Category Archives: 2008 theater reviews

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The Incredible Hulk

Date: June 14, 2008
Location: AMC Sunset Place

After the bloated, boring Hulk Ang Lee delivered in 2003, I really wasn’t expecting much out of this new incarnation. The presence of Ed Norton intrigued me, but my suspicion was that — everything else aside — the technology isn’t quite there to make a 10-foot green monster man believable. King Kong is, for my money, the most convincing CGI character to grace the big screen, but a 25-foot gorilla is more out-there than something that looks at least partly like a human being.

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Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Date: May 23, 2008
Location: Muvico Boynton Beach

I’ve come to the realization that there are Indiana Jones films, and there’s Raiders of the Lost Ark. Crystal Skull is the former, and it is much like its predecessors (Temple of Doom and The Last Crusade) — exciting, corny, outlandish, funny… and not a very good movie.

Raiders of the Lost Ark is a very good movie. In fact, I’ve said I consider it a perfect movie. It has no false notes, takes no missteps. It’s one of the most spectacular feats of entertainment ever committed to celluloid. And as such, it’s an impossible act to follow.

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Iron Man

Date: May 3, 2008
Location: AMC Sunset Place

Now that’s why you go to the movies!

I had high hopes and expectations for Iron Man the moment I heard Robert Downey Jr. was the star. He’s one of the finest actors working today, but beyond that, he brings a very specific sarcastic charisma to all his roles that puts him in a class of his own. So Downey as a superhero… that would have to be good.

And it certainly is, in large part because of Downey, but also because of director Jon Favreau, sidekick Gwyneth Paltrow, the team who wrote the script and some wonderful special effects and action sequences.

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Forgetting Sarah Marshall

Date: April 19, 2008
Location: AMC Sunset Place

The latest film from Judd Apatow and gang (thought he neither wrote nor directed this one), Forgetting Sarah Marshall has the big laughs and the earnestness of earlier hits such as The 40-Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up and Superbad without ever reaching their heights in terms of overall quality.

Jason Segal, an Apatow staple from Freaks & Geeks on, is the most recent atypical leading man to carry one of these films. There’s a bit of a backlash out there about all these movies featuring slacker schlubs landing such great women but I say to hell with that — it’s nice to see men who are attractive primarily due to their sense of humor win the day for a change. And Segal does a fine job as a heartbroken dumpee who travels to Hawaii to forget the break-up only to run into his ex-girlfriend at the hotel. Kristen Bell doesn’t have much to do other than look cute as the ex, but she’s pretty good at looking cute.

It’s the supporting players who are most memorable, particulary Mila Kunis and Rusell Brand as the other love interests in the leads’ lives. Kunis, whom I know only from a couple seasons of That 70s Show, has grown into a stunningly beautiful actress with a confident, relaxed vibe and nice comic timing. Brand, whom I don’t know at all, steals the show as an alternately oblivious and perceptive British rock star. He delivers some of the movie’s biggest laugh lines. Apatow regulars Paul Rudd and Jonah Hill show up in glorified cameos, and 30 Rock‘s Jack McBrayer has a great turn as an uptight Christian on honeymoon.

A fun night out, but far from a classic… Forgetting Sarah Marshall is the Weird Science to Knocked Up‘s Breakast Club, if you buy into the premise that Judd Apatow is a Gen-X John Hughes.

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Nim’s Island

Date: April 18, 2008
Location: Muvico Boynton Beach

First, I must comment on the very sad fact that Muvico has switched to Pepsi. I can’t imagine such a fine establishment serving such swill. It’s like the Four Seasons giving you a wine list populated entirely with Ripple. This will pose a problem for Alex and me, because a nice cold Coke is an important part of any moviegoing experience. I see much smuggling in our future.

On to the movie. I went with Sophia, which is always special. She sat on my lap, we shared a box of Milk Duds and she whispered observations in my ear throughout. Good times.

The movie itself is rather odd — a blend of slapstick humor, melodrama and genuine emotion. I had trouble with the basic premise right off the bat, though. Nim is a girl (maybe 12 years old) who lives (and has lived for as long as she remembers) on a remote island in the South Pacific with her marine biologist father and a bunch of animals. This immediately struck me as a borderline case of child abuse. How cruel to raise a child without the company of other children (or anybody else, for that matter)! And how long will this go on? Will she remain there through her teens? Her twenties? At one point, Nim runs into a child of her age (when a cruise ship happens upon the island) and it’s as if she’s had an alien encounter. Very strange.

Apart from that, though, it’s a sweet film. Jodie Foster takes on a very light-hearted role for a change and does some great physical comedy as the agoraphobic adventure novelist. She also delivers in a very touching scene toward the end of the film. Abigail Breslin brings the same real-girl charm she was lauded for in Little Miss Sunshine. Gerard Butler is a long way from 300 as the stranded dad, and I was touched by his determination to get back to Nim.

Sophia seemed to enjoy it, though she was full of questions like “Where does she get her clothes?” Her first reaction after the lights came up: “I liked the seal.”