Here's some stuff I give thumbs up to, which should come as no surprise, since you probably enjoyed these 5-10 years ago.

Schindler's List (IMDB): I don't know if you're allowed to say anything critical about this movie, ranked No. 6 on IMDB's top 250 list. I know you can't say that there were some unexpectedly nice breasts, so I won't. Of course, it was as heavy as a movie can be, but like any anything based on real events, thoughts of how a straight documentary would have been different went through my mind. For example, images of emaciated, walking skeletons seemed absent. I know the limitations there with working actors, but just something I thought about.

Overall, it was incredible. But it wasn't my initiation to images and stories of the Holocaust. So maybe I was itching a bit for this particular angle to develop. But the movie paid off huge in the end, when humanity peered through a storm of immense horror. I'll never comprehend how so many people allowed this to happen in my parents' lifetimes.

BTW, what is someone gonna do with a movie poster of Amon Goeth? Gotta be one of the most-hated villains in cinema history.

School of Rock (IMDB): This movie had two essential ingredients to a solid comedy:

1. A kick-ass lead actor. Jack Black was Jim Carrey-esque in that he could probably read a phone book and make it hilarious. This is where guys like the Wilson brothers fall short. They're witty, but not fall-on-the-floor funny on their own. Chris Farley, yes. Ben Stiller, no.

2. A real script. Along with Old School and The 40-Year-Old Virgin, this was probably the best comedy script Hollywood has thrown at us in some time. Look, it takes only a couple of no-way-would-ANYONE-laugh-at-that jokes to realize these things get mailed in. Will Ferrell saying, "I like to put bacon in my slippers, because the grease keeps my feet soft" is not part of solid script. Not that he's ever said that, but I wouldn't put it past him.

Rounders (IMDB): Even though I saw this well after its release, when I'm already familiar with Hold 'Em strategy, it was surprising watchable.

I mean, there were some corny parts, like Mike figuring out KGB's Oreo-cracking tell, which I figured out two hours earlier. Or when KGB totally freaked out because Mike slow-played a big hand. I mean, that never happens, right? It's like doing a baseball movie and having one opposing manager want to kill another because he called a pitchout.

But it highlights a seedier side of poker that we don't don't see on ESPN (thank god, because Norman Chad would definitely get his ass kicked), and Worm has some witty, wise-ass hustler parts. As long as it's not all completely predictable, it's cool.

Pauly Shore Is Dead (IMDB): If you wanna see Pauly Shore basically throw a roast for himself, if you want to laugh with Hollywood as it laughs at itself, if you wanna see old MTV clips of Pauly as The Weasel, definitely check this out.

The plot is that Pauly is sick of being ridiculed as the chump who starred in Son in Law, Encino Man and Jury Duty, so he pulls an Eddie Wilson and kills himself, figuring that dying young might put him in the class of Sam Kinison and Lenny Bruce as comedic geniuses lost too soon. And the public buys it, till he's outed and they hate him even more.

The cast includes, among about 1,000 cameos, Todd Bridges as a jail cell mate, a cursing and fuming Carrot Top, porn star Jewel De'Nyle, Andy Dick, Corey Feldman and Mario Lopez. How can you go wrong with that?

There's a bonus section on the DVD where he fields questions from film students, and he mixes comedy with plenty of serious and solid advice. You can tell he worked hard to put this together, not with promises of huge residuals but by convincing his friends that it's OK to laugh at themselves — but mostly at him.