I hope I can remember everything I've seen so far this summer - I've
actually been to most of the films I wanted to see this year. I think
I just need to hold on to ticket stubs.

HOOT (4/10) - Went to the premiere because one of the producers I work
for put this together for the studio. I was never a huge fan of the
way they developed the script, but this should have made a pretty nice
film for younger kids. They could have involved the owls a little
more and done a few less Florida montages. Timothy Blake Nelson is
hilarious. The highlight was the old guy with the dogs, who
unfortunately died just a few weeks after the movie was released. OK,
but I'd probably not watch it again.

On the bright side, I got to chat with Jimmy Buffett. He's about four
feet tall.

M:I:3 (7/10) - Provided everything I wanted in an early-Summer flick:
spectacle, a gaggle of hot chicks and a bunch of explosions. Loved
the McGuffin of the Rabbit's Foot. Philip Seymour Hoffman is simply
The Man right now. Say what you want abotu Tom Cruise, but he's
always good and he's a bona fide action star to the hilt. I'll go as
far as saying that I was TERRIFIED during the scene with the drone on
the bridge - that drone scared the living hell out of me for some
reason. Totally worth the $13.

OVER THE HEDGE (7/10) - Not the best Animated Feature of the year, but
I was definitely entertained. Steve Carell really made this one for
me (as I'm sure he did for a lot of people) and I thought the end
heist was EXTREMELY creative. Still, it was a little uneven. Leaps
and bounds better than MADAGASCAR, though. Just thought it could have
been a little more consistently funny.

THE BREAK-UP (7/10) - There could have been more story involved here,
and they could have done a little more to make us care about the
characters themselves as opposed to the state of the relationship.
Jason Bateman steals the two scenes he's in. Favreau is a hoot. I
will always have a soft spot for Joey Lauren Adams and she wasn't in
this as much as I'd like. I think this is probably not as good as I
thought it was, but I appreciated it because I had about 90% of the
same fights with my ex-girlfriend ("Why would I WANT to do the dishes?").

WORDPLAY (8/10) - I'm a sucker for documentaries, I'm a sucker for
anything involving English (see also: SPELLBOUND), and this one just
made me laugh, especially with the people who were a little "too" into
their word games. It's a shame most of you wouldn't have even had the
chance to see this.

SUPERMAN RETURNS (9/10) - For me, this was the biggest movie of the
early Summer...and man, was I satisfied. I'm easily forgiving some of
the movie's flaws, though it was far from perfect. I didn't really
buy Kate Bosworth. I was pissed that they made Parker Posey's
character Ms. Tessmacher Jr. I was pissed that they cut out all of
Kal Penn's good scenes. I hated the fact that Superman didn't do
anything to lock up his power crystals - especially when I found out
that that's exactly what he did in the comic book.

But the positives really outweighed the negatives here for me. I
thought Brandon Routh was superb - he might not be able to do anything
else, but damn, this kid was a f*cking good Superman. I thought
Spacey was great, and unlike a lot of critics who complained about his
masterplan and how it didn't make sense...I figured it made perfect
sense (I thought creating the barren continent was far less about
charging people to live in a place that was uninhabitable and far more
about power and dragging Superman into one big, final trap). For me
it wasn't too long, there was plenty of action and there was a lot of
heart. I'm sold on Singer carrying this series.

A SCANNER DARKLY (6/10) - This one confounded me. I was always
interested in what was going on so it kept my attention, but I won't
for one minute pretend that I understood everything for most of the
film. I think that animation kicks ass, but I thought the script was
really, really undercooked. I want to go back and read Philip K.
Dick's original story before I form a final opinion, but here's what
really bugged me...

Without getting into spoilers, there's a bit of a twist at one point,
a twist I figured out randomly about five minutes before it happened.
Even when it did happen, I knew it had happened but I wasn't sure why
the story had built up to that. About ten minutes later, there's a
scene where two people talk in a restaurant and in three minutes they
explain the entire plot. I thought that was really f*cking lazy. You
can be mysterious and challenege people and keep secrets within a
narrative - even never giving answers to some - while still keeping
people in the story. I think most people who see this are going to
stop caring about the story quickly. It's a great concept to begin
and end a movie with, and if you see it I think you'll agree with me,
but when this was being written the ball was metaphorically being
dropped. Ambitious and intriguing but highly flawed.

YOU, ME AND DUPREE (3/10) - First of all, there were a few good laughs
in here and I did in fact enjoy Owen Wilson's character. That said,
the story was extremely watered down, the jokes were few and far
between, and Matt Dillon is absolutely worthless as an actor. He just
f*cking sucks. The story is poorly written and the execution is lazy.
We all have that crazy, irresponsible, inexplicable friend that we
love to tell people about, and this could have been a movie about
him...but it's fluff. HOWEVER - and I'm going to head straight into
Male Pattern Cheauvanistic Territory here - I would gladly again pay
$13 to see the scene with Kate Hudson on the boat again. My God.
Sadly, this is why I will buy the DVD. But my God.

THE OH IN OHIO (6/10) - Another film that almost no one will have
seen, but I got to the premiere of because a buddy of mine was the
composer. First of all, Paul Rudd can carry any movie he's in and is
one of my three favorite actors working right now. Second, though you
couldn't call the writing even above average...I really liked the way
this one was written. Does that make sense? I liked the characters
and the way they evolved and learned. The editing was BAD and the
back half is sorely in need of some recutting. Mischa Barton is the
Matt Dillon of her age group. She looks great but she is worthless.
I recommend checking this out once it hits DVD, even if it's just for
some of Rudd's great one-liners.

MONSTER HOUSE (8/10) - This one started slow and I was a little
worried about it; gradually, though, it built up speed, the jokes
picked up and stayed consistently funny, the story began to flow
nicely...and all of a sudden, I was having a blast. It's gets more
and more creative as it goes along and the story that it told just
ended up being fantastic. I can't believe this hasn't done better at
the box office. I really enjoyed myself. Bit of a warning, though: I
wouldn't take a kid under the age of 8 or so to see this unless you
know they can handle being scared. If I were six years old this would
have terrified me.

LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE (9.5/10) - Probably the best movie I have seen
all year. It's another one that starts a little slower - this time on
a more sour note - but it begins to pick up speed and man...you'll
just fall in love with it. Not only is the little girl in this
adorable as all hell, but she's also a pretty good little actress.
Alan Arkin has never been better. Steve Carell is pretty understated
but in a way that makes you take notice and buy into his character.
This is one of those movies that involved complicated, dynamic
characters in an actual narrative. It's almost perfect. I laughed my
ass off, and my guess is you will too if you get to see it.

BORAT (10/10) - I...I don't even have words for this. If you're not
familiar with Borat, he's a Kazakhstani reporter character, a creation
of comedian Sascha Baron Cohen, the star of DA ALI G SHOW (Ali G. is
another one of Cohen's characters). The basis for this character is
simple: he fools real people - actors, politicians, activist groups,
spokespeople, etc. - into thinking he's really Kazakhstani and really
a reporter trying to learn American culture. He then sets up fake
interviews and situations and proceeds to be and act as uncomfortable
as possible. He also makes no bones about the fact that he hates Jews
(Cohen is Jewish and typically brings this up to highlight
Anti-Semitism in all forms of culture).

I have never laughed as hard or consistently as I did for the 80+
minutes this movie ran. Never. This movie is going to offend the
living hell out of a lot of people, but I challenge you to see this
and not choke on your own laughter.

If you've never seen Borat, do a YouTube search for his clips ("Borat
Visits the South" and "Borat Goes to a DAting Service") are probably
the best.

This was, hands down, the funniest movie I've ever seen in my life and
I think that if I ever had a chance to laugh harder than this, I'd
just have a heart attack. I don't even mean to be exaggerating. You
should have heard the theater go up during this one. Everyone was
wiping tears away, and several people had to come down from coughing
fits. Unforunately, this doesn't release until November. But get ready.

ACCEPTED (7/10) - Also caught an advanced screening of this one. If
you liked OLD SCHOOL, you'll probably dig it. It's a college comedy -
what do you want? Justin Long is always entertaining and likable.
Jonah Hill is on his way to becoming the next Chris Farley/John Candy
without being as hyper as the former. Basically CAMP NOWHERE in
college. I had fun, but I don't think for a second that everyone is
going to like it. If you like movies like this - and you know exactly
what they are - you'll dig it.

As for the rest of the Summer, I'm damn excited about TALLEDEGA
NIGHTS, SNAKES ON A PLANE, BEERFEST, HOW TO EAT FRIED WORMS, WORLD
TRADE CENTER, CRANK, and WICKER MAN. On into the Fall and the rest of
the year I'm f*cking going crazy to see THE FOUNTAIN, and I'm also
anticipating RIDING ALONE FOR THOUSANDS OF MILES, TRUST THE MAN,
HOLLYWOODLAND, LUCKY YOU, JACKASS II, CHILDREN OF MEN, THE SCEINCE OF
SLEEP, EMPLOYEE OF THE MONTH, RUNNING WITH SCISSORS, THE PRESTIGE
(which, I'm telling you, will be 500 times better than the
woeful-looking THE ILLUSIONIST), FAST FOOD NATION, STRANGER THAN
FICTION, F*CK (A Documentary about the etymology of the word - and no,
it didn't start as "Fornication Under Consent of the King"), CASINO
ROYALE, HAPPY FEET, TENACIOUS D: TE PICK OF DESTINY, FOR YOUR
CONSIDERATION, THE NATIVITY STORY, APOCALYPTO, and PAN'S LABYRINTH.

G*ddamn, that was long.

Geoff

--- In thehollywoodcamerata@yahoogroups.com, "Fitz" <it_fitz@...> wrote:
>
> It's that time of year again... time to size up and slam down those
> summer movies... so chime in with your ratings!
>
> Here's what I've got so far (I have much catching up to do):
>
> Pirates - 9 out of 10
> Superman - 8.5
> X3 - 7 or 8
> Monster House - 8.5
>
> Let's see YOUR lists!
> Fitz
>