Honestly when I saw the first previews for this film, I thought I’d skip it all together. It didn’t look good, didn’t seem fresh in any way. But my son hadn’t seen a movie in theaters in a few months, so we we’re dying to take him to anything. Maybe it was my low expectations, but I found myself truly enjoying Kung Fu Panda from beginning to end and actually came away thinking the film was a minor animation classic. It’s as good as, or better than some of the lesser Pixar films, and way better made than the Shrek or Ice Age films.

The film quickly brings you into this completely unique world, where all animal species live together in relative harmony. Where a duck raises a panda and that panda, named Po, dreams of becoming a kung-fu master. The animal kingdom lends itself well to the kung-fu styles, making the tiger, crane, snake, praying-mantis and monkey characters masters of each style named after them. Together they are the Furious Five. It is them that Po looks up and has dreams of one day joining. His father’s profession as a noodle maker, has no appeal. During a ceremony naming who will become the Dragon Master, Po stumbles his way into the path of the master Tortoise Oogway and is named the one who will unite the group, even though his kung-fu skills are extremely limited. It’s up to their leader Shifu to train Po to become a kung-fu master. Making things even more precarious, is a ferocious Panther, Tai Lung, who has just escaped the ultimate prison and is on his way to claim the title Dragon Master.

The scene where Tai Lung escapes the prison makes the film worth seeing on its own, he is such an incredible bad-ass that he has a prison all to himself, buried miles under the ground, surrounded by thousands of armed rhinos. His fight to get out, is some of the most impressive kung-fu ever brought to screen. The film is chalk full of wonderful fight scenes, that will impress the most die-hard of kung-fu fans, yet are gentle enough for little ones to enjoy. Although they may come away punching and kicking the air. The world the filmmakers have built is extremely gorgeous, modeled after ancient China. The most satisfying thing about the film, is that it's completely its own world, there are no pop-culture references to bring you out of the story, it’s a story that will remain timeless.

The one thing that may be a deal breaker for some people is Jack Black, he voices Po, who is in 95% of the film, with his character and humor being very much Jack Black. I for one enjoy his comedy stylings, so I really liked the character, but others might not. The voice work of the other characters is very well done, I especially like Dustin Hoffman as Master Shifu and Ian McShane as Tai Lung. The rest of the Furious Five are recognizable voices, including Angelina Jolie as Tigress, but none are distracting, falling easily into character. Kung Fu Panda is an extremely well put together film, for an animated family film or not, it’s got elements for everyone and at the same time doesn’t stoop to making tasteless jokes that only adults will get. The film has a nice message about finding and believing in yourself, while also kicking some serious butt. – Grade: A- (Seen on 6/21/08)

I loved Night Watch, I thought it was an incredible viewing experience; full of gorgeous photography, very cool special effects, wonderfully inventive action scenes, and a cool premise; even if the whole thing comes of as a kind of Russian version of The Matrix.

I was very excited to see the middle part of this trilogy, Day Watch. The film jumps right in with not even the most basic of wrap-ups of the events from the last film. It had been over a year since I'd seen Night Watch, besides the lead character and the main premise, I didn't remember much of it. So I felt like I was playing catch-up for much of the film. Which is something I like for most films, usually I'm about 10 steps ahead, but as a sequel, I wanted a little bit of a reminder. I'll have to go back and re-watch it.

Day Watch continues the story of Anton, an agent of Light, who discovered a whole new world in the first film; where the forces of good and evil are in a constant battle to keep things even, so the world doesn't come to an end. He and his team continue their struggle against the Dark side. This time they're searching for something called the "chalk of fate", which when written with can basically grant wishes. Obviously a potent tool for either side.

I'm not sure if it was my catching up, but I never connected with this film the way I did with Night Watch. It has the same top-notch filmmaking, but I didn't latch onto the characters the way I did the first time. Even Anton seemed kind of stand-offish. There's a large section of the film, where he changes bodies with a women, which is kind of funny for a while, but grows tiresome. And it never is fully explained why it might save him. That was a big problem with the film, a lot of it is never fully explained, you're not quite sure what the characters motivation is much of the time.

Another little thing that I missed from Night Watch was the very cool subtitles, that grew and changed with the character's inflection; we're left with the standard boring ones here.

Day Watch has a lot of action, but not a lot of moves the plot forward, just plays as eye candy. The end kind of ruins the whole film as well, it basically erases everything that just happened, which makes it all seem pointless. We'll see how that plays out with the final film Twilight Watch. The middle section of a trilogy is always the toughest, it may play better once the films are complete. It's not a bad film, but it didn't grab me in the same way.

While watching this, I began to wonder when director Timur Bekmambetov would make his first Hollywood film. His sense for action and effects would fit in perfectly. The same night, I came across the trailer for Wanted an over-the-top action film starring Angelina Jolie and noticed his name in the end credits.