I didn't know anything about this film going into it, except that it was a French horror film that had received some good reviews. And that was the perfect way to see this film. I'll try to give away as little as possible, talk only about the filmmaking, and little about the plot. Not that there's a whole lot of plot to talk about. It's pretty much a young couple spending a night at home, when they're attacked for no reason. I haven't seen it yet, but it looks an awful lot like the recent American horror film The Strangers, which I haven't found any connection between the two.

The film is almost the perfect example of good suspense. Nearly the entire film is suspenseful. It starts with a young girl and her mom, broken-down on the side of the road, they hear some weird noises outside their mini-van, you're not quite sure what's going on outside of the van, but it sounds creepy. The photography, the editing and the sound design, draw you into this minimalist situation and it really bugs you out. Soon they're dead, and we're following Clementine, who we'll stay with for the rest of the film.

She goes home to her large country house, has a quiet dinner with her husband and they're off to bed. Not a lot is said between them, but their silence and body language leads us to believe that not everything is okay between them. Which quickly becomes an afterthought when, in the middle of the night, they're attacked by unknown persons. The rest of the film is spent with Clementine and her husband Lucas being chased around by an couple of thugs, who attack them with a variety of household weapons. They're chased through the house, through the attic, through the woods outside the house, then finally through a sewer system. We're never really given a reason why, it's simply happening, which makes it all that much more realistic and sickening to think about. The who is eventually revealed, and it's quite a surprising shock.

Them isn't a perfect horror film, there's not enough character development to make you truly care about Clementine and Lucas, maybe if they'd spent another 5 to 10 minutes letting us get to know them as people, it would helped us get more involved. But if you really just want to be creeped out by some nearly technically perfect suspense scenes; long stretches of silence, puncutated by something horrible, this is a wonderful film. The film has the best keyhole scene ever made, perfect in its execution. It has almost no score, relying on the sound of the attackers chasing these two. There's minimal dialog, once the chase begins, there's little more than screaming. And although the film was shot digitally, it has a gritty, 70's aesthetic to it. This isn't a horror film for those who want something typically Hollywood, this is a film for true horror fans, those that can appreciate something different. - Grade: B (Seen on 7/20/08)

I recently reviewed a pair of French comedies, complaining about the lack of good American comedies lately. These two films here are exactly what I'm talking about. I won't even bother to separate them as they both have all the same problems. In the completely unnecessary remake of The Pink Panther, Steve Martin puts on a ridiculous French accent to play the role of Inspector Jacques Clouseau. Originally made famous and a thousand times funnier, by the comedy-genius Peter Sellers. You can practically smell the desperation in the filmmakers attempts to make us laugh. Steve Martin, who himself once was an incredibly funny man, making stupid comedy seem brilliant, in films like The Jerk. Seems lost in how to make a joke work as Clouseau. He simply pumps everything up to 11; the stupidity of his character is so far out there, it's no longer funny.

I felt the exact same way about Robin Williams in License to Wed. This often intensely hilarious actor, seems out of his depth. I didn't find myself laughing once at his portrayal as Reverend Frank. His nonsensical ideas on how to bring Mandy Moore and John Krasinski together as a couple, didn't once seem genuine. There has to be at least a certain sense of reality, when trying to make us laugh. Krasinski, who I find very funny and charismatic on the great show The Office, seems demeaned to be playing this guy set to be married to the ultra-bland Moore. He does the cliche' romantic-comedy thing, of constantly lying to his partner, performing ridiculous often illegal acts, getting himself deeper into trouble, when a moment of truth would resolve everything.

Poor Kevin Kline and Jean Reno, both great performers in their own rights, couldn't have been more obvious in their lackadaisical approaches to their characters. They both seemed embarrassed to be part of the mess that is The Pink Pather. Emily Mortimer, who plays Clouseau's love interest, is the only one that had any realistic attachment to her character, but she's in the film so briefly that she can't help. Beyonce, once again does her, "look Mom, I'm acting!", thing that I can't stand. The only performances with any life to be found in License to Wed, were done by some of the bit roles. I like young Josh Flitter as the Reverend's aid, he brings some life to his character, and out funnies Williams. Brian Baumgartner, Kevin from The Office, is maniacally over-the-top as another finance going through Reverend Frank's trials, but he at least seems to be trying to get some laughs.

The filmmakers behind these two extremely lame attempts at comedic filmmaking should be embarrassed by these movies. They are sloppily put together, with no real sense of zest, horribly acted by reliable performers, and worse beyond anything, not funny. I think between these two films, I had three slight chuckles, but countless groans at the pathetic attempts at humor. Not once was I drawn into the film or made to care about anyone in the least, I remained a distant viewer throughout each. The only worthwhile moment in either film is the opening credits animation in The Pink Panther, because it reminded me of the better versions of the film. - Grade: C- (Seen on 6/4/08) License to Wed plain sucked throughout. - Grade: D- (Seen on 6/15/08)

There's almost nothing worse than when a movie falls apart at the very end. It makes it seem like such a waste, when you've been enjoying a film all along, and then the filmmakers do something so stupid to ruin all the good faith they've built up. Shrooms is just that type of film. For a low-budget horror film, I thought it was pretty well made, with some good photography, decent acting by a bunch of nobodies, a fairly interesting twist on the horror genre, a couple of cool trippy scenes, and it's all completely ruined by a last minute, unnecessary twist, that tore apart everything that I'd just seen.

Shrooms starts like a lot of horror films with a group of kids going into the woods to camp, take drugs and fornicate; and end up getting chopped into piece instead. What made it work for a good portion of the film is the care that the filmmakers take to make these cliche's somewhat different. The death scenes aren't fantastic, but the killer chasing them is made interesting by the fact that these kids are tripping out of their minds, so you're not quite sure if what they're seeing is real or a hallucination.

Each murder is telegraphed by the main girl Tara, who took some kind of super-shroom that should have killed her, but instead gave her the ability to see her friends gruesome deaths in advance. There seems to be some sort of black-hooded specter floating around these Irish woods, relishing in in the chance to chop them to bits. It also may be as simple as some mutated-redneck with a penchant for blood, which they strongly hint towards, by having a couple of backwoods brothers show up halfway through the film talking about their other crazy brother. But in the end the answer is even stupider, and ultimately doesn't make a hell of a lot of sense, in the way the killer is everywhere at once.

If they hadn't bothered with the last minute twist, I would have enjoyed Shrooms so much more. They should have left the murders a bit of a mystery, not giving us a firm grasp on what actually happened. Having a bunch of tripping-teenagers as our unreliable P.O.V. would have made it different and more ambitious. The film is nicely made, with some good, dark photography, trippy editing and creepy effects. It's also fairly funny in spots, I particularly like the talking cow scene, I thought it was pretty inspired. But ultimately a film is the sum of all its parts, and the stupid tacked on ending ruined, what could have been a decent little cult classic. - Grade: C- (Seen on 5/23/08)

Is there anything worse than a horror movie that isn't scary? Or in the case of Crazy Eights, doesn't even want to try? Maybe that's not what the filmmakers were going for, maybe they were trying to create some sort of psychological drama? Which is what it felt like at times, but which in that case, doesn't work either. But silly me, when I watch a movie from the horror series Eight Movies to Die For, I expect to at least have some attempts at horror. And honestly, there are a few moments that have some horror elements, but the filmmakers seem to be trying to create the opposite of suspense. Any time anything even remotely dark or freaky started to happen, they get it over with as quick as possible and cut to the next scene. I'm sorry, but that's not how horror films work.

When I originally heard about the Eight Movies to Die For concept, I was excited. Here were some folks really trying to scare us, or at least that's what they promised. Their intention was to bring us eight films, that we hadn't yet had a chance to see, eight films that supposedly lived on the edge. If they had had their first festival anywhere near me, I would have gone. Luckily, I had to wait till DVD. I believe I watched seven out of eight from the first series. One, The Abandoned, was actually good and somewhat creepy, two or three were okay, like Reincarnation, the rest sucked badly. So it was with trepidation that I went again to the well for their 2007 series, hopefully I started off with the worst one of the bunch, because if they get any worse than Crazy Eights, my confidence has been completely destroyed.

Crazy Eights, is about a group of people brought together for a funeral of a friend. It comes out that they all spent time in a mental institution together when they were children. There's a mystery surrounding their friend's death, so the alive seven make the trek back to the institution to find out what really happened. Their first stop is a time capsule they left for themselves to find, inside they find the bones of a little girl, who was at the institution with them. Being too stupid to call the police, they investigate further. And before you know it they find themselves locked in the basement of this long abandoned institution, with what appears to be the ghost of the little girl stalking them.

They continue to make the stupidest, most cliche´d horror mistakes possible. With each character insisting on setting off on their own, no matter how many of them get knocked off. They're constantly saying things like, "Oh no, that's our 4th friend to die in the last fifteen minutes, I'm going to explore this creepy hallway where I just saw something ghost like moving about in. You guys stay here." These are literally about the dumbest characters you could find in a modern horror film. So you can't possibly care when the obvious happens and they get killed.

The set-up isn't that bad, I can go along with them trying to figure out their past in this crumbling shell of a hospital. The set design is moody, the lighting appropriately dim, they even do a decent job of setting up the ghost. Unfortunately past that, they seem completely clueless on how to scare anyone. As soon as anything creepy starts to happen, they try to get it over with as quickly as possible, a hand jumps out of the dark, they cut to another room and we hear a muffled scream. That's how nearly everyone dies in this sorry excuse for a horror film. There's no drawn out suspense, there aren't even any good deaths. Everyone dies by editing.

By the end I'd lost all interest in the film, I honestly don't remember how it ended, I just didn't care. The acting is all pretty bad. Dina Meyer and Traci Lords are the lead actresses, neither has ever turned in a convincing performance, the filmmakers were simply going for some recognizable faces. They also got Gabrielle Anwar, who has made some decent films in the past, but she's pretty much wasted here, one of the first to die. Frank Whaley does his typical whiny role, he's phoning it in, and still creates the most realistic character. They try to create some drama about the horrible past these friends have gone through, but the writing and acting aren't good enough to pull it off. The little creepiness they have going for them, they almost deliberately avoid. A real waste of a film. - Grade: D-

I feel very lucky to live in a small town, that has a high quality film festival. They Ashland Film Festival gets great films and filmmakers to come to a small town in Oregon. It's one of my favorite weekends of the year. The only unfortunate thing about it, is that it's so short, only five days long, by the time I'm getting into it, it's over. So this year I only got a chance to see two films. Luckily, I did a little research, i.e. watching online movie trailers (see below), and found a film that I thought my wife and I could enjoy. Outsourced turned out to be even better than advertised.

Todd Anderson works as a manager of a call center for a company that sells cheap Americana knick-knacks. In the very first scene of the film he is told that his entire department is being laid off and being moved to India. If he wants to keep his job, his stock options, his security, his only choice is to move to India to help train the replacements. Being a straight-laced kind of guy, he does what his boss tells him. A classic fish-out-of-water set-up.

From the moment he steps off the plane he's out of his element. The people mean him well, but their customs seem strange. His new underling wants the best for him, so he sets him up at a friend's house, instead of a hotel; which throws him off even more, as he's now forced to live like an Indian. When taken to his new office and employees, the place is a total mess, the computers are outdated, the employees untrained. Even worse his company won't let him leave until he gets the call times down to an average of 5 minutes, they now average over 15. He has a seemingly impossible task in front of him, living in a land that is completely unfamiliar.

It's fairly easy to guess where Outsourced is going to go. Todd learns to love India and its customs and then falls in love with Asha, a girl from his office. But this film is not about the destination, it's the journey. It is an utterly charming film, full of wonderfully crafted scenes, consistently funny, and even educational.

It has great performances by the lead actors. Josh Hamilton is one of those actors that has been around for a long time, you see him in a lot of things, probably most recognizable from the classic 90's flick Kicking and Screaming, but here he gets the rare chance to carry a film and he does it with a ton of charisma. Asha is played by Indian actress Ayesha Dharker, who you might remember from her very small role as the princess who comes after Amidala in Attack of the Clones, again, she gets the rare chance to shine, and proves that she's as talented as she is beautiful.

Writer/Director John Jeffcoat has created a love letter to India. Through Todd's character we get to learn about the beautiful country and people of India. At the opening of the film he's thrown for a loop by a unknown-child sitting on his lap while riding on a crowded train, by the end he's willing to follow a stranger into the slums for an impromptu meal. His turning point comes during the Festival of Color, one of the only days of the year that the Indian people really let loose, throwing bags of paint at each other, it proves to be an opportunity for Todd to finally loosen his tie. The relationship between Todd and Asha feels genuine, and doesn't go exactly how we expect. Outsourced isn't the kind of film that slaps you in the face, it slowly comes over you, and by the end you'll fall in love with it. - Grade: A-

I appreciate the craft and hard work that goes into any film, even if the final result isn't all it was meant to be. I'm doubly impressed by the work put into indie films. And I'm not talking about something like Pulp Fiction, that has a relatively huge budget, movie stars and professional crew. I'm talking about true independents, films that have zero connections to Hollywood, that are made completely outside of the system, with thread bare budgets. Automaton Transfusion is such a film, made in Florida, with a budget under $100K, and not a single recognizable actor.

I'm usually much easier on such films, because I know exactly how much love and hard work is donated in making a film like this. So while I wouldn't rate this as a fantastic film, I'm deeply impressed by what they were able to create. The filmmakers said screw-it in trying to develop a unique story, they used as few dialogue scenes as possible, and focused all their attention on creating some serious gore. They knew that hardcore horror fans would forgive the bad acting and the cliche' ideas, if they were fully entertained by the sight of nonstop blood.

It's a normal Friday afternoon in Grover City, a few high school seniors have a night of partying ahead of them, but things go awry when a horde of zombies attack their town and they're forced to fight for their lives. That's about it on the plot. One minute their biggest problem is a pimple, the next they're running to literally save their skin. Near the end of the film, the film comes to a screeching halt with a poorly done scene of exposition, as a soldier explains why everything just happened and also sets up the sequel. The filmmakers planned on turning Automaton Transfusion into a trilogy, and the film ends with a: to be continued...

However, you don't watch zombie films for originality, you watch them for bodies being torn apart and eaten. Automaton Transfusion has that in spades. Despite the low budget, they went all out on the gore. Every body part imaginable is ripped off in waves of the sticky red stuff. They created the most imaginative death I've ever seen in a zombie flick, as a girl's unborn baby is torn out of her stomach and bitten into, while she screams helplessly, before getting eaten herself. It's so disgustingly perverse, so over the edge, that I actually cheered when it happened. There are never ending waves of zombies, the filmmakers got every friend and friend of friends to show up to get turned into the undead. They're the new-style zombies, quick moving, with a touch of smarts in how to get to their victims.

If you're any kind of horror fan, you have to do yourself a favor and see this film. What it lacks in acting, most of the characters are seriously bad, the less talking the better; and story, it's your basic military experiment gone wrong plot; it more than makes up for in stylized gore. The make-up artists did a great job in creating some seriously sick imagery. They even got their city to shut down a few blocks, to add to the authenticity. There was one thing about the filmmaking that bugged me all the way through, I'm not sure if they were trying to get a film look out of their video source, but the whole film has that skipped-frame look. You know like some of the battle scenes in Gladiator, it's an effect that should be used sparingly, and they went a little nuts with it here.

Ultimately I believe that writer/director Steven C. Miller has a very promising future in horror. With Automaton Transfusion he created a lot out of a little, if he gets any kind of budget and a decent script, he could create a classic horror film. - Grade: B+

I was one of the few people that defended McG's direction of Charlie's Angels, I thought it was spot-on for that particular film. The sequel, I wasn't as fond of, but it had a stupid, goofy charm that made it enjoyable. So I was interested in seeing what he could do with a film beyond that world, but was surprised when he signed on to do We Are Marshall. I wasn't sure if he could do drama, if he could calm his camera and editing down to a reasonable pace. After finally getting around to seeing it, he proves that he's got some adult in him as well.

Now, I wouldn't call Marshall, a great or even a very good film, but it's passable; good enough to keep you interested in the story. He gets some fine performances out of some good actors, I particularly liked David Strathairn as the school's Dean and Ian McShane as a grieving father. Matthew Fox has got the quiet, pensive act down pat. Matthew McConaughey is trying too hard not to play himself, he's got a weird accent, that must be some attempt at trying to sound like the real guy, but it came off as distracting; I thought he should have been reigned in a little more.

I was born after the Marshall University plane crash tragedy, thousands of miles away, so I didn't know anything about it's history. There's no way I can attest to the accuracy of the film's portrayal, it feels real enough, but there are scenes that are definitely built for emotional impact. At least they don't have the football team coming back to win the National Championship, they're content with having a moral victory. I thought that the football scenes were overly dramatic, turning routine plays into something way beyond that; and everything was shot too close, so it's hard to tell what's really going on. But I appreciated the passion that surrounded the games, I liked the journey the team, coaches and town takes getting back to the field. From what I've read those touched by the tragedy, were happy with the film, and since it's their story, that's what's most important.

If I didn't know, I would never have been able to tell this film had the same director as Angels; it lacks that visual panache, but it's a story that didn't need it, an over-active camera would have felt out of place. What most felt like his touch was in the soundtrack, he has a penchant for Top 40 hits used in the most obvious ways; and you'll recognize every song as a classic rock staple. I think that McG has a decent career ahead of him, he'll turn out to be a competent studio director, that's comfortable in multiple genres. And maybe just every once and a while he'll knock one out of the park. We Are Marshall, is a fairly nice sports drama, it won't become a classic, but it goes down smoothly without a bad aftertaste. - Grade: B-

I don't have a lot to say about this film, and if I ever want to catch up on my reviews, I'm going to have to shorten a few here and there. I enjoyed this documentary about the MPAA, it's well made and entertaining. I think some of their rating practices are pretty ridiculous, and there need to be some serious changes made. Especially the way that violence gets a pass, while sex is considered the most evil thing ever; and the fact that they treat studio movies with kid gloves, while being particularly harsh on independent films. There needs to be steady and even rules for every film.

But honestly even as a filmmaker, it didn't get my ire up. There are too many other, much bigger problems in the world to truly care about than this. I commend Kirby Dick (who directed the cult-documentary Sick) for tackling the idea and making an entertaining film out of the subject. I particularly liked the bit, where he split screen clips of gay and straight sex scenes, commenting on how they were shot pretty much the same, but how the gay scenes were all rated NC-17, while the straight sex got R's. If you have any interest in knowing how films are rated, this is a documentary worth watching; plus there are a lot of great film clips included. - Grade: B-

Michael Crichton is a big reason I’m now such a fan of reading. Jurassic Park is the first novel I read that I truly enjoyed, before that it had been stuff I was forced to read in school. I remember being initially disappointed in the film because it had left so many scenes from the book out; ultimately I fell in love with the film. In quick succession after that I read his books Congo and Sphere and loved both of them. Since then I’ve read every single one of his books, none of them reaching that initial enjoyment. I don’t know if his books have gotten worse or if my tastes have changed, but his last few have been particularly bad.

Next is what I would consider his worst book to date, State of Fear is a close second. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad read; it’s interesting and moves along at a decent pace, but his books have changed from exciting stories with a background in realistic science, to science guidebooks with a bit of story thrown in. With Next he tackles genetic engineering and the bad idea of letting companies patent genes. Which is a really ridiculous idea. How can someone claim ownership of something that occurs in nature? I’m glad that Crichton uses his popularity to spread the knowledge of something atrocious going on hidden from the publics view, I only wish he’d wrote a better book.

There are too many characters in Next, none of them very interesting. He’s constantly jumping from a scene with mother trying to save her son from a bounty hunter who’s been sent after them for their genes, which a company believes it owns the rights to; to a story about a half-chimp, half-human boy; to the owner of the company who’s being systematically destroyed by a rival company, and quite a few other stories and characters. Each time one of them starts to get interesting, the book jumps to another set of characters; instead of ramping up the suspense, it gets tiresome, so by the time you get back to the story you were getting into, you no longer care. All together about half of what happens in the book is worthwhile, the other half felt like filler, simply so he can round out the entire world of genetics. If you’re a Crichton fan you’ve probably already read it; otherwise find the book, flip to the back pages and read his epilogue about patenting genes. I think it’ll serve you well to know about this before it gets worse.

The Independent Film Channel has become my saving grace for documentaries. I enjoy watching them, but they're very hit or miss, so I often don't want to waste a rental. This way I can DVR as many as I want and check them out at my leisure, and if they're not up to snuff, erase them. I've known for a while that I wanted to see Darkon, I first heard about it when it won the Audience Choice Award at SXSW.

I've never had an interest in any kind of role-playing games, I didn't play Dungeons and Dragons as a kid; but I can appreciate the fascination. Escaping into a make-believe world, inventing a new life for yourself, it sounds tempting, especially for those of us that don't quite fit in. LARPing, or Live Action Role Playing, is a little more involved; kind of like D&D meets a Renaissance Fair. I knew a couple of guys that played when I worked at an Internet company in Seattle, but again, I never had any interest;, too geeky for even for me. Through Darkon I got a good understanding of what it's all about.

The film starts out like a bad Lord of the Rings knock-off, with a group of guys in half-decent costumes standing around a fire, badly acting out some fantasy jargon about how so-and-so must be destroyed. We soon learn that these are the players of Darkon; a make-believe land run by a large group of people in the suburbs of Baltimore. There are thousands of players, each with their own role, from King to peasants; they fully immerse themselves into this fantasy. The film introduces a quite a few of them, most of them too briefly, and they all say about the same thing; they do it to escape from the dulldrum of their real lives.

Skip Lipman is the star of the film; he probably speaks well as an everyman of Darkon. Inside the game he has great ambitions; he's worked his way up through the game's ranks, becoming the leader of a large group, but still had to take orders. So he took his minions and broke off to form his own faction; which is now battling for supremacy of the land. At home, he's the stay-at-home father of a young boy and girl; it's not a terrible existence, but it's not everything that this American lifestyle taught him to dream for. The other main character is Daniel McArthur, a married businessman, who is who Skip hopes to overthrow as ultimate leader.

Mostly it is all an excuse to hit each other with large foam swords; which there is a lot of. Sure the players take some time out to make up fantastical back stories, trade fake-money for fake magical items and draw up political agendas; but mostly they want to whack each other to ten-minute-deaths. And boy do they! The filmmakers of Darkon go to great lengths to capture these epic struggles; using nearly every trick you'd find in a Hollywood production, from sweeping helicopter shots to right in-your-face hand-held fight photography. There's even an epic fantasy score to back it all up; you could almost take it seriously if they weren't fighting with PVC pipes wrapped in foam, and if the soccer goals in the background didn't keep popping into frame.

There are too many battles in the film, too many guys falling bloodlessly to the ground, it begins to grow tiresome; they don't and can't have the impact of Gladiator or Braveheart and after the little we've learned about the game, I ultimately didn't care who won or lost. The filmmakers could have set it up as a battle between good and evil, making us really root for one side over the other, but we've learned to like both the main characters; there's no Billy Mitchell to root against.

Instead I think they should have focused a bit more on the people of Darkon. I liked hearing from these self-proclaimed nerds, geeks and dweebs, about how they have so much trouble fitting into the real world; how Darkon makes them feel comfortable, that they're able to talk to girls, able to assert themselves. That is the true power of the game. Darkon is a fairly good documentary, it's entertaining and some-what enlightening; it celebrates the players, instead of making fun of them, but like the weapons and players of Darkon, it feels padded.

I already knew this story well. A couple years ago I saw and reviewed the excellent documentary, Little Dieter Needs to Fly, a jaw-dropping true-story of survival. The interesting thing was, that director Werner Herzog and real-life-hero Dieter Dengler would have rather been making a fictional feature about his life. At the time they only had the budget for a documentary. Over a decade later, their dream came true with Rescue Dawn. Unfortunately Dieter never got to see the film, I'm sure he would have been proud.

The chameleonish Christian Bale plays Dieter, a Navy pilot during the Vietnam War. Growing up in Germany during WWII, he locked eyes with a pilot who was bombing his town. In that moment, he became obsessed with flying. Moving to America and joining the military was his best chance to do that. He never wanted to be in another war, but that's what he got, and he's the kind of guy that easily rolls with the punches. On his own very first bombing run, he is shot down and left for dead in the extremely dangerous jungles of Laos.

Soon after he's captured by the Vietcong and brought to a small P.O.W. camp with a few other soldiers. The amazing part is under the worst conditions imaginable, he never loses his cool and remains forever positive. While the other soldiers are content wither-away or die, while waiting out the war, he must escape. He comes up with a doable plan and must convince the others to go along with it. They manage to escape their prison, but now they must escape the jungle, which proves to be an even tougher ordeal.

While Rescue Dawn may sound like some kind of Rambo film, it's all very realistically done. And from what I've read and seen in the documentary, it also remains as true as possible to the the real life events. Making Dieter's actions that much more exciting. The film is shot documentary style; nobody makes these films the way that Herzog can. He makes sure that everything is as realistic as possible, and the camera is right there along with them, as they're jumping into rivers and tromping through the impossibly thick jungles.

Mix that with one of the most dedicated actors on the planet, Christian Bale; watch him eat real-live maggots, be drug behind a horse, hung upside down while being pelted by rocks and many other horrible things, and you have one hell of a movie. The film is so in-your-face about it all, that after it's over you'll feel like you've escaped the jungle along with Dieter. While not really a pleasant experience, the film will make you feel proud of human endurance, as it is an incredible true-life story, captured like you're right there with them.

This is one of those movies, that looked so middle of the road, that I really had no interest in it. I enjoy Robin Williams for the most part, but this looked like his same old shtick warmed over. Barry Levinson is a decent director, but he hasn't done anything truly memorable in almost two decades. It looked like all the same jokes I've seen in other political comedies like Wag the Dog or The Daily Show. I really only bothered with it, because I try to see everything, it'd been sitting on our DVR for a few weeks, and I was in the mood for a comedy. Luckily it turned out better than I thought.

Not a whole lot better mind you, but it offered a few new jokes and some good political ideas, that made it worth watching. Plus the cast is top notch, it's hard not to get into something starring Williams, Christopher Walken, Laura Linney and a personal favorite Lewis Black. The filmmaking is your average Hollywood production, with everyone's hair and make-up perfect, the lighting colorful and bright; nothing to complain about, but nothing to take notice of either.

Williams plays Tom Dobbs, the host of a political comedy show; when an audience member suggests that he runs for president, the idea starts to build until he's actually doing it. Christopher Walken is Tom's manager, who isn't too pleased to be moving from the entertainment world to the political one. When Dobbs runs with a typical, boring political campaign, his writer Lewis Black takes offense. Both him and Walken want him to run as himself, a comedian. He's resistant to the idea, until the final debate, when he's so sick of the bullshit that the other candidates are spewing, that it sets him off and makes him tell the truth about the whole political process in a very funny and enlightening way, it's easily the best scene in the film.

I could have done without the subplot about Laura Linney, who works at a company that is running the first Presidential vote tallied solely by computers. When a computer glitch accidentally gives Dobbs the presidency, she's the only one who knows. When the guys running the computer company find out, they ruin her life, so she won't have any credibility when she tries to tell somebody. The whole story drags the film down, I never cared a bit about it. They could have come up with some other way for Linney and Williams to get involved with each other. And I would have liked to have seen the film play with Dobbs winning the election for real.

I can't complain too much about the film, it's too average to really care. I didn't think about Man of the Year once after it was over. I didn't feel like I wasted my time, but it didn't change a single idea in my head. It isn't challenging or truly interesting in any way. If you want a few laughs, from some recognizable actors, in a completely safe setting; this is your film.