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Shame on you Disney. Shame on you John Travolta. Shame on you Robin Williams. And, most important, curse you Wild Hogs for setting some evil precedent that horribly written, directed, and edited films about old men rediscovering their youth are box office draws. They're not. They're huge mistakes with no shred of redeeming value. It was true of Wild Hogs, it holds true with Old Dogs. Disney used Travolta to humorous effect with both their Hairspray remake and their animated feature Bolt, but now they've gone and ruined him. And Robin Williams, oh Robin Williams. For the last decade we've endured crappy comedy after crappy comedy with you finally making something decent again in 2009 (World's Greatest Dad), only to have you confirm that that was a fluke. Well, you let us dream. Old Dogs is the least surprising disappointment of 2009. Everyone knew it would be awful going in, and it didn't let us down. Well done Disney, sort of.

Every medium, every genre, every profession has that guy (or gal); he will never be as popular as the rest of his colleagues, because his work is too outside the mainstream, but absolutely none of the others want to be subjected to a face-to-face match with him. Deep down, they all know that he’s better and could wipe them all off the map the second he felt like it. In the world of feature-length animated films, I don’t think that there’s any question but that figure is Hayao Miyazaki, the Japanese maestro who has frequently been compared with Walt Disney in terms of obsessive bravado about his work output (and the subsequent quality of that output). Disney seems to have gotten the message, because they are now rereleasing a number of Miyazaki’s Studio Ghibli films, only with their name above it on the cover in the hope that people will confuse it with their own output (one can only assume, as they’ve recorded an all new English soundtrack). My Neighbor Totoro is one of the titles being released, and it’s as good a place to start as any for those unfamiliar with Miyazaki’s work.

The long shadow of neurotics past hangs heavy over Cold Souls, the debut feature effort from writer-director Sophie Barthes. In particular, one can see the lingering influence of both Woody Allen and Charlie Kaufman, as the film’s screenplay tries to meld together the distinctly whiny, self-loathing, and socially ill-adjusted sensibilities of both those writers. To be fair, while both Allen and Kaufman have spent their careers hiring surrogates to personify their personal issues on film, neither one of them ever found one quite as effective or personable as Paul Giamatti, who portrays an actor named Paul Giamatti (but still not himself, which is one of the film’s less successful tropes). It is tribute to his presence as an actor that the film retains the charm that it does, and is able to pull off some of its more half-baked ideas.

Paul Giamatti’s inner life is deflating due to his participation in a production of Uncle Vanya, as the role requires far more gravitas than his fragile psyche seems to be able to handle. As a relief, he investigates the offices of Dr. Flintstein (David Straithairn) after reading an article in The New Yorker claiming that they extract souls from the body. Hoping that it will relieve him of his stress he undergoes the operation, only to find that his soul actually resembles a chickpea (the variations in size, shape, and color of the soul is something that could have been a compelling subplot, but ends up reduced to a humorous aside). At first, it is relieving to be freed of the burden, but soon enough he finds that the cons of not having a soul far outweigh the pros (the greatest of which having to do with his ability to perform Uncle Vanya), and soon desires his soul back. Unfortunately, his soul is already on the Russian black market and he is forced to enlist the help of ‘soul mule’ Nina (Dina Korzun) to try to get it back.

Are you morally comfortable with the death of a human being you don't know in exchange for one million dollars? Richard Kelly wants to know.

The Box, starring Cameron Diaz, James Marsden and Frank Langella, is a weary thriller that fails to achieve. We are taken back to a 1976 Virginan doorstep where a mysterious cardboard box is left for the Lewises. Few keys are introduced that effectively achieve a visual of this not-so-complex time period, the stylist and set designer play a huge role in making this film terrible. Cameron Diaz, as Norma Lewis, lends a hand by being unable to speak in a proper Virginian accent, or anything resembling the dialect.  Arthur, James Marsden, and Norma live a nuclear life in a house with their one young son.  When we meet Arthur he is hard at work in NASA’s Langley Research Center producing an aid for his wife's handicap - a deformed foot. His performance is one of the few highlights of The Box, having both legitimate reactions and emotion.

A cherished bit of nostalgia is brought to cinematic life by director Spike Jonze in this family friendly film. Where the Wild Things Are is a full-length adaptation of the beloved 1963 children's book written and drawn by Maurice Sendak. The original picture book is 37 full-panel pages and the whole story consists of only 9 lines. Adapting the timeless classic into a 94 minute film is literally a stretch and others have attempted it but given up. (It has been adapted into an animated cartoon and a lite Opera, however.) Jonze and scriptwriter Dave Eggers manage to pull a workable script out of the brief book and it's effective for the most part but it’s not without its share of flaws.

"Thats none of your business," an agitated man said. Kristian Harlan is his name. He's sat at his kitchen table, a mixed bundle of emotions. He's stubborn in maintaining that his opinion of his father should be private, yet appears to recognize a sense of obligation to speak. Kristian is just one of over a dozen family members interviewed for this documentary. Some of them are painfully aware of their legacy, others have a harder time superimposing such horror on their relatives. But they're all part of the Harlan clan.

Their long-deceased patriach, Veit Harlan, was Joseph Goebbels' golden boy during the Third Reich. The Harlan family tree's legacy is Jew Suss; a movie so anti-Semitic and unapologetically fearmongering that Goebbels declared it required viewing for anyone in the SS.

Remember when Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez were making their Grindhouse double feature of Death Proof and Planet Terror? They were so excited about reviving this seemingly neglected style of cinema, which died when cheap local theaters with a small screen gave way to multiplexes owned by large corporations. These large corporations answered to boards and investors thus instilling an arbitrary moral code that forbade them from showing cheaply made exploitation flicks filled with gratuitous sex, nudity and violence. Nevermind that this business model wasn't as profitable as dedicating multiple screens to the latest blockbuster. Tarantino and Rodriguez had a good idea when they made Grindhouse, even if the two films had a few serious issues (Death Proof's dialogue was indulgent, Planet Terror was supersaturated with genre-atypical special effects). Bitch Slap doesn't make these mistakes.