Jennifer Beals

With unflappable cool and surprising gentleness, Denzel Washington strides a bleak and barren world in The Book of Eli. Eli is headed west, but on the way, he passes devastation and squalor, and occasionally he must mete out some devastation of his own with a sharp blade. But when he arrives in what passes for a town in this dust-and-ash future, the power-hungry owner of the town's bar, Carnegie (Gary Oldman, looking a million years old), covets his one important possession. (Spoiler alert, sort of: it becomes apparent pretty quickly that it's a King James Bible.) Conflict ensues!

Set in Manhattan, Roger Dodger takes a comic look at the male ego and the art of manipulating women. Campbell Scott stars as Roger, a sharp-witted advertising copywriter who can talk his way into any skirt. Which is exactly why his nephew, Nick, pays him a visit. With Nick's virginity at stake, Roger takes him out for a one-night crash course in seduction, only to realize he still has something to learn about women... and himself.

That Oscar-winning title song buzzes in your ears long after the movie has stopped. The attraction here is youthful spirit and a pulsating score, because the weak story is merely a conduit for the song-and-dance numbers. The plot is every young woman's daydream come true. Jennifer Beals holds down a macho job as a welder by day, but performs erotic dance numbers in a club at night. It's not a strip club, so her morality remains intact.