Fred Armisen

CHICAGO – Ali G, Borat, Bruno and the Stationmaster Guy in “Hugo” is now “The Dictator.” Sacha Baron Cohen puts on another character mask and produces his usual style of cheap laughs with a surprising sense of political sharpness. Anna Faris and Ben Kingsley go along for the ride.

CHICAGO – It’s tough being a high school freshman nowadays. Your parents either don’t pay enough attention to you or they pay way too much. There’s peer pressure everywhere — smoking, partying, getting laid. What happened to just playing with toys and jumping off the roof?

CHICAGO – There is nothing wrong with “The Smurfs” that a thousand volts of electricity couldn’t cure. It is well made, looks good in the optional 3-D and has a competent cast trying their hardest. What it lacks is a spark, either of nostalgia or a fresh update, as it meanders with the seen-it-all-before template.

CHICAGO - “Easy A” is simply a hard film to swallow. Set in a high school on another planet, it wants everything and ends up giving very little. The cast is game - Emma Stone, Patricia Clarkson, Stanley Tucci, Thomas Haden Church and Lisa Kudrow - but with few exceptions the players cannot handle the lead balloon banter that passes for jokey dialogue. It wants also to be a grand statement on gossip and those who get hurt by it, but perky Stone doesn’t seem that affected.

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(L-R) Tim Ware, Hugh Dancy, Isla Fisher

CHICAGO – This 19-image slideshow contains the official press images for “Confessions of a Shopaholic,” which was directed by P.J. Hogan and features Isla Fisher, Hugh Dancy, Joan Cusack, John Goodman, John Lithgow, Kristin Scott Thomas, Leslie Bibb, Fred Armisen, Julie Hagerty, Krysten Ritter, Robert Stanton, Christine Ebersole, Clea Lewis, and Wendie Malick. The Touchstone Pictures release opens on Friday, February 13th, 2009.

CHICAGO – Rainn Wilson is more than just the popular NBC character Dwight Schrute. The bespectacled antagonist of “The Office” is nowhere in evidence this time around as Wilson sat down with HollywoodChicago.com to talk about his new film “The Rocker”.

CHICAGO – Barring extreme wealth or hermetics, everyone uses the grocery store. It is the great equalizer – the marketplace where all socioeconomic groups can co-exist side by side – in pursuit of daily bread. Inspired by this reality, writer and director Steve Conrad turned it into his feature directorial debut.