Before I give my predictions for today's games, let me go back and see how my preseason projections panned out:
NFC East: Way off. Thought Washington would finish at the bottom, Philadelphia at the top.
NFC South: Not too terrible. I had New Orleans finishing first, before Atlanta.
NFC North: I had Minnesota finishing last, behind Detroit!
NFC West: Nailed it!
AFC East: Pretty good here.
AFC South: Flip-flop Tennessee for Indy.
AFC North: Had Pitt finishing 2nd to Cincy's 3rd.
AFC West: Correct on Denver but I had KC finishing 2nd.
As for the playoff participants, from the NFC I had Chicago, Atlanta (yes), New Orleans, Philly, Green Bay (yes), and San Fran (yes). 3 out of 6.
From the AFC, I had Buffalo, KC, New England (yes), Baltimore (yes), Denver (yes), and Houston (yes). 4 out of 6.
So that's that. As for today's games, I like - and I sincerely hesitate to say this - Cincinnati to win their playoff game in what seems like 50 years. Yes, Marvin Lewis will win a playoff game and yes, he will win a road playoff game and yes... Cincinnati 23, Houston 20.
No way does Aaron Rodgers and the Pack lose for the second straight week to Minnesota, even if Adrian Peterson does run for 200 yards again. Green Bay 34, Minnesota 20
*
The Woman in the Fifth (2012), taken from a Douglas Kennedy novel that was initially intriguing but collapsed at the two-thirds mark, is a deeply unappealing, unsatisfying film. For those who haven't read the Kennedy book, I imagine you will be bewildered by the plot's lack of answers and closures. About the only thing writer-director Pawel Pawlikowski (2004's intriguing My Summer of Love, which projected Emily Blunt into our cinematic lives) succeeds in is creating an enigmatic mood of menace and unease, disturbance, and those traits comes through in Ethan Hawke's odd, haunted performance as the writer who relocates to Paris to be near his ex-wife and daughter.
It's clear that something is off with Hawke, who is somewhat compelling but his character is too closed-off, softly preoccupied; Hawke chooses to speak in a low, rumbly tone. As the titular woman of mystery, Kristin Scott Thomas is appropriately beautiful, but the film treats her harshly and her character doesn't seem fully (or even remotely) thought-out.
The film is only about 80 minutes but it seems twice as long, to be honest. There are way too many meaningless shots and there are far too many questions raised that aren't answered. The last twenty minutes seem to try to cram in about 100 pages of the novel, and it left me confounded. Talk about a waste of time. Fail!
Image courtesy of: http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8aFEWY1C61k/T0AbuWcZs3I/AAAAAAAAA1s/XyVc6_7WknI/s1600/woman-in-the-fifth.jpg
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