I know what you're saying, so please stop explaining. Don't speak.

This phrase will have some baring in the last portion of this post and so I dedicate the above words to one actress...

The lyric/title today comes from No Doubt's classic Don't Speak. I was persuaded to take three 14 year old girls to a Gwen Stefani concert Sunday night and the highlight came when I texted the jumbotron the following message:

Hey Gwen! Sure wish this was a No Doubt concert instead!

Anyway, it wasn't, and I endured her craptastic pop onslaught to the screams of my kids. Once upon a time though she made great music. To see that band's website click the title of today's post.

So I needed my own way to critique things. Thumbs up and down, stars, red, green, and yellow lights, and even good, bad, and ugly have been taken by media outlets and critics. So I delved into my own taste to make a critique out of my measure for critiquing and today I employ it for the first time.

Coke, Sprite, or Diet Coke?

I love Coke! I actually crave it sometimes and drink at least one a day. I know I should like it less and drink it even less, but there is just no substitute for the real thing. Labeling something Coke is my way of saying it is great and everybody should try it.

Sprite is okay! I think sometimes it is refreshing. But it has no caffiene and tends to go flat and get watered down quickly. I will drink one on occasion, especially if a Coke isn't available, but really I know it isn't as good.

Diet Coke is just awful! I think it tastes like dirt and I won't drink one if I don't have to. I think it is fine if people love it, but my own taste often leaves me wanting to ask them "how" and "why".

Using this determination, here's my take on the last three movies I've seen.

Coke, Sprite, or Diet Coke THE MOVIES Volume One

I was a bit surprised too, but the first-ever Coke goes to...



TMNT

It isn't just that I grew up watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or that I enjoyed the first film when they made these cartoon characters live action, it is the simple fact that this is a good movie. It is animated in such a way that it feels more real than when people were dressed up in costumes and framed like a real action film, the screen moves like a camera would; close-ups and pans, crane shots even.

The storyline is middle of the road; appealing enough for kids and adults, but not boring for either. The movie seems to pickup sometime after the original movies, but exists independent of them. Certain choices were made by the animators to sharpen personalities; they only missed by turning Michaelangelo into a stereotype (though he has been drifting that way for a while). Top-tier talent did the voice work (Patrick Stewart, Mako, Sarah Michelle Gellar). This movie is just constructed better than most. It knows where it is going and what it needs to do to get there. TMNT also knows its audience and gives us a few scenes we've been dying to see. But at no point does this movie overreach or undersell. It is a kids cartoon for grown-ups and acts accordingly. I would see it again! Mostly, it is entertaining and well made and that earns it the disctinction of Coke!




Reign Over Me

I found this movie incredibly refreshing, though not without room for improvement. Don Cheadle, who has got to be in any discussion for best actor working today, plays a dentist in a mediocre existence who runs into his college rommate, played by Sandler, who lost his whole family in one of the planes on 9/11.

Now, going in I knew all that, such is the way of movie promotion these days. I wanted to see how a film handled such a scenario and frankly what chops Sandler brought to the task, especially when surrounded by real actors; not just Cheadle, but Jada Pinkett-Smith, Donald Sutherland, Saffron Burrows, and Mike Binder. I've gotta say, Adam Sandler wowed me. This movie fails to bring that cinematic moment of screen magic, it doesn't leave us delighted or moved or overjoyed. I like that it doesn't. I think it is one of the most real movies I've ever seen; its performances, its storyline, its conclusion. Why I would hesitate to recommend this movie is that there is one plot twist that almost undoes all that I just claimed for this movie; an unfortunate court scene and laughable premise unspooled in a judge's office. That, and the casting of Liv Tyler as a therapist almost derail this movie, but Cheadle, and yes Sandler, are too good of actors to let that happen. Not everyday, but maybe if you needed a caffiene free distraction.

This one is not so surprising...




Spider-Man 3

I'll admit I didn't like Spider-Man, hated Spider-Man 2, and have come to the conslusion now that I just don't like Spider-Man the character. This movie carried on the series' tradition of great casting of and portayals of villians and poor acting and writing for main and recurring characters.

The way Tobey Maguire, or maybe Director Sam Raimi, has decided to portray Peter Parker from the start seemed cartoonish. Similar to Clark Kent's bafoonery, Peter Parker is a nerd who in this movie is getting shot by spitwads during his Microbiology class at college, because stereotypes go to college too, and then wins over the city of New York with his bravery and crime stopping at night. There is a pretty girl in his class at school who shows up ten or twelve times in this movie, each time in a very contrived way, played by Bryce Dallas Howard who is radiant and great and gets a pass for this buttnugget. There is an escaped convict, played by Thomas Haden Church well, who we're told may be Peter Parker's uncle's real killer even though last movie we thought Peter had killed him. There is a rival photographer played by Topher Grace, who gets what acting in a comic book movie should be, who becomes Venom though never named as such. Rosemary Harris, who plays Aunt May, almost always lifts the level of artistry in the movie when she graces the screen, but has become the equivalent of Spider-Man talking with the angel on his shoulder in these movies. James Cromwell is in this movie in a complete throwaway role. J.K. Simmons, who I've seen act for real before in better movies, continues to assault the screen as the editor of The Daily Bugle, trying to make a stereotype out of his character to fit in I guess. James Franco plays the son of Goblin, and really tries to stretch that thinly made character, but isn't actor enough. And lastly Kirsten Dunst plays herself, as a talentless actress who gets repeatedly saved by Tobey Maquire playing Spider-Man. She is so bad, even the fact she is a hot redhead isn't enough for me. Her character's name is Mary Jane, which is funny since she recently told a magazine that all people should smoke weed. I seriously considered it for the first time once I remembered how crappy these movies are.

What can I say about this movie? I hated it. The plot is paper thin masquerading as deep character study. The action, much like that in the most recent Superman, is good to watch and intense in its way, but so computer generated that one wishes he'd just rented the video game and skipped the hooplah. Peter and Mary Jane are a happy couple I guess, though the writing for them is so bad and the actors who portray them so much worse that one doesn't really know. But Pete's gonna propose, so things must be alright. She is a singer in a Broadway show that I think might be named after the Broadway show the muppets were trying to get produced in one of their movies. She gets fired after one night, because she sucks. I think this is Sam Raini's way of telling her about Spider-Man 4 but I could be wrong. Spidey on the other hand is flying high and therfore has no time to console her. A convict gets molecularized after falling in a vat of sand making him a flying dustcloud that can materialize into a sand giant or the guy again, but not another shape (say somebody else) that would be useful to an escaped convict. Goblin's son has become New Goblin, never named or explained, and fights Spider-Man to kill him until he bumps his head, then tries to steal his lady, then gets beatup by him, then...

Some goo falls from the sky and is never explained, but somehow crawls around Peter's apartment until one night when he gets mad in a dream. It makes Spider-Man a badass, and Peter is all excited about his new prowess, even combing his hair into his face and wearing black, until he realizes it makes him kind of an ass and rips the goo off. It falls on somebody else and they become villian number 3. Really, I'm not making any of this up.

The most telling scene in this turd is when Peter Parker walks down a street with his new emo hairdo flashing fingerpoints and thumbs up at girls and pelvic thrusting in a new suit, because the rage has made him cool...

I'm not kidding...

Then he dances...

Anyway, after the old people in the movie set things right with the young ones, and Venom finds the convict who he mysteriuously knows all about and they team up, Mary Jane is taken and Spider-Man is called into action. The whole thing ends up pretty dumb, all the actors who were really trying in the movie die except the old lady, and we find out that revenge doesn't like church bells.

Seriously, if there were ever a series of overrated movies it is this one. This movie will make a ton of money, has already, and they'll make a 4th and 5th, but not once will they create a character that is truly identifiable or heroic. So I give them the first ever Diet Coke...for the bad taste in my mouth.