The Incredible Hulk: HULK SMASH!

Sometimes, before I write my own review, I read what others have had to say. I know, I shouldn't do that, it might taint my own opinion. But I do. and I have a question for some of the other reviewers out there regarding The Incredible Hulk.

What the hell were you expecting? Dr. Zhivago? It's a Beautiful Life? The Godfather, maybe? Fiddler on the Roof, hmm?

This is THE INCREDIBLE HULK. Wanna know what it's about? A guy who gets pissed off every now and then, and turns into a giant green monster who smashes the crap out of everything in sight. So you know what you need to be in the mood for before you go see it?

Yeah- a giant green monster smashing the crap out of everything in sight.

And you wanna know what I was in the mood for when I went to see it? A giant green monster. Smashing the crap out of everything in sight.

And you know what they gave me? EVERYTHING I WANTED, AND MORE.

This movie was friggin AWESOME. He tears a cop car in half- IN HALF- with his BARE HANDS- and uses the halves as BOXING GLOVES. What's not to like here??

There is no message here, beyond the obvious metaphor regarding controlling your anger. There is no attempt to win an Oscar going on here. I didn't go to see this in hopes of being lifted up on cloud 9 and taught to be a better person.

I came to watch a giant green monster smash the crap out of everything he could possibly smash the crap out of. And I was entertained.

I am giving The Incredible Hulk a 9 out of 10, for smashing the crap out of everything in sight. And I am giving other reviewers the bird for thinking they were going to see Ben Hur, or The Sound of Music.

The Happening: Happening Now at a Theater Near You.

Have you heard of M. Night Shyamalan? He's a brilliant young director who many have hailed as the "New Alfred Hitchcock." I don't think anyone believes that moniker any more than he does, and this movie almost comes across as a business card with "The New Alfred Hitchcock" emblazoned across the top of it.

I guess it doesn't outright rip off movies like "The Birds" and "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", but if you've ever seen those movies and their ilk, this one will feel awwwwwwfully familiar to you.

That's not a bad thing. It's kind of nice to watch a creepy, End-of-the-World-as-We-Know-It movie every so often. They don't make enough of those anymore. Horror has been abdicated to the cliche' in recent years. It used to be the launching pad for new talent; now it's the cemetery for has-been Big name stars. It seems that every single film takes place in the dead of night, in a darkened house, with someone sneaking up behind someone else at some point in the film, and some creepy, jerky, twisted-human-form special effects thrown in. Yaaaaaaaaaaawn.... is that really scaring anyone anymore?

This one takes place in the bright, glaring sunlight, from beginning to end, and while I hesitate in calling it "original", I don't in calling it "skillful". It's not easy to scare an audience in broad daylight, but he does it. He does, however, resort to some in-your-face shocking moments to put fear into your heart, and that was somewhat of a disappointment to me. It almost seems like cheating.

So if you have a strong stomach and you like to be creeped out, and especially if you're a fan of his earlier films, go ahead and see this one. You're more likely than not to enjoy it. I give it a 6 out of 10.

Kung Fu Panda- There is No Charge for Awesomeness!

When I wrote my Summer Movie Preview, I placed this film on my list of "Upcoming Movies that are Going to Suck." My sincerest apologies to everyone out there who missed this film because of that. This is hands down one of my favorites so far this summer.

Let me explain my mistake: Kung Fu Panda. I thought to myself, "Oh great, they exhausted the Penguin motif, so now they're going to overdo the Panda films." Well, it's still quite possible they will, but don't miss out on this because of that; save your silent stay-at-home protests for the later, lesser films in the genre that are sure to come.

This story has your typical "Every-Day Guy Dreaming of Bigger-and-Better Things" theme to it, accompanied by that "We All Have a Champion Inside Us" cliche'. But come on, it has an enormously fat panda doing Kung Fu, and it has JACK BLACK humor to boot! And let me just say, after seeing this, I vote that all Kung Fu movies be required to stage their fight scenes with CGI cartoon animals instead of live actors.

I'm giving this an 8 out of 10, and I'm going to recommend it to everyone, even if you don't have kids! Bring along a niece or nephew or something though, because single guys alone in cartoon movies always look like pedofiles.

You Don't Laugh During The Zohan (very much)

I have never been a huge Adam Sandler movie, and I have to admit that this review is tainted with that existing bias. I have always thought his movies were full of half-developed humor, and this one is no exception. You watch it start a gag , you start to smile as it develops, and then suddenly they have moved on, and you realize they weren't laying out the groundwork for a great gag, but rather, that WAS the gag. That's all you get. Sometimes you laugh, but most of the time you just kinda-sorta smile.

Well, smiling's good, right? Not worth $9 and 2 hours in a theater, but if you have a Friday night free in a few months and you see this movie at the local Red Box, I say go ahead and rent it. You could do better, sure, but you could also do much worse.

Zohan is a former Mossad agent who fakes his own death so he can abscond himself off to New York City and fulfill his true life-long ambition of being a hairdresser who bangs fat old ladies in the backroom after making their hair silky-smooth. No, seriously, that's the plot. You're surprised? This comes from the guy who made a movie about an adult who finishes grade school, and a hockey player who becomes a golfer.

It's full of crotch jokes and sophomoric sexual humor. It has a few mediocre visual gags, lots of Jew-vs.-Arab humor (who knew that even existed?) and a lot of hummus jokes. In two hours, I laughed out loud maybe half a dozen times, smiled maybe a dozen more, and made an "ew" face three or four times, but never out-right vomited, although my gag reflex was triggered twice.

This movie offers nothing of redeeming value, but then again, neither does Guitar Hero, so I say you flip a coin to decide between the two when you have a free weekend evening without a date.

I give this a 5 on a scale of 1-to-10. And who knows, I could be totally off about its socially-redeeming value. Maybe the leaders of Hamas will sit down and watch this with the Israeli Prime Minister, and in laughing and not quite puking together, they will see the foibles of their rocky relationship, and come together in the name of peace. Probably not, but what do I know? All I do is review movies.

Indiana Jones and the Bitter Realities of Aging

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

This was a parody, right? Not a sequel.

If you view it as a sequel, and not just that, but a sequel that was 19 years in the making, well, sorry, folks, but it sucks.

So view it as a parody.

This isn't a bad movie, honestly. If you were a fan of National Treasure, The Mummy movies, or Danger Island from the old Banana Splits show, you'll probably love watching this. It's a fun ride, and worth a couple of hours of your time.

But I'm sorry, this isn't just a movie. It's an Indiana Jones movie. This movie set its own bar too high.

Let me start off with my opinion of the Indiana Jones series as a whole. It was one phenomenal first movie, followed by number 2 rushed out to capitalize on the surprise success of the first, and the third vainly attempting to recapture the lost magic of the first.

Raiders of the Lost Ark wasn't just a good movie, it was Iconic. It was Epic. It stands out as one of maybe three or four movies from my youth that truly drove me to the theaters time and time again, driven by the hope that somehow, all the other pap I was sitting through could break through and match the wonder and amazement it opened up in my impressionable little head.

The shame of it all is that I don't think even Spielberg/Lucas realize what it was about "Raiders of the Lost Ark" that made it so damn good. It wasn't the car chases, or the cliffhanging sequences, or the cartoonish bad guys, or the seemingly invincible hero who got out of scrape after scrape more on his luck than his skill. Instead, it was the over-arching sense of Awe that served as the backdrop for the rest of those elements. And not just awe, but GOD-awe.

Throughout the first movie in the series, you had a sense that something greater than us all was at work. You felt like there was an underlying mystery of epic porportions beneath all of the action you witnessed on the screen. Indy's quest had a sense of importance; he didn't seem like some greedy treasure hunter, he seemed like God's unlikely last hope to save mankind from the evil of the Nazis. Even the music conveyed this feeling.

And along with that sense of Awe, there was suspense. Every so often, the action stopped, and you were allowed to just stand and behold something magical and wonderful, with that edge-of-your-seat feeling of "hurry up, Indy!" driving the adrenaline into your bloodstream. (The scene in the maproom comes to mind, or the ending sequence when the Ark was opened.)

By the second film, that magical sense of awe had been completely discarded. Indy was no longer a hero, but a curmudgeon who reluctantly gave in to moral turpitudes in the end, obviously begrudgingly. There were no more stand-and-behold moments. There was just car-chase-shoot-out-fight-scene-Indy-gets-the-girl. Even at age 12, I knew they had lost the magic.

Now here we are, 26 years after the first masterpiece, and I sit once again disappointed. And not just that the magic is gone, but that even the elements that should have been slam dunks were bungled and wasted. The witty banter was forced and uncomfortable to sit through. The scenes of Indy's school-teacher life lacked the warmth and comfort that always contrasted so brilliantly with the danger he later got himself into. The humor was predictable and bland. Even the chase scenes were dull and plodding. It's as if Spielberg has aged even worse than Indy himself. He used to know action like the back of his hand; now you stare disinterestedly at the action like a liver spot on the back of his hand.

And the reunion with Marion? Marion, the ultimate heroin? Marion, with her raspy voice and sexy-tomboyish charm? Marion, who had as much fight in her as any guy in the film? Marion, the heroin who you wanted to see in all of the sequels, instead of the dumb, whiney eye candy they replaced her with?

Yeah, she's a fat dumpy hausfrau now, and her character is entirely useless. She does nothing but ride along. There is no spark or chemistry between her and Indy whatsoever. She might as well have been a mannequin. Even the reunion you have waited 26 years to see was, in the end, a disappointment.

So like I said in the beginning, take this as a parody. If you go in expecting very little other than some goofball characters lampooning a decades-lost greatness, mixed in with some good flash-bang special effects, then you will be entertained. But if you're looking for Indiana Jones's last hurrah to go out with the luster that he came in with, you're only going to learn the sad reality that even the greatest among us just grow old and wither in the end.

I give it a 6 out of 10. That nuke blast was cool.

Speed Racer: Turbo-Charged Eye Candy!

I'm pretty sure I just had a coronary watching this movie, so let me try to calm down as I write this review.

Speed Racer looked like someone shot a bag full of skittle across the surface of a pinball machine with an airgun. If you have ever wondered if live-action anime' could possibly work, wonder no more. The Wachowski Borthers (remember The Matrix?) have proven that it can.

But it's a delicate dance, so before this launches a whole new live-action anime's genre, let me just tell the rest of the directors in Hollywood, "You won't be able to do it like they did, so please don't try."

I had wondered, before going in, why A-List actors like John Goodman, Susan Sarandon, and Christina Ricci were signed on to appear in a movie that seemed to be so visually-driven from the previews. I mean, you'd think they could have signed on anyone with a heartbeat out of any old Studio Cattle-Call and saved themselves a buck or two. But live-acting an anime' series, without making it look completely ridiculous, is probably one of the more difficult things an actor can pull off in their career, and they found the best cast they could have to do it.

Slap on top of that the best visual effects so far of the year, and you have a checkered flag for the weekend Box Office receipt race. (Hey, it's a racing movie review; as a reviewer I'm obligated to use predictable cliche's, ok?) Borrowing from Tron and improving upon it a hundredfold, it is without hesitation that I call this a "visual delight." The Wachowskis have discovered a whole new frontier in cinematography, one that I hope they contnue to explore.

A few other small things made this movie particularly enjoyable for me, on a personal level: the bad guys were easily identifiable by their bad teeth; they had a chimpanzee in people-clothes, and that's always been one of my favorite things to watch; and someone near the beginning of the movie said "Holy Canoli," and I always say "Holy Canoli."

I give Speed Racer a grade of 8 out of a possible 10; the only real flaw that keeps it from being perfect is in the nature of the film itself. As a racing film, and not just that but a speed racing film, there are two hours of speeding cars throughout the movie, from beginning to end. That unavoidably lessens the climatic effect of the final race, since you feel like you have been watching the climatic race for two hours by the time Speed Racer makes his final pass over the finish line. But if that's all I can find to complain about, then you know it's going to be one hell of a ride.

Enjoy!

Iron Man: The Greatest Movie... EVER MADE!

I kid you not... This was the greatest movie ever made.

It had explosions. It had guns. It had epic bad guys and smart-ass heroes. It had robotic fist-fighting and terrorists getting their come-uppance. It had battle-scarred titanium armor, super-models dancing in flight attendant outfits, and it even had JEFF BRIDGES- yes, the BIG LEBOWSKI HIMSELF!

The only thing that could have made it better would have been Gwyneth Paltrow in a slinky, backless evening gown-- WAIT!

IT HAD THAT TOO!

THIS is a masterpiece. THIS is why CGI was invented. THIS is why movies are made in the first place.

Ok, am I overstating it? Maybe a little bit, but I don't really think so. Because on top of all the guy-elements that I had expected from this Juggernaut of a comic-book movie, it had another rare treat that blind-sided me:

Robert Downey Jr.

Now listen, I am honestly not much of a comic book reader, and I have never been a huge Iron Man fan in any other incarnation of the character. So I didn't go into this with an proconception of what Tony Stark was supposed to be.

But I can tell you what he was, as portrayed by Robert Downey Jr: He was the greatest Ordinary Man-turned-Super Hero I have ever seen in a movie. He wasn't a dorky Peter Parker or a stiff Clark Kent. He was loose, he was quick-witted, he was human, and above all he was fun to watch OUT of the Iron Man suit, and THAT, my friend, was something I never expected from a movie like this.

I suppose I should give some sort of "plot" synopsis, right? So you know what you're going to see? Ok, here it is: Tony Stark makes a super-suit and becomes Iron Man. The rest of the details don't matter. Just enjoy the ride.

It without hesitation at all that I give this movie a ten out of ten. Yes. My highest rating possible! There might be better causes you can shuffle your nine dollars off to, but as of right now there isn't a better movie out that you can waste it on.