What might have been a one-note family comedy becomes something more thanks to the comic brilliance of co-stars Nathan Lane and Lee Evans, as well as the distinctive, dark-fable look given the film by a little-known director named Gore Verbinksi (could he be the next Tim Burton?). Lane and Evans play idiotic brothers who inherit a house and all but destroy it in pursuit of one small, pesky mouse. The guys are always the butt of the sight gags--most of which are very funny--but their considerable powers as slapstick artists are also at play. The climactic scene at an auction was the funniest scene in any American movie in 1997, the year of Mouse Hunt's release. --Tom Keogh
A delightful undersea world unfolds in Pixar's animated adventure Finding Nemo. When his son Nemo is captured by a scuba diver, a nervous clownfish named Marlin (voiced by Albert Brooks) sets off into the vast--and astonishingly detailed--ocean to find him. Along the way he hooks up with a scatterbrained blue tang fish named Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), who's both a help and a hindrance, sometimes at the same time. Faced with sharks, deep-sea anglers, fields of poisonous jellyfish, sea turtles, pelicans and much more, Marlin rises above his neuroses in this wonderfully funny and thrilling ride--rarely do more than 10 minutes pass without a sequence appearing that's destined to become a theme-park attraction. Pixar continues its run of impeccable artistic and economic successes (Toy Story, A Bug's Life, Monsters, Inc). Supporting voices here include Willem Dafoe, Geoffrey Rush and Allison Janney. --Bret Fetzer
In the steamy jungles of the South Pacific an enormous creature is created by nuclear fallout. Lost for decades the power and the fury of the world's largest monster are about to be unleashed. He's the most spectacular creature in cinematic history with a foot the size of a bus a body as tall as London's Big Ben and strength and agility the likes of which the world has never seen.
As "gigantic monster reptile attacks New York" movies go, you've got to admit that Godzilla delivers the goods, although its critical drubbing and box-office disappointment were arguably deserved. It's a shameless, uninspired crowd-pleaser that's content to serve up familiar action with the advantage of really fantastic special effects, and if you expect nothing more you'll be one among millions of satisfied customers. There's really no other way to approach it--you just have to accept the fact that Independence Day creators Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin are unapologetic plagiarists, incapable of anything more than mindless spectacle that can play in any cinema in the world without dubbing or subtitles. The whole movie plays out like a series of highlights stolen from previous blockbusters of the 1990s; it's little more than a rehash of the Jurassic Park movies. The derivative script is so trivial that it's unworthy of comment, apart from a few choice laughs and the casting of Michael Lerner as New York's mayor, whose name is Ebert and who closely resembles a certain well-known movie critic. Perhaps that's a clever hint that this movie's essentially critic-proof. It's stupid but it's fun, and for most audiences that's a fitting definition of mainstream Hollywood entertainment. --Jeff Shannon
Nick Falzone (John Cusack) is a control freak. An air traffic control freak.
Alpha And Omega: What makes for the ultimate road trip? Hitchhiking, truck stops, angry bears, prickly porcupines and a golfing goose with a duck caddy. Just ask Kate and Humphrey, two wolves who are trying to get home after being taken by park rangers and shipped halfway across the country. Humphrey is an Omega wolf, whose days are about quick wit, snappy one-liners and hanging with his motley crew of fun-loving wolves and video-gaming squirrels. Kate is an Alpha: duty, disc...
Alpha And Omega: What makes for the ultimate road trip? Hitchhiking, truck stops, angry bears, prickly porcupines and a golfing goose with a duck caddy. Just ask Kate and Humphrey, two wolves who are trying to get home after being taken by park rangers and shipped halfway across the country. Humphrey is an Omega wolf, whose days are about quick wit, snappy one-liners and hanging with his motley crew of fun-loving wolves and video-gaming squirrels. Kate is an Alpha: duty, disc...
In the steamy jungles of the South Pacific an enormous creature is created by nuclear fallout. Lost for decades the power and the fury of the world's largest monster are about to be unleashed. He's the most spectacular creature in cinematic history with a foot the size of a bus a body as tall as London's Big Ben and strength and agility the likes of which the world has never seen...
What makes for the ultimate road trip? Hitchhiking, truck stops, angry bears, prickly porcupines and a golfing goose with a duck caddy. Just ask Kate and Humphrey, two wolves who are trying to get home.
With a title like Chopper Chicks in Zombietown, you'd be excused from any great expectations here--but you'd also be missing out on one of trash-cinema's great pleasures: catching one of Hollywoood's A-list in their pre-fame days. In this case, the catch is Billy Bob Thornton, in a brief appearance as one of the Chopper Chicks' ex-husbands. It may be a guilty pleasure, but seeing this good 'ol boy playing dumb-as-a-doorknob long before Sling Blade (or A Simple Plan) and paying his dues is still, however strangely, gratifying. As for the film itself, Chopper Chicks is no Hell Comes to Frogtown, but it comes with all of the Troma hallmarks. The requisite beheadings and low-grade effects are all present and correct, along with the so-bad-it's-really-bad dialogue (except for the occasional so-bad-it's-good one-liner). The acting is wooden, the story negligible (cycle sluts come to town, kill zombies, save a schoolbus full of blind kids), and even the appearances by Thornton and original MTV (US) VJ Martha Quinn provide only occasional relief. The DVD extras include a photo gallery of screen-stills and the original trailer. --Randy Silver
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