First Knight (1995)

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!

I don’t know if this has come up yet, so I want to share something with you: I am not a big Richard Gere fan, so many of his films I see are likely to have their ratings tainted by subjectivity. Just a fair warning. Anyway, First Knight falls into some of the standard pitfalls that King Arthur films succumb to, but it goes further than other interpretations do in getting things horribly wrong.

Many Arthur films screw up in a number of excusable areas. First, they typically set the Arthur story too far into the Middle Ages, with shining armor, valiant knight and glorious castles. In fact, Arthur existed in the 5th or 6th Century when things were not as opulent and glamorous as the romanticized tales have led many to believe.

Secondly, most Arthur films really overdo the kinship of the Round Table. Depictions of gorgeous stone or wooden tables abound and the knights were all dashingly handsome. In reality the round table probably didn’t even exist. The knights were really a kind of rag-tag band of wandering men who fought for justice. Their relationship was probably close, but not as glorious as we’ve come to believe.

Finally, almost all Arthur films, and most films with knights and swords, use horrible swordplay for their fight scenes. As heavy and cumbersome as real swords would have been, the parrying and quick swordsmanship defies physics. It’s all stage and film trickery meant to make the fights look cool and more dangerous.

But like I said, all of these items are excusable because they have been commonplace in presentations of the Arthur legend for quite some time. First Knight has bigger problems on its hands.

For starters, Gere plays Lancelot very poorly. Gere is only 5’11” and many of the actors in the film are of a comparable height. Guinevere is only a few inches shorter than Lancelot, though you can hardly tell because of her hair and all. King Arthur is several inches taller than Lancelot, which is a historical no-no. Lancelot, by legend, was a very tall man, towering above many of his peers. This little goof really jars your suspension of disbelief if you know your Arthur at all.

Along with Gere’s height, his performance of Lancelot is completely void of any accent. Literally every single character but Lancelot speaks in an appropriate British accent. The fact that Gere refuses to even try to pull off an accent is a major point of contention with me. They have voice coaches for a reason. Use them.

The dialogue is very wooden, unsatisfying and predictable. This is a huge detriment because most Arthur stories include very beautiful prose and really capture the beauty of the romanticized Arthur legend. This is compounded by the fact that the acting is rather unbalanced. Some actors perform up to par, but most either overact or under-act their roles. This leads to a bizarre up and down feeling when processing the lines.

The special effects and stunts are all a little to modern as well. Camelot is presented as a gigantic city with opulent towers and brilliant colors. It’s all too over the top and came right out of left field for me. A stunt involving a runaway carriage was also rather hokey. It was essentially set up as a medieval car chase, with all the predictable elements of the bad guy jumping on top, crashing through windows and breaking off of doors. Sorry, been there and done that a hundred other times without the added cheese of a medieval setting. There was also a gauntlet prop that Gere ran through in exchange for a kiss from Guinevere that was easily far beyond the design of anything from the Middle Ages.

The love story is altogether unconvincing and they go about Arthur’s death all wrong. Somehow, the writers found it a bright idea to have Arthur snuffed out by relatively minor character from Arthurian legend. The man, Malagant, never amounted to beans in Arthur histories and his position as an evil conqueror and murderer was just confusing.

In the end, First Knight gets a lot of things all wrong, but still manages to look pretty. Ironically, many of the castle locations are shot as old and overgrown with vegetation even though these structures would have been new at the time. Girls will swoon over the sappy love story and guys will sit there with a glazed look on their faces. While it doesn’t quite do enough damage to itself to drop too far in my rankings, I would advise against seeing this film unless you seek an example of how not to present the Arthur legend.

RATING: 2.25 out of 5

Care Bears Movie II: A New Generation (1986)

In many ways, this is just a repackaged copy of the first Care Bears movie. It’s part sequel, part prequel and ultimately more memorable than the first (at least in my mind). Two kids receive comfort from the Care Bears and they in turn help the Care Bears stop a dark and evil force that wants to eliminate caring from the world.

We’ve been here before, but something in the execution clicked more for me in Care Bears II. I often had blended the two together in my mind and forgot some of the particulars. The film begins with True Heart Bear and Noble Heart Horse taking care of the young Care Bears and Care Bear Cousins as they try to avoid the dreaded Dark Heart. The Great Wishing Star bestows special powers upon these two and all of the little ones in tow (thus explaining how the Care Bears got those symbols on their tummies).

When Dark Heart strikes out on a new conquest against caring, True Heart and Noble Heart leave the cubs in the hands of two young children from a summer camp that had all but given up on caring. Taking care of the cubs gives them a purpose and they enjoy it. When they return to camp, they find that Dark Heart has set up his base there and is posing as a young boy (among many other things he can transform into).

In just a short time, the Care Bears and their Cousins are mostly grown up and willing to take on Dark Heart in order to keep caring in the world. They are over-matched and their existence is threatened by Dark Heart's powerful magic. Only the return of the elder True Heart and Noble Heart can make them strong enough to defeat the villain, which can always be assumed in a kids' movie.

The animation is just as good as in the first film and the music is a bit more memorable, but it is essentially the same story as before, just with a few different elements thrown into the mix. I prefer it to The Care Bears Movie, but most viewers will find little difference between the two. It provides a solid message of the importance of friends and caring to its intended audience of young children and goes by in a breezy 76 minutes, so parents won’t be bored with the subject matter either.

Good lesson, fun songs but the same basic story as before, so no increase in the rating from the first installment.

RATING: 3.25 out of 5

Bio-Dome (1996)

Before there were stupid Will Ferrell movies there were stupid Adam Sandler movies. Before there were stupid Adam Sandler movies, there were stupid Pauly Shore movies. Bio-Dome is one of those stupid Pauly Shore movies. The only difference between this and some of Shore’s other cinematic craptastrophes is that it promotes being responsible caretakers of the Earth. Aside from this, Bio-Dome fits into one of two categories: brainless juvenile humor flick or total guilty pleasure.

Bio-Dome pits Pauly Shore and Stephen Baldwin against a team of scientists trying to make environmental progress by secluding themselves inside an artificial closed ecological system in the Arizona desert. Shore and Baldwin (as Bud and Doyle) think the Bio-Dome is a mall, so they stop to go to the bathroom. After sneaking inside, they are unwittingly locked in with the scientists after the unveiling ceremonies for an entire year.

Bud and Doyle live by the motto “Just because we’re stuck in a bubble doesn’t mean we can’t cause any trouble.” And they do just that! Their slacker tendencies and disrespect for the experiment lead them to turn the Bio-Dome into little more than the wreck the Earth has become after throwing a large-scale party and letting people in through the back door.

To repent for their environmental sins, Bud and Doyle decide to help the Bio-Dome team save their mini-environment. This involves a lot of clever plugs for ways to help clean up the Earth. Along the way, Bud and Doyle flirt with the attractive female scientists and crack numerous sophomoric jokes, often involving crude humor. A few jokes are even totally random and make no sense whatsoever, including a montage of work set to the Men Without Hats song “Safety Dance” that includes a midget in medieval attire (just like in the music video). It also features a very early appearance of the acoustic-metal-comedy band Tenacious D.

As silly and thin as the soul of this movie is, it is a redeeming quality. Bio-Dome came out around the time of a resurgence in Earth-friendliness and capitalizes on this by milking its pro-environment stance for all its worth. Is it exploitation? Hard to say, but the clash between Bud and Doyle and the uber-smart scientists is worth a few laughs.

For some, Bio-Dome is a piece of nostalgia and a guilty pleasure worth revisiting once in a while. It’s better to make that once in a great while, but the film is mostly harmless if you feel so inclined to watch it. Bio-Dome is ripe for making fun of MST3K style, but it can also prove to be a semi-entertaining 90 minutes of brainless nonsense.

No one will remember Bio-Dome for any amount of greatness, but you can’t escape the fact that its “so bad it’s good” cult following illicit a few chuckles, groans and smiles whenever mentioned. Arguably Shore’s most remembered film, Bio-Dome is a part of the cultural lexicon of the 1990s and can’t be completely ignored, useless as it may be.

RATING: 2.25 out of 5

1408 (2007)

Based on a short story by horror legend Stephen King, 1408 stands tall against its recent horror genre peers. You see, 1408 is a different kind of horror film. While most films in the genre these days go for shock and terror by barraging viewers with violence, bloodshed and graphic anatomical gore, 1408 goes back to the roots of horror. The thing that drives this is simply the fear of the unknown.

John Cusack stars as Mike Enslin, a paranormal investigator who makes a living writing about haunted locations across the country. He himself is a skeptic and does not believe in ghosts or God, but has no issue with taking people’s money by writing his fantastical and false reviews and accounts of his stays in “haunted” places. One day he gets a postcard from a hotel in New York that simply advises him not to enter room 1408. Taking it as a challenge, he attempts to book the room but the hotel staff repeatedly attempt to block him from staying there for any amount of time.

Enslin confronts the hotel manager, played by Samuel L. Jackson, who also attempts to keep Enslin from staying in room 1408, but Enslin’s determination wins out in the end. Enslin is led up to 1408 personally by the hotel manager, who refuses to enter the room and leaves quickly. Enslin thinks this is all part of a ruse to excite him and get his mind running overtime before beginning his stay.

The freakiness begins almost immediately. At first the scares are innocuous enough to draw chuckles out of audiences. The room starts off with a few very basic and predictable happenings that have been used many a time. If they are clichés, then they are masterfully used clichés, because somehow we know that room is just warming up, playing games really. Such things would generally be freaky to us if they happened in real life, but seeing a skeptic who knows all the tricks try to rationalize what he is experiencing is darkly amusing.

Eventually, 1408 quits playing cutesy little scare games and unleashes its arsenal upon Enslin. The scariest thing about this is that neither Enslin nor the audience has any idea what this room is capable of. Having dispensed with the standard spooks, everyone is treading in dark, unknown waters. With serial killers, monsters and aliens it’s usually easy to figure out what will happen based on the conventions of their kind. A haunted room is not typical and there is no way of knowing what is coming next or whether or not we have seen everything the room can do to its victims.

Samuel L. Jackson’s character puts it best when he says “It is an evil f--king room.” Eventually Enslin stops trying to rationalize everything he’s experiencing and focuses solely on surviving, which proves to be a hellishly daunting task. The torments he faces are all disturbing, bizarre and virtually free from any gore. This film puts the adolescent torture-porn sub-genre that’s so popular these days to bed and focuses on mature thrills and chills.

The fear of the unknown is only part of this masterfully carried out film. Not knowing what the room is capable of is enhanced by what the room actually does. Everyone has been to a house or hotel that gives off a creepy vibe or their mind gets overactive when their alone in the house, so seeing a fairly unassuming looking room turn evil is doubly creepy. Instead of a dark and shadowy room with moldy carpet, stains on the tile floor in the bathroom and marks on the wall, 1408 just looks like an old hotel room. If it decided to leave you alone, you would have no idea that this room is pure evil.

The fear of the unknown along with the creepiness of evil being something all-too-familiar to us compounds in 1408 for some great moments. John Cusack really performs admirably as the sole star of the film. It is very difficult in film to isolate one character and keep him or her interesting, but Cusack performs deftly and really anchors the film. It is a vast departure from his normal work in films, and is more in the vein of his performance in Identity. His seeming normalness enhances the terror and he is very convincing.

While there are a few slow parts and some things don’t work as well as the filmmakers planned and hoped for, 1408 is a success. It provides old school chills that prove you don’t have to resort to gratuitous violence and relentless carnage to make people squirm. I hope the likes of Eli Roth and the folks behind the Saw franchise took notice, because genuine terror need not come from a knife or other sharp instrument. Sometimes the scariest things imaginable are just on the other side of a door.

1408 isn’t likely to put an end to the popularity of torture-porn films, but it does offer a ray of hope that horror films haven’t completely lost touch with their roots. Bravo.

RATING: 3.5 out of 5

The Notebook (2004)

I’ve never been a big fan of romances because all too often they fall victim to clichés and stereotypes in the worst ways. Whether it’s the all-too-perfect mushy dialogue or the highly unlikely turn of romantic events, romance films rely on women’s lack of caring about these things in order to see a love story play out that they wish were their own. Often times this brings big bucks too. The Notebook was a very popular and very successful romance film a few years ago and I was pleasantly surprised to see how unlike other romances it was.

For starters, this film doesn’t focus explicitly on the couple’s time together. Most of the film covers their time apart and the issues they faced during this time. They coped with the separation and even had come to terms with it when their lives were suddenly and unexpectedly thrown back together. Their reunion is anything but harmonious and that’s what is so remarkable about this film. It is one of the few honest portrayals of love I’ve seen outside of a traditional drama.

The Notebook shows both sides of love. There are the romantic and thoughtful moments we’re accustomed to seeing, but there are also dark places that love can lead us: obsession, denial, despair. Granted, not all of these moments are deftly acted by such the film’s young stars, but they get it right more often than not, so kudos to Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling. The passion they display is one of a kind and the freewheeling, playful side of love they show is actually done right for a change.

But the story doesn’t just exist in the defining moments of their youthful love. As with real life, the story goes on. The real story is a mix of joy and sadness and is so different from anything I’ve seen before in the genre. Author Nicholas Sparks understands that happy endings aren’t real endings, which I appreciate.

One thing I definitely enjoyed (especially coming off the previous review) was the fact all the clothing looked like the characters actually wore it. Everything seemed real: the clothes, the sets, everything. I liked the choices for on-location shots and the filmmakers didn’t overdo it on the music either. Nothing too sappy or melodramatic. It was all pretty well in line.

There’s really not a whole lot more I can say or get into without giving away much about the film (which I am not in the business of doing). The only other thing I can say is that the older actors in the film did an impeccable job and were just as good, if not better, of conveying a deep-seated love that solid movies are built around.

The Notebook is a solid film and I definitely recommend it, if you are into the romantic side of the movie spectrum. Good stuff here.

RATING: 3.5 out of 5

Hairspray (2007)

I’ve run into a slight problem while trying to write a review for this film. I still remember it very clearly, so that’s not the problem. I hit a roadblock in trying to compare this movie-musical to its original incarnation, which I have not seen. Hairspray is a movie-musical based off of a Broadway musical which was based off of a non-musical cult film from Director John Waters. Waters is one weird dude and his films typically reflect that. Waters had little to no involvement with this musical version and I think that was a mistake.

Even though I have never seen the original Hairspray and have only seen bits and pieces of Waters’ work, I was expecting more of his signature weirdness to come through. Instead, we’re treated to a glitzy Broadway confection that fancifully portrays a coming-of-age story during the early days of civil rights and integration. It’s bright, it’s loud, and it’s Broadway.

If you're new to my site, allow me to point out to you that I am not a big Broadway fan. At least not neo-Broadway. Movie musicals based on bright fluffy Broadway hits don’t turn my stomach, but they bore me to tears. I’ve never been a big glitz and glam kind of guy and all the Hollywood tricks that serve to cheese up an already cheesetastic production grow on my nerves with amazing quickness. Silly transitions, extra digital grading, overdone lighting- it’s all just too much for me to appreciate.

Combining the excesses of Broadway with the excesses of Hollywood grinds my gears. It’s gross, it’s gaudy, and it’s gratuitous. People complain about the excess of blood, gore and nudity in today’s string of successful torture porn films, like the Saw and Hostel series. Yet, nobody calls films like Hairspray on their needless excesses. In fact, most embrace them. Hypocritical, paradoxical- I don’t quite know what to call it. Basically, the excess of schmaltz and camp pull me out such films.

While I understand that Broadway likes vibrant colors and crisp looking costumes, I found myself unable to get past the fact that virtually all of the clothing in the film looked like it had never been worn before. The colors I can get past, because I don’t know if those styles didn’t exist back in the day, but when only a few characters actually look like they live in those clothes, my suspension of disbelief checks out.

The inclusion of John Travolta as an obese, middle-aged woman also didn’t earn any points with me. I do know that in the original version of Hairspray, a notorious cross-dresser played the part now played by Travolta, but Travolta just seems to be there for the yuck-factor. Of course it’s funny to see a famous actor dress up like a woman, but the joke overstays its welcome rather quickly. After the first few scenes, seeing Travolta in a fat suit had no effect on me.

Overall, it just feels like this film is missing something and I think it’s the edge that John Waters’ films are known to contain. By adding songs and removing Waters from the creative process, it seems like they watered down the tone of an otherwise better film. And we all know that hairspray and water don’t work well together.

To really give an accurate review I’ll need to watch the original Hairspray and then re-watch this version. Until then, my rating is mostly subjective.

RATING: 2.5 out of 5

In The Army Now (1994)

Pauly Shore movies have a tendency to be pretty bad but In the Army Now is actually almost good. Sure, there are plenty of outlandish antics and stupid jokes, but there’s something about this movie that is kind of endearing. I certainly never expected to say that about a movie with Pauly Shore and Andy Dick as the leads, but then again, stranger things have happened!

Shore and Dick star as bumbling electronics salesmen who are completely unsatisfied with life and fear that they’ll never achieve their goal of owning their own shop. They see a sign for the Army Reserves and decide to sign up because of the sign-on bonus. Their pay for being Reservists would go a long way to helping them reach their goal. Leary of signing up for anything too dangerous, the duo decide to learn water filtration as their Reservist specialty.

After surviving basic training and learning the ins and outs of water filtration, their unit (including David Alan Grier and Lori Petty) gets sent to Africa when Libya invades Chad. Shore and Dick’s four-soldier water filtration unit is essential in the hot climate but things get bungled up and they get lost in the middle of the Sahara desert. They argue and bicker, hopelessly search for the rest of the Army and all sorts of goofy things happen.

In the end, an opportunity to save the day presents itself. They discover a secret missile launch site and radio into their superiors, who send them the supplies needed to make it visible for an air strike. Summoning all their courage and training, the four misfits prove that Reservists can be just as brave and effective as the regular Army guys and save the day. (Come on, it’s a comedy after all!)

For some reason, In the Army Now is one of Pauly Shores most tolerable films. He doesn’t do as much of his nonsensical “Weasel” persona and the subject matter of being a Reservist is treated with a proper amount of respect. Instead of making the military look stupid, bravery and courage are emphasized. Granted it’s Pauly Shore emphasizing these traits, so a grain of salt is needed. Nevertheless, it’s actually worth watching. I think most people will find it funny and it’s mostly harmless. You won’t lose brain cells watching this movie.

Oddly enough, this is probably one of Pauly Shores least remembered films, yet it’s one of his best. Check it out if you don’t mind some innocent semi-brainless fun.

RATING: 2.75 out of 5

Dan in Real Life (2007)

This was a date movie for me. I took my fiancée out to dinner and a movie and this was the only remotely decent thing playing that we could agree upon. I’m very glad we did because this film is charming and really showcases Steve Carell’s versatility as an actor.

Dan in Real Life got more favorable reviews than it did negative ones, but it wasn’t garnering the kind of positive buzz that builds anticipation for a film in the minds of the masses. The film did have appeal from wildly different demographics because of its star, Steve Carell. When Dan in Real Life hit theaters Carell was still a big draw for young audiences because of his work on The 40 Year Old Virgin, Anchorman and The Daily Show. Older audiences and some bleed-over from the youthful demographic know and like Carell from his performance on The Office and Little Miss Sunshine.

It’s rare to get this kind of catch-all appeal but it worked for Dan in Real Life (to some extent). Its main competition on the weekend was the youth-magnet Saw IV and the next weekend would see the launch of the much-hyped American Gangster and the Jerry Seinfeld vehicle Bee Movie. The odds were certainly stacked against it but it persevered.

I don’t know what critics and moviegoers failed to see in this film, because I thoroughly enjoyed it. I can see how some viewers and critics felt like the story was something out of a sitcom, but it all works because the story couldn’t be stretched into a TV show. I think the reason people took issue with it is because it doesn’t fit a specific comedy mold. It’s part romantic comedy, it’s part straight comedy, it has a few slapstick elements, some black humor and plenty of tongue-in-cheek wit. This causes Dan in Real Life to not fit any comfortable genre classification that people ultimately try to associate a film with.

I like films like this- the ones that are virtually unlike anything that has come before it. It’s unique and stands out in my mind. The uniqueness of the film comes from many different factors. Not only is the story good, but the writing and acting all heap goodness upon goodness.

Steve Carell stars as Dan, an advice columnist on the verge of national syndication. Every week people rely on his advice to clean up the messes in their lives. Ironically, his life is full of quirks and messes that he struggles with: he’s a middle-aged widower with three daughters (two of them teenagers) that he doesn’t completely understand. He and the girls head off to a family gathering, where we meet even more eccentric but endearing relatives.

Dan is set to fetch the morning paper in town, where he meets a lovely woman named Marie, played by Juliette Binoche. Dan and Marie awkwardly flirt, both realizing how silly it must seem to see middle-aged adults flirting like children without trying to be too obvious. It’s cute and appreciable. There’s a real emotional honesty in these scenes, as well as the rest of the film, that most romantic comedies fail to capture. Instead of absurd yucks, Dan in Real Life aims for heartwarming chuckles and it succeeds.

Marie and Dan say goodbye and she departs after receiving a phone call from her boyfriend. Dan feels a little bummed, buys the paper and heads back to his parents’ house. He returns only to find Marie fraternizing with his family. Turns out Marie is going out with Dan’s brother, played by Dane Cook. More humor and awkwardness ensues as the two try and work everything out over the course of the weekend.

Carell and Binoche really convey an honesty in their performances that is hard to come by. Despite the seemingly unlikely setup, they really make you feel like everything is real. Technically, it is all very possible, but they made it feel like it was never not possible that this all could happen. It just feels so genuine that it’s hard for me to explain.

And I think that genuine quality explains why its success was so limited. The theater I saw this film at was packed. Half the crowd was young teenagers and half were adults. The kids must have been disappointed because they didn’t laugh very often. Perhaps they thought this would be another 40 Year Old Virgin. The older crowd, myself included (I guess), had a good time. Most of the younger crowd probably told their friends not to bother seeing it because it wasn’t as good as Carell’s crude humor flicks. Older viewers may have recommended it to friends, but we adults are stingy about what we spend money on, so most are probably waiting for it to come out on video.

The disappointed young folk are wrong though. This is one of Carell’s best films to date and easily his best leading role. He excels at being normal- Dan is honest, sensible and vulnerable. Carell really shows his acting chops here because, while we already know he can make us roll with laughter, he invokes laughter from everyday absurdities and also works the audience’s emotional side. For a funny man to make you tear up is truly a beautiful thing.

The rest of the cast is spot-on in their performances. Dane Cook, who I normally can’t stand, is surprisingly normal, tolerable and effective as Dan’s brother. The daughters bring their characters to life and are wonderfully realistic. Every character builds in just the right places to make this film work.

It may be hard to tell from my rambling review, but I really, really liked Dan in Real Life. It’s emotional honesty and subtle humor goes a long way and is a refreshing change of pace from the typical Hollywood comedies. It’s a testament to Steve Carell’s abilities and I hope he goes far in his career. I highly recommend that you check this one out.

RATING: 3.75 out of 5

The Fast and the Furious (2001)

Not only does this film glorify the irresponsible and potentially deadly hobby of illegal street racing, it also seems to make an attempt to legitimize it, leaving me with nothing but contempt for The Fast and the Furious.

Essentially a shallow repackaging/rip-off of the 1991 film Point Break, The Fast and the Furious boasts “high-octane action and excitement” but, in reality, rarely manages to make it out of first gear. Paul Walker stars as a twenty-something undercover cop trying to break into the local street racing culture in hopes of uncovering the mastermind behind a series of semi truck robberies on local highways.

Walker makes himself look like a rookie fool by racing the local hotshots with his car at stake and losing, though he tried his darndest to win. Fortunately, a “surprise” police raid causes everyone to flee, allowing Walker to save one of the street racing gang leaders, played by Vin Diesel. Despite looking like a total stooge and the all-too-convenient raid and getaway, Walker is admitted into Diesel’s inner circle. One of Diesel’s gang sees right through Walker’s ruse but Diesel doesn’t believe it.

Walker proceeds to fall in love with Diesel’s sister and comes to embrace his new found “friends” and their lifestyle. This clouds his vision to the fact that Diesel is indeed the one behind the highway robberies and he spends much of the movie trying desperately to find evidence that one of the other gang leaders is behind it.

In the end, Walker has to make a choice. After a highway robbery goes awry and one of Diesel’s gang is seriously hurt, Walker exposes himself as a cop to get medevac for the injured. With Diesel’s operation exposed and cops on the way, Walker does the only logical thing left to be done: he lets Diesel flee to Mexico. Walker puts faux friends and a lifestyle that isn’t his above his duties as a police officer and lets the bad guy get away.

So, aside from the anti-establishment undertones, what is wrong with this movie? For starters, the writing sucks. I understand that much of the dialog is meant to be tongue-in-cheek, but it’s still woefully written tongue-in-cheek. Groan worthy lines like “You look tired, I think you should go upstairs and give me a massage” and “I live my life a quarter-mile at a time” are just a few examples of how stale and out of touch the script is.

The actors do their best to deal with the horrible prose they are force fed, but stale or overblown performances prevent the acting from achieving anything above mediocrity. Very few, if any, of the characters seem genuine. Most are built out of stereotypes and conventions that have grown to be more irksome than appreciable. Walker’s eagerness to be playing his first bona fide leading role and the lousy script make his character completely unbelievable and easy to pick out as an undercover cop. Vin Diesel appears to either have just been acting like his normal self or he decided to adopt his character’s attitude in real life. It’s hard to tell, but either way he’s a flat character and it’s hard to imagine a guy who grew up on the streets and working with cars to be such a genius at crime.

The rest of the cast is filled out with actors and actresses who have also had very little experience with main or even supporting roles. There’s a lot of raw talent in The Fast and the Furious, but it doesn’t appear that director Rob Cohen spent much time helping the young cast figure out their characters. All this untapped and unfocused talent is a lot to sit through for 100 minutes. I’d like the think the cast (excepting Vin Diesel of course) will go on to have bright careers when they get the proper amount of direction.

Some of the chase scenes and visual effects are a bit on the silly side. I mean, do we really need a CGI shot that takes us from the engine block back through the exhaust pipe? I think not. The use of computer inserted ‘speed lines’ to make viewers think that the cars are traveling really fast are preposterous. These effects make the cars look like they are traveling much faster than they really could under the same conditions in real life.

Also, some of the stunt work, while impressive looking, is very deceiving. Some of the race scene and wrecks are very well choreographed and executed, but rely on visual trickery and many modifications to pull off. For instance, very few cars are low enough to the ground to drive underneath and a semi truck’s trailer. Even one that is low enough would be obstructed by the spare tire holder and other parts that hang below the bottom of the trailer. The trucks used have raised trailers, which are easy to spot if you know where to look. It all looks ‘cool,’ but it’s not realistic.

And that’s the biggest problem with The Fast and the Furious. Much of it is just too unrealistic to keep my mind from suppressing my doubt for very long. The dialog is phony, the acting is stale and the plot is a stretch. The way they rob the trucks is really truly laughable and probably wouldn’t work.

At its heart, The Fast and the Furious is a guilty pleasure movie but it really turns out to be guilty of poor execution and being an almost undetectable rip-off. Just as Point Break sparked an interest in surfing back in the early 90s, The Fast and the Furious sparked interest in illegal street racing, a decidedly more dangerous and less athletic pursuit.

Thanks for nothing.

RATING: 1.5 out of 5

Elektra (2005)

This is a confusing and confused movie. My expectations were low to begin with, as it is a combination sequel and spin-off of 2003’s Daredevil. Daredevil itself was underwhelming and uninspired but between modest gains at the box office and Jennifer Garner’s popularity from the hit show Alias, this movie was destined to be made. With alterations to the main characters back-story and a poorly thought out attempt at several layers of misdirection, Elektra fails to impress.

Jennifer Garner is a beautiful woman, which appeals to young men. Lots of martial arts action, violence, and high-energy stunt work also appeals to this demographic. Banking on a pretty face and some flashy stunts are poor choices for the foundation of a movie. I wasn’t able to determine if this film is actually based off any of the Elektra comics, but considering how very little praise it received from comic book enthusiasts (or anyone else for that matter) I would venture to guess that the story was written just for the film.

I have little to say about the acting because it was actually pretty good for a comic book movie. However, whatever good comes out of the acting is undone by the illogical choices and poor dialog given to the cast. They do their best with it but even they seem to be unsure of their words. This makes the whole package feel awkward and pushes it into the realm of silliness at times.

While the protagonists are sufficiently developed, though veiled behind the layers of misdirection, the antagonists are treated like disposable toy soldiers. They serve their purpose by creating a threat to Elektra and her goal, thereby acting as the impetus for a number of flashy displays of stunt work and CGI. They look mean and act mean, but their back-story and an explanation of how or why they have their supernatural powers is not explained. The only known motivation is that they work for the bad guy and like to hurt people. They’re not very deep, which is a shame. I tend to enjoy multifaceted, morally ambiguous villains.

All in all, the fight scenes go overboard and become the focus of the film. It really seems like the plot takes a backseat for about an hour and is used as a thin ploy to move between fight scenes. Then there is the hint at the end that the events of the entire film were part of a larger misdirection meant to teach Elektra some larger lesson in her ongoing training. This serves only to confound me further, because that implies the higher up good guys risked Elektra helping the bad guys at first. It’s all too much for anyone but comic book fanboys, and even they didn’t respond to this film favorably.

Eye candy aside, this movie is a stinker.

RATING: 1.25 out of 5