It looked like Ben Stiller was one of the showbiz meteorites who was moving so fast he would soon have no worlds left to conquer.

In truth, “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close” isn't about Sept. 11. It's about the impulse to drain that day of its specificity and turn it into yet another wellspring of generic emotions: sadness, loneliness, happiness. This is how kitsch works. It exploits familiar images, be they puppies or babies - or, as in the case of this movie, the twin towers - and tries to make us feel good, even virtuous, simply about feeling. And, yes, you may cry, but when tears are milked as they are here, the truer response should be rage.

The weave of the personal and the political finally proves as irresistible as it is moving, partly because it has been drawn from extraordinary life.

In scene after scene, meaning sneaks in and sometimes roars.

The movie industry is failing women. And until the industry starts making serious changes, nothing is going to change.

Paprika is evidence that Japanese animators are reaching for the moon, while most of their American counterparts remain stuck in the kiddie sandbox.

American commercial cinema has long been dominated by men, but I don’t think there has ever been another time when women have been as underrepresented on screen as they are now. The biggest problem isn’t genuinely independent cinema, where lower budgets mean more opportunities for women in front of and behind the camera. The problem is the six major studios that dominate the box office, the entertainment chatter and the popular imagination. Their refusal to hire more female directors is immoral, maybe illegal, and has helped create and sustain a representational ghetto for women.