Mark Metcalf, co-owner of Libby Montana restaurant in Mequon, is an actor known for his work in movies, TV and on the stage. He is best known for his work in "Animal House," "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Seinfeld."

In addition to his work on screen, Metcalf is involved with the Milwaukee International Film Festival, First Stage Children's Theater and a number of other projects.

He also finds time to write about movies for OnMilwaukee.com.

This week, Metcalfe weighs in on "Once Were Warriors," "Snatch" and "Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium."

"ONCE WERE WARRIORS" (1994)
This is an extraordinary New Zealand film about a Maori family living in the city enduring the racism that many aboriginal peoples suffer and the poverty that often goes with it.

You don't witness overt racism, but rather the result of being enticed to abandon your culture, to try to function in the modern world.

This is a very powerful film with lots of very human brutality and intolerance. Someone once said that the great thing about film is, as with books, you get a chance to travel and experience places and people you might never get a chance to actually visit. The opening image of the physical beauty of the natural landscape of New Zealand, as we got to see in "Lord of the Rings," transforms by simply panning away and down to the city streets of the New Zealand version of a slum, which is not much different from a Milwaukee slum.

The Maori, who refer to themselves as black, have all the problems of the poor everywhere: too much alcohol and drugs dull the senses and the mind; crime and brutal fights are the vehicle used to strike back at what must be an enemy.

The beauty shot is a billboard. Just a way of selling something, of making people think there is something they don't have but they must have to be, what ... happy? It starts slow and you worry that it may be a little sloppy, but it gathers strength and power like life and becomes a beautiful and tragic statement about the human condition.

SNATCH (2000)
It may be my new favorite movie. Certainly more so than "The Contender." I mean, I like Joan Allen, but I don't think it gets on anybody's top five lists except Annie Schimmel's, but she can do anything she wants.

Anyway, "Snatch," is a Guy Ritchie film. He directed "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels" and is married to Madonna, which seems to be a big thing in his life (and why shouldn't it be?) He works with Jason Stratham a lot. "Snatch" is a real boys' film -- tough, English hoods having fun making a movie. It probably wouldn't exist if it weren't for "Reservoir Dogs."

It has all the toughness and the threat of Tarantino, most of the mayhem, and a lot more fun. Good storytelling with music video or commercial style editing. Pacing is furious.

The film brings maybe 10 different characters and their apparently disparate stories together, the way Altman does. Ritchie obviously has watched a lot of movies and drawn from good sources, but he comes away with his own, very distinctive style, and the most important thing is that everyone seems to be having loads of fun and that comes across.

I was talking last week with some friends about how the really great movies seem to be about making movies. Not literally, but in some way the war, the campaign of making a movie is translated into the language of the film itself, so the more involved, the more committed and serious people are about the work of making a movie and the more together the 60 to 100 people who are on the set everyday are, the more that commitment and the fun come across on film and the audience has fun.

And I forgot to mention how great Brad Pitt is. He plays a "Pikie," an Irish gypsy, who talks in a dialect that cannot be understood. He just makes a mess of everything he says and the movie is constantly calling attention to it. In fact, the movie has a lot of fun with the fact that on this little island, that has the audacity of calling itself "Great" Britain, the people who live right next to each other and all claim William the Conqueror as their forefather for the most part can't understand each other.

It's very funny and Pitt, whom I don't usually like, is great as Mikey, the Pikie fighter who loses his Mum but ends up winning everything -- even though you can't understand a word he says.

MR. MAGORIUM'S WONDER EMPORIUM (2007)
I watched this with my son Julius and Alyssa, his best friend. I watch a lot of movies that I wouldn't ordinarily watch because Julius wants to see them and it's a good way for us to spend time together doing something we both love.

"Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium" didn't do well at the box office. It wasn't reviewed well. I started out thinking it was going to be a poor man's "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," for the obvious reasons that the names echo each other.

But it has none of the perversity that Willy Wonka has, in spades when in the hands of Johnny Depp and Tim Burton, and embedded in the original story by Roald Dahl, and even in the original film with Gene Wilder.

"Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium" is pretty straightforward and what we used to call corny or hokey, but it's sincere and it works.

The effects are not spectacular but they are wonderful and they are there all the time. They just don't call attention to themselves. The performances don't, either. Dustin Hoffman is aging gracefully and impishly. He has given some great performances since "The Graduate": "Midnight Cowboy," "Straighttime," "Rain Man," "Tootsie" and "Kramer vs. Kramer" as well as any number of others. And he has given some goofy ones. He isn't around as much as DeNiro and he isn't as tough. He isn't as "actory" as Pacino. He always gives a straightforward, honest, well-conceived performance that brings attention to the human he is playing and not to himself. As he grows older, he reveals himself to be quite funny and, to my mind anyway, quite healthy in a spiritual way. He is getting simpler, and that is very attractive.

Natalie Portman won me over in "The Professional," did it again in "Beautiful Girls" and even Queen Amidala and having to act with Hayden Christianson in the second/first "Star Wars" trilogy haven't spoiled her for me. She is emotionally honest and has a certain innocence and wonder -- an openness -- that is very attractive. The film is very satisfying. Everyone else cried when Mr. Magorium decided to move on and I cried when Natalie Portman got her magic back.