Belongs squarely in the . . .

Limacher Low Down: The Sitter has previews that offer a pretty decent glimpse into the entire story line of the movie; an R rated remake of “Adventures in Babysitting”. The problem with trying to retell a classic of a generation is the fact it may not work well, and that is certainly the case with “The Sitter”. Jokes that some may get don’t always hit with others, and the only thing that made me laugh a handful of times were the one liners. The plot developed poorly, certain things were predictable, and the end couldn’t come soon enough.

“The Sitter” starts off with a rather “racy” scene where Noah (Jonah Hill) is doing everything he can to make the girl he wants, Marissa (Ari Graynor), like him even a little. We find out that Noah has no job, no money, and no license; when his mom asks him for a favor, to babysit her friends’ kids so she can meet a new man and get some extra cash for him, Noah reluctantly accepts. This part of the movie really shows us how wrapped up in himself Noah is, but why? We get a little background to the family life, but it seems a little preachy and a meager way of setting up future plot points.

So, Noah takes the job, not like he has anything better to do!  We meet the first kid, Slater (Max Records). Slater is a seemingly misunderstood kid who faces the pressures of someone twice his age, at least in his own mind. Noah then is introduced to Blithe (Landry Bender). Blithe is eager to grow up like  a Hilton or a Lohan, she says everything is “hot” and likes to put on make-up that would make Tammy Faye Baker cringe. Lastly, we meet Rodrigo (Kevin Hernandez). Rodrigo was adopted and brought in from El Salvador. Rodrigo definitely has a chip on his shoulder.

The kids’ parents leave quickly, and like most brats, they start testing the patience of their new babysitter, Noah. That is until Noah gets a call from Marissa. The whole meeting of the kids is important to gain a better understanding of each character, and it does help build a flimsy rapport with the audience. A few things seem far-fetched, but this is a farce of a movie after all.

Noah, who was advised against driving the family vehicle (remember, he has no license), quickly loads up the kids in the minivan and is off to do what he can to get to Marissa, and possibly get laid. This is where I saw a shining gleam of hope, only to be let down. We meet Karl (Sam Rockwell), who has something that Noah was asked to pick up for Marissa. Karl quickly accepts Noah and wants to be “friends” with him. Well, to be friends with Karl is not what Noah has in mind; he just wants to pick up what Marissa wants and be on his way. Unfortunately, bad things happen to Noah and he gets into deeper shit than he ever imagined as he started the trek. One thing leads to another and Noah needs to get a hefty sum of cash in a short amount of time. I generally like Sam Rockwell. He’s made mostly good choices, but this role just doesn’t fit him, and it really comes across in the movie as well.

The adventure officially begins for Noah and the gang; and there are some good quick jokes in the scenes. When the “adventure” really kicks in there are parts that seem forced; parts that made me question the logic; and there were even parts that seemingly took way too long to develop to progress the movie in the direction, which was rather predictable, in the way it was going. The movie concludes on a rather predictable note, and while there are very few redeeming qualities, it just was good for the movie to be over.

So many scenes were predictable and not funny, which left a bad taste in my mouth. Development wasn’t a strong suit either, as the movie had moments of heart and growth; it also had moments that just fell flat and completely missed the target. The thing I hated most about everything was this was another situation where I saw most of the funny parts in the previews!

The kids in the movie, especially Landry Bender, were one of the few bright spots, as they really did a good job and held their own. One thing I came away noticing was that Jonah Hill works well in SMALL doses, but a movie where he’s the STAR and tries to carry the movie just doesn’t work. I say you can avoid this movie, and remember the good times of “Adventures in Babysitting”. Basically, “The Sitter” belongs in the, hmm, what rhymes with sitter?  Yea, if you can predict that, you can easily pass on this inept attempt to rehash a classic comedy.

Sweet dreams are made of Zzzzzzzz…

The H-Bomb: So this is a dream house, huh? It must have been one dull ass dream. But how did it go wrong? This film, which I’m guessing was supposed to be a thriller, certainly had a dream team on both sides of the camera. A first rate director in Jim Sheridan (“My Left Foot”, “In America”), and a first rate cast in Daniel Craig, Rachel Weisz, and Naomi Watts. Sadly, instead of being a clever, well crafted spookfest with A-List talent, “Dream House” is merely a very well polished turd, one in which the audience will not be trying to untangle the over-tangled mystery, but will instead be wondering how it all ended up being such a thrilless and chilless bore?

Well, before I go into what went wrong, let me briefly take you through the set up: Book editor Will Atenton (Craig, sporting a laughably dorky haircut) is quitting his high paying job in NYC and relocating to a small town to write a novel, and spend more time with his all-to-perfect wife, Libby (Weisz), and their all-too-perfect daughters. The house they move into is a definite fixer-upper, but everyone’s happy… that is, until the girls start seeing a strange man out their window, and start hearing things go bump and creak in the night.

One snowy evening, such unnatural sounds lure Will into the basement, where he catches a pack of emo brats messing around with dolls and spray painting things on the walls. Will grabs one as they attempt to run, and she tells him about the man who used to own the house, Peter Ward, and how he murdered his wife and two daughters some five years earlier. When Will goes around town asking about the murders, he notices people giving him the stink eye. In particular, his neighbor across the street, divorcee Ann (Watts), seems to know more about the murders than she lets on. As Will tracks down this Peter Ward, who was recently released from the local laughing factory, he discovers something that… well, I should stop there.

To divulge any more at this point would be to drop some major spoilers, not that it would really matter, since the fucking trailer spoiled at least one major twist anyway (seriously, which intellectually challenged Marketing intern cut the trailer to this thing– I want his fuckin’ name!). Not that it really matters that much, since I highly doubt that not knowing this plot development would have enhanced my enjoyment of this hopelessly dreary affair.

Which brings me back to my original query, despite the Oscar Caliber Pedigree involved, where the hell did this lead footed, boring-er-than-thou “thriller” go wrong? Well, to me the answer is pretty obvious; this “Dream House” simply lacked the foundation it needed to stay standing. To put it more simply, it lacked a good script. When it isn’t just running through the list of supernatural thriller clichĂ©s, it’s just hokey, unbelievable, and kind of stupid (the scene in which a character’s name is explained is one of the dumbest, most unintentionally funny moments I’ve seen in any movie). After the key twist, the one the trailer brilliantly gives away, is revealed halfway through, the story just becomes illogical, repetitive, until it finally culminates in a climax that’s as rushed and tacked on as it is preposterous.

I feel bad for this cast, because they try, they really do. But when you give them nothing to work with, how can you expect anything more than nothing in return? I like Daniel Craig, and I really want him to have a bonafide hit outside of Bond, but for him, this is a Double-O Zero. I still have hopes for “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”. Weisz does her best with a role that basically required her to alternate between looking happy, looking concerned, and looking scared. She’s done better.

Watts, who looks like she’s had one facelift too many, has even less to do than Weitz, in what has to be her most thankless role since “Children of the Corn IV”. The great Canadian actor Elias Koteas is also in here, but God knows why, because he’s wasted completely in an important but severely underdeveloped role.

Plainly put, “Dream House” is a stinker. When it’s not going the “been there, done that, seen that, bored with that” route, it’s just making no fucking sense at all. The last time I sat through a suspense flick this lifeless was around this time last year with “My Soul to Take“, and while it didn’t quite plummet to the same level of suckage as that Godforsaken piece of shit, it comes shockingly close. Overall, “Dream House” is one sorry excuse for a scary movie, and one lame way to kick off the Halloween season.

Stop touching your face!

How many times does the average person touch their face? Check it out, here: Wiki Answers & ChaCha.Com (yes, only two places…I’m lazy) the consensus agrees that the average person touches their face three to five times every waking minute. So that means on the high side, subtracting eight hours for sleep, the average person is touching their face a whopping four thousand, eight hundred times a day! Think about it…how many times have you touched your face today? What did you touch prior to that? Money? A doorknob? Toilet lid? Lightswitch? A pen? Your keys? Someone else? You get the picture – germs get transmitted easily through your touch. If you want a better picture, check out the Mythbuster’s episodes where they test the dirtiest items in a home.

Contagion predicates itself on this consensus, opening our story on day two of the outbreak with our first known victim, Beth Emhoff (Gwyneth Paltrow), who just returned from Hong Kong on a business trip. Her husband, Mitch Emhoff (Matt Damon) and son Clark (Griffin Kane) are both exposed but we soon find out that Mitch is immune. The story branches from there involving the CDC, most prominantly Dr. Ellis Cheever (Laurence Fishburne), Dr. Erin Mears (Kate Winslet) and Dr. Ally Hextall (Jennifer Ehle). Rattling the CDC and the government cages, is blogger/writer and rabble rouser Alan Krumwiede who is dead set to blow his percieved government conspiracy wide open while making moves to cash in on the ground floor with a publicized cure. There are some other branches of story I won’t even touch, because in the end, it was all pointless.

I sat there feeling like I was watching a movie for the entire one hundred five minute run-time. For me, that’s a bad thing. I like to watch movies to be engaged, to be sucked in almost as if I were part of the story rather than a spectator. Sure, there was drama, and there was some suspense, but anything not directly pertaining to the impending epidemic at hand was just trite bullshit fluff that left me comfortably nowhere near the edge of my seat. For me, Contagion falls flat on its ass in that regard, just like the Oscar-winning Traffic did, which is no surprise as director Steven Soderbergh managed to lay a golden turd with that one. No doubt, his bowels are moving for a repeat.

Diatribe aside, there are a few bright spots of Contagion. The opening infection path montage was nicely done, and Matt Damon takes a hearty step into his non-Bourne Identity and plays the limited role of Mitch Emhoff very well. Another notable, though not on purpose, is Enrico Colantioni who plays Dennis French, a bureaucratic agent of some sort. He was notable in that I could not separate him from one of his previous roles – that of Mathesar (Galaxy Quest).

Every time he came onscreen I kept picturing him saying, “You must save us,” with that flaccid humor inducing smile to whichever person he was addressing. Jude Law is also convincing with his portrayal of a typical dirt digging conspiracy theorist/reporter that provides one of my favorite lines in the movie, ringing the death nell of print media.

In the end, while it was a good attempt, the multiple threaded storyline detracts what could have been a solid movie. Sadly, I think there will be some Oscar nods for this fluff, but the only thing Contagion can really be applauded for is its feast on people’s paranoia. Purell’s bottom line will make some executives happy in the next few months, I’m sure.

We had completely different opinions on this one; H-Man hated it, and Amadarwin thought it was a good complement to Besson’s other work. Click on each image above for the reviews, then rate the film above and post your comments here.

Where the ‘Robert’ meets the road!

Normally I like movies that are unusual and don’t require much thought to watch, but Rubber made me question my tastes.  I heard the concept was basically about a killer tire on the loose and I got REALLY excited about seeing this movie; yet shortly after the film got rolling (ha ha) . . . I regretted my enthusiasms.  The TIRE was the only element that made the movie remotely enjoyable, and I wish I was joking!

Rubber starts off in a small southwestern town where Lieutenant Chad (Stephen Spinella) comes out of a car trunk to “introduce“ the movie to the audience, presumably the viewing audience, but in actuality, there is an on-screen group of people standing in the middle of the desert to “watch” this movie.

This is our first glimpse of the tire (Robert), the star of the movie. Robert is learning how to roll, much like an infant walking, and coming across certain items in the desert in which he chooses to just roll over to display dominance. Meanwhile, the audience in the desert is watching these actions and coming to their own conclusions of what is going to happen next.

We meet our next “important” character, Sheila (Roxane Mesquida). Sheila is driving along when she sees the tire rolling, and gets passed by an angry motorist who just runs right into poor Robert. Sheila continues driving along when she sees the angry motorist and chooses to flip him the bird; when the tire meets up with our angry motorist, we get the first glimpse of his “killing powers”. Needless to say, this was one of the more humorous parts of the movie.

Night falls and Sheila has checked herself into a hotel room. The tire rolls up to the same hotel and peeks inside Sheila’s room as she showers and when she slams the door shut, he magically appears in the adjoining room and LITERALLY stays on the bed and watches television at higher amounts of volume.

Day comes, and the audience is still in the desert. While most slept, only one man, the Man in the Wheelchair (Wings Hauser) continues to watch everything that is happening. While the audience is complaining of hunger, the Accountant (Jack Plotnick) arrives to feed the audience.

Sheila awakes and looks around the small town; the tire gets kicked out of his room by the cleaning lady while he was taking a shower. (I can NOT make up this shit!) After getting thrown out of the room, Robert, the tire, takes his revenge on yet another that has gotten in his way. But, Robert was not alone at the time, and wtiness Zach (Remy Thorne) saw everything.

Lieutenant Chad arrives on the scene to explain that this is all nonsense that is occurring around them. The tire decides to hide out in the pool when hotel owner, M. Hughes (David Bowe) orders Zach to retrieve the tire from the pool, and then kicks the tire away. I think you can see where this is going.

Days go by, and the people finally realize that the one thing that is killing all the people is the tire. They stage a stakeout, and Lieutenant Chad believes he has taken care of the problem, or has he?

Most should pass on this film, but if you must watch Rubber, fast forward to the scenes with Robert, the tire! Robert was the ONLY enjoyable thing about this movie. The way the scenes with him were portrayed, and the sheer humor that came across the screen made it watchable at pretty much only those points.

The plot was non-existent, but I must admit the fact there was the attempt at a plot made me wish that Robert WAS real and that he would do to me what he did to those who got in his way.  Just make it quick, Robert, I can’t stand another one of your films!

“No one in this family has any imagination!”

The Berggren Bottom Line: Judy Moody seemed like a wannabe combination of Dr. Seuss, Superfudge, and Pippi Longstocking for modern audiences, but it lacked any of the originality of those tales. This movie was not worth its weight in a box office ticket and treat prices for the family. Save yourself and go for a bike ride.

First, let me make it clear that my dislike for this film is not because it is for kids. In my bio you will see several kids films listed as my favorites. Second, let me say I am not familiar with the Judy Moody book(s) that this movie is based upon. I know nothing of them. They seem to be very popular and are probably very good, but this movie wasn’t.

The movie begins very promising. It starts on the last day of school before the summer starts. Everyone knows that’s the best day of school. Unfortunately, Judy gets ‘bummed’ because she finds out her best friends aren’t going be home for the summer. So they won’t be there to adventure with her. She’s destined for a bummer summer and audiences are destined for a bummer movie–literally.

The best part of this movie was that the guy who played Steve Urkel (Jaleel White) from Family Matters was in it. And he was even pretty good. In fact, the casting was pretty good overall, although I had a hard time figuring out 30% of what the kid playing Judy’s brother said. He had a bit of a speech impediment. It’s not that I have a problem with handicaps. And I’m all for celebrating victory over them by giving people opportunities. Unfortunately, with quick sequences, fast dialogue, and flashy visuals, it was hard to follow his dialogue. My son kept saying, “What did he say, Dad?” Bummer.

This movie was just trying too hard. It combined some animation to capture a particular imagination sequence Judy was having. Trying to be creative, it just came off weak. Judy also used lots of new ‘cool’ words like “thrilladellic” this and “megasuper” that. It just wasn’t on-top-of-spaghetti cool or supercalifragilisticexpithrilladellic. It was uberlame and a bummer.

Judy Moody just wasn’t a ‘movie’ quality film. Actually, I’ve seen plenty of iCarly episodes with my kids that were better than this film. Sure, it had some fun parts and cute laughs, but it would have been better as a made-for-television movie. Lastly, it was about 15 minutes too long. So save yourself and some money: rent it or Netflix it if you have to see it.

Sorry folks. I don’t mean to be a scrooge, but Judy Moody bummed me out and made me depressed for wasting my time watching it.

Parents: Although rated PG, it was a very clean and innocent movie. Good for any kid over 4 (if there’s absolutely nothing else to see).

Swift shot: Lifetime TV has more tension.  If you haven’t seen “Single White Female” maybe you will find this worthy of your time and money.  This is essentially the teen version, which is what I was expecting, but it had no real edge worthy of mentioning.

Minka Kelly (Friday Night Lights) and Leighton Meester (Gossip Girl) star in this less than thrilling “thriller” set on the ‘ULA’ campus in Los Angeles.  Sarah Matthews (Kelly) is an aspiring fashion designer from Des Moines who draws the shortest straw by getting Rebecca (Meester) as her freshman roommate.

At first, things are more or less normal, Rebecca (not Beck, or Becca, or Becky) is a little over-protective of Sarah and doesn’t approve of her hanging around with another girl from the dorm, Tracy (Alyson “Hellcats” Michalka) who plays the campus party girl.  Rebecca has a little shared shower chat with Tracy and explains it might be best if she steer clear of Sarah.  That scene was supposed to be tense, and if I was a 13 year old girl, maybe I would have been terrified . . . but I am not, and I was not.

Every damsel in distress needs a Prince Charming, enter Stephen (Cam Gigandet) who plays drums in a, self-described, sucky coffee house band.  He also raises the ire of Rebecca who doesn’t want to share Sarah with anyone and manipulates several ancilliary characters to keep them away from Sarah.  No self-respecting psycho stalker thriller would be worth its salt if it didn’t have some poor little four-legged creature tortured or killed – “The Roommate” is no exception.

No spoiler here, we eventually find out that Rebecca isn’t taking her meds, and she is actually a diagnosed bipolar disorder patient who has issues making friends and playing well with others.  But, Rebecca is capable enough to seduce the sultry, lesbian mynx, Irene (Danneel “One Tree Hill” Harris) who finds herself in a rather compromising position and may well serve as a reminder to use more discretion in choosing your bedroom playmates.

When everything cranks up and Sarah is confronted with just how insane Rebecca (not Beck, or Becca, or Becky) truly is, the thrill payoff is decent, but again, only if you are a 13 year old girl – which, as I stated earlier, I am not.  Want to see something worthy of the title “thriller”?  Go ahead and rent “Single White Female”, starring the incredibly creepy Jennifer Jason Leigh and the superbly fragile Bridget Fonda.  You can wait until “The Roommate” comes out on Lifetime in a few months; I don’t imagine much will be cut out by Standards  and Practices.

Even the crows weren’t scared . . .

Swift shot: Not scary, somewhat imaginative, but overall an unimpressive film.

Husk starts out with a group of college kids stranded in the middle of nowhere (sound familiar?), with no cell signals (sound familiar?), and no common sense.  Following a car accident caused by a murder of crows, they all wake up after being unconscious for an inordinate amount of time – but discover they are a man down.  For reasons that I can’t remember, and I really found I didn’t care – they assume he walked into this vast, endless cornfield.  So, they all head in to find him, all but the driver who decides to stick with his SUV in hopes someone will drive by and be able to help.

The motley crew of hapless victims making up the cast of Husk are: the jock, Brian (Wes Chatham); the nerd, Scott (Devon Graye); the first to die, Johnny (Ben Easter); the coward, Chris (C.J. Thomason); and the hot girl, Natalie (Tammin Sursok).  The plot is essentially this, and if I spoil something for you here, I apologize, but I just can’t think of anything else to say.

There is like a farmer who has a good son and an evil son, and the evil son (shocker) kills the good son, but to hide the body he makes a scarecrow mask and turns his dead brother into a scarecrow.  At some point, they all die or something, and this evil spirit re-enacts the murder of his brother through new souls – in this case, our crew of college kids.

How all these things are revealed is what I didn’t like, Scott keeps having visions, but unlike a Stephen King story, we’re never let in on how he has this ability, is it just that he is weaker, is it he’s psychic, is it his glasses . . . well, they never tell you.  This is one of those films where they want you to constantly guess at what shit means – and I just didn’t care.  The overall delivery made no sense.  For some reason, I never did figure out, the mask makers had to nail their hands to the sewing machine – for some reason, the farmer character was in and out of the visions, but there was never a resolution for him – and if there was, I missed it.

The editing and directing were solid, the acting was good as well, it was the story that lacked the stuffing to make a decent flick.  See, for horror movies with a supernatural slant, they really must have a solid story to keep me interested.  Real horror surrounds us everyday now, so for the metaphysical to be effective, it needs to be either somewhat believable or incredibly interesting.  Special recognition goes out to Marco Fargnoli whose cinematography made the film somewhat interesting.  Director Brett Simmons wrote this thing, and while his directing was solid with the performances he got out of his team, he should stick to that aspect of the industry and find others to create the stories.

There was ONE scary scene, where a smiling scarecrow is peeking his head out of the corn, staring at you, the viewer, and people that are maskaphobic may piss themselves – but it did nothing for me other than to make me realize the grin on the mask was chilling and they should have incorporated more of that in the film.  I caught this on SyFy, and while I am glad I didn’t waste money, I am pissed I wasted two hours time.

Will test the limits of your patience.

The H-Bomb: Or, it will test the limits of your attention, because this latest offering from veteran indie oddball Jim Jarmusch sure doesn’t do much to hold it. The “story” (using that word in the loosest way possible) is about a hitman traveling around Spain on an assignment that’s never really explained to us. He meets up with various mysterious people played by the likes of John Hurt, Tilda Swinton, Gael Garcia Bernal, and some naked chick.

At these little meetings he always orders two cups of espresso, and his contacts give him a matchbox containing a small piece of paper, which he reads over and then swallows. Then, the contact will spout some incomprehensible lines of philosophical gibberish, then tell him to go to such-and-such a place and talk to so-and-so. Stick a bunch of scenes of our protagonist, played by Isaach De Bankole, walking around, riding on trains, meditating, not talking much, not boning the hot naked chick, and in general not doing much of anything at all, and you have “The Limits of Control”.

I must give Jarmusch credit, he has, either intentionally or completely by accident, created the ultimate cure for insomnia. Any time you’re having a restless night, forget the bottle of cheap wine and the Lunesta, just pop this cinematic sleep aid into your DVD player and let it play… you’ll be snoozing away in La-La Land in no time. Even if you down a few of those espressos that the main non-character loves so much, you’ll still be straining to keep your eyes open to the end. In many ways, this reminded me a lot of “The American”, a film I quite liked, except here the nuanced character development has been reduced to zero, the pretentiousness has been multiplied by about a thousand, and the boredom by roughly a million.

Jarmusch’s signature style has always been one of off beat minimalism and existential cool, and until now, I’ve genuinely enjoyed everything he’s done, and a few, like “Dead Man“, “Night on Earth“, and “Down By Law“, I absolutely love. But this time it seems he decided to strip away the quirky charm and personality that usually defines his work, and instead just go for straight up filmic masturbation… somehow satisfying himself, and nobody else.

I would swear that Jarmusch spent more time styling that ridiculous hairdo of his than he did on writing the script to this thing. From what I could gather, he was attempting pure cinematic minimalism, not dissimilar from Gus Van Sant’s more recent films. Though for me, the only one of Van Sant’s films made in this style that actually worked completely was “Elephant”, where he used the banalities of an average day at high school as a chilling build up to a Columbine-type massacre. Jarmusch’s film, however, has no such foundation, and therefore he is left with nothing more than an empty shell of a movie about a non-character taking part in a non-plot that leads to a non-ending.

Is there anything to recommend? Well, if you like looking at pretty pictures for a long time (another pastime our protagonist enjoys), then sure, since the cinematography by Christopher Doyle is quite lush and gorgeous. De Bankole is a gifted actor, and he could have given a strong performance, had he been given a script or a character to work with. But, he only had a non-character, and as a result, he gives a non-performance. I never thought I would say this about an actor with his abilities, but he does little more than take up space on the screen.

Most of the supporting cast members only have a scene or two each, in which they spout dialogue so hysterically pretentious I thought Jarmusch was attempting self-parody. “Sometimes the reflection is far more present than the thing being reflected.” “Wait three days until you see the bread, then the guitar will find you.” Sweet baby Jesus… they should be given a collective Oscar for being able to utter such drivel without vomiting.

Every good director is going to have the occasional dud, and for Jarmusch, “The Limits of Control” is definitely a dud. A dud that lands with a thud that’s the opposite of entertaining. Again, if you have a sleeping disorder, then definitely give this a watch. But if you’re looking for an independent film with interesting themes or interesting characters or… interesting anything, then I think you can pass on this indulgent snoozer in good conscience.

More images awaiteth ye, here!

Swift shot: The 3D is just a gimmick to take more cash out of your pockets, first and foremost, avoid spending money on this one – PERIOD! Jack Black grew on me over the years, but this latest outing needed to stay lost at sea, forever.  The running fat guy in a little coat bit gets old rather quickly, and just when I found myself interested in Black’s Gulliver, the idiocy reigned supreme, overshadowing any real interest in these cookie-cutter characters.

I can’t say it was total garbage, but it was garbage for the brain, sure you will laugh a few times, but are you laughing in earnest or are you trapped in that seat and thinking, I better get my money’s worth?  You won’t have to worry about that, because you’ll heed my advice and leave this journey to be experienced at home, months later, on Netflix or on ABC Family or something.  Nothing really dramatic EVER happens in this work, granted it is a family comedy – but what clan of uni-brow buffoons would find this dull fantasy amusing?  I’d rather I never find that out – oh sure, every film has one cult following or other – it takes all kinds, still I stand by my opinion, I never want to meet the cultist weirdos, donning purple sneakers and hoodies to catch a ride to Lilliputia.

One mark for this flick, I enjoyed the novel approach to this modern version of Gulliver’s Travels.  Many of us remember enduring the Ted Danson mini-series in the 90s, hell, I watched at least half of one, because I always found Gulliver’s Travels interesting.  Thank you, Director Rob Letterman (Monsters vs. Aliens, Shark Tale) for actually featuring a normal guy in our modern time period as opposed to some high-sock wearing lame ass.  I liked the quippy little pop-culture references and the bad-ass robot.  I liked looking at Emily Blunt, but to be blunt, I could see her dying inside as she delivered her lines, wondering, is my career in the crapper now, is this how it begins?  I am sure she will bounce back as will Jack Black.

I am not usually this harsh to a film unless it really disappoints me, and maybe I was hoping for a lot more from Gulliver’s Travels than I got – thus the scathing point-blank attack.  Jack Black, take this one off your imdb, because it was an anemic attempt at a family comedy, maybe the kids will like it, but they like freaking Thomas the Tank Engine and Max and Ruby, and freakin Babar, the dictator elephant – so you can’t take their opinions for much.

One more thing, Amanda Peet was under-used and Jason Segel’s character wasn’t killed off fast enough.  I knew him . . . Horatio, yea, so what?  And, finally, a musical number to end all wars, now I know Obama needs to call up Jon Favreau and get with Jack Black and Amanda Peet – apparently terrorists and wars can be thwarted with Elaine Benis’ famous reference to the original title for War and Peace.  Oh God, was that a spoiler?  No, by definition that can only happen if there is something worthy of spoiling – this film was devoid of spoiling, because it was delivered rotten and full of prickly seeds that stick in your teeth and leave stains on your fingers that get all over your lovely tapestries.

I would not recommend anyone pay to see this one, if you do, you don’t have me to blame.