Below (or after the jump) is a list of motion pictures I’ve seen since the last time I told you about motion pictures I’ve seen (Too long! I know!). Also, here is a picture of Isabelle Huppert in White Material (highly recommended).

• Inception = Not recommended
• Twelve Angry Men = Recommended. Happend to see this just after jury duty.
• The Kids Are All Right = Recommended.
• The Other Guys = Not Recommended.
• Get Low = Fine.
• Catfish = Recommended.
• A Film Unfinished = Fine.
• Predictions of Fire (a/k/a Prerokbe Ognja)= Highly recommended. Fascinating documentary on Laibach, the Slovenian punk-industrial band (and art collective) that critiqued communism, fascism, capitalism as Western Europe transformed around them (because of them?). Kudos to Long View Gallery for organizing the screening.
• The Social Network = Recommended.
• You Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger = Fine.
• Vertigo = Highly recommended. No idea how many times I’ve seen it – always on the big screen. Always holds up.
• Pepperminta = Highly recommended. Screened at the Hirshhorn. I really wish they’d put on a serious film program over there. Maybe after the bubble gets built?
• Howl = Fine. First screening I made it to at the tiny but very welcome West End Cinema.
• The Hedgehog (a/k/a Le hérisson) = Recommended.
• Cameraman: The Life and Work of Jack Cardiff = Recommended.
• Baseball: The Tenth Inning = Recommended. PBS!
• LennonNYC = Recommended. More PBS! Can you tell that we had a DVR installed at my house in November?
• It Happened One Night = Highly Recommended. Again.
• Punch Drunk Love = Recommended.
• Carlos = Highly Recommended. Worth all five hours.
• Foreign Correspondent = Fine. I heart Hitchcock, but if I recall correctly this one was made mostly as a war propaganda film. Not his best.
• Airplane! = Highly Recommended. Of course. First time seeing it all the way through somehow. And Leslie Nielsen died two days later. R.I.P.
• White Material = Highly Recommended.
• The Black Swan = Recommended.
• The Forbidden Zone = Recommended. So Oingo Boingo, the band, started out as an experimental art/film/performance group. They made this very strange film. I saw it in Minneapolis because I really wanted to check out the Trylon Microcinema. DC needs something like it. Who’s with me?
• Somewhere = Recommended.
• True Grit = Fine.
• Blue Valentine = Highly recommended.
• The Palm Beach Story = Highly recommended. Again.
• Biutiful = Highly recommended.
• 2010 Oscar Nominated Documentary Shorts = On the whole? Not impressed. I know there are better things out there that should be nominated in this category.
• When We Leave = Fine.
• The Red Shoes = Highly recommended, classic.
• The King’s Speech = Recommended.
• Black Orpheus = Highly recommended. Again.
• Putty Hill = Not recommended.
• Even the Rain = Fine.
• Bringing up Baby = Highly recommended. Amazing.
• The Lady Vanishes = Highly recommended.
• The Adjustment Bureau = Not recommended.

Place your bets now on how soon the next installment of this list will be published.

You probably already know that Breathless (highly recommended) is charming and essential and a classic. A newly restored version is making the rounds right now and I caught it in Silver Spring this week. Presumably, this re-release was the catalyst for Dan Hoffman’s timely article on why Breathless resonates so much more than other Very Important Films. It does. Probably because Michel and Patricia’s stories are so deceptively simple. Yes, Michel is a cop killer on the loose in the big city, but he otherwise behaves just like your own goofball friends. Patricia has plenty of glamor, but she’s living in the believable squalor of an intern abroad working at a newspaper. Also, I always forget how amazing Martial Solal’s original score is.

…Now some long-overdue viewing notes:

• Greenberg = Fine. I’m catching up on publishing my film notes, and it’s been a couple of months. As always, I really want to like Ben Stiller. I just don’t remember Greenberg making much of an impression on me.
• La Dolce Vita = Highly recommended. Obviously.
• Exit Through the Giftshop = Highly recommended. A/K/A “the Banksy movie”. Highly entertaining play on documentary conventions with plenty of incredible footage and revealing things to say about the art world.
• Please Give = Highly recommended.
• The Man Who Would be King = Recommended.
• Carnal Knowledge = Highly recommended.
• Freakonomics = Fine. Silverdocs opening night selection strung together several short topics directed by documentary all-stars. Felt a bit like This American Life’s TV show to be perfectly honest.
• The Kids Grow Up = Recommended. Very much enjoyed Doug Block’s latest – a portrait of his own family as his daughter prepares to leave for college.
• Waiting for Superman = Highly recommended. Plenty to quibble with in the details of Davis Guggenheim’s education reform documentary, but his thesis that we’ve largely been doing things that make adults feel comfortable instead of doing things actually proven to help children learn is important. Will make a huge splash this fall.
• My Perestroika = Recommended.
• On Coal River = Fine.
• Utopia in Four Movements = Highly recommended. This is actually a film-performance hybrid. Deserving of a full post, but in the highly likely case that I don’t get around to it, please check Sam Green and Dave Cerf’s website for tour dates near you (San Francisco, Philadelphia, New York, and Minneapolis are all coming up, so none of my four likely readers have any excuse for missing out).
• The Tillman Story = Recommended.
• Marwencol = Highly recommended. Google the plot summary to be astounded and then just let me tell you that it is all done skillfully and with respect for the subjects.
• Sleeper = Recommended. Especially outside in the neighborhood with friends and frozen yogurt and fresh fruit.
• I Am Love = Fine.

I went all in for the “Silver Film Buff” pass this year, which guarantees at least 10 films in 7 days. The second night of the festival may even wind up as a film / rock-and-roll double header since I’d also purchased tickets for The New Pornographers that night. Exciting!

As a public service to those who like sitting in dark rooms with me, I’ve pasted (after the jump) the films I’m almost certainly attending. Grab tickets now! Afterwords we’ll hit Silver Spring’s other famous dark room: The Quarry House.

Monday, June 21st

• 7:30 PM – FREAKONOMICS
  Alex Gibney, Rachel Grady, Eugene Jarecki, Heidi Ewing, Seth Gordon, Morgan Spurlock
  2010 | Special – Opening | 85 min.

Tuesday, June 22nd

• 7:00 PM – THE KIDS GROW UP
  Doug Block 2009 | Sterling US Comp | 91 min.

Wednesday, June 23rd

• 7:30 PM – WAITING FOR “SUPERMAN”
  Davis Guggenheim 2010 | Special – Centerpiece | 102 min.

Thursday, June 24th

• 6:30 PM – MY PERESTROIKA
  Robin Hessman 2010 | Sterling US Comp | 88 min.

Friday, June 25th

• 6:15 PM – ON COAL RIVER
  Francine Cavanaugh, Adams Wood 2010 | Sterling US Comp | 80 min.

Saturday, June 26th

• 11:30 AM – THE LIVING ROOM OF THE NATION [ 11:30 am seems unlikely, but maybe - E ]
  Jukka Kärkkäinen 2009 | Silver Spectrum | 74 min.
• 1:15 PM – CAMERA, CAMERA
  Malcolm Murray 2009 | Sterling US Comp | 60 min.
• 2:30 PM – UTOPIA IN FOUR MOVEMENTS
  Sam Green, Dave Cerf 2010 | Special | 65 min.
• 7:30 PM – THE TILLMAN STORY
  Amir Bar-Lev 2010 | Special – Closing | 94 min.

Sunday, June 27th

• 11:30 AM – FAMILIA [ Again, not sure how realistic 11:30 is, but maybe - E ]
  Alberto Herskovits, Mikael Wiström 2010 | Sterling World Comp | 82 min.
• 4:00 PM – A FILM UNFINISHED
  Yael Hersonski 2009 | Sterling World Comp | 87 min.
• 9:30 PM – MARWENCOL
  Jeff Malmberg 2010 | Silver Spectrum | 83 min.

I finally had a chance to see noon:30 play last night. I know two members of the band and have been trying to make it out to one of their infrequent shows for almost as long as I’ve lived in DC. They play with a ton of intensity and clearly have a lot of fun doing it. noon:30′s sound is punk/experimental with great, sometimes en Français vocals. The show started with some noisy drone guitar work and some improvised percussion involving a wooden plank. A fantastic version of Jim Carroll’s “People Who Died” finished off their first set with a couple of friends joining the trio on stage and made a great fit alongside the rest of their music. I’m not going to do their sound justice describing it here, so maybe you should check out the clips on their MySpace page, friend noon:30 on Facebook, or follow them on Twitter.

Last Saturday I was invited to an all-day birthday party in the form of a bus tour of Virginia wine country. Even though I’ve seen Sideways, I pictured something unnecessarily snooty and dignified. I was pleasantly surprised that it turned out to be the exact opposite. Our tour only went to two wineries (possibly because sensible vineyards try to cultivate an image that doesn’t include rehabbed orange school buses decorated with vinyl silhouettes of people dancing in bell-bottoms). Two proved to be exactly the right number for a reasonably paced introduction.

First up was the beautiful hillside Bluemont Vineyard. While there, I learned about a variety of grape called Norton that has been grown locally since the time of Thomas Jefferson. I found it to be well rounded and Bluemont’s best offering. Next up was nearby Veramar Vineyard. Their Cabernet Franc was my top pick for it’s pleasantly spicy flavors.

Loudoun County has a number of other vineyards. All are close enough to make a great day trip for any locovore/foodie in DC—so long as someone else is driving.

I currently devote all of my energy to new media design, user experience strategy, and content strategy at SEIU, the Service Employees International Union.

Yesterday was a tough call in Minnesota’s newsrooms. The Pioneer Press gave 2/3 of a page to the amazing news that I’ll still be cheering for Joe Mauer when I’m 44. The Strib instead gave 2/3 of their front page to the news that the United States is no longer a barbaric, backward land where health care is granted only to those who can either (a) work for a soulless corporate empire until they forget what it was like to be healthy, or (b) swear under oath that they’ve never, ever been sick before in their entire life.

USA! USA! Win Twins! Win Twins!

P.S. On big news days like today, you really are missing out if you don’t walk down to the Newseum on Pennsylvania Avenue where you can view all of our nation’s large and medium sized daily periodicals’ front pages and mingle with / eavesdrop on your fellow countrymen.

Fried avocado Mighty Cone = highly recommended

Austin is a great food city, but during SXSW I kept too busy to put as many delicious things in my belly as I should have. I did eat the above pictured and highly recommended “Mighty Cone” from an outdoor trailer / stand on South Congress Street. It is essentially a large soft taco in a paper cone. Inside the flour tortilla is cole slaw and yes, fried avocado topped with spicy mayo. Mighty Cone breads the avocado with a mix of sesame seeds, almonds, chili, salt and corn flakes giving it a flavorful and crunchy exterior when it comes out of the advertised “deep saute.” If you are of the meat-eating persuasion, you can have that same treatment applied to chicken or shrimp.

I’m excited to be heading to SXSW Interactive to meet and learn from the luminaries of the internet/tech world and hope to bring back some inspiration for my team’s work in DC. I’ll be in Austin through the 16th. SXSW Film coincides with the Interactive fest, so there’s a good chance I may catch a hot new documentary or at least bump into a member of the old doc-blog cabal.

If you are heading there for any reason and are within the sound of this blog post, please don’t be shy about reaching out. Tip: my phone buzzes in my pocket when you leave a comment below or tweet @erikmoe .