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Valentine's Day   
 Since all the movie really offers is big stars playing people who are connected getting paired off, we’ll describe the cast in pairs and point out how they’re kind of linked.  Marshall gives us two Jessicas (Alba & Biel), two Taylors (Swift & Lautner), two Roberts sisters (Julia & Emma), two stars of Grey’s Anatomy (Patrick “McDreamy” Dempsey & Eric “McSteamy” Bane), two stars of That ‘70s Show  (Ashton Kutcher & Topher Grace), two older women (Shirley MacLaine & Kathy Bates) two Hispanics (George Lopez & Hector Elizondo), and two African-Americans (Jamie Foxx & Queen Latifah)...   Is that everyone?  It’s hard to tell, because with so many people crammed in there, it’s really hard for anyone to stand out – especially since the storylines are no better than what you see in the average sitcom.  
Full review at moviejungle.com

Edge of Darkness  
Fair or not, audiences and critics are going to judge Edge of Darkness entirely by its star.  The last time we saw Mel Gibson in front of a camera, it was a mug shot and he was on the edge of some personal darkness...  Edge of Darkness was a good choice for him.  Audiences should like a family man out to do good who has enough of an edge that action fans will like him.  He needs to be hero, not an anti-hero, and it’s certainly too soon for the guy who called a female cop “sugar t**s” to play a romantic lead.  You can’t help but notice there is no female lead in Edge of Darkness.  So – good choice, Mel...   but it’s only on the edge of being a good movie.  It’s on the edge of being an all-out action movie; it’s on the edge of being a murder mystery, and on the edge of being a political thriller.  It only touches on and is only average at each.
Full review at moviejungle.com

The Book of Eli 
“It takes forever to get to what isn’t so much an allegory but a flat-out obvious religious fable.  It’s almost the Left Behind movies with A-list stars. That’d be fine if it didn’t move so slowly and feel like any other post-apocalyptic thriller.  Everyone wears layers of clothes, including gun belts and knives.  There’s trading for goods, scavengers on the hunt and a lot of standoffs that end just after our hero tells the unsuspecting gang that “they better just move on.”  As directed by The Hughes Brothers, the world is very grey with occasional sunlight peeking through.  It looks cool, but not all that original.  Pardon the pun, but it’s all done by the post-apocalyptic book.”
Full review at moviejungle.com 

Planet 51  
"Any good UFO story is going to involve a good conspiracy theory, where the characters and audience try to unearth questions about what’s “really going on here.” Sometimes we get answers, sometimes we don’t – and after seeing Planet 51 I’m left with questions myself.  Mainly: who do they think this is for?...  None of it is particularly original, which gives logic-minded adults opportunity to think about those unanswered questions: how is it everyone speaks English, all the signs are in English, yet no one can read the wrapper on Chuck’s Twix bar?" 
Full review at moviejungle.com


Harry Potter & The Half-Blood Prince   
          Admittedly, when it comes to Harry Potter movies, I’m something of a Half-Blood Critic.  Harry Potter & The Half-Blood Prince is the sixth movie, and I’ve seen three of them.  I’ve never read a J.K. Rowling novel.  I honestly had to go back to the archives and look up what came after the ampersand in the movie I saw in the middle.  Many of you reading this probably know about Harry Potter than I do.
          But I’ll say this:  I enjoyed this one considerably more than the other two I saw.  I felt the other ones I saw were just going through the motions – that they were so concerned with recreating the experience of the book that they weren’t all that interesting as movies.  “You smiled with wonder when you read about Hogwarts.  Now, here it is.”
          I don’t live in a complete bubble:  I knew about names like Dumbledore and Voldemort, I knew what Hogwarts was, and I could even tell you what quidditch is.  By the sixth movie, the real fans and guys like me no longer needed introductions and by-the-book plotting.  We can let ourselves get caught up in the doings at the school for wizards – and I did.
          Hogwarts just seems like a fun place to be.  Harry and his friends Ron and Hermione aren’t little kids anymore – they’re teenagers about to become adults, and they have the same concerns Muggle kids would have.  Their hormones are raging, and that leads to all the comedy and drama of any good coming-of-age story.  To the moviemakers good luck (or incredible pre-planning), Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson have all matured into very good actors who can carry the comedy and the drama. 
          It’s interesting to see them have some very real life experiences as they “experiment with potions.”  They drink some things they shouldn’t and have to deal with the consequences.  I get it, J.K.  I get it.  I won’t tell the people concerned that your novels promote the devil about this other stuff.
          They’re matched by the wonderful supporting cast who play their mentors.  Michael Gambon is a convincing Dumbledore, and the marvelously snarky Alan Rickman is great as the perhaps untrustworthy Snape.  Jim Broadbent is a great addition as Horace Slughorn, the returning Professor of Potions that Dumbledore asks Harry to spy on.
          But eventually, in relying too much on the fun, returning director David Yates shoots himself in the foot.  We see so much of Harry Potter the man that we don’t see enough of Harry Potter the myth and the legend.  Not enough attention is paid to the Harry Potter Mythology – where he’s “the chosen one” who will bring down the evil Voldemort.  When the villains of the movie do show up, they do what they have to do – and then take off.  That’s not enough for a Half-Blood Critic like me – I need to know their motivations.  It makes the last half hour of the movie completely confusing.  By the time they do the dramatic thing that I knew would happen (when the Half-Blood book came out, I asked Potter fans to just tell me the ending), I had no emotional involvement in it..
          I know who the Half-Blood Prince is by the way.  But I’m left asking:  “So?”
          In this two and a half hour movie, we have a good two hour movie, and a half hour set up for the final installment.

The Proposal  
The idea behind The Proposal’s been done a few hundred times, so if it’s going to work it has to have the right people and the right setting.  And they got it half right.  The right people are Sandra Bullock’s Margaret and Ryan Reynolds’ Andrew...   Unfortunately, The Proposal makes the huge mistake of leaving the office environment and heading up to Alaska...  Instead of a workplace romance between two people who know each other so well, what we end up with is a diluted Sweet Home Alabama."
Full review at moviejungle.com 

The Hangover  
"There are guys who probably do have a raunchy decadent time on their Vegas vacations, and then there are guys who probably like to yell “Party!” and do a lot of fist pumping without really knowing how to pull it off.  The Hangover’s promos make it seem like a fist pumping kind of movie, but it really isn’t that.  That’s not necessarily a bad thing:  watching guys yell “Party!” is only funny for so long, so you have to give The Hangover credit for being a more mature comedy than it advertises... it tries too hard to be a cult classic, when what it really is is an ok comedy with a neat idea.  Personally, I found the solution to where the groom was and what really happened unsatisfying, but I will admit it’s an original solution, so you may feel differently."
Full review at moviejungle.com


Terminator Salvation 
"...There are spectacular chase scenes and plenty of fights – very loud fights.  I’m not sure I’ve ever heard such loud metallic crashes... But while the fights are interesting, the story really isn’t.  It’s a movie about destiny and keeping up the Terminator continuity – which means all the original ideas were spelled out for us in the first three movies... It’s too grim to be much fun."
Full review at moviejungle.com

Angels & Demons 
"At the risk of sacrilege, let’s compare Dan Brown’s books and Ron Howard’s movie adaptations of them to a Sunday worship service.   Sometimes you go and you’re inspired when you hear a wonderful speaker with fresh ideas.  But sometimes, you listen to a sermon or a homily and you think your clergyman is just going through the motions...    The Da Vinci Code held our attention because it looked at the idea that there were secrets we never knew about right in plain sight.  It’s not as fun to see a secret revealed that we never knew anything about anyway.  Since he’s chasing kidnappers based on clues they leave behind in the present day, it’s less like Langdon is unlocking pivotal historical mysteries and more like we’re watching Batman’s chased the Riddler from Gotham City to Vatican City."
Full review at moviejungle.com

Obsessed 
"Give Obsessed credit --  it knows it’s a rip-off of Fatal Attraction and other stalker-themed suspense thrillers, so it doesn’t waste any time setting things up for us.  In fact, within the first minute, I literally figured out exactly how the movie would end...   But you know what?  I kind of enjoyed Obsessed.  I laughed a lot.  I don’t know if that was the idea, so Beyonce and her staff may not be thrilled with this review."
Full review at moviejungle.com


17 Again 
"It’s also not exactly the most original idea for a movie either, but Hollywood is “doing it all over again” with 17 Again.  But to be fair, “Hollywood” is not one big entity responsible for every movie – it’s a number of competing studios trying to outdo each other.  Back in the 80s, there was a quick succession of movies about men trapped in boys’ bodies, and if we’d written them all off, we never would have gone to see the last one in that set – Big.  And to continue to be fair, every movie like this is somebody’s first movie like this...  So, if you saw 18 Again and go to 17 Again, then you’re seeing 18 Again again.  But if you’re seeing 17 Again with young eyes, you may be entertained."
Full review at moviejungle.com

Fired Up 
"What were the Wedding Crashers like in high school?  That is basically what we have here – two fast-talking, quick-thinking charmers – one brunette, one blonde – who scam their way into a place they shouldn’t be – all so they can hook up with as many females as possible... But you know what?  It’s not like they’re ripping off Citizen Kane here...  I’m not ready to necessarily cheer “F.U!!” repeatedly after seeing the movie, but I’m far from wanting to scream “F.U.!” at the movie either."
Full review at moviejungle.com

Hotel For Dogs 
"OK, my stay at Hotel For Dogs didn’t have the most luxurious accommodations, but I’m none the worse for having been there.  Sure, it’s not all that memorable, but checkout time was reasonable.   Lame hotel analogies aside, parents won’t find much here to enjoy, but their kids will be ok with it.  If you’re looking for anything more, you’re barking up the wrong tree... Oh yeah, the dogs.  They’re the real stars.  If you’re inclined to see the movie, it’s because you saw the word “dogs” in the title.  And fans of cute dogs won’t be disappointed.  Even the big ones are docile, well-trained charmers."
Full review at moviejungle.com

Seven Pounds 
"You were willing to see him as a drunk and bitter superhero in Hancock.  You were willing to see him practically all by himself in I Am Legend.  You were willing to see him with gray hair in The Pursuit of Happyness.  But are you willing to see him in a movie where you have no stinking idea what’s going on?"
Full review at moviejungle.com

Four Christmases 
"At first, it may seem like this is Take 2 of the Vince Vaughn Holiday Classic Movie (a year ago, Vaughn starred in and produced the under-appreciated Fred Claus).  But don’t be fooled into thinking this is a holiday film... Four Christmases is s a comedy about relationships.  As Vince Vaughn movies go, Four Christmases is really a lot closer to The Break-Up than it is to Fred Claus."
Full review at moviejungle.com

Quantum of Solace 
"Honestly, I’ve never understood the plot of a single James Bond movie, but for some reason, I get excited before each new one.  The action scenes, the dapper secret agent, the fights, the cool villains, the babes – they really seem like something any red-blooded American action movie fan should like.  No, you don’t have to understand everything about a Bond movie to enjoy it.  But if it’s fun, you can smile and overlook it.  When the bullets and fists are flying, you can.  When they aren’t, you look at the screen and wish Daniel Craig would give us a little wink to let us know he’s enjoying it."
Full review at moviejungle.com

Zack and Miri Make A Porno 
"Some of the dirty jokes are brilliant. Like a porn star willing to experiment, (Kevin Smith) comes up with some clever moves. Other times, full frontal nudity is just there for the sake of full frontal nudity. And that makes Smith more a dirty uncle than a clever writer and director. Smith, like Jay & Silent Bob, is probably too old for this. He created two good characters in Zack and Miri. He should put the porno away."
Full review at moviejungle.com

Body of Lies 
"Director Ridley Scott is back with collaborator/muse Russell Crowe, but to get a little more bang for his big budget’s buck, he’s borrowed Martin Scorsese’s current collaborator/muse to take the role that once would have been Crowe’s.... The action scenes go on for an awfully long time though – and for a good hour, they seem almost pointless. They certainly establish Leo’s bona fides as a tough guy, and they set up the relationship between DiCaprio and Crowe very well, but it’s not all that obvious that they’re accomplishing anything – or what their goals even are. It’s going to take some patience to get through it all."
Full review at moviejungle.com

Nights in Rodanthe
"Fans of the movies inspired by Nicholas Sparks’ novels... won’t be surprised by what they find... It’s a place where people always have wine with dinner, listen to jazz and sit on adirondack chairs by the water. It’s a world where people still write letters to each other by hand, and hear the voices of the writer as they read them. It’s a world where eventually one or both of the lead characters drawn to each other no matter how they fight it will have to scream at the other: “What are you afraid of?”
Full review at moviejungle.com

Pineapple Express
"Stoners should have two new heroes this summer... Like Harold and Kumar, Dale (Seth Rogen) and his drug-dealing friend Saul (James Franco) are stoned throughout the movie.  And like Harold and Kumar, they’re in what’s essentially a dumb stoner comedy.  But the dialogue is sharp, and the movie is as entertaining as listening to any dude with a high IQ start rambling.  You know when you hear lines like “Pandora’s out of the box and you can’t put her back in” that you’re dealing with guys who are writing what they know – but they are good writers... Potheads do tend to ramble once they get going, and sure enough, Pineapple Express is just a little too long.  It is essentially a one-joke movie that could have wrapped up about half an hour earlier."
Full review at moviejungle.com

The Perfect Game
"... is almost too perfect.  It’s a sports movie with very little tension, suspense or challenges for the young players.  Let’s put the emphasis on the young.  Our players are a group of Little Leaguers, and their peers are who the movie is made for.  If you’re going to take your kids to a movie and they’re just discovering baseball, then The Perfect Game is a fine choice for them... The other teams aren’t much of a challenge whatsoever.  For kids used to their baseball on a video game screen, it’s like coasting through on the easy setting.  Nobody could be on the edge of their seats watching this thing.  But it won’t send you running from your seat either.
Full review at moviejungle.com

Hancock
          Hancock is lucky he’s played by Will Smith, otherwise he wouldn’t stand out amongst summer’s superheroes.  When you’ve got a movie as good as Iron Man or (fingers crossed) The Dark Knight, you really have got to work hard to stand out. 
          But the idea of a disgruntled superhero isn’t even an original one.  Did you see Superman II?  Spider-Man II?  Spider-Man III?
          OK, the idea of a superhero who doesn’t want to be one is a good one – Stan Lee owes his millions to it.  And with Will Smith’s personality and charm, he could have made it work.  But what should have been light-hearted fun takes a dark turn halfway through and essentially forces in another storyline that should have been Hancock II.  There are some laughs early on, but in the end you wonder what Hancock's "signature" storyline is supposed to be.

Son of Rambow 
"With a title like Son of Rambow, a pop-culture-obsessed film critic would likely get excited that we have a film that parodies a cultural icon.  And with a little religious kid expressing himself to others for the first time, that same critic could hope we have a subversive film about art triumphing over fundamentalism.  And for a little while we get that.  The boys have big fun making their film, and it’s expressed nicely through charming performances by Milner and Poulter.  In our eyes, they’re smearing ketchup on themselves and fighting scarecrows with garbage cans on their heads.  In their eyes, it’s blood and some kind of demon.  Two lonely kids form a nice bond through their imaginations, and it’s nice to see." 
Full review at moviejungle.com

 
Sex and the City
          I’m not ashamed to say I know how Sex and the City on HBO ended.  In fact, I’ve seen every episode.  Each character all settled down in ways that fit each of them -- Carrie ended up with Big after all, Samantha took control of her boy toy Smith’s career and had him at her disposal, Charlotte adopted a baby girl and Miranda and Steve started a family and made significant sacrifices in their respective lives.
          It was actually a pretty good ending.  All those years of discussing every possible sexual issue under the sun finally paid off as the women moved to new stages of their lives.  There really weren’t any loose ends.
          Ah, but Michael Patrick King, Sarah Jessica Parker and the other creative minds behind SATC must have had another ending in mind.  1A worked very well on HBO, but they must have been thinking about a 1B.  So they made it. 
          And 1B isn’t too bad for awhile.  The first 45 minutes to an hour of the movie are pretty entertaining as we see Carrie and Big ponder their relationship and prepare to take it somewhere else.  The buildup is pretty good and the dramatic moment leading there is the best part of the movie (I’m trying so hard to not write spoilers, but I feel like an idiot being so vague). 
          Then we get ending 1C, which is like the three most boring episodes of SATC strung together.  The aftermath of 1B is exactly what you think it would be, and then this fairly unnecessary movie is pretty much made up of unnecessary scenes, unnecessary concepts and unnecessary characters.  The ladies zip off to Mexico for a meaningless jaunt where nothing happens (you’d think in a movie with the word “sex” in it, one of them would get some action in another country).  The writers remember that the franchise was built on women talking frankly about sex, so they throw in token conversations about Halloween costumes for women and Miranda’s self-grooming.  At that point, the ladies are doing impressions of their past glories – the conversations aren’t exactly revelatory.  Then there’s the addition of Jennifer Hudson as Carrie’s assistant – a bland character poorly acted that makes me think Hudson’s going to need to sing to win another Oscar.
          So I’m at like 5 out of 10 on SATC.  The women I talked to?   8!  9.5!  10 out of 10! 
          They get essentially the 2 ½ hour family reunion they’ve been dying for, so good for them (speaking of reunions, was it necessary for the women to scream every time they were reunited with Samantha, who now lives on the West Coast.  Once would have been enough and I would have gotten it – she lives in another state).
          So yeah, I know it wasn’t made for me, and the fans loved it.  If you weren’t one of the fans:  don’t bother.  This movie will mean nothing to you.
          If you are one of those fans, I just want to address you for a moment.  I’m talking to the kind of fan who went with their gal pals in groups, drank Cosmos ahead of time, and walked side-by-side into the theater like the women in the series walked everywhere in Manhattan (and how do you walk side-by-side like that in Manhattan without bumping into anyone?).   You know that guy dressed like Boba Fett at the last Star Wars movie?  OK, you don’t actually, you think you’re too good for him, and you don’t know who Boba Fett is.  You know that guy dressed like Harrison Ford’s character in one of those Star Wars movies?   You’re the same.  You’re doing the same thing.  I’m just saying.

300 
No History Channel documentary is going to have the visuals 300 has.  It is spectacular to look at, even when it gets very gory.  The fight scenes are slowed down or sped up at just the right moments, and it’s hypnotic to watch Leonidas hit and chop his way through the invaders... Why then does this comic book geek not give 300 a full recommendation?  1) After awhile, it’s the same fight scene again and again, with different looking villains to kill.  2)  It’s as easy to immerse yourself in the world of 300 as it is to immerse yourself in the world of Sin City.  But when you’re caught up in Sin City, you feel kind of cool.  If you get caught up in 300—and really think about it—you’ll feel a little silly.  
Full review at moviejungle.com

Speed Racer
"The live action version of Speed Racer really is like nothing we’ve ever seen before though.  I’m not even sure we can even call it live action frankly...   It’s a stretch to take a cartoon and turn it into a 90-minute feature film.  But a 2-hour and 15-minute film?  It’s a test of the viewer’s patience, whether it’s an all-out animated spectacle or not...  I give Speed Racer a lot of credit for technical achievement, but the Wachowski Brothers have to learn when to apply the brakes.
Full review at moviejungle.com

Forgetting Sarah Marshall  
Producer/writer/director Judd Apatow doesn’t forget his friends, especially if they have talent... he continues to use many of the same people, confident they’ll deliver. And with Forgetting Sarah Marshall, he’s mostly right.   Segel and company will absolutely be delivering Apatow another box office hit... and will be delivering to fans some more great and quotable lines – but they aren’t delivering the movie world another comedy for the ages like Virgin or Knocked Up proved to be. 
Full review at moviejungle.com

21   
Anyone who’s won or lost at the tables will understand the feelings. It’s thrilling to get blackjack, to beat the dealer, to be treated like a king, to see the chips pile up, and to get the attention of all the people around you. Whether you’re at a small Indian-owned casino or jumping from casino to casino on the Vegas strip, it’s hugely exciting.  Then you’ll come crashing down to Earth when the cards stop going your way.  21 is like that. Not just because it teaches the lessons of over-extending yourself while gambling, but because it’s fun and thrilling during the glamour and disappointing after the inevitable crash.

Vantage Point
          There are all kinds of ways to look at Vantage Point.  It’s part-JFK, part-Lost, part-24, and part-Rashomon, which could have made it pretty cool.  But it’s also part-French Connection, and while there’s certainly nothing wrong with a good car chase in a good movie, it’s just thrown in and proves they had no clue how to end this thing.
           In the middle of a rally on a crowded Spanish street, someone takes a shot at the President of the United States.  It’s seen from many different angles by an all-star cast, including Dennis Quaid, Sigourney Weaver, Forest Whitaker, Matthew Fox and William Hurt as the Commander-in-Chief himself.
           We see everything Sigourney Weaver’s TV producer (the noblest of all jobs really) sees for about 10 – 15 minutes, then the film rewinds itself back to the beginning, and then we see it again from Quaid’s perspective.  Then it rewinds again to another character’s vantage point -- each time we learn just a little more and see how the different vantage points tie together.  It’s intriguing, and after awhile, you look forward to each rewind.  The audience even makes little noises each time it happens, like they would if they collectively watched an episode of Lost or 24.
           But after the last rewind, we discover maybe it’s not as intricate as we thought.  Quaid’s apprehensive secret service agent suddenly becomes a Jack Bauer-type who can do no wrong (and is really an exceptional driver).  I don’t mind a movie about a super government agent, but I need to know early on that he is one.  The intriguing ideas become a mess, the movie becomes noisy and it stretches reality too far.
          And as it turns out, I totally called the big plot twist. 
          From my vantage point, they blew it.

The Brave One
          The Brave One is a good movie, but it’s not the movie it thinks it is.
          Honestly, it’s really just a variation of a Charles Bronson Death Wish movie, but because it stars a woman and is shot more artfully, it thinks it’s more of a thought-provoking message movie.
          Jodie Foster plays a liberal radio talk show host for the kind of program nobody listens to but smart people say they do because it makes them sound smart.  She’s a storyteller; she wanders her beloved New York City with a microphone and goes on the air to talk about the sounds she captures.  One day, she and her boyfriend are brutally attacked (and it is brutal), and her perspective on life changes—so much so, she becomes a gun-toting vigilante out to clean up the streets herself. 
          Some of the action scenes are pretty good, and there’s an intriguing game of cat-and-mouse between Foster and a detective played by Terence Howard.  Foster is effective as a vigilante who wonders what she’s become, much as in real life she may wonder how she became an action hero in movies like The Brave One, Panic Room and Flightplan.
          Her soul searching is of course there to make us, the viewers, sit and think about violence and punishment.  The problem is once you start thinking too much, you realize how ridiculous Foster’s new world is.  Someone who is the victim of a horrible crime would look at the world differently, but in The Brave One, it’s not her perspective that changes, it’s her physical world.  Post-attack, crime is everywhere.  It’s not just that Foster looks at her fellow New Yorkers with more suspicion—it’s as if the crime perpetrated on her opened the flood gates for more crime in New York.  It follows her around at a ludicrous rate, so much so, that The Brave One becomes Death Wish 6 (I think that’s where they left off).
         There’s nothing all that wrong with putting out Death Wish 6, but the makers of The Brave One figure they need a female Oscar winner if they’re going to get us asking questions.  But really, there’s no reason an intelligent mind can’t watch Death Wish and still do some thinking.

Resurrecting The Champ
          Resurrecting The Champ is less about boxing and more about journalism, so it mostly held the attention of this journalist. 
          The boxer is long past his prime.  In fact, he couldn’t be more out of his prime.  “Champ” (Samuel L. Jackson) is homeless, wandering the streets rambling about his former glory as a championship contender.  Sports writer Erik (Josh Hartnett) stumbles upon him and the story that could make his journalistic career.
          The film is based on a magazine article by journalist J.R. Moehringer (and stay away from the movie’s official site which gives it all away.  I’m glad I didn’t look up the name “J.R. Moehringer” until after I saw the film).  Not knowing the story, I followed Erik’s writing, research and its aftermath with a lot of interest.  But then again, I don’t know my boxing history.  Certain things may not take everyone by surprise.
          Samuel L. Jackson’s presence almost always takes over in any movie.  Now we know it’s not just for his booming voice.  Champ’s throat is shot from years on the street; it’s odd to hear such a weak voice come from Samuel L. Jackson.  But he’s totally into this homeless character and is impressive as the most “un”-Samuel L. Jackson-like I think he’s ever been.
          The movie loses some points for a ridiculous cameo by Teri Hatcher as a Showtime executive trying to recruit Erik for a job as a boxing commentator.  She’s way too slick and her lines sound as if they were written by a blogger who hates TV sports coverage. 
         It also suffers because we don’t quite know why poor Erik and his journalist wife are on the outs.  They clearly have a strong relationship, and it’s never really explained why he isn’t living at home.  The only thing I can see is that maybe she’s a better writer than he is and he’s living that sports movie cliché of “chasing his father’s ghost.”
         Finally—a little moment I want to point out to anyone reading this who’s also from Canastota, NY:   Watch for the part when Erik asks his research assistant:  “Is there a Boxing Hall of Fame somewhere?”

License To Wed
          The producers of TV’s The Office must have sent a memo out about Summer 2007:  “Make movies but please make them bland.  We don’t want your outside work to overshadow the very funny stuff we do here.”
           Steve Carell has done great work in movies before, but he’s wasted in the very bland Evan Almighty.  Now, it’s The Office’s John Krasinski (he plays Jim Halpert) who gets his chance to be bland in License to Wed.  Fans of the show will be interested to know the people who play Kelly, Kevin and Angela are all in this movie, and none of them really stand out either.
          But this isn’t a review of The Office. 
          In License To Wed, Krasinski seeks his license to wed with Mandy Moore, as cute as usual, but she too has done edgier work (Saved, American Dreamz).  Together, they’re a chemistry-free couple going through the motions of a romantic comedy.  They’re also going through kind of the Pre-Cana from Hell with Robin Williams’ Reverend Frank testing their relationship before he’ll agree to marry them.  Williams too is going through his Patch Adams motions.
          The movie is saved from a complete trashing by the robot babies Reverend Frank has the couple carry around to see how they’d do with a real one.  The babies are disturbing to look at and do all kinds of disgusting things.  The sequence with them is hysterical.  They’re the couple worth talking about.

Evan Almighty
          There was a time when Evan Almighty might have seemed like Son Of The Mask or Dumb and Dumberer:  an attempt to capitalize on a Jim Carrey movie while not paying the big bucks it would take to get Jim Carrey involved.  Steve Carell was a scene stealer in Carrey’s Bruce Almighty as anchorman Evan Baxter.  But could that character carry a movie?
          But Carell went and became a star since then.  He’s the star of one of the funniest shows on TV (The Office), has carried his own movies (The 40 Year Old Virgin) and in movies like Anchorman has made his small parts seem like big parts (that’s what she said.)
          So Evan Almighty?  It falls somewhere in between The 40 Year Old Virgin and Son Of The Mask.  It doesn’t make the most of Carell’s talents, but it doesn’t ruin the original movie.
          Unlike Bruce, Evan isn’t given God’s powers.  Instead, God (Morgan Freeman) visits him and asks him to build an ark.  He and his kids take up the challenge, even though the rest of the community thinks Evan has lost his mind.  The movie has more in common with John Denver's Oh God! than Jim Carrey's Bruce Almighty.
          Actually, John Denver could probably have made Evan Almighty.  It’s a very family-friendly story, with a loving wife, three cute kids, wacky sidekicks and plenty of cute animals.  I’m not sure how John would have felt about all the bird crap, but he wouldn’t have any problem with the story or its message.
          John Denver’s movie may not have been as stocked with as many popular friends in cameos as Evan Almighty is.  (OK, at the time, maybe Teri Garr and Dinah Shore were good gets).  Evan includes appearances by Carell’s Office-mate Ed Helms, the always dependable John Michael Higgins, Wanda Sykes and even Jon Stewart. 
          I probably shouldn’t apply too much logic about a movie based on a giant ark and faith, but I did have a little trouble getting over how few people believed Evan.  I’m not saying they need to buy into his “I talked to God” story entirely, but if they see bears and elephants following him around everywhere, wouldn’t they think there’s something more going on than just one guy acting like a lunatic?  And since his Noah-beard keeps growing back instantly (and miraculously), couldn’t he just shave in front of his wife so she’ll believe him?
          Details like that may not be too important considering what the movie really is:  a children’s book version of a Bible story.  It’s sweet, it has a nice message, but you know all involved could have done something with a little more edge.

Spider-Man 3
          I’ll begin by telling you how I choose what comic books to read every week.
          I’m not just doing that to bore you, but because this is Spider-Man we’re talking about.  And just to establish my bona fides, Amazing Spider-Man and Sensational Spider-Man are on the list of comics I have pulled for me every month at the comic book store.
          What I do, because I get so many titles, is take a quick peek at the last panel to see if the story might have a “To Be Continued” there for me.  If it does, I set it aside and wait for the next issue of that title.  I like to read the whole story at once, because I’ll forget from month to month among all the comics I read.
         Sometimes, those cunning comic book editors trick me though.  The story has ended on the next to last page, and the little “To Be Continued” is just tacked on at the end as a little teaser. 
         Spider-Man 3 is a lot like that.  It’s actually three different Spider-Man stories tacked together, and when one ends, another begins.  They tie them all together towards the end, but by then it’s been a little too long and seems a little forced.
         There IS a lot to like in Spider-Man 3.  It was made by the same people who made 1 and 2, and they were among the best super-hero movies ever made.  The entire cast is back:   if you enjoyed Tobey Maguire as Peter Parker/Spider-Man, Kirsten Dunst as Mary Jane Watson and even JK Simmons as the very funny J. Jonah Jameson, you’ll like them all here.
         Perhaps more importantly, director and Spider-Man fan Sam Raimi is back.  He knows how to put together great action sequences.  If you liked the action in 1 and 2, you’ll love the action here.  The subway sequence in Spider-Man 2 was a favorite, and the aerial fights in Spider-Man 3 are just as good.  Spider-Man and the villains he fights don’t fly per se:  they fall, they glide, they swing, and they bounce off walls— all at fast speeds with intricate moves.  They are a lot fun.
         Now let’s talk about those villains Spider-Man fights.  There are maybe one too many of them.  Taken one-by-one:
         -- The Sandman, played by Thomas Haden Church (Sideways):  From all I’ve read, Raimi wanted The Sandman in the movie, the producers wanted comic fan favorite Venom.  Sandman is made of sand and can shift his body accordingly—sifting through things or turning solid and very strong.  He’s got a great look for a movie with computer-driven special effects.  He however was always very boring in the comics, and to stretch things a bit, Raimi throws a wild coincidence into his back story that lets him “dance with the devil in the pale moonlight.”  (That is code for fans of comic book movies.  My apologies if you don’t get what I’m trying to say here).
         -- The New Green Goblin, played by James Franco:  If you saw Spider-Man 1 or 2, or read Spider-Man comics, you knew this one has been coming.  In a slow build, Peter Parker’s best friend Harry Osbourne’s resentment of Spider-Man has been growing to the point where we’ve known he’s going to follow in his father’s footsteps and become The Green Goblin.  The Spidey-Goblin fights are great, but I’m disappointed that after the long slow build, Harry’s story gets sandwiched in between two other villains'.
         -- Venom, played by Topher Grace (That 70’s Show):  Venom deserves his own movie and should have been saved for Spider-Man 4.  Eddie Brock is like a Bizarro-version of Peter; he certainly looks like him, is out to replace Peter as the Spider-Man photographer at the Daily Bugle and is interested in Peter’s lab partner Gwen Stacy (Bryce Dallas Howard).  Eddie lacks Peter’s morals though and will do anything to get ahead.
         In a never-really explained twist-of-fate, an alien parasite attaches itself to Peter and becomes his new costume—turning Peter into a darker version of himself.  Eventually, Eddie goes through the same thing, and the alien turns him into the villainous Venom.  Venom is just cool.  He’s a twisted version of Spider-Man—his body morphs into different shapes, Eddie’s face moves in and out of him—and he has fangs!  He looks fantastic. 
         It’s a shame we don’t see Eddie as Venom until about an hour and 45 minutes in, but that’ll happen if you try to cram too much in.  The aforementioned Gwen Stacy is huge in the Spider-Man mythos, but the love triangle she creates and her back story get lost here.  To try and please us nerds, they threw in a little bit of her background, including her father, Police Captain Stacy.  But they don’t do anything with him, so what’s the point?
         My hope for Spider-Man 4 (and you know there will be one) is that they bring back Venom and Gwen—and then stop tangling the web up so much. 

Meet The Robinsons
          Disney is promising us the next phase in CG animation with the Digital 3-D of Meet The Robinsons.
          It’s definitely neat to watch and kind of fun to look around at a theater full of people wearing 3-D glasses, but aside from being computer animated as opposed to hand drawn, the experience is really still just a novelty.  Audiences won’t mind putting on funny glasses every once in awhile, but this is hardly the wave of the future.
          Meet The Robinsons also isn’t a memorable enough movie to set off the wave of the future.
 It’s cute enough to be a fine way to pass an hour and a half, but it’s not a landmark in storytelling.  It also has a misleading title, because it takes forever for the Robinsons to show up.  You’ll spend a good chunk of time early on wondering “Is his last name Robinson?  Who are the Robinsons?”  It’s like watching a monster movie as a kid:  they take forever to get to the Godzilla content.
          Still, there are a lot of cute moments before the Robinson-reveal.  Young Lewis is an orphan (what would a Disney movie be if the hero wasn’t orphaned?) who is also a brilliant inventor.  He scares adoptive parents off because he’s an overzealous science nerd.  Frustrated, he builds a machine that he hopes will let him look back in time to see who his real mother is.  At a science fair, he befriends Wilbur Robinson (there they are) who is actually from the future and has come back in time to enlist Lewis’ help. 
In the future, we meet the Robinsons, the wacky family that the movie is named after.  They’re bizarre and animated (in the lively sense), and are probably who Disney plans on making merchandise out of.  But I actually preferred the first half of the story.  Lewis’ desires to be adopted and to make his inventions work were more touching and more engaging than the madcap things that happen in the future.
          I also wonder if kids will be able to follow the time travel plot.  Time travel stories can be incredibly confusing even to the most seasoned of sci-fi fans.
          If you enjoy modern animated movies for the celebrity voices, I’ll tell you now you can save yourself the effort of trying to figure out the voices you’re hearing.  I was under whelmed at the star power in the credits (although there is one surprise voice toward the end that was a smart idea).  
          Parent and grandparents will want to get to the theater on time:  Meet The Robinsons is preceded by a newly-restored 1950s Donald Duck/Chip and Dale cartoon.

Shooter
          It’s Lee Harvey Oswald—action hero.
          Oswald must have crossed the minds of the makers of Shooter, but you can’t make an action movie out of him.  So you a) make him innocent (I’m not weighing in on that fight, let’s stay focused on the movie);  b) make him look like Mark Wahlberg;  and c) you don’t have him kill a police officer and get caught in a movie theater—you make him not kill anyone during his escape but kick lots of ass and take lots of names.  Jack Ruby would not have a chance.
          Wahlberg plays a former military sharpshooter who was abandoned after a mission went bad.  He lives in a shack away from the rest of the world, looking at conspiracy theories on the internet.  He gets recruited by some mysterious government types who want him to scout out a way to assassinate the President.  They don’t want to do it—they think a plot is afoot to assassinate the President, and they want him to study “how he’d do it if he were to do it.”  Then, while he’s in what looks like the Texas Book Depository, someone fires a shot from the Grassy Knoll, and he realizes he’s been made to look a patsy.
          I’m giving the movie even less of a recommendation having just read the paragraph I just typed.
 Why would this paranoid hermit fall for what these guys in suits and black cars tell him?  Why would a smart guy who understands strategy fall for a ploy that sounds like the title of O.J’s aborted book?
          I’ll give Shooter credit.  I honestly didn’t think much of those flaws until I sat down to write.  The action sequences are good enough that I didn’t think about things like that.  Wahlberg is pretty good as an action hero (like in last year’s Four Brothers), and even though I didn’t understand a word of the movie’s frequent “gunspeak”, I got caught up in the urgency of the situation and the skill Wahlberg has as a sniper. 
         Until I started writing, my biggest problem with the movie was the ending and the way it through some real-life politics in.  Now that I look back, I see I got caught up in the shootouts and didn’t realize Shooter didn’t quite hit all its targets.

Ghost Rider
           As a comic book series, Ghost Rider never really took off.  But as a comic book figure, he’s one of the more memorable super heroes.
           Why wouldn’t he be?  He’s a leather-bound stunt cyclist with a flaming skullhead.  That is cool.  That’s the kind of thing people get tattooed on themselves.
           How stunt rider Johnny Blaze became Ghost Rider is a little convoluted, as is his mission in life (death?).  The hard-to-explain concept is probably the reason why Marvel Comics hasn’t published Ghost Rider on a regular basis, but the cool look is probably the reason they keep trying.
           Now Hollywood is giving Ghost Rider a shot, with a big-time star in the title role.  Nicolas Cage, a long-time comic book fan finally gets a shot at playing a super hero  (Cage took his stage name from Marvel Comics’ Luke Cage, he gave his son Superman’s Krytonian name and he has owned some of the most sought after comics ever printed), and obviously is having fun.
           Ghost Rider could be a dark, goth kind of film with its concept:  Blaze sells his soul to The Devil, who collects on the deal by recruiting Blaze to become his bounty hunter.  In the presence of evil, Blaze becomes Ghost Rider and forces evil-doers to confront what they’ve done.  Now, if you say that out loud, it’s pretty ludicrous, and to the movie maker’s credit, they don’t take it too seriously.   This is a comic book movie if there ever was one.
           Cage is a lot of fun as Blaze, a tortured soul sure, but he adds a lot of humor to his character.  It’s more of a deadpan kind of torture.  Sure, he feels guilty he sold his soul to the devil, but he never forgets he loves the Carpenters and anything on TV featuring monkeys.
           Sadly, the movie lost me when Blaze actually does become Ghost Rider, which happens in our second half.  Ghost Rider looks cool, but he’s a complete CGI creation with no personality.  I’m not entirely sure that’s even Cage’s voice anymore.  And as the fights get underway, things happen that seem to contradict the explanation of who Ghost Rider is and how he got that way.  The concept shouldn’t matter too much if you’re just trying to have fun, but it becomes so ludicrous, it’s hard to care.
           I really liked one nice touch:  casting Peter Fonda as The Devil.  When you think about it, that would be Easy Rider helping create Ghost Rider.  (And a quiz to see if anyone’s really reading:  why else is it cool to have Peter Fonda in the role?  Hint:  it has to do with Marvel Comics)
           Ghost Rider’s limitations as a comic book series translated to the screen, which probably means we won’t have a new franchise here.  That would explain why this is a February release and not a summer blockbuster.  But before Ghost Rider I saw two previews Ghost Rider fans will like:  Spider-Man 3 and Fantastic Four:  Rise Of The Silver Surfer.    So consider Ghost Rider an appetizer for now.

These would be the movies in current release or from the recent past that aren't all that great but aren't all that bad either.  Consider these your Return Of The Jedis... your Spies Like Us's... your Notebooks...  if these were bands, they'd be Poison or The J. Geils Band...