Men in Black 3

Well, whaddaya know, the "MiB" have gone MiA for 10 years already! No wonder many of us have forgotten about them as Men In Cape and Bodysuits (aka The Avengers, Batman, Spider-Man, et al) have been hogging the cinemas while the "Men In Black" go missing-in-action. No matter, they are still a barrel of fun in this three-quel that comes as more of a surprise than a treat that we have been waiting for.

And with Barry Sonnenfeld back at the helm of this troubled and delayed US$215-million production, it is a nostalgic film in more ways than one.

Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones reprise their roles as agents J and K of the secret Men in Black organization that monitors alien activity on Earth. The 'odd-couple' have their work cut out for them when extra-terrestrial serial killer Boris the Animal (Jemaine Clement) escapes from his maximum security prison on the moon and travels back in time to kill K. Since only J remembers K's existence, it's up to him to venture through time, look for a young K (now played by Josh Brolin) and stop Boris from destroying the world once and for all.

I have never been a fan of time-travel plots and I still don't like them. However, the time-travel subplot here is just to provide the "Back To The Future" fantasy to the MiB franchise. The narrative, as well as the mood and tone of the movie, are light-hearted, fun and always on the outer limits of credibility. Again, it is nice to see how a deadpan face like Jones' can generate so much mirth. The Smith & Jones pairing is augmented by Brolin who gives a good representation of how K would be in the Sixties, with most of the sequences accompanied by popular Sixties hits on the soundtrack.

One of the staple jokes of the MiB series is the celebrity cameos that suggest alien origins. In MiB3, we have a 'twist' that suggests a certain pop art personality is an undercover MiB agent! Still, the mainstay of the MiB series is Rick Baker's creature designs and make-up rendered in 3D. The 'monster show' does not disappoint, especially that of a huge fish that attacks diners at a Chinese restaurant. Oh yes, there are also a couple of cool gadgets and vehicles like the giant wheel hoover-bikes used by Agents J and K. On the whole, Agents J and K still provide the 'L'. - limchangmoh.blogspot.com

This film is about Agent J going back in time to rescue Agent K from being murdered by aliens.

My friends say that "Men in Black III" is a brainless comedy, you can go in just for a few laughs and switch your brain off. After watching it, I can safely say that I have another opinion.

"Men in Black III" does have its brainless moments. It can be politically incorrect too, but it is entertaining and fun to watch. Special effects are realistic, and the scene involving a very tall building made me so nervous that my palms perspired a lot! The ending is very touching; I certainly did not see it coming even though a friend guessed it.

I think it is great that "Men in Black III" manages to combine emotional elements in the middle of mainstream blockbuster entertainment. I look forward to the next film in the series already.

I am not exactly a Will Smith fan. I think the last Will Smith film I watched and liked was the first "Men in Black" film back in 1997. I was surprised to learn that there will be another installment of "Men in Black" this year, the third of the series. The second MiB was shown in 2002, and I did not even care to finish that one. Will the ten years between the last episode and this one make a difference? I needed to see that.

In this film, a vicious alien villain known as Boris the Animal escapes from his prison on the moon, where he had been locked up since being arrested by Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones) back in 1969. One day, Agent K disappears from the present day. His partner Agent J (Will Smith) realizes that K had been assassinated by Boris forty years ago, which caused a major change of events, allowing Boris' alien race to overrun the Earth. J had to find a way to travel back in time to 1969 in order to save K and rectify the tragic consequences of his death. Can J save K and in turn save the Earth from the clutches of Boris?

The odd couple was just as they were before in the first films. Will Smith is still his old loudmouth Agent J as Tommy Lee Jones was his tight-lipped Agent K. As J goes back to the past, he will interact with the young 29-year old K, perfectly played by Josh Brolin. Brolin amazingly captures the laconic persona, and even the distinct voice, of Jones so well that they seemed to have been one and the same actor. It was also good to see Emma Thompson again in a major film as she portrayed Agent O, another senior agent with a soft spot for K. The younger Agent O was played by a cutie named Alice Eve, but she certainly did not convince us that she would look or act like Emma Thompson when she grows older.

I must say that this film was really a most entertaining one. Well, maybe more for me than for my kids. Younger audiences may find the jokes about 1969 cultural references, such as the hippies, the racial tension, etc., to be a bit difficult to grasp. But the fun action sequences with some exciting futuristic vehicles and weaponry, the imaginative and repulsive aliens made by no less than the master monster-maker Rick Baker, the thrilling integration of the historic Apollo 11 lift-off, and the touching revelation of K's big secret made this a very good and enjoyable movie to watch. 3D did not seem necessary. Director Barry Sonnenfeld got it right this time, and this segment certainly gave perfect closure to the story arc of the whole series.

Once again our favorite MIB agents Jay & Kay are battling it out for earth. Quick action, colorful villains, beautifully designed settings and CGI, comic relief in the face of imminent destruction, all those made the first two movies great as well as successful in the box office. Could they better the formula in the face of all the other bad sequels we have been seeing for years?

This is one of the reasons I had stepped into the cinema with trepidation. (Good grief, was it 1997 when I saw the first and ten years ago the second? How time flies). The other reason was the pitfall of time travel.

Time travel is one of the favorite themes in sci fi movies but it needs to be handled carefully. My humble word of advice to the script writers: Keep-It-Simple. Avoid overtly complicated jumps back and forth and paradoxes that confuse the audience. Remember the eventual mess in the Back To The Future trilogy? I was then so pleased to see that they kept the time travel relatively simple and easy to follow. There was a small part when they crossed the line juuust a tiny bit when young agent Kay meets a certain father and son (don't want to spoil it). Even if traveling back in time was possible, you wouldn't necessarily bump into everyone you know in the present.

Will Smith is in his usual good form in his character Jay which however needs Kay to balance him. It is then fortunate that Brolin gives a great performance as the young agent.

Was it better than the 1997original? It was as good, without the novelty value obviously. Was it as good as the MIB2? I would say that it surpassed the second.

A decade away from the movie scene has given the Men In Black series a chance at a fresher, newer perspective. Taking its cue from Shrek Forever After, MIB 3 takes on a tired concept (time travel in this case) if only to acknowledge the failure of its dull sequel and take us back to a different era allowing us to view the franchise from an unsullied angle. The result is a film that returns to its roots and gives audiences the chance to relive much of what they first enjoyed – a smart, sci-fi, buddy comedy that embraces everything weird and wonderful about the unknown universe.

In his first cinematic role in nearly 4 years, Will Smith's Agent J is the usual charming, witty wiseass we expect him to be. Still teamed up with the laconic Agent K (wrinkly Tommy Lee Jones) he is no closer to cracking his older partners deadpan demeanour but their relationship issues take a back seat when a nemesis from Kay's past, Boris the animal, turns up to exact revenge for having been imprisoned on the moon 40 years ago. His elaborate plan takes him back in the past, to the day he was caught, and sets ripples in the present, where K no longer exists and a different reality results. J has to then literally time jump (off the Empire State building no less) and fix the past for normalcy to return in the present.

Directly Barry Sonnenfeld seems to find his groove once again with the zany and icky shenanigans that put him on the map with the original. Using plenty of the wide angle camera work that gave him fame as the Coen's favourite lenser, the resulting imagery should work wonders for those who decide to pay extra and catch the film on 3D (converted). Boris the animal is also a return to series villains being screwball and menacing in equal measure (remember Vincent D'Onofrio?) and Rick Baker's excellent makeup effects are both incredible and revolting. The big surprise is how well Josh Brolin impersonates Jones in the role of a younger K – which should not be a surprise considering Brolin's recent, impressive body of work as a bonafide actor, most notably in W. So chameleon-like is his performance that you forget it's him and actually completely believe it's just a younger version of Tommy Lee Jones that you're seeing.

The films primary achievement and a true signal of its return to form though are the scenes set in the past. Not only is Josh Brolin a deadringer for Tommy Lee's K during his youth, but the hip musical vibes of the late 60's/early 70's allow for plenty of playfulness to ensue with a particularly hilarious segment devoted to Andy Warhol. If that isn't enough, everything very neatly ties into another epochal scientific moment from that time period and ends on a moment of curiously satisfying emotionality that provides not only closure to the film but the series as a whole. If that doesn't make you forgive all the wrongs that the sequel did and embrace this film as one of the years better movie franchise offerings the only thing that might work on you is a neuralizer.