"Les Miserables": Miserable, indeed. I think I lasted about 60 seconds. As soon as Wolverine rowing started belting out a song, I shut it off. I don't get movies where people burst into song. Who does that?
"Life of Pi": I read this years ago and have next to no recollection of it. Same thing happened with The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Also with The Time Traveler's Wife.
I watched maybe the last third of "Life of Pi" on a first-class flight out of Boca Raton. Have I recommended first class? Because I cannot recommend it enough. Another time I flew first class, and they actually served warm nuts. I thought that was a punch line. In first class, it's real.
My point is I watched "Life of Pi" on a tiny screen and didn't even see all of it. I could tell, though, that it was a thing of spectacular genius, and that all those critics crowing about how it was some kind of miraculous reinvention of cinema were right. That said, I could also tell it needed to be watched the same way I saw "Avatar": in a giant theater with a giant screen and with 3D glasses.
The whole big reveal part at the end? Lame. Everything else? Enchanting.
"This Is 40": Not to be confused with "This is my rifle." It's the couple from "Knocked Up" but years later and with a cameo from the chubster from "Girls." I'd give this movie a "meh."
Some parts of it are funny, and there are a lot of toilet jokes, but it's like going out with a funny guy who is trying to be serious, and it just doesn't work.
The Apatow girls were funnier when they were younger.
"Rust and Bone": I FUCKING LOVED THIS MOVIE. Oh, my god, it's so great. And it's not even in English. I mean, I had to read subtitles the whole time, and I still loved it.
I hate to say that it has a really strongly awesome female lead because then I sound like something that fell off the feminist truck and hit its head, but the main female character, played by the always sexy Marion Cotillard (men: you get to see her boobs in it, if that inspires you to watch it), is a freakin' killer whale trainer. The main guy bare-knuckle punches people in the head for a living.
This movie is great because while beautiful things happen, terrible things happen, too. Which is like life, really. There are always these spectacular things happening -- like the monster moon rising through the streams of clouds in the darkness -- and there are always these godawful things happening -- like death, and disease, and terrors that lurk in sinkholes. That is existence in a nutshell: the beautiful ugly.