I had the chance to watch four films over the weekend. Two (Nashville & Charade) are from the Feed the Queue feature. The other two (Four Lions & Shutter Island) were 2010 films I caught up with for Awards consideration purposes.

So, here is what I watched this weekend:

NASHVILLE

Robert Altman’s style of humor is often quirky, frequently dark and seldom laugh-out-loud. Yet, Nashville hits on all three styles of humor with equal measure. The story revolves around several individuals, some successful, some not, who converge on the country music capital of the world seeking fame and fortune. The film plays on the cultural and political turmoil of the period without feeling preachy or excessive. The narrative structure is held together as a fictional presidential candidate spews his rhetoric through his canvassing van’s loudspeakers. He’s never seen, but his presence is felt frequently punctuating the action going on onscreen without feeling like a driving force in the film.

No one comes out of the film without delivering a terrific performance. The most notable are Henry Gibson as a self-centered, big-name country star; Lily Tomlin as a gospel singer and mother of two deaf children; and Ronee Blakely as a fading country star who’s been in and out of hospitals. And despite the more than two dozen characters, they are juggled effectively. The film never flinches from honest conversations and while you can pick up a sense of foreshadowing on occasion, the finale still resonates long after the film is over.

SHUTTER ISLAND

A spooky thriller about a Federal Marshal investigating the disappearance at an asylum known as Shutter Island. There, he attempts to uncover a dark mystery that suggests the facility is conducting vicious experiments on its patients. Martin Scorsese’s genre films are frequently more entertaining than his more mainstream efforts as I much prefer this film to his Oscar-winning The Departed. Matter of fact, I’d say this is his best film since The Aviator and easily one of my favorites he’s directed.

Leonardo DiCaprio gives a convincing performance as the tortured marshal whose wife (played by Michelle Williams) died in a house fire. He is ably supported by Mark Ruffalo as his new partner, Ben Kingsley as the facility’s administrator and Patricia Clarkson as a rogue psychiatrist. The rest of the cast is fine, but these are the standouts. The atmospheric storytelling, compelling visual effects and narrative thoroughness make for an engaging mystery that convinces you at least a dozen times that you know what’s going on, but only once are you actually right, making for an engaging conclusion.

FOUR LIONS

It’s a quirky story about a cell of Islamic extremists living in London who want to martyr themselves for their religion, but have absolutely no experience, no training and limited intelligence. It’s a strange sensation to watch a film about terrorists and actually feel a bit of sympathy for them.

Four Lions does a tremendous job of not only poking fun at the concept, but also enabling the audience to feel a measure of warmth towards the four men. The leader of the group, Raj (Kayvan Novak) is selected to go to Pakistan and receive training from fundamentalists there on becoming members of Al’Qaeda. When he and his bumbling friend Omar (Riz Ahmed) accidentally blow up a nearby training camp, they escape Pakistan and return home where Fessal (Adeel Akhtar) has already recruited two new cell members and plans to blow up their own local Mosque to encourage Jihad within England. The ludicrous idea is frequently referenced and although brilliantly conceived, does bear a bit of idiocy that exemplifies these hapless would-be suicide bombers. You may know where the film is going, but every time you form an opinion, the movie moves in an entirely different direction. It’s a humorous, well written film that should be seen.

CHARADE

Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn ride their starpower to solid effect in Stanley Donen’s espionage comedy-thriller Charade. The film is about a former spy whose murder on a train sets off a frantic search for the quarter-of-a-million dollar booty they had agreed to split during the war, but which never made it into anyone’s pockets.

Hepburn plays Regina Lampert, the wife of one of the criminals who is believed to have possessed the stolen loot. Although she has no idea where the money is, all of those seeking the cash believe she does and thus she becomes the center of a sinister plot to try and retrieve the money even if it means killing her or the other partners-in-crime. Grant plays the debonair Peter Joshua who pretends to be someone other than he is in order to weed his way into Regina’s life in an effort to extract the information. George Kennedy, James Coburn and Ned Glass play the other crooks wanting the money. Rounding out the cast is Walter Matthau as Hamilton Bartholemew, a member of the C.I.A. feeding Regina information while hoping when she discovers the money’s location will return it to him since it was the U.S. government’s money to begin with.

Even though the film is quite entertaining at times, it feels a bit tedious in segments and despite solid performances, there is nothing exceptional about them. Grant seems to be skating by with one of his least impressive roles and Matthau is interesting, but somewhat vacant. Kennedy and Coburn are the standouts here with Hepburn a close third. Kennedy is deranged and hilarious while Coburn fits the malicious profile quite well. Meanwhile, Hepburn uses her charm, grace and comic timing to keep the audience believing and championing her character.