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This peanut butter cookie contains Reese’s peanut butter chips, Hershey’s milk chocolate chips, and the entire bottom of the cookie is dipped in Hershey’s milk chocolate. The cookie is sufficiently soft without the disgusting taste of raisin that many soft cookies contain to keep them soft. As soon as I took my first bite I was reminded of the Nabisco Almost Home peanut butter cookies I loved a little too much as a child.

I had expectations for this cookie, but Reese’s and Hershey’s far exceeded them. I love soft baked cookies, I love peanut butter cookies, I love Reese’s products, and I love Hershey’s products. Put all four together and the best pre-packaged cookie on the planet is hanging out in my mouth being chewed ferociously.

In the “I wish I’d known that before I ate it” department, a single cookie is two servings, each serving weighing in at 170 calories and 8 g of fat. Oddly, the cookie used to be 190 calories and 9 g fat per serving, but the package I picked up in Tennessee clearly states that the same 2.75 oz cookie shown elsewhere on the internet is 20 calories and 1 g fat less per serving. BFD, though, really, it’s still bad for you! So, indulge, eat both halves!

Buttery’s Rating:

Recommendations:

A glass of milk really hits the spot with this cookie.

Eat your vending machine cookie while watching Neal and Del eat their vending machine food on their way home for Thanksgiving in Planes, Trains and Automobiles.

New York Times chief art critic Michael Kimmelman admits, “all art in some ways is a lie.” But is Marla Olmstead’s art the biggest lie of all?

In this riveting documentary we follow the life of Marla Olmstead, a then 4-year old abstract artist whose paintings sky rocket to fame after her story is picked up by the New York Times.

Director Amir Bar-Lev is invited into the Olmsteads‘ home to document the story of Marla’s first gallery show. But while filming footage in support of Marla’s work a 60 Minutes story airs hypothesizing that her father Mark, who is also a painter, coached Marla while creating the paintings then sold the art as Marla’s.

Once speculation from the 60 Minutes story spreads, as well as additional speculation that perhaps Mark created the paintings from start to finish himself and marketed them as child prodigy art, sales of Marla’s art dry up completely. Mark and his wife Laura begin to receive threatening letters that they are using their daughter to commit fraud. Amir is invited into the home to film one of Marla’s pieces from start to finish to put to rest the rumors that Marla is not the true artist, but Amir is left to wonder if the Olmsteads are being truthful.

Is the young child of a Frito-Lay factory manager and a dental assistant really a world renowned-worthy abstract artist? The Olmsteads look like the all-American family pursuing the American dream until we learn that gallery owner Anthony Brunelli, himself a hyper-realist artist, believes that abstract art is a sham. Was he in on a scheme with the Olmsteads to fool collectors into buying art under false pretenses?

Side-by-side comparisons of several of Marla’s previously created pieces to her Oceans piece which she creates start to finish in a 5-hour video filmed by Mark Olmstead are included in the film so viewers can decide for themselves if Marla’s works are truly her own.

This documentary’s haunting undertone of potential deceit is in itself a masterpiece. It starts off as an innocent film about the happy results of a child’s creative outlet, but is twisted into a dark tale of manipulating collectors with an eye for art out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Bar-Lev attempts to be objective about the news that Marla’s paintings are not completely her own, doing his best to disprove the 60 Minutes story with his own footage of Marla in her natural element. He does not compromise the story by blindly sticking to his original objective, but rather takes the time to delve into the truth behind Marla’s creative process.

Special features include art critic Michael Kimmelman’s overview of art and the artistic process, footage of Amir Bar-Lev making the trip to Binghamton and debuting the film at Sundance 2007, the continued blind support of local Binghamton reporter Elizabeth Cohen who wrote the original story which propelled Marla’s works into the mainstream art world, stories from local Binghamton residents who give their opinion on the Olmsteads‘ story, Mark’s showcase of Marla’s paper drawings at age 6 which are very intriguing, and Amir’s thoughts on what the truth is behind Marla’s paintings.

One bucket off for the bitter “something just isn’t right” taste left in my mouth after watching this film.

Buttery’s Rating:

Recommendation

Lots and lots of Utz Potato Chips add the perfect crunch to this biting documentary.

Some Absinthe to enjoy the ride this documentary takes you on may be in order.

It’s a viral war between the evil vs. the eviler… and it’s bloody.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t make it a good movie. But we’ll get to that.

It’s April 3, 2008 and the Reaper virus breaks out in Scotland, causing its victims’ faces to bubble and their bodies to basically rot. The virus is, of course, highly contagious and it takes no time at all for most of Scotland’s people to die from the disease. The UK government orders that Scotland be sealed off with a wall perimeter so that no one can go in and no one can get out. All of Scotland’s people are left to die. Fortunately for young Eden Sinclair (Christine Tomlinson), her mother is able to put her on a helicopter transport out of Scotland before the country is completely abandoned.

Flash forward to 2035 when the Reaper virus resurfaces, this time in England. Eden (Rhona Mitra) is called upon to lead a special ops team into the walls of Scotland to find a scientist named Kane (Malcolm McDowell) who presumably could help find a cure for the virus. What the team finds when they arrive is a large population of people immune to the virus who have forsaken any semblance of a lawful society (and why shouldn’t they since they were forsaken by the rest of society!) who are led by Kane’s son Sol (Craig Conway). Eden’s team is captured by Sol’s thugs but Sol’s sister Cally (MyAnna Buring) helps them escape and leads them to Kane who has crowned himself king of a medieval castle (yup, weird) where his people fear and follow him because they are led to believe there are no survivors outside the walls of Scotland.

This Mad Max meets Robin Hood meets 28 Days Later film sounds really good in print, but its execution on the main screen is a complete and utter letdown. Dark filming and close camera angles make it hard to see what’s going on during the action sequences. There were several gruesome scenes that were semi interesting, including total annihilation of an innocent bunny rabbit, shotgun blast to the head, machete to cut off a dead man’s hand, a man set on fire and roasted alive then carved for eating, several people being thrown into fiery explosions and burned to death, and several heads chopped clear off.

However, it seems that writer/director Neil Marshall put three stories together into one, none of them were particularly interesting, and none integrated in smoothly with each other. I found myself bored during the movie, fighting to concentrate or actually care about any of the characters. I love end of the world movies, particularly at the theater, so when I’m bored you know it’s really quite bad.

The ending is really unsatisfying, and obviously I can’t say too much more than that other than: hokey! Bob Hoskins (Who Framed Roger Rabbit?) could have been great in this movie, but he was completely wasted, used simply as a plot device to tie in Prime Minister Hatcher (Alexander Siddig) to the story line and to bridge the gap between young and adult Eden.

One of the movie’s best attributes is its 6-song soundtrack, including a rendition of Fine Young Cannibals‘ Good Thing during Sol’s Mad Max-esque spectacle. Also, eye candy deserving of a bucket: Adrian Lester as Norton who doesn’t seem to ever agree with Eden’s plans of action and makes that known but follows her anyway with guns blazing. Yummy.

Go see this movie with your mother (which I did — hi, Mom!) so you have something to trash talk over lunch.

Buttery’s Rating:

Recommendation

We recommend some nice Buffalo Bills 3.5oz Honey Pepper Country Cut Beef Jerky so you can pretend like you’re part of the cannibal scene! Yummy people meat!

A Kamikaze is the only appropriate drink for the end of the world.