With hardly any dialogue, the first 30 minutes are still able to capture you, by stunning animation, careful sound design, and Thomas Newman's score, which varies between eerie and playful.

It's hard to describe why Wall-E is so good without giving spoilers. So I won't. Just see for yourself.