JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH

"You're the man, Uncle Trev!"
"That's what I've been telling the scientific community for years!"

Trevor Anderson is your average messy professor. He is trying desperately to keep his deceased brother Max's research on progressive volcanology alive. When his nephew Sean comes to visit for a few days, one of Trevor's inactive sensors starts getting some interesting data - it reads exactly the number that it read when Max disappeared. Trevor sees this as his only chance to find out what happened to Max, so he and Sean team up with an Icelandic mountain guide named Hannah to the rumored center of the earth.

When Walden Media and New Line Cinema come together, you know you can expect cool things. My sister watched this for her birthday, and I was impressed at how good it was! At first, Sean is mumbly and disrespectful to Trevor, but soon his uncle begins to fill the void left by the death of the father he never knew. This movie is aimed at kids, but adults can enjoy it too. The effects are believable and great, and the cast is awesome. We all know the Brendan Fraser is good, and Josh Hutcherson is one of the best kid actors I've ever seen. The storyline is not THE LORD OF THE RINGS, but doesn't leave you rolling your eyes either.

As for the negative content, Sean and Trevor place "dibs" on Hannah a few times. There are a couple of kisses. There are dinosaur chases, big scary fish, and carnivorous plants that the gang has to fight off, but it's not flat out scary - they interlace everything with jokes and funnies. Still though, watch this before your little kids do. Some time after Trevor comments about the different types of schist rock, Sean groans, "Oh, we're in deep schist". Besides that little nod, JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH is completely clean.

This film is an interesting, action packed, watch-with-popcorn-in-the-dark type family movie! Check it out - it's a worth a watch or two!

Directed by: Eric Brevig ~ Produced by: Brendan Fraser (executive) ~ Written by: Jules Verne (novel), Michael Weiss, Mark Levin ~ Starring: Brendan Fraser, Josh Hutcherson, Anita Briem ~ Music by: Andrew Lockington ~ Cinematography: Chuck Shuman ~ Editing by: Paul Martin Smith, Dirk Westervelt, Steven Rosenblum ~ Distributed by: New Line Cinema, Walden Media ~ Release date: July 11, 2008 ~ Running time: 92 min

STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS

"Kidnapped, Jabba the Hutt's son has been. Negotiate the treaty with Jabba, Obi-Wan will. Find the renegades that hold Jabba's son, your mission will be, Skywalker."

~Yoda

With the war between the Jedi and the Separatists spreading throughout the galaxy, Count Dooku and his apprentice, Asajj Ventress, have abducted Jabba's son. The Sith hope to frame the Jedi for the crime and gain the Hutts' support. It is Obi-Wan and Anakin's job to find the Huttlet, but the mission takes an unexpected turn for Anakin when Master Yoda assigns him an apprentice - a youngling named Ahsoka. With this bother to deal with Anakin sets off to save Jabba's son, little knowing that it will stab him in the back.

Say hello to the first animated STAR WARS movie! I went to see it with low expectations - but not this low. But I'll talk about the positive elements first.

Anakin doesn't like Ahsoka at all at first. Both are very arrogant, but they soon learn to respect each other. Padme risks her life to try to assist the Jedi. Christopher Lee, Anthony Daniels, and Samuel L. Jackson all do the voices of the characters they play in the real movies. That was nice. The other voices are quite convincing - don't worry about being distracted through the movie because "that's not Obi-Wan Kenobi". There is some excellent animation, and some choppy animation. For all you clone fans, it was cool to see some more action from the 501st. They did quite well. The characters were all pretty true to their non-animated selves. Ventress finally gets a nod.

BUT, if you're expecting to see some real Star Wars - DON'T GO HERE! The plotline was a huge stretch. I mean, give me a break, Jabba the Hutt's son??? Surely they could've thought up something better than that! The story was weak at best, and the lightsaber fights were... not lightsaber fights. They were choppy and lego-style. In fact, all the starships looked like things my little brothers could make any day. There was no deep theme. We forgive the real movies for bad lines and strange side-stories because of the good vs. evil and Darth Vader and all that. This had no hint of Anakin's fall, or real good versus real evil, or anything of the sort. No brain food at all. I could be happy with calling it a kids' movie, like some attempt to get 5-year-olds engaged in Lucas's world, but the 501st commander lets out a swear during the first 10 minutes of the movie! Class. They add a horrid new character in Jabba's uncle - a purple, 80s looking Hutt that speaks Basic and talks like an old lady. Pointless. The music was not John Williams - didn't even SOUND like Star Wars. Dissapointing.

All in all, I echo the sentiments of a reviewer who said, "Has it come to this? Has the magical impact of George Lucas' original vision of Star Wars been reduced to the level of Saturday morning animation?" I'm not saying it's a no-go forever. After all, there's a whole TV series of this thing that's coming out. I'm saying don't go see it at the theaters and if your kids want to watch it, watch it first and don't expect to see any real Star Wars in there. You want Star Wars? Just put in REVENGE OF THE SITH and pop the popcorn!

Director: Dave Filoni ~ Producer: Catherine Winder ~ Writers: Henry Gilroy, Scott Murphy, Steven Melching ~ Starring: Matt Lanter, Ashley Eckstein, James Arnold Taylor, Dee Bradley Baker, Tom Kane, Nika Futterman, Ian Abercrombie, Anthony Daniels, Christopher Lee, Samuel L. Jackson, Catherine Taber ~ Music by: Kevin Kiner ~ Distributor: Lucasfilm, Warner Bros. Pictures ~ Released: United States:August 15, 2008 ~ Runtime: 98 minutes