Academy Award results

BEST PICTURE
Black Swan
The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
127 Hours
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter's Bone
*WINNER - The King's Speech

One of those safe picks. Was it a really good movie? Yes. Was it daring, innovative, or something that'll be remembered as an all-time classic in 40 years? No. But I liked how Spielberg said the losers will join the company of The Grapes of Wrath, The Graduate and Raging Bull.

BEST ACTOR
Javier Bardem, Biutiful
Jeff Bridges, True Grit
Jesse Eisenberg, The Social Network
James Franco, 127 Hours
*WINNER - Colin Firth, The King's Speech

Much deserved, and he gave a nice speech.

BEST ACTRESS
Annette Bening, The Kids Are All Right
Nicole Kidman, Rabbit Hole
Jennifer Lawrence, Winter's Bone
Michelle Williams, Blue Valentine
*WINNER - Natalie Portman, Black Swan

Much deserved, and she gave a nice speech.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
John Hawkes, Winter's Bone
Jeremy Renner, The Town
Mark Ruffalo, The Kids Are All Right
Geoffrey Rush, The King's Speech
*WINNER - Christian Bale, The Fighter

Bale's been good in so many things that it's like the Academy was just waiting for the right opportunity to reward him, and they found it. He's also changed his accent so much that hearing him in his native tongue sounds like another character he's doing.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Amy Adams, The Fighter
Helena Bonham Carter, The King's Speech
Hailee Steinfeld, True Grit
Jacki Weaver, Animal Kingdom
*WINNER - Melissa Leo, The Fighter

There'd been a backlash against her for doing a "For Your Consideration" photo shoot after she was nominated. (Self-promotion? In Hollywood? Scandal!) I'm glad enough voters still went with her. Her f-bomb drop looked like a genuine accident. Nice to see her be overwhelmed.

BEST DIRECTOR
Darren Aronofsky, Black Swan
Joel & Ethan Coen, True Grit
David Fincher, The Social Network
David O. Russell, The Fighter
*WINNER - Tom Hooper, The King's Speech

This one bugged me. The Coens have already won, so okay. But Aronofsky, Fincher, and Russell are genuine artists, where Hooper just seems like a really good director.

BEST ANIMATED FILM
How to Train Your Dragon
The Illusionist
*WINNER - Toy Story 3

But of course.

BEST FOREIGN FILM
Biutiful, Mexico
Dogtooth, Greece
Incendies, Canada
Outside the Law, Algeria
*WINNER - In a Better World, Denmark

Haven't seen any of the nominees, though Dogtooth's in my queue.

BESY DOCUMENTARY FILM
Exit Through the Gift Shop
Gasland
Restrepo
Waste Land
*WINNER - Inside Job

I've been looking forward to Inside Job for a while. I did catch Restrepo and found it really good, but to me, it's a crime that Waiting for Superman wasn't nominated.

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
127 Hours
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Winter's Bone
*WINNER - The Social Network

Deserving win for Aaron Sorkin.

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Another Year
The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
*WINNER - The King's Speech

I was rooting for Chris Nolan's Inception, but Seidler gave a great acceptance speech.

BEST ART DIRECTION
Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows Part I
Inception
The King's Speech
True Grit
*WINNER - Alice in Wonderland

Can't really argue with it. It wasn't a particularly good movie, but the design of it was great.

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Black Swan
The King's Speech
The Social Network
True Grit
*WINNER - Inception

I was happy to be surprised by this. I thought for sure Roger Deakins would get it for True Grit.

BEST COSTUME DESIGN
I Am Love
The King's Speech
The Social Network
True Grit
*WINNER - Alice in Wonderland

Yep.

BEST FILM EDITING
Black Swan
The Fighter
The King's Speech
127 Hours
*WINNER - The Social Network

It does take a good editor to do the time jumps and make sure the audience never gets lost.

BEST MAKEUP
Barney's Version
The Way Back
*WINNER - The Wolfman

I wanted The Way Back, because that's the main thing I remember about that movie.

BEST SOUND EDITING
Toy Story 3
Tron: Legacy
True Grit
Unstoppable
*WINNER - Inception

I look back and love that Inception tied King's Speech for most Oscars, even if Inception's were all technical.

BEST SOUND MIXING
The King's Speech
Salt
The Social Network
True Grit
*WINNER - Inception

Yep.

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Alice in Wonderland
Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows Part I
Hereafter
Iron Man 2
*WINNER - Inception

M-hm.

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
How to Train Your Dragon
Inception
The King's Speech
127 Hours
*WINNER - The Social Network

I wonder how many people saw that fascinatingly normal Trent Reznor fellow and had no idea he's the guy from Nine Inch Nails.

BEST ORIGINAL SONG
"Coming Home", Country Strong
"I See the Light", Tangled
"If I Rise", 127 Hours
*WINNER - "We Belong Together", Toy Story 3

Good for Randy Newman. But really, of his twenty nominations, fifteen of them are the same song.

BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT
Strangers No More

BEST ANIMATED SHORT
The Lost Thing

BEST LIVE-ACTION SHORT
God Is Love

As for the show, I can't say it was very good. Anne Hathaway would have done much better if Hugh Jackman had been by her side, or Alec Baldwin, or Martin, or Crystal, or Jimmy Fallon, or a hundred other guys I can name, instead of the remarkably robotic James Franco. In the end, Franco looked like he regretted ever agreeing to the gig. I like the opening tradition of splicing the host into other movies, even though it's better when Billy Crystal does it. In fact, the energy and laugh-factor rose when he walked on stage. It wouldn't surpise me if they ask him to host for a 9th time.

They said they were going to pay homage to movies past, but it was really more of a bookend deal. Gone with the Wind... and then what? I did like all the winners coming out with the kids chorus to "Somewhere Over the Rainbow." Nice moment.

In Memorium was probably the least moving one in history. I was distracted by how many actors they were ignoring so they could squeeze in these editors and agents. The Oscars is a TV show, and the viewing audience doesn't care about some costume designer dying. Corey Haim trended on Twitter for his snub.

The humor mostly fell flat, the energy was off, and the moments that worked seemed to do so "in spite of."

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger - DVD Review

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Starring Naomi Watts, Josh Brolin, Anthony Hopkins, Gemma Jones, Antonio Banderas, Freida Pinto, Lucy Punch, Anna Friel, Pauline Collins, Ewen Bremner and Roger Ashton-Griffiths.
Directed by Woody Allen.

It's not bad, per se, not enterting the level of the painful like Whatever Works. But it is frightfully unnecessary. Woody Allen's been cranking out movie for forty years, but he doesn't seem to have anything new to add to the conversation. I think we all get it. He distrusts marriage, women, happiness, and so we get another stellar cast going through the motions of selfish behavior.

Okay, let's run through this. Naomi Watts and Josh Brolin are Sally and Roy, unhappily married. He wrote a best-selling novel but hasn't been able to sell a second book in several years, draining their resources and her patience with him. Sally is drawn to her boss (Antonio Banderas) while Roy is drawn to their new neighbor (Frieda Pinto). Meanwhile Watts' parents have recently split. Her father Alfie (Anthony Hopkins) is into feeling younger, and therefore hooks up with an "actress" (Lucy Punch) half his age. Her mother Helena (Gemma Jones) is seeking guidance for love and happiness from a psychic who always has the prediction she wants to hear.

Each element of this story has been told before in previous Allen efforts. You can take a subplot here and there from his 1980's work, recast it in England, and voila, he thinks he has a new movie. He relies on a dull narrator to give us background and plot shifts. When I got to the end, I felt like the moral of the story was one I knew at the beginning. We know most of these people are going to end unhappy because they start unhappy. They're craving new love, new validation, but when the reality of other people sinks in, they remain unfulfilled.

The standout here is Jones. Her dithering old-mother character could be one-note but Helena winds up being one of the only sympathetic people moving about Allen's chessboard. Now everyone involved can say they've done a Woody Allen movie. That seems to be the only real point of its existence.

Unknown - Movie Review

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Starring Liam Neeson, Diane Kruger, January Jones, Bruno Ganz, Aidan Quinn, Frank Langella, Sebastian Koch and Karl Markovics.
Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra.

I love Liam Neeson kicking butt in Europe. We had Taken, now we have this. I'd like it to become a genre. Every third movie Liam makes should be him kicking butt in Europe.

This isn't as satisfying as Taken, but it is a nice little puzzle of a movie where Liam plays Dr. Martin Harris, attending a convention in Germany with his wife. He forgets his suitcase with their passports and hopes into a taxi to recover it. The taxi crashes, and he wakes up with partial amnesia. Nevertheless when he shows up back at the hotel, his wife (Mad Men's January Jones) acts like she doesn't know who he is, and there's another man (Aidan Quinn) there caliming to be Martin Harris.

So Martin has to go on the run, trying to figure out what's going on. Is his wife a double-agent, or is she being forced to play this out? The revelation toward the end at first disappointed me until I thought about it and realized it was the only way the first two acts made sense. But then there are decisions made in the third act that don't make sense, but it's house of cards that asks you to admire the patience of construction, not how easy it is to swipe and knock it down.

I also like the bonus of respectable German actors popping up, like Bruno Ganz (Downfall), Sebastian Koch (The Lives of Others) and Karl Markovics (The Counterfeiters).

It's not high art; it's pulp action. It has its share of car chases, most of which bored me, honestly. Two guys in pursuit of a snowy rooftop will do more than any standard car chase.

The Way Back - Movie Review

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Starring Ed Harris, Jim Sturgess, Colin Farrell, Saoirse Ronan and Mark Strong.
Directed by Peter Weir.

"Inspired by a true story" makes me wonder just how far away they strayed from real events. Did they stray a little, like The King's Speech, or a lot, like The Exorcism of Emily Rose? Regardless it's a solid study in the examination of the lengths to which people will go to be free.

We get Nazis up the yin-yang in our movie villains, but sometimes people forget just how nasty the Stalinists were. We meet one Polish prisoner (Jim Sturgess), sent here after Stalinists torture his wife to make her lie about her husband, and he immediately starts thinking about how to escape. Throw in a grumpy American (Ed Harris), a wily Russian (Colin Farrell) and some other rag-taggers, and we have our escape group.

The movie puts us through the slogs they went through, and while I can't say it was fun, it was just the right length and served as a testament to human determination.

P.S. It had a limited release in December somewhere to qualify it for Oscar nominations. It has one nomination - makeup - and it would be a worthy winner. Walking from Siberia to India does horrible things to your skin.

FOX's Traffic Lights - TV Review

Gigantically unappealing clone of Rules of Engagement and Perfect Couples and How I Met Your Mother and any show where there are friends where some are married and some aren't. This one has a married couple, a couple that just moved in together, and one single guy. The single guy (Love Actually's Kris Marshall) is happy and carefree, and the other two men are whipped. In fact the wife came across as a total shrew.

More DVD Reviews

THE GIRL WHO PLAYED WITH FIRE (lll) &
THE GIRL WHO KICKED THE HORNET'S NEST (lll) -
Starring Noomi Rapace and Michael Nyqvist. Directed by Daniel Alfredson.

The further adventures of Lisbeth Salander continue. While she and Blomkvist teamed up to solve an old murder mystery around the Vanger family, Part 2 finds Lisbeth on the run, falsely accused of murder, and Part 3 finds her on trial to prove she's sane.

The sequels don't quite have the kick of the first one, but Lisbeth's more front and center to the action. In Fire, three people are murdered, including her guardian/rapist Bjurman. The evidence looks bad and Lisbeth goes on the run. Blomkvist does his best from his vantage point to prove her innocence, but there isn't a lot to go on. We learn more about Lisbeth and how her background was the result of a large government cover-up.

In Hornets, Lisbeth is on trial for her mental competancy. I actually hadn't read Book 3 when I saw this, and so there were plot points the movie seemed to rush through. I felt that way about the first two, and with the third movie, not having read the book, my feelings remained the same.

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WELCOME TO THE RILEYS (ll) - Starring James Gandolfini, Kristen Stewart and Melissa Leo. Directed by Jake Scott.

Three good actors in three sadsack roles. Could've benefitted from filling up the script, which centers on a man who befriends a stripper because she reminds him of his late daughter. Feel like an hour of material stretched to an hour and a half.

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PIRANHA 3D (ll) - Starring Elisabeth Shue, Adam Scott, Jerry O'Connell, Ving Rhames, Steven R. McQueen, Christopher Lloyd, Dina Meyer, Eli Roth, Jessica Szohr, Riley Steele and Richard Dreyfuss. Directed by Alexandre Aja.

A movie that pokes fun at its trashy self still has a trashy self. It does have some intentional laughs, never really taking itself seriously, but it doesn't add up to more than babes in bikinis being ripped apart at predictable intervals by CGI killer fish. So, mission accomplished.

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FOR COLORED GIRLS (ll1/2) - Starring Thandie Newton, Janet Jackson, Kimberly Elise, Whoopi Goldberg, Loretta Devine, Anika Noni Rose, Kerry Washington, Phylicia Rashad, Tessa Thompson, Macy Gray, Hill Harper and Michael Ealy. Directed by Tyler Perry.

Based on the stage-play For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf by Ntozake Shange, this movie takes 35-year-old monologues and meshes them into a modern-day settings, striving to combine the beat poetry of the original words with the dramatized surroundings of a Waiting to Exhale ensemble. So good are most of the actresses here that it makes me feel bad I didn't like it more, but the source material of the 1970's, despite some updated (like AIDS), still boils down to "men ruin women's lives."

The story connects most of the characters by having them live in the same apartment building, and the eight main characters have enough tragedy between them to make Shakespeare suicidal. Murder, rape, infidelity, abuse... it's all here. The shifts the movie takes are obvious each time they happen, to where title cards wouldn't have been any less distracting. "And now, another monologue..." It's a noble undertaking by Perry, an attempt at artistic cred. But too often it's just wallowing in misery.

Gnomeo & Juliet - Movie Review

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Starring the voices of James McAvoy, Emily Blunt, Jason Statham, Ashley Jensen, Matt Lucas, Michael Caine, Maggie Smith, Ozzy Osbourne, Stephen Merchant, Patrick Stewart, Hulk Hogan and Dolly Parton.
Directed by Kelly Asbury.

A G-rated kids cartoon movie taking on Shakespeare's tragedy isn't going to end with the two leads dying, is it? Is it? That would have been cool.

The story of star-crossed lovers takes place almost entirely in two adjoining backyards, one with blue-themed garden gnomes and one with red-themed garden gnomes. They have been at war since before they can remember. In fact no one really knows why, but the war must go on. But then the blue Gnomeo (James McAvoy) and red Juliet (Emily Blunt) and it's instant love.

There's a lot of cleverness on hand and attention to detail, not to mention the occasional pop-culture reference for adults (Braveheart, American Beauty and Borat are among them). Elton John's greatest hits populate the soundtrack. We get our inevitable wrap-up, followed by an ill-conceived dance number/curtain call, and so, mere hours later, I feel like I've forgotten most of it. The trippy voice cast makes it at least worth a rental though.

A Brief Look at Disney's 52 Animated Movies

There are fifty-two official movies considered to be called Walt Disney Animation. Movies where there's more live-action than animation don't count (Mary Poppins, Bedknobs & Broomsticks, Pete's Dragon), nor do movies from their secondary studio (Jungle Book 2, A Goofy Movie), nor movies they distributed but done by other studios (Valiant, The Wild), nor Pixar (Toy Story, Up).

So here's a brief history of the official titles.

THE BEST FOOT FORWARD

1937 - Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs
1940 - Pinocchio
1940 - Fantasia
1941 - Dumbo
1942 - Bambi

Snow White was a giant gamble for its time. Consider the level of animation back then. You had Steamboat Willie and Betty Boop, but the 1930's had Porky Pig and Popeye starting to catch on. Still, a full-length movie? Then you have the timelessness of the next four, and you have the best starting five of any studio or artist ever.

THE SHORTS COLLECTIONS


1943 - Saludos Amigos
1944 - The Three Caballeros
1946 - Make Mine Music
1947 - Fun & Fancy Free
1948 - Melody Time
1949 - The Adventures of Ichabod & Mr. Toad

During World War II, Disney saved money by making movies that were essentially collections of shorts. Saludos Amigos and The Three Caballeros were made at the behest of the Office of Inter-American Affairs, and Disney was happy to make what are essentially commercials for South America. Each after that has good episodes within (Make Mine has Peter & the Wolf, Fun & Fancy Free has Mickey & the Beanstalk, Melody Time has Johnny Appleseed & Pecos Bill, and the 1949 titles peaks for itself).

THE SECOND WIND


1950 - Cinderella
1951 - Alice in Wonderland
1953 - Peter Pan
1955 - Lady & the Tramp
1959 - Sleeping Beauty
1961 - 101 Dalmatians
1963 - The Sword in the Stone
1967 - The Jungle Book

Disney got back to classic storytelling with Cinderella, and even though the mice's roles might be too big, it remains one of his best. Alice in Wonderland has a weirdness no other Disney tale has been allowed. 101 Dalmatians is where rotscope animation came in, giving the movies cheaper looks, though the 60's stories remain strong. Jungle Book's still groovy, but it lead to Phil Harris dominating the next few films.

THE POST-WALT ERA


1970 - The Aristocats
1973 - Robin Hood
1977 - The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
1977 - The Rescuers
1981 - The Fox & the Hound
1985 - The Black Cauldron
1986 - The Great Mouse Detective
1988 - Oliver & Company

Disney's finances got weaker and weaker in the year after Walt Disney died, and the quality of the movies suffered. I still find Robin Hood one of the funnier scripts, particularly from Peter Ustinov's line-reads as the snivelling Prince John, but its shortcuts are transparent. The Black Cauldron was a low-point for their box-office, and longtime animator Don Bluth left digsusted with the Disney trajectory and made the classic Secret of NIMH.

THE RENAISSANCE


1989 - The Little Mermaid
1990 - The Rescuers Down Under
1991 - Beauty & the Beast
1992 - Aladdin
1994 - The Lion King

The Rescuers Down Under would fit better in the Post-Walt section, even though it's a good movie. These other four highlighted the return to box-office success and critical darlinghood.

THE ROLLER-COASTER

1995 - Pocahontas
1996 - The Hunchback of Notre Dame
1997 - Hercules
1999 - Tarzan
1999 - Fantasia 2000
2000 - Dinosaur
2000 - The Emperor's New Groove
2001 - Atlantis: The Lost Empire
2002 - Mulan
2002 - Treasure Planet
2003 - Lilo & Stitch
2003 - Brother Bear
2004 - Home on the Range

Pocahontas's oddly preachy, politically correct story was still a huge hit, but one where the silent raccoon was the best character and audiences might have come to see not everything that has the Disney label is gold. The musical formula still worked for Hunchback, Hercules and Tarzan, but Dinosaur was an expensive disappointment. Michael Eisner insisted the dinosaurs speak, and for my money it would still be remembered if they'd tried to find a way to make it like a nature film and not a humorless Land Before Time ripoff. Emperor's New Groove rediscovered the Jungle Book-level of laughs Disney movies could have, and Mulan succeeded in the Hercules-Tarzan vein, but the one-two actioners of Atlantis and Treasure Planet is where 2D animation showed its weaknesses. Lilo did well, but Brother Bear did less so, and Home on the Range was publicized as the last 2D effort of the studio, and the humor couldn't match new Groove's.

THE CG-ANIMATION ADDITION

2005 - Chicken Little
2007 - Meet the Robinsons
2008 - Bolt
2009 - The Princess & the Frog
2010 - Tangled
2012 - Wreck-It-Ralph
2013 - Frozen

Chicken Little had two years of marketing, but Disney's own 3D effort paled next to the Pixar canon. Meet the Robinsons is fun but light. Somewhere in there, Disney bought Pixar rather than just distributed its movies, and the Pixar touch is evident in the rewrites of Bolt, particularly since Bolt goes through the same character-crisis as Buzz Lightyear. The Princess & the Frog saw the decent return of 2D animation and finally an African-American princess, and Tangled, Wreck-It-Ralph and Frozen have all been hits.

Around 2010, Disney and Pixar said they felt like fairy tales are of the past, but Frozen showed that all they have to do is tell the story well, and it'll be a hit. I do hope any future ones they tell, they let them have their real names. No more "Rapunzel becomes Tangled" or "The Snow Queen becomes Frozen."

Buried - DVD Review

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Starring Ryan Reynolds.
Directed by Rodrigo Cortes.

Everyone who's ever wondered if Ryan Reynolds can actually act, I give you Exhibit A. Beyond that, though, Rodrigo Cortes can really direct, making the most of a 90 minute film that all takes place in a coffin.

Reynolds plays Paul, a truck driver in Iraq who awakens buried alive in a box. He has a cellphone and a lighter and a bag, and he has to figure out how to get out. He gets a call from an insurgent, demanding $5 million or he's going to leave him there to die.

Paul calls everyone he can think of to get him out of this mess. Some of it is believable, some of it is not. It's amazing how detached and red-tapey some of the people are that he calls, including a calloused personnel director who may be the most evil human being on the face of the earth. At one point Paul even finds himself accompanied by a rattlesnake that he just didn't notice earlier.

It's one of those simple concepts of which Hitchcock would have been jealous.

Red Hill - DVD Review

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Starring Ryan Kwanten, Steve Bisley, Tom E. Lewis and Claire van der Bloom.
Directed by Patrick Hughes.

The reason to see this is to see Tru Blood's Ryan Kwanten speak in his native tongue, and then from there watch an old-fashioned Western that transpires in the small town of Red Hill, Australia.

Kwanten plays a deputy newly transferred to Red Hill, pregnant wife in tow. The good ol' boys at the sheriff's department already have a way of doing things, but that night they learn the town's most dangerous killer, a Maori beast named Jimmy, has escaped from prison, and he's coming for revenge. Seems the sheriff is the one that put him away.

Jimmy is an unstoppable force, a cross of Anton Chigurh and Jason Voorhees. There's some nifty backstory that gets filled in as the climax mounts, and it's just rhe sort of pulp that makes for a decent rental when one is in the mood for what it delivers.

Never Let Me Go - DVD Review

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Starring Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley, Andrew Garfield, Charlotte Rampling and Sally Hawkins.
Directed by Mark Romanek.

My understanding is the book is really good, and maybe the book addresses my main flaw with the film.

It follows three kids who grow to adulthood in an alternate reality where certain kids are groomed to be organ donors. These three know they don't have long to live, as they'll soon be called to make the donations, but they hear that exemptions are granted for donors who fall in love, and they engage in a love triangle.

My one problem, which could have been addressed with a line of dialogue, is why don't they ever try to escape? There's plenty of opportunity, but it never occurs to them. If they were genetically engineered to just be that way, fine. Say so.

Takers - DVD Review

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Starring Matt Dillon, Idris Elba, Paul Walker, Hayden Christensen, Michael Ealy, Tip "T.I." Harris, Chris Brown, Jay Hernandez, Zoe Saldana, Steve Harris, Johnathan Schaech, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Nick Turturro and Glynn Turman.
Directed by John Luessenhop.

Slick, empty caper about a gang of thieves and the cops trying to stop them. Idris Elba, using his real accent, leads the crooks, and Matt Dillon cracks skulls as the main cop. It was passable to me until I realized it's virtually the same plot of Michael Mann's Heat. Then it instantly paled.

It's not without its guilty pleasures. I liked seeing a skinny, suspenders-wearing Hayden Christensen beat up three guys in a well-choreographed fight scene in a small office. I liked Michael Ealy giving earnestness to a movie that doesn't really deserve it.

It's dragged down by subplots that don't really add anything, like Elba's drug-addict sister and Dillon dealing with red-tape and possible corruption at the station. The final shoot-out held no emotional wallop, but I think it was supposed to. That's a bad sign.

The Green Hornet - Movie Review

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Starring Seth Rogen, Jay Chou, Cameron Diaz, Christoph Waltz, Tom Wilkinson, Edward James Olmos and James Franco.
Directed by Michel Gondry.

Seth Rogen & writer partner Evan Goldberg reinvented action-buddy comedy with Pineapple Express when they made it about a pot-smoker and his dealer on the run. It was a messy romp. Now Rogen's trying to do the same thing with superhero movies, but fortunately he leaves the marijuana at home. Kato & the Green Hornet will have to settle with getting drunk with each other.

As a comedy, it's not funny enough, and as a superhero movie, it didn't work either. I appreciated that it didn't aim for fake earnestness like, say, Elektra, but that it also didn't degenrate into pun-happy neon camp like Schumacher's Batman.

Rogen, that Fozzie Bear of an actor who's the same in pretty much everything, plays Britt Reid, son of a multimillionaire (naturally), wasting his life with partying. One day Dad dies, and now Britt is heir, and his primary responsibility is running the Daily Sentinel, the only insanely-profitable newspaper left in America. Britt decides to team up with Kato, his dad's driver, to fight crime, but in order to get close to the criminal underground, they'll pretend they're bad guys. He uses his paper to help villify the Green Hornet.

Chou does kick butt as Kato, but it seems torturous for him to speak English. Cameron Diaz shows up as the token female interest and the movie grinds to a halt for all of her scenes. Christoph Waltz never quite hits the right comedic notes as Chudnofsky, a crime boss going through an identity crisis.

The 3D added absolutely nothing except the increased price of the ticket.

As my wife said as we left the theater, "Jack Black could've played the Green Hornet."

Survivor's Russell: Spoiler Villain

Check out this on Russell Hantz's alleged involvement with a spoiler site. COuld cost him millions.