The trailers and TV spots for Four Christmases suggest that its lead couple, Brad [Vince Vaughn] and Kate [Reese Witherspoon] are going to have to cram in four visits to their divorced parents and their various dysfunctional families when plans to go to Fiji are ruined by flight-cancelling fog. The problem with the film is that the families get less dysfunctional as we get closer to the end of the film – and then there’s the cop-out Hollywood ending that recalls the plot point that precipitated the whole fiasco in the first place.

The merriment begins as Brad and Kate visit Brad’s father [Robert Duval], who is also hosting Brad’s two brothers-cum-wannabe-ultimate-fighters [Jon Favreau and Tim McGraw], one of whom is married and all of who, are rednecks who would make rednecks complain about profiling. A hitherto unknown pricing cap for gift exchanges and a satellite dish installation cap a visit that includes Brad being beaten half silly by his brothers – and a secret about Santa being revealed.

The second visit is to Kate’s mom’s [Mary Steenburgen] home – where cougars hold sway, according to Kate. These include lecherous Gram-Gram [Jeanette Miller], Aunt Sarah [Carol Kane] and Aunt Donna [Colleen Camp] – all of whom are upstaged by Kate’s pregnant sister, Courtenay [Kristin Chenoweth] and the revelation that mom’s new boyfriend, Reverend Phil [Dwight Yoakum], is the pastor of an aggressively ecstatic congregation, where Brad gets carried away with their Christmas pageant

By comparison, Brad’s mom [Sissy Spacek] is merely an aging hippie who is now living with Brad’s ex-best friend. By the time we visit Kate’s father, she and Brad have decided that they don’t want the same things and he drops her off, thereby missing the least dysfunctional part of the day – before waking up to the realization that… wait for it… he loves her. D’OH!

From a fast-paced dysfunctional family Christmas movie, Four Christmases devolves rapidly into a toothless tiger. The laughs that dominate the first half of the film [beginning to fade, rapidly during the second visit], are pretty much gone before we reach the fourth visit. By then, it’s time to trot out variations on most of the homilies we’ve come to expect in lazy seasonal films. The crazed energy of the first visit dies well before the last act and all we’re left with is a curiously lacklustre, meaningless film that can’t even get a laugh out of its call back to one of the film’s best scenes, involving an on location TV news crew.

This puppy just ain’t worth it.

Final Grade: D

When WALL*E premiered, I described it as follows: “WALL*E is the best film of the year - let alone the summer - so far. Easily.” While that was before The Dark Knight and a number of amazing smaller films came out, this eco-fable/romance between the decidedly blue collar trash compacter on tank treads and the equally decidedly uptown seeker of life is still one of the year’s best films.

Looking like a Bizarro World hybrid of ET and Johnny 5, WALL*E may be the year’s most unlikely leading man, while sleek, shiny EVE should be far, far out of his league. For some reason, though, the duo have become a classic romantic duo – in spite of their differing backgrounds – and their story plays almost as well on a twenty-seven inch screen as in a theater.

The three-DVD set is almost overflowing with features: Disc One: Audio Commentary by Director Andrew Stanton; BURN*E, a new animated short featuring a peripheral character from the film; Presto, the animated short that accompanied WALL*E in theaters; Deleted Scenes [two, lasting over six minutes], Sneak Peek: WALL*E’s Tour of the Universe, and Animation Sound Design: Building Worlds from the Sound Up – Legendary Sound Designer Ben Burtt Shares Secrets of Creating the Sounds of WALL*E.

Disc Two: The PIXAR Story, a ninety-minute documentary by Leslie Iwerks; Deleted Scenes [twelve more minutes – with optional introduction by the director]; Behind the Scenes Featurettes [The Imperfect Lens, Captain’s Log, Notes on a Score, Life of a shot: Deconstructing the PIXAR Process, Robo Everything, and WALL*E & EVE]; BnL Shorts [The History of Buy n Large; Operation cleanup; All Aboard the Axiom; Captaining the Axiom, and Meet the BnL Bots]; WALL*E’s Treasures and Trinkets; Lots of Bots [Interactive Storybook & Games].

Disc Three: Digital Copy [for uploading to other media]

Grade: WALL*E – A+

Grade: Features – A+

Final Grade: A+

Walt Disney’s Bolt is a thoroughly enjoyable bit of fluff with just the right amount of darkness and danger to give kids [and their parents] a bit of a scare before everything works out. In terms of animation, it’s almost to the level of PIXAR, though the storytelling isn’t as fluid. The 3D, however, works really well, and the film has more of a feeling of solidity than I expected – and the number of showy 3D sequences is much lower than I would have expected [and none that don’t actually serve the story].

The movie’s conceit is that Bolt [agreeably voiced by John Travolta], a German Shepherd pup who was rescued from an animal shelter, and became the lead in a hit TV show – but since he’s never been off the set, he thinks his TV superpowers are real. When he accidentally gets mailed across the country, he has to get home to save Penny [Miley Cyrus], whom he believes to have been kidnapped by the show’s villain, The Green-Eyed Man [Malcolm McDowell]. He is aided by a streetwise cat called Mittens [Susie Essman] and a hilariously overeager hamster in an exercise ball, named Rhino [Mark Walton].

The second film from the Disney Animation Studios since Disney bought PIXAR, Bolt also went through a creative disembowelment at the hands of John Lasseter and seems to be the better for it. It’s much better than Meet The Robinsons on every level. The animation is first-rate [Dreamworks quality, if not yet PIXAR level]; the script is genial and genuinely amusing, and the voice cast works like a dream. If Bolt feels like a weird hybrid of Inspector Gadget, Super Friends and Homeward Bound, that isn’t really a bad thing.

Something to note: some of the scarier moments might be too much for really young kids. There were a few outbursts of tears and crying at the screening I attended. In a way, that’s a reinforcement of Bolt’s effectiveness as an entertainment – it does secure the emotional reactions it seeks. There are also more than a few laugh out loud moments [a few more than the scary darker moments] and, overall, the film does provide a number of giggles, chuckles and grins. Bolt is light entertainment, but it’s good light entertainment.

Final Grade: B+

The story of how Po [Jack Black] becomes the Dragon Warrior – despite the skepticism of the Furious Five Masters, Crane [David Cross], Mantis [Seth Rogen], Monkey [Jackie Chan], Tigress [Angelina Jolie] and Viper [Lucy Liu] – is one of the year’s surprise hits, critically as well as at the box office.

The film’s DVD release is full of bonus features and, in a special two DVD package, includes The Secrets of the Furious Five. This twenty-five minute tale finds Po facing his greatest challenge – teaching a class of easily distracted young bunnies the art of king fu [Master Shifu, still voiced by Dustin Hoffman, seems particularly tickled by the situation]. To get the class’ attention, Po relates stories of how each of the Five – Crane [David Cross], Monkey [Jaycee Chan], Mantis [Max Koch], Tigress [Tara Strong], and Viper [Jessica Di Ciccio] – had to overcome such flaws as impatience [Mantis], Compassion [Monkey], control [Tigress], and so forth. Even Master Oogway [Randall Duk Kim] puts in an appearance.

Most of Secrets is filmed in the beautiful 2D style seen in the prologue to Kung Fu Panda, with CG used for scenes that feature Po and his class – and the clever cover art from the two DVDs is designed to be one larger picture when placed side by side.

There is a wealth of features on each DVD.

Kung Fu Panda: Audio Commentary by Co-Directors John Stevenson and Mark Osborne; Meet the Cast; Pushing the Boundaries [improvements in CGI]; Sound Design; Kung fu Fighting Music Video by Cee-Lo; Mr. Ping’s Noodle House [watch a master make noodles from a simple ball of dough]; How to Use Chopsticks [this time for sure!]; Conservation International: Help Save Wild Panda; Dragon Warrior Training Academy; Printables and Weblinks [DVD-ROM], and Dreamworks Animation Jukebox.

Secrets of the Furious Five: Po’s Power Play: Learn to Draw [Character animators show how to draw their respective characters]; Dumpling Shuffle [which bowl is the dumpling under]; Pandamonium Activity Kit [DVD-ROM]; The Land of Panda: Learn the Panda Dance; Do You Kung Fu [demonstrations of basic kung fu forms]; Inside the Chinese Zodiac; Animals of Kung Fu Panda [and how they relate to their namesake forms of kung fu], and What Fighting Style Are You?

Grade: Kung Fu Panda – A

Grade: Secrets of the Furious Five – B+

Grade: Features: Kung Fu Panda – A+

Grade: Features: Secrets of the Furious Five – B+

Final Grade: A

It’s been several hours since I walked out of the theater and I’m still wondering whutinthehighholyhellwuzzat?!? If you’ve seen any of the films that Kaufman wrote previously [Being John Malkovich, Adaptation, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind], then you know that is the usual state of mind that follows a screening his work. It’s just that Synecdoche, New York takes things to a whole other level.

Kaufman lulls us into a state of false comprehension by opening with the family of small time theatre director Caden Cotard [Philip Seymour Hoffman] as they go about a depressing day – a day that seems to last forever and ends with his artist wife, Adele Lack [Catherine Keener] and daughter, Olive [Sadie Goldstein] leaving for a show in Berlin. The two-week separation becomes seventeen years.

In the meantime, Caden, following on the heels of a Broadway success with Death of a salesman, wins a genius grant of quite possibly billions and mounts a play that he hopes will bold and true and a bunch of other artistic stuff. What he winds up with is a scale version of New York – peopled by actors playing all the people in his life [however slightly or parenthetically]. But that’s all window dressing.

Besides being a pun on Schenectady [the Cotards' hometown], synecdoche is a word that can mean “a part that represents the whole.” In terms of Kaufman’s film, this can mean any number of things – Kaufman himself says that it means what you take out of it. For me, the film is about Life. It grows and shifts in variations on a theme even as members of Caden’s cast quit and are replaced – even though the new actors are doing the same things as their predecessors, they are different because they are different people, much as we are different people at various stages of our lives.

Life, and Death, are both bigger than we are, and smaller. We can be replaced, though never exactly. We can be reproduced, though never exactly, in any number of media. In an odd way, Kaufman seems – to me at least – to be saying that life, the universe and everything is what it is. That can be both a comforting thought and a harrowing one.

Final Grade: A+

Confession time. I did not see Madagascar. Nope. The trailer did nothing for me – and I was thoroughly penguined out, in any case. Thus, you can imagine my surprise when the trailer to Escape 2 Africa actually caught my attention. Further, you can probably imagine my surprise when I sat through the film and found myself laughing. Not uproariously, mind you, but laughing.

There’s probably no point in providing a plot description. Other reviewers will have covered that in enough detail that only the ending will be in doubt [though I’m not spoiling anything when I say it’s a happy one].

What you need to know is that Madagascar 2 is funny, frequently very much so. Also that the main characters – Alex the lion [Ben Stiller], Marty the zebra [Chris Rock], Melman the giraffe [David Schwimmer] and Gloria the hippo [Jada Pinkett-Smith] – are only half the story, laugh-wise. The second string – King Julian the lemur [an unrecognizable Sascha Baron Cohen], Mort the squirrel [Andy Richter] and head penguin Skipper [Tom McGrath], among others – more than hold up their end of the comedy tentpole.

There are some scenes that might scare younger kids [a toddler was taken, crying, from the theater when the villainous lion, Alec Baldwin’s Mukunga, was being particularly nasty], but as a whole, this is a film that will thrill kids while not boring parents. Fans of CG animation will also enjoy the film.

Now I’m going to have to rent the first film. Nuts!

Final Grade: B

I remember, with great fondness, The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. Tom and Dick Smothers started out as a comedy/folk duo, playing clubs like the legendary Purple Onion. When CBS offered them their own TV show, they had no idea what they were letting themselves in for. The Brothers Smothers started fairly innocuously, but as the series progressed it became a bastion of political satire that caused one U.S. president, LBJ [who clearly had a sense of humor], to send the duo a letter of praise – and another [Johnson’s successor, in fact] to ask CBS to take them off the air [making them the second top ten-rated series to be removed from a network’s schedule because a sitting president didn’t like it – the first being The Wild Wild West].

My favorite moment of the series came as the teaser for one episode that found Tom and Dick noting that CBS had been getting a lot flack because of the show, and that henceforth the audience wouldn’t hear “anything you wouldn’t hear in your own home…” followed by the sound of a toilet flushing. The Best of Season 3 has moments that match that hilarious moment [the opening song of the season premiere, We’re Still Here, for example notes that they’ve survived, among other things, the network’s censors]. And presented some of the most memorable musical performances of sixties television – as when Jim Morrison of The Doors blanked on the words for Touch Me, or when Donovan turned the show into a love-in/sing-along for Happiness Runs. And where else would you find George Harrison stopping by just for a couple minutes to urge the brothers to keep on keeping on? 

Most of the eleven episodes included here are edited – partly for content [not all the moments on the show were gems, and not all of the show’s musical guests were all that memorable], and partly because the pacing of variety shows [and television in general] wasn’t anywhere near what today’s audiences are used to. What remains, though, is the wit and charm of the Smothers Brothers and their show’s writers – along with some hot button issues that contributed to their show’s demise – including a medley that was excised from the season premiere because of controversial content [activist Harry Belafonte performing a carefully structured medley of calypso songs before a screen on which played scenes from the Democratic Convention of 1968]; a comedy sermonette by David Steinberg [part of the episode that CBS removed from the schedule when they fired the brothers, and other odd bits [like the take-off on Bonanza that dared question why the series featured only men as regulars...]. Also included is the CBS Special, Pat Paulsen For President, possibly the funniest campaign film of all-time [and, given the manner in which Paulsen spoke about the issues, another nail in the Comedy Hour’s coffin].

Along with the eleven episodes [which include that unaired ep], The Best of Season 3 also comes with a mitt full of bonus features. Two such are especially noteworthy: when you click on certain episodes in the Episode Selection menu, before it plays, you will hear Tom Smothers comment on the notable circumstances of that episode, and, again, when you use the Episode Selections menu, you can choose to screen each ep with an Introduction and Close by the Smothers Brothers.

Other Features: Disc One: Interviews With Harry Belafonte, Bob Newhart, Third Season Producer Allan Blye, Doors’ Drummer John Densmore, Filmmaker Chuck Braverman, and Writer Rob Reiner; Featurette: A Fable For Our Time [Tom smothers reflects on the series the duo’s battles with the network]; Rehearsal Footage Shot By 60 Minutes [aired January 7, 1969]; 1969 Emmy Awards Clip; Photo Gallery, and CBS Documents: Network memos and other documents regarding some of the show’s controversial elements.

Disc Two: Interviews: Just Collins, Bob Einstein [Writer/Occasional Performer]; Mom Always Liked You Best – Tom, Dick and Mrs. Smothers; Dr. Benjamin Spock Interview [censored from season three premiere]; Photo Gallery, and CBS Documents.

Disc Three: Interviews: Joan Baez, Jackie Mason, David Steinberg; Excerpts from Tom and dick’s Post-Cancellation Press Conference; Jackie Mason Dress Rehearsal; Joan Baez Dress Rehearsal and Alternate Performance; Episode Promos; Smothers Brothers 2000 Reunion at the U.S. Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen, Colorado; LBJ Letters; David Rumsfeld’s “Department of Peace” Letter; CBS Documents; Photo Gallery, and Tom’s Final Reflections.

Disc Four: Robert F. Kennedy With Pat Paulsen and Tom Smothers – never before seen outtakes from the Pat Paulsen For President special; Interview Outtakes From special: Woody Allen, David Frye, Eddie Fisher, Paul Hornung, Nancy Ames, and Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara; Pat Paulsen at the White House; Pat Paulsen at the 1968 Democratic National Convention; Pat Paulsen Comedy Club Act at the Pierce Street Annex, Anchorage, Alaska [March 31, 1992]; E! Intro segment to Pat Paulsen For President; Photo Gallery; Pat Paulsen’s Malignant Humor – Pat’s personal notes from his fight with cancer, At Paulsen’s Memorial humor.

Grade: The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour: Best of Season 3 – A

Grade: Features – A+

Final Grade: A

In May, 1977, NBC premiered a [very] short-lived satirical science fiction series created by Buck Henry – one of the duo behind Get Smart. The series was called Quark and it ran for seven weeks before it was unceremoniously cancelled. The series was based around a United Galactic Sanitation Patrol vessel captained by Adam Quark [Richard Benjamin].

Most of the components of the series were based on Star Trek – particularly the relationship between Quark and his Vegeton science officer, Ficus [Vegetons, being plants have no emotions] – The Captain’s “Space Notes;” the transporter [or at least its sound effects], and even one episode, Goodbye Polumbus, which was a send up of the classic Trek ep, Shore Leave.

Henry took the Get Smart template [smart stories about less than brilliant characters in important positions] and transferred it to Quark. The crew of the USGP ship included Gene/Jean [Tim Thomerson], a “transmute” who exhibited both male and female behaviors; Ficus [Richard Kelton], the aforementioned Vegeton; Bettys I & II [Trish and Cybill Barnstable], a human and her clone, both of them second in command [and both of them crazy about their captain], and Andy [Bobby Porter], a cowardly android/robot that Quark built from spare parts. They received their missions from Otto Palindrome [Conrad Janis], commander of Perma Station 1 and The Head [Alan Caillou], a disembodied giant head seen only on a video screen.

Besides the show’s riffs on Star Trek, it also poked fun at all manner of SF and space opera conventions. The episode, May the Source Be With You, had a pretty obvious target [and skewered it pretty thoroughly] and set the tone for the series. But the show was just hitting it stride with the two-part Flash Gordon spoof, All The Emperor’s Quasi-Norms, when it was taken from NBC’s schedule.

Much of the series has held up pretty well, but there are instances where the silliness doesn’t quite make it. Overall, though, even some of the effects hold up – the transporter is more colorful than Trek’s and the series did show a fair number of actual alien lifeforms [some of which changed shapes disconcertingly – check out Captain Walker who is radically different in each of two eps].

Final Grade: B+

Last season’s addition of two new couples [one gay] to the inhabitants of Wisteria Lane sparked a season of television that ranked right up with the first season’s deliriously/deliciously funny first year. Of course, one member of one couple was a former resident of Wisteria Lane who was returning after a dozen years. Katherine [Dana Delaney] and Adam [Nathan Fillion] Mayfair and her daughter, Dylan Davis [Lyndsy Fonseca] brought one of the season’s darkest secrets with them, while the gay couple, Bob Hunter [Tuc Watkins] and Lee McDermott [Kevin Rahm] brought the world’s ugliest lawn ornament.

Katherine brought one other thing to the show – competition for Bree in the Make-Martha-Stewart-Look-Like-a-Piker Sweepstakes and Adam’s profession [gynecologist] led to some unusual [and unusually funny scenes early in the season. Meanwhile, Lynette [Felicity Huffman] and Tom Scavo [Doug Savant] had to deal with Tom’s daughter from his first marriage, Kayla [Rachel Fox] – a true demon seed if ever there was one. Add to that the Carlos-Gaby-Victor triangle; prospective in-laws; Edie’s usual machinations and the drama of a gay wedding… sorry, commitment ceremony… and that would do for an entire season on any other show. Then, there was the tornado…

The balance between the dramatic and comedic aspects of the series has never been better and the cast really tore into the material. Season four even spawned an episode that could contend for FX and set design Emmys with the tornado and aftermath episodes. If Marc Cherry decided to end the series tomorrow, it could have no better send-off.

Continuing his innovations, Marc Cherry came up with a great concept for the DVD package for season four: Couples’ Commentaries. Each of five episodes has a commentary track by the actors who play one of the main couples on the show, plus there are two additional commentaries of the traditional nature.

Features: Audio Commentaries: Marc Cherry, Bob Dailey and Jeff Greenstein on the season premiere, “Now You Know,” and Marc Cherry, Nicollette Sheridan and David Warren on Mother Said; Couples’ Commentaries: Marcia Cross and Kyle MacLachlan on Now I Know, Don’t Be Scared; Dana Delaney and Nathan Fillion on Distant Past; Eva Longoria Parker and Ricardo Antonio Chavira on Something’s Coming; Felicity Huffman and Doug Savant on Welcome to Kanagawa, and Teri Hatcher and James Denton on Mother said; Getting Desperate: From Beginning to End – following the making of Something’s Coming; Spare Time: Hanging With the Men of Wisteria Lane; Cherry-Picked: Creator Marc Cherry’s Favorite Scenes [with optional commentary]; Alternate ending [with optional commentary]; Deleted Scenes [with optional commentary], and a Blooper Reel. There is also an eight-page booklet designed as a Fairview Reality flyer with realtor’s descriptions of the eight houses we’ve seen in the show, along with ads for local businesses and a list of episode titles and some [but not all] of the bonus features [at the least, they could have included the list of commentary tracks].

Grade: Desperate Housewives, Season 4 – A

Grade: Features – A

Final Grade: A

He sees dead people... and they annoy him.

Ghost Town is one of those rare romantic type comedies that doesn’t fall prey to the over use of clichés or sappy sweetness. It remains smart, funny and sometimes bitingly sarcastic.

The premise of Ghost Town falls somewhere between the elements of the recent ‘Over My Dead Body’ and the older ‘Heart and Souls’ and this movie manages to capture the comedy aspects that ‘Over My Dead Body’ failed to live up to and yet match the reaffirming warmth found in ‘Heart and Souls’. For this reviewer it made for a funny and winning combination.

Much of the dialog and premise of Ghost Town relies heavily on the comedic talent of its star, British actor/comedian Ricky Gervais and he delivers the goods with outstanding consistency. Gervais’ droll, deadpan sarcasm delivered in his almost aristocratic accent adds just the right touch of humor needed to bring his character of Dr. Bertram Pincus to life. Pincus is a self centered loner whose only concern is finding ways of keeping the rest of the human race, whom he finds tedious and boring, as far way from him having to interact with them as possible. That life style is going along well for him until something happens that changes his life and brings him the ability to see dead people, whom he finds even more annoying.

Akira Toriyama is best known for the manga/anime series Dragon Ball Z, but he has done a good deal more. One of his most entertaining is COWA!, the tale of a half-vampire/half-werekoala named Paifu and his friends as they seek a cure for Monster Flu – a disease that affects ghosts, were-beings, vampires and all other monsters, but not humans.

The world of COWA! is one where humans and monsters generally co-exist in peace – human children go to school during the day, while their monster counterparts go to the same schools at night. Paifu and his best friend, a ghost named Jose Rodriguez, are typical kids who like to play pranks, skip school and enjoy their lives/unlives. When a strange illness strikes their friends and relatives, the two set out to find the cure. They enlist the aid of a curmudgeonly former sumo named Mr. Maruyama – but known as The Volcano – and another kid, Arpon, who considers himself Paifu’s arch-enemy, tags along [to swipe the credit if they’re successful].

Toriyama’s storytelling is clever enough, and his art guileless enough, that COWA!, although aimed at younger readers, is terrific fun for everyone. The characters are beautifully developed; the plotting is more than sufficient to hold one’s attention; the twists aren’t telegraphed, and the ending is satisfying enough that I, for one, would love to see more of the characters.

The first chapter [sixteen pages] of the book are in color – and beautifully done – which allows the reader to imagine the “real” look of the black & white remainder of the story. It’s kind of amazing to see the range of color to be found in Toriyama’s nights.

COWA! is thoroughly delightful.

Final Grade: A

Tropic Thunder may well be the most [deliberately] politically incorrect film I’ve ever seen - and one of the funniest. The fake trailers alone are worth the price of admission! Ben Stiller’s film takes aim at every level of Hollyweird culture, from trailers to fraudulent writers to explosive studio executives – and is on target far more often than not.

When the writer of a book about the Vietnamese War [Nick Nolte] suggests that a first-time director [Steve Coogan] send his actors into the jungle – which has been seeded with cameras and various practical effects [explosions, gunfire and the like] – the cast members find themselves mixed up with a heroin cartel headed by a twelve-year warlord [Brandon Soo Hoo].

The actors are a truly motley assemblage of stereotypes: Tugg Speedman [Ben Stiller] the action star seeking legitimacy; Jeff Portnoy [Jack Black], star of the Fatties franchise and drug addict, also seeking legitimacy; Alpa Chino [Brandon T. Jackson], a rapper breaking into the acting game; Kevin Sandusky [Jay Baruchel], an actor in his first big movie, and Kirk Lazarus [Robert Downey Jr.], an Australian actor with multiple Oscars, who has his skin darkens to play a black character. None of them really has much of a clue, which leads to explosive ranting by studio head Les Grossman [a virtually unrecognizable Tom Cruise].

Stiller’s direction is pretty much on the money as his movie-within-a-movie allows him to show Hollywood at both its strangest and its worst. When we see the trailer for Simple Jack, for example, we aren’t seeing an attack on the mentally handicapped – unless we’re looking at Tugg Speedman for playing a mentally handicapped man solely to win an Oscar – or Kirk Lazarus for explaining, in a very funny bit, why simple Jack didn’t work. And speaking of trailers, the fake trailers that open the film are spot on satires of specific genre trailers, and are among the funniest moments in the film.

Other highlights include black rapper Alpa Chino keeping Lazarus honest as he plays a black character, even while he [Chino, that is] tries to flog his line of merchandise on camera; Coogan’s director, Damien Cockburn, taking charge; Speedman using what he’s learned from Lazarus to wow his captors in a live, less-than-no-budget performance; that the film becomes a big honkin’ war movie even as it satirizes the culture that creates an Apocalypse Now; Matthew McConaughey’s turn as Speedman’s TiVo-obsessed agent, and Danny McBride who steals every scene he’s in as the film’s special effects expert, Cody.

Tropic Thunder may be the best film Ben Stiller has ever made. It’s loud and crass, joyously politically incorrect, and well under two hours and gives us all the action of movies thirty minutes longer. In a summer that has had a number of good comedies, Tropic Thunder literally blasts its way to the next level.

Final Grade: A-

Seth Rogen may have used his action sequences in Pineapple Express to audition for his upcoming The Green Hornet, but despite action sequences choreographed for humor as well as thrills, his earnestness in them almost takes deflates the good-natured stoner buddy comedy that Pineapple Express really is.

Dale Denton [Rogen] is a process server who loves his job [mostly because of the costumes he uses to fake out his victims – and the time it affords for smoking up]. After a day of multiple disguises, he stops at his dealer’s place. There, Saul Silver [James Franco] hooks him up with some Pineapple Express – smoke so potent that you can high just smelling it! From there, Dale heads off for one last delivery before calling it a day – a summons for Ted Jones [the comically malevolent Gary Cole], the dealer who supplies Red [Danny McBride], Saul’s supplier. When Dale witnesses Ted and a policewoman [Rosie Perez] kill an Asian man, he freaks out and tosses his roach of PE – which in turn leads Ted to Saul, via Red and things go from easy flowing and happy, to omigawdomigawdomigawd! And I haven’t even mentioned Dale’s high school student girlfriend, yet…

If Harold and Kumar are the stoner Hope & Crosby, then Dale and Saul are the stoner Riggs and Murtagh. Director David Gordon Green somehow manages to takes Rogen and writing partner Evan Goldberg’s split personality script and makes it feel like a single piece. The action sequences ramp up the tension, but much of the choreography and stunt work have elements of humor to them that hold the film together despite Rogen’s dead serious approach to them. Fortunately, between the ridiculous action, Franco’s ability to just bliss out – even when under fire – and some way out bits with McBride’s Red, the goofily genial absurdity of the film is maintained.

Although Pineapple Express is the weakest of the productions from the Apatow Comedy Factory, it remains, largely, above the average because of its slightly hallucinogenic bromance and its integrity when it comes to maintaining its overall upbeat mood. And did I mention Danny McBride’s Red? Definitely one of the best parts of the flick…

Final Grade: B-

Touchstone’s Swing Vote is a political fable on the value of the individual vote; a tale of reversed roles in a dysfunctional family, and the best thing Kevin Costner has done in a decade. The plot revolves around one vote being ruined because of mechanical failure – and the courting of the supposed caster of that one vote by the incumbent Republican President [glossily played by Kelsey Grammer] and the principled Democratic challenger [a surprisingly delicate performance by Dennis Hopper].

The problem is that Ernest “Bud” Johnson [Kevin Costner] got drunk and passed out, thereby missing his appointment with his daughter, Molly [Madeline Carroll – Watch out, Dakota! Look out, Abigail! There’s a very talented new kid in town!] at the polling station. When Bud fails to show, Molly takes it upon herself to sneak into a voting booth [after sneaking a voting card and forging her dad’s signature]. Unfortunately, a cleaning lady accidentally unplugs the machine just as Molly tries to cast Bud’s vote.

Once the word gets out that Bud will have to re-cast his vote, he becomes the center of a three-ring circus that includes the President and Democratic candidate. As Bud is interviewed, the two candidates are lead by their campaign managers [Stanley Tucci and Nathan Lane] into adopting each other’s policies, until finally, Bud is called out by Bill Maher on national TV ["Bud Johnson is a dumbass!"].

Costner does a great job as the befuddled Bud, who has never recovered from his wife leaving him and Molly. As we see in the first two acts, he is a drunk who can’t hold on to a job packing eggs - and Molly is really parenting him. When he suddenly becomes the center of attention on all the news shows, he rides the wave without really thinking what he’s saying – or what it effect it will have on the country’s image around the world. The two candidates are so focused on winning that they ignore their principles as they try to persuade Bud to vote for each of them.

There’s a bit of speechifyin’, but it’s done with sincerity and a bit of unexpected wit, and really speaks to issues like hypocrisy in politics – while simultaneously giving us the story of a loser who finds something inside himself that he truly didn’t expect to be there. Perhaps the film works because Costner financed the film himself and thus felt a real connection to the material – or maybe, the film’s secret ingredient is Carroll, who is definitely one to watch. Whatever the case, even though it is a mite long, Swing Vote does work.

Director/Co-Writer [with Jason Richman] Joshua Michael Stern has, in Swing Vote, produced a thought-provoking little dramedy that deserves to be seen. Hopefully, it will corral all the moviegoers who choose not to brave the crowd of the weekend’s blockbuster fantasy/adventure movie [you know, the one with the mummies].

Final Grade: B

There are stand up comics who make a career out of other people’s pain; comics who make careers out of their own pain, and comics who make a career out of the story of their lives. Christopher Titus does all three [though in fairness, the other people’s pain comes from the members of his family, and his friends...].

If you watched FOX’s three-season sitcom, Titus, you’ve probably encountered much of this material – watered down, at least in terms of language – before. Or, you might have heard some of it on one of his other CDs, or at one of his concerts. If you have, don’t think you can skip this new two-CD set.

Christopher Titus does something that no other comic does – he makes a childhood that should be tragic and turns it into humor. Whether he’s explaining why fathers are better parents than mothers; suggesting likely occupations for ex-junkies, or detailing the events of his childhood, Titus pulls no punches – in fact, on occasion, he leans into them.

With his machine gun-like vocal style, he launches into moments of heartbreaking poignancy just long enough to turn them into some of the funniest bits you’ll ever hear. Even the title of the album – Norman Rockwell is Bleeding – is a humorous reference to the utterly dysfunctional nature of his family. There are too few comics whose work is actually as important as it is funny. Titus is one of them. If you think your family is weird, you owe it to yourself [and, possibly, your family] to check out this CD. Just don’t be too surprised if some of it rings the odd bell or two…

Final Grade: A+

When the third season premiere of Psych [USA, Fridays, 10/9C] airs this evening, pseudo-psychic Shawn Spencer [James Roday] is going to be thrown for a loop in ways he never anticipated. First, off, his best and partner in the Psych detective agency, Gus [Dule´ Hill] is basically given the choice of staying with the agency and losing his highly remunerative day job, or keeping his day job and quitting Psych. Second, his mother, Madeline [Cybill Shepherd] is in town – and his father [Corbin Bernsen] knew she was coming. To further complicate matters, the CEO [Christopher McDonald] of the company where Gus works has a haunting problem – the kind of case that only Shawn and Gus can handle.

As in Psych’s lead-in, Monk, this evening’s case isn’t the primary focus of the ep – The Ghost in You. Sharp-eyed viewers will notice something unusual in the way that Shawn’s investigative scenes are shot that is integral to the case’s solution. But what really matters in the way that Shawn’s relationship with his father is challenged by the arrival of Madeline – but her impact isn’t just on the Spencer men.

It seems that Madeline is a psychologist who used to work with the police department. She has returned to not only visit Henry and Shawn, but to see if Detective Carlton Lassiter [Tim Omundson] is fit for duty. The sparring between them is quite literally priceless.

While Psych initially seemed like a series based on a gimmick, it has become a dependable source of entertainment because its writers know just when to lay off the shtick and spring a dramatic moment on us. The Ghost in You is no exception. Between trying to figure out how to keep Gus involved in the agency, without getting him fired at this day job – and dealing with the emotional rollercoaster ride that his mother’s surprise [to him] visit produces – as well as the agency’s latest case, we get to see sides of Shawn that we don’t usually see [which ties in, thematically with the Monk premiere that precedes it].

The Ghost in You is a solid ep that allows Roday and Hill to do their Gene Wilder/Richard Pryor of detectives thing to full advantage, while giving the show’s guest and supporting cast an opportunity to add texture and colors to the proceedings. It may because of the unusual shift of focus, but this is one of the best eps of the series, to date.

Final Grade: A-

Although technically not a superhero movie, Hellboy II: The Golden Army is one of the most beautifully visual films of this or any other year. It’s also a combination of a lot of genres: comic book movie, action flick, fairytale, horror story, eco-fable, romantic drama, pulpy noir, FX flick. The thing is, because of writer/director Guillermo Del Toro’s love of the characters, and his amazing visual sense, all of these genres fuse into a whole that is ever-so-slightly greater than the sum of its parts.

Hellboy [Ron Perlman] and Liz Sherman [Selma Blair are together in this film – a situation that is more a bit awkward. As Abe Sapien [Doug Jones] puts it, “They have their good days and their bad days… and their really bad days. Complicating matters are Hellboy’s longings to go public – FBI liaison Tom Manning [a woefully underused Jeffrey Tambor] is particularly put out by a photo which the big guy posed for… and autographed!

Into this chipper little situation comes an elvish prince named Nuada [Luke Goss], who wants to raise the legendary Golden Army to destroy mankind as mankind has been replacing nature with shopping malls and parking lots. His twin sister, Nuala [Anna Walton] is dead set against this and flees – encountering Abe in the Troll Market [think a fusion of the Star Wars Cantina and the Floating Market from Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere], where he helps save her from a troll. Everything escalates from there.

Perhaps The Golden Army’s greatest asset is Del Toro’s amazing visuals. All of the film’s creatures are beautiful [sometimes in very disturbing ways] and the sets are enthralling. The creatures are mostly practical and the prostheses and animatronics are absolutely state of the art. Of course, they wouldn’t mean anything if the story and the characters didn’t support them – but they do.

The film is probably hardest on Abe, who encounters romance for the first time in his life, but the Hellboy/Liz relationship takes some interesting and powerful turns as well. Then there’s the new kid on the block, Johann Strauss [voiced by Seth McFarlane], a Teutonic being of ectoplasm housed in an encounter suit that resembles the old spider-Man villain, Mysterio. Brought in to bring Hellboy to heal, Strauss shows some unique abilities, but can’t contain the curmudgeonly demon.

Del Toro shows that Pan’s Labyrinth was no fluke as he sets up action sequences and emotional situations that are simultaneously larger than life and as real as oxygen. He puts his characters through trials of epic proportion, while keeping their feet firmly on the metaphoric ground. The only real flaw of the film is that it may be too rich, too full. There’s so much going on – on every level – that it’s hard to get it all in one viewing. The cliché, “I laughed. I cried. It became part of me,” may actually apply here – Hellboy II: The Golden Army has an effect that lingers long after you’ve left the theater.

Final Grade: A

With an A-story that features the love story between WALL*E [Waste Allocation Load Lifter - Earth Class] and EVE [Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator], and a B-story that involves humanity’s possible return to a post-apocalyptic Earth, WALL*E is more than a bit of a gamble on PIXAR’s part.

Neither WALL*E nor EVE has a large vocabulary [at least, in terms of actual words - he has a number of R2D2-like sounds that clearly express what he's feeling, and she has her own electronic vocabulary as well] - and neither has what you could call a real face [he's a pair of binoculars on a box and she's a floating egg with occasional arms & hands] - and yet we always know exactly what they are thinking and feeling.

Their romance is a classic one - and simultaneously poignant and hilarious – even though the film goes almost twenty minutes before a word of English is spoken.

The B-story features humans who have, in 700 years in space, become obese figures on floating couches/chairs. They live on a gigantic starship called the Axiom, where they are waited on, hand & foot, by robots of all sizes, shapes and functions [there’s more than a bit of eco-satire here, and it’s quite sharp].

The appearance of EVE [and WALL*E] with a fragile little plant from Earth should signal a return to Earth, but there are problems…

WALL*E does pay homage to various classic SF films [he resembles ET more than Johnny 5, and the ship's autopilot, Otto, will certainly remind one of Hal from 2001], but homages are only cool if the film is worth seeing.

WALL*E is, quite frankly, dazzling. Purely from a cinematography perspective, almost every frame of the film is a perfect composition - and yet not predictable, or in any way sterile.

Some of the best moments include the realization that the deserted city we first see is only partly man-made [you'll see what I mean...]; the lovely moment from the trailer when WALL*E trails his hand through asteroid dust like a little boy trailing his fingers through the water as a motorboat zips across a lake [see photo]; the beautiful skyscapes that open the film, and so many more [including the fact that WALL*E is hooked on Hello, Dolly – and has a cockroach as his only friend!].

WALL*E is the best film of the year - let alone the summer - so far. Easily. It may be too intense or hard to follow for younger children [the lady and four kids, ages about three to six, who were sitting next to me got up and left well before WALL*E reached the Axiom], so you should be aware of that.

Grade: A+

Get Smart could have gone wrong in oh so many ways. Fortunately, rather than parrot the ‘60s hit spy spoof, writers Tom J. Astle and Matt Ember choose to give us the story of how super-analyst Maxwell Smart [Steve Carell] made the shift from computer jockey to field agent. Mixing clever gags with action is tricky, and while the ratio isn’t quite right, the film manages to maintain its entertainment quotient by keeping Max from being hopelessly incompetent. Instead, Max passes the field agent test with flying colors but is only sent into the field when the identities of all Control’s agents are compromised.

Only Smart and Agent 99 [Anne Hathaway, sexy in a Disney-cute way and deadly in a Modesty Blaise way] can find and destroy KAOS’s stockpile of nuclear weapons – cleverly hidden in a Moscow bakery [well, it would be cleverly hidden if the bakery wasn’t a huge building with an enormous sign bearing its name]. If they fail, it could be curtains for Los Angeles and the visiting President of the United States.

Staples of the series [Max’s love of little British sports cars; Agent 13, the master of disguise; certain trademark phrases] make appearances – including one that is so utterly perfect that I won’t mention the character or the actor. I wouldn’t want to ruin the surprise for fans of the original series. Besides the homages to the original series, there are things about this movie that work because they are different.

Max is not incompetent – his bumbling usually occurs because his focus is too narrow and everything outside his focus gets past him – watch him deal with a hulking Russian assassin, for instance. He also cuts a mean rug in a party scene – where he gives an unlikely dance partner an incredible ego boost [which refers back to Max’s past].

Get Smart’s supporting cast is excellent, but underused. Since some of the action sequences run a bit long, it might have been a good idea to give more time Dwayne Johnson’s suave Agent 23 – or Terrance Stamp’s Siegfried. Another cool change is Alan Arkin’s Chief – instead of being put upon like the character originated by the late Edward Platt, here the Chief is very much a player.

Overall, then, Get Smart is a smart, if slightly overlong movie that reintroduces the characters from the TV series in a fresh way that does not negate the originals. For the most part, it is great fun – and the moments where it tries too hard can be forgiven. Peter Segal directs the film with good energy and if the action threatens to overwhelm the comedy occasionally, it never quite does. The result is an entertainment that should tickle fans of the series as well as those who’ve never heard of it.

Final Grade: B

Imagine the sound of one hand clapping. Not in the Zen koan way, but in the actual one hand impacting on nothing but air way. This was the sound that accompanied eighty-five of The Love Guru’s ninety-one minutes at the screening I attended – and another four minutes were closing credits.

In a nutshell: Toronto Maple Leafs owner Jane Bullard [Jessica Alba] hires the number two self-help guru in the world, Guru Pitka [Mike Myers] to help her team’s superstar, Darren Roanoke [Romany Malco] get his mojo back after his girlfriend leaves him for the Jacque Grande [Justin Timberlake], goalie of the Leafs’ Stanley Cup opponents, the Los Angeles King.

Myers performance is smarmy and self-indulgent; Alba is her usual wooden self and virtually no is funny. In the course of the film, I laughed six times – two because of actual humor and four because if the sheer awfulness of the attempts at humor. That was four more times than the group of fifteen-year olds [allegedly the film’s targeted audience]. Otherwise, the theater was silent.

Writing, acting, cinematography, directing – all pretty much suck. The only things preventing The Love Guru from being the worst movie I’ve seen in the last few years would be Norbit and Delta Farce. The Love Guru makes The Cat in the Hat look like Shakespeare. You have been warned.

Final Grade: D-

It’s an odd thing to realize that you’re one of three straight men in a theater auditorium. It’s another thing entirely to realize that, properly presented, women will laugh at a poop joke as heartily as any man – and laugh just as hard when the incident is referred to later in the movie. Sex and the City: The Movie brings the fab four, Carrie Bradshaw [Sarah Jessica Parker], Charlotte York [Kristin Davis], Miranda Hobbes [Cynthia Nixon] and Samantha Jones [Kim Cattrall] back is style [well a lot of styles – all more interesting [or horrific, depending on one’s point of view] than the last.

As in the series, there are break-ups and make-ups; sexy clothes, sexy foods and sexy sex. None of these things come as a surprise. The surprise is that, as the film opens, Samantha has been in a genuinely monogamous relationship for five years – with an actor, Jerry “Smith” Jarrod [Jason Lewis], whose career she is also managing. There’s a perfectly reasonable proposal between Big [Chris North] and Carrie that’s mature and, again, reasonable – but not magical – which is probably the biggest reason they break up for [if you believe her friends] the sixteenth time. Relationship woes also plague Miranda and Steve [David Fienberg] – which leads to a fateful conversation between her and Big at the rehearsal dinner.

The Big/Carrie break-up leads to one of the brightest spots in the film. Following an unhoneymoon with the four, Carrie hires an assistant to help get her life back on track. She hires Louise, from St. Louis [Jennifer Hudson], who turns her onto rented fashions. Hudson’s natural brightness takes what could have been a stereotypical servant role and elevates into a real friendship.

While Sex and the City: The Movie hits all the best beats from the series – and thus is not the most surprising of movies – it does a great job of presenting the unique friendship that exists between the four lead characters and, hey! Poop jokes! Who knew?

The film was written and directed by one of the series’ most consistently good writers, Michael Patrick King, and you can tell. There’s no groundbreaking cinematography; no raising of the stakes beyond what we’ve seen before. Just a smart [and trust me, even the poop joke is smart], witty film that celebrates one of the most entertaining quartets of characters we’ve ever met. If you’re looking for angst or profundity, this is not that movie. What it is, is fun – enough fun that guys who are dragged to the theater to see it will probably enjoy it almost as much as their significant others. Works for me.

Final Grade: B

It’s been twenty years since Heathers was released by a dying New World to critical acclaim and some box office success. Now, Anchor Bay has released the dark high school comedy as part of its Cult Classic Film Series. The film’s indictment of kids who will do anything to be popular – and become the ultimate jerks once they achieve it – is as grotesquely funny today as it was when it was first released.

Veronika [Wynona Ryder] is one of the Heathers – the most popular girls in school [the other three are all named Heather] – and the least ruthless. About the same time as she reaches her limit with her so-called friends, she meets a charismatic new guy in school, J.D. [Christian Slater] and becomes in embroiled in a series of murders that the two stage as suicides.

First-time director Michael Lehman and first-time writer Daniel Waters produced a terrific film with its own peculiarly daring sense of humor – and its own slang. With its budget constraints, what propels Heathers is the energy of its performances. Ryder and Slater have, frankly, never been better – And Shannen Doherty stands out as the shyest of the Heathers.

Features include: Audio Commentary by Lehman, Waters and Producer Denise DiNovi; Swatch Dogs and Diet-Coke Heads [a 30-minute of reminiscences by the cast, director, writer, producer and editor]; Trialer; Screenply Excerpt; Original Ending, and Talent Bios.

Grade: Heathers – A

Grade: Features – A-

Final Grade: A

Forgetting Sarah Marshall is doomed to be remembered as “that naked break-up movie” though it’s considerably more. For one thing, the naked break-up is a simultaneously funny and poignant scene and Jason Segel’s performance as Peter [the breakee] is staggeringly vulnerable. For another, that vulnerability continues to come into play when Peter tries to get away from it all at the same Hawaiian resort where Sarah [Kristin Bell] is staying with her rock god boyfriend. In turn, Peter’s heartbreak is tempered by Rachel [Mila Kunis], a pretty, intelligent hotel employee who has also had a miserable heartbreak.

Segel‘s script meanders a bit, but those wanderings lead to emotional payoffs that make sense – especially when news that the TV series that stars Sarah, and for which he composes the “dark, ominous tones,” has been cancelled. A comment from Rachel leads Peter to finish his dream project [a rock opera for puppets – about Dracula and his search for True Love], while Aldous’ [the rock god, played by Russell Brand] behavior has Sarah rethinking leaving Peter.

Director Nicholas Stoller keeps the wandering script focused and gets terrific performances from his entire cast. Check out supporting work by the reliable Paul Rudd [as a goofy surfing guru] and Jonah Hill as Aldous’ number one fan. Stoller understands the necessity for an extra beat in a quiet moment and how to set up a gag without being obvious. As a result, Forgetting Sarah Marshall is one of the best films to come out of the Judd Apatow crude-with-a-heart comedy factory. I may not have laughed as often as the lady behind me, but I did laugh and smile and chuckle enough to recommend Forgetting Sarah Marshall as more than your daily recommended dose of fun.

Final Grade: B+

The Upright Citizens Brigade is a group of improvisational comics who have taken their game to the next level.

Matt Bessler, Amy Poehler, Ian Roberts and Matt Walsh comprise the Upright Citizens Brigade – a troupe [not troop!] of comedians who have taken the art of improv to a whole different level. Instead of doing a number of shot scenes based on several suggestions from the audience, they take the first suggestion from a first-time audience member and then introduce a monologist, who does an improvised monologue on the subject. This occurs twice for each show.

From there, the group then riffs on the variations of the subject subjected by the monologist until they figure they’re they’ve mined that subject for every possible good bit. Then, the monologist returns and riffs on the variations explored by the group in a second monologue which, in turn, suggests fresh variations for the group to explore.

Thus, each show is sparked by only two audience suggestions – and then explored in precisely the same way that a jazz group takes a riff, or chord progression and develops it in unplanned/improvised directions.

The two monologists featured on the DVD are Tom Lennon [working from the suggestion “medical marijuana”] and Private Practice’s Kate Walsh [working from the suggestion “boyfriend”]. Highlights include: from Lennon’s monologues, Tripping Talking Cactus and Talking Bleached Skull, and from Walsh’s monologues, The Worst Birthday Gift Ever.

If these bits don’t make you laugh out loud, you’re made of stone. Trust me.

Features include: Upright Citizens Brigade Interview; Monologus Interruptus; We Love Our Audience; The ASSSSCAT! Theme], and Commentary by Upright Citizen’s Brigade [an improv master class].

Grade: Upright Citizens Brigade: ASSSSCAT! – B

Grade: Features – A

Final Grade: B+

This small effort from the Jud Apatow funny factory skips the f-bombs but still manages to be funnier than at least one of his R-rated efforts.

What can you do when you’re corpulent, skeletal or really, really short and are facing your first day of high school? Apparently, you can expect to get thumped on a regular basis; crammed into lockers, trophy displays and such; and get kicked when you’re down.

How can you avoid these problems? Well, there’s always Drillbit Taylor: Budget Bodyguard. As played by Owen Wilson, Drillbit is a homeless deserter who stumbles into a great scam - charging three kids of the aforementioned general builds for teaching them to keep the school bully and his equally malevolent sidekick from using them as punching bags.

The three are the corpulent Ryan [Troy Gentile], the really, really short Emmit [David Dorfman] and the skeletal Wade [Nate Hartley. The bullies are Filkins [Alex Frost, apparently taking his bully role from Elephant and making him a complete psycho] and his sidekick, Ronnie [Josh Peck] - and they are definitely serial killers in training.

The Kristofor Brown/Seth Rogen screenplay features more physical violence than all three of the other hits to come from The Judd Apatow production line [I guess something has to escalate to fill the space of all those missing cuss words]. Steven Brill’s direction is pretty straightforward - the pace picks up for the violence; slows slightly for the jokes [allowing beats for audience response], and slows appropriately for the one romantic plot arc.

It’s the romantic arc between Drillbit, faking his way as a substitute teacher, and the lovely, but lovelorn Lisa [Leslie Mann, who is brilliant as usual] that brings the homeless con man out of his scam and into admitting that he actually likes his intended victims. This revelation occurs just in time to try to stop his equally homeless friends from stealing all of Wade’s family’s possessions.

For Wilson, the character of Drillbit pretty much plays to his strengths: aw shucks charm with an underpinning of darkness. He’s fast on his feet, though not as much as he thinks he is - and, of course, when it comes down to crunch time, he makes the right choices even if the result won’t be that good for him.

The punching bag trio come from the usual assortment of circumstances: Wade’s mom re-married a guy who is proud of having been a bully in school and has two sons who look to be following in his footsteps; Ryan’s single mom dotes on him to the point of enabling his weight gain, and Emmit seems to appear from the ozone.

Filkins has become emancipated, and the idiot Principal Doppler - Stephen Root’s second most oblivious character [after Office Space's Milton] - takes that to mean he’s a nice, honest boy who is being maligned by the trio’s allegations of violence. The only person outside the trio who seems to like Wade is a little Asian girl named Brooke [Valerie Tian], which is good because he has a definite crush on her - and has joined all the same clubs [including the Asian Heritage Club] as her in hopes that he’ll be able to work up the courage to talk to her.

Ryan’s claim to fame is that he’s a not too terrible rapper - a sequence where he raps against Filkins is one of the movie’s highlights. Emmit, it seems, doesn’t have any notable skills, but shows an immense amount of courage at a crucial moment.

While the climax of the movie might not be what you’d expect - you’d think three nerds would outthink the bullies - there is an intelligence at play in their actions, especially in how they organize them. And there’s a moment near the end that harkens back what we are sure must be an apocryphal tale about Filkins - a perfectly timed bit of business that gives Wilson one final bravura moment to follow up his one moment of genuine heroism.

Sure, Drillbit Taylor doesn’t have the same level of language and gross humor as, say, Superbad, but it still has plenty of bodily function humor and decent sight gags. It never reaches the heights of Superbad, or Knocked Up, but I have to say I enjoyed it more than The 40-Year Old Virgin [despite Steve Carrell, I still don't regard that one with much respect]. Drillbit Taylor is a little more violent than it needs to be, but it works well enough, overall, that I can recommend it - just.

Final Grade: C+

Have I said lately how much I really dislike Judd Apatow movies and Seth Rogen? Their films are generally hollow, profanity laced, geek boy fantasies. Where the slobby, foul mouth, fat jerk always ends up with the hot chick.  Their formula is successful, but it’s cookie cutter beyond belief.  The only difference is they switch between “Adult fair,” to “Teen fair,” without changing their character template.  Their latest effort Drillbit Taylor is the same basic film as all of the other Apatow productions. But what amazed me is, I actually kind of liked Drillbit. I generally love Owen Wilson, but a little of him goes a very long way.  Drillbit is kind of a modern remake of an early 80’s film called “My Bodyguard.”  It’s every picked upon nerd’s fantasy. If you can’t handle the school bully, why not hire someone to do it for you?  In this case the school bully Filkins (Alex Frost) is wonderfully insane.  He has the makings of future serial killer written all over his face.  Filkins has the ability to go from ‘Eddie’ Haskell Jr. to Norman Bates with minimal effort.  Our two nerds - Wade (Nate Hartley) and Ryan (Troy Gentile) have a reason to be scared. Where Superbad failed Drillbit somehow worked for me.  It’s almost the exact same movie. Same characters only different situation.  And just like Superbad, I couldn’t stand the fat kid - Ryan the wannabe rapper.  He is so unlikable it’s a wonder his mother loves him. Was writer Seth Rogen this annoying as a kid? I hope not. Then again it probably explains a lot about why he seems incapable of creating original characters.

But despite this I liked this movie, Owen Wilson’s Drillbit is just like every other Owen Wilson character - a fast talking, scheming, liar who is always looking for the next score. Drillbit, a homeless man sees these rich nerds as his meal ticket and instead of fighting the bullies for the kids, trains them how to fight.  So he says.  Along the way even a loser like Drillbit finds a hot teacher Barbara (Beth Littleford) to fall for.  While this movie didn’t contain one laugh out loud moment, it did feel more like a real film than previous Apatow productions. It’s not as over the top as previous efforts. Director Steven Brill does a great job with pacing, although the montage where Filkins and his buddy are terrorizing the nerds seems to go on forever as does a lot of the scenes with Wilson training the kids. It’s cute in small doses, eventually it starts to get annoying. I know it sounds like I didn’t like this film but it actually did work for me. It wasn’t laugh out loud funny and have I said how much I hated that fat kid? This is a wait for cable kind of film.

Final Grade C

EM Review by
Michelle Alexandria
Originally posted 4/21/08