NEW RELEASES
WALL-E - "Wall-E" gets an "E" for energy, and for entertaining, at times, and for erratic. From the spectacular creative team at Pixar, that enclave of inventiveness in Emeryville that turns out memorable animation pictures from "Monster's, Inc." to "Finding Nemo," "Toy Story to "Ratatouille," "Wall-E" has too many moments that'll drive you up, well, the wall. Wall-E, which stands for Water Allocation Load Lifter, Earth Class, is the lone survivor (except for his cockroach pal) of an Earth that has been overrun by trash and pollution. It's 2077, and the remaining humans have been evacuated to a first-class spaceship where they're all obese, nestled in lounge chairs and having robots do everything for them. One can't fault Pixar for taking a risk. But "Wall-E" smacks of creative people in a room playing with toys (and a $180 million budget, according to reports), trying too hard, thinking too much. You admire the work, the edgy animation, the chutzpah, but there's only so much heart you can get into a mechanical contraption. "Wall-E." Running time: 1 hour, 37 minutes. Rated: G. 2 1/2 stars.
RECENT RELEASES
THE LOVE GURU - Mike Myers is a seeker of sequels: He went around the "Wayne's World" twice, then milked the day-glo "Austin Powers" cow to the point of emaciation. It's a safe bet many will like "The Love Guru." Sure, it's a lot like "Austin Powers 4," but the stale formula has been spiced up with tandoori. Making fun of Indians has been taboo since Peter Sellers' role in 1968's "The Party," but Myers sidesteps offense by playing an American who has fashioned himself as an Eastern spiritual mentor to get women. Myers' character, Guru Pitka, is sexually insecure. Though second only to Deepak Chopra as a giver of advice, a hidden chastity belt keeps him love-starved and juvenile. Pitka is like SNL's self-helping Stuart Smalley stewed in the curry of Gallagher-style wordplay. He explains that "intimacy" means "into me I see," "nowhere" means "now here," and "guru" is a sort of acronym for "gee, you are you." Myers, who wrote the script with Graham Gordy, excels at silly one-liners, and metes them out like a steady mantra. Much like transcendental meditation, "The Love Guru" works much better if you empty your mind. "The Love Guru." Running time: 1 hour, 22 minutes. Rated: PG-13. 2 1/2 stars.
GET SMART - "Get Smart" is a taut, laugh-filled homage to a beloved TV show of the '60s that may not have translated to contemporary times but for the splendid chemistry of its stars, Steve Carell and Anne Hathaway. Purists who adored the old series featuring manic Don Adams as field agent Maxwell Smart and Barbara Feldon as his partner, Agent 99, of the spy agency CONTROL, may take shots at this amusing picture, but who's going to listen, and who cares? Amid the humor (puns fly this way and that), the film has real, James Bond-like excitement. Carell handles it with natural, everyman charm. Golden moment: his boxer versus briefs exchange with Hathaway. For those who know the TV show, it was engorged with gadgets from the shoe phone (quaint in this time of everyone-has-a-cell phone) to the Cone of Silence, which, in "Get Smart," becomes an animated, digitally enhanced, raucous set piece. The new, futuristic weapons include explosive dental floss, cuff-link bombs and a Swiss Army knife that has flamethrower capability. "Get Smart." Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes. Rated: PG-13. 3 Stars.
THE HAPPENING - Tippi and Rod, please come back. All is forgiven. Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds" was shot in 1963, after Hitchcock had directed a series of masterpieces featuring bona fide stars: Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, Grace Kelly, Janet Leigh. "The Birds," though, is saddled with Rod Taylor and Tippi Hedren, a pair of low-wattage schlubs. Or so I thought for 45 years. After catching "The Happening," M. Night Shyamalan's riff on "The Birds," a reconsideration is in order. In both films, humankind is suddenly menaced by Nature. In both, the plot races from city to country, the characters fleeing from crowded streets to isolated fates. In both, horror descends on a couple who, despite early crankiness, are Meant For Each Other. "The Happening," then, might have been an exercise in deja view. But as the bickering Elliot and Alma Moore, Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel accomplish the near-impossible: They had me yearning for Tippi and Rod. "The Happening." Running time: 1 hour, 31 minutes. Rated: R. 1 star.
THE PROMOTION - With "The Promotion," you expect a comedy, maybe even a silly comedy given the stars - Seann William Scott ("American Pie"), John C. Reilly ("Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby"), Jenna Fischer ("The Office") and Fred Armisen ("Saturday Night Live"). Oh, it is funny - two guys competing for the job of manager at a new grocery store. But it's unexpectedly a lot more. Credit Steven Conrad, who wrote "Pursuit of Happyness," "The Weather Man" and "Wrestling Ernest Hemingway." He wrote this one, too, and it's also his directorial debut. He does fine with that, but it's his storytelling that makes this small film such a big surprise. There are some very funny moments that play out, and some poignant ones. Reilly and Scott richly mine their characters, alternately confiding in and undermining each other. Their vulnerability and yearning for the good life is a quiet but powerful statement that will stay with you long after the closing credits. "The Promotion." Running time: 1 hour, 25 minutes. Rated: R. 3 stars.
THE INCREDIBLE HULK - "The Incredible Hulk's" most powerful feat doesn't involve pummeling, clobbering or giant-fisted fisticuffs - it involves memory erasing. After being worked over by Ed Norton's muscular take on the Surly Green Giant, you'll probably forget that Ang Lee's "The Hulk" ever existed. Watching "The Incredible Hulk" is like going to a fast-food restaurant and ordering a big salad: Sure, it's cheap and easy, but at least you don't feel sick afterward. There's a lot of supersizing, of course: "The Incredible Hulk" has at least three outstanding action sequences, each finding clever ways to depict Norton's transformation from nebbish to brutish, from Jekyll to Hyde, from passive-aggressive to aggressive-aggressive. Variety wins the day: You might see Hulk fighting in an airy green pasture or a nighttime metropolis, and the villains change and develop throughout the film, rendering it redundancy-free. "The Incredible Hulk." Running time: 1 hour, 52 minutes. Rated: PG-13. 3 stars.
WHEN DID YOU LAST SEE YOUR FATHER? - Though the title sounds like a rhetorical guilt trip just in time for Father's Day, "When Did You Last See Your Father?" isn't an appeal to visit your pop - though it is likely to leave you wanting to. Rather, this brilliantly crafted father flick is both a pensive elegy and a paternal tribute, highly personal yet somehow universal. The film gradually draws a distinct portrait of an imperfect father-son relationship ... and most of them are, aren't they? The story is adapted from a memoir by Blake Morrison, and the film's perspective is entirely Blake's, as the 40-ish married man returns to his childhood house in rural England. He's there to "put things in order" - in the fullest possible sense - while looking after his dad, Arthur (Jim Broadbent), whose health is rapidly deteriorating due to bowel cancer. Director Anand Tucker uses a sleekly intuitive flashback structure as areas of Blake's house and neighborhood pull him into his memories. Past and present connect in the same take, panning from the elder Blake (Colin Firth) to his V-necked teenage self (Matthew Beard). "When Did You Last See Your Father?" Running time: 1 hour, 32 minutes. Rated: PG-13. 4 stars.
YOU DON'T MESS WITH THE ZOHAN - In real life, you don't mess with Adam Sandler, who stars as a hummus-loving, indestructible Israeli commando in the raucous and ribald, crude and surprisingly sweet "You Don't Mess With the Zohan." In this comedy Sandler is a superhero Israeli assassin who is tired of all the violence. He's forced into action one more time in order to capture a Palestinian terrorist dubbed "The Phantom" and played by John Turturro. Problem is, Zohan fantasizes about becoming a hairdresser. His foray from Israel to New York (after faking his death) ends up in Brooklyn, where immigrant Israeli and Palestinians live uneasily in the same neighborhood. Soon, he gets hired at a Palestinian-owned salon and, of course, falls for the proprietor (Emmanuelle Chriqui). This movie will please fans of Sandler's softer films ("The Wedding Singer" and "50 First Dates," for instance) yet it still delivers the vulgarity and sex his groupies come to expect. "You Don't Mess With the Zohan." Running time: 1 hour, 53 minutes. Rated PG-13. 3 stars.
KUNG FU PANDA - In this animated tale, Jack Black lends his voice to Po, a clumsy and overweight bear who loves snacking yet longs to be an elite kung fu fighter. It looks like DreamWorks Animation has taken a cue from the superior storytellers over at Pixar: "Kung Fu Panda" is about a lot more than kung fu, and it's also more than a place for Black to unleash his over-the-top zaniness. Po is a waiter at his dad's noodle restaurant who has an unhealthy obsession with the Furious Five fighting team. Despite his girth, Po dreams of being just as brave as Tigress! Viper! Mantis! Crane! Monkey! With a cast that includes the voices of Angelina Jolie, Dustin Hoffman, Lucy Liu and David Cross, "Kung Fu Panda" takes us on a physical and spiritual journey toward making Po the best fighter that China's ever seen. "Kung Fu Panda." Running time: 1 hour, 35 minutes. Rated PG. 3 stars.
THE FOOT FIST WAY - It used to be that the loser was the sorriest of all characters in the movie universe. Then along came a guy named Napoleon Dynamite, and he transformed the nerd into the coolest guy around. In this movie Fred Simmons is a modern-day movie hero, a nice guy, played by unknown actor Danny McBride, who tries hard and is pretty oblivious to his actual loserness. Fred is actually not so bad. And in his own mind, Fred thinks he's quite an amazing person. He owns his own karate studio. His students look up to him. And his friends share his obsession for tae kwon do superstar Chuck "The Truck" Wallace. Of course, Fred's little bubble has to burst when he finds out his wife isn't as innocent as he'd like to believe. The plot is simple and predictable. The use of karate as an outlet for physical comedy gets overused. And some of the jokes about who could beat up who in a fight seem regurgitated from "Napoleon Dynamite." But those with a bit of patience and a love for losers will enjoy the film. "The Foot Fist Way." Running time: 1 hour, 27 minutes. Rated R. 3 stars.
SURFWISE - A burly, Tarzan-like surfer and Stanford-trained medical doctor drops out of society to live as a vagabond, driving his 24-foot camper from destination to destination with no itinerary or goal other than to be happy. He lives by a self-styled code called the "5 Pillars of Health," in which he eats only the healthiest food, surfs every day and makes passionate love every night with his wife. Oh, yeah. One more thing. The wandering couple have nine kids - eight sons and one daughter - but continue living in the cramped camper and don't allow their children to attend school. This motley clan of iconoclasts is the Paskowitz family, whose life and times as the first family of surf culture are documented in the film "Surfwise." This is a provocative film that compels you to take sides and forces a discussion of what we will do in the name of love. "Surfwise." Running time: 1 hour, 33 minutes. Rated: R. 3 stars.
SEX AND THE CITY - Back when "Sex and the City" was just a fizzy HBO television series, half an hour of Carrie and company never seemed like quite enough. Five long years after the show's finale, we finally get more. A lot more. And maybe, just maybe, it's a bit much. The movie version of "Sex and the City" is almost 2 1/2 hours long. At first, though, there's a giddy thrill in seeing Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha together again and on a big screen. The beginning of the movie is a bubbly whirlwind of fun: so many designer outfits, enviable Manhattan apartments, even a Vogue photo shoot. It's enough to disguise things like how the overacting and mugging that went unnoticed on TV feels cutesy in a movie theater. Adding to the cute is that everyone is seemingly living happily ever after. "Sex and the City." Running time: 2 hours, 28 minutes. Rated: R. 2 1/2 stars.
THE STRANGERS - "The Strangers" has an apt title: You'll most likely leave the theater wishing never to meet anyone involved in the film's production. This low-budget slice of soft-core torture porn hits the trifecta of horror-flick no-no's: It's artless, it's humorless and it's unimaginative. If you're looking for a masochistic meal, try again. This is oatmeal. Though it's about as sharp as an antique butter knife, at times "The Strangers" approaches watchability in a minimalist, "Blair Witch" kinda way. "The Strangers." Running time: 1 hour, 30 minutes. Rated: R. 0 stars.
INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL - "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" is like a visit from an old uncle you hadn't seen in 19 years. He shows up suddenly with nothing but the same old stories. The film is set in the late-1950s (the others took place in the 1930s) and we know that because the initial soundtrack music is Elvis Presley's "Hound Dog." It's also the era of the Cold War and the dawn of the Nuclear Age. In one of the movie's best segments (Warning: Spoiler here), Indy survives an atomic blast, a cataclysmic piece of filmmaking. As a movie-going, popcorn experience, "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" ranks below the series' three previous films. More than two decades of advances in special effects and other technology has not made "Crystal Skull" more entertaining than the others. It is, in fact, less interesting. "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull." Running time: 2 hours, 3 minutes. Rated: PG-13. 2 1/2 stars.
SON OF RAMBOW - The first thing to know about "Son of Rambow": It has about as much to do with Rambo as Dirty Harry does with "Harry Potter" or as Rocky Balboa does with flying squirrels. The second thing to know about "Son of Rambow": It recalls so many other films, you can count the cultural footnotes on your fingers and tributes on your toes. Set in the early 1980s but shot with the earth-toned elegance of the 1950s, "Son of Rambow" follows an unlikely friendship between two British boys. Perched on the edge of prepubescent innocence, they attend a school where the girls tower above them like trees in uniforms. Carter (Will Poulter) is a crew-cut bully. Will (Bill Milner) is a religious recluse. The bulk of "Son of Rambow" mirthfully depicts the boys' growing friendship after Carter enlists Will to be the stuntman in a shot-by-shot video remake of "Rambo: First Blood" he's making for a competitive contest on BBC television. "Son of Rambow." Running time: 1 hour, 36 minutes. Rated: PG-13. 2 1/2 stars.
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RATINGS
4 STARS - Excellent.
3 STARS - Worthy.
2 STARS - Mixed.
1 STAR - Poor.
0 - Forget It (a dog.)
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