Reviews

No live-action movie has ever captured the anarchic feel of the rubbery Max Fleischer cartoons of the 1930s better than "Forbidden Zone." It's an LSD-fueled Betty Boop picture mixed with "Alice in Wonderland" and "The Inferno," all filtered through David Lynch's kaleidoscope (or run through R. Crumb's Cuisinart).

The story, such as it is, deals with the adventures of Frenchy Hercules, who lives over a doorway to the "Sixth Dimension," which is ruled by King Fausto (Herve Villechaize) and Queen Doris (Susan Tyrrell) with sadomasochistic glee. The whole flick really fits the Betty Boop formula perfectly--a shapely heroine (who loves to rumba) falls from her own bizarre "reality" into an even stranger one. Much mayhem and cool swing music ensue, as Frenchy's brother and grandfather (playing the roles of Bimbo and Koko the Clown from the old Fleischer cartoons) try to rescue the unfortunate girl.

This strange mix of animation and live action really has to be seen to be believed--all very low budget and very imaginative (a quality sorely lacking in movies lately). Fans of Oingo Boingo won't want to miss this one (especially group leader Danny Elfman's Cab Calloway-like turn as Satan in the flick's best scene). There are racial and ethnic stereotypes galore, but since this movie seems to exist in an entirely different universe, it doesn't come across as offensive.

Not for everyone--but a "can't miss" for some. Worth seeing just for the musical numbers alone.

"Sahara" so strained my credulity that I feared it would snap and give me whiplash. The strain started with the name of the hero: Dirk Pitt. Now there's a manly name. I found myself coming up with even more outrageous names, ala "Mystery Science Theater." How about "Rock Hardin"? "Harry McChest"? "Punch Meatslab"? "Buck Bronzeback"? "Dick Steele" was already taken.

The plot is basically part Steve Sommers's "The Mummy," mixed with a touch of Indiana Jones and a pinch of James Bond. Dirk and his sidekick Al (why not a better sidekick name, like "Buzz" or "Fuzzy"?) are on a quest to find a lost Confederate ironclad battleship, which managed to make its way across the Atlantic and up an African river, only to be buried in the treacherous sands of the Sahara. Never mind that you don't have to be a ship designer to know that such a vessel would have less chance of making it across the Atlantic than a rubber ducky. Never mind that this fact is pointed out to Dirk more than once by other characters. You're just supposed to go with it.

Such movies need to have a sense of giddy fun about them, like Sommers's "Mummy." Much of the fun is stripped out with a parallel quest involving Penelope Cruz as a World Health Organization doctor trying to track down the source of a contagion that's spreading from the country of Mali and into Nigeria. I don't know about you, but juxtaposing the story of two treasure-hunting frat boys with that of a doctor trying to stop the spread of a contagion that threatens the lives of thousands of people kind of bled some of the fun away for me.

There's also a warlord so mean that he, well, "put the 'war' back in 'warlord.'" (I wonder where the war went?) He's hell bent on covering up the contagion, taking bribes from a big corporation that's using his country as a toxic waste dump (the source of the contagion, which is conveniently located near the buried battleship), and fighting a group of ragtag warlord wannabes. Oh, and this contagion, if it reaches the ocean, will cause a worldwide environmental disaster. With me so far?

Dirk and Al cheerfully wisecrack their way across Mali as they blow up their boss's speedboat, bounce along on camels, dodge bullets, save the doc, and wreak havoc at a high-tech installation that would be right at home in a James Bond flick. Clues drop in their laps like manna from heaven. My favorite is a cave painting that tells them everything they need to know. With hints like these, the Three Stooges could find this battleship. (In fact, this would've been a great vehicle for Moe, Larry, and Curly.)

"Indian burial ground": If those three words appear anywhere in a real-estate listing, look for a different neighborhood. A young couple with a young daughter and a toddler-age son move into a Maine house adjacent to a pet cemetery--and, after a l-o-o-o-ng hike, an ancient Indian burial ground. Seems the Indian ground can bring Fido or Fluffy back from the dead--if you don't mind having a raving hell beast for a pet. It can do the same for dead people--if you don't mind having a homicidal zombie around the house.

Throw in a busy two-lane blacktop, speeding big rigs, a well-meaning (if somewhat dim) old neighbor, and one kid who really doesn't get enough supervision, and I think you can figure out what happens from there--an over-the-top, illogical mess, which, in all fairness, does offer up a few scares.

Well, there are worse Stephen King adaptations (such as "Maximum Overdrive," which King also directed). But there are far better ones, too (such as "Salem's Lot," "The Dead Zone," and both versions of "The Shining").

Before Peter Jackson became a "respected" director with "Heavenly Creatures," and an Oscar winner for "Lord of the Rings," he made slapstick gore flicks. He was New Zealand's answer to Sam Raimi (who also went on to better things).

"Dead Alive" is New Zealand's "Evil Dead"--all it lacks is Bruce Campbell (and there is one character, a butt-kicking priest, who bears more than a passing resemblance to the big-chinned Bruce). The plot is essentially this: A "rat monkey" bites the bitter old Mum of a milquetoast named Lionel. Mum becomes an undead ghoul who feasts on human flesh. Her bite turns other people into ghouls, etc. (I think you can fill in the rest.) Will Lionel stand up to his Mum and save his girlfriend from almost certain ghouldom? Rent the flick and find out.

This is a fairly entertaining movie if you're in a particular frame of mind--think "The Three Stooges Meet the Living Dead"--but, boy, are Jackson's influences showing. The look of the ghouls, not to mention the plot of the movie, recalls Raimi's "Evil Dead" pictures. One character, Lionel's sleazy uncle, even refers to "total bodily dismemberment" as the only way to kill ghouls (this is a direct quote from "Evil Dead"--the uncle even acknowledges that he heard this in a movie). The ghoul attacks recall George Romero's "Living Dead" flicks; even the idea of a disease that causes its victims to become homicidal maniacs is derived from Romero's "The Crazies."

Yes, Jackson's antecedents are definitely showing, but he does ratchet up the gore. In "Evil Dead II," Bruce Campbell straps a chainsaw onto the stub of his wrist to slice up ghouls; in "Dead Alive," Lionel straps a lawnmower to his chest and purees the monsters (simple dismemberment isn't quite enough). But, as derivative as it is, slapstick gore fans will probably enjoy "Dead Alive," even though Raimi's movies are funnier (and he has Bruce Campbell).

One wonders why an animator with a wise-cracking, New York sensibility like Ralph Bakshi wanted to tackle Tolkien. After all, Bakshi gave us such gritty, urban comedy dramas as "Heavy Traffic" and "Coonskin." Even "Wizards," his warm up to "Lord of the Rings," squeezed in plenty of bawdy "New Yawk" types, including a cigar-chomping wizard and goblin warriors who sounded like they were straight out of Brooklyn. Perhaps he wanted to stretch himself by tackling a book that most other film-makers (including, supposedly, Walt Disney) deemed "unfilmable." Or maybe he just thought that making "Rings" would be like printing money--all the Tolkien geeks would see it three or four times, right? What ever Bakshi's reasons, the result was a wildly uneven, sometimes interesting movie.

Take Bakshi's use of rotoscoping (tracing characters from a live-action film). He mixes rotoscoped characters rather liberally with fully animated characters. Sometimes, it's effective--for example, when Frodo puts on the ring of power and enters the world of the Black Riders and their master, Sauron. The rotoscoped Riders do, indeed, look ghostly--as though they're from another dimension--and the effect is quite creepy. (Peter Jackson picked up on this in his version of "Rings.") But when Baskhi rotoscopes a large crowd, as in a tavern scene, it looks like a cheap way to, well, animate a large crowd, or an out take from "Yellow Submarine," and the movie suffers. The battle scenes are especially bad. The massive orc army in the climatic battle at Helms Deep, with its ape-like figures in what seem to be bearskins and hobo masks, looks like something Terry Gillam whipped up for an episode of "Monty Python."

The character design is erratic, too. Gandalf the Gray looks about right, but the old wizard, with his pointed hat and staff, is a fairly easy figure to visualize. Aragorn, the tortured king without a throne, is captured well as a scruffy, yet regal ranger. The hobbits all, unfortunately, look alike, except for Frodo's good friend Sam (he resembles Buddy Hackett, while the others look like Bobby Sherman). The tragic Boromir looks like the mascot of the Minnesota Vikings, and the elves would fit in well on "Star Trek" as Vulcans. Gimli, the dwarf, in his overalls and slouched hat, seems to be in search of Snow White (perhaps this is a sly wink at Disney).

The design of the orcs is laughable, but that may have been the idea--they are a bunch of bumbling idiots, for the most part. They look like Fred Flintstone with tusks and horned hats. Barney Rubble could take these guys.

If Bakshi had been a bit more restrained with his rotoscoping by using it only for the evil characters while fully animating the good characters, this would've been a much better movie. The voice work is good (although the hobbits come off as a bit fey), and the screenplay is a reasonably decent adaptation of Tolkien's complex novel (well, half of it, at least). Bakshi fans will want to check it out. Tolkien fans will want to stay away.

Willy Wonka is not a nice man. Yet, somehow, you can't help but like him, at least as he's played by Gene Wilder in "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," the semi-psychedelic, and "psychotronic," 1971 version of Roald Dahl's classic children's novel. Wonka is aloof, sardonic, sarcastic, mysterious, manipulative, and devious--a leprechaun with a hyperactive thyroid and an edge. But, as Wilder plays him, you sense the sweetness behind the wild gleam in his eyes; he's really hoping that one of the five children he's invited to tour his chocolate factory will be a worthy heir to the world of his imagination.

Yes, Wonka is a cynic and a misanthrope. (What else could he be after sequestering himself in his own little world for years on end?) But he wants to believe that there is still some good to be found in a "weary world." Wilder captures Dahl's creation perfectly.

The rest of the cast is perfect, too, and they make the most of Dahl's often witty script. Peter Ostrom, in particular, is excellent as Charlie.

Yet, this minor classic of a movie has its flaws. The production design suffers from a lack of budget. Wonka's "Chocolate Room" looks like an elaborate mini-golf course, with a dirty river running through it, in a brick warehouse. The "Inventing Room" is meant to be a whimsical, magical laboratory, but comes off more like an especially elaborate hideout for the Joker on the old "Batman" TV series. The songs range from reasonably good (Veruca Salt's ode to brattiness "I Want the Whole World") to saccharine ("The Candy Man") to downright wretched (the Oompa-Loompa oeuvre entire, with lousy choreography to match). Wilder's rendition of "Pure Imgaination," an overly sugary confection that could induce diabetic comas in the wrong hands, works thanks to the faraway look in his eyes; he makes it magical. The make up and costumes of the Oompa-Loompas (Wonka's workers), on the other hand, are simply embarrassing.

Yet despite these flaws, "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" is hugely entertaining and probably the best family film of the 1970s. Think of it this way: "Willy Wonka" is to Burton's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" as the "Batman" TV series (from the 1960s) is to Burton's "Batman." Both are different, entirely valid takes on the same source material. Both are worth watching.

Yes, slobbering. That's what you'll be doing at the back of the theater, your head slumped, your tongue hanging out, as you watch this week's Marvel-comic-book movie, "Fantastic Four." FF was my favorite comic book back when I was a wee lad. These were Stan Lee's original superheroes with "feet of clay" (even before Spider-man). But the real heart of the comic was the Thing (Ben Grimm)--the big, tough wise guy with the big broken heart. And he is the one thing the movie got right--Michael Chiklis (and the impressive make up) capture the Thing perfectly.

Unfortunately there are three other team members, who need to be "developed": Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic), Sue Storm (the Invisible Girl, er, Woman), and Johnny Storm (the Human Torch). Ah, for the old comic-book origin story, where the four are shot up into space, are exposed to "cosmic rays," crash back to earth, and immediately start manifesting their super powers. Before you know it, they're fighting the Mole Man (and sometimes each other).

If only the movie had used such shorthand. Instead, well over half the flick is "family" bickering as the Four discover their abilities--and the origin of Dr. Doom (their greatest enemy) is outlined.

Doom is the movie's most serious misstep. In the comic books, Doom was a scientist who falls from the "pure faith" (yes, "he tampered in God's domain," to lift a bit from Ed Wood's "Bride of the Monster"). He had a regalness and grandeur about him, even as he tried to destroy the FF and take over the world (the perfect opposite of Reed). In the movie, Doom is another tiresome industrialist who (ala Norman "Green Goblin" Osborn) obtains super powers. His showdown with the FF at the end is somewhat less than epic (and the climax rips off a bit of "Terminator 2").

The whole movie feels as though they shot a first-draft script (characters fairly trip over the loose ends, and Reed is about as much of a super genius as Wile E. Coyote). But there is the occasional chuckle, usually thanks to Bashful Benjy Grimm.

Or an episode of "Night Gallery," with some swearing. Yes, "Ghosts of Edendale" plays like an extended episode of Rod Serling's last TV series, mixed with a bit of "The Shining," Clive Barker's "Coldwater Canyon," and David Lynch's "Mulholland Drive." Call it "omlette Du homage," I guess.

Actually, this is a fairly standard "Hollywood" story tarted up as a horror flick. It's not the ghosts that are scary (Wha? The head ghoul is Tim Mix?), but the fear of not being one--that is, of being excluded from the "right" parties and the "right" neighborhood. And exclusion is horror in Hollywood.

This low-budget flick manages to achieve a shock or two, but shooting on videotape hurts. It's tough to create the foreboding atmosphere a good horror movie needs on videotape without resorting to photographic effects that make it look like a "Dr. Who" episode from the 1970s. The pace is set a bit too slow--too many shots of people giving meaningful looks at things or people--and too much reliance on ghost-story clichés (for example, faces appearing in woodwork and creepy, whispering children's voices).

"Farts of Darkness" is, in some ways, more entertaining than the movie it documents ("Terror Firmer"). It's like walking into the pages of Director Lloyd Kaufman's book "All I Need to Know About Film-making I Learned from the Toxic Avenger" (more so than "Terror Firmer," which was inspired by the same book).

Here you see Troma at its best and worst--for example, making a rooftop into a "street" to get around a lack of a permit to film a scene on the ground, or showing an actor actually vomiting into a toilet after doing multiple retakes of a scene where he's forced to eat fake feces (which look disturbingly realistic). This same actor is later forced to run around Times Square buck naked, all for the sake of film.

It's a funny, disturbing, essential, disgusting look at low-budget movie making, and it's especially entertaining after reading Kaufman's book.

A friend of mine used to play a fiendish little parlor game, which went something like this: "Three men have machine guns trained on your parents. They will kill them unless you cut off your left foot with a chainsaw. Do this, and they will not only spare your lives, but also give you one million dollars. Would you do it?" This is the premise of Saw, another in a long line of movies about cunning psychos who have unlimited time and resources. In this entry, the fiendish "Jigsaw" places people in seemingly hopeless situations, just to see what they would do to live a little longer—and to make them appreciate living a little more. For example, a would-be suicide, who had once tried slitting his wrists, is forced to crawl naked through a lethal maze of razor wire. A young female drug addict is forced to cut into a man's stomach to pull out the key to a nasty bear-trap-like device strapped to her head, according to directions given her on video by a talking clown dummy on a tricycle.

Yes, Jigsaw is quite the tinkerer. He's Rube Goldberg channeling the Marquis de Sade after watching a fistful of Dario Argento and David Fincher movies. Yet he really just wants to help people. He's the Dr. Phil of psychos.

But the focus of the movie is two men—a sleazy photographer and a doctor—chained to pipes at opposite ends of what appears to be Hell's men's room. A corpse lies between them in a pool of blood, a gun in one hand and a cassette tape player in the other. Seems that Jigsaw will kill the doc's estranged wife and daughter, unless the doc kills the photographer. You're in for over a 100 minutes of head games, screaming, whimpering, whiplash editing, and enough nihilistic techno music to make Ozzy Osborne's head explode.

Yes, it's every bit as entertaining as it sounds. Your interpretation of the previous sentence will reveal just what kind of a movie fan you are.

I won't reveal much more, but note that these poor guys each have a hacksaw, not for cutting through their chains, but through their ankles. That's it, really—the whole movie is about waiting to see some guy saw through his ankle. Oh, and there is the identity of Jigsaw, but when the revelation comes, you won't feel that you've been misdirected by a master storyteller as much as you've been rooked by a carnie.

Do yourself a favor. If you really want to see a flick about a psycho who outsmarts everyone in sight, rent The Abominable Dr. Phibes and let Vincent Price show you how it's done.

It was the grimiest grind house in town. Yeah. The Carmike. Williamsburg, Vee Ay. My town. What can you say about a place whose best day was 1764? Guess it was all downhill after Washington and his French buddies gave Fat George and his boys the bum's rush.

I shuffle up to the box office. Cash only. Figures. Only jack talks in this town. The goateed guy behind the window doesn't even look at me. Just at my sawbuck. Guess he'd rather be at a comic book store.

The floor's so sticky that I have pry up my Doctor Dentons with my shiv just to take a step. The first seat I try folds like a bad poker hand, and I barely keep my keister out of a pile of melted goo on the floor. The place stinks. I haven't smelled this much coconut oil since I passed out on Virginia Beach after a three-day Sterno binge. Seems like the right place to see Sin City.

Yeah. Sin City. If a movie had a smell, this one would reek of cigarettes, cheap hooch, and even cheaper sex. Looks like the kind of town where the main cause of death is lead poisoning contracted during a smoke in a filthy toilet stall.

But, at the get go, it's all about love. Boy meets girl. Boy kisses girl. Boy whacks girl with his big 44 mag. Love sure makes people do funny things.

Bruce Willis shows up as Hartigan, the only honest cop in Sin City. Smart move when your acting career is in the tank. Go back to the old Pulp Fiction well. Too bad he has a bum ticker. He shoots the equipment off some creep who's favorite song is "Thank Heaven for Little Girls." He saves a little girl, but the creep has low friends in high places.

Mickey Rourke shows up next as Marv, a big gorilla who looks like the Frankenstein monster after he's finished a hitch in the Marines. A beautiful hooker named Goldie gives him a night of sweaty bliss. Too bad she wakes up dead in the morning. Poor dope. Looks like he's being framed. What did he expect in Sin City? Marv "kills his way to the top" to find out who's framing him. But he didn't figure on getting his butt kicked by Frodo Baggins. Yep, Elijah Wood with the kung-fu grip takes big Marv down. It's like watching the Lollipop Guild wail on Sergeant Rock. But Marv don't stay down long.

The next story is another heart warmer—a killer, a bad cop, some Irish mercs, and an army of hookers. You'd swear this was a Disney flick--maybe "Herbie Goes to the Tenderloin" or "Pollyanna's Big Score." Clive Owen is Dwight, a "killer with a new face" who's after Benicio del Toro, a bad cop whose been slapping around Dwight's new girl. Dwight chases the flatfoot into Old Town, which is the territory of the Fighting Hookers of the 101st Prophylactic. Seems that the hookers have a deal with the cops and the mob that gives them Old Town. Seems that they didn't know del Toro was a cop. Seems that this kung-fu hooker killed the copper by plugging his gat so it backfires (never let this happen to you). Seems this breaks the truce and gives the mob a chance to retake Old Town. Seems it's up to Dwight and his old hooker girlfriend (Rosario Dawson) to keep this from happening. Seems like nothing is ever like it seems.

Remember Hartigan? Well, he's been framed, too, by the creep's old man, who happens to be a senator (Powers Booth). Tough break. Hartigan gets out of the joint after eight years, but he's a tool for finding the little girl he saved at the beginning. She's found a fulfilling career as dancer with a rope act at this dive where Marv hangs out. I never meet classy broads like that. Anyway, Hartigan has to save her from this yellow-skinned creep who who looks like he was on the losing side of the War of the Rings. No prizes for guessing who he is. Seems that the creep's old man found some drugs that grew back what Hartigan shot off, but with some nasty side effects. Never use that stuff they hawk on the Internet.

But remember, all this is in the name of love. Sweaty, grimy, blood-soaked l-o-v-e.

I shambled out of the theater, my feet crunching on half-eaten Lemonheads and sticking to stinking puddles of Cherry Coke syrup. So, what about this Sin City? Definitely looks cool, but I doubt that Suzie Sunshine and Larry Lawnmower in Suburbia are gonna take to it. Not too multiplex friendly, this flick. But I bet they sneak it out of video stores in plain brown wrappers.

As much as I like "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," this was a film crying out to be remade. It was a minor classic thanks to the performances of not only Gene Wilder (still the definitive Wonka, I think), but also the rest of the cast (especially Peter Ostrom)--as well as its often witty script. But it was dragged down by depressing production design (which resembled a mini-golf course built in an old waterfront warehouse), those Bricuisse-Newley songs (stop the movie I want to get off), and the hideous Oompa-Loompas (purple-faced, orange-haired freaks in genie shoes).

Burton's remake gives Dahl's classic story the production values it deserves--and ratchets up the creepiness. Johnny Depp's Wonka is a ten-year-old, and a rather anti-social one at that, in a adult's body--a freak with Carol Channing's hair and smile, Jack Skellington's physique, and Oscar Wilde's wardrobe. Depp does an excellent job, but he doesn't make the character quite likable enough (Wilder's Wonka was mercurial yet affable); still, he fits Burton's vision of Wonka's world. (I've often thought that Depp would be the only actor other than Wilder who could play this role.)

Danny Elfman does excellent work on the score. The various Oompa-Loompa songs (Dahl's words set to different musical styles, such as 1980s "hair metal") are great numbers that "doop-a-dee-doop-a-dee" beat the original movie's rather sugary tunes.

Best movie of the summer so far.

On one hand, the folks of Troma are true independent filmmakers, striking a blow for the First Amendment with every movie they make. On the other hand, they make movies with jiggling breasts, tons of sex, severed body parts, and crushed melons for brains. Troma fills the void left behind by John Waters when he went semi-respectable.

"Terror Firmer" is the low-budget maverick's grandest statement for freedom of expression--its biggest blow against the empire. The flick is "Babes on Broadway" crossed with "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls," with a touch of "Pink Flamingos" for good measure. The plot, such as it is, involves Troma trying to finish the latest entry in its "Toxic Avenger" series while dealing with the ultimate critic--a serial killer bent on shutting the production down.

I'll say one thing for "Terror Firmer"--it's funnier than Waters's "Cecil B. Demented" and much more repulsive. I can't recommend the movie entirely (although I never found it boring), but Lloyd Kaufman's (the director's) book "All I Need to Know About Film-making I Learned from the Toxic Avenger" is a hoot and worth reading.

I admire Troma's spirit, if not necessarily their movies. We need these guys now more than ever.

Global disaster--now that's entertainment. Even if you haven't seen a disaster flick since the heyday of Irwin Allen, you know the plot of "The Day After Tomorrow"--global catastrophe brings cardboard-cutout people closer together and doth make the box office's heart grow fonder.

Yes, things do, indeed, get destroyed real good in this movie, but does it truly take us "Beyond the Poseidon Adventure"? Will it create a "Swarm" of business at the box office, or will it go up like a "Towering Inferno," or plunge to the depths on a "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" (which was a disaster flick before it became a cheesy sci-fi TV series)? Will I keep working in titles of other Irwin Allen movies until "The Day Time End[s]"? (Well, "Ended," actually.)

At least Irwin wouldn't have given us cartoon wolves--a guy in a rubber snow monster suit draped in seaweed, maybe, but not cartoon wolves. And why does the world have to end "The Day After Tomorrow"? "A Week from Wednesday" would work better for me.

But those people haven't sat through this movie. I thought that "Hillbillies in a Haunted House" was the nadir of low-budget movies, but I'll be damned if Hollywood didn't dig itself a deeper hole with "Nasty Rabbit."

The plot is a bunch of idiocy (especially sad because it's supposed to be funny) involving a Soviet plot to infect the U.S. with a deadly plague via an infected rabbit. Of course, spies from many countries are involved, and every ethnic group (from both hemispheres) is demeaned and insulted. After about five minutes of this, you'll find yourself begging for Arch Hall, Jr., to stop and warble a few tunes.

By the end, if you make it that far, you'll be hoping that the rabbit completes its mission.

Well, after watching Arch Hall, Jr., play what were supposed to be cute, likable heroes in "Eegah!" and "The Nasty Rabbit," but finding him to be creepy and unlikeable, instead, I decided to catch Junior's turn as a giggling psychopath.

And you know what? It works for him. Hall's over-the-top, Jimmy Cagney-like performance in "The Sadist" is nearly perfect playing off the rather square actors who play his victims.

I won't completely spoil the plot, but I will say that Freud would have a field day with this one--what else can you say about a flick that involves a psycho who forces a shirtless man to change a fuel pump at gunpoint? Sit around with your friends one night and psychoanalyze "The Sadist."

Shrek 2 follows the old Joe Bob Briggs maxim of movies sequels: just make the same darn movie again. Yes, all the issues, plot points, and gags of the original Shrek are here--acceptance of people (or, in this case, ogres) even though they're different from you; good-looking people looking down on what they perceive to be ugly; Shrek having to rescue Fiona from a marriage-related event and becoming more "human"; Shrek constantly telling Donkey to to shut up; flatulence jokes; and, of course, Disney bashing (such as easy target these days). This makes for a pretty slow-moving story, at least compared to the original. There are some amusing moments (mostly from Antonio Banderas's Puss-in-Boots), but as a whole, the movie seems a bit tired; your average episode of The Simpsons has more laughs.

Dreamworks Animation has to move beyond Disney-and-fairy-tale bashing. They hit the bullseye so often in the first Shrek, that there's little left to hit (especially now that Disney is getting into the act, too).