Film

British actress Helen Mirren, perhaps best known for her long-running role as Det. Supt. Jane Tennison on TV's Prime Suspect, has had two quite closely related roles recently. She plays Elizabeth I in a new HBO four-part miniseries premiering April 22; then she appears as Elizabeth II in The Queen, a film from Stephen Frears.

The Notorious Bettie Page explores the life of the 1950s pin-up queen, who posed for under-the-counter men’s fetish magazines, and for photos and films for private collectors into the bondage scene.

Bettie Page was considered the "pin-up queen" from 1950 to 1957, based on photographs of her in the men's magazines Wink, Beauty Parade and Titter. Director Mary Harron discusses her new film about Page, The Notorious Bettie Page.

Film critic David Edelstein reviews Friends with Money, the new film by writer/director Nicole Holofcener who wrote and directed Lovely & Amazing and Walking and Talking.

Sharon Stone returns as a gorgeous novelist (and apparent psychopath) in a sequel to her 1992 smash hit Basic Instinct. This time, she's matching wits and sexual techniques with British actor David Morrissey instead of Michael Douglas. David Edelstein has a review.

Actor Seymour Cassel has roles in the new TV series Heist and the film Lonesome Jim. Cassel, who comes from a showbiz family, has been acting in film and TV since 1959. His mother worked in Burlesque, and Cassel grew up backstage, amid chorus girls and sequins.

L'Enfant is a new feature film from Belgian filmmaking brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardennes.

Actor Andre Braugher stars in the new series Thief, which debuts at 10 p.m. Tuesday on FX. Braugher plays Nick Atwater, leader of a small gang of thieves. Braugher is best known for his work on the TV series Homicide: Life on the Streets.

Two new documentaries probe the effects of outside influences on third-world countries. In Our Brand is Crisis, the arrival of U.S. campaign consultants threatens the outcome of a Bolivian presidential election. And Darwin's Nightmare is about the devastation of Lake Victoria in Tanzania.

V for Vendetta stars Natalie Portman as Evey, a wallflower who teams up with a superhero to resist an oppressive futuristic government. The movie's producers include the Wachowski brothers, of The Matrix fame.

The new film Thank You for Smoking follows a fictional American tobacco lobbyist as he defends the rights of smokers with double-talk and snappy irony. The satire is based on the novel of the same name by Christopher Buckley.

The new film The Hills Have Eyes is a remake of the 1977 Wes Craven horror classic. The new version was directed by French filmmaker Alexandre Aja.

Film critic David Edelstein reviews the films that are up for an Academy award under the Best Foreign Language Film category. They are: Paradise Now, Sophie Scholl: The Final Days, Don't Tell, Joyeux Noel and Tsotsi.

A hardened young South African gang leader steals a woman's car -– then finds out her baby is in the back seat. So starts the South African film Tsotsi, which is up for an Academy Award for best foreign film.

Several recent DVD releases feature great black entertainers of the 20th century. For classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz, his favorites feature the great tap dance team of Harold and Fayard Nicholas.

Critic at large John Powers reviews the two-DVD edition of the 1939 classic film Young Mr. Lincoln, directed by John Ford and starring Henry Fonda.

Race and politics add to the tension of a detective's search for a kidnapped child in Freedomland, starring Samuel L. Jackson and Julianne Moore. The film's screenplay was written by Richard Price; the story is based on his novel of the same name.