Reviews

Wolf Creek does not deserve to be called a horror movie. It is essentially a snuff film with art-house cinematography, and only the thinnest, barest premise of a story. Three tourists in the Australian outback are captured, tortured, and humiliated by a bully. That's it. No plot development, no surprises, and thus not a lot of fun. You get to watch people cry, suffer, and eventually die.

What's truly sad? Even the fans of this movie won't dispute the claim that there is no plot, but rather they'll rebut by complimenting Wolf Creek for being so "uncompromising" in its depiction of sadistic murders. Essentially, they're employing a kind of dimwitted bizarro-logic that goes something like this: if someone who sets out to make a fun, enjoyable movie deserves praise if they succeed, then by de facto reasoning, the creators of a detestable, unenjoyable movie should also be praised if their actual intent was to produce something detestable and unenjoyable. If after the credits start rolling you find yourself feeling lousy, applaud enthusiastically and give them their due credit. What a pathetic way to judge the merits of a film, or any medium.

Reality check: if movies like Wolf Creek only come along once in a while, it isn't because Hollywood's not bold or innovative enough to make films like this, it's just that most people don't have time to waste on creating mean-spirited trash. Wolf Creek is about a guy with weapons bullying some kids who don't have the means to defend themselves. You'll find there's nothing bold or innovative about that if you pick up a newspaper once in a while. Maybe Wolf Creek fans should schedule there next vacation in Rwanda, so they can enjoy watching some brilliant, uncompromising guerrillas hack up helpless victims with machetes.

I love a good horror film, and violence can really spice up a movie when there's some effort to express an idea, or just provide pure entertainment. But Wolf Creek has nothing to say about anything, and its purpose is not to provide any kind of thrill. Beyond cruelty for cruelty's sake, this plate of garbage is devoid of any ambition other than to make a few million bucks off of anyone who's lived such a sheltered, boring existence that they find the waste of human life to be titillating rather than depressing. One star.

About one step above an Olsen's twins film, there's a nary a surprise in store here except for how repulsive the bloated, hunchbacked Depardieu looks walking around the beach without a shirt on. This guy was supposed to be some sort of heartthrob? Quasimodo hubba hubba? Well, whatever.

Katherine Heigl's a great actress, whose career over the last several years has displayed a lot of her potential as both a comedic and dramatic actress, but this movie definitely didn't do anything to offer her a break-out role. Her vapid character lacks any trace of personality or self-esteem, spending her entire vacation crushing on a cute boy that she thinks is the greatest guy in then world (basically because he's a cute boy), yet she can't be honest with him for two seconds. Ladies, let me tell you something; if a guy's really into you, he's not going to stomp off in a huff because you tried to pass your dad off as your boyfriend. He may be a little confused about why you'd do something so silly, contrived, and um...incestuous, but in the end it's just going to be something you'll laugh together about.

The plot and dialogue hits every clche' right on cue. No originality and no wit...but it's rilly, rilly SWEET and Ben's rilly, rilly cute so viewers who think Titanic is the greatest movie ever made will of course say this movie is great because they won't notice that it doesn't have a brain in its head. One star.

I've watched 3 episodes of this show so far, and correct me if I'm wrong here, but the entire population of Glory Island (with the exception of one nosy writer with too much free time on his hands, one dumb-as-dirt cop, and one cute-but-kooky coroner) apparently consists entirely of crazed serial killers. Every week there's a bizarre series of kidnappings, murders, or what have you, and every week we're treated to a handful of never-before-encountered suspects to choose from.

Of course, all you have to do is disregard the red herrings tossed clumsily into your path and instead pick the one who seems the most harmless, the most friendly, and most sane. Sure enough, by the end of the show he or she will be ranting incoherently as they try to do our hero in with a speargun or weed-whacker. Ho-hum. Nab the bad guy and reset everything back to the way it was at the outstart of the episode.

But why even bother trying to identify the lunatic de jour? Next week there'll be some other nutjob with a deep, dark, secret axe to grind. Let all the psychos run amok; the law of averages says that eventually they'll all start bumping each other off. Just as "Murder, She Wrote's" quaint little town of Cabbot Cove grew to become the murder capital of the county over the course of a decade, Glory Island is destined to become the maniac mecca of the U.S. God, forget solving all these picayune mysteries and just drop a nuke on the place already. Worried about fallout? All right, get a crop-duster full of thorazine and seed the clouds over the island. Or even better yet, start writing campaign to get the plug pulled on this unimaginative, uninnovative, and downright tedious waste of time and film.

Harry and Debbie, next time you make a movie, pick a target audience and go with it.

The movie starts out spoofing boy-bands with a parody group called "DuJour". The song they're singing is called "Back-Door Lover", and in case the title is too subtle for you, the lyrics and dance routine should eventually clue-in all but the most imperceptive viewer that this is a light-hearted ditty about anal sex. Maybe a 12-year-old girl wouldn't catch it, but just based on that scene alone I wouldn't take a daughter of mine to see Josie & the Pussycats. But all-in-all it is a sufficiently-amusing roast of the sad state of music groups today (which don't even deserve to be called "bands" because that word denotes that they can play their own instruments) that a jaded thirty-year-old like myself could enjoy the rest of the movie, sans daughter, if it had more bits like that. I also couldn't help but notice that towards the end of the movie, a few expletives get tossed out as well. While it's certainly not enough swearing to hold a candle to the non-stop stream of profanities found in a PG-13-rated Kevin Smith movie, it's just enough that, again, it's not something fit for children.

But most of Josie & the Pussycats is sugar-coated, smut-free kiddie fare, with nothing more risque than an open-mouthed kiss or two. The plot consists of a simple rags-to-riches Cinderella storyline and is populated by archetypical characters that haven't got much more depth than their Hanna-Barbera cartoon counterparts. One gets the distinct impression that this was a tale intended for girls who still have an active Barbie doll collection. For instance, Melody is a twentysomething-year-old whose internal monologue consists of singing "If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands!" to herself. Then there's all the childish humor and jokes that are way to obvious to be deemed clever by an adult, such as the running product-placement gag as well as several scenes where a character, in a fit of smarm, decides to stop the flow of the film by breaking the 4th wall.

So what were directors Debbie and Harry trying to accomplish here? They made a movie that is haphazardly marketed towards girls somewhere in the pre-to-post bubblegum-popping teeny-bopper age demographic, and yet they actually expect those very same space cadets to appreciate the movie as it

mocks them and their shallow tastes in music? The movie would've been better off trying to appeal to cynical generation-X Metallica fans.

Having said all that, there are two major aspects of the movie I have to praise: the Pussycats' songs. The first is Rachel Leigh Cook. She has a breathtaking look as Josie. She should really consider keeping it.

The second would be the music. "3 Small Words", "Pretend to Be Nice", and "Spin Around", are a lot of fun to listen to. These tunes fuse pop and rock together with a remarkable smoothness, having just enough of an edge to get me shaking my head and doing the "white-man's-overbite", yet incorporating just enough pop flavor to make the experience qualify as a guilty pleasure. If music groups today were fueled by the innovativeness and sheer spunk of the Pussycats rather than the pre-processed, mass-produced, corporate-choreographed "You-go-girl!" formula of Eden's Crush and Destiny's Child, you might see a few of us cynical generation-Xers standing in line to pick up the latest top 10 hits along with the teeny-boppers, rather than fantasizing about beating the tar out of Justin Timberlake as we lay back listening to "Dark Side of the Moon" for the ten-thousandth time.

Harry and Debbie, next time you make a movie, pick a target audience and go with it.

The movie starts out spoofing boy-bands with a parody group called "DuJour". The song they're singing is called "Back-Door Lover", and in case the title is too subtle for you, the homo-erotic lyrics and circle-jerk-style dancing should eventually clue-in all but the most imperceptive viewer that this is a light-hearted ditty about anal sex. Maybe a 12-year-old girl wouldn't catch it, but just based on that scene alone I wouldn't take a daughter of mine to see Josie & the Pussycats. But all-in-all it is a sufficiently-amusing roast of the sad state of music groups today (which don't even deserve to be called "bands" because that word denotes that they can play their own instruments) that a jaded thirty-year-old like myself could enjoy the rest of the movie, sans daughter, if it had more bits like that. I also couldn't help but notice that towards the end of the movie, a few expletives get tossed out as well. While it's certainly not enough swearing to hold a candle to the non-stop stream of profanities found in a PG-13-rated Kevin Smith movie, it's just enough that, again, it's not something fit for children.

But most of Josie & the Pussycats is sugar-coated, smut-free kiddie fare, with nothing more risque than an open-mouthed kiss or two. The plot consists of a simple rags-to-riches Cinderella storyline and is populated by archetypical characters that haven't got much more depth than their Hanna-Barbera cartoon counterparts. One gets the distinct impression that this was a tale intended for girls who still have an active Barbie doll collection. For instance, Melody is a twentysomething-year-old whose internal monologue consists of singing "If you're happy and you know it, clap your hands!" to herself. Then there's all the childish humor and jokes that are way to obvious to be deemed clever by an adult, such as the running product-placement gag as well as several scenes where a character, in a fit of smarm, decides to stop the flow of the film by breaking the 4th wall.

So what were directors Debbie and Harry trying to accomplish here? They made a movie that is haphazardly marketed towards girls somewhere in the pre-to-post bubblegum-popping teeny-bopper age demographic, and yet they actually expect those very same space cadets to appreciate the movie as it mocks them and their shallow tastes in music? The movie would've been better off trying to appeal to the cynical generation-X Metallica fans that wind up beating the daylights out of DuJour.

Having said all that, there is one major aspect of the movie I have to praise: the Pussycats' songs. "3 Small Words", "Pretend to Be Nice", and "Spin Around", are a lot of fun to listen to. These tunes fuse pop and rock together with a remarkable smoothness, having just enough of an edge to get me shaking my head and doing the "white-man's-overbite", yet incorporating just enough pop flavor to make the experience qualify as a guilty pleasure. If music groups today were fueled by the innovativeness and sheer spunk of the Pussycats rather than the pre-processed, mass-produced, corporate-choreographed "You-go-girl!" formula of Eden's Crush and Destiny's Child, you might see a few of us cynical generation-Xers standing in line to pick up the latest top 10 hits along with the teeny-boppers, rather than fantasizing about kicking the crap out of Justin Timberlake as we lay back listening to "Dark Side of the Moon" for the ten-thousandth time.