Your Weekend Movie Guide for June 2011

"Mighty Joe Young!"  You'll gasp and gape!  Now that's a good movie to go see this weekend.

If the weekend is in 1949.  Because, here in 2011, there is absolute shit playing in the multiplexes.  Garbage tailored solely for the mindless twenty-year-old. 

You know the drill, folks.  I'll flip through the movie pages of the Los Angeles Times and I'll give you my knee-jerk and often gut-wrenching reaction to the swill Hollywood is shipping us this week.  The worst movie summer in history continues.

Green Lantern:  Ryan Reynolds as yet another super hero.  It's amazing how many of these guys there are.  The target audience loves their comic book characters who possess super powers.  Meanwhile, most of them are hardpressed to work a light switch.  From the trailer I saw, the computer special effects are getting cheesier and cheesier.

Mr. Popper's Penguins:  Jim Carrey's in it and I hope these things attack to kill.

X-Men First Class:  Clearly economy class.  Back of the plane.  Middle seat. 

Kung Fu Panda 2:  I actually know some adults who went to see this and they didn't bring children.  This is why, when updating my address book, I write names in pencil.

Thor:  For IQs 50 or lower.

Judy Moody and the Not Bummer Summer:  A kids movie and a pretty bad message to send.  Can the title be any worse grammar?

Bridesmaids:  They wonder why they're not married.

The Hangover Part II:  A shameful attempt at comedy.  Because blacking out from an overdose of liquor is a laugh riot.  A prime example of why the youth of America is completely fucked up.

Pirates of the Caribbean - On Stranger Tides:  The fourth installment and they ran out of plot right after the first splash when the ride opened up in the mid 60s.  Friends who got suckered in tell me this was the most boring movie they've seen in years.

The Tree of Life:  Pray for a forest fire.

Midnight in Paris:  Allegedly Woody Allen's best work in years.   The word of mouth is wildly divided between love and hate.  I will have to see it and decide for myself.

Super 8:  Reviewers say this Steven Spielberg-produced alien movie is reminiscent of his earliest work.  The days when he didn't rely on bloated special effects and an even more bloated Tom Hanks.  This is on my very small list of films to see.

The Art of Getting By:  George, a lonely and fatalistic teen who's made it all the way to his senior year without ever having done a real day of work, is befriended by Sally, a popular but complicated girl who recognizes in him a kindred spirit.  Supposedly this is a teen movie with a brain with British roots.  So that means no fart and penis jokes?

Queen of the Sun:  Investigates the mass disappearance of bees.  Has no buzz whatsoever.

Road to Nowhere:   A young filmmaker gets wrapped up in a crime while shooting his new project on location.  Len's rule of thumb:  If the title includes the word "nothing" or "nowhere," the film sucks.

City of Life and Death:  A dramatization of the rape of Nanking in 1937.  A multiple choice quiz and essay exam follow every screening.  Yawn.

Jig:  Documentary on the 40th Irish Dancing World Championships.  I'd even go see this instead of 'The Hangover Part 2." 

The Last Mountain:  A documentary about a coal mining corporation and a tiny community vie for the last great mountain in Appalachia in a battle for the future of energy that affects us all.  I usually see documentaries.  Bobby Kennedy Jr. and his liberal crackpot friends are involved in this.   I won't be seeing this one.

Women Art Revolution:   Through intimate interviews, provocative art, and rare, historical film and video footage, this feature documentary reveals how art addressing political consequences of discrimination and violence, the Feminist Art Revolution radically transformed the art and culture of our times.   Yeah, I won't be seeing this one either.

Beginners:  I'm hearing good things because this sounds like it was written with a brain.  A young man is rocked by two announcements from his elderly father: that he has terminal cancer, and that he has a young male lover.  The latter means that there will be very few Mormons in the audience.

Submarine:  Another teen movie from England, where the kids are much smarter than the dopes in America.   15-year-old Oliver Tate has two objectives: To lose his virginity before his next birthday, and to extinguish the flame between his mother and an ex-lover who has resurfaced in her life.  Hmm.  My only goal at that age was to win at Strat-O-Matic.

Dinner last night:  Spaghetti, garlic, tomatoes, and pancetta at Il Cielo.