reviews - books, movies, tv series

Howard the Duck is one of my favorite childhood movies from the 80s. Basically, it's about a duck alien who comes from a dimension where everyone's a duck. He gets sucked into some sort of interdimensional space warp and ends up in our world. Pretty fun, and most of the movie is how he's trying to get back, but makes lots of friends while in our world.

Trying to figure out which tissue paper is the best for you?

I was ecstatic when I found out MGM had finally decided to release the Cannon series of fairy tales on DVD. For those not in the know, these are musical children's tales, and VERY sweet!

Going back to school! Taking a class about American history. Hope it's good.

Lynne Graham's latest book is the last in a three-book series on 3 friends whose parents died in a car crash. The friendship part is very loose (not a central part of the series). That's a major relief after her last trilogy attempt, about 3 separated sisters (same mother, different fathers) who were given up for adoption.

In this book, the last one, Hilary was 19 when she first met Roel Sabatino, a wealthy Swiss banker. They made a marriage of convenience to fulfil the terms of his grandfather's will, but had not seen each other for 4 years, ever since the wedding. Roel gets hurt in a car accident, and his aunt finds an old photo of Hilary, signed "From your wife" in Roel's wallet, so she decides to call Hilary and have her look after Roel (the aunt being too busy with her own vacation plans, and not seriously worried about Roel's injury). Hilary, having harbored a secret crush on Roel ever since they first met, rushes over, only to find that Roel has lost his memory. So she decides to play along, hoping to create a few memories with Roel before he remembers everything and sends her away again...

I have a new author to worship - get chick lit meets serious dead old dudes. I've read the first few pages of Jasper Fforde's "The Eyre Affair". In Fforde's world, Britain is politically separated -- no United Kingdom, just the Republics/Kingdoms of Ireland, Scotland, England, and Wales. Literature is the cool thing to do -- it's pop culture, and has cult status. You tour dead famous authors' houses like we would the White House. People buy knockoff first editions of famous prose on the street, then complain when they find out it's fake. There's a special police corps especially to police literature. Time is fluid. This is a COOL world! If you liked J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter schoolbooks, you'll find the turn of phrase and wit refreshingly familiar. For the literary fanatic, you'll get all the inside jokes. For the literarily unversed, get a crash course in Great Works.

Plot Details: This opinion reveals everything about the movie''s plot.

The trailer was actually better than the movie -- it captured the funnest parts, but the movie itself wasn't too bad. It was a nice B-grade preteen chick flick.

Premise: Julie invites 3 other girls over to her house for a sleepover after their junior high graduation: her best friend Hannah, who's moving away, and 2 other girls. Stacie, an ex-friend (from elementary school), who is in the popular crowd, challenges Julie and her friends to a scavenger hunt -- including, among various things, a guy's underwear (who Julie has a crush on). The winners get to eat their high school lunches by a coveted fountain. The losers have to eat by the dumpsters. Complicating matters is that Julie's parents have said they can't go out, so Julie enlists her brother to cover for them while they go on the hunt. The movie ends with a typical happy ending -- they win the scavenger hunt and 2 of the girls (Julie and another girl, who's shy and overweight) get their guy.

It's not very realistic in that you can't really expect the popular girls to keep their word. The dumpster spot is a VERY nasty place (smelly, gummy, etc). And there are no witnesses.

But I still thought it was okay; Probably the best line in the movie is Hannah telling Julie: "We're not talking about a lunch spot, we're talking about who you're gonna be." And Julie's crush was not a bad looking guy.

Recommended Yes

Even if I hadn't already known, I would have guessed by watching this movie that either the director or screenwriter, or both, had been heavily involved with Independence Day (the movie where Will Smith smacks some alien butt --- wait, there are two of those -- it's the one that happens on the 4th of July).

Premise:
It's ok for people who were really into Independence Day, and the weather was kind of cool. It had a LOT of holes :

Dennis Quaid, who plays the father, treks to New York from halfway between Washington DC and NYC? In snowshoes, and what is supposedly WAY sub-zero temperatures? Excusez moi?

His courageous doctor-wife who stays behind for a sick kid who can't be moved until the emergency services come (if they come at all). Heartwarming, but not if it seems pointless. There just doesn't seem to be a benefit in her staying. The kid's asleep and it's not as if they would normally have a 24-7 bedside watcher.

The superfast rate of freezing (within seconds)

The open chimney in the library -- the librarian said it hadn't been used for years, so the flume should have been shut off a long time ago, otherwise they would've had major dirt and wet problems whenever it rained or snow melted.

Jake Gyllenhal, who plays the kid, seems pretty blah here. And his budding romance with his teammate is not very electric.

What I liked: The vice-president; everyone says he's probably modeled on Dick Cheney, the real-life American VP, but he actually seems like a normal guy who realizes and admits when he's right (true, it took the entire U.S. getting frozen over to do this, but come on, would YOU believe a crazy meteorologist who says we're going to be in a new ice age in a few weeks?)

Recommended: Yes