A Girl Walks Into An Alley...

Today is the 13th Anniversary of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It was 4745 days ago that the first episode of Buffy aired on the now defunct WB network, back when they still had a singing frog between shows. Not many remember that the show was a midseason replacement. I know because I was there.

This has the potential to be one of those I Knew It Before You stories, like the fact that it seems we all know a Baby Boomer who went to Woodstock. That's not my intention though. The nice thing about geek shows is the telling of how you got into it is part of the cultural experience, unlike say hipsters who abandon a band when they become too popular.

Truth is, I followed the writer. It was 1997. I was finishing up my college classes while working full time, living at home of course. At this point, I was just formulating the idea that would become a central premise in my life, the search for why I liked what I liked, to discover the people who made the entertainment I enjoyed, the search for the creative DNA of the shows, movies, books I loved. This search led me to an article in a sci fi magazine whose name escapes me. (I know it became a online only news site before finally folding. Boy, that's gonna bug me.) In this article, I was introduced to a young writer with an impressive resume. He had helped to write Toy Story, Speed and Alien Resurrection. He also was the writer of the big screen Buffy that I was not a fan of, despite a fantastic turn by Paul Reubens. Turns out, Joss was also not a fan of the movie he wrote. Intrigued, I kept reading.

He talked about all the problems he had with their version of the movie and the parts the bugged him. I agreed with everything he said. He talked about the movies he loved. Same ones as me. And he had a great take on Star Wars being a 'lived in universe' and them calling the Falcon a piece of junk being a transcendent moment in sci fi movies. This guy was speaking my language. Joss talked about how he wanted to create a show that was not only funny but also truly scary, with kids who talked like kids not mini-adults. It was his vision well articulated that made sure I would not miss out on seeing his show.

I sat down and watched this show with the silly title and was blown away. It was funny in a way I had never seen before. The characters were talking about movies I'd seen and books I'd read. This stuff is commonplace now, but back in 1997 referencing was unheard of outside of MST3k. And it was genuinely creepy. Heck, one of the main characters is killed in the first episode. I watched every one of those 13 episodes and told everyone I knew about this show. Not many listened. But over the course of the summer, they replayed the show and I videotaped (yes, it was that long ago) every episode. I started showing them to my friends, getting them all hooked on this little show on a little network. So began an obsession, and thirteen years of joy.

I've had the honor of meeting my hero twice, and while I didn't explain to him how he changed my life, I also didn't completely embarrass myself in front of him. Something about that show really affected me. It made me laugh and cry and tell everyone I know about it. I've watched a lot of TV, had a vast collection of video tapes with complete seasons on them before the advent of DVD, but no show has had as much of an impact on me as Buffy. Can't imagine anything else will. It was the right show at the right time done just right. And it all started 13 years ago today.

Go Ask Alice...

why this movie isn't better.

I got a chance to see a sneak of Tim Burton's Alice In Wonderland 3D. First off, if you haven't been clued into it by now, this movie is a sequel. This is not Tim Burton's version of the classic Lewis Carroll stories about Alice visiting Wonderland for the first time or even her second time back through the looking glass. No, the movie is about an 18 year old Alice seeing how Wonderland has changed. Hardcore geeks will recognize this tale as having been told in the video game American McGee's Alice, with the movie adaptation long in development hell, now totally dead. I'll try to avoid spoilers as we proceed, mostly referring to tone and feel rather than plot points, but one man's allusion is another man's movie ruining moment.

I'm beginning to doubt the theory that Tim Burton is a visionary filmmaker and auteur of the highest order. Why? Because filmmakers make films, they don't remake them. Tim hasn't done an original film in what, a decade? Two? Everything he does is an adaptation or a remake. Now I'm not against either type, but what happened to the days of Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands? Now the studios just dig out their catalogs and wonder what old material they can get a Tim Burton spin on?

And it's a shame, because the script her is actually a pretty good one. And in the hands of a passionate filmmaker, one who hadn't done this same thing with the same people half a dozen times, it might have been significant. What is is, is exactly what you'd expect. It's pretty good. It's beautiful and weird and Johnny Depp dances all over it, switching between crazy accents. But under it all is a really interesting story about growing up and choices and how you see the world that's secondary to seeing crazy CGI lengthened limbs and giant heads. That being said, I dug a lot of the digital work. There were some real artists sitting at keyboards for this one. The Cheshire Cat was great, well voiced and fascinating to watch whenever he was on screen. All the background animals in the Red Queen's castle were alive with personality even if they never spoke. The card soldiers were cool and creepy. The growing and shrinking effects were pretty cool. Some weird design choices took me right out of the movie. I never got over the bizarre giant head of Helena, or the jittery March Hare. I spent most of the time with Tweedles Dee and Dum trying to place the actor instead of listening to them. And the extra long limbs on the Knave were more distracting than enhancing.

It tends to get a wee bit confusing, as underneath what's going on is making Wonderland from a childish fantasy into a real, complex fantasy world on par with Narnia or Oz. The kingdom has a name, as do all of the characters, beyond their “titles” which leads to people calling, say, the Mad Hatter by that name or by his real name. And since all the characters do this, it does momentarily puzzle as you wonder who they are talking about. Oh right, that's the Red Queen's OTHER name. But Burton doesn't seem to care about this aspect, so it's only there to annoy instead of enhance. Who cares about a deeper plot? Put in more twisty trees!

I'm being hypercritical, I know. Everyone who sees this will dig it. They'll praise the crazy visuals and the 3D effects and Johnny Depp newest crazy character, and they won't be wrong. But I can't help but think of this one as being phoned in by the man in the director's chair. This will not inspire legions of devoted fans, cosplay fervor, or Hatter tattoos. It's simply exactly what you'd expect from putting Tim Burton and Alice together. And that's exactly what we got.

Dead on Target

I'm a black widow television fan. It's true, whatever shows I enjoy always die. No, better, I'm the Typhoid Mary of TV, what I love...I kill. My mother is the one who brought this to my attention 20 years ago. It was right after some show I adored had been killed, maybe Misfits of Science or Automan. And so it is with a heavy heart I condemn another quality enterprise to one season wonder status: I have fallen for Human Target.

From my earlier trepidation about how much of the central concept was altered, I have come to judge the show on its own merit, not on my preconceived notions and have found it amazing. Why does it work so well? Here's my theory. Action movies died in the mid 90s. No, it's true. It's nearly impossible to find a quality action film after The Rock. It's a bookend of a film. But what about superheroes, you ask? They are their own new popular genre. What I mean by action movie is one that doesn't involve costumes, aliens, supernatural forces, anything beyond that one Super Science device that doesn't quite exist, but might. Eagle Eye would be at the far end of that scale. Now, we've had a bit of resurgence, but it's mostly coming from Europe. Here in the good old US of A, we're still too concerned about filmgoers getting upset at watching people blow up buildings instead of aliens or mummies. It doesn't mean I don't want to watch them even if they stopped making them. Now I get what my dad was talking about with westerns after we went to see Silverado.

The genre flatlined and moved to television, where the ideas are big but the budgets are small. You didn't get to see Will Smith firing a machine gun, but you could watch Chuck Norris beat up the same stuntmen in different wigs ever week. Now we've come to a new era where the quality of the picture has met the high standards of Hollywood stunts with much improved visual effects (no more green screen auras!). Human Target is, essentially, a great action movie every week. It's like Die Hard or Lethal Weapon where you don't have to wait 15 years between gradually diminishing adventures (also known as the Ow! My knees! Factor). Every week, new thrills, new chills, new fights. And I know it'll all turn out all right, that Chance will defeat the bad guy, but like every great action movie, I get caught up in it. But this will all be for naught, as it's a great show, it has sci-fi elements and it's on Fox. Time to get my heart broken again.

Lost in LOST

I can't believe they found a third way. At the end of the last season, Jack and his merry band of time travelling miscreants decided to enact a plan. By the detonation of a nuclear weapon, they would disrupt the timeline and make is so their plane would never crash, wiping out the previous five seasons of the show. And in the end, as we watched the screen fade to white, we were left wondering which of the two options would it be? Would the plan work and everything would be restarted, a grand retcon that would make the Dallas “Bobby in the shower” moment into a momentary blip? Or would it be a grand failure, thereby negating all the work and effort of the previous season and leaving us right back where we started? But those clever writers, the brilliant brains inside that writers room actually found another OR from their EITHER OR scenario. And they got out of the storytelling hole of Flashback or Flashforward. Now, it's Flashsideways? Flashparallel?

No show confuses me so happily. I honestly have no more idea of what is going on or going to happen than you, and I read books on the outside, peruse message boards, listen to podcasts from both the show's creators and massive fans. But I am just as clueless as anyone else, and blissful about it. Seriously, what other show has done this? Spun so many plates so effectively for so long? It's gotten so dense that major mysteries of previous seasons are quietly answered under even more questions.

I am sure not all the questions will be answered. I would love if every episode leading up to the finale would be amazing, but they won't be. What I know is that these people are doing something I've never seen on TV before. The fact that the show is still on the air does not amaze me. The fact that it is still popular does. This show is smart, it's mental heavy lifting. And while a fair amount of people jumped ship when they knew it wouldn't be spoon fed entertainment, the vast majority stayed with this weird, frustrating, topsy turvy show. And it looks like they'll stay right to the end, as will I. And I'm not even doing it in a weird BSG nerd momentum way. I'm honestly engaged and look forward to every episode, good or bad. All I want is for the show to go out exactly the way they came in, smart, complex, weird, deep, engaging, rich of character and unafraid of ambiguity. Our vacation time on the Island is just about up, but let's make the most of the time we have.

Midseason Madness

I love midseason TV. Love, love, love and also love. Some of my favorite shows started out as midseason replacements. The queen of this category would, of course, be Buffy. Midseason is the place where, after the networks big time, expensive, star studded shows have come, did six episodes, then died, new shows must fill the gaps. These shows are usually smarter, smaller and who are we kidding, mostly dead in the water. They premiere when no one is watching TV and get almost no advertising to tell the people who are that they should watch. As the shows premiere, I'm hoping to make this a regular feature but for now, I going to discuss two shows that have stood out.

Human Target

I was prepared to hate this show for incredibly geeky reasons. Here's the problem. In the original comic (a phrase which has proceeded many a nerd rant), the Human Target, Christopher Chance is a master of disguise. When someone's life is threatened, he becomes them, thus becoming the Human Target the title implies. This leads to him having severe identity issues, which leads to good drama. In the new show, the second attempt to make a show on this concept but with 100% less Rick Springfield this time out, the Human Target is actually the Human adjacent to the Target. His modus operandi is to become a boring member of the staff, to be ignored until the hit comes where he springs into action and takes out the assassin. All well and good, but not the comic. Why bother to pay the money for the property when you could just make a show called Bodyguard or Human Shield or Ninja Accountant. Incidentally, I'm shopping Ninja Accountant around Hollywood right now, so no stealing.

But having watched the pilot, I'm interested. It's not a great show, but it is a lot of fun and much smarter than I would have imagined. It's got a good pedigree, aside from the presence of the director who most wishes he could be Michael Bay, Simon West. Mark Valley is solid in what my good friend J refers to as the Johnny Squarejaw part. Chi McBride is always good in what he does, but the show stealer is Rorschach himself, Jackie Earl Haley. His intro, where he gets the better of two thugs there to beat him up in five sentences and without getting up from his table. I tend to think of those guys as the Dan Fielding type, fantastic secondary characters who would never work as a lead but who end up making the show, named after John Laroquette's Emmy winning character from Night Court. I'm intrigued enough to give it a couple episodes, have a good time and cry no tears when Fox cancels it in May.

Spartacus: Blood and Sand

I can't tell you it's good show. It's not revolutionary, or exemplary in any way. Beyond that, it has a terrible pilot episode packed to the gills with cliches. Then in the final moments, I got a glimpse, a glimmer of what the show might be and how I could enjoy it if I just accepted it on its own terms. The second episode, in that frame of mind, that's what got me hooked.

The best way I can describe the show is to call it Zach Snyder's Gladiator. So far, the story is a combination of 300 and Gladiator, of the noble warrior brought down by the Romans and made into a gladiator, one day to rise up and lead a great rebellion. Where in a movie, this would all be a 20 minute montage, here it is expanded out to a series. The budget is nothing, but well spent. It comes from the creators of Hercules and Xena, who know how to stretch a dime. It's done green screen with that slow-fast camera so well used in 300 and Watchmen. The first time you see someone get an arm sliced off in slo-mo with the way too bright red blood shooting out, you'll roll your eyes in recognition, but I'd much rather they ape that style than the Michael Bay half second shot seizure enducing edits or the Paul Greengrass shake the camera to make it look real nonsense.

Did I mention this is a show for adults? In the list of combinations, I'd also add Rome meets Xena. While it still has the crazy action, if not so cartoony, what it does have is severe language, gore and nudity. And not casual, half glance or carefully edits, but full on full frontal. I was shocked enough when a famous television actress appeared topless in the 2^nd episode, but then to have the next scene be in the gladiator's bathhouse with all their gear on display was even more of a surprise. You've got some good actors, some famous ones, some bad actors clearly chosen for their ability to wield a gladus. And somehow it works, more accurately, it's starting to work. They have the Roman politics, the class warfare, the righteous man determined to fight back, the noble savage, the underdog factor, all very primal storytelling tools. And they are doing a lot with what they have. And I'll take a show with imagination over excess any day.

Human Target is on Fox and can be watched on Hulu. Spartacus: Blood and Sand is on Starz (I know, right?) and is also available for streaming on Netflix Instant Queue. It was also renewed for a second season before the first episode even aired, so at least the network has faith in it.

FlickForward: The Films of January 29th

Edge of Darkness

There's an Edge of Obscurity joke in there somewhere. Mel is another one of those guys who we chuckle about, or shake our heads at, but forget that when he acts, he's astounding. He's one of the guys who can pull off crazy without hamming it up. What I worry about is this movie makes me think of a mash-up of Mystic River and The Brave One, neither of which I really enjoyed. It irks me that these Serious Films come out and have to spend half their lengths trying to justify vigilantism. It's liberal guilt Death Wish. Novels are for long chapters of should I or shouldn't I? Movies mean should, definitely should. Do I want to see aged Mel getting revenge on the bad dudes what killed his kid? Hell yes. Do I want to see Mel crying at a Formica table in a dark kitchen for 20 minutes? Hell no.

When In Rome

Everybody's got dues to pay. I don't begrudge one of my favorite young actors, who I've met twice thankyouverymuch, taking a role in what seems to be a cookie cutter Rom-Com with that added spice of a supernatural element. It is one of the steps in building a career. Every actress at the top of the charts has had to do it, Even Angelina Jolie. Anyone remember Life Or Something Like It? No? Well, be glad for that. That being said, no way will I pay money to watch it. This movie screams lazy Saturday afternoon, stumbled across on USA Network.

24: The attack of Grandpa Jack

I've been on and off with 24. I watched every episode of the first 5 seasons of the show. But somewhere in season 6, I developed 24 Fatigue. Somewhere around the 12th hour, my attention starts to wander and by hour 16, I've let several episodes build up on my DVR. And once it starts deleting them, I give up. So I've seen the first half of the previous seasons, but not the end. That way I start every season fresh, not knowing any more than the new characters. I'm not sure if it is the shows fault, as they do tend to drag before their big ramp up to the finale or just that I can't muster up enough enthusiasm for the marathon that a season of 24 demands of its viewers. But that's all part of “Previously, on 24...” We're here for the new post title beeps stuff.

We're four hours in now, and I'm impressed. Where a show like 24 can triumph over a similar plot in a movie is time. Not Real Time, but actual time on screen. We see Jack as a grandfather, and wanting to start a new life close to his family. We even see him smile for the first time without a gun in his hand. And over the first couple hours, we see what he would be giving up to get pulled back into the life. When the moment comes that he must set aside his own desires to help the nation once again, we get to see him agonize over it. We get to see the sacrifice, and are not shouting for the hero to get on with it already like in an action movie.

The great assassination plot to kill some ruler of some country was lame, but we all know that's A plan not THE plan. The guy behind the guy behind the guy gave us his brief appearance, but we all know that guy will be working for one of the main characters, to be revealed close to hour 20. For all its merits, the one thing 24 has never really been good at is mystery. Maybe its the nature of the 24 hour format beast, but the big reveals and twists always seem out of the blue, like they were just made up on the day. It's not really what makes the show great, so I guess it doesn't matter. But for all the scenes of boring government employees talking about how this will appear to the American People and discussing documentation of events, you'd think it would all mean something instead of just filling time.

The new CTU has Star Trek doors on the interrogation room. Ooooh, fancy! It's a pretty slick new layout, with chrome everywhere and the GIANT SCREEN looming over everyone. How long before we see the big giant villain head giving his demands on that thing? And the addition of drones and facial recognition software will make scanning the crowd move along much faster. Lots of new faces for the NYC office as well. Freddie Prinze as an ass-kicker, who'd'a thought it. But he handles himself pretty well. I wouldn't give him the franchise, but he's getting to Curtis/Chase levels of competence. The new head of CTU is the usual ultra efficient pencil pusher type, this time he's always on his bluetooth. But I really like the actor, all the way back to Boomtown and even to Forrest Gump. I just wish he wouldn't hunch so much. Seems like he's always hanging his head. Maybe the producers told him to do that so Keifer wouldn't look so short. Then, we have the women.

First Chloe. I get the idea. You take the smartest person in the room and move her to a room she doesn't know, you get friction, tension, drama. But the trouble is that if you keep up the geek rage, it doesn't come off as extreme confidence/arrogance, it becomes whining and bitching. For the first time, I started rolling my eyes when she'd sass off to the boss. Her vindication helps set things right, but it's still a fine line. My main trouble comes in typecasting. The show doesn't have a great record with women. While on the one side you have Nina, you also have Kim vs. cougar. It's not as terrible to women as say, Rescue Me, but they are not a global beacon for feminism. Not that I know what I'm talking about in any way about this topic. I just know strong women when I see them on the movin' picture box. Yadda, yadda, yadda, Starbuck. I'm glad Katee is getting work. She's a very talented actress and won her golden gloves in the Tuff Chicks On TV competition with not only BSG but being the only consistently good thing on the Bionic Woman remake. Which she should have been the star of, btw. But somehow she ended up playing slick chick who's hiding the fact she's trailer trash. How very Clarice Starling. We then come to the Bad Boyfriend showing up to wreck everything, and she just rolls over for him. I know about story structure and conflict and feeding the beast, but due to their casting I just didn't buy it. Starbuck would have kneed him, rolled him into the back of his van, dropped him off the GW and been back to work before her dinner break was over. This is not a slight against the actress, but against the casting. You don't cast Sackoff and make her milquetoast. It's a waste. I know, her time is coming. In about 6 hours, she'll stand up and tell him off. This is my baggage. Personally, I'd have switched her and Freddie's roles. Now THAT'd be some interesting TV. Tough commando chick getting hitched to a squeaky computer dork with a secret? That's a day in the life I'd like to see.

I admit, I'm hooked. We've moved past the treaty assassination stuff for now and moved into Russian mob territory with the return of an old flame. I like how Jack was freaked out about her cutting off a guy's hand to go undercover when he cut off a dude's head to do the same thing. It reminds me of the end of season 4 of Doctor Who where the Doctor sees what his companions are willing to do to save the earth and is crushed by the realization he has made them into warriors. Now Jack has to live with someone trying to emulate him. Consider me along for the ride, for at least 12 hours that is.

FlickForward: The movies of January 2010

January 22nd
Extraordinary Measures
I tend to stay away from things based on true stories. Knowing they are changing reality to make their flick seems way more false to me than the 100% lies that fiction is made of. I'll take Varsity Blues over Friday Night Lights. Yes, I have accepted my hypocrisy and am at peace with it. But this one, if it wasn't for the star power, that being Harrison Ford, I'd swear this was a TNT original film, or Saturday night on CBS.

Legion
Paul Bettany as an asskicking angel with a machine gun? Really? Isn't he playing Charles Darwin in a movie playing right now? Wow. The movie looks to be a combination of The Prophecy, which wasn't very good despite Viggo showing up as Lucifer, and, oddly, Tales From The Crypt: Demon Knight, one of my favorite, but little seen, horror films from the '90s. As a solid B-movie, it might be kinda cool. But I wouldn't set my sights too high.

The Tooth Fairy
Dwayne would like us to believe this is all part of his “Become a Movie Star in 5 Easy Steps” Plan, but you can only go to the well so many times. The idea should be one for you, one for them. He did The Rundown, then he did Game Plan. The next thing should have been for him, something action or at least for someone more than 12 years old to enjoy. But then we got Witch Mountain, and now Tooth Fairy. Congrats, you're a movie star of the same level as Hulk Hogan. We didn't need another Mr. Nanny. Dwayne, dude, seriously, if I don't see you shooting someone in your next movie, you're gonna be an anecdote.

COCO Says NO GO!

I hadn't been watching the late night shows for several years. Once in a while, I'd hear about an actor or musician I'm a fan of was scheduled to appear on Dave or Conan's show, and I'd tune in, but I wasn't what you'd call a regular watcher. I'd consider myself a fan of Letterman and O'Brien, Not so much for Leno. From what I've heard, as a comedian, Leno is (or was) one of the best. In standup, he kills. In chat show format, he dies. Don't get me wrong. You don't get 10 million regular viewers by being a chump. What he became is vanilla. Not good, not bad, just consistent, the McDonald's hamburger in a world with Red Robin and In & Out. I couldn't stand his show because of the unwavering formula, especially in his interviews.

I'm a big fan of conversation. I love hearing people talk, and my favorite writers, Bendis, Whedon, Sorkin, are the guys who can make the chats seem real, or better than life. In a great interview, I hope to see two people chatting, the host you know well and the guest you don't, and see where the conversation goes. Dave only asks about what he's interested in, the rest he totally ignores. Conan starts from his cards, but when something catches his fancy, he'll follow it right down the rabbit hole. Leno writes a script and follows it point for point, having worked out all the anecdotes with the guest previously. That's not a conversation, that's a skit, and not even a funny one.

I started watching more during the writer's strike. Want to see if someone is really funny? See them out in the glare of the lights with no script. Watching Conan working so hard to put out a show, featuring bits like Ring Spinning where he'd see how long he could keep his wedding ring spinning on his desk, was pretty amazing. When the time came for the transition, I started keeping tabs on everything. Of course, it helped that I was up with a baby who'd only sleep while being held. What I saw was while Leno was packing up to leave on the date he had decided on, he did the same show over and over right up until the last 10 minutes of his final show. Meanwhile Conan was getting very emotional about not only the fact that he and his staff would have to uproot their lives and head for LA, but he was leaving the job he loved for the job he'd always dreamed of.

Oh, Leno, don't you know we can't miss you if you WON'T LEAVE. Thus the first few weeks of Conan's Tonight Show are overshadowed by the show more people wrote about than watched: The Jay Leno Show, now polluting prime time! I never watched The Jay Leno Show. Why would I? But I did watch the first month of Conan's show and I thought the same thing I thought after seeing his first few Late Night episodes, he was finding his way. Several of his bits were very funny and some were better off left out of a highlight reel. But he's making the show his own, as any new host should.

But the previous tenant refuses to move out. I don't get what's going on with Leno. He announced his retirement six years early. And even if he now says he was fired, he still had SIX YEARS to get his house in order, to plan for his not being on the TV five days a week. But something happened on the way to heaven, and either he got cold feet or his ego wasn't being stroked enough. Either way, he decided he wanted to be the belle of the ball, he wanted to come in and single handedly save the network. Who does he think he is? Regis?

Jay has had his day in the sun. That day is over. Johnny stepped down gracefully. He didn't suddenly demand his desk back but at an earlier time. Now granted, Jay has not put in the time and is younger. We don't need him to disappear. But he does need to go away. Be the bigger man. Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. He's got time, money and cars, not to mention a loving family. Most people would be happy with any one of those things and he has all of them. Still not enough? Fine. Send him to Fox. They'll cancel him in six episodes anyway. Meanwhile I'm with COCO, no matter where he goes.

FlickForward: The movies of 2010

Here's my own sneak previews of the movies about to hit theaters. Haven't seen more than a trailer on any of them, but that's enough to decide if it's worth heading out to the cineplex.

January 15^th

The Book of Eli

I can answer the question of whether this movie will be worth seeing with one word: DENZEL. Does this guy make a bad movie? No, wait, amend that. Is this guy ever bad in a movie? Nope. Even when the flick is not up to scratch, he is always amazing. With him playing a badass in a post apocalyptic America, more Road Warrior than The Road, how can you say no? Add to that going up against Gary Oldman, stretching those villain muscles he developed in The Professional and The Fifth Element and it's gonna be worth seeing. Scenery will be chewed, sawed off shotguns will be fired and I will be there.

The Lovely Bones

Peter Jackson's been a bit quiet since King Kong. After that monster of a film, he wanted to make a smaller film and so chose an adaptation of a quiet novel about a murdered girl who narrates her own haunting. It didn't end up as quiet as he'd hoped, and jumped around the schedule quite a bit before ending up here in the doldrums of January. I'm not expecting to fall in love with Peter's latest, but he's one of the most interesting directors out there, especially at incorporating CGI into his work. Even just for the visuals, this is not one to miss.

The Spy Next Door

Alas, poor Jackie Chan. Hollywood just doesn't know what to do with you. And now here you are stuck in a silly Pacifier retread. I'm thinking it might be time to head behind the camera. Throw in the occasional Hitchcock-esque cameo and you'd be good. I'll just wait until he shows up in the Karate Kid remake coming out in June. Did anyone tell the studio execs that Jackie doesn't know karate?