Luke Cage (script)
"In the screenplay Ramsey stays faithful to the comic origins of Cage but contemporizes him for today's audiences. Luke Cage is a playa and he talks like one. I forgot to mention that there is also a lot of pimp and playa talk in this script. Enough to piss off little Spike Lee and turn him into the Incredible Hulk but I enjoyed the hell out of it..." (full review)

Flight of the Dead (script)
"I cannot begin to tell you how profoundly insulted I felt after reading this garbage. This thing pisses on everything us zombie fans love about the genre. I realise that you have to suspend your disbelief when faced with a story involving zombies but this is ridiculous. "House of the dead" was a masterpiece compared to this (Yeah, I'm going there). I don't know what else to say. I still don't know who wrote it and I really don't care. Things like these make me hate scary movies. Wait a minute. No they don't. I could have read this thing at 4 A.M. on a New York subway and it still wouldn't have scared me. I guess I still love scary movies after all..." (full review)

13 Going on 30
"The chemistry between Ruffalo and Garner is another reason this movie floats right through scenes where it should sink.  The two flesh out their thinly written characters and turn cardboard into flesh and blood.  By the end of the film, you're buying into everything they're selling you (other than that annoying "Thriller" dance sequence and the Fedex product placements); as implausible as all of it is.  Suddenly, you have a trite romance feeling eerily close to magic.  Watching the rekindling of a childhood crush nearly makes you melt..." (full review)

"A feel good movie that actually makes you feel good.  Everyone involved seems to be having so much fun on the screen that they work their way into your heart.  Their joy is contagious, and you can't help but sit back and go with it..." (full review)

Mean Girls
"I'm sure a lot of parents would love to assume that this movie is an exaggeration, that their daughter doesn't act like this. They should read the book. They should also take their girl to see this, as it ultimately makes some very important points of encouragement for both them and those who have to deal with them. Like the aforementioned BREAKFAST CLUB, I get thing feeling this one is going to touch a nerve with a lot of people. After most movies, the crowd disperses immediately. After this one, small pockets (cliques?) of every demographic stood around for up to a half an hour discussing not just the funny scenes, but the environment, personal stories, and more. I'm betting $5 (to my favorite charity, not to you, countless readers) that in five years this will be one of those movies everyone assumes everyone has seen, likes, and owns. "Oh my God! You haven't seen MEAN GIRLS? What, were you living in Africa or something?" And the cycle continues..." (full review)

Laws of Attraction
"The movie also tries to strike a nerve on the subject of divorce, but ultimately fails.  When the writer's final analysis for divorce is "because the couple just gives up", the audience isn't fooled.  Fortunately, this is a romantic comedy and not a drama, so weak attempts at making a statement can be overlooked.  Unfortunately, the weak plot cannot be overlooked, and it ultimately mars what could have been a great date movie.  The movie will still appeal to older moviegoers, but, for the majority, the final verdict is a thoroughly predictable and forgettable lover's quarrel..." (full review)

Man on Fire
"Man on Fire is a film that will own you utterly as you watch it. It is a sledgehammer, brutal, much more intense than expected. But it is also intelligent and moving, a feat rarely accomplished by a big-budget Hollywood film. Denzel Washington delivers a revenge film of raw feeling and ferocity..." (full review)

"It's a well-known fact that director Tony Scott is going to make something stylish and slick with whatever material he takes on. But even armed with that knowledge, nothing could prepare the senses for "Man on Fire," the latest revenge picture to hit the multiplexes, and easily the worst of the bunch. There's a competent vigilante film underneath all of Scott's excessive and pretentious camerawork, and one-notch-above-blitzkrieg editing, but no reason whatsoever to sort through the visual muck to get to it. The film will get your attention, that's for sure, but someone should've stopped Scott in the editing room before he turned his film into something resembling a cinematic strobe light..." (full review)

Spartacus (TV)
"The hardest thing to do while watching this miniseries remake of "Spartacus" is to not compare it to the classic 1960 feature film directed by Stanley Kubrick and starring such heavyweight Hollywood stars as Kirk Douglas, Sir Laurence Olivier, Jean Simmons, Charles Laughton, Peter Ustinov, and Tony Curtis. So the best thing to keep in mind for those who have seen the original theatrical adaptation is that this is a different dramatization told more the forty years after the original and simply not to expect the exact same thing..." (full review)


Van Helsing by 'Dan'
We were so excited to get passes to a screening of this film a few weeks back. It was one of those Blockbusters that couldn't miss. No such thing you say? You would be right. This movie misses on every level. Let's start with a lack of story or story development, things simply happen in this film as though it were one long action sequence. When it reaches a point where they don't know where to take it, they simply make something up out of thin air. They never bother to explain it and trust me, their choices are always dumb.

Basic Story (which is all there is): Van Helsing (Jackman) is sent to Transylvania to fight Dracula and save Anna Valerious (Beckinsale), who is supposed to be his equal in tough-guyness. Both can defy gravity (tons of wire-work) in the most bizarre ways. Dracula is attempting to utilize Frankenstein's lab to bring his babies (from all of his brides) to life, since they are all born dead. He decides he needs the life-source of Frankenstein's monster in order to give them all (millions of them) life. It's up to Van baby to save the day... protect the babe (from not only Dracula, but her werewolf brother), and find a way to fight Dracula who is un-killable from the likes of mortal man.

Spoiler Alert!

For instance, in this movie we eventually find out that the only thing that can fight Dracula, is a werewolf? Huh? Why? Stakes and silver don't harm him, but some big teeth do? Ugh! Once this lame story idea is revealed, you will immediately guess where the story will go from there... who will get bitten by a werewolf only to become a Dracula fighting lycanthrope. Lame!

The lack of story development is only furthered by the lack of character development. For some reason, that is NEVER explored/explained, Van Helsing has lost his memory of who he was, and somehow taken on this monster-fighting persona after being rescued (from what we don't know) by a Priest. The Priest must look at him and think, "I think I'll make you into a monster fighter". None of the characters in this film are developed AT ALL. David Wenham plays Carl, Van Helsing's sidekick, modeled after "Q" of James Bond fame. He is completely wasted. He spends the entire film bumbling around as comic relief, while his character is just not funny.

We've seen this shtick before and it has gotten old. In the beginning, he's working on an invention that contains the same light strength as the sun... Van Helsing asks what he could possibly use a sun casting bomb for... They both shrug and say that maybe something will come up. These guys have already battle vampires, so it's not like they don't know when they'll be able to use their lame device. The film is full of predictable clichés like this, that it became painful to witness. Kate Beckinsale once again plays a cold, passionless woman. For such a hottie, it is a shame that she never shows a spark in any of her roles. This is the same character she played in "Underworld".

The FX: While some of the fx are cool. Frankenstein's monster is done very well... some of them simply look cheesy once you are forced to look at them for anything longer than what the film's trailer shows. The Hyde monster (Jekyll / Hyde) in the beginning is so awful looking that I yearned to see "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen's" body suit. The flying monkey vampire babies are so goofy looking that you will laugh. They must think that they will be able to make dolls out of them and sell them like they were Elmo. The vampire brides look ok, although the jaw enlarging effect they use when they are going to bite someone looks bad.

Dialogue: Oh my! They didn't even attempt to make this realistic. The film takes place near the end of the 19th century, but everyone speaks as the real life people they are. Hugh who now sounds American seems like he's doing a cheesy action film of the 1980's. I like this guy, but he needs better material (ala more like Wolverine). There are so many bad one liners in this film, that I found myself cringing every few minutes.

The music: That's right as I said before, every aspect of this film is bad. The music switches genres so often that it becomes clear that they were watching other movies while deciding on what a kind of music a specific scenes should have. It goes from Desperado/Once Upon a Time in Mexico music to over the top score (as was used in the films like Frankenstein meets the Wolfman), to John Barry music. It's soundtrack is so scattered that it fails to help any scene build any tension.

As I stated, I and my wife, were excited to see this film. We loved the idea of an homage film to the 20th Century monster films, and both like Hugh Jackman, but this film bombs on every level. The audience (350) we saw it with had only about 50 people cheering, and the rest of us scratching our heads. We, along with a group of late-teens / early 20's that sat next to us, all noticed that the focus group that was being pulled for the after film talk, were only coming from the 50 that cheered the film. So, I'm sure they're claiming this thing test-screened amazingly. Trust me, those 50 people out of 350, must have been plants because the amount of moaning and groan... laughing at things that weren't supposed to be funny... and snide comments during the film, truly showed what the majority of the audience thought... that this is one stinker of a film!