Hamlet, price of Denmark, is distraught after the death of his father, to say nothing of the ease with which his uncle has taken the late king’s place both on the throne and in the queen’s bed. The late king’s ghost appears, hinting that his death was no accident and urging Hamlet to avenge him. When the ghost next appears, it tells Hamlet that the current occupant of the throne is the killer. The knowledge sharpens Hamlet’s desire for revenge and slowly begins to drive him mad. He plans to expose his uncle as his father’s assassin, but the new king is too wily to be drawn out so easily. Hamlet becomes more relentless, and soon doesn’t care who pays the price for the truth to be known.

Review: I’m a big Hamlet fan, enough of one that I can be a bit hard to please. So many phrases that we take for granted as a part of the English language spring from this single Shakespeare masterpiece. I can allow a lot of latitude for amateur productions, but for the pros – and the Royal Shakespeare Company, no less – I absolutely expect to be blown away. This production, which sold out repeatedly (and drew complaints from a few critics about the casting of SF TV superstars David Tennant and Patrick Stewart), more than met that expectation. (more…)

In August 2010, Wikus Van De Merwe’s life changes forever. He is chosen to head up the effort by MNU to relocate a population of aliens to a new settlement. Since their ship appeared in 1982 in the sky over Johannesburg, South Africa, the aliens – generally known by the racial slur “prawn” – have been corraled into an inner city ghetto known as District 9. Johannesburg’s human residents have finally railed against the aliens enough that a very expensive and very risky resettlement has been undertaken. During the search of one alien residence in District 9, Wikus is exposed to some sort of seemingly makeshift biological weapon. Initially it only makes him nauseous, but within 36 hours of his exposure, he’s no longer entirely human. This is of particular interest to MNU, which is also one of the world’s largest arms dealers, and has long been frustrated by the inability of any human to use the aliens’ advanced weaponry. Wikus demonstrates – under duress – that he is the first human who can activate the aliens’ weapons. This makes him a hot property at MNU – though his employers now want to dissect him so they can corner the market on alien weapons, even if it means genetically re-engineering those who will wield them. Wikus is left with no choice but to escape, and now the only place where he has any hope of hiding is District 9 itself…but neither fully human nor fully alien, friends and allies will be hard to come by.

Review: District 9 is truly a movie of the moment – very much a product of its time. It cuts relentlessly fast between various fictitious footage of the movie’s protagonist (if, indeed, it can be said to have any one single clear-cut hero) before the events of the movie unfold, “news footage” which cleverly lays out the backstory of the alien presence before it slyly starts to slip in some foreshadowing that something has happened to the main character we’ll be following. Throughout the movie, the perspective shifts with little or no warning between handheld documentary cameras – probably there to document events in case MNU needs to pull a CYA maneuver – and fixed “security cameras”. We’re well into the movie before we see any “God’s eye view” that doesn’t directly address the fourth wall, and eventually the bulk of the movie switches to that omniscient, omnipresent camera out of necessity. But at all times, District 9 is gutsy and visceral – there isn’t much in the movie that’s pleasant to see. (more…)

For the story synopsis and credits, please visit theLogBook.com’s Episode Guide entry for this movie.

Review: It seems to be the most popular film in the franchise since Star Trek II – and if box office receipts are anything to go by, it may prove to be even more popular than that. The movie simply titled Star Trek has “rebooted” the Star Trek universe for a new generation of fans, and seems to be winning over a wide audience – an audience that, perhaps, wouldn’t have bothered if this was simply a follow-up to the Next Generation flick Star Trek: Nemesis.

To put it bluntly, Star Trek has needed this for some time. Now, around the time that writers and directors new to the franchise teamed up to give us Nemesis, we were hearing a lot about new blood then too – but all that “new blood” really brought to the table, under the thumb of the executive producer who had been at the wheel since 1991, was a glossy new look for what was essentially a watered-down rehash of Star Trek II. Star Trek takes a bolder stab at reintroducing Trek to a new audience by completely dispensing with what has gone before. (more…)

Young billionaire Bruce Wayne, traumatized by the murder of his parents, wanders the world attempting to find some purpose to his life. After being directed to the mountaintop retreat of Ra’s Al Ghul, Wayne seems to find some peace with his past. But Wayne is unable to join Ra’s Al Ghul in his quest to topple civilization and he, instead, tears down Al Ghul’s retreat and returns to his home in Gotham City to become its protector. He takes on the mantle of Batman and aligns himself with Jim Gordon, one of the few uncorrupted officers on the Gotham Police Force. But just as he begins to do some good, Ra’s Al Ghul comes back into his life, questioning whether he has chosen the right side for which to fight…

Review: Batman Begins is a fresh start for the Batman franchise that began with such promise with 1989′s Batman and crashed in flames with 1997′s Batman & Robin. It jettisons the ultimately convoluted continuity of the ’89-’97 series in favor of telling Batman’s origins from the ground up. It clearly uses the “Batman: Year One” comic series as a template, but finds its own path as far as the details are concerned. (more…)

The crew of the third American moon landing mission prepares for their flight early in 1970. At the last minute, command module pilot Ken Mattingly is declared unfit for flight due to possible exposure to the measles, and mission commander Jim Lovell can either make the flight with the backup pilot, Jack Swigert, or risk his entire crew being pushed back to a later flight. Lovell decides to replace Mattingly with Swigert, and even though Swigert has had less training time, he’s determined to make it a good flight. The launch goes off smoothly, and Apollo 13 is en route to the moon. But during a routine procedure, a huge explosion rips through the service module of the isolated spacecraft, draining the vital oxygen needed not only for consumption by the astronauts, but to provide electricity for the attached command module. Lovell, Haise and Swigert evacuate to the relatively tiny lunar module, which is meant to sustain only two men for less than a day – but they now face a journey of several days to return to Earth, during which they will have to shut down both the lunar lander and what’s left of the command module to preserve power. The three astronauts and their hundreds of landlocked flight controllers – including Ken Mattingly, who is most assuredly healthy and puts all of his effort into exploring possible survival solutions for his former crewmates – are focusing their energies on bringing Apollo 13 home. But time, physics, and the odds are all against them.

Review: This is, without a doubt, the best space movie ever made. And it doesn’t hurt that, for the most part, it’s a true story. The performances are all fantastic, and in those cases where the odds get too oppressive in the story, there are unexpected moments of levity which usually take the form of brief television snippets of unintentionally ridiculous reportage (such as Jeff Kluger, co-author of the book that inspired this movie, doing a television science report in which he says if this basketball is Earth, and this baseball the moon, the spacecraft has to travel along a path no thicker than this sheet of paper…), slightly reminiscent of Being There. Tom Hanks, fresh from his blastoff to fame as Forrest Gump, is exceptional as Jim Lovell (who himself appears in an uncredited cameo as the captain of the Navy ship which recovers the Apollo 13 crew after splashdown). And while Lovell’s book describing the events surrounding Apollo 13 paints a picture of his wife Marilyn being a little more calm and steely, Kathleen Quinlan provides an earthbound oasis of raw emotion, as opposed to the ultra-professional calm and occasional humorous quirkiness of the NASA flight controllers in Houston. The sets are nothing less than astonishing in their accuracy. (more…)

Time-lagged super-spy Austin Powers is astonished to discover that his beautiful bride is, in fact, one of Dr. Evil’s fem-bots. And that isn’t the only trick up the evil genius’ sleeve – he has constructed a time machine so he can travel back to the late 60s, steal Austin’s mojo, and place an enormous laser on the moon which will put the entire world in his command, under threat of a powerful blast from orbit. (Why he couldn’t simply do this in 1999 is…well…a matter for another movie.) Austin must also return to the 60s, recover his mojo, and stop Dr. Evil and the diabolically diminutive Mini-Me from taking over the world (and if the opportunity presents itself for a quick round of shagging, Austin won’t hesitate to do that either).

Review: Last month, I waxed rhapsodic about the uneven Pleasantville, asking myself if it was a brilliant chunk of celluloid or if it was a big mess. No such quandary with Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. This film is a big mess – a very funny mess at times, but still a mess. (more…)

Widower Michael Faraday raises his young son and teaches a univeristy class on American militia, separatist and terrorist groups. His fascination with this subject has blossomed into an obsession since bungled orders cost his wife – an FBI agent – her life. Faraday is driving home one day when he spots a young boy with a horribly burned and bleeding hand. He drives the boy to the hospital and discovers that the child’s parents are his neighbors across the street – a family to whom he has never introduced himself. His neighbor, Oliver Lang, is grateful to Faraday, and the two become fast friends (as do their sons). But Faraday, who has become accustomed to subjecting everyone and everything he knows to extreme scrutiny, is a little unsettled by some of Oliver’s off-the-cuff remarks. Faraday begins to suspect that Oliver is not what he seems…and when he finds that “Oliver Lang” is the name of a dead man from his neighbor’s home town, it begins to appear as though his suspicions aren’t as groundless as everyone tells him they are.

Review: This supremely creepy thriller explores the notion that your neighbor could be anyone or anything. Arlington Road swings the pendulum relentlessly from “he’s on to something, they are suspicious” to “naaaahh, he’s paranoid.” The script is masterfully executed, and Jeff Bridges and Tim Robbins turn in a couple of excellent performances, though their acting starts to go off the deep end about three quarters of the way through the film (but so does the directing, so I’m not blaming the actors for this one). Bridges and Robbins have done enough good work in the past that I’m sure their instincts would’ve served the movie better than the over-the-top, almost drunkenly-lurching style that takes over not long before the film’s climax. (more…)

Review: Well, A Bug’s Life is now available for general consumption. But why am I writing a review of a cartoon? There are a couple of reasons. After watching the movie I made a quick comment about it to our humble (and lovable) web host. He wrote back and asked me to flesh it out to a more accepted review length. I must admit I’ve always felt that anyone dumb enough to ask for my opinion deserved to get it. However, the more I thought about it, the more I thought this is the perfect opportunity to vent my spleen about something that has bothered me for years. (more…)

At a U.S. military desert base in Qatar, a helicopter reported shot down in Afghanistan mysteriously appears. Ordered to land, the chopper suddenly morphs into a gigantic robot and proceeds to hack into the military network, which is quickly cut off by the soldiers. Enraged, the ‘bot destroys the rest of the base and deploys a giant robotic scorpion to kill a small group of surviving solders, led by Capt. Lennox.

All of this activity and much more is brought to the attention of a secretive branch of the U.S. Government known as Sector Seven which has not only recovered what Archibald “discovered”, but has hidden it in Hoover Dam (the actual reason the dam was constructed) and used it to reverse engineer all the technological progress since the late 1940s. But even Sector Seven (including Agents Simmons and Banacheck) have no idea of what is really happening – that Earth has become the battleground between two different groups of sentient robots, the noble Autobots and the warlike Decepticons. For centuries their war has raged, completely devastating their home world of Cybertron, and now it threatens all of Earth, with humanity caught in the crossfire…

Review: I’m sure I speak for a lot of people when I say I was a bit skeptical when this little film was announced, especially when I heard that Bay (who has often been called one of the most hated men in film today) was tapped to direct it. I won’t go into detail about it here, only that Bay is better known for choreographing mayhem than he is at developing believable characters. (more…)

The King Of Kong is a serious documentary about two men’s battle for, and the ensuing controversy surrounding, the world’s highest Donkey Kong score.

(Okay, you two in the back, stop snickering.)

Review: For what sounds like to some a trivial, boring, or extremely nerdy premise for a documentary, King Of Kong is surprisingly entertaining and interesting, even for spouses and friends who wouldn’t know Mario from Luigi. (That’s a video game joke.) (more…)