One of my all-time favorite quotes comes from, not surprisingly, one of my all-time movies, Batman Begins.  A young Bruce Wayne (Batman's alter ego) is asked by his father, Thomas, why we fall. Thomas goes on to answer "so we can learn to pick ourselves up." It's such a simple statement, and yet so deep. I think all of us will agree with it. If we never failed, we'd never strive to improve ourselves. If we never faltered, we'd never have any reason to grow. Life, as a result, would seem mundane -- empty, even. Nothing feels sweeter than achieving a goal after investing a lot of sweat and tears -- and failing repeatedly -- in something. Obviously, this in no way means failing deliberately or as a result of reckless, ill-conceived decisions. I'm talking about exhausting all your savings just so you can get your fledgling business off the ground. I'm talking about studying your tail off until you turn your "F" in engineering clas...

The worst movies, hands down, are those that fail to illicit a reaction in you. You couldn't care less what happens to anyone in the film, even the central character. An hour or less into it, you're yearning for it to end and wish you could get that time back. Such was the case over the weekend when, at a friend's behest, I watched "Man of Steel." Since we plan to watch "Batman v Superman" together, which is slated for a March 25 release in the U.S., he thought it imperative that I watch this one first in order to get some background on the origins of Superman. The movie was completely devoid of any plot or character development. It was laden with special effects, yes, but I had a hard time grasping what was going on and why characters were doing certain things at different points. Special effects are certainly neat, and they help enhance a movie. But to me, at least, they are no substitute for a trite script and lousy acting. I was expecting the m...