Over the course of my time in this job I have acquired a reputation as someone who reviews and appreciates lots of foreign films. Of course, at the same time I have occasionally been accused of not understanding these films at all, which is partially true. It's not technically possible for one person to fully absorb and comprehend every facet of every industrialized culture in the world. For one thing, subtitles never accurately translate what's being spoken, and then there are little cultural things, certain behaviors, for example, that may not translate either. Conversely, it's impossible for any one person -- filmmakers included -- to represent a culture. It gets even more complex than that, if you want to boil it down. For example, I could say that I identify with the characters in High Fidelity (2000), but if you consider that I've never been to Chicago, and consider further that the book was originally set in London, then it creates a cultural divide. That movie has levels that will forever be out of my grasp.

You do your best. You keep an open mind. Although, I admit I'm usually disappointed when I see too many Western filmmaking elements slavishly copied in Eastern films (Mongol, The Counterfeiters, etc.); it shows the overwhelming influence of Hollywood on other parts of the world. I'm sure more people in Portugal saw Transformers than saw Manoel de Oliveira or Pedro Costa's latest films.

A poorly-reviewed movie easily fought its way to the top of the weekend box office. That's almost standard practice for big-budget Hollywood studio product, but is quite unusual for an indie film. Joshua Seftel's comedy / drama War, Inc. (First Look) earned $17,650 per screen at two locations, according to estimates compiled by Box Office Mojo, despite receiving mostly negative reviews -- Rotten Tomatoes pegged the critics at only 24% positive. Writing for Cinematical, Joel Keller described it as "an ambitious film that fails miserably at everything it attempts to be." John Cusack co-wrote and stars along with Marisa Tomei, Joan Cusack, Ben Kingsley and Hilary Duff.

Roger Spottiswoode's drama The Children of Huang Shi (Sony Pictures Classics) did not fare any better with our critic, Nick Schager, who felt that the film is "a TV movie in disguise, a handsomely staid affair that prefers skin-deep elegance to psychological or historical substance." Jonathan Rhys Meyers stars as a reporter that helped a school of orphaned children in 1937 China; Chow Yun-Fat plays a rebel and Radha Mitchell a nurse. Opening at seven theaters, The Children of Huang Shi averaged $6,036 per screen.

Good returns were also enjoyed by Joachim Trier's Reprise (Miramax), which expanded to 14 theaters in its second week and took in $6,614 per screen, and Claude Lelouch's Roman de Gare (Samuel Goldwyn), which added 11 more locations in its fifth week and increased nicely to $4,485 per screen.

With stately cinematography, period piece detail, and a true-life tale that mixes historical conflict and doomed romance, The Children of Huang Shi has all the ingredients for a stirring epic. Yet the resultant concoction of wartime heroism and loss seems to have been cooked in a cinematic Easy Bake Oven, blending its familiar elements with uninspired clunkiness. Director Roger Spottiswoode's film offers a functional retelling of the life of George Hogg (Jonathan Rhys Meyers), an English reporter who in 1937 sneaked into Japanese-controlled Nanjing, China and, with the aid of colorful communist rebel Chen Hansheng (Chow Yun-Fat) and brave nurse Lee Pearson (Radha Mitchell), cared for - and then led to safety across hundreds of mountainous miles - a school of orphaned children. A tale of sacrifice and courage embroidered with sweeping vistas of early 20th-century China and shiny shots of Mitchell's long, flowing blonde locks, it's a TV movie in disguise, a handsomely staid affair that prefers skin-deep elegance to psychological or historical substance, moving from regal panorama to gallant speechifying to dewy-eyed amour with metronomic predictability.

News bites for Tuesday:

• Sony Pictures Classics grabbed the rights to the Chinese war drama, The Children of Huang Shi, which Chris Ullrich told us about in October. Based on actual events, the film centers on a British reporter (Jonathan Rhys Meyers) who is in China when it was invaded by Japan in 1937. The man rescues 60 war orphans and leads them a feet-aching 1,000 miles to a village near the great wall. Chow Yun-Fat plays a political leader, Michelle Yeoh is an aristocrat and Radha Mitchell plays a nurse he falls for. The film should be released later this year.
• Another name has been added to the upcoming comedy, Sunshine Cleaning. Earlier this month, I shared news that Alan Arkin had joined Amy Adams and Emily Blunt in the movie about sisters who start a new business cleaning up crime scenes. Now Steve Zahn is a part of the cast, playing a married cop who is getting a little of Adams' character on the side. Now the question becomes: will this be a goofy cop, or will Zahn wow us with a little depth?
• Ms. Keira Knightley, the young, tough, sex symbol from Pirates of the Caribbean is baring all for her new film, Silk. According to MSN entertainment, her nudity is used to chastise her. A source is quoted as saying that during one of her two nude scenes, "she leans over her husband with her gown gaping open and he remarks that her breasts are small and like a little girl's." In the film, she plays the wife of a silkworm smuggler (Michael Pitt) from the 1800's who becomes obsessed with a concubine of a baron in Japan. Obviously, he's all sorts of charming and respectful.

The names in the title of this post kinda sound like they're from some sort of funky international law firm or something, don't they? Or maybe, instead of a law firm, a relief agency for orphaned children specializing in Asia? That would actually make more sense considering the true nature of this post. What the heck am I talking about? Glad you asked.

According to Production Weekly, Jonathan Rhys Meyers (of Bend It Like Beckham and the underrated Ang Lee film Ride With The Devil), Radha Mitchell (of High Art and Man on Fire), master of swords and two-handed pistol shooting Chow Yun Fat and former Chow co-star Michelle Yeoh are booked to be in the period drama The Children of Huang Shi for director Roger Spottiswoode.

The film, which tells the story of young British Journalist Gregg Hogg (played by Myers) who saves a group of orphaned children during the 1937 Japanese invasion of China by taking them on a 1000 mile journey to safety, is being written by Jane Hawksley. Mitchell will play the brave Australian nurse who helps Hogg save the children.

This new film covers similar ground explored before by Steven Spielberg in his film Empire of the Sun . In that film, a very young and pre-Batman Begins, Christian Bale is forced to flee his home when the Japanese invade China. He ends up separated from his parents and living at an abandoned airfield with other refugees -- including John Malkovich, Joe Pantoliano and a young Ben Stiller in one of his first movie roles . Empire of the Sun is a great movie that if you haven't seen lately, or at all, deserves a look.

If The Children of Huang Shi, which while obviously dealing with similar subject matter tells a different story, turns out to be half as good as Empire of the Sun, I will definitely be interested in seeing it. Even if Chow Yun Fat doesn't fly through the air, pistols blazing away in both hands, taking out bad guys.

Filming on The Children of Huang Shi is expected to begin mid-November in China with production moving later to Australia.