Netflix - After seeing all sorts of online ads for it and reading a few recommendations from people of whom I respect the opinion, I've signed up for a two-week free trial of Netflix. So far, so good.

One thing I like about Netflix is that it's going to free me up to view all sorts of movies I might be reluctant to spend money on at Blockbuster. You can have 3 films out at a time, can have them out as long as you like and (if you return the movies quickly) can view many different films over the course of a month. I've already seen Hyôryuu-gai(City of Lost Souls) (a very interesting crime film involving Japanese, Chinese and Brazilian cultures clashing) and A wonderful con artist movie that beats the last David Mamet film by a long shot. It was an Argentinian film called Nueve reinas(Nine Queens).

I highly recommend Nine Queens. Try City of Lost Souls only if you like Japanese films and bad subtitles (which I find at least entertaining). For example, this film was called City of Last Souls in some locations. I'm about to watch The City of Lost Children.

Netflix lets you establish a queue of movies you would like to see, and as you return the movies they simply send you the next DVD in the queue. Odishon (1999) is a movie that Rui told me about (a disturbing Japanese suspense/horror film). This movie is released on DVD this week, and Netflix is sending it along.

I'll let you know if I continue to be happy about their service. It partly depends on how quickly they can turn these DVDs around. I sent my first disk back on Friday, and another on Friday. They're already sending me 2 more, which will probably get here tomorrow or Wednesday. With the turnaround I can probably get about 4 movies in a week.