Demeter:Surrender
1. It's a story of love and lust and violence and greed and well, just about all of the Seven Deadly Sins, all in a 15-minute movie. Except sloth, because, frankly, they haven't got time for sloth.

2. If you look up "hot redhead" in the dictionary, there will probably be a picture of Yanni Kuznia, who plays Daphene.

3. If you look up "gorgeous Renaissance chick" in the dictionary, there will probably be a picture of actress-photographer-writer Rio Scafone, who plays Demeter.

(DISCLAIMER: Your dictionaries probably won't actually have entries for "hot redhead" and "gorgeous Renaissance chick". It's a figure of speech. But if there were dictionaries that did have entries like that, they would have pictures of Yanni and Rio. Trust me on this.)

4. Sean Harris, who plays Danny, is, in addition to being a very believable corpse, a outstanding bass player (according to the music on his MySpace page), a very good cook (according to Ms. Scafone) and extremely attractive (according to my wife after seeing his picture).

5. Sonja Ribicki is brilliant in her three seconds of screen time as Raimi. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll hope you didn't blink.

6. The chase scene adds a new item to the list of "Things I Learned Not To Do From Horror Movies", which is "If you are being chased through an abandoned warehouse, and you find some boxes to hide behind, DO NOT reveal yourself just as the chaser gets there. If you do, she will find you, and you will have to jump off a 17-story balcony. You should instead stay hidden until she runs PAST YOU, then go in the other direction."

6b. Actually, there's another new item for the list: "If you corner the person you are chasing, and they throw something into the air, DO NOT watch it. If you do, they will punch you in the nose. It's the oldest trick in the book."

7. Ms. Scafone, who has already been nominated for a Tony for Best Erotic Eating for her role in "Recent Tragic Events", gets fed again in "Demeter: Surrender".

8. If you've ever had a bad romantic experience, this movie will make you feel better, because, well, it wasn't THIS bad. Demeter and Daphene manage, in 15 minutes, to have a relationship that makes Britney Spears and K-Fed look like June and Ward Cleaver.

9. You want to support the local film scene, including two lovely and talented young actresses.

10. Four words: Hot babes making out. Do you really need nine other reasons?

Shooters: Get The Picture
1. It's a movie about photography that will appeal to anyone who has ever tried to decide between color and b&w, between digital and film or between art and action.

2. It's a movie about moving beyond the teachings of a mentor, so it will appeal to everyone who has ever had a teacher ... or a caring parent.

3. The movie's right ... it really is hard to take a good picture of the Detroit River. I've only ever come close once.

4. The movie's also right that journalism really does involve a lot of standing around.

5. You, too, can try to figure out the mystery picture at the end of the movie. I saw something that looked vaguely like this.

Snapshot
1. While the movie does involve people trapped in an elevator, it did not hit any of my other major phobias. There were not clowns or bees or stryofoam in the elevator, for instance, nor any musical selections by Celine Dion.

2. It's a movie that will appeal to anyone who has ever been judged on their looks or their weight ... positively or negatively. If there is anyone reading this that hasn't, please tell the world your secret.

(Although, to be honest, Jacquie Floyd, who played Veronica, is slightly too gorgeous for the audience to believe that her boyfriend doesn't think she's attractive!)

3. It's a movie about judging a book by its cover, and if there's anyone reading this hasn't done that, please tell the world your secret.

4. It's a movie that answers the question asked by every 15-year-old boy: "What would it look like if I covered my wall in Playboy centerfolds?"

5. Did I mention that this movie had people trapped in an elevator? Did I mention that's like my #2 phobia, right behind Celine Dion dressed up as a clown? You'll have to forgive me - I had a hard time focusing on some of the movie.

Red Seven
1. It's about time that someone made a movie about high-stakes card games and didn't use Texas Hold 'Em. Or even poker, for that matter.

2. Grace Anne Rowan not only does a great job as the lovely-yet-gullible Sarah, but she also appreciates finely back-lit cigarette burns, and agreed with me that the Knicks should have probably forfeited Thursday's game once the Celtics got a 50-point lead.

3. This movie will appeal to anyone who has ever lost money gambling, because you'll be able to say to yourself "At least I wasn't as inept as these three."

4. This movie was produced in 21 days for the Project Twenty1 Film Festival. And it's about blackjack, which is also called 21. I'm not actually sure which of  those was required for entry in the film festival, but I'm guessing it was the former. An entire festival of movies about blackjack would not seem to have a lot of potential.

I guess it could work, if you changed games every year. You could do blackjack in 2007, Sorry! in 2008, chess in 2009, Tiddlywinks in 2010 and, obviously, four-square for the sport's sesquicentennial in 2011, but then you'd have to change the name of the film festival every year. There's a reason that they don't move the Cannes Film Festival to Cherbourg every once in a while - it wouldn't have the same cachet to win an award at the Cherbourg Film Festival.

So, while it might, on the surface, have some sparkle, I really don't think it would work. So, hopefully, the Project Twenty1 Film Festival is for movies made in 21 days, or, possibly, movies where all the actors are legally able to drink.

5. I don't have a No. 5, because No. 4 was longer than the actual movie.

John "Skippy" Kolar
1. It's a movie about a man who was in the Guinness Book of World Records, and, well, haven't we all dreamed about being a Guinness record holder? Haven't we all wondered to ourselves what obscure event we could practice and practice until we smashed the record?

2. It's a movie about skipping rocks aka "ducks and drakes". Why is it called ducks and drakes? Did you used to get bonus points for skipping your rocks off waterfowl?

3. The movie is about an event on Mackinac Island, the greatest place on Earth.

4. The movie tells the story of the famous "24+infinity" throw - John Kolar's toss that set a world record of 24 skips, then disappeared into a summer mist. According to ancient legends, on foggy summer mornings, you can still hear the rock skipping across the Straits of Mackinac.

Which, now that I think about it, is a little odd. How can they have ancient legends about something that happened in the 1980s?

5. The last scene of the movie does not take place at Hawk Woods Nature Preserve in Auburn Hills, one of my favorite spots to take pictures. I thought it did, but the director said it was somewhere else, which ruins the point behind this item, but it is 2:09 am, and I'm getting tired.

Detroit Unleaded
1. This movie finally answers the age-old question "How many bullets does it take to shatter the bulletproof glass at a gas station?"

Then it answers the question again. And again. With different answers every time, which is always fun.

2. This movie will appeal to anyone who, as a child, slept in a bunk bed and thought to themselves "It could be worse - I could be sleeping on the bottom shelf of a gas station's cage."

3. You should see this movie if you've ever tried to find the damn interstate.

4. No, ma'am, gas-station owners are not going to Hell because of high gas prices. Oil-company executives, on the other hand ...

5. Think Romeo and Juliet meets The Arabian Nights meets a Skittles commercial.