By Calvin Trager
June 4, 2002
There’s something very onomatopoetic about this: “Ben Affleck stars as America’s best defense against terrorism in The Sum of All Fears”. Yup, that about sums up my fears all right: Special Agent Ben Affleck! I mean, if I’m the CIA, I put Undercover Brother on the case before Ben Affleck, is all I’m saying.
If real FBI agents have trouble getting the attention of the real government, with honest-to-God tips about impending terrorist activity, what hope does Ben “Sigma Delta” Affleck’s Jack Ryan have?
--“This is Ryan! The bomb is in play, repeat, the bomb is in play!”
--“Sure thing, Jack.” “We’ll be sure to tell the President riiight away”
Jennifer Lopez stars in Enough, as a woman on the run from an abusive marriage? I loved this movie when it was called Sleeping with the Enemy. Actually, I didn’t love it all that much, which should tell you that I’m not the target demo for either film. Which in turn should tell you that I’m not the author of this Web page.
Al Pacino’s character in Insomnia has trouble falling asleep? Maybe he should check out a screening of Enough. That oughta do the trick. And if he’s still awake by Friday, the Ya-Yas are coming with a trump card that could put him out indefinitely.
Tired, I am of Yoda’s backward-speak. Grating, it is. It didn’t seem too obvious or annoying in Empire, but it totally was in Clones. When he ordered, during one of the battles - you know the one I mean - “Around the survivors, a perimeter create!”, I tried to stab myself in the ear with a Gummi Worm, just to put an end to the madness. I’m still swabbing granulated sugar out with a Q-tip; it isn’t pretty. Anyway, at this point, on the scale of annoying voice peculiarities, the Yoda-speak is right up there with Jar Jar and Fran Drescher. Can we FedEx a Berlitz tape to Naboo before 2005, please? I’m begging here.
You know, I finally caught Thirteen Days the other night when TiVo snagged it for me and all I can say is, everyone who whaled on Kevin Costner for his bad Boston accent should be ashamed of themselves. That’s right, ashamed, because you didn’t even come close to capturing the mind-bending awfulness of his performance. To be fair to you, though, there aren’t too many words that can adequately describe it. Train wreck? Nope. Double train wreck? Try again. Double nuclear train wreck at rush hour? Ballpark. Hearing it for the first time left me slack-jawed. The UFCW should sue this guy for defamation of character. Had I known it was that bad I would have definitely seen this one in the theater; I’m sure anything other than full Dolby Digital doesn’t do it justice. I hope the producers made Mayor Quimby return a portion of the fee he received as Costner’s voice coach.
Episode II’s opening weekend estimate was off by six million?! Who crunched those numbers, Arthur Andersen? By comparison, Spider-Man was off by less than a million on a bigger number. Put another (yet another) check-mark in Spidey’s column, if you’re keeping score at home. It goes right under “Bigger Opening”, “Better Legs”, “Fastest to $100 million, $200 million, $300 million, and $400 million”, and, oh yeah, “More Fun”.
How many times do you suppose Steven Spielberg watched Blade Runner and The Matrix back-to-back while making Minority Report? And do you know what? Good for him, for knowing which movies to crib style notes from. I mean, if it has already been done to perfection, don’t screw around. You don’t read about the geniuses at BF Goodrich rethinking the shape of the wheel, do you?
Just announced for Thanksgiving 2004: Wallace and Gromit and the Great Vegetable Plot. Yes, please. Talk about something to be thankful for.
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If Tom Cruise has somehow managed to screw up Minority Report like he screwed up the Mission: Impossible franchise with M:I2, that tears it. He’s not getting a card from me on L. Ron Hubbard’s birthday. Wait, Fincher is directing M:I3? Tom, all is forgiven.
What exactly is it with these Jedi? Can’t they actually figure anything out ahead of time? Hello!? Stuff’s happening all over the damn galaxy and Yoda just sits there and chats up Shaft Windu the whole time and scrunches up his forehead making “I’m trying to think” faces. Come on! Wake up, Grover, the empire is forming right under your nose while you’re like, “Hey Mace, wanna catch the pod races this weekend? I was going to meditate on the ever-growing presence of the Dark Side I feel gnawing away at my gut, but it’s supposed to be warm and sunny on Tattoine so I think I’ll just blow it off until Episode III”.
I could watch a two-hour movie entirely comprised of Jango Fett and Ben Kenobi kicking the tar out of each other in the rain. I’m not joking.
Speaking of Obi-Wan, is Ewan McGregor the only Episode II cast member who didn’t forget that acting is still a requirement for being an actor? I mean, for crying out loud, Yoda has better chops than half the flesh-and-blood humans involved in Clones. That’s right; freakin’ Yoda, who spent three movies with Frank Oz’s fist jammed up his keister and is now 100% digital, has more acting range than these zombified goons. I mean, Mark Hamill is a better - wait. You know what? I better stop before I say something I’m going to regret later.
Let me wrap up my Star Wars comments like this: I know it was just the way the seams were cut on Natalie’s white body-suit, and you know it was just the way the seams were cut on Natalie’s white body-suit, but hey. I’ll believe what I want to believe, and you can believe what you want to believe, and none’s the wiser, okay?
Getting a jump on all the critics that use bad puns here: Anyone else think Scooby-Doo looks like doo-doo? The main problem, as far as I can tell: They forgot to cast Scooby. Lookit, I know Scooby. I watched Scooby. I was there when it all went down, with the ski lodge, and the gold mine, and with the scaring and the whole unmasking business. You, sir, are no Scooby. You might as well be Marmaduke for all we can tell. But what the hell do I know? I think Velma is hotter than Daphne. See ya next time.
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