2008, in theaters

If you've been paying attention, you'll have noticed that Dan and I have fairly eclectic taste in movies. Friday was opening day for two films Dan really wanted to see:Wanted and Wall-E.

I had discount movie passes. Wall-E counted as a special engagement that invalidated the passes. Wanted did not.

As usual, Dan had read the comic.

Now, I mentioned above that we saw this movie opening night. Clearly, I haven't written about it before now. Does that tell you anything?

It wasn't a bad movie. If it had been, I would have been here ranting about it. It just wasn't that good a movie. It was entertaining -- a nice, mindless summer flick -- but it wasn't anything special.

The movie is about a normal guy who is pretty much kicked around by his normal life: his girlfriend is cheating on him with his best friend, and his boss's only joy in life is making her underlings' lives miserable. But then, one day Angelina Jolie shows up...

And then the bullets start flying, and don't stop until the ending credits roll. Our (anti)Hero, as it turns out, is the son of the world's greatest assassin, and as such is the only one capable of killing his murderer.

But who cares? He gets to make bullets go around corners, see Angelina Jolie naked, and blow up rats.

The movie is heavily reliant on comic book/movie magic, and that's OK. If you can accept the Loom of Fate, the rest of it falls into place. If you can't, well...

I enjoyed the movie. It was fun. But it wasn't all that great. I would have been just as happy seeing it on video in a few months. If you haven't seen it yet, save your money and hold off.

Oh, and if you do decide to see it? Go in understanding that it's very gory. Blood doesn't bother me much, but brains kind of cross the line for me.

The rest of the Internet

As always, beware spoilers
The official film website.
The IMDB and Wikipedia pages.
Decent reviews at Rotten Tomatoes.
An enthusiastic review from Peter Travers at Rolling Stone.