Midseason Gems

If you're not into holiday fare, December through March can traditionally be a slow time, both at the movies and on TV. Fortunately, the '08-'09 midseason features the return of the world's most famous spy, the supposed last turn in front of the camera for a film legend, and more than the usual number of noteworthy TV premieres.

AT THE MOVIES

Quantum of Solace , Daniel Craig's second turn as James Bond, supposedly takes place twenty minutes after 2006's Casino Royale , with Bond chasing down the sinister organization behind the death of Vesper Lynd (Eva Green), a level of continuity not seen between any previous Bond movies.

That said, the action in Quantum is so frenetic, Bond so driven, the movie doesn't stand alone very well. Craig, Judi Dench, and the other returning actors were all on their game, but there's little time for new characters--the Bond girls, the main villain--to make an impression. And if you didn't like Craig in Casino Royale , Quantum won't change your mind.

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Gran Torino stars Clint Eastwood as bigoted Korean war vet and retired Ford plant worker Walt Kowalski. Mourning his beloved wife as the movie opens, Walt would like nothing better than to spend the rest of his days undisturbed, admiring at his meticulously maintained 1972 Gran Torino. Walt's plans change when his neighbor, a timid Hmong boy named Thao (Bee Vang) is bullied into trying to steal the car.

Walt scares Thao off with a shotgun and would prefer that be the end of things, but Thao's mother insists Thao repay Walt by helping with odd jobs around the house. In the process, Walt becomes a father figure to Thao, who is similarly coping with the death of his own father. While the movie offers a good measure of Walt violently laying down the law against the Asian gang bullying Thao, it's also about mortality, with Walt succumbing to a disease causing him to cough up blood.

The movie's main theme, the bond that grows between Walt and Thao, seemed a bit of a stretch to me, especially given Walt's persistent use of epithets against all ethnicities, races, and religions. If the action weren't steadily directed by Eastwood, and if Walt weren't played by Eastwood, I might have a much lower opinion.

ON TELEVISION

Premiering December 7, 2008 on TNT, "Leverage" stars Timothy Hutton as Nathan Ford, a former insurance investigator. Ford gains new awareness of the everyman's plight when his firm refuses to pay for experimental medical treatment for his son, resulting in his son's death. In the pilot, airline CEO Victor Dubenich (Saul Rubinek) hires a drunk and listless Ford, claiming a competing airline has stolen his designs. Dubenich convinces Ford to coordinate three outlaws (Christian Kane, Beth Riesgraf, Aldis Hodge) he's hired to steal the designs back.

When the team discovers they've actually helped Dubenich steal his competitor's designs, they decide to run a scam on him, with the help of Nate's old flame, ham actress and virtuoso grifter Sophie Devereaux (Gina Bellman). Not another dark, brooding crime drama, Leverage is fast-paced and served with a sense of fun. In fact, the fun and huge payout of that first job is the reason the team stays together.

"Leverage" often doesn't show everything the team is doing until a big, ending reveal--an attempt to keep viewers somewhat fooled along with the villain each week. This works in some episodes better than others. My biggest complaint is that TNT hasn't aired the episodes in the order they were shot. While the main plots can stand alone, smaller moments of character continuity are missed. Despite this, "Leverage" had a solid audience in its first season, and has been picked up for a second, to premiere later this year.

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On February 13, 2009, Joss Whedon returned to FOX with "Dollhouse," a sci-fi drama starring Eliza Dushku as a woman forced to join a secret organization that implants its agents with memories, personalities, and skills to do whatever they are hired for, and then wipes them clean for the next job. In the pilot episode, Dushku's character, codenamed Echo, takes on the persona of a kidnap negotiator. The episode doesn't give much more exposition, but I'm confident Whedon will take viewers somewhere worthwhile if given the time.

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Premiering Monday, March 9, ABC's "Castle" may be of particular interest to fans of crime shows and crime fiction. Nathan Fillion plays hot mystery author Richard Castle, brought in by the NYPD when someone starts mimicking the ways people are killed in Castle's books. Blocked after killing off a hugely popular protagonist, Castle finds new inspiration working with Det. Kate Beckett (Stana Katic). My thoughts on "Castle" will appear in the Summer 2009 Mysterical-Eye.