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Thumbing his nose at critics and doing his own thing has become director/writer/star Tyler Perry’s mantra. And for the most part it has paid off. But what if Tyler Perry made a movie that he didn’t have to hide from critics?

Horror fans have a choice this weekend: stand up to Michael Myers or face an unseen force in THE (yes, “The”) FINAL DESTINATION!

The normally unstoppable Michael Myers will likely take a back seat as a broader audience should pay to see what has been billed as the final installment in the successful FINAL DESTINATION series.  While neither film has screened in Atlanta for this critic, from the lengthy HALLOWEEN II trailer that was shown for us before INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS, it appears that Michael Myers will be spending a lot of time slicing and dicing in what looks like a cruel and bloody motion picture.

Here’s something strange, Martin Scorsese’s next film, SHUTTER ISLAND, has possibly been removed from 2010 Academy Awards consideration. The reason is apparently economic.

The best facial animation on the big screen that I've ever seen was shown to audiences last night throughout the country. Twentieth Century Fox and Jim Cameron (yes, in an introduction, the famous “Titanic” director told us to call him “Jim”) shared several clips of “Avatar” in IMAX 3D. Having just suffered through “X Games 3D” this week, I was already weary of the new format. But with “Avatar” I suspect that our appreciation of 3D, IMAX, and animation will change.

“We’re gonna be doing one thing and one thing only, killing Nazis.” Lt. Aldo Raine proudly says as he stands before his recruits. Raine speaks in a deep Tennessee accent and has an impossibly square jaw (one that only actor Brad Pitt can effectively achieve without lapsing into outright parody).

Quentin Taratino’s seventh film, INGLORIOUS BASTERDS starring Pitt as Raine, is violent. It contains the most realistic, in-your-face violence of any Tarantino film since Michael Madsen’s Mr. Blonde tortured a police officer by playfully removing his ear in 1992’s RESERVOIR DOGS. Violence, both comic and realistic, plays an integral supporting role in all of Tarantino’s movies. But the dance that the master auteur often performs dangling on the edge of good taste is precarious.

Not in an official capacity I’ve ventured onto the set of DROP DEAD DIVA. The LA set show is actually being shot in Peachtree City, Georgia, and in my home town of Senoia, Georgia. The cameras and trailers have been hard to miss along the streets of the little town of Senoia, the place where movies are being shot with regularity. Ashton Kutcher is even filming a movie there.

TRUE BLOOD evolves as this week’s episode extends the conspiracy and productively builds on the growing cast of supernaturals. Caught in the middle is the naive Tara who falls prey to Maryann’s wicked party girl comely vibes. A whole lot of shakin’ concludes this provocative episode, and Jessica might just take in a little O-positive man blood in the process.

Less a television series than a highly addictive drug, HBO's deliriously entertaining "Entourage" kicks off its sixth season on Sunday, July 12 (10:30 PM).  With its energy, flash, humor and fast-paced storytelling, "Entourage" is entertainment even the most challenged members of the short-attention span generation should find satisfying.  Each 30-minute episode always seems to fly by in half the time, and season six is shaping up the same way.