I walked into the theater to see Julie & Julia knowing I was in for a good evening. I was alone with my wife, going to see a movie about cooking. For me, that is a trifecta that cannot be beat—and for those reasons I loved this movie.

Julie & Julia is the weaving together of two stories: Julie Powell’s and Julia Child’s.

Amy Adams plays Julie Powell, a young married woman in New York who takes on the task of cooking her way through Julia Child’s massive cookbook, “Mastering The Art Of French Cooking,” in one year, blogging her journey as she goes.

The other half of the film is the story of Julia Child (Meryl Streep) going from American housewife to cooking legend. Ping-ponging back and forth between the two women’s stories, the film shows the similar paths their lives took as well as exposing the differences.

Meryl Streep spent the 123 minutes of film showing the world why she is the most nominated woman in Hollywood history, while Amy Adams continued to prove that she may be the most likeable actress in Tinseltown.

Really... What is love?  Some mysterious "thing" that we spend our lives avoiding and/or seeking?  How does one fall "in" love?  Standup comic Charlyne Yi sets out across the country to explore such questions in Paper Heart.  This quest quickly turns from philosophical intrigue to a documentary about whether or not she (Charlyne) has and/or will ever encounter true love.  The potential lover?  None other than lil' George Michael... er, Michael Cera.  As Yi and Cera cross paths midst the (Judd) Apatow circle of friends, Yi's quandaries come front and center.

Helvetica surprised me.  That is, the 2007 documentary about the ubiquitous typeface surprised me.  Gary Hustwit released his film on the 50th anniversary of the typeface's introduction, an anniversary most of us probably missed.  Entry into the world of those who didn't miss this anniversary is one of the surprises of Helvetica.  This is a world of designers and typesetters, of art and advertising.  These are men and women for whom the shapes and sizes of type reflect a much larger conversation about the place and purpose of design.  Are words on a page a means to communicate or are they the communication?  Should a typeface's meaning come from its design or from the words its letters form?  In Helvetica this debate between modernists and postmodernists takes place in public view in the form of corporate logos, advertisement, and your computer's library of fonts.

I have this small, black, fits-in-your-pocket, piece of technology that I currently refer to as my Gregory Alan Isakov Player. You probably have one to—you call it an iPod—that is only because you have yet to upload Gregory into your iTunes libaray.

Every summer deserves a soundtrack and This Empty Northern Hemisphere is likely my choice for ‘09. Hemisphere has a sound that demands a warm evening, a laid back gathering of friends and a few good drinks.