Cinephile.

You expect to see fairies in a magic fable, but Stardust gives you one that is most unexpected. This fairy is a godfather, and he's played by Robert De Niro in a giddy, cross-dressing performance. De Niro is Captain Shakespeare, an airship commander who is all gruff growls in public but turns sweet the moment he's behind closed doors. At first, the young heroes on the run (Charlie Cox and Claire Danes) are afraid to have fallen into his clutches, but Shakespeare assures them they have nothing to worry about--he's just happy to have someone he can reveal his secret to. Still, the biggest shock isn't Shakespeare's hidden life; it's the sight of De Niro smiling up a storm.

Everyone seems to be enjoying themselves in Stardust, and why not? This is the kind of self-contained fairy tale that studios rarely make these days, adapted from the Neil Gaiman novel by Layer Cake director Matthew Vaughn. It's the story of Tristan Thorne (Cox), a young romantic who aims to prove himself to haughty Victoria (Sienna Miller) by trekking into a magical kingdom to catch a falling star for her. That star is Danes, and Tristan isn't the only one who wants her--so do a fleet of princes fighting for the king's crown as well as a crafty witch (Michelle Pfeiffer) who can use the star's heart to prolong her own youth.

That so many characters are racing each other initially lends the film a frantic, busy air, but by the time De Niro shows up, things have settled in nicely. This fairy tale is hardly original, but it's been made with care and sprinkled with quirks. I have always wanted to see Michelle Pfeiffer battle a unicorn, and no film has been willing to oblige me until this one. For that, and for De Niro's pirate poof, Stardust sparkles.

Only slightly less fantastic is The King of Kong, a documentary about men who parlay their teenage mastery of Donkey Kong into grown-up careers attending video game championships. These guys may have been zeroes in high school, but they're heroes in this niche circuit--none more so than Billy Mitchell, a boastful man with a mullet who in 1999 was proclaimed the greatest video game player of the century. Mitchell is as notorious for his self-mythologizing as he is for his records, among the most notable of which is a score on Donkey Kong so high it takes the game to a rarely glimpsed "kill screen."

Into this mix comes Steve Wiebe, a quiet family man who mastered Donkey Kong in his garage after being laid off from his job at Boeing. Though he manages to beat Mitchell's score and submits a tape of his achievement to electronic-gaming records chronicler Twin Galaxies, officials there are skeptical and demand to see him replicate the feat in public. His quest to do so leads Wiebe on a cross-country tour of arcade championships. Meanwhile, Mitchell frets on the sidelines, clearly worried that his long-held high score will be trumped by a newcomer.

The competitive gaming world is full of quirky characters, and Wiebe and Mitchell are but two in this film. There's also Doris Self, elderly champion of Q*Bert, and Roy Shildt, a former Missile Command record holder who goes by the name "Mr. Awesome." The film's most relatable character may be Wiebe's wife. A plainspoken woman who registers palpable discomfort when dubbed the first lady of Donkey Kong, she knows how much it would mean to her husband to finally succeed at something. These nerds-made-good have created a world where they're the stars, and The King of Kong supplies them with a delightful stage.

The ancient Chinese story of bisexual Emperor Ai says that when he awoke to find his favorite male concubine cradled on his arm, he cut off his sleeve rather than disturb his lover's rest. The new film Cut Sleeve Boys re-creates that scene with a twist. Replace the love-struck emperor with a tranny, who slices off not her sleeve but her scarf--so as not to be found with smeared makeup. It's one of the most winning scenes in the film, largely because it focuses on Ashley (Chowee Leow), a Chinese Brit who's realized he's much more irresistible as a woman than he ever was as a man.

Unfortunately, Cut Sleeve Boys dedicates more screen time to Ashley's friend Mel (Steven Lim), an age-obsessed gym bunny who's all too aware of his hotness. Mel's boyfriend is a sweet Welshman by the name of Todd, but Mel, hardly the loving type, rebuffs Todd's advances over and over. There's only so much Mel a man can take, and unlike Todd, most moviegoers will have had their fill almost immediately. Were you to wear your heart on your sleeve, this Botoxed bodybuilder would surely break out the scissors.