reviews: July 2005 Archives

Thoroughly enjoyable. I haven't laughed that hard at a movie in a long time. Few movies are this laugh-out-loud hilarious. I'll have to see it again to catch all of the lines drowned out by the audience's laughter. For once, they didn't give away every punchline in the trailer, I guess because this was a genuinely funny movie with plenty of laughs to spare. Vince Vaughn is a comedic genius, and has good chemistry with Owen Wilson. The comedy is tad bit raunchy in places, but doesn't disappoint, and don't visit IMDB and spoil the surprise cameo in this movie -- you'll be glad you didn't.

The scariest scenes of this already not-that-scary movie were ruined for me since I had seen half of them during Jennifer Connelly's media blitz (Letterman, Conan, The View, Regis & Kelly) last week. But apart from that, the enormous holes in the story were the biggest disappointment. Half of the characters in this film were introduced and developed for no apparent reason because they had no bearing on the outcome of the story. There were clearly parts to this story that were missing -- must I wait for the DVD's alternate endings for this movie to make any sense?

Not having read the original book, nor having heard the radio play from 1938, nor having seen the original film from 1953, I had no preconceived notions regarding what this movie was going to be about. I knew the basic storyline -- Mars Attacks (only with fewer cameos) -- but I was completely ignorant of the details. But damned if Spielberg didn't manage to screw this one up bad enough that even *I* noticed! Between the plot holes big enough to drive a truck through (Alien ships buried on Earth for millions of years? Grandma's house unscathed amid the rubble of what was once Boston?) and the awkward pacing of the film's finale, one is left to wonder if a veteran director like Spielberg was actually at the helm the entire time, or if he handed it off to an apprentice while he went on vacation.