THE HATEFUL EIGHT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnRbXn4-Yis

I believe this is what happens when Quentin Tarantino holds a poker night for his favourite actor pals: Eight bounty hunters in this serio-comic Western flick - among them, Tarantino old-time faves Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Tim Roth and Michael Madsen - get holed up in a halfway rest stop during a snowstorm in the mountains. All of them look like scruffy, sneaky cutthroats out to really cut the throat or shoot the heck out of Russell's prisoner - played by Jennifer Jason Leigh, Tarantino's latest career-revival gal.

"One of them fellas is not what he says he is," bellows righteous Russell, who is known as "The Hangman". I'm hooked. I'm a big QT fan who would even go see it when he's holding a reunion in an ashtray.

FATHERS AND DAUGHTERS

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZ-6gOCidMY

Maybe this is the best way to star in a film with Russell Crowe. Share top billing with him, but don't act with him. Old Grumpy Russ doesn't exactly have the reputation of a choirboy. Amanda Seyfried plays the grown-up version of Crowe's daughter long after he has died. Which means they don't meet in any scene in this trailer.

Playing a famous writer, Crowe is suffering seizures and exuding the sort of sacrifice-for-only- child teary moments with Seyfried's little-girl version, reminding you of Will Smith doing the same thing with his son in 2006's The Pursuit Of Happyness. Then I realise that this milked-for-emotion deal is helmed by Italian director Gabriele Muccino, who also did The Pursuit Of Happyness. I did joke in 2006 that if the movie starred Crowe, it'd be The Pursuit Of Crappyness.

Tay Yek Keak