Review: How To Train Your Dragon

Image by Daniel Semper via Flickr

Movies don't have to be terribly original to pack a serious punch. Dreamworks Animation's How To Train Your Dragon is essentially the coming-of-age love story of Happy Feet, only it's told against a backdrop of dragons and vikings instead of penguins. It's also an effective story, told with lots of heart, and endowed with breathtaking visuals. It's a very effective mix, and the movie has also been marketed brilliantly with cunningly crafted trailers shown in all the right venues. This, my friends, will be a deservedly big hit.

It's not all wine and roses, of course. The "vikings" speak Scottish against a Celtic bagpipe soundtrack, which is somewhat offensive to true Scandinavians like myself. Call 'em Highlanders and I'd be happier. Nobody else will care a whit, of course. Dragon benefits greatly from a full-on 3-D treatment, but is butting up against Alice In Wonderland at the opening and Clash Of the Titans at the tail end. That unfortunate squeeze cuts down on this movie's income potential, just as Dragon curtails Alice's profits.

Still, this should be a franchise tentpole in the mold of Shrek for Dreamworks. How To Train Your Dragon is based on a bestselling book which is followed by a whole series of sequels, providing rich soil for the creative team. And I really wouldn't mind seeing more of these bewitching dragons, even if I have to put up with a horde of Scottish vikings.

4.5 out of 5 stars. Lose the celtic-viking confusion and you'd get a clean 5.

A Pale Ghost Writer

The Ghost Writer has Ewan McGregor doing his finest accidental detective since Obi-Wan in The Phantom Menace. The Scottish star is enjoyable as always, but neither he nor co-stars Pierce Brosnan and Kim Cattrall stand a chance of rescuing the film's paper-thin plot from an ugly demise.

I know, it's cinema legend Roman Polanski directing a story by bestselling thriller author Robert Harris. That should be enough to guarantee a strong story. But the plot is full of glaring holes, the ending is completely implausible, and I found myself not caring one way or another whether Brosnan's central character lived or died. Ghost Writer is a whodunnit thriller where hero McGregor never meant to solve a crime and every clue is delivered by deus ex machina. Even then, the dots never connect.

As much as I wanted to like this movie, Ghost Writer left me disappointed in a lot of people who really should have done better. McGregor nearly gets off the hook for his engaging performance, but he should have turned this script down altogether.

2 stars out of 5, and that's because I'm feeling generous today.

Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs

Image by Jeff Cushner via Flickr

The book Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs by Judi and Ron Barrett has been a grade-school favorite since its publication in 1982. Now it's an animated movie, and I've got some good and bad news for fans of the book:

• The bad: The movie version is very, very, very different from the book.
• The good: You will probably love the movie too, just for different reasons.

Many of the changes simply adapt the material to the film medium, and to modern sensibilities. In the book, it;s a grandpa telling tall tales about food storms. There's no hero, no girl to get, and no plot. That's fine for a bedtime story, but wouldn't make for a very interesting film.

In the movie version, we get to see why it's raining hot dogs and pizza. It's a cookie-cutter plot superimposed on the town of Chewandswallow from the book -- the hero changes the weather, falls in love, and then has to fix the huge mess he made. So far, so bad, right?

But here's the thing: from script to post-production, the people who made the movie love it and dare to go all the way with every wacky idea. If this was Shrek, you'd see the spray-on shoes joke exactly once, and the whole thing would be a cavalcade of throwaway pop-culture jokes. In Meatballs, every one of the potentially one-off jokes becomes a running gag with real importance to the plot.

I loved all the in-jokes and references to movie history, and my kids were laughing at the rat-birds and food fights. I would love to see sequels built around inventor Flint Lockwood. That franchise wouldn't build on the Barrett's only follow-up, but could grow into a pop culture phenomenon all its own. And that's just fine by me.

5 easy stars on a five-star scale!

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The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard

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Some directors push the envelope of good taste in a desperate attempt to snag the young male demographic. That never works. Exhibit A: The Ugly Truth.

Others simply take their jokes to the next level in a fearless cavalcade of T, A, and insults. It works, because it's funny.

Goods star Jeremy Piven may be interchangeable with Truth stud Gerard Butler, but they're working with vastly different material. Butler's film was formulaic and tedious, and the R-rated bits felt forced. Piven and his supporting cast -- yes, this is a one-man vehicle -- simply goes way over the top with every joke in a simple story.

This is Animal House on a used car lot. It's funny and smart, and not PC at all.

Stay home if you're thin-skinned. This movie serves up insults to everybody, whether you're a woman or a man, Asian or black, war veteran or nerdy musician. No punches are pulled, ever.

When The Goods hits the DVD market, I expect it to be a cult favorite at frats and bachelor parties. It's perfect fare for a night of beer and Buffalo wings with the guys.