Food and Drink Features
Vivian Boroff
Oklahoma City has a thriving Vietnamese community, and within the Asian District are several wonderful restaurants that specialize in the tantalizing soup known as pho (sounds like “fuh”).

Drama
Rod Lott
When Stanley Kubrick’s Vietnam film, Full Metal Jacket, hit theaters in the summer of 1987, I was all of 16 years old. Even I could tell it was far better than Oliver Stone’s Platoon, which by then had won four Academy Awards; by comparison, Jacket would be nominated for one, Best Adapted Screenplay, and lose it to The Last Emperor.

Music
Louis Fowler
While everyone with normal lives will be buying bargain-basement trinkets and low-end electronics for their loved ones at 3 a.m. on Black Friday at their nearest SuperTarget, hardcore music geeks will be sleeping in.

Drama
Phil Bacharach
Lincoln practically shouts “prestige production” before you’ve even had a chance to buy your popcorn. A costume drama about one of this nation’s most revered historical figures, this is the kind of film irresistible to awards groups.

Documentary
Rod Lott
There's a great story surrounding Stan Lee and Marvel Comics. I know because a month ago, I read all about it in Sean Howe’s new book about the very topic. As for the documentary With Great Power  ...: The Stan Lee Story, however, it's perfectly fine if the only portrait you care to see is superficial, self-laudatory and largely wart-free.

Documentary
Rod Lott
I was incorrect in thinking the documentary I Am Bruce Lee wouldn't reveal anything new about the screen's greatest martial artist. While not exactly earth-shattering, the facts I learned numbered many.

Comedy
Rod Lott
Meryl Streep is in a rut — not the actress, who's arguably still atop her game in her fifth decade of screen stardom, but the character she plays in Hope Springs. Long married to frowny sad sack Arnold (Lincoln's Tommy Lee Jones, not exactly stretching), Kay feels more like a roommate than a wife. They don't even share a bedroom any more.

Horror
Rod Lott
Lake Placid: The Final Chapter has swam to video shores, losing the numeral “4” somewhere along the way. Haven't seen Lake Placid 2 or 3? Didn't know they existed? Ooh, you are going to be so lost!

Horror
Rod Lott
What began as an intended Saw prequel has spawned a franchise of its own, now that 2009’s The Collector has begat The Collection. I hope in my heart of hearts that The Collection begets a third chapter — The Collective, perhaps?

Action
Rod Lott
Let us now praise a giant of action cinema: Bruce Lee. It seems like a good time, given Shout! Factory’s reissuing of four of the man’s marital-arts titles via a pair of double-feature DVDs: one with 1971’s The Big Boss and 1972’s Fist of Fury, the other with 1972’s The Way of the Dragon and 1978’s partly posthumous Game of Death. In total, that’s three-point-two-five good movies.