I guess when a man kills another man by shoving a carrot in his mouth, then through the back of his neck you know what kind of movie you’re getting into.

Shoot ‘Em Up starts with a sequence probably never seen before in movie history. As a pregnant woman is being chased by bad guys with guns, a man waiting for a bus, the enigmatic Mr. Smith (Clive Owen), decides to get involved. Of course the woman goes into labor during the gunfight. Our hero must take out about ten bad guys while trying to deliver the baby. The child is born and Smith caps it off by cutting the umbilical cord by shooting it. The woman dies and Smith makes it his mission to protect the little guy. Along the way he enlists the help of a lactating hooker (Monica Bellucci).

The bad guys are lead by Mr. Hertz (Paul Giamatti). Who Hertz works for and why they want the baby dead is a mystery at first but after being revealed is actually kind of a clever plot device.

This is a film meant to be taken with a grain of salt. There is no greater meaning behind the scenes here. No message to get, no lesson to learn. It is simply an orgy of action and violence. Clearly inspired in equal parts by Bugs Bunny and Quentin Tarantino.

Sure the action gets a bit tedious by the end. But writer/director Michael Davis wisely keeps the running time a few minutes shy of an hour and a half. The plot, what little of it there is, moves along like a Grand Theft Auto-type video game. Gun battles and bad jokes for twenty minutes at time, a five minute cut scene (to advance the story) and then it is back to the blood and guts.

Most of the acting is over the top. Bellucci does little more than look good and over-act. Giamatti goes all out to ham it up as the villain and has fun with lines like:

Mr. Hertz: My god. Do we really suck or is this guy really that good?

Owen plays his usual understated type. Looking and sounding like he has something better to do yet always coming off as cool. I just wonder what is up with him playing the baby protecting hero in two movies in a row.

Shoot ‘Em Up feels like the kind of movie that was written by a teenage boy who just wants to make a movie that includes all the things that make life worth living. That joy translates into the movie but quickly gets tiring. Once the viewer gets past the craziness and accepts it for what it is the imagination of the violence gets monotonous. The film goes to the well too many times with stuff like the carrot eating. It is scenes where the movie truly turns convention on its side, such as when Smith tries to pay for ammo with food stamps, that the movie really works. S.E.U starts with a bang, but soon goes limp.

The Upside: Owen, Giamatti, Bellucci: The Holy Trinity of cool!

The Downside: Shoot ‘Em Up is a one trick pony.

On The Side: If you like Looney Tunes cartoons, Kill Bill Vol. 1, or the comic book Preacher, you might like Shoot ‘Em Up.

What was worth the hype? Which films surprised? Will the bottom of my shoe ever stop sticking to the theater floor? The answers can be found in the 2007 Summer Movie Wrap-up!

What was good?

Spider-Man 3 – Sure it was a drop off from the second film but it still delivered the goods.

Waitress – Keri Russel is sweet as pie in this one.

What was bad?

Lucky You- Good cast + Good screenwriter + Good director = forgettable Lifetime movie of the week.

What did I miss?

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End – Felt the first one was over-rated.

Once – Wanted to catch it but never did.

Shrek 3 – Just didn’t care.

What was good?

Knocked Up – Best movie of the summer, God Bless Judd Apatow.

Oceans Thirteen – Fun but forgettable summer fluff.

Sicko – Michael Moore is usually entertaining whether you agree with his politics or not.

What was bad?

Evan Almighty – Worst movie of the summer, maybe of the year.

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer & Live free or Die Hard – Not bad so much as disappointing.

What did I miss?

1408, Mr. Brooks, A Mighty Heart, Surf’s Up, Nancy Drew, and Hostel 2 – Just didn’t care

Ratatouille & Daywatch – Wanted to see but just slipped through the cracks.

What was good?

The Simpson’s Movie – Feels like a good episode of the show.

Sunshine – Okay, but not great.

What was bad?

Transformers – Just because is a movie is trying to be fun, doesn’t give it an excuse to be bad.

I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry – Not even Jessica Biel’s sweet ass could save this stinker.

What did I miss?

License to Wed, Joshua, Hairspray, No Reservations, and I Know Who Killed Me – Just didn’t care.

Rescue Dawn & Talk To Me – Still want to see but missed due to limited release nonsense.

Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix – I’ve missed the last two in this series and didn’t want to see this one until I saw the other two.

What was good?

Superbad – I am McLovin this movie!

Death at a Funeral – A little slow to start but very funny once it gets going.

Stardust -Flawed but fun grown up fairy tale.

What was bad?

Nothing I’ve seen so far.

What did I miss?

Hot Rod, Underdog, El Cantante, Bratz, Skinwalkers, Rush Hour 3, Daddy Day Camp, The Invasion, War, Mr. Beans Holiday, and September Dawn – Just didn’t care.

Might see – The Bourne Ultimatum, Balls of Fury, and Halloween.

So it was an up and down summer. Way too many three-quels and not enough really good movies this year. But still there is enough escapism to keep it from being a total loss. Ultimately, summer 2007 is just a mostly forgettable summer.

Summer 2007 Final Grade: C

On The Side: My shoe doesn’t really stick to the floor. The theaters I go to are usually clean…

Johnson will play a Las Vegas cab driver who picks up a pair of siblings with magical powers. Produced by Andrew Gunn from a script most recently credited to Matt Lopez, Witch Mountain is a follow up to the 1975 film Escape to Witch Mountain also released by Disney.

Production will begin in March.

On The Side: Dwayne Johnson also stars in the long delayed ‘Southland Tales’. A departure from his family friendly films as it features Sarah Michelle Gellar as a pornstar! ‘Southland Tales’ is tentatively scheduled for Nov. 9, 2007 release date. I’ll believe it when I see it.

The former Tony and Emmy winner is currently filming Australia in, you guessed it, Australia. The thinking is an Aussie based Wolverine shoot would free up Jackman for any ADR work and/or re-shoots for the Baz Luhrmann epic.

Wolverine is expected to shoot this November for a possible 2008 release.

On the side: Dougray Scott was initially cast as Wolverine in the first X-men movie. He had to step down after shooting for Mission: Impossible II ran too long. Hugh Jackman was then tabbed to slip on the claws for his career making role.

Remember how cool it was to watch Speed Racer? How the Mach 5 was the coolest damn car in the whole world because of all the cool technology that was on it? Well The Wachowski Brothers remember that also. So how fitting that the tech savvy siblings are going to use a revolutionary new film system to tell Speed’s story?

Our friends at FirstShowing.net are reporting the live action adaptation will be filmed with Full Focus cameras. This new system will record the films in layers. Allowing both the foreground and background to be in focus at the same time. Just like the Speed Racer cartoon.

What is even more unusual about this story is the source: Actress Susan Sarandon.

They’re using some high def thing that comes with guards and it’s beyond anything I’ve ever…. I saw 10 minutes before I left, they did a special thing for me cause they’re just wrapping and having a party tonight, they were still working after I left. They’re doing something where they’re layering film so that the front and the back are in focus like a cartoon and they’re also doing two dimensional and three dimensional stuff and mixing and everything is very, very saturated with some new kind of film, so they actually have to treat the actors in some way so we can hold our own with the background. So it’s every color that wasn’t in The Matrix is seriously in this film.

Speed Racer is scheduled to open May 9, 2008.

On The Side: Speed Racer isn’t the first cartoon Susan Sarandon, who plays Mom Racer, has helped bring to the big screen. She also voiced Coco in The Rugrats go to Paris.

When I was in high school my friends and I would stay out all night and go wild. Sometimes we would drink, sometimes we would sneak around in dark clothing while performing the most idiotic and inane acts of petty vandalism, and sometimes we would just drive around. The best part of these misbegotten nights was the start of the evening, everyone leaving their houses and meeting up at a predetermined location. These moments were thick with excitement and the feeling that anything could happen.

As I got older those moments happened less and less. The group grew up, some married, some didn’t, some had kids, some didn’t, some friends drifted away while others stayed close, we all started working and life became full of routines. Then along comes a movie like Superbad and that feeling of unpredictability is back, at least for two hours.

Superbad tells the story of three friends. Seth, Evan, and Fogell have managed to make it through high school without getting laid and are worried their inexperience with woman will hurt them in college. Evan and Fogell got into Dartmouth but Seth is going to State. This complicates things as Seth and Evan are best friends and the thought of separating runs just under the surface of the entire movie.

After getting invited to a popular girl’s party the boys offer to buy the booze in an effort to score before leaving for college. Fogell gets a fake I.D. with the now famous “McLovin” moniker. But when he tries to get the alcohol trouble goes down. Seth and Evan bail at the first site of the police and get caught up in their misadventures, while Fogell is whisked away by two of the funniest and inept cops in movie history.

Officer Michaels: McLovin?
Officer Slater: [pause] That’s such a cool name.
Officer Michaels: I know. It sounds like a sexy hamburger.

What sets Superbad apart from most teen comedies is the balance of story and humor. Like John Hughes movies or Fast Times at Ridgemont High there is just enough plot and character development to get emotionally invested in these characters without sacrificing laughs. This isn’t just another night in their lives, it is a turning point for each of them, albeit in different ways.

The casting is pitch perfect. Jonah Hill and Michael Cera are a great comedy team in the mold of Vince Vaughn and John Favreau. Hill plays Seth with so much vulgarity and obnoxiousness it’s almost over the top. But he somehow manages enough charm to get us to root for him.

Seth: [referring to Evan's mother] I am truly jealous you got to suck on those tits when you were a baby.
Evan: Yeah, well, at least you got to suck on your dad’s dick.
Seth: [shrugs] It’s a nice lookin’ dick.

Evan on the other hand has the same nervous calm and naivety that Cera perfected as George Michael Bluth on “Arrested Development”. Chistopher Mintz-Plasse as Fogell/McLovin, a part he was born to play, has delivered one of the most memorable catch phrases of the last several years, “I Am McLovin”!

Full of explosive laughs, vulgar language, and dick drawings this is yet another in a string of winners from producer Judd Apatow (“Freaks and Geeks”, “Undeclared”, The 40-year-old Virgin, and Knocked Up). By remembering how wonderfully awkward it is to be on the verge of growing up Apatow is able to find poignant humor in any situation. Superbad is the funniest movie of the year and well worth your time.

The Upside: Funniest movie of the year!

The Downside: You’ll wish you were young/cool enough to get into keggers again.

On the side: If you liked Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Knocked Up or Sixteen Candles, you should like Superbad.

One of the awkward things about funerals is meeting all the of the deceased acquaintances. No matter how well you think you knew the departed, odds are there is somebody else in attendance who knew them in a completely different light. So imagine meeting Peter (Peter Dinklage) at your father’s funeral. Peter catches your eye right away, he’s a midget after-all, and asks to talk. He then shows pictures of your father and him dressed as Romans and you soon figure out Peter was more than just “Dad’s friend’.

Death at a Funeral follows the service for the recently deceased patriarch of a middle-class British family. We have a good idea what to expect after the opening scene when the wrong body is delivered to the family. After the right body finally shows up and the service can begin. Enter the bereaved: Daniel (Matthew MacFayden) is the slightly neurotic son who is doing his best to keep things together while making to plans to break away. Robert (Rupert Graves) is the successful but flaky older brother who seems more interested in picking up girls than actually mourning his father. Cousin Martha (Daisy Donovan) shows up with her fiancee Simon (Alan Tudyk) seeking the approval of her father. Simon has a problem though, he accidentally takes some hallucinogenic drugs and precedes to “trip out” during the course of the day. Throw in various aunts, uncles, friends, neighbors, and blackmailing gay midgets and the madness begins.

Story-wise this is not groundbreaking material here. It is your basic dysfunctional family. Everyone has their own baggage and they all mostly seem to work through it. They all have reasons to be caught up in their own worlds and not give a crap about everyone else. Of course by the end of the movie they all have a greater understanding of what means to be a part of a family and blah, blah, blah. It’s not really about any of that, it’s about making an audience laugh.

What saves this film from being like all the other dysfunctional family films are two key performances. Alan Tudyk is absolutely superb as Simon. Suffering from an anxiety attack he takes what he thinks are a couple of Valium, not knowing it’s acid. Soon after he is urging toilet paper to be free before he ends up naked on the roof of a house. Also memorable is Peter Dinklage as the grieving secret lover. Just the shock of his being there is enough for some nervous laughter, but his “jack-in-the-box” moment makes his performance one of the funniest of the year.

Death at a Funeral is a manic romp from director Frank Oz (Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, What about Bob?, and Bowfinger). Oz has a great Robert Altman-like talent for managing large casts into organized chaos but this also leads to the film biggest flaw.

It takes too long to set all the pieces into place. The pacing for the first half of the movie is slow with only a few funny parts. This is somewhat forgivable since we’re dealing with a large and very diverse group of characters. A few more jokes early on would have helped though. Luckily things pick up about halfway through and never looks back. Death at a Funeral is not the funniest film you will ever see, but it is worth your time.

If you liked Six Feet Under, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, or Elizabethtown you might like Death at a Funeral.

Danny Boyle’s Sunshine is a movie that is not sure what it wants to be. It starts out as a Science-fact type movie. We meet the crew and discover their specialties as well as what life might be like if one were to take such a trip. Next we are shown the emotional rigors of such an important mission when Capa (Cillian Murphy) and Mace (Chris Evans, who is quickly becoming a great actor) soon start brawling after a disagreement. Mace is sent to a “holo-deck” type room, it’s nice to see that Star Trek: The Next Generation is still relevant in the future, to cool off and be reminded of what it is they are trying to save. At this point the movie would lead us to believe it is a psychological thriller.

It next switches gears to a mystery. Icarus-1 is discovered and after great debate the crew boards the ship to investigate what happened to the first team. Without giving a whole lot away the movie also becomes a 2001: A Space Odyssey-esque riddle, a Jaws-like man vs. nature struggle. and finally an Alien type thriller. If you’re going to steal, steal from the best.

But the worst transformation is into a cliche. Though I’d never watched this movie before, I felt liked I’d seen it. For instance, there is a scene late in the movie when the computer notifies Capa that there is a fifth person on board the ship, at this point half the crew was killed or has sacrificed themselves for the sake of the mission. Like any rational person might do he asks the computer where this fifth person is. The computer replies that the location is the observation deck. Now, instead of alerting the others, he goes to the O.D. on his own. For a brilliant scientist this guy is pretty stupid.

Where Sunshine succeeds is the execution of these imitations. Even though it is familiar territory the sequences are quite effective. For instance, at one point the shields that protect Icarus-2 from the sun are damaged. Two of the crew have to go out and repair them. Fortunately the ship is turned so they will be in the shade. But when unforeseen circumstances cause the ship to rotate it becomes a race to repair the craft and get to safety in time. The rest of the crew is forced to passively watch as event spiral out of their control.

Sunshine is not a bad flick, but it is not a good one either. I applaud director Danny Boyle in his diversity of projects. In the last eleven years he’s tackled such genres as drug addiction (Trainspotting), romantic comedy (A life less ordinary), zombie film (28 days later), and sentimental family film (Millions) with varying degrees of success. He is trying to accomplish something different with each film. Ultimately it is that desire to be different that de-rails Sunshine.

Final Grade: C

The Upside: Good special effects, decent acting, and some quality kills.

The Downside: Trust me, you’ve seen this all before.

On The Side: If you liked Event Horizon, Alien, or Mission to Mars you might like Sunshine.

The Simpsons Movie starts out like a typical episode, Marge is doing housework, Lisa is campaigning for the environment, and Homer and Bart are driving each other nuts. Homer acquires a pig and soon is walking it on the ceiling. They get a lot of mileage out of the Spider-pig jokes. At the same time Lake Springfield is becoming a dumping ground, it’s become so polluted that one more dump could cause terrible damage to the environment. Of course this warning falls on deaf ears and Homer dumps the pig’s poo in the lake. The government puts a giant dome over Springfield and The Simpsons are chased out of town. With everything falling apart Homer and family must find a way to save Springfield.

The humor works very well. It’s that trademark Simpsons humor where you have the stupidest gags, Bart riding his skateboard naked through town and all the clever ways to cover his twig and berries, along with clever satire such as Homer’s commentary on why anyone would pay to get something they can get for free. The jokes fly with reckless abandon. Not all work but, most do.

The downside is there is nothing to really get emotionally invested in. We’ve seen variations of this story for years on the show. I think everyone understands that Homer will find a way to save Springfield and keep the family together.

As I touched on before, the lack of supporting characters dragged things down. Don’t get me wrong almost everyone is there but little time is spent with any of them. It would have been folly to make the movie longer than it already is, but a more inventive story could have worked a few of them in.

But enough of all that, I came to The Simpsons Movie to laugh and I did. Some people feel this movie is perhaps a few years too late. The show has definitely delcined in years, though it still has its moments. The decision to bring in an “all-star” writing team from previous seasons paid off.

The Simpsons Movie is a solid piece of work. It’s like watching an above average episode of the show. It moves the story along and keeps you laughing all the way through the end credits. More importantly it won’t leave thinking “Worst Movie Ever”.

If you like The Simpsons TV show, The South Park movie, or classic Flintstones cartoons, you should like The Simpsons Movie.

Set in New Zealand, we are introduced to Lily, (Loren Horsley) a sweet but homely girl who works at a “Meaty Boy” restaurant. It’s clear from the start that she has a difficult time interacting with people. She is quiet, fidgety, and not popular with her co-workers. When her store has to let someone go Lily’s name is pulled out of the hat. Only later does she discover her name was the only one in the hat. The only person she seems to connect with at all is her brother Damien (Joel Tobeck) since their parents died years before and the two take care of each other.

On one of Lily’s last days at work Jarrod (Jemain Clement) gives her an invitation to his party. This excites Lily, as she has been eying him for a while, until he asks that she give it to a co-worker, one who ends up refusing it. Donning a shark costume–the party’s theme is dress as your favorite animal–Lily goes to the party instead. Once there she advances to the finals of a Mortal Kombat-style video game tournament. Jarrod obliviously trounces Lily while she stares at him.

As Lily and Jarrod’s relationship advances, Lily finds out that Jarrod is training for a mission. He wants to go back to his hometown to exact revenge on a high school bully, who he hasn’t seen in twenty years. Not being able to afford the trip Lily offers help in the form of her brother. Damien drives the pair and Lily spends a week getting to know Jarrod and his family.

Almost any review of Eagle Vs. Shark you will read is going to compare the movie to Napoleon Dynamite. And rightly so. really feels as though the characters are just adult versions of the ones we met in the previous film. That’s not to say that this movie is a direct ripoff, but it is clearly inspired by Napoleon Dynamite. For example, while taking a break from nun chuck training for the big fight, Jarrod tries to taunt his unknowing opponent with prank phone calls:

Man on phone: D’you want to leave a message?
Jarrod: Tell him that justice is waiting for him.
Man on phone: OK Justin. Thank you. Bye bye.
[hangs up]
Jarrod: No, justice. Justice.

It’s the odd unexpected moments like this that are the funniest. The big showdown with the bully is like no other fight captured on film. Definitely the comedic highlight of the movie.

The biggest problem in the film is Jarrod. To put it frankly, he’s an asshole. He is very selfish. While the pair are cleaning out a closet, Lily finds a candle Jarrod made and after seeing how much she likes it he takes it from her. He also lies about his parents being dead and the fact that he has a daughter. When Jarrod dumps Lily because he thinks he has a chance with another girl I was hoping she would wise up and move on. There is a reason for his behavior, but I never felt that the reason really excused any of it. Outside of loneliness, it’s hard to find anything that would make Lily want to be with him.

Eagle Vs. Shark is one of the strangest, most original films in a long time. The characters all are very unique. These aren’t the kind of people you would soon forget after meeting them. There is some cut-away animation that has its own style, but which ultimately prove to be nothing more than a bit distracting.

Basically, this movie is so different that I really wanted to like it, but the romance between Lily and Jarrod feels forced and that derails the rest of the movie. For something so different from all the romantic comedies that Hollywood puts out, this Kiwi import ends up feeling just like everything else.

If you liked Napoleon Dynamite, Saturday Night Live movies, or The Fisher King, you might like Eagle Vs. Shark.

The movie opens at a U.S. Army base in Qatar. A mysterious helicopter lands without identifying itself. After all the precautions are taken, every points weapons at it, the pilots are instructed to leave the chopper. It then morphs into a giant robot and starts tearing up the base and killing as many of the soldiers as it can, though a few get away. The robot then hacks into the computers looking for a specific piece of info. We then flash to L.A. and Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf), a teenager about to get his first car. Guess what the car turns out to be? Yep, a transforming robot, that chooses Sam more than Sam chooses it. Sam uses the car to try and impress the beautiful Mikaela (Megan Fox). Eventually his car starts acting strange. Sam soon learns that his car is Bumblebee, a robot guardian sent here to protect him. After a quick one-on-one fight with a transforming cop car, Bumblebee soon contacts the other Autobots (the good guys) and they come crashing to earth. Sam was chosen because he has a pair of glasses that belonged to his great-grandfather who was an antarctic explorer. A hundred years ago Megatron, the decepticon leader (the bad guys) had come to earth looking for the “allspark”, a cube that can bring life to their planet or be used to destroy planets. Megatron was frozen in the ice until he was discovered by old man Witwicky. The location of the allspark was embedded on the pair of glasses. That is why everyone is fighting.

Decent enough setup but by the time we learn all this the movie is half over. At this point we’ve had only one fight between robots and lot of lame jokes that don’t work half the time. We haven’t seen Megatron at the halfway mark and never get a feel of just how mean/tough/vicious he is supposed to be. In fact you never get a real idea of who any of the robots are except for Optimus Prime and Bumblbee. These are supposed to be the stars of this movie. As good as Shia LeBouf is in the movie, he has the only memorable performance in it, no one ever said “Oh boy, they are making a Transformers movie starring Shia!!!”

When we finally do get robot on robot action it’s poorly filmed. Bay loves his quick cuts, shaky cameras, and close up shots. All of that makes the action impossible to follow. One minute Megatron and Prime are duking it out. All of a sudden we cut to Sam on the run being chased by Megatron and Prime is nowhere to be found. We never see how Megatron gave the autobot leader the slip or anything. It just gets so confusing there is no point in trying to make sense of it all. I just waited for it to end.

That is not even taking in to account the many plot holes and poor choices. Take for instance the little Decepticon who infiltrates Air Force One by turning into a boom box and hiding under a seat. People can’t even get toe-nail clippers on a commercial flight but I’m supposed to believe a boom box can mysteriously show up on the President’s plane? There is a scene where the Army shows off what the allspark can do by zapping a Nokia cell phone. It turns into a little robot that fires bullets and missiles. Or the biggest plot gaffe, the glasses. When Megatron imprints the location of the cube on them it is in the Antarctic. Yet when Optimus Prime decodes it seventy some years later, the imprint leads to the cubes new location, underneath the Hoover Dam.

I was more disappointed in what saw this movie had potential. The special effects were great. The robots looked real and a part of the world they inhabited. Some of the humor worked. When Mikeala walks away from Sam and Bumblee the radio belts out Player’s “Baby come back”. Stuff like that was funny. Shia LeBouf was very good as the teenage kid learning there is more than meets the eye to his first car. The outline of the story was okay, there was just not enough to back it up.

Some people say it’s foolish to try and read so much into a film like Transformers. That it is just supposed to be fun and go along with the flow. On the surface I agree with that statement. But just because a movie is “fun” or is a “kids movie” doesn’t make it okay to be just plain bad. Transformers is a bad movie. If you liked The Rock, Armageddon, or Robo Jox you might like Transformers.

For anyone who hasn’t seen the trailer let me lay it out for you. Evan Baxter (Carell) is a newly elected congressman. He moves his family to Washington D.C., checks his staff into their new office, and prepares to make a difference in the world. He so prepared to do this that the night before his big day he prays to God (Freeman) to make it so. The next morning his General Electric clock goes off early at 6:14. Gen. 6:14. Genesis 6:14 the Bible verse! If you actually think that is funny then stop reading this and go see the movie. Anyway, it’s the bible passage where God tells Noah to build the ark. Evan goes outside to find a tool box and wood delivered to his house. God then talks to Evan and tells him a flood is coming and he wants an ark built. Of course Evan doesn’t believe him until there are animals, traveling in pairs, following him all over. Finally Evan gets the idea that maybe he should do this and the supposed hilarity starts.

But most of the humor is flat. Evan does a little dance that can be a little humorous at first but the joke wears out the second, third, fourth time, etc… There are a lot of scenes animals poop, spit, pee, hump, or makes a faces. Yeah, that is great if I’m twelve.

Of course along the way it is filled with little “life lessons”. Ark, for example, stands for Acts of Random Kindness. Most politicians are greedy and don’t care about the environment. We should always give stray dogs water.

Besides being not funny, and so sweet it will give you a toothache, there are two huge flaws. 1) The characters are so unbelievable, especially Evan’s family. He takes over as a congressman but they complain he is not at home enough. Are we supposed to believe that being a lawmaker is a 40 hour a week job? Look, I know you shouldn’t get too realistic in a film like this but come on, aren’t these supposed to be real people here?

2) Animals follow Evan everywhere he goes, he can’t shave his beard because it grows instantly back, his clothes disappear and he can only wear robes. Yet NO ONE believes him when he says he talks to God. What? Has he all of a sudden become the world’s greatest illusionist? Part of what made the Oh God! movies so good was God didn’t get involved in theatrics. In those movies the characters cannot prove to anyone that God is real. Here the evidence is every where but no one wants to believe. If a water stain that resembles the Virgin Mary appears on an overpass people come from all over to worship it. In Evan Almighty, a man builds an ark and has animals following him but not one person buys it.

The good news, Jonah Hill is funny and Wanda Sykes has a couple of good lines. That is it.

As I sat in the theater and the lights came up I thought, “well, at least children and the elderly will like it”. I saw kids laughing and smiling and figured my assessment was right on the money. But then I saw on old man, and he looked pissed! Another area the movie failed in.

If you liked Veggie Tales, Bible-man, or Davey and Goliath, you might like Evan Almighty.

The bad teams just mine the history and try to retread what works. Often they resort to cheap laughs and throw in fan-favorite characters for no reason at all. The creators never inject any real passion into it. In the end the reader understands the only reason that issue was published was to have something out that month. The creators of Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer seem to only aspire to the latter.

The movie begins with a large ominous cloud sweeping over an unnamed planet. After the storm passes the orb is now desolate and looks incapable of hosting life. Out of this a silver object is seen streaking toward Earth. We then catch up with the F.F. Reed (Ioan Gruffudd) and Sue (Jessica Alba) are planning another wedding. It seems like every-time they start a ceremony some catastrophic event occurs and the team must must come to the rescue. Johnny (Chris Evans) and Ben (Michael Chiklis) are just where we left them from the last film. The hot shot and the lovable oaf. A group of military personnel led by General Hager (Andre Braugher) arrive to ask for Reed’s help. It appears that the silver object is actually a man on a surf board. This “Silver Surfer” has been traveling around the planet and leaving strange craters in his wake. Reed creates a machine that can track the surfer. The surfer shows up in time to interrupt the wedding and Johnny takes off after him. While all this is going on Dr. Doom (Julian McMahon) has reawakened from his coma-like state and makes his move for power.

It’s a good set up but, it takes almost half the movie to get there. Unfortunately we are bombarded with humor that never quite works. It’s mostly “cutesy” jokes. Look how Reed stretches, Johnny lights something on fire to impress a girl, Sue puts up a force field and smashes Reed’s face, and Ben, well Ben is big and rocky. They filled the last movie with this type of stuff and try out all the old material here.

They missed some great opportunities to be witty or do something original. For instance, in an early scene Johnny is shown with a costume covered advertisements. He looks more like a NASCAR driver. This could have been a great place to do some witty humor about fame and advertising. Instead later in the film when we finally see the Fantasticar, it has the Dodge logo all over it. They do a bad “This thing have a hemi?” joke. It is not funny, and turns out to be distracting.

Or later in the film when the team is in a forest, setting up devices that can capture the Silver Surfer. As Ben is setting up his device a bear comes out of the woods and growls at him. Ben tells the bear “I don’t want to hurt you”, but the bear just growls again. I was hoping there would be some kind of conflict here. The Thing wrestling a bear is the kind of cool throw away moment you would see in a comic. Not here though, Ben growls back and scares the bear away. What a waisted opportunity.

However, the movie is not a complete train wreck. When the actual plot is happening it’s not bad. The special effects are decent, only towards the end does it look like a cartoon. Those not familiar with the comics will find a little mystery as to who the Silver Surfer is and what he is doing. The character of Dr. Doom is handled right this time. He is more concerned about beating the Surfer to steal his power then getting simple revenge. McMahon plays him much more menacing as opposed to the whinier Doom of the first film.

After being so disappointed by The Fantastic Four, I lowered my expectations for this one. The trailers looked really cool which gave some hope. But the finished product is merely tepid. The plot works but the humor doesn’t. If the film had been longer it may have had time to redeem itself. The cast is competent, but if there is going to be another film, new writers and a different director are needed. A creative team that can not only awe us, but put the “Fantastic” in the Fantastic Four.

If you liked The Fantastic Four, Daredevil, or Ghost Rider, you should like Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.