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I watched Fracture with Anthony Hopkins and Ryan Gosling this week. It's sure nice to see Hopkins step out of his evil murderer role - oh wait, he plays an evil murderer in this movie too!

When Ted Crawford discovers that his beautiful younger wife, Jennifer, is having an affair, he plans her murder--the perfect murder. Among the cops arriving at the crime scene is hostage negotiator Detective Rob Nunally, the only officer permitted entry to the house. Surprisingly, Crawford readily admits to shooting his wife, but Nunally is too stunned to pay close attention when he recognizes his lover, whose true identity he never knew, lying on the floor in a pool of blood. Although Jennifer was shot at point blank range, Nunally realizes she isn't dead. Crawford is immediately arrested and arraigned after confessing--a seemingly slam-dunk case for hot shot assistant district attorney Willy Beachum, who has one foot out the door of the District Attorney's office on his way to a lucrative job in high-stakes corporate law. But nothing is as simple as it seems, including this case. Will the lure of power and a love affair with a sexy, ambitious attorney at his new firm overpower Willy's fierce drive to win, or worse, quash his code of ethics? In a tense duel of intellect and strategy, Crawford and Willy both learn that a "fracture" can be found in every ostensibly perfect facade.

I like Anthony Hopkins in most of his roles and he's always great playing an evil person. I found myself rooting for him to escape instead of being brought to justice. I also like Ryan Gosling from watching Lars and the Real Girl but he wasn't any spectacular in this movie. Still, I enjoyed the film and I recommend it.

I had recorded A Scanner Darkly from HBO awhile back and finally watched it this weekend. I knew a little bit about this movie and I like Robert Downey Jr. as an actor, so I was interested in it.

The movie is based on a Philip K. Dick novel. Dick wrote many other science fiction stories, several that have been made into films after his death (Blade Runner, Total Recall, and Minority Report).

To give the film a distinct look, the movie was filmed digitally and then animated using interpolated rotoscope over the original footage. To me, it looks kind of like a very-smooth cartoon, which was a perfect way of showing the drug-induced views of the characters in the movie.

Set in a future world where America has lost the war on drugs, an undercover cop, Fred, is one of many agents hooked on the popular drug Substance D, which causes its users to develop split personalities. Fred, for instance, is also Bob, a notorious drug dealer. Along with his superior officers, Fred sets up an elaborate scheme to catch Bob and tear down his operation.

Also starring in this film are Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder, and Woody Harrelson. I enjoyed the animation and the acting, although the story was fairly complex and I had to pay close attention to make sure I knew what was going on. But you're rewarded with thoughtful and uncommon plot that makes it worth watching.