When I heard Peter Jackson’s latest film had a midnight showing I was at the theater faster than white on rice. This is the fourth film in the Lord of the Rings series based on the books by JK Rowling. The movie takes place about 50 years after the last film in New York City during The Great Depression. At first I was disappointed that none of the cast returned for this movie, but the new actors they brought in were excellent. Jack Black plays a hobbit who is trying to make a movie on Skull Island. He has in his possession a treasure map that he got from One Eyed Willy. Adrian Brody plays a mentally challenged man who writes the script for the movie. Some hot girl and the guy who used to be on the short lived series Early Edition are the actors in the movie. Black has an assistant too who is a really good actor. He’s like a young Tom Hanks.
So this ragtag bunch of adventurers find Skull Island where the people are all decendents of Gollum. They sacrifice the hot girl to Kong (a giant Gorilla) who plays with her like an anatomically correct Barbie doll. Team Venture head in to save her but then discover that Skull Island is also the same island where Jurassic Park took place. An hour of CG later and they not only rescue the girl but they capture Kong with a little help from Chlorophyll (more like Bore-aphyll!)
Back in the states, Jack Black becomes a huge star. Apparently in the 40s animal trappers were treated like celebrities. On opening night Kong becomes the total Hollywood diva and throws a big hissy fit causing many offscreen casulities. I won’t give away the ending but I will say that Kong and hot girl don’t live happily ever after. (Did I mention that the hot girl and Kong are in love? Really, I didn’t? I should have mentioned it because Peter Jackson will beat you over the head with that fact like Professor Plum with the lead pipe in the conservatory.)
Overall I thought the movie was very good. It didn’t have any of the magic or epic battles of the previous movies but it did have dinosaurs. And in the end that’s all that really matters.
Are you about to have a seizure from watching all those old stop motion Rankin-Bass Christmas specials on ABC Family Channel? No? Well, check out these other shows anyway.
Extreme Makover: 13 Candlewood Edition (ABC)
Ty Pennington and his crew of homemakers travel back in time to 1991 to remodel the disheveled hovel of some drunken college losers. Viewer Discretion Advised.
No Glove, No Love (Fox)
Ahmish boy Lars sets out from his family’s Pennsylvania farm on a quest to find a condom so he can consummate his love for the virtuous holstein cow Betsy. On tonight’s episode, Lars loses his beard in a craps game in Pittsburgh and must delve into the town’s seedy underworld in order to win it back.
The Wasted Years (Lifetime)
Andy Richter stars as Ed, A socially inept, middle-aged midwesterner dealing with the consequences of having spent his college years in a state on constant inebrieation, squandering the most formative years of his life and forcing him to seek attention by posting witless entries on a friend’s website. On tonight’s episode, Ed stays up late drinking cooking sherry and emailing old girlfriends; after he is arrested for violating several cease and desist orders, he must plead with his well-to-do friends from the Computer Mafia to secure his release.
Stern Warnings (CBS)
A group of senior citizens confined to an old-folks home write dire letters to local media outlets predicting the downfall of society. Tonight, “Grandma” Esther Suggs writes the New York Times a rambling letter about “these kids today and their rock and roll music.”
Eat Your Spouse (NBC)
Dan Cortez hosts this extreme reality show where married couples compete to win fabulous prizes by seeing which pair can eat more of each other. Tonight, see if Jeff and Shiela Atweiler can recover the lead lost when Jeff barfed up Shiela’s duodenum.
Judge Bladderspackle (Syndicated)
The Honorable Navin Bladderspackle presides over small-claims cases in backwoods Nutscrum County, North Carolina. This week the wife and non-incarcerated children of deceased Finster Snert gather to fight for their inheritance: the rat-infested rear seat from Snert’s 1970 Dodge Dart.