Alvin and The Chipmunks: The Squeakqual- D-

In "Alvin and The Chipmunks: The Squeakqual" brilliant comedian David Cross' dignity is sacrificed for the film's one and only laugh. He's taken enough heat for appearing in the first one, so I won't lay it on any more. But he's back again here drawing a paycheck for a piece of crap he himself would never lay eyes on if he weren't being paid to do it.

Jason Lee seems to have wised up and taken the easy road out. He's technically "in" this movie, but his screen time (and his embarrassment) has been cut down to almost cameo status. He lucks out by spending most of his scenes in a hospital bed after his character "Dave" suffers some misfortune at a charity concert as a result of Alvin's showboating antics at the beginning of the movie. He leaves a layabout relative by the name of Tobey in charge of the singing sensations who are now taken off the road and thrust into school to live the lives of normal children.

Cross' unscrupulous record producer reenters the picture when he finds a team of singing female chipmunks and seizes on them as a way back to the big time.
Which brings me to the film's only laugh. Cross tries to get his new girl group into the school talent competition to steal the spotlight from the Chipmunks. As the three Chippettes sing Beyonce's "Single Ladies," cross has stage lights attached to his arms, legs and head and he's furiously waving them all around to simulate a real concert light show. That made me chuckle once. Nothing else did.
and from the sounds of the audience I saw it with, I think I might be a little generous in acknowledging even one laugh.

"Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakual" D-

10 Worst of 2009

My 10 Worst Films of 2009 (in No Particular Order)

Motherhood
X-Men Origins: Wolverine
All About Steve
Alvin and The Chipmunks: The Squeakquel
The Blind Side
Land Of The Lost
Year One
Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen
Did You Hear About The Morgans?
Night At The Museum: Battle Of The Smithsonian

Did You Hear About The Morgans? D

At this point in their careers Hugh Grant and Sarah Jessica Parker can sleepwalk through roles and they often appear to be doing just that in the romantic comedy "Did you hear about the morgans?"

We've seen Grant play the witty english cad, and Parker play the shrill urbane new yorker more times than we can mention. Here they're a highly successful couple that's been separated because of an infidelity and they're on the outs. That is until they witness a murder and are thrust back together into the witness protection program in what seems like the blink of an eye.
You don't go into the movie expecting plausibility. They're soon swooped away, by private jet (hey aren't we in a recession?), to the tiny town of ray wyoming. And we're treated to an endless stream of warmed over smugness and big city folk in the country hijinks. Oh and there's a contract killer out to get them, but that part of the story seems lazy even by these low standards. Hmm, I wonder if there will be a rodeo involved?

The film literally seems to lurch from one Hugh Grant self depricating punchline to the next, and stands there waiting agonizingly for laughs that almost never come. A few of them made me smile, but the silence in the theater was deafening. You know it's bad when you compare a film to "The Great Outdoors" and "The Great Outdoors" starts to look not quite so bad.

"Did You Hear About The Morgans?" D

It's Complicated: B

It's Complicated is a well crafted genre exercise that knows its audience and knows exactly what it wants. It's like a big pint of haagen daas. Comfort food that adds a little twist to make it seem new, but also knows how to push all the right buttons.

When you have such pros like Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin and Steve Martin, they elevate the material. But while my wife thought the film about complicated middle aged love was a bit too "menopausal" I thought it was at least a bit refreshing to see this kind of a relationship on the screen. It exists in a fantasy world where everyone has everything they want materially and can afford to spend countless amounts of money on everything their heart desires. But of course the material things can't buy them what they really want, someone to love.

Alec Baldwin is appealing and a little revolting as the horny ex husband who, emboldened by a drunken fling with his ex-wife Meryl Streep, falls back into love with her and all the things he loved about her.
Streep is a joy as always, and presents a complicated portrait of a self confident older woman who's in touch with her younger sexual side, but doesn't spill over into gross caricature.

It may be a bit disconcerting to hear about Meryl Streep's bikini waxes, or lack thereof, but I found it to be an enjoyable time at the movies.

It's Complicated: B

Avatar: B

You can say this for James Cameron's Avatar, you've never seen anything like it. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing remains an open question after this ambitious journey into a new sci fi world. But I've got to hand it to Cameron for so aggressively paving his own way and creating a new world instead of simply piecing together one from the spare parts of other sagas.

We're taken to the new world of Pandora, where soldiers working for a corporation are looking for a valuable mineral called "unobtanium." The natives don't take kindly to the new alien intruders, so the corporation creates Avatars. They look, and act like the natives, but they're actually controlled by humans through brain waves back in a lab.

Cameron's Avatars look a bit like the bastard step children of refugees from the musical "cats" and the elves from Lord Of The Rings with a little blue smurf dna thrown in. Things get complicated when a military grunt controlling one of the avatars begins to fall for one of the natives and see things from their point of view.

Cameron's visuals once again trump his somewhat ham fisted story telling. He's got old veteran Sigourney Weaver to help, but centerpiece Sam Worthington doesn't have quite enough charisma to paper over his director's weaknesess. But at least he largely avoids the pitfalls that have trapped late period George Lucas- An infatuation with technical gizmos while neglecting to put together simple things like a story, characters, or real human emotion.

Avatar doesn't always succeed, and things get a little silly at times as he pounds home his environmental message with a sledgehammer, but it's worth a trip to the cineplex for something you'll be talking about for a while to come.

Avatar: B

Invictus: C+

Playing a well known historical figure is always a tricky proposition, especially when the figure is still alive and still a part of the national consciousness. It's hard to look at an actor- even a great one like Morgan Freeman- and not see him as an actor playing the part of Nelson Mandella. But Invictus tries to replace the image of Mandella entirely by inserting Freeman in what looks like real news footage of Mandella being released from prison, and being sworn in as the new president of South Africa. It didn't sit well with me, because while watching it I kept thinking what's Morgan Freeman doing up there and where's the real Nelson Mandella.

In Invictus, Morgan Freeman plays Nelson Mandella as a national Hero, but also as a shrewd politician. It would be easy to reduce Mandella to an almost saintly like caracture who just spouts high minded platitudes about the state of the South Africa such as "we have a lot of promises to keep."
But the film and Freeman always make sure to hint at the well of political calculation simmering just beneath the surface. Mandella is a politician who is forging a path of compromise to keep his fractured nation together after decades of segregation. Freeman does his best to give us some insights into Mandella the man behind Mandella the public figure.

Matt Damon has an even tougher time as the captain of South Africa's rugby team. Although he's playing a less well known figure, Damon is a little too distanced from the part. You can almost see him working on the difficult South African accent in his head before he talks. It's not a bad accent, but it just sounds like copied a few of the bad guys from Lethal Weapon 2.

We begin the story shortly after Mandella takes office for the first time, and both sides of the country are learning to live together without apartheid. The racial struggles are largely seen on a day to day level through Mandella's bodyguards. At first it's an uncomfortable mix of Blacks and Whites, but they eventually come to an uneasy truce and learn to trust each other a little.

When he is swept into power, one of his first big gambles is to save the name of the south african rugby team. The new black heads of south africa's sports council want to banish the name, the colors, and the anthem of the Springbox because it is a symbol of apartheid for them. But Mandella swoops in and argues successfully that to deprive the white minority of this symbol of national pride would only confirm their worst fears and rip the country apart.
And thus we begin mandella's championing of the rugby team as a political tool for racial harmony. And he forges a relationship with its captain to help get the team to the world cup and give the new south africa a shiny new image.

This predictably all leads up to the big game, and a predictable crowd pleasing finale. It's a better film than that other crowd pleasing football drama "The Blind Side" and I learned more about rugby than I knew before. But much like Clint Eastwood's last movie "Changeling" it's a handsomely mounted trophy piece that doesn't really do much.

Invictus: C+

Nine: B

Nine begins with a total deconstruction of the art of film in its first few seconds, and then it begins to spin this naval gazing yarn about an italian director at a loss for a script or even a story for his next film. He's surrounded by a wife, a lead actress, a mistress, a reporter and a costume designer. They're all women who have shaped him and his psyche. His wife makes him a family man, but stifles his creativity. His mistress is a plaything, but their pleasures have lost their meaning, and she becomes something he would rather keep hushed up just as she becomes tired of living inside this compartmentalized section of his increasingly chaotic public and private life.
The costume designer is the voice of reason. His lead actress is the outlet for his fantasy. She's the part he wants her to play, but (as he found out with his wife, who was once his lead actress) reality refuses to play by art's rules.

Daniel Day Lewis is a bit glum but I didn't have a problem with his performance as the conflicted director. Penelope Cruz is effective, but her mangled english tends to sabatoge her efforts at seduction, for the audience anyway. The rest of the cast is solid, but unremarkable.

The film isn't half as clever as its source material, but it does capture your attention. It doesn't have quite the freshness or vivacity of director Rob Marshall's last foray into the world of musicals "Chicago," and its soundtrack is engaging but lacks a showstopping number that you'll be able to remember even 5 minutes after the end credits roll. But it doesn have style, and it does at least try to tackle some interesting subjects.

All in all, it's pretty good. But not the home run you'd expect.

Nine: B

Up In The Air: A-

George Clooney has his work cut out for him in "Up In The Air." He's a corporate downsizing specialist, a hired hatchet man to make the cuts bosses don't have the stomach for. And the way he lives with himself is by fully embracing a life on the road.

For him, a night in the Hilton in wichita is as warm and comfortable as home. Airports are his office. He's kind of like Tom Hanks in "The Terminal" only he makes every airport his home. He's the kind of guy who picks up a fellow female traveler on the road by comparing their club cards.

I'm convinced that no one other than George Clooney could have possibly played this part. No one else could have found a soul in this seemingly superficial character. And that's quite a feat because his boss says bad times for the economy are great times for them, and he's fired so many people so many times for so long nothing fazes him any more.

His life in which he's devoted himself to building up miles and gaining even more elite status among the airlines, hotels, and car rental companies he uses every day is a fantasy. But it may be the only way to truly survive with some kind of happiness. I've known plenty of people who travel a lot for a living, and everyone says the same thing. After about the first week, it gets to be a grind and you start to hate it.

The story is almost deceptively lighter than air. Clooney sees his chosen way of life under attack when his boss played by Jason Bateman considers pulling him off the road and firing everyone by webcam instead. To make a case for why its beneficial to do your dirty work face to face, he agrees to take the new corporate whizkid named Natalie along for the ride to show her the ropes. There are a few ringers like Zach Galifinakis and J.K. Simmons among the mopes who get canned along the way.

Up in the Air isn't a movie that jumps out and grabs you immediately. It kind of sidles up next to you and begins making conversation. And the more time you spend thinking about it, the more agreeable it seems. And before long you've found yourself watching a movie that has won over your heart with charm, and wit.

Up In The Air: A-