The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy -- 2005 -- PG

This movie was just funny. It had a decent plot line and some great gags to fill it in. The jokes were just isolated, but completely ingrained into the storyline making them even funnier than they would be otherwise. It had some great costumes from Jim Henson's creature shop, and some clever and amusing twists to the plot as we traveled along.

My only complaints were that the main character, on two occasions, made some decisions that rested more with moving the plot than what his character would do. It would have better served the character for him to have been dragged away at the point where he just ran when the girl was captured. It just felt wrong.

The other was near the end when he chose to enter the final structure where I would have felt better had he been more hesitant and wanted to return to the others. I just felt his willingly going in was like abandoning everyone. Granted all this worked out, but again, it seemed odd.

The only other hiccup was an importance stressed on carrying a towel, but the reasoning behind this was never really explained. It is used a couple of times, but anything could have conceivably been used. The bad guys seemed afraid of a towel for some reason, but it seems a small thing to carry a towel to defend against one race.

Other than that, good show. Got a kick out of the Point of View Gun and the Improbability Drive.

Hitch -- 2005 -- PG-13

Through the Queen, I was subjected to this film whose trailers did not paint a promising picture. I was pleasantly surprised, though with a cleverly constructed chick flick with well-rounded characters and individual motivations and stories.

Early on, I was getting lost in the multitude of plots, and I worried they were trying to do too much. However, it all came together as we shot forward and the conflicts reached a satisfying height and resolution. All in all, one of the better romantic comedites I've seen in awhile.

House of Wax -- 2005 -- R

Theoretically, this is a remake of he 1953 film with Vincent Price, but the only similarity between this one and that one is the wax covered corpses, and the deformed man with the wax face. Beyond that, this is an original take on the old idea.

The idea behind this film isn't bad. You have an isolated town with a wax museum made entirely of wax. Some argue that the wax building would melt in the sun, but wax takes some extreme temperatures to melt, and I don't see it as a large error. Anyway, the entire town is essentially dead, so these brothers take it over, filling the shops and building with wax dummies to give the entire town the appearance of being a wax museum. Come to find out that these brothers are killing passers-by and covering their bodies with wax. The deaths are okay, the chases are pretty good, and the ending is kind of neat as well.

Characters are about normal for a horror movie in that you get just enough to know who they are, but not develop them to the point that you care. They also do their typical range of idiotic things such as exploring other people's houses and going places that the script tells them to. I rolled my eyes a lot during this film.

When would I have left if I were them? When I'd made camp and a truck drives up and sits there with its lights shining on the campsite. Knowing there was someone in the area who would do this, I would never go to sleep. We'd be out of there. What do they do? Go to sleep only to have a camera stolen and a car sabotaged. Can't say that I'm that surprised.

In the end, for a horror flick, it was okay, but certainly not the best, or even decent, film to come out last year. If they'd spent some time developing the characters and having them make intelligent decisions, that would have improved this film a lot.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - 2005 - PG-13

The fourth film adapting the Harry Potter series continues the tradition laid down in the third of allowing Stephen Kloves to adapt the book properly instead of trying to film the book as the first two films did. The result is a film that, like the books, is darker and scarier than the one before it. While it was diappointing that John Williams did not compose the music to this one, it is still a great film and a great addition to the HP series.

This film moves fast. Kloves followed the standard of adaptation very well by retaining the essential plot points of the book while writing a screenplay around them. We thankfully do not include the Dursleys here allowing us to pick up right in the wizarding world with the Quidditch World Cup and all the things that went with it. From there, we jet right over to Hogwart's and get into the point of the movie: the Tri-Wizard Tournament, that underage Harry, of course, has to participate in.

It's been awhile since I read the book, but I remembered much of it as I watched the film meaning it followed the story pretty closely. I'm sure there were some things missed, but given the length of the book, that comes as no surprise. The essence of the story was captured, and we got ourselves a dark, fast film with some solid character moments for the lead trio and those around them.

A moment I am grateful was touched on is the budding love-hate between Hermione and Ron that is back and forth in the books. They were given a solid scene to play out the emotions and they did it very well. Be very cool to see how they continue to blossom this one.

So, overall, if you've liked the movies so far, this one will not disappoint.

Hello Again -- 1987 -- PG

This was a cute little romantic comedy involving a woman who chokes to death and is broughtback to life by her transcendentalist sister who owns a shop of items such as crystal balls and books on myticism. Trouble is she was married and wasn't brought back until a year after her death giving her husband ample time to find himself a new life. The film follows her picking up the pieces of her life and working to move forward. Of course, there is a fair amount of jealousy and conflict from both hubby's new wife and everyone who doesn't believe she actually died.

This is a sweet little film and has plenty of laughs and goofiness along with some nice characters and a happy ending.

Haunted Mansion -- 2003 -- PG

Haunted house movies are notorious for wanting to be creepy but rarely succeeding to any degree (Poltergeist and Amityville Horror being notable exceptions). Disney's contribution to this genre works very well, because they take away the character of the house and make it silly showing as I've always suspected that haunted house movies tend to be silly rather than scary. I was grateful for the silly departure from the norm, and they played with it well. 

While the characters are well rounded, their weaknesses were rather cliche. Workaholic dad. Attitude laden teen daughter. Family values going down the tube. Of course, their individual problems are all worke dout in the end, but in the meantime, we get a decent little storyline of intrigue as we tour the haunted mansion. This isn't life changing cinema; this is the movie you go to the cinema for to forget life.

The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy -- 1981 -- NR

This is a 6-part serial that appeared on BBC and then was on PBS for a little bit. Personally, I could swear I watched this when I was younger, but I didn't remember any of it when I saw it again. This version was based on the radio plays which eventually spawned the book.

The first four episodes were pretty good. It had a really good flow, decent pacing, some clever and funny gags and jokes, we were getting into the characters and their situations, and the fourth episode even ended on a good cliff hanger. After four episodes, I'm thinking this is a very funny, off the wall series. I was enjoying every moment. And then they apparently ran out of ideas.

Episode five dragged horribly. There was no direction for the characters to take and for the most part nothing at all happened. Finally, they escaped in some kind of ship, but it still didn't indicate any direction or goal for the characters. 

Episode six wasn't much better. Still no direction. Two of the main characters disappeared into oblivion; no clue what happened to them. And then our heroes end up in a Planet of the Apes situation on Earth to live out their days knowing it was going to be destroyed in two million years. How they got that far back in time is never explained.

So it had a really good start, but as soon as stuff got introduced, it got dropped and never returned to. I'm not even sure what the point was of the series. Usually, if a series has a beginning and end, they are striving towards a specific goal, but this one got lost in the shuffle...in fact, I don't even know if it had one. 

However, we did get the question to the answer of 42 for the menaing of life, the universe, and everything. What is it? Hm, should I make you suffer through the 6 episodes of the series to find it?

How To Lose A Guy in 10 Days -- 2003 -- PG-13

This film had an excellent premise to spring from with a ton of potential that it executed very well.

Andie Anderson is the "how to" girl in a local magazine who announces she'll write an article about dating mistakes women make and drive a guy away, hence the title. Ben Barry is an advertising guy who wants a big time diamond account and announces as a bet to win the account that he can make a woman fall in love with him in 10 days. And who should his competitors have happened to visit that very day? Why Andie who they spot at that very party and point her out for him to snag. 

The antics they go through in her trying to get rid of him and him trying to keep her are hilarious. He gets to the point where he hates her, but can't get rid of her because of the bet. She has to drive him off because of the story, but is beginning to like him.

Sure, some of it is very predictable because it follows the tried and true romantic comedy framework, but it is more fun than a lot of films out there.

While Ben's character was rounded out pretty well, Andie's was a little thin on the backstory. The separation element near the end (so important for romantic comedies) was a little contrived, but played on one of his strengths. This one has a sequence of strong language where the family plays a game of B.S. (if you now the game, you know what it is), and they actually say the full word over and over (it's actuallya wonder they held onto the PG-13 rating). Anything else could have been used to control the language element, but it managed to fit into the plot rather well.

So this is a comedy that is funny and cute. It works fairly well throughout, and has a killer premise which is likely why it was made to begin with.

House of Wax -- 1953 -- NR

The plot of a wax museum curator using corpses as wax models is a plot going way back and is doubtless the result of the lifelike appearance of wax dummies.

This version of the tale from 1953 with Vincent Price in the lead role is a good take on this tale. When his partner decides to burn the museum down in order to take advantage of the insurance money, the owner, who has an unnatural attachment to his work, takes on apprentices to do his work for him. At the same time, there are a series of murders and the corpse disappears, baffling the police. 

Only one person has seen this murderer and that is Sue Allen, but the cops don't believe her description of the assailant as he is badly burned. One might believe this to be the museum owner, but low and behold, when we see him, his face is not only normal, but he is in a wheelchair, and can't walk.

It tells a great tale in the style of a thriller approaching early slasher. The characters are decent and the only complaint I have in this one is the heroine getting herself into danger by going placs we know full well she shouldn't, though in this case, there is at least some measure of reasonable motivation.

Overall, the film works well as an old style horror tale with that macabre twist that is done so well in older films when they couldn't get much in the way of gore past the censors.

Hostel -- 2005 -- R

Well, that was interesting. once you get into the actual plot of the movie, it turns out to be pretty...well, interesting isn't exactly the right word...maybe engaging is better. The movie kicks off with an absolutely idiotic premise: three guys are backpacking through Europe and staying at a variety of hostels in order to get laid. Yup, that's it. That's why they ended up at the hostel in question.

Once there, we learn that this particular hostel is not just some place to get some rest and get laid. No, this one has sinister motives behind it. People get hacked up in this one. Right up Quentin Tarantino's alley, I'd say, though he was just an executive producer and the guy who gets his name above the title.

Once we get past the sex and the basic hack-n-slash, we get into a very intriguing, yet incredibly disturbing, plot that unfolds little by little as the film does. We are rightly left as in the dark as the single surviving character to unravel this puzzle as he struggles to survive. I think the premise could have been a lot better, and I was downright bored once I hit the end of act one. Once the plot finally kicked in, it got better, though a lot more disturbing.

I think it was an ok film, and for the grehounds, I'm sure they ate it up. I do have several dislikes about this film, but I can't really go into them without spoiling the plot. So, if you like bunches of gore and screaming, you might enjoy this. If you're into a bizarre, nearly conspiratorial idea, you might enjoy this once we get far enough into it. I love a good plot, and this one worked well enough, at least, to catch the sequel when it is released...yup, there is one planned.

Homage to Eadweard Maybridge -- 1880's (1994 documentary)

This was a collection of sequential picture films, each lasting only 30 seconds or so each. As a predecessor to the actual film camera's product, they provide an interesting glance into what led to what we are now familiar, but of course, since it was all experimental, provide no story or anything.

One point of interest, though, is what he chose to film for a subject. As the oldest of films, this kinda points to the dirty mind of man...every one of these short subjects were naked women. Yup. Completely disrobed.

As I watched the "Woman throws a baseball" one, I couldn't help but think that if that were how the sport were played, it would have a much bigger fan base...

I'd say we've come a long way quality wise in the way of 35mm prints and HD video, but when you realize your first genre is porn, you gotta wonder where they were planned on taking the art form.

This is on "The Movies Begin Vol. 1".

H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds -- 2005 -- R

Not to be confused with the Spielberg version that came out the same month, this film is from a company called The Asylum that works with a bit of a lower budget than that of a small, undeveloped country like Spielberg tends to have at his disposal. 

Ok, on the whole, it was no where near as bad as a lot of people tend to rant on about. Sure, it isn't perfect, but those films are very few and far between, and we could punch holes in the Godfather if we wanted to. But I enjoyed the film as a whole. Most of the detractors of this film either never watched it, or for some reason rely on special effects to tell a story.

The good parts. Gotta start with the good. I felt the main character, George, was decently rounded for the genre. We understood his journey, and could follow the plot very easily. He hooked up with the priest (pastor?) Victor, who was also a well thought out character and in some respects better rounded than George was. Kerry seemed a bit thrown in to give George someone to talk to for awhile, but on the whole, he was ok. Kind of threw me off when they separated. 

The effects were by no means distracting and did not take away from the experience at all. If nothing else, it showed what the company is capable of. Many of the sets give a good appearance to a big budget disaster movie, so well done there. 

The writer/director seems to have a bit of a penchant for inside jokes. George Herbert, for example, as in Herbert George Wells being one of those. 

My prime beef was with the driving point of the plot. It just seemed a bit upside down. Guy's wife and child go to D.C. while he stays at home. Bad stuff happens, and he wants them to stay put while he goes to them. I do like what one of the characters brought up in that it would make more sense for him to stay home while they came to him. He travels in the hope that they will be waiting for im on the step of the Lincoln Memorial in the capital of the superpower of the free world. I know it make for a cool end shot to see D.C. rampaged, but it just seems that it would have been a easier to swallow premise for him to be away from home and they waiting for him to arrive there. Now, the home could have been in Washington, D.C. to still achieve those end shots, and actually most of the film would have played almost exactly how it played, but the overall feeling would have been "I have to get home to them" as opposed to "I will meet them on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial if she got my message during the 30 seconds of time when the power worked and I was able to get through to her. I have faith she'll wait there." 

I'm also not a big fan of blind coincidence. A lot of these coincidences could have been easily rectified with a setup somewhere else in the film before the big use of it occurred. 

The chances of someone catching something through a telescope without actually spotting it first is very small. Telescopes are very difficult devices to use well, and someone just happening to look through one at the exact spot at the exact time something just happened to pass in front of the lens's field of vision is hard to swallow. Better would have been spotting something in the sky, repositioning the telescope, and then looking at it. This would also have helped the hard to accept "I think I'll look through a telescope (generally accepted as a night device with the exception of peeping Toms) during the day." 

The power surge thing was a bit of a strange point since it allowed for some coincidences. When the power comes on, the phone instantly rings. This means that the power is surging at the same time at points hundreds of miles apart or that person just happened to call at the exact moment the power would be back on at home. 

One way to have gotten around this one as a coincidence would have been the flip-flopping of the plot that I mentioned earlier. Another way that would be ok with the existing plot would have been for the caller to mention that their power just came back on or something. It's weak, but it would have worked. 

The boat was a bit of a strange find as well. It was the only one on that shore (wherever that shore was), no one was using it, and Kerry disappeared before George got in it. Also, I got the idea that we were in North Carolina, and him going to D.C. means he has to travel North. The only river in the world that travels North is the Nile, meaning George put himself a night in the wrong direction by riding this boat. 

The setup would have been to mention where they are and why there were boats here. Also would have worked if more people were taking these boats and it woudl have helped to see Kerry get separated from him. 

The final big coincidence was remeeting Kerry and the Lieutenant turned Major. The chance of him running into them after the path he'd taken was incredibly microscopic. Add to this that the scene really did not serve to drive the plot forward at all, but give a finality to Kerry's character, something that (given his end) was rather unnecessary from a dramatic standpoint. I could see a single point to that scene, and that is Samuelson's speech about the scientist's winning the war, not the infantry. This speech could have been in the first meeting very easily and this later scene trimmed right out. I would have trimmed it just to get away from the coincidental factor. 

As I understood the rabies angle, by injecting this into that one alien (another coincidence the character was praying for, since they had no way of knowing whether they'd see an alien close enough to actually inject it), they might somehow kill off the entire invading force? Unless every alien in the world were linked together somehow, this would not have worked at all. Better to stick with the book reasoning and have our native bacteria wipe them out. Sure, it isn't dramatic, and it doesn't involve our main character actually doing it, but it's an adaptation and in the book, so people more easily accept that. 

A few other things that got to me. Sometimes the aliens shot people, sometimes they dragged them off. There would need to be some kind of reasoning behind their choices. Otheriwse, it's easier to just pick one or the other. The weird alien acid slime that did in Victor was out of nowhere as well. I got the purpose (I think), but it just seemed like it was thrown in. 

I did like the green death mist thing; that was cool. 

Ok, there it is. At the end of the film, I did find it to be a good job. It's actually worth watching as long as you take it on its own merits and don't draw comparisons between it and the bigger budget version with Tom Cruise.

The Hills Have Eyes -- 2006 -- R

Ok, so we have another remake; this one of a classic film originally directed by Wes Craven from the late 70's about cannibals living in the radiation drenched desert of New Mexico (I believe).

This one got weird from the get-go with some old guy wandering around hollering for "Ruby." Well, in short order, we get a collection of odds and ends including an ear, and our protagonists stop into his gas station. In typical horror movie fashion (and completely unlike reality), everyone gets out of the vehicles (a truck with a full fifth wheel camper in tow) including the dogs which, of course, need to be chased down. It's kind of an annoying scene overall, but hey, it's really the only development we get for most of these people.

At the end, we get our catalyst for the whole film. Old guy says take this road that's not on the map; it's a shortcut. Me? I would have said thanks but no thanks, but our big man in the driver's seat putts himself and his family down a completed deserted dirt road in the middle of no where from a highway leading through the middle of nowhere, and of course, they end up crashing from from strategically placed spikes in the road that blow out all of the tires and send the truck careening into a nearby rock. Now they're trapped.

What's the first thing they do? Split up. That's right, it's a horror movie, so they split up. One goes down the road to see how far it goes...seriously. The other heads back to the gas station. Me? I'd've seen four blown out tires and no evidence of what did it and suspect something is up. Then again, I'd've never gone down that road to begin with in a truck towing a camper. Anyway, everyone else stay at the camper in the blistering heat.

As could be expected a dog escapes and runs across the desert to its timely demise. The boy chases said dog; I would have let the dog run...they come back. The boy discovers the dog gutted, flips out, and tells no one...even when he insists they all sleep together in the camper, and the married couple wants to sleep in the truck...even then, he doesn't tell. "He didn't want to freak everyone out," he says later.

Now, the move that ruined the whole movie in believability. I tell you this because this film is really not worth renting. The cannibals get into the camper and find the cute teenager. They want a piece of her, even though mom is sleeping in the camper too. You ready for this? The teenager gets a little scream out. They use a remote to light up dear old dad some distance away (cause they captured him at the gas station). Mom gets up and runs out the door WITHOUT NOTICING THE TEEN OR EVEN LOOKING HER DIRECTION. This is a mobile tube and mom didn't notice their visitors or that her daughter was in danger. I just laughed at this because it was so unbelievable. And then, to top that off, these guys are working on doing their business with her, her brother-in-law comes back into the camper for something (I forget what), says something to her quickly, and leaves ALSO WITHOUT NOTICING HER PERIL. This should have been one of the most horrific and suspenseful scenes in the film, but I just could not accept that no one would notice someone in trouble less than 10 feet away.

So, the film was pretty much destroyed for me from there. People die. The baby is kidnapped (yeah, they put a little baby in the film) so the brother-in-law has to look for his child in the freak town of the cannibals. He takes the living dog with him. Good move, in my opinion. Then, he stashes the dog somewhere when he enters the house with the baby. Idiot. Dogs count as, like, two people in a fight.

They have one of the cannibals' wakie talkies...and then use it with the camper's CB to communicate. Um, hello? The cannibals have the walkie talkies...they can hear you.

Finally, the guy gets the baby (the first time), and tries to exit the house back through the front door instead of at least trying the window for a quicker, safer escape. If the window is stuck, then fine, but he didn't even try it.

This film was a case of characters jumping through hoops to ensure they follow the plot only and not do what people logically do. Most of it is completely unbelievable and the suspense was almost impossible to get into as a result. Not as bad as "Manos" The Hands of Fate or Scary Movie 2, but it's down there.

House of the Dead -- 2003 -- R

Wow. That was pretty bad. Normally, I'm one to comment on the story, but this film had so many shortcomings, it was just sad. Why did I watch this movie? Well, it's like this... I'm a member of this screenwriting site, and they're always trashing Uwe Boll movies. I'd never been so fortunate to have seen an Uwe Boll movie, so I thought I'd see his first one: an adaptation of a first person shooter video game. Holy load of crap.

Let's get the only redeeming quality in this film out of the way. The action scenes were well done. They were rather intense when it comes to level of danger and actions of the characters. So for about the middle third of the movie, we were moving...sort of. It played like a video game in that they were almost superhuman in their actions and never ending energy supply only running out of ammo at the convenient end. During this long action sequence, we got some matrix-y shots of the lead characters, but...we had them using one weapon during the fight and then a completely different weapon during the spin-around bit. We have digital cameras to remember these things; there's no excuse for that.

The story was razor thin. Basically, we get a bunch of kids going to a remote island and they all die and become zombies. Yes, the Romero rules are in full effect. So our first couple gives up lots of boobie shots and then she goes off looking for the missing boyfriend, walks into a house like an idiot and dies. Why do people just walk into houses in the middle of no where? Seriously, who does this?  

Our main group misses the original boat, so they follow behind overpaying some sea captain for passage, and he high tails it away from some coast guard chick in a weird and nearly pointless subplot. It has a thin point that comes up later, but it was mostly unnecessary.

My favorite directoral oversight was the on again-off again rain. It was raining on the captain's boat, not raining on land, not raining on the boat, then raining on the boat in the next few shots, then not raining again. During the part where it was pouring down rain, the captain walks to the edge of his deck, pops a cigar in his mouth, and pops on a lighter (which is strangely unaffected by the deluge around him), and lights his cigar with ease (also unaffected by the rain).

Amusing point two was an "old book" one of the characters found while snooping around this old house they holed up in. This book appeared to have been created on a printing press when the girl opened it and declared it was so old that something in there might help them. Personally, if I found an old book, I'd figure it was another copy of Tom Sawyer, not a vital piece of exposition. Worth something on eBay maybe... Anyway, she flips through this book an declares it was the first officer's log from the ship and said that so-n-so killed the captain and burned the ship. This was so ridiculous tht I half expected it to say "...and me too. And that's how I, the first officer, died a horrible death." If it were a first officer's log, why it is professionally printed and bound?

By the latter third of the movie, I was already numb to it. It played out ok, I suppose. Everything that was setup payed off, and there weren't any real surprised. We got a rash of cliches at the end which offered no surprises. Not even the final twist was a big shock. It was amusing, but not a shocker.

So the dislike of Uwe Boll is fully understood, and being the gluttong for punishment I am, I have a couple more Uwe Boll flicks lined up, but if this is any indicator of what I'm in for, I'm not setting my standards too high.

Hidalgo -- 2004 -- PG-13

At its most basic, this is a film about a horse race. More deeply, though, it's about a fish out of water who is fighting for a great many things, and this race is simply a way to get them. It's really a good tale of trying to prove that you're more than what you appear.

Based on the life of Frank T. Hopkins, this film shows a snip of his life in the Wild West show of "Wild Bill" Hickock. There, it is claimed he has the greatest long distance racing horse in the world, which eventually draws the attention of those who race horses in Arabia in a 3,000 mile race across the desert. They ask that he either enter this race and prove his claim, or remove the title.

In addition, businessmen have been rounding up all the wild mustangs in order to sell them. This practice has been taking the horses away from the Indian tribes who can't afford the stiff prices these men have placed on the horses' heads. Frank negotiates with someone or another (no idea who it was or how they relate 'cause I thought it was Wild Bill) to get this one chief a horse, and this was agreed to.

Anyway, this all leads Frank to Arabia, where he gets jibed a lot for his little mustang and being an American "infidel." Really, the jibs got over the top after awhile, and I was ready to let the movie progress without them. We got the point. He is even given a guy as a helper who happened to be a criminal of some sort. Probably more of them messing with him.

The race section from beginning to end is overrun with little conflicts to give us something to stare at, since (let's face it) watching the actual race would be very boring. Gotta fill up the time with something. So we get a little mistaken activity, lots of conversation about this and that as it relates to horses and the race and history and people and family and...yeah, it goes on like that. The race is given a handful of obstacles, one of the more interesting being a big sandstorm.

But like with any story of this nature, you have a certain cliche pop up; the people who want to cheat to win. Here's the problem with this one. No one expects the "cowboy" to win. He is given no odds at winning. They don't even think he'll survive, and yet, they give him all kinds of trouble during the race. They don't think he'll win, but they'll do whatever it takes to make sure he doesn't. Kind of a weird mixed confidence thing. If they don't think he's going to win, why worry about him? There are quite a few instances where these people toss obstacles up in his path, which he overcomes (yay for him), but the obstacles seemed to have little point.

To a more specific oddity, we have at one point some pits that were placed in Frank's path in order to finish him off. Kind of extreme, really, but add to this that they want one specific horse to win, and this horse crosses this same path, and they knew it would. Since they want one to win and one to lose, it seems really risky to place deadly pits in the path of both. Naturally, the favored one passed unscathed, and Frank fell in creating yet anther obstacle.

As for characters, Frank is the star and he's a fairly well rounded guy. Everyone else is incidental to him and pretty well blends into the background. The shiek is fairly decent, and they make an attempt at giving his daughter some life, but for the most part, everyone else is interchangable. Even his assistant guy is only there for a handful of scenes, and not really enough to give him a lot of depth.

It makes a good action-adventure film, and the character of Frank is a far cry from when we saw Viggo as Aragorn, so that was interesting. If you let the nit-picking go, you've got a nice little flick that does have an emotionally satisfying ending to it. All my complaints just stop it from the realm of perfection, but it is worth having a look.

Hellboy -- 2004 -- PG-13

Hellboy is another film based on a comic book where the hero of the story is actually a demon brought into this world by the Nazis, but rescued by the Americans and raised to be a defender against the forces of darkness. He tries to fit in as much as a large red man with a tail can, but it seems that sanding off his horns is just not enough.

Superhero films come in two main varieties in their first movie incarnation. Either we get a look at their first mission as a superhero, or they've been doing this for awhile and they're up against the biggest adventure of their lives. Hellboy is of the latter variety where this guy has been working for a special division of the FBI for years against weird creatures that pop in from the "other side," and is this story, he is going to undergoing not only a demon that resurrects itself when killed, but he's going to be hitting a lot of personal changes as well including dealing with his own personal demons.

Action-wise, we get a lot of it throughout to keep us interested in what's going on, and we're left hanging on multiple points to make us wonder what's up next. The worst thing that could happen keeps getting worse as we travel onward through the plot, whcih is simplistic laid out and followed, and it comes to a very neatly drawn head at the end where plot plus character is required to bring us to a satisfying conclusion. On a rather odd note, the film has no blood in any of its fight scenes. Hits, slashes, people run through, cut in half, and no blood is shown except in one scene where the existence of the blood is pivotal to the plot.

Character-wise, Hellboy is remarkably well drawn. He is the strongest character, and for a demon, he's very relatable and even a little believable. A fair attempt is made at filling out those around him, and a decent job is done in doing so, but they come no where near the complexity given to the lead. Given that this was based on a comic book, there are quite a few characters that serve to support Hellboy, and the villain is not only he, but his sidekicks as well, which gives us 6 other characters to get to know, and given that rather daunting task, they did a decent job. On the good guy side, the old guy gets more than anyone else with the girl and new guy coming in together with their development. On the villains, the weirdest of the bunch got most of the development, and this was in the form of a vocalization of his past by the old guy. The other two, including the main baddie, Rasputin, weren't given much more. Rasputin got a brief origin, and the girl...well, we know why she's still so young anyway.

This film delivers a lot for its genre, and really works hard to make its hero as human and real as possible (even though he's not human). It only falls short of the perfection mark because of its neglect to the other main characters in the mix. That being said, it is still a rather good film to watch if you don't have anything else to put on.

How To Marry A Millionaire -- 1953

This may be my third one of these for today, but believe it or not, I've been watching movies like crazy lately, and I've got three more backed up (four once I finish the other half of Grudge 2). Some may suggest I lay off the movies (like I'm on drugs or something), but hey, the job I want is making movies, and it is important that I study, right? :-p

Anyway, this flick comes out of the "Marilyn Monroe Diamond Collection," but ironically, Marilyn Monroe is not the lead character. She plays one of the main characters, but the film's lead is played by Lauren Bacall. Marilyn being Marilyn, I guess, she not only gets top billing now, but she's the only one on the outside of the DVD case. I guess Ms. Bacall just doesn't sell like she used to. Along with these two, even, this film has no shortage of star power for 1953 as we also get Betty Grable rounding out the top 3 here with the odd names of Loco (Grable), Pola (Monroe), and Schatze (Bacall).

The story involves 3 women moving into a plush, high class apartment they really can't afford in order to attract a millionaire husband for at least one of them. Bacall is the one making all the rules and telling him the standards she is laying down and the first person we get walking through the door is a guy who falls for Schtze, but since he isn't wearing a tie, she dismisses him as a "gas pump jockey" when in reality, he is the very millionaire she seeks. The other two are here and there as the film progresses finding their millionaires, but then finding actual love in chance meetings with other men while pursuing these million dollar guys. Our "gas pump" millionaire decides to pursue Schatze without ever telling her his worth, hoping to woo her with his charm, instead of his wallet.

The characters are all very cleverly constructed with each girl having her own unique traits and idiosyncrasies. Schtaze is miss practicality; Loco is as her name suggests and very scatterbrained, yet spoiled when it comes down to it; and Pola believes that men don't like girls with glasses, so she prefers to run into things rather than wear them, even though she is blind as a bat without them. Even the men they run with are given personalities and traits to make them a little more real than the cannon fodder they could have been.

It's a comedy and it's very funny in my opinion. The jokes and gags are delivered just right to engage the audience in some well placed laughs to enhance the enjoyment of the story.

So not only does this qualify as a classic, but it's a very enjoyable comedy as well. There are some points that feel a little dated, but if you take it as 1953, it's a lot of fun.

How To Eat Fried Worms -- 2006 -- PG

So a kid movie based on the book of the same name. I think I may have actually read this at some point in my younger life, but I don't remember anything about it. Probably wouldn't make any difference if I did. The film adaptation offers not only a decent coming of age type story, but also a fair amount of total gross-out effects (and no worms harmed during the making of the film).

Moving stories of kids changing schools and trying to fit in with the new culture on the other side of those foreboding school building doors are nothing new in the movie world. In fact, most kid stories are either this type of story or some kid doing something superheroic that only a child watching the film would accept. This film gives us a big twist on its tread-worn concept. This kid is initiated into the culture with a surprise lunch box full of worms. He makes the fatal mistake of saying he eats worms which inevitably leads to the bet that he will eat ten worms by sundown on the first Saturday he's in the new school.

The bet solidified, the bully makes every effort to make the worm experience the worst of this new kid's life (as if eating worms to begin with weren't bad enough). The worm eating sequences are absolutely disgusting. The worms are very realistic and they look even worse when "cooked" or prepared; I found myself on the verge of gagging just watching some of this. Eat your heart out, Friday the 13th...oh wait, they did that in the ninth one...sorry, I digress.

We have a handful of main kid characters who get acquainted incredibly fast, which is realistic for kids who instantly trust each other beyond what adults would even think of doing. Even though there are a lot, we get to know them fairly well for as many as there are and as short as the film is. There are some very short sequences of mom and dad in there along with dad adjusting to his new job, but these scenes are thankfully short since we really want to get back to our boy and his antics at school and such. So as the worm-eating bet moves on, new kid earns the respect of his new found peers, much to the chagrin of the bully who thinks they're his posse and his alone.

This may be a kids movie, but I actually enjoyed it. It isn't perfect and has a sappy ending to make the kiddies feel all warm and fuzzy inside, but it plays the gross out factor very admirably, and doesn't hold back at all. Great fun.

Hellcats of the Navy -- 1957

So I've never sat down and watched a war movie before, particularly a submarine one. The reason I watched this one is because I realized I'd never seen a Ronald Reagan movie, and this one happens to be the only one to have both Ronald and Nancy Reagan (as Nancy Davis) in it twenty three years before they took over the White House as President and First Lady.

The plot is rather simple. It involves a submarine captain (Ronald Reagan) and his first officer as they navigate their submarine through the waters around Japan during World War II. Early on, the captain is forced to abandon one of his men when a Japanese destroyer starts breathing down their necks and the first officer believes he did it because that person was going out with the captain's ex-girl. The captain insisted that what he did was in the best interest of the ship and crew, but it serves to create that line of tension between them. There's some development as the captain reunites with his girl (Nancy Davis) and he reiterates the reason he didn't want a relationship with her before the war was because he wanted a "wife and children" not a "widow and orphans." Seems reasonable. After a daring move, the captain's sub is blown up and he and his first officer are given another sub to take on a final big mission. They go through it, and we get our inevitable irony before a big happy ending.

While the film sports decent characters and an interesting enough situation, it didn't really have much in the way of outward plot tension. The subject is war, and though we occasionally had the Japanese closing in, we never really felt it. I'm not sure if it was to detach from them, but we only had one image of any Japanese soldiers; the rest was implied or just boats. It never served to really grip us or drag us into the story. It just plodded along and everything continued to work out just fine.

Maybe that was the point. In the end, it felt like a bit of war propaganda even though World War II had been over for 12 years at that point. Maybe it was assurance that we did the right thing. It opened up with an "admiral" voice over explaining the situation and the heroes involved, and closed with titles congratulating those involved. It was actually a bit corny.

So I don't know how realistic a depiction of war it really was. I mean, we did lose a sub as well as some of the men on board, but we never got the emotional impact of that loss, since we never saw any reactions to this other than from Reagan who simply described what happened. But for a film about a conflict, the conflict was limited, and the emotional impact was stifled. I thnk it could have been a lot better if they allowed that part of the story to open up, but maybe that would have been too much for the public to handle at the time. Perhaps so close to the end of the War, people still wanted to feel good about it and minimize their own emotional scars.

I can grant this for the time being, but it destroys any staying power this film ever hoped to have as fifty years after its release, its only claim to fame is the reason I watched it. As a basic film, it only stands as mediocre; not bad, mind you, just mediocre.

The Holiday -- 2006 -- PG-13

The previews on this one looked intriguing and being billed as a romantic flick almost guaranteed my wife was going to get it. So being the good husband I am (and secretly wanting to see it myself), I gave it a viewing and was pleasantly surprised to find a film with some complex characters, some realistic situations, and an overall decent plot.

The basics go like this: you have two women -- one in L.A. and one in England -- who are having man troubles. They each want to get away from it all and when the L.A. one discovers the England one's on a home exchange website, they switch houses for two weeks to get away from their worlds. Once done, we end up with the story of four people as opposed to two, each with their own troubles in the world of relationships. As the tale of each unfolds before us, it becomes more and more touching for all involved and while it can't be said that the ending was unpredictable, the journey getting there was ripe with surprises.

Overall, I don't have a lot of complaints on this one. I can nitpick it to death with a handful of cliches, but it was actually a really good film. Stories should be about the characters and this one exemplified this without resorting to a lot of contrived spectacle to tell the story. It boils down to simply the two women going to opposite sides of the world to tackle their demons and finding what their lives were ultimately missing.

It's good for a chick flick, and definitely worth a viewing should you have some extended time to do so.