"Scary Movie 4" * (out of four):Depressingly scattershot parody barely held together by its own scatology.

I can understand why Anna Faris (a likable actress and general good sport) signed on to the first and even the second “Scary Movie”. As a young actress this franchise must have seemed like a way to open doors for a serious acting career. Okay, I’ll even give her the benefit of the doubt for “Scary Movie 3”, when the franchise reigns were handed from the Wayans brothers to David Zucker. Working with one third of the Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker combo that launched the genre which is the raison d’etre of this series must have seemed like an opportunity. But after SM3 proved to be as unfunny as it was un-scary, I wouldn’t have blamed Ms. Faris for calling it quits. And yet, here’s “Scary Movie 4”, the latest attempt to ring some dollars out of the pockets of moviegoers eager for a quick fart-related laugh.

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I have no idea what they are trying to sell me.

"The Notorious Bettie Page" ** (out of four): Gretchen Mol shines in Mary Harron's startlingly inert biopic of the much-loved 50s pin-up queen.

If nothing else, “The Notorious Bettie Page” serves as an indication of how times change. The film, which concentrates on the short period in the mid-50s when Ms. Page became “pin-up queen of the universe”, spends the majority of its running time staging the photo shoots for which Ms. Page became famous. It’s telling that the same imagery of leather-clad vixens, which caused such a stir at the time, can now be reenacted in an R-rated movie with little fanfare. What used to be verboten now seems quaint. And unfortunately, there isn’t much at all that’s scandalous in Mary Harron’s startingly inert biopic.

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Today marks the 100th anniversary of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, and survivors like Herbert Hamrol are still around to talk about it. Let's all have a little jello for Herbert.

by Cracked.com. (absolution rocks!)

...and they have shirts, now.