While in line:
• 75% women
• 20% gay men
• 5% straight men who were brought kicking and screaming against their will by women
• The line to see that George Clooney goats movie was almost as long as the one to see Precious. At 1 AM, no less. A girl in front of me was checking her Twitter and I eavesdropped one of her friends using the hashtag “#WordsAfterSex.”

After the movie:
• Lee Daniels is kind of a not-good filmmaker. There was no subtlety in the flick. And should the flick carry on and pick up steam as awards season kicks into gear, he needs to thank Gabourey Sidibe, Mo’Nique, Mariah Carey, and Paula Patton for elevating what was some of the most hackneyed writing ever. His directing is about as nuanced as Brett Ratner’s.
• Also, I think a lot of people are going to misuse “poverty porn” to describe this — maybe they wanted a polemic about America’s crumbling educational system. But this isn’t Freedom Writers, it’s a character sketch mostly.
• A few times, this made me recoil the way Dancer In the Dark made me recoil years ago.
• I secretly hope Sidibe does not get an Oscar nomination. At her age and after a role of this magnitude, it could be a career killer and I’d like to see her win more parts in the future.
• That’s all!