Mélanie Laurent is the coolest. I feel like most French women are cooler than Americans, but she takes the macaron. Did you know that she’s also a jazz singer and a director? In our interview about Beginners, I also asked her about Lars von Trier’s controversial comments at Cannes about Hitler, and she went off on him and Dominique Strauss-Kahn like a bomb. She also has normal girl problems:

“You can meet the perfect guy [and] if you’re not ready to be in a relationship, you can just f**k up everything.”

Sing it, sister.

Read my interview here.

Beginners opens today. Bring a hankie or five.

Heyyyy, folks! I have a new column where I discuss two nerdly obsessions: video games and movies. Two great tastes that sometimes — though not always! — taste great together.

This week’s topic: L.A. Noire. Can a movie replicate the video game experience? Would we even want it to?

I totally didn’t even PAY the super-nice commenters, either. No trolls! Shocking.

The video gamer, as well as the comic book fan, was once looked upon as an antisocial creature, worthy of wedgies and empty cafeteria tables; kind of like how us film geeks are treated when we spend multiple sunny afternoons inside the cozy bellies of our local art house theaters soaking up obscure films or scouring eBay for out-of-print laserdiscs? Now they/we are looked upon as loyal audiences and cash cows, especially when it comes to the multiplex. Our combined obsession and passion means something to someone else, and as long as that’s the case we’ll be seeing major companies going after both audiences with the same product.

Read more: Movie/Gamer: When Can Games Be Movies? | Featured Article | Movies.com