JackReese

I've read comments by others saying this was the best movie of the year and that this rivals Jurassic Park and one person went so far as to say it rivaled Titanic. Now, let's all just calm down and think about this rationally. There are several moments in this movie which are "yeah, right" moments. Obviously, we have to allow some, we are talking about a giant ape on a monster infested island. But there are some moments which supersede the audience's suspension of belief and bring us into a cartoony and laughable movie. There is no great message about love in this remake, at least nothing that was not offered in the original. There is however a bunch of cartoon dinosaurs tumbling about the island, machine guns with magic bullets and Icecapdes galore. Please now, let's all calm down. Peter Jackson did give us Lord of the Rings, and we are grateful, but had he made this first, we would have been very suspicious of him bringing Tolkein's world to life. This film is too long and too boring. Random sequences of slow motion are generally used to highlight important events, but not in this movie. Apparently random things such as opening a door to the bathroom are worthy of about thirty minutes of our time (that scene was cut from the film, you won't find it unless you pay the $150 for the director's diary DVD, a great marketing scheme for a lousy movie). And if that doesn't convince you, think about this: you may leave the theater thinking Jack Black actually has talent. That, my friends, is a place in the history of film into which we do not want to go ever again.

A nice pleasant but disturbingly short documentary on the Batman tales from comic strips to the big screen. Although well intended and well needed, it focuses too much on the Batman of the 60's and fails to acknowledge his development up until the time of 1989. Also, it uses too much archive footage. "Too much?" you say. "You can never have too much Batman." True...but you can have have too much Adam West in his old bat-uniform telling bat-jokes at a bat-car lot or something to a bat-crowd of about 20 people. (Sorry Adam...but I loved the DVD release of Batman The Movie with you and Burt commentating..that was nice) It also briefly discusses the Batmania of its day. Since this was made in 1989, it could have dealt more with Tim Burton's Batman and more with the controversy surrounding it. Perhaps it had been made just a few months later, we could have gotten that. Nevertheless, if you can get your hands on a copy, it's worth watching. I work at a video store and saw it sitting around one day and took it home and watched it. A rare find.

So, I really didn't want to watch this. I work at a video store so I get to watch everything before everybody else. Usually that's a good thing. Cinderella 2 is just one pointless movie. One little plot point after another that simply joins characters back together again. Don't ruin the first by watching this one. Walt had the idea. No sequels. Too bad he's still not around to enforce that idea.