It's An Honor Just to be Nominated

Please forgive the extremely crude Photoshopping

Forget the Oscars. Who cares about the Golden Globes? For Hollywood's elite, there's only one true measure of greatness: Brian's Crimson Ticket Stub of Prestige, also known to industry insiders as the Stubbie.

And the Stubbie Goes to...

Best Comedy
The nominees:

• Juno
• Forgetting Sarah Marshall
• Tropic Thunder
• Ghost Town
• Role Models
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Juno. It was a very close race between Juno and Sarah Marshall, but Juno's pathos, wit and lack of Jonah Hill made it very appealing.


Best Action-Adventure
The nominees:

• Indiana Jones IV
  
• The Dark Knight
  
• Iron Man
  
• Eagle Eye
• Wanted
• Quantum of Solace.
  

And the Stubbie goes to... The Dark Knight. Honestly, there was no way I could not give the Stubbie to this masterpiece. Quantum of Solace and Wanted tie for runners up.


Best Drama
The nominees:

• Smart People
• Atonement
  
• Fireproof
  
• Australia
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Atonement! Even though the ending made me furious, I can't deny this is a great movie.


Best Musical
The nominees:

• Walk Hard
  
• Mamma Mia
  
• An American Carol

And the Stubbie goes to... bleh. They aren't worthy. We here at the Stubbies have standards.



Best Sequel
The nominees:

• Rambo
• Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay
• Indiana Jones IV
• The Dark Knight
• Madagascar 2
• Quantum of Solace
• RocknRolla

And the Stubbie goes to... Indiana Jones IV! I know, I know. How can I possibly rank Indy and the Incredible Flying Fridge over The Dark Knight? Sure, TDK was a much better movie (and didn't have any prairie dogs) but Indy IV had a certain charm and despite popular opinion, I think it contiued the spirit of Dr. Jones as well as possibly could be expected.



Longest Movie
The nominees:

• Australia
• The Dark Knight
• Appaloosa
• Speed Racer
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Australia! It clocked in at a whopping 165 minutes.



Best Animated Feature
The nominees:

• Bee Movie
• Horton Hears a Who!
  
• Kung Fu Panda
• Bolt
  
• Speed Racer
• Madagascar 2
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Kung Fu Panda! Despite disliking it the first go 'round, its stock rose significantly when I was forced to see a second time in a group.



Best Movie That Is Pretty Good But I Don't Need To See It Again
The nominees:

• Australia
• Attonement
• Burn After Reading
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Australia! I'm sorry, Baz, but life is too short.


Best Movie that Should Have Sucked But Didn't
The nominees:

• Fireproof
  
• Marley and Me
• Get Smart
• Ghost Town
  
• Role Models
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Fireproof! Way to go, Kirk Cameron! It was a virtual dead heat for FP, Ghost Town and Role Models, but my expectations for FP were just so darn low, it's hard not to declare it the winner.


Movie I Should Have Walked Out of But Didn't
The nominees:

• Bee Movie
  
• Step Brothers
  
• Speed Racer
• Mamma Mia!
• Max Payne
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Mamma Mia! My blood pressure is rising just thinking about it.


Best Movie That is Stupid But I Still Kinda Like It
The nominees:

• Marley & Me
• Eagle Eye
  
• The House Bunny
  

And the Stubbie goes to... The House Bunny! There's no denying that Anna Faris has talent.

Most Disappointing
The nominees:

• Walk Hard
  
• Speed Racer
• Step Brothers
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Step Brothers! I was embarrassed to be seen in the theater.


Best Surprise Ending
The nominees:

• Role Models
  
• Atonement
• Forgetting Sarah Marshall
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Role Models! Yeah, Sarah Marshall's puppet rock opera was all sorts of awesome, but the epic and surprisingly warm ending to Role Models gives it the advantage.


Worst Surprise Ending
The nominees:

• Atonement
  
• Role Models
  
• Forgetting Sarah Marshall
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Atonement! I almost let an expletive slip when the big twist hit.


What Were They Thinking?
The nominees:

• Hancock
  
• Max Payne
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Max Payne! I like Mark Wahlberg, but I have limits. He crossed them.


Most Overrated
The nominees:

• Atonement
• Bee Movie
  
• Walk Hard
• Appaloosa
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Bee Movie! Why Jerry? Why? What did I ever do to you?


Best Special Effects
The nominees:

• Speed Racer
• Indy IV
• Wanted
• Dark Knight
• The Day the Earth Stood Still
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Wanted! Me likey curvy bullets



Best Costume Design (suggested by Kelly)
The nominees:

• Atonement
  
• Semi-Pro
• Australia
• Appaloosa
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Semi-Pro! You gotta love Will Ferrell in those short shorts.



Most Misguided Will Ferrel Vehicle
The nominees:

• Semi-Pro
  
• Step Brothers
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Step Brothers! Will and John C. Reilly should both be ashamed.


Best Movie to Knit To (ie: you don't have to pay that much attention to it) (suggested by Kelly)
The nominees are:

• Horton Hears a Who!
  
• Kung Fu Panda
• Tropic Thunder
• Madagascar 2

And the Stubbie goes to... Tropic Thunder! It's a movie full of great one-liners. You can tune in and out at will and I promise you'll land on a laugh.



Best Actor/Actress
The nominees are:

• Ellen Page, Juno
• Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
• Ed Harris, Appaloosa
• Nicole Kidman, Australia

And the Stubbie goes to... the late Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight! Ms. Page did a phenomenal job as Juno, but Mr. Ledger too it to a whole 'nother level.


Best Soundtrack
The nominees are:

• Mamma Mia
• Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
• How to Lose Friends and Alienate People
  

And the Stubbie goes to... How to Lose Friends! I know I'm supposed to pick Nick and Norah, but that's just how I roll.



Best Remake
The nominees are:

• The Day the Earth Stood Still
• Journey to the Center of Earth
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Journey to the Center of the Earth. Say what you will, I like Brenden Frasier.


Outstanding Achievement in a Cameo Appearence
The nominees are:

• Justin Long, Paul Rudd, Jack Black, Jason Schwartzman, Walk Hard
• Tom Cruise, Tropic Thunder
• Thandie Newton, How to Lose Friends and Alienate People
• Neil Patrick Harris, Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay

And the Stubbie goes to.... Justin Long, Paul Rudd, Jack Black and Jason Schartzman! This was probaly the toughest decision yet, but their turn as the fab four was by far the best part of Walk Hard.


Best Use of Seth Rogan
The nominees are:

• Pineapple Express
  
• Kung Fu Panda
  
• Horton Hears a Who!
• Step Brothers
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Pineapple Express! I didn't especially love the movie, but he was perfectly cast.


Worst Use of Seth Rogan
The nominees are:

• Pineapple Express
  
• Kung Fu Panda
  
• Horton Hears a Who!
• Step Brothers
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Horton Hears a Who! I don't get it. Why.



Best Use of Jonah Hill
The nominees:

• Walk Hard
  
• Horton Hears a Who
• Forgetting Sarah Marshall
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Forgetting Sarah Marshall! Who knew he could be funny?


Worst Use of Jonah Hill
The nominees:

• Walk Hard
• Horton Hears a Who
• Forgetting Sarah Marshall
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Walk Hard! Ugh.


Outstanding Achievement in the Casting of Paul Rudd
The nominees:

• Walk Hard
• Forgetting Sarah Marshall
• Role Models
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Role Models! Way to go, buddy!



Best Performance by a Rapper turned Actor
The nominees:

• Ludacris, Max Payne
• Ludacris, RocknRolla

And the Stubbie goes to... Ludacris, RocknRolla! Seriously, he's a decent actor.



Best Movie Based on a Book
The nominees are:

• Atonement
• Marley & Me
• Horton Hears a Who!
• An American Carol
• How to Lose Friends and Alienate People
• Journey to the Center of the Earth
  

And the Stubbie goes to... Atonement! Even though it's not my cup of tea, I must say it's a great translation of a great book.


Best Movie Based on True Story
The nominees are:

• The Express
• Marley & Me
• How to Lose Friends and Alienate People
  
• Expelled

And the Stubbie goes to... Marley & Me. Yeah. That's how much The Express annoyed me. I picked the dog movie.

2008 By the Numbers

Movies Seen: 53 (45 + 8 repeats)
Average Score: 3.2/5
Different Venues: Nine, spread over three states
Buckets of popcorn: Two (I just don't buy popcorn at the movies)
Movies seen at the Drive-in: Two (Get Smart, Kung Fu Panda)
Money spent (approximate): $375
Time spent in theaters (not including trailers and credits): 95 hours and 11 minutes (or 49 minutes shy of four days, 1.1 percent of 2008).
Number of words used to review movies: 26,474
Celebrities met/interviewed/photographed: One (Ben Stein in Expelled)
Most movies seen in one day: Four (An American Carol, Momma Mia, Eagle Eye, How to Lose Friends and Alienate People)
12:01 a.m. premiers seen: Three (Iron Man, Indiana Jones IV, Quantum of Solace).

Marley & Me, 3/5

Rated PG. Click here to view the trailer.

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD.

Over the long Christmas holiday, I stumbled across this ridiculously cute puppy. Besides reminding my family of me sitting in the pew on Sunday morning, it rekindled some small desire in my heart to to get a dog.

Marley pooped all over that desire. I am now terrified at the idea of owning a dog.

Marley - as I'm sure you're aware - is the titular hound from the depths of hell in the latest man-and-his-dog movie, Marley & Me. Yeah, he's cute, but only for about two minutes. Then he instantly becomes an inexplicably destructive whirling dervish of a dog that utterly obliterates anything and everything. His resume includes digesting answering machines, diapers linoleum flooring and drywall. He makes Beethoven look like the obedience school apple-polishing valedictorian. Seriously, Job has nothing on John and Jen Grogan. It's not funny, it's terrifying.

And there's positively no reason for the Grogans (Owen Wilson and Jennifer Aniston) to love or even tolerate Marley's behavior. If he had pulled a Lassie and pulled her out of a burning building or maybe brought Wilson's character the morning paper even once, I could maybe see keeping him and putting up with his epic shenanigans, but Marley has absolutely zero redeeming qualities. He's supposed to die fighting a cougar, not go quietly into that good night because of a twisted stomach. All I can say in his defense is that he does not eat the Grogan children (although he does knock them down).

Surprisingly, I can offer more in defense of the movie as a whole. It look to be a trite, subpar holiday pablum, but it's a real movie, even if the the family's love for the Attila the Dog is inexplicable. I can honestly say I didn't hate it.

Owen Wilson wouldn't be my pick for a lead in a family comedy, but he's not horrible. However, he does have that stupid surfer haircut that doesn't change even through he supposedly ages 20 years on screen. His nose is overwhelming when you have to sit on the second row. He and Aniston (who also doesn't appear to age a day) are actually kinda funny as they try to navigate life, marriage and their careers as Miami journalists. Lucy Merriam, the actress who plays their four-year-old daughter is cute. She delivers an adorable eulogy.

Here's the weird thing: It's not really about the dog. It's mostly about how Grogan can't be satisfied with his amazingly high-paying job. He learns tolerance and life lessons (apparently) from Marley for the first two acts but the dog is missing from a large part of the final 40 minutes. I'm sure John Grogan is a nice guy, but I really don't care to see a movie about him whine about a cushy, high paying job at the South Florida Sun-Sentinel and living in a nice home in Boca.

The movie is based on the best-selling non-fiction book of the same name, some of my gripes about the movie's faults can be explained by falling back on the it's-based-on-real-life defense. However, good books don't always make good movies without changes and embellishments, sometimes large ones (case in point, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button). The story was too long, and Marley needs a hero moment. He had his chance when the Grogans' neighbor gets stabbed out of nowhere, but Marley just sits there chewing the curtains. The non-dog moments should have been tighter.

Still, the movie works because it's not a zany, slap stick, Jim Carey-type of movie. Like any good dog, it is earnest and that earns you lots of capital in my book. Maybe that's what the Grogans saw in Marley.

RocknRolla, 3.5/5

Rated R. Click here to view the trailer.

RocknRolla is the anti-Ocean’s 11. Yeah, they’re both tales of lawbreakers and ne’er do wells, but this merry band of thieves don’t dress well, aren’t charming, could use a good orthodontist and have absolutely zero sense of loyalty, humor or decency. There’s a better-than-even chance they will tie you to a chair and lower you into the Thames River to be eaten alive by giant crawfish, and they haven’t even decided to kill you yet.

That’s not to say RocknRolla isn’t a fun, good movie; it mostly is. At least I think it is. I can’t be 100 percent sure since I only understood about 2/3 of writer/director Guy Ritchie’s (the former Mr. Madonna) cockney, fast-pace dialog. I’m not even sure I know what a rocknrolla is, and we’re given that answer at least twice, once over the opening credits.

I won’t even try to describe the marvelously labyrinthine plot, because to do so would require four more screenings and a team of court stenographers. Characters like Tank, Nurse, Fred the Head, One-Two, Mumbles, Handsome Bob, Johnny Quid, Waster and Councilor run around London generally scamming and scaring the pants off each other. There’s a basic frame set around a real estate deal gone bad, but with Guy Ritchie, the plots really aren’t what it’s all about. RocknRolla is pretty much the same plot as Snatch which is pretty much the same as Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. They’re all more or less exercises in talking fast and finding creative ways to beat the crap out of people. It’s not a wholly bad formula really, and if you’re a Ritchie fan, go for it. I will say, however, that RocknRolla is the weakest of the three (Snatch being my personal favorite).

Even though I found it impossible to keep the characters straight, the acting corps is pretty strong. For the first time, I finally figured out why people like Thandie Newton and Jeremy Piven is, as always, awesome. Chris “Ludacris” Bridges makes an appearance as well, and does a fine job. I’m not sure when he decided to become an actor, but he’s doing an OK job at it.

The Day The Earth Stood Still, 3/5

Rated PG-13. Click here to view the trailer.

For your information, aliens prefer to zip around town in reliable, fuel-efficient Honda Accords, discuss the end of the human race over a nice, hot Mickey D’s McCafe Latte, the US Government uses computers made by LG (they make computers now?) running Windows Vista and we had better start recycling and saving the whales, pronto.

Those are just some of the lessons we learn from The Day the Earth Stood Still, which, despite what you may have read on the blogs, is not a documentary on freeze tag. It also teaches us that Keanu Reeves might very well be an actual alien.

Dr. Pretty Brunette (I forget her real name, but she is played - rather blandly - by Jennifer Connelly) is an expert in astro-biology (huh?). When a huge alien sphere shows up in Central Park, who better to poke and prod mankind’s first-ever contact with extra-terrestrial life than someone who has supposedly been studying it for years? A trigger-happy army sniper accidentally wounds Klaatu (which sounds just slightly more alien than Keanu’s real name) which provokes his metal, cyclops-of-a bodyguard to have a laser-shooting conniption. Dr. PB calls for a medic to save Klaatu (is there an alien doctor in the house?) and he’s taken into custody. In a stunning reverse of clichés and alien stereotype, the Secretary of Defense (Kathy Bates) wants to drug and probe him.

Dr. PB helps, sees something she likes in Klaatu’s eyes and helps him escape the evil military's clutches. She and her jerk of a step-son (Will Smith’s son, Jaden) ferry Klaatu around New England until he finds his under-over, alien contact, who of course has assumed the form of an old tiny Japanese man. He tells Klaatu, who of course knows Japanese (why wouldn’t he?), the terrible truth: Mankind is so destructive, they all must perish in order to save the rest of the Planet. Dang it, I KNEW we should have listened to Al Gore and bought hybrids!

The laser-riffic Cyclops dissolves into 7 bajillion titanium termites while Dr. PB takes Klaatu to the one person she hopes can convince him humans are worth saving: Monty Python’s own John Cleese, a brilliant, Bach-loving scientist who recently won the Nobel Prize for his work in – wait for it – altruistic biology. I think that means he buys toys for underprivileged DNA strands at Christmastime and serves homeless genomes turkey dinners at the local shelter at Thanksgiving.

Do they succeed in convincing him we can change? Does the Earth actually stand still? Will Congress pass an auto-maker bail-out package? You’ll have to pay your $8.50 to find out.

Jennifer Connelly, as I already mentioned, is pretty vanilla but does what she can with her remarkably flat character. Mr. Reeves seems to have been preparing his entire post-Excellent Adventure career to play an emotionless being from another world and here it works pretty well. John Cleese’s character is wholly unnecessary and Kathy Bates isn’t bad despite her ridiculous character. As for young Mr. Smith? I’m not much for slapping people, especially children, but he got on my last nerve.

I presume the story is a fairly faithful re-imagining of the original 1951 sci-fi classic (I haven’t seen it), but I came away wanting a little more. Whereas the original served as a precautionary tale against nuclear proliferation, this reiteration is concerned with global warming, I guess. It’s not a bad story, but it’s a vague story that suffers from pacing errors. The Day the Earth Stood Still could have been much tighter, more exhilarating and much more direct in its criticisms (if it actually has any).

Final thought: Someone should take scenes of people "standing still" and make a killer music video to The J. Geils Band's Freeze Frame!

Australia, 4/5

Rated PG-13. Click here to view the trailer.

WARNING: Insensitive and inappropriate racial humor ahead.

Unless I decide to go back to the Sleep Study Center and hook myself up to 30 or 40 electrodes, there's no real scientific way to measure how well my CPAP machine is working. At least, there wasn't until tonight. I'm no board-certified sleep pathologist, but tonight I unequivocally proved that I am indeed sleeping better and have more energy. Ladies and gentlemen, I stayed awake and alert through all three hours of Australia.

Australia is Baz Luhrmann's sweeping, over-the-top, 180-minute celluloid love letter to his homeland and it certainly is epic. A little too epic, perhaps.

Set in the days leading up to WWII, Nullah, a 9-year-old "Creamy" (the wince-inducing slang for half whites, half Aborigine children) narrates the story of Lady Sarah Ashley (Nicole Kidman). She is a proper English housewife who comes to Far Away Downs, a HUGE cattle ranch owned by her philandering husband but just as she arrives, he is killed by the Magic Negro, King George. Lady Ashley hires a cattle drover named - wait for it - Drover (Hugh Jackman) to help herd her cattle and outrace competing ranchers to Darwin in time to meet snag a lucrative Army contract. Those brave Australian soldiers have to have good, Aussie beef if they're going to fight against those murderous Japs, don't they? Boy, I'm just getting all the racial slurs in today, aren't I?. Are there any Jews in the house? Do we have any Guidos in the audience tonight?

Lady Ashley and Drover fall in love and she more or less ends up adopting the orphaned Nullah. Things happen and events occur. A lovable drunk gets tramped by a CGI stampede. Nullah develops an affinity for the movie The Wizard of Oz and learns to play the harmonica and hypnotize cattle. Ninety minutes in, the story ends. Then it picks back up again and barrels on for another 90 minutes as callous missionaries kidnap Nullah and take him to an island to "breed the Black out of him." Drover and Lady Ashley have a tiff, and those murderous Japs attack the Australia's Northern Territory. Throughout both "acts," King George is stealthily shadowing the main characters. It's very White of me to say so, but I wanted to tell him to take a bath. Oh, the hegemony!

If you're exhausted reading all that, trying staying awake through it.

I'm not saying it's a bad movie - it's actually pretty good - but there can be no doubt it suffers from its length. There's a good movie in here. Actually there's two, and that's the problem. I supposed true epics like The Odyssey, The Illiad, The Aeneid or even Gone With the Wind don't exactly fallow the exposition-escalation-climax-denouement pattern, but it's exceptionally hard to make a good movie doing anything but that.

From Lurhmann, the man behind such stylish movies like Moulin Rouge!, Romeo+Juliet and this timeless masterpiece, I wanted something with a little more style and flash. We get some good opening credits and the "animation" tracing Lady Ashley's journey down under is cool, but mostly we get a straight drama. Like I said, it's not bad, but it could have been great.

I did enjoy the bits of Aborigine mysticism and especially the Australia/native jargon used by Nullah. He can make himself "invisible" at times and can do other "magic."I'm generally not a fan of animism, it was at least interesting. Some have criticized the movie as being condescending to Aborigines, but come on, it's a movie.

Brandon Walters, who plays Nullah, is very, every good and Hugh Jackman is pretty darn watchable, even if he does make me feel woefully inadequate. As for Nicole Kidman, well she did OK, but she left me with this one lingering question as I left the theater: Where did she find a botox clinic in the Outback?

Ooh! I almost forgot: There's a Chinese cook named Sing Song. I bet he knows karate and has a severe overbite. They all look alike, you know [sound of a gong].

Max Payne, 1/5

Rated PG-13. Click here to view the trailer.

A word of advice to the people who perpetrated Max Payne on the unsuspecting public: when you’re making a bad movie, it’s best not to choose a title with a homophone of “pain” in the title. And don't lie to me, you knew you were making a bad movie. We're talking Elektra-bad here, folks.

There’s absolutely nothing right with this movie. It’s so bad, it’s beyond the realm so-bad-it’s-good. When Ludacris turns in the best acting performance in a movie that includes Mark "Say Hi to Your Mother For Me" Wahlberg, Mila Kunis and Olga Kurylenko, three actors I actually really like, something somewhere has gone horribly wrong. In this case, it’s pretty much everything, not the least of which is that the movie is based on a just-slightly above average video game from the late 90s, yet doesn’t resemble it in the slightest.

Max Payne (Wahlberg, acting as if he’s high on horse tranquilizers) is dark and brooding NYC detective. He’s pissed off at the world and lets you know it. His wife and baby son were murdered several years ago and he spends his nights tracking the killers down. Sasha (Kurylenko) might be able to lead him to someone that knows what happened, but before she can help, she is brutally murdered and Max is framed for the crime by Luda. With the help of Sasha’s sister (Kunis), he breaks free and goes on a murderous rampage. It sounds halfway interesting, but it’s not. Trust me.

Did I mention there are demonic valkyries patrolling the airspace of New York, ready to snatch people up and shred them to mincemeat with their large talons? 'Cause yeah, there are totally demonic valkyries patrolling the airspace of New York, ready to snatch people up and shred them to mincemeat with their large talons. Napoleon Dynamite would be terrified.

You should be too.

Bolt, 4/5

Rated PG. Click here to view the trailer.

ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF slightly above average lost-dog-finds-his-way-home story saved by quirky pigeons and a feisty hamster ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF John Travolta makes a good dog ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF Miley Cyrus's unusually deep voice bothers me ARF ARF ARF ARF Hey, they just got in a Finding Nemo dig ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF who is Susie Essman and who decided she'd make a good cat? ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF. Pretty good little CGI cartoon, though certainly not a Pixar-instant classic ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF nice shout out to Missouri! ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF it's worth watching for the pigeons ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF.

Role Models, 4/5

Rated R. Click here to view the trailer.

Role Models is a hopeful, funny little movie with a great personality. It's just that it hides behind an such abrasive front, that I didn't notice it until the brilliant and inspired final act. It's a lot like the children asigned to "big brothers" Seann William Scott and Paul Rudd: They all might take a little coaxing to come out of their shell, but there's something worth loving in there. On three, everybody: Awwwwwwwwwwwww.

Danny (Rudd) and Wheeler (Scott) are two energy drink salesmen who go around with a distinct lack of energy as they peddle their noxious "Minotaur" at area schools. Wheeler is an optimistic slacker who enjoys the fact that he can do his job well while hungover and/or high, which is one of the few perks of dressing like a minotaur all day. Danny is a depressed underachiever who is having trouble with his lawyer girlfriend (Elizabeth Banks), his job, the local coffee shop, a surly tow truck driver and pretty much the rest of the world.

After a particularly bad day, they run afoul the law and are faced with two options: 30 days jail, or 150 hours of community service with Sturdy Wings, a Big Brothers, Big Sisters knock-off run by former coke-fiend Jane Lynch. Danny is assigned to Augie (the perpetually congested McLovin, Christopher Mintz-Plasse), a nerd of epic proportions who lives for medieval reenactment/role playing events . Wheeler's young charge is Ronnie (Bobb'e J. Thompson), an incredibly "challenging" 10-year-old who is every adult's nightmare. The "Bigs" and "Littles" venture out into the world together and hilarity ensues. But here's the thing: Hilarity actually ensues. I know. I was just as surprised as you.

It's those genuine laughs and again, the surprise third act, that pull it all together. The cast is superb and they milk the script (co-written by Rudd) for all it's worth. Rudd has a goofy smile and wry delivery that would make you laugh as he read a Waffle House menu, and Scott is just enough of a wise-cracking jerk to be a really great, really funny friend. Mintz-Plasse and Thompson bring depth to what could have easily been throw away roles and Jane Lynch, well, God bless her, she's just awesome.

Sure, we see where things are going (Bigs and Littles dislike/distrust each other initially, they go on various adventures, slowly bond, there's a crisis where they "break up," then they eventually form a friendship stronger than any court order as the closing credits roll). That's mostly the case here, but there are actual, genuine laughs along the away and there's a surprise final act that I don't think anyone in their right mind saw coming. There are hints along the way, but it's just so out there that it's still a surprise. Who knew that was still possible in today's movie world? Kudos to Rudd and his writing partners for playing things close to the chest then springing things on us at the exact right time.

Yes, it deserves its R rating, but beyond its crass facade, Role Models is pretty warm and cuddly inside.

Appaloosa, 2/5

Rated R. Click here to view the trailer.

Westerns, as a genre, have never really done it for me. As of this morning, there were exactly three westerns I've liked (Quigley Down Under, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, and of course, Blazing Saddles). Now that I've sat though two long hours of Appaloosa, there are still three.

Lawmen Virgil (Ed Harris) and Everett (Viggo Mortesen) stroll into the sleepy town of Appaloosa (were there ever any wide awake towns in the Old West?) to rid the town of local badman, Bragg (Jeremy Irons). Bragg, among other personality flaws, gunned down the previous sheriff and this has understandably caused the town aldermen no small amount of stress. Somewhere in there, Miss Allie (the oh so unfortunate looking Renee Zelleweger) enters the picture and inexplicably catches the eye of the good guys and all the bad ones too. I know attractive women-folk were often a rare commodity in 1886 New Mexico, but surely the men weren't this desperate. Everett follows Virgil around like a love-sick puppy dog and it's just weird. No, we're not venturing into Brokeback Mountain territory here, but there is a definite Cowboy Bromance going on.

The real conflict isn't between the two marshals and Bragg. It's supposed to be between our two heroes and the Little Miss Scrunchy Face. Between the Law and feelings. Too bad I wasn't convinced any of those.

Harris is so bland it's impossible to enjoy his character. I've never been a fan of Mortensen and his take on this walking SAT-Vocabulary-Flash-Card-Set of a deputy didn't win me over. Zellweger doesn't have a "good personality" nor is she funny. She officially has nothing going for her. I'm sorry. That's a horrible, horrible thing to say. But seriously, she looks like she just had an allergic reaction to some shellfish.

The lone bright spot is Jeremy Irons. His scenes are the only ones worth watching. I also liked Everett's umm... occasional lady-friend, played by Ariadna Gil.

Harris directed the movie and he fared about as well behind the camera as he did in front of it. The editing is clumsy and music was at times distracting. The script is way too long and skipped right over the natural, satisfying ending and took a logical u-turn and went along for two more subplots and 45 minutes. The actual ending is lame, as if one of the stray bullets got it in the leg.

Did I mention Peter Pettigrew plays one of the town aldermen? Yeah. He does.

Oh, and note to Mr. Harris: Westerns aren't supposed to have narrators.

Quantum of Solace, 4/5

Rated PG-13. Click here to view the trailer.

I had a good time at the 12:01 screening of Quantum of Solace, but this reborn series could very easily become derailed.

The great problem with the first 20 Bond films is that they pretty much all blend together. Of course, Bond’s personality, the arsenal of cool gadgetry, colorful super-villains, volcano hideouts and the bevy of femme fatales with hilarious names overpowered the series’ monotony and created an endearing character for the ages. Solace, the 22nd in the series and the second of the Daniel Craig era, suffers the same problem as the original 20, but doesn’t have the charm. Instead of an evil mastermind hell bent on building a space station to hold the world hostage, we have a smarmy French real-estate speculator who desires to buy 60 percent of Bolivian utilities companies. NOOOOOOO! TAKE 55 PERCENT, BUT NOT 60! He doesn't even cry blood. There is no Q, no Money Penny, no gadgets and no humor. Heck, Bond seems to have taken a True Love Waits pledge and doesn’t even attempt to bed Camille (Olga Kurylenko). At least there’s a decent opening titles song/montage, courtesy of Jack White.

Bond #22 begins moments after Casino Royale ended, leaving Bond aching to avenge the death of his love, Vesper Lynd (thus making it the first true Bond sequel). The plot details got a little hazy (but hey, it’s a Bond film, so who cares?), but he traces her killers to Bolivia and finds himself mixed up in a suspicious land deal between Dominic Greene (the aforementioned smarmy Frenchman) and an ambitious Bolivian general with eyes on the Presidential Mansion in La Paz. Camille also has a beef with Greene/Mr. President–elect and so does the CIA. Along the way Bond kills lots of people. Lots. TONS. One of his unintended victims is Agent (Strawberry?) Fields (Gemma Arterton), who I mention only because I have thing for redheads.

Solace moves along at a decent clip, but the action scenes were so frantic and edited to death that I was confused during the obligatory car chase. And boat chase, and plane chase, and horse chase and motorcycle chase. Director Marc Foster tries to emulate the urgent, immersive style of the Bourne films, but the main difference is that those sequence were coherent and a viewer could follow the action. I consider myself pretty savvy when it comes to action sequences and these are subpar.

Thematically, it's full-throttle revenge. Duty, and sex take a back seat as it turns out that avenging a loved one's death can do a lot for your determination and pain threshold. In other words, he is Batman. Does Bond really need such a strong theme to make a movie work? Is achieving some small quantum of solace (Hey! That's the title of the movie!) a good enough excuse to make me sit in a theater for 106* minutes? I'm not sure. It's interesting, I'll give you that, but I'm not sure how far it can take us.

One area where you can’t fault Solace in its acting corps. Although I’ve just criticized Craig’s Bond, the problem is the script, not in Craig’s acting. He was awesome in Royale and he’s just as awesome here. I don’t throw “sexy” around very often when talking about men, but heck, it fits. Holy crap, he look great in a tux. Dench is awesome as M, even if her character is little bit wishy washy, trusting Bond, losing faith, trusting, losing faith, blah blah blah. The villain, played by Mathieu Almaric, is creepy and frightening, even if his scheme is pedestrian and ridiculousloy white collar. Kurylenko is quietly alluring but Jeffrey Wright, an actor I’m normally quite fond of, sleep walks through his role as CIA spook Felix Leiter.

Royale blew audiences away because it was so new and different. The same goes for Craig. His was a darker, more damaged Bond and we all ate it up. This new offering tastes the same and my jaw could soon get tired of chewing, even if it hasn't just yet. A great action film to be sure, Solace doesn’t have the fresh feeling Royale did, and doesn't quite make it into the echelons of the greatest Bond flicks. Craig and Co. had better figure out how to balance realistic action and stoicism with some of the original Bond elements that made the series so darn loveable. I’m giving them a pass them time, but next time around I won’t be so generous.


*This is the shortest Bond film ever, and a full 44 minutes shorter than Casino Royale.

The House Bunny, 3/5

Rated PG-13. Click here to view the trailer.

My sister's seven-word review pretty much says it all. "It's OK, but the beginning is unbearable."

If you can just get past that unbearable opening the rest of the movie is... well, actually Kelly was right. It's pretty forgettable.

Anna Farris is Shelly, a former Playboy Bunny kicked out of the mansion because she is too old for Hef's taste. I guess 27 is the new 40. Homeless and witless she stumbles upon Greek Row at a local college and becomes a House Mother to an ugly duckling sorority. "It's just like a mini Playboy Mansion!" Surprise, surprise, she teaches them how to be sexy and they teach her that life isn't all about looking good. It's Revenge of the Nerds, but with halter tops. Offering a reason to grow up is Shelly's crush, played by Colin Hanks.

There are a few laughs but the movie is too broad and heavy handed to pull off the sweet feeling I think they were going for. The sorority girls are all no-names with subpar acting skills, except for Kat Dennings who must have owed someone money. Hanks, who was really good in Orange County, is an utter waste as the manager of a nursing home, or as Shelley puts it, "an orphanage for old people."

If there is a saving grace, it's Faris. She is pretty, funny and is willing to go all out for the laugh. I hope Hollywood does her a favor and gives her better material.

Madagascar 2: Escape 2 Africa, 2.5/5

Rated PG. Click here to view the trailer.

Don't get me wrong, I like to move it move it as much as the next guy, but Madagascar 2: Escape 2 Africa just didn't do it do it for me.

First of all, the movie picks up in Madagascar where the original left off, which means if there's to be any escaping, it will be FROM Africa, not TO (2) Africa. Geography lesson aside, here's the skinny:

Our quartet of marooned NYC urban-jungle dwellers are attempting to escape from their island "paradise" and able to do so with the aid of some very skilled (and verbose) penguins and a few thousand helpful lemurs under the command of King Julien (voice of Sacha Baron Cohen). Alex the Lion (Ben Stiller), Gloria the Hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith), Melman the Giraffe (David Schwimmer) and Marty the Zebra (Chris Rock) are desperate to make it back to their lives of comfort, but wouldn'tyaknowit, there's a problem and their plane crashes in a wildlife preserve in sub-Saharan Africa. Apparently this is Real Africa, and Madagascar is just Poser Africa.

There are a few funny moments here (penguins with switchblades are inherently funny... surprisingly, so are dying giraffes), but it's missing the charm and simplicity of the original. There are too many new characters introduced and too many new subplots. Perhaps the biggest crime is that one new character is voiced by Alec Baldwin and it isn't a homerun. Tragic. The rest of the high-profile voice talent (including Bernie Mac, Cedric the Entertainer, Andy Richter and will.i.am) are all OK, but aside from Cohen's King Julien and the crew of Penguins (Tom McGrath, Chris Miller, Christopher Knights and Conrad Vernon), it's all a wash.

I know I like to talk about movies in terms of elements of other movies, but in this case, the movie makers just got lazy. Madagascar 2 blatantly mashes together the EXACT plots of The Lion King, Lord of the Flies, and - wait for it - Joe Versus the Volcano to come up with an "original" story.

It's not a bad movie by any means, and it's worth spending $6 bucks to take the kid. It's just not near as fun or original as it should be.

Journey to the Center of the Earth, 2.5/5

Rated PG. Click here to view the trailer

Journey to the Center of the Earth is a very, very mediocre throw-away excuse for a movie that is pulled back from the brink by Brendon Frasier and his inexplicable yet undeniable charm.

Hopefully you know the basic plot of Jules Verne's 1864 classic sci-fi novel of the same title. In this film, Frasier plays a modern-day geology professor who takes spelunking to new heights (depths) as he, his nephew treat Verne's book not as science fiction, but as factual diary and field manual and try to retrace his steps.

Frasier the only reason why this movie doesn't suck. I don't know what it is about him, but he's a likeable guy who can sell the ridiculous line. When he tries to lecture his students on the finer points of geological theory, you're more likely to grin than you are to grimace. Every time he sets his jaw and tries to look intense, all I can think of is Encino Man. I think Frasier knows this and doesn't care. That's why it works.

The other actors are wholly forgettable. Josh Hutcherson plays the nephew whose iPhone is eaten by a giant sea monster (likely voiding the warranty) and Anita Briem is pretty bland as Hot Icelandic Mountain Guide (seriously, they call her that). An interesting bit of trivia via IMDB: Briem's special interests include travelling, encountering different cultures, reading and spending time with family. What a dynamic woman!

Those who have read the book can be safe in assuming the movie will end pretty much the same way, but the movie telegraphs this even more by having Frasier's explain the entire plot of the book half way in. There's tipping your hand and then there's Journey to the Center of the Earth. Since there can be no suspense as a result of the plot, the movie tries (if you can call it trying) to create tension by throwing in dinosaurs, glow-in-the-dark birds and a hanful of perilous falls. In one scene, our heroes fall for a good minute ("We're still falling!") , yet survive the fall without a scratch.

But hey, it's a PG-rated action movie that's being shown in 3D (though I only saw it in 2D) - what do you expect? I doubt Verne would be impressed, but a nine-year-old me probably would be.

The Express 3/5

Rated PG. Click here to view the trailer.

(For exclusive coverage of the premier by our Syracuse correspondent, click here and here.)

It’s hard to dump all over a movie that exposes the ugliness of prejudice and unfounded hate while showcasing the triumph of the human spirit, but I’m going to have to do it.

Rob Brown is Ernie Davis, the Syracuse halfback nicknamed The Elmira Express. He overcomes expectations, an inexplicable speech impediment (the movie promptly loses this subplot) and hate to become to become the first African American to win the coveted Heisman Trophy (1961). The movie follows his college career at ‘Cuse and focuses largely on his relationship with coach Ben Schwartwalder, played by Dennis Quaid. Coach Schwartzwalder is racist in a 1960s old-white-guy-who-thinks-he-is-tolerant-of-“negroes”-but-really-isn’t kind of way, although we wouldn’t have much of a movie if Davis’ heart and determination didn’t show him the beauty and value of every human being blah blah blah.

The Express is an OK effort but this same movie has just been done so many times and there's nothing special here, save that it's based on a true story. If you wanted to get picky about it, you might could argue that most movies owe something to previous films in their genre, but the underdog-football-triumph-over-adversity-drama-kum-by-yah thing has been done to death (see Remember the Titans, Any Given Sunday, Brian’s Song, Rudy, Invincible, heck, even The Little Giants).

There is a fairly significant Pride of the Yankees-style “life event” that happens to Davis near the end of the film (it’s common knowledge to any one who knows the story, but I didn’t know it so I won’t spoil it here), but it just tacks on an extra 30 minutes and deflates story that should already be over. Movies aren’t supposed to climax (here, it’s “the big game” vs. vile and racist Texas Longhorns in the Cotton Bowl for the national title, a feat I doubt Syracuse will be repeating this season) near the END of the movie but The Express barrels right on past it and keeps going. Think of it as scoring a touchdown then insisting on wading 20 yards into the stands to give the ball to a poor kid with leukemia. The “life event” would have been fine as a few words scrolling across the screen just before the end credits roll kills all the movie's momentum. Give credit to The Express for not exactly following the formula, but take it right back for failing to tell a good story. The story may be mostly true (more on that in a minute), but this is a feature film, not an HBO documentary narrated by Bob Costas.

Brown is decent at Davis, but he is just so stinking polite and earnest that it’s annoying and begins veer toward unbelievable. Maybe the real Davis was like that, I don't know. Quaid does a great job yelling and providing the only real drama in the movie. Sure, he comes to accept Davis but you know he'd have a conniption if Davis started dating his daughter.

The best acting job is turned in by Omar Benson Miller, who plays Davis’ black teammate, JB. His is actually a much more interesting story. He suffered just as much as Davis, but got none of the glory or recognition. As one of Davis' lineman, you could say he cleared the way for The Elmira Express., but figuratively and literally. I’d like to see a movie about him. I'd also wouldn't mind a movie about Davis' hero, Jim Brown, who preceded him at Syracuse. He undoubtedly faced more adversity and it is universal consensus he was denied the Heisman because of the color of his skin. I'm just not sure Davis merits a movie, rest his soul.

There’s no denying that Davis’ Heisman win was a big step toward racial equality, but does it really necessitate a full-length feature? I don’t mean to diminish his accomplishments. I’m sure a black man winning that award meant more than I can imagine. If I were thrust into his cleats, I would have given up and run home. But, being named the best football player in America doesn’t exactly rank high on my list of Civil Rights Landmarks. Should Halle Berry get a biopic because she was the first black woman to win the Oscar for Best Actress?

I'm picking on the movie for not embellishing the story and making it more movie friendly. "But then it's not true!" That might be, but the movie does take many liberties with reality, so why not take a few more and make a better story? A key moment in the film shows a matchup at West Virginia, where the redneck Mountaineer fans hurl beer bottles and slurs on Davis, thus giving oomph to the whole We Shall Overcome theme. The game on that date was against West Virginia, but it took place at Syracuse and there were no bottles thrown at him (although I do not doubt opposing players took cheap shots). Davis' quarterback, Dick Easterly, saw the movie and had this to say: "I apologize to the people West Virginia because that did not happen. The scene is completely fictitious. We're sitting watching this thing, saying, 'Jeez, where did they get that from?'"

The movie later shows the Orangemen being informed their black teammates cannot attend the Cotton Bowl MVP trophy (which Davis of course won) because the banquet is at an all-white country club. They of course boycott, showing those hillbilly Texans just how much more empathetic Yankees are. In reality, they attended and Davis accepted the trophy.

The movie also shows them riding a bus to that game, seeing racial injustice and Sorrow, riots over school intergration while they ride a bus 1,300 miles through Arkansas. Too bad they actually flew straight from Syracus to Dallas. Once they get to their Dallas hotel, the team's three black players are forced into a dirty broom closet. In reality, they had a suite.

Again, this is a movie and the writers are allowed to play with the truth to tell the story. Quaid reportedly said that "Sometimes if you get all the facts right, you miss the truth." In this case, I agree. Creative mainpulation can enahnce a story. But why make those changes to history and not massage Davis' character to make him more believable? I make this point not to come to the defense of WVU or racists that lived in Oklahoma's dingy basement, but for the sake of Story. For all his obstacles, Davis' rise to glory is just too easy and free of speedbumps. Where's the struggle? At least let his get angry once in a while or show him getting tackled for a loss. Let him get pissed off and punch an opposing player who has been wailing on him all game. Americans wants our heroes to have flaws!

Note: In other Ernie Davis continuity news, a statue of Davis on Syracuse' campus has him wearing shoes that weren't invented yet.

Another note: Easterly apparently agress with me that Jim Brown's story might make a better movie: "I [saw] a lot of things [in The Express] that never were done to Ernie but maybe happened to Jim Brown. Hell, the movie's more about him than Ernie."

A final note: To read more about the movie's inaccuracies (remember, I'm not saying playing with the truth in a movie is neccesarily wrong), and Davis' former teammates' thoughts on the movie, check out this excellent article.

Fireproof, 4/5

Rated PG. Click here to view the trailer.

I can’t tell you how happy I am to report that Christians have finally put together a decent movie. Fireproof is far far far from being a great movie, but for once we’ve done it right.

Growing Pains' pain-in-the-derriere Kirk Cameron is Caleb, a firefighter whose marriage to Catherine (Erin Bethea) is falling apart. He struggles with certain addictions and she has eyes for a doctor at the hospital where she is a PR hack. Excuse me, “PR practitioner.” She doesn’t respect him, but a guy who rescues complete strangers for a living, he doesn’t really deserve it. The both are lousy communicators who can only agree that a divorce is their best bet. This is a Christian movie with wedding rings in the poster, so we know they’re compelled to work things out, courtesy of a fellow firefighter and Caleb’s recently converted father.

I seriously doubt that any souls were saved by the Left Behind movie (another Kirk Cameron vehicle), but there’s an honest chance that this movie could actually make a difference in people’s lives and marriages. Cameron was so intent on maintain the integrity of the film’s message, that in the climactic scene when he and Catherine are supposed to kiss, he persuaded the director to make it a wide angle silhouette shot so he could fly the real Mrs. Cameron out and kiss her instead. I’ve heard some make fun of him for this acting “limitation,” but think it makes an enormously important statement A) about marriage in general and B) that he and the rest of the cast/crew truly believe what they’re saying. For once, this set of Chrsitians can’t be accused of hypocrisy.

Sure, non-Christians will likely find the movie preachy, but I can conceive of someone being legitimately convicted here if they’ll just give it a chance. I’m not the target audience for this movie (it is definitely aimed at couples), but I didn’t get bored, which was a major fear. There were actual twists in the plot that I did not see coming. Had I not lowered my expectations, I might have caught on earlier.

Cameron or Bethea aren’t going to win an Oscar any time soon. There aren’t any stellar thespians in Fireproof’s credits, but for a cast of nobodies with zero acting experience and an 80s child actor, they do a great job. Cameron got on my nerves at first, but he doesn’t do a half bad job. I’m proud of him and happy for him. Bethea is no Dame Judy Dench, but for the daughter of Sherwood Baptist Church’s (the church’s production company produced the film) pastor, she does a pretty respectable job.

It’s a pretty thin plot and the movie feels a little too long, but quite frankly my expectations were so low I’m willing to forgive it all. Sure, things are a little cheesy, but the acting is competent, the directing is competent, the soundtrack is competent, the editing is competent, the special effects and the script is competent. Sometimes I think God is less than thrilled with some of the “art” we produce in His name, but I have to think He probably gives this one a “see it” endorsement. Not that it really matters compared to His, but I give a “see it,” too. This movie doesn’t suck! Hooray!

One final thought: One of the movies flaws (there are a few) is the fire fighters that make up Cameron’s crew. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t meet some of the requirements for entering a firefighting academy, and these guys probably couldn’t either. Let's just say that human fat burns very well.

How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, 2/5

Rated R. Click here to view the trailer.

How to Lose Friends and Alienate People could win an award for truth in advertising. It certainly delivers on everything it promises in the title.

Sidney Young is a rabble rousing journalist who leaves his London-based tabloid for a job at the ultra-hip, ultra-exclusive Sharps Magazine (based on Vanity Fair). Sharps editor, Clayton Harding (played with relish by Jeff Bridges), is a maverick in the publishing world and puts up with Sidney’s antics, which include alienating the publicists of the very celebrities he’s paid to cover, inviting a C-list celebrity pig to a party and bringing a transvestite stripper to the office. On Bring Your Daughter to Work Day (“I didn’t know! We don’t have BYDTW Day in England!”).

The only person who even begins to appreciate Young and his eccentricities is his immediate editor, Alison (Kirsten Dunst). This is surprising since Young is such a wholly unlikeable bloke. Alison and Sidney develop a shaky friendship (based on La Dolce Vita), but that is derailed when Sidney runs off to pursue the Hollywood sex kitten dujour, Sophie Maes (Megan Fox).

Simon is normally a very funny man, but he’s such an inexplicable jerk in this movie that he ruins whatever comedic capital he had. Kristen Dunst is forgettable as are the numerous cameos by various movie stars who must have had nothing better to do that day. Megan Fox’s character is a Paris Hilton-like, Chihuahua-toting attention junkie, but I can’t tell if it’s because she’s a great actress or if she isn’t acting at all.

The Dolce Vita scenes are sweet and fun. They're one of the few redeeming qualities of this movie. Another is Young's attitude toward journalism. He’s isn’t afraid to piss off his interview subjects and works hard to come up with new and interesting angles and questions. Watching him call an art gallery to get caption information is pretty entertaining. The third is Jeff Bridges. His voice talent alone is worth the price of admission. A final redeeming factor is that this movie introduced me to MGMT’s Time to Pretend.

Based on the book by British alienation specialist Toby Young. The real Mr. Young, as well as Pegg’s version, is the arrogant prick to end all arrogant pricks, with just an ounce charm. He might be fun at an office Christmas party, but only for a few minutes before the trannies and farm animals show up. Mostly it loses viewers alienates movie-goers.

Eagle Eye, 3.5/5

Rated PG-13. Click here to view the trailer.

Pickers of nit and sayers of nay will have plenty to keep them busy during a screening of Eagle Eye. But, if you can allow yourself to settle in and overlook the HUGE lapses in logic and scientific fact, the nit and nay are easily pushed aside and we actually have a decent action movie here.

Shia "One Hand" LaBeouf is Jerry Shaw, a drifting slacker making ends meet by working at the local Kinkos. He comes home after attending his twin brother's funeral to find an apartment full of terrorists' wares and BOOM in bursts Billy Bob Thorton and the FBI.

He escapes soon enough with the help of his cell phone and the disembodied GPS Lady's voice, who takes the idea of Big Brother to a whole 'nother level. Not only can She give precise driving directions looking in on traffic cams ("Accelerate to 52 mph. You will make it though the traffic.") but She can control traffic lights, robot cranes at a junk yard, the power grid, Japanese tour buses and even the home theater department at Circuit City, not to mention eavesdrop on every single cell phone in the country simultaneously.

Big Sister decides Jerry needs a partner, so he is joined by the exceptionally pretty Rachel (Michelle Monaghan), a single mom whose extremely freckled son is going to play his trumpet for the President in Washington, DC. No points for guessing that that detail will become important later on.

There are also discussions of sibling rivalry, government intrusion on personal privacy, the rights and wrongs of fighting terrorism and technology's role in our lives. Frankly the movie doesn't care and so you really should try too hard searching for a coherent theme. We get treated to some very cool footage of Predator UAVs doing their thing. Cars blow up and there is TONS of collateral damage. It steals significantly from 2001: A Space Odyssey, especially as it attempts to tie up all the loose plot strings.

Given the reasoning Big Sister eventually gives for the Rube Goldbergian chase around the country (involving not only planes, trains, automobiles, but also a garbage barge and the aforementioned tour bus), it curious that She would go to such lengths and allow so many civilians to be killed in her wake. SLIGHT PLOT SPOILER: The Voice's eventual targets number 15, but the act of killing them will also kill at least 400 others, not including the sky-high death toll up to that moment.

You should be getting the idea by now. This is not a movie to be shown in Logic 101. Still, I found it pretty darn entertaining. Mr. LaBeouf may be a little bit of a pretty boy, but after Transformers, Indy IV and now this, he's turning a reasonably credible action star. He cracks lame jokes at time when my sense of humor would have been turned off, but hey, it's a movie. Monaghan isn't really required to do much, but what she does is perfectly satisfactory. Thornton is convincing as an FBI agent who, for once, is able to keep an open mind and look at the big picture as he pieces together the puzzle. Special Agent Perez (Rosario Dawson) is there to help, but she gets pretty much lost in the plot.

Eagle Eye is absolutely absurd and has very, very little going for it beyond Michael Bay-style special effects and extremely fast editing. In other words, Kristi Mahaffey would absolutely love it. For once, I agree with her.

Mamma Mia, 1/5

Rated PG-13. Click here to view the trailer.

Good Lord, this is an annoying movie. Amanda Seyfried is kinda cute. The End.

An American Carol, 2/5

Rated PG-13. Click here to view the trailer.

An American Carol has an excellent, excellent premise. It' s a shame the rest of movie can't even begin to live up to it. Why? Let's just say it has country music star Trace Atkins playing the Angel of Death.

Produced and directed by Jerry Zucker (the man behind Airplane! and The Naked Gun), Carol stars Kevin Farley (brother of deceased funny man, Chris) as a Michael Moore-style documentary maker, who, much like the real man, lives for pissing off Republicans. In the movie, he leads a group called "MooveAlong.Org" to ban the Fourth of July. A modern conservative take on Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, the Cratchit to his Scrooge is his nephew, Josh, who is fixing to ship out to Iraq. Just as the chubby filmmaker is beginning to shoot a feature film with some financial backing from some mysterious Afghanis, he falls asleep as is visited by ghosts who escort him through "real" America and he learns what a liberal wimp he has really been.

To say the movie's treatment of modern politics is heavy handed is a severe understatement. Then again, no one ever accused Michael Moore of being subtle either.

There are many conservatives that are great thinkers and artists, but none of them signed up for this movie. There are some relatively big names (Kelsey Grammer as General Patton, Dennis Hopper, Jon Voight as George Washington, Bill O'Reilly as himself and finally Leslie Nielsen) and some relatively small names (Kevin Sorbo, Kevin Farley, a Rosy O'Donnell lookalike) and I will say that the production values aren't horrible. Farley is OK because, let's face it, Michael Moore is a parody waiting to happen.

Things in this movie just don't work. Nielsen's narration was absolutely unnecessary. Even more unnecessary was the absolutely retarded Tiny Tim cadre of characters. I almost want to tell you to see it so you can see just how stupid that part is.

Call me a liberal commie sympathizing pinko if you want (not many have), but I am smart enough to realize that opposing the war doesn't necessarily mean you hate the troops. The movie doesn't. Still, is does paint of positive picture of NASCAR America and I'm tempted give them the benefit of the doubt. To an extent I agree with many of the sentiments this film espouses, even if they sometimes get out of hand.

So, you're also a conservative. Would you like this movie? Is a positive picture of America worth the hiccups? Judge for yourself based on these two scenes:

• ACLU lawyers dressed up as Zombies invade a court room. Grammer, the entire 3rd Mechanized Calvary Division, and Hopper fend them off with shotguns. As a stray shot nicks a copy of the Ten Commandments, Grammer dispatches another lawyer and asks "It is the one about not killing still up there?"
  
  
• Terrorist A calls out to one of his colleagues in a crowd: "Hey, Muhammad!" Every other terrorist answers. Terrorist A: "Dang it. I must remember to use last names. Muhammad Hussein!" Every terrorist answers. Haha.
  

It's not a great or even a good movie. It will do nothing to correct the popular image of Republicans and conservative Christians as ignorant boobs, even if there are some nuggets of truth in there. I must also point out that equating liberalism with wanting banish the Fourth of July is fairly large leap.

Conservative satire is a very hard thing to do, and the brother of a former SNL star and the guy behind "We have clearance, Clarence. Roger, Roger. What's our vector, Victor?" are not the people to do it. Hollywood and America could use a good conservative Dickensian fairy tale, I just wish they'd been smarter about it. All that said, my boss loved it.

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, 3.5/5

Rated PG-13. Click here to view the trailer.

The opening lines of Ecclesiastes have Solomon lamenting "Vanity of vanities! All is vanity!" Vanity here means "in vain" and not narcissism. The original Hebrew is more properly translated at wisp of smoke or a puff of breath. All the temporal things man clings to on this planet are futile, pure vanity.

This movie is pure vanity. Call it Garden State Lite. It's nothing too special, but Michael Cera and Kat Dennings, the two titular characters, as well as one very funny drunk elevate it to far more than the sum of its parts or the swiss cheese of its plot holes

Nick is a bass player for a band that can't settle on a name, but most of his time is spent composing mix CDs (the sixth Love Language) for his cheating ex, Tris (Alexis Dziena). Tris immediately tosses each mix, which is then pick up and devoured by Norah. Norah's best friend, Caroline (Ari Graynor), gets drunk. (That's pretty much her only contribution, but she does it very well.)

N&N meet cute in a club (since when are high school seniors allowed to frequent NYC night clubs?) and spend the night alternately chasing a mythical indie rock band named Where's Fluffy? and the drunkenly lost, gum-smacking Caroline. (I love Queen but I'm not sure I'd chase even them around the Five Boroughs until the sun rises.)

As I mentioned, Cera and Dennings are the highlights. Cera continues in his trademark nerdy, uncomfortable, sensitive guy with an incredibly cute girlfriend that began on Arrested Development and continued through Superbad, Juno and now N&N. One wonders if he fears being typecast, but these are the roles he was born to play. Plus he gets to drive a Yugo. I was initially unimpessed by Dennings, but her smile big eyes and awkward jokes won me over.

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist is nothing but cotton candy. It's a cinematic vanity of vanities with a great sound track. But hey, if it's going to be fluff, at least it tastes good.

(Forgive the forced biblical allusion. I just took my first Old Testament history exam and have Ecclesiastes on the brain. That sounds like a disease.)