I didn’t see last winter’s The Last Samurai because I thought it was a bold award-fishing move on Tom Cruise. Many people called me crazy for thinking that, and many other people said it was a good movie, but it just didn’t jive with me. Truth be told, Tom Cruise movies call into one of two categories for me, either A) holy crap this looks cool or B) what the hell? Lucky for you and me, Collateral falls into the former category and brings Mr. Cruise into a villainous role with great ease.

Much press was given to the film because of the headlining actor’s aforementioned trip into the role of a bad guy complete with grey hair and a personality that was both friendly and ominous. Cruise portrays Vincent, a hired hit man gunning down witnesses around LA the night before a big trial. Vincent is picked up by Max (Jamie Foxx), a cab driver aspiring to be the owner of a limo company. Max is the prerequisite nice guy who gets caught up in Vincent’s dealings after he picks him up as a fair and has an unexpected run in with one of the bad guy’s targets (in the aerial form). The cabbie is then forced to drive Vincent around town, doing errand after errand for the man who will most likely kill him when the night is through.

The film, directed by Michael Mann, is highly stylized, which I believe is one of the things that drew me to it in the first place. I’m a sucker for unconventional camera angles and different ways of shooting movies, seeing Collateral filmed in what looks like handheld DV was icing on the cake for an enjoyable film. The film is a fun ride with dialog that would make Quentin Tarantino happy and a storyline breaking away from the usual summer norm of bigger and bigger explosions with less and less plot. In fact, Collateral is a film that makes you think, at times, but provides enough explanation for its plot points to be fleshed out while not giving too much away. The movie’s twist towards the end is fore-shadowed at the beginning of the film, but can still be a surprise, as it was to me.

While a lot has been said about Tom Cruise and the role he played in the film, I feel not enough credit has been given to Jamie Foxx in a straight dramatic role. If he isn’t nominated for Best Supporting Actor I will lose the little bit of faith I have left in the Oscar process. That faith was only resorted after Return of the King swept the awards earlier this year. Foxx provides the film’s comic foil, something every film should have, no matter how serious, but still pulls off the required role with grace. I’ve read other reviews online that said it, but now I believe it, this was a real career move for Foxx and I wish him the best of luck.

Mann doesn’t shy away from the brutality of Vincent’s work, which plays well for the film. Rather than sanitize the life of a hitman and showing most of the deaths off-screen, the director opted for the brutality not seen since The Punisher, earlier this year.

The only problem I have with the film is the Hollywood ending. I know it is almost impossible to avoid it, but I felt that things were wrapped up in too neat of a package. Without spoiling the closing moments of the film, let me just say you may be disappointed with how it turns out. This isn’t to state the movie, as a whole, isn’t fulfilling, which it is, it is just saying that in a film such as this, where unconventional seems to be the word of the day, I was disappointed.

Even with the rather cliché ending, Collateral is still a worthy film of your summer’s dwindling time. The truly breakout performance from Jamie Foxx and the first time Tom Cruise has portrayed a villain are more than enough to justify seeing the film, but the exciting story and unconventional film style are even more reasons to plop down the $6.50 for a ticket and enjoy the final weeks of summer.

M. Night Shyamalan has brought us some incredible movies in the past, movies that have peaked out interest in the unknown, movies that have given us hope that a hero exists in the most unlikely of places, and even that there are no coincidences in life. Now, in his fourth movie, Shyamalan shows us that peace can come at a great price, and sacrifices must be made to preserve this peace.

Set the Wayback Machine to the colonial 1890’s in Covington, Pennsylvania. A beautiful valley with  a peaceful people, living the simple life. Everyone knows everyone else, and everybody is peaceful and happy. However, a few rules exist. Nobody is to keep secrets, the color red is never to be seen, worn, or used, and “those we don’t speak about” should never be mentioned, unless warning of their intrusion. A truce has lasted as long as the town has; simply, the “people we don’t speak about” do not enter the valley and the town, and the townsfolk do not enter the forest. The creatures seem to be attracted to the color red, as they wear it when they are seen; therefore red is not to exist in town.

Love, however, seems to be abundant in this little township. For Lucius Hunt (Signs‘ Joaquin Phoenix), love seems to be sparse. As a simple blacksmith, he does not speak his mind as the others do, and is frowned upon for not doing so. However, there is one who appears to have love for this lone tradesman. Ivy Walker (Bryce Dallas Howard), the blind younger daughter of the lead town elder (Lost In Space’s William Hurt), has feelings for Lucius. Lucius finally returns Ivy’s love, and they are to be wed. However, Noah Percy (Adrien Brody) is a good friend of Ivy’s, and is a bit mentally deranged. Unknowing of what he does, he severely injures Lucius who now needs medical supplies from the towns beyond the forest, but no person has ever been permitted to enter the forest. It becomes the burden of Ivy, driven by love, to enter the forest and obtain the supplies necessary to keep her lover alive.

Shyamalan seems to have an excellent way of chilling us to the bone. In The Sixth Sense, he chilled us when we find that Bruce Willis was actually a ghost. In Unbreakable we find that Samuel L. Jackson’s character killed all those people just to find a real-life “superhero”, we all were astounded. Everyone had their eyes glued to the screen to catch the first glimpses of the aliens in Signs, and this movie is certainly no exception. The twists and turns in this film will keep you in disbelief for the entire running time.  The biggest plot twist at the end will leave you in utter shock, with an ending nobody saw coming. Just like in his other three hits, Shyamalan does give himself a small role in the movie. This time around, he plays a smaller part, with a very interesting camera trick used to finally show his face in the shot.

Overall, Shyamalan delivers another chilling hit with this tale about alliances and truces, and why you should never stand in the forest on the other side of the yellow flags with your back to the darkness.

When The Bourne Identity was released two years ago many where surprised by the success of the film mainly based on the fact that no one believed Matt Damon could be an action hero. Yet, Damon’s portrayal of Jason Bourne wasn’t one of one man looking to take down an opposing army with a barrage of bullets and super-human strength, it was an amnesiac looking for answers about his past and coming up with some troubling facts. I doubted Damon as much as the next critic, but after viewing the film, and seeing how well he fit into the character, I was instantly proved wrong. Not only did Damon’s acting build the critical acclaim of the film the smart script, excellent fight scenes, and oh-my-god-how-is-he-going-to-get-out-of-this moments paid for the ticket ten times over

Now, fast forward to present day where Jason Bourne is once again back in the spotlight of a CIA investigation and it is time for the second book in Robert Ludlum’s Bourne series to take flight on the big screen and come up big as one of the best films of a lackluster summer. The Bourne Supremacy finds Jason Bourne hiding “off-the-grid” in India and trying to make a life for himself and Marie (Franka Potente), but, when assassins once again set their sights on him, he targets the organization that he once worked for to get answers once and for all.

Truth be told, the film is filled with plot holes and inconsistencies, but where it lacks believability at some parts, it makes up for them in others. The movie, like its predecessor, is a smartly crafted spy tale about one fallen agent looking for a door way into his past while also looking into the future. Damon’s Bourne is a man who is troubled with his past actions, shown beautifully and emotionally near the end of the film, but his training makes him and wanted man and in order to survive his pursuers must face the consequences. The underlying story of the film is the assassination of a Russian diplomat nearly a decade before the events of the film, but new information turns up and a mission to retrieve this intelligence is cut short when two men are shot dead. All evidence points to Bourne, but in a movie filled with turncoat CIA agents, could there be a deeper conspiracy.

Like The Bourne Identity and The Sum of all Fears, Supremacy is an intriguing picture to watch. The lure of the intelligence agencies and the “in-the-shadows” atmosphere brings in moviegoers by the hundreds merely to get a glimpse into something we are never meant to see in real life. Maybe that is part of the appeal of the film. The fact that we know stuff like this must go on all the time, throughout the world, but the common man will never ever see it.

With that being said, you do have to suspend disbelief at times as situations always seem to work out a bit too perfectly for Bourne, but don’t they always for the good guy? British director Paul Greengrass’ penance for using a handheld shaky camera during most of the film’s fight scenes, similar to the foot-chase seen in Narc, and leaves the audience with a disoriented feeling as it is hard to grasp what exactly is going on. Luckily the sound effects are more than adequate to equate the situation for moviegoers. As I stated before, the good more than outweighs the bad, and after the audience is treated to another killer car chase sequence at the climax of the film, you will completely forget about its faults.

The supporting players have a very important role in the film as they add layers to an already deep narrative. Ward Abbott (Brian Cox), a senior member of the CIA, provides an intriguing antagonist to both Bourne and Pamela Landy (Joan Allen), who is vying for his desk and looking to make up for the botched operation. The folds to the story that each one adds tie into the original film and fleshes out the back-story to the series itself. Kirill (Karl Urban) is more or less a hired assassin sent to kill Bourne, and while the character is not as deep as the others, he also provides a worthy nemesis to the crafty Bourne.

After everything is said and done Universal managed to make up for the bomb that was Van Helsing and deliver a truly intelligent, yet fun, summer movie that will have James Bond and Matt Damon fans both clamoring for more from the series. With a generally modest budget and a bank-filling opening weekend, we can only hope the third film is already in the cards.

Will Smith seems to have the Owen Wilson syndrome when it comes to acting. No matter what part he plays, he’s always playing himself in the role. However, much like Owen Wilson, his character seems to work in most applications (except for Wild Wild West). However, it did work well in I, Robot, even though it was Will Smith playing Will Smith in another movie. Smith still managed to play a believable and somewhat humorous performance in one of the darker sci-fi movies in recent memory.

In I, Robot, Will Smith plays the role of detective Del Spooner, part of the Chicago police department in the not so distant 2035. Spooner has a serious problem with the growing robot population, and the introduction of the new series NS-5 robot has him completely techno-phobic. He is called to a crime scene by a holographic projection of the pioneer of robotics, Dr. Alfred Lanning. Dr. Lanning, who was a top scientist at US Robotics, seems to have committed suicide, and Detective Spooner finds an NS-5 robot as the prime suspect. However, he is alone in his quest as everyone else in the free world believes that robots are incapable of committing a crime as it violates the basic 3 law system that all robots are built to abide by. The robot suspect, Sonny, seems different, somehow, and not like the others. It is up to Spooner to get to the bottom of the situation without being labeled crazy.

The aspect of this movie that really shines is the effect department. The transition from real scenery to CG is nearly seamless, and the completely CG robots seem to interact with the actors with lifelike quality. The robots in this movie were purposely made with small abdomens and thinner limbs, to make them more realistic, but required that stand in actors not be used. Instead, they were able to green screen a pole with a tennis ball for a head, so the actors knew where to look and interact, and required less editing to fit. The parts where facial expressions of the robot Sonny were used, a true actor was employed, wearing a green leotard (voice and face acting done by Alan Tudyk). He was then edited out, except for the face, where motion capture was used to emulate the prosthetic face of Sonny. The technique seems more costly both in time and money, but provided quite a realistic and amazing robot onscreen.

The only thing that made me want to stay home from this movie was the pre-release buzz that this film was not originally based on the book of the same name, but was actually a completely different script called Hardwired. When Fox picked up the rights to Asimov’s stories, Hardwired was rewritten as I, Robot, and, apparently, only has a very loose affiliation to the actual book, but I can’t be the judge of that until I actually read the book.

A few substandard acting jobs and reused camera tricks were the movie’s only faults. A scene featuring a showdown between the people of Chicago and robots seemed to have the exact same camera pan set as a similar scene in Lord of the Rings, which took away from the uniqueness of the scene. At least it wasn’t a stolen technique, as WETA Digital, who did the effects for LoTR, had their hand in this movie as well. I’m somewhat surprised that Lucas and ILM had nothing to do with this movie.

Bridget Monynahan played a somewhat campy role as Susan Calvin, robotics expert and psychiatrist. Not quite a normal choice of majors in college, but who knows what those crazy kids will be learning in 2035. Her acting just didn’t click with me. She tried really hard to cry when she was supposed to be crying, and it showed. But she seemed to nail the bitchy attitude when that was necessary, maybe that’s what they were going for, bitchy-brainiac-who-tried-too-hard-to-cry. At least she had a PG-13 shower scene, but, so did Will Smith, if you are into that sort of thing.

All in all, the film wasn’t too bad. Definitely one of the top 5 films of the summer, but that’s not saying as much as I wish it was. As Tom put it, “I came to this movie expecting crap, but I got better than crap.” So we’ll leave it at, “better than crap.”

Regardless of when this review is posted it won’t matter too much, you will already have seen the best movie of the summer. No denying it, no refuting it, Spider-Man 2 is the best movie of the season. We can already look forward to being disappointed come Oscar time when the film won’t even be nominated for Best Picture, best Actor, or, most importantly, Best Director. However, we can stand around the water cooler, join up on message boards, and verbally speak out how seeing the next chapter in the Spidey saga brought hope to an otherwise abysmal summer season. Take my hand, its okay.

I had trouble finding the words after seeing Spider-Man 2. Really, how do you explain emotions you haven’t felt in such a long time towards a movie? When a movie brings everything, every genre together into a tight, clean, awesome package, how do you really explain to someone that they should drop what they are doing, get a ticket, and see such an amazing picture?

Spider-Man 2 picks up nearly two years after the first film’s end. The Green Goblin/Norman Osborne (Willem Dafoe) has been killed by Spider-Man, Harry Osborne (James Franco) despises the hero, Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) has finally made it as an actress, and Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) must now find a way to balance his life as an average, ordinary persona with that of Spider-Man. With the Green Goblin dead, a new villain must step up to the plate and provide a worthy antagonist. This new villain goes by the name Otto Octavius (aka Doc Ock) and is wonderfully acted and presented by Alfred Molina.

Spider-Man is one of those superhero movies where you aren’t cringing at the bad dialog or the horrible acting. Watching Halle Berry as Storm in X2 was one of the most excruciatingly painful things I’ve ever had to do, but every single member of the cast is strongly represented and wonderfully portrayed. Harry Osborne is the brooding, word-obsessed follower of his father, Peter Parker is the sometimes-reluctant hero who struggles to keep his non-Spidey life together after the woes of the city begins to weight down on him, and Doc Ock is the scientist under the duress control of his mechanical arms. Each of these parts is believably acted and each actor knows what they are doing. Even the supporting cast brings everything they have to the table with a notable standout being J.K. Simmons’ J. Jonah Jameson who nearly doubles his screen time and ups the ante on the laughs.

It’s nice to see a film that has something for everyone. The humor is well placed and well scripted, but just as fast as a joke is delivered the film can switch gears into a serious tone with no problem, and nothing lost on the audience. The action sequences, especially the fights between Spidey and Doc Ock, are amazing. The computer effects, drastically improved from the first film, really portray the look and feel of a comic book with highly stylized camera angles and sets. Never before in a comic book movie have the pages of the graphic novel come to life as accurately as in Spider-Man.

For fans of Spider-Man the script includes many shout-outs to the series and opens the door to sequels to come. In order to keep this review spoiler free I won’t dive into them, but familiar names do make an appearance, and if you are a die hard fan of the comic, you will fine plenty to sink your teeth into. Not to be outdone, fans of director Sam Raimi will find a whole sequence harking back to the days of Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness complete with fast zoom shots onto a chainsaw, a camera moving across the ground just as in Evil Dead and even an appearance by the “King” himself, Bruce Campbell. Like I said before, the pleasure that this film brings to any moviegoer will certainly rival anything else produced this year.

If it seems I strayed away from talking about the actual film in this review, you are correct. Like I said in the opening paragraph, nothing I say here will change your mind about seeing the film, and I wouldn’t want it to. Spider-Man 2 is every bit as good as you have heard, and I honestly can’t find anything I didn’t like about it. Comic book fan or not, Sam Raimi fan or not, Spider-Man fan or not, everyone needs to see this film and have the best time at the movies this year. I don’t think there will be many who disagree with me on this one, see it, no matter what.

You couldn’t turn on the news the past couple of weeks without hearing something about filmmaker Michael Moore’s latest documentary. Everyone was talking about it. From Hollywood stars who believe their opinion is worth more than everyone else, to local news stations trying to be “cutting edge” even the lowest of the low in journalism have been rumbling over this little film. As little as it may be in the minds of some, the ideas expressed in the film will have hard hitting repercussions on the upcoming election is left-wing liberals have anything to say about it.

Most movie reviews are nothing more than a Joe Somebody, such as me, spouting off about what I liked and disliked about a film. It’s as simple as that. I have no thoughts of grandeur about my work. There are hundreds upon hundreds of film reviewers online, each with their own taste in films and the judgments that they make upon them. So understand where I am coming from with my personal opinions in this review, because, chances are, if you don’t like what I have to say, there is bound to be someone who agrees with you, you just have to look for it.

Fahrenheit 9/11 is a film with one purpose and one purpose only, to get President George W. Bush out of the White House come November, and for the swing voters who see the film in the next couple of weekends, the desired outcome could very well happen. Fahrenheit explores the events prior, during, and after the attacks of September 11, 2001 and how the United States Government, lead by Dubya, brought our country into war with two Middle East countries and sent thousands of American troops overseas.

Like Moore’s Oscar winning Bowling for Columbine, Fahrenheit 9/11 is factual based opinion piece, and while you may not believe everything that Moore says in the film, you tend to believe some of it with the evidence that he has. Many groups have come against Moore because of the way his information is presented. They believe that most of the information is nothing more than fiction than truth, and without being a first hand witness to these events, it is very hard for the viewer to refute them. Still when you hear facts and figures, such as President Bush being on vacation for a great majority of his first 100 days in office, you tend to wonder if conservatives are afraid of this information getting out, rather than it being false.

Again, like Bowling for Columbine, Moore uses humor to progress his point throughout out the film. His editing techniques can turn even the most heinous subject into a chuckling matter purely because of how quotes are interpreted (or misinterpreted, depending on who you talk to). The first part of the film tries to show the connections between the oil rich Saudis and the Bush family. It also dives into George W. Bush’s background and his penance for driving companies into the ground, as well as his father’s involvement with members of the bin Laden family prior to him taking office. One aspect that Moore seems to shy away from is the 2000 president election, in which Al Gore lost his bid for the White House, and the actual attacks. They are in there, but only a black screen is shown for a good two minutes as audio clips play through the surround sound, creating a very powerful and overwhelming experience that had me close to tears. It isn’t often that such a serious movie, with such a serious topic in the title can both entertain and bring out the most extremes in human emotion.

The film then swiftly ushers us to present day focusing on the troops deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq and the countries reaction to going to war over evidence that has yet to be found. While the politics behind the decision may never be known, the actions taken by this nation are examined in great detail. Moore’s stunt in Fahrenheit is to hit up Senators on the street and persuade them to sign their children up for the armed forces. One of the most startling facts in the film is that only one lawmaker, in either the Senate or House of Representatives, has children who are serving in the armed forces. Moore seemed reluctant to put the bit in the film as it only lasts for less than five minutes and Moore only talks to a handful of lawmakers before the film moves on. 

Moore’s “bashing” of America’s leaders has spawned a new trend in Hollywood in using documentaries as vital weapons for any point anyone is wanting to make. The most high profile weapon is the upcoming Michael More Hates America which should prove interesting viewing.

Fahrenheit 9/11 is a great political weapon and a great film, while it’s standing when compared to Bowling for Columbine is still up in the air for me, the subject matter is hits much more closely to home than gun control. Fahrenheit may face opposition from any number of groups before the November election, but if the film can sway enough swing votes for the democratic party to win by one electoral vote, it would have done its job and there will be a new President in office to face the media, celebrities, and, most importantly, the public. No matter what your beliefs of the issues are, it certainly can’t hurt to see Fahrenheit 9/11, if only to add more material to your argument and throw some leaves on the fire.

In our Summer of Cinema 2004 feature earlier this summer I wrote this about The Chronicles of Riddick, “I hope that Universal doesn’t see this as something to exploit and become controlling over in the wake of the success of Lord of the Rings.” While I wasn’t right in my pre-judgment of the film, I wasn’t exactly wrong either. It seems as though all of the parts that made Pitch Black such an excellent sci-fi horror film have been broadened and broken down in creating a new vehicle to launch a new franchise.

The Chronicles of Riddick picks up six years after the final events in Pitch Black. Escaped convict Richard B. Riddick (Vin Diesel) is once again being hunted by mercenaries for the bounty placed on his head. Riddick manages to escape capture and located the creditor who is offering the reward for his capture. This old friend brings him to New Mecca where Aereon (Dame Judi Dench), an elemental, pleads for Riddick to help her disrupt the reign of the Necromongers, a group of traveling warriors seeking out the Underverse, their promise land. The Necros jump from planet to planet, assimilating the inhabitants and destroying their very existence.

If the film sounds like it doesn’t have much to do with Pitch Black, you are reading correctly. The basic story elements of Riddick are left intact, and the characters that survived the first film are in this one, but newbies to the series, those who haven’t seen the first film, will find Riddick as easily accessible as those who loved the first film. This is where the movie’s major problem lies, Universal built the movie around Riddick this time, and the premise of the character is strong enough to support a trilogy of movies, but the writing in this film is so absurd in some parts that you almost wonder if this was from the same director.

I must give David Twohy credit though; he managed to do what Stephen Somers only dreamed of with Van Helsing, he created a film with amazing architecture, back-story, and sequel elements that will have science fiction fans clamoring for more for the next ten years. Somers could only accommodate 10 minutes of story laced in with his elaborate special effects and “liberties” that turned one of the coolest villains in cinema history into a Kindercare teacher. Twohy established Riddick in the first film, so the trick this time was figuring out a way to craft a story around him so that it would be believable for the character to return and not leave the audience laughing at the absurdity of it. Mind you, this is no laugh-fest like LXG, but you will still be chuckling to yourself at times when the story is suppose to be suspenseful and interesting.

As the story breaks down Riddick realizes that he is one of the only remaining Furions, a race of born warriors who wouldn’t bow to the Necromonger leader Lord Marshal (Colm Feore). After his escape from the Necro Flagship he is transported to a penal colony deep inside a boiling planet where the sun will burn you alive on contact, this proves to hold a bulk of the movie’s main story elements, including Riddick’s reunion with Kyra (Alexa Davalos) who previously went by Jack in Pitch Black. Still, Riddick’s biggest hook is his ability to see in the dark. This ability is drastically underused in the film because it simply isn’t needed. Not being stranded on a planet held in perpetual darkness doesn’t aid itself well to the story. But the screenwriters can’t make up their mind whether Riddick should wear the goggles or not. In Pitch Black we saw him flinch when light was shined in his eye, but in this film he walks through half of the movie without them, and the other half either taking them off or putting them back on.

Those with a keen eye will notice the Shakespearian undertones to one of the movie’s B-storylines which involves Vaako (Karl Urban) and Dame Vaako (Thandie Newton). The constant persistence of the female half of this union prodding her husband to murder his lord and take his rightfully place atop the throne of the Necromongers. For those wondering, read Macbeth.

I still have mixed feelings as to whether I really liked the film or if I was disappointed, and maybe when it comes time to revisit the Summer of Cinema Feature in September I will have different feelings, or maybe a few viewings on DVD will put my mind at ease. As it stands now, The Chronicles of Riddick brings back one of the coolest anti-heroes ever brought to the big screen, but whether the film is a success in the minds of moviegoers and fans remains to be seen.

From a Roland Emmerich film you can expect three things, unrelenting peril, awesome special effects, and laughably bad dialog. With The Day After Tomorrow you get all three of these things, pumped up on steroids, and busting through the closest wall, unfortunately the shock and awe of the special effects aren’t enough to outweigh the implausible story elements.

The Day After Tomorrow enlightens us to the fact that global warming is destroying the planet and from the film’s very first scene we know that this will be constantly brought up, like a bad public service announcement on how not carpooling or methane emissions from cows are destroying our planet. Unfortunately we didn’t need a two hour film to tell us this fact by the shear number of complete a-holes trolling around in SUVs and thinking they are mightier than thou. I digress. Tomorrow shows us the effects of another ice age encapsulating our planet and making life difficult to survive in sub artic temperatures.

Tomorrow focuses on Jack Hall (Dennis Quaid), a paleo-climatologist, who believes that the polar ice caps will melt and will cause tragic events on the weather of the planet. The Vice President doesn’t believe him (how surprising), and his own theories don’t foresee anything happening for another 100 years. But after it begins snowing in tropical regions and tornados tear apart Los Angeles, people finally start thinking he might be right. Like Independence Day before it, Tomorrow features the calm, collected scientist solving a problem with the help form his assists and ultimately saving the world. Jack, however, sets out on a daring journey to the recently flooded and frozen New York City to rescue his son Sam (Jake Gyllenhaal).

The main problems with Tomorrow are the increasingly ludicrous plot points that Emmerich throws at us. Things start out with the “super-storms” that are crossing the globe, freezing everything in their path in a matter of seconds. By far, these storms have to be the lamest antagonists this side of “the website” in feardotcom. Still, as if freezing storms weren’t enough, we also have to deal with a boy who has cancer and can’t be moved without an ambulance, a girl who gets a blood infection, and, most ridiculous point of all, hungry wolves. The story tries to be much more serious than it should, and with the aforementioned wolves and their subsequent attack on the survivors in New York, you know that Emmerich was really stretching to find something to pad the script after the destruction of New York and LA only took 15 minutes of film to accomplish.

The shining moment of the film, and most likely one of the funniest bits in cinema all year (intentional or not) is the newscast about illegal immigration of US citizens to Mexico. While people in any state except Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and California may not laugh, those who have to deal with the situation find it extremely funny.

The Day After Tomorrow isn’t all bad though, if anything it presents some of the most beautiful and jaw-dropping special effects not seen since the conclusion of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The sight of massive tornados ripping apart the greater LA area or a wall of water slamming into New York City will leave you speechless. In fact, if the film was just 90 minutes of natural disasters it might be more entertaining than inane plot point after plot point.

For fans of the director and massive-end-of-the-world films, The Day After Tomorrow may please you enough to hold out for the next big thing. For those of us expecting something to go along with the digital imagery, you will be sorely disappointed in the unintentionally funny story that really stretches the bounds of believability. Scientists may call the movie’s premise bad science, and artists may call the effects beautiful, but as a film summed up to a whole, The Day After Tomorrow is a wall of water that doesn’t leave you very wet at all.