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Once upon a time, a child of predestination is born with a distinctive marking upon her arm, foretelling her destiny to bring about the demise of an evil tyrant, Queen Bavmorda. Knowledgeable of the prophecy, the malevolent Queen hordes pregnant women across the land with hopes of killing the child once she is born.

Just like the story of Moses, a well-meaning caretaker spirits the chosen one of an infant away from the Queen's dungeon and places her in a raft to float down the river to a distant land, assured in the knowledge that one day, Elora will return to liberate the people from oppression.

And that's pretty much where Willow's carbon paper thin plot begins and ends.

Characters like Willow (Warwick Davis) ,Madmartigan (Val Kilmer), and Raziel(Patricia Hayes) enter the picture as the obligatory forces of good, seeking to thwart the efforts of the bad guys to apprehend Elora and destroy her.

The utterly stupid storyline never progresses beyond the premise itself, deteriorating into a tedious succession of action filler as the heroes and villains swap possession of the baby back-and-forth.

Quite frankly, the almost inexplicably positive reception that this movie has received only bodes credibility to the notion that people give less of a hoot about a decent story, and merely look to eat up mounds of meaningless action sequences along with some obligatorily fancy creature effects.

It also perplexes me how many people seem to find the premise of this particular story "compelling", when insofar as the fantasy genre is concerned, the "child of prophecy" foundation is not only completely unoriginal, but one of the oldest and overused gimmicks in the book.

Lame jokes abound the movie's entirety, and Lucasfilm showcases a bloated demonstration of its latest "breakthroughs" in visual effects, which may have appeared impressive for the time, but have ultimately aged horribly over the years.

In one of the movies contrived and lame developments, Joanne Whalley's Sorcha begins the story as one of her mother's entrusted henchwomen, but quickly switches to the "good side" after developing the hots for Madmartigan, who amidst the influences of potion-induced delirium, spouts lame facsimiles of romantic poetry which quickly melt Sorcha's once evil resolve.

Unexplained spurts of arcane elements inadvertently spring various monsters and automatons to life, and ultimately serve no purpose whatsoever other than to showcase another round of Lucasfilm's latest special effects technology.

And so on.

Just as appallingly, in the end, the movie's stupid prophecy doesn't even come true. Elora herself never actually perpetuates the queen's demise, as latter winds up more or less killing herself by accident.

Positive highlights of the movie include James Horner's evocative score, and New Zealand's naturally gorgeous terrain.

Beyond that, Willow easily qualifies as one of the dumbest offerings in the fantasy genre, beaten out only by 2000's utterly atrocious "Dungeons and Dragons".

Attempting to masquerade itself off as a breed of passable mid-80's entertainment, "Sky Bandits" (aka "Gunbus") merely comes across as an attempt to fuse fumbling attempts at a self-styled "war epic" with two of the most obnoxious protagonists in cinematic history.

As two outlaws blackmailed into military service after a series of ham-fisted bank robberies, these two misplaced rednecks find themselves inadvertently posted to the honorary ranks of the Royal Flying Corps in a collective struggle to thwart the impositions of a German "Super Zeppelin" rampaging all over war-torn France.

As if the protagonists' affinity for petty squabbling and gung-ho Americanism weren't intolerable enough, Sky Bandits further compromises its thoroughly-compromised premise with a few other cheesy endeavors, including an eccentric engineer's unconventional "flying circus" of ridiculous airborne contraptions which conveniently figure into the film's lame-brained climax.

The movie's special effects are merely up-to-standard of the time period, but obviously have not aged particularly well, over the years.

Ultimately, "Sky Bandits" qualifies as a standard "B-movie not quite bad enough to be good", and should be merely viewed within the context of a series of misguided cinematic endeavors pertinent to the overcrowded film market of the 1980's.

And for the information of the filmmakers' less-than-cursory understanding of German, the correct term for the Deutsch rank of "Captain" is "Hauptmann", not "Kapitan". Jeez!

Technically speaking in terms of cinematography, 1917 is an amazing achievement, with a near flawless implementation of the highly publicized one-take illusion, and some truly gorgeous camera perspectives.

Unfortunately, that effectively summarizes the near extent of the film's virtues.

When matters relating to actual substance come into play, the movie embodies a redundant retread of tired war-movie clichés, improbable scenarios, and with a smattering of nationalistic propaganda thrown into the mix.

Unfortunately, Sam Mendes has managed to pull every brand of "hip" and "edgy" war movie trope out of his narcissistic rear end as to delude impressionable masses into mischaracterizing this work-of-art as the greatest and "most realistic" war movie ever made.

Thus, this film will likely wind up securing an Academy Award for "Best Picture" a meager few weeks into the authoring of this review. But, hey, if "Crash" can do it and "Forrest Gump" can do it, so can "1917"!

First of all, the movie fails where so many others have succeeded in terms of accurately conveying the horrid conditions of trench warfare. While real soldiers of the era were forced to contend with knee-deep mud and a prevalence of rats, 1917 depicts the trenches as merely the biproduct of less-than-luxurious and minimally damp conditions, complete with make-up work that depicts British soldiers and officers as extensively well-groomed and practically ready for a "night on the town", so to speak. This, notwithstanding the fact that a total of about six (evidently clean and well-cared-for) rats show up in the entire movie.

While barbed-wire injuries were largely deemed an "occupational hazard" so frequent as to motivate the majority of troops to shrug off such occurrences as meager discomforts, one of our esteemed protagonists (McKay) winds up sustaining a meager prick on his index finger and proceeds to whine about it for several minutes.

The atrociously written screenplay is turgid and thoroughly superficial, replete with an overabundance of redundant observations, simplistic deductions, and such a prevalence of one-syllable words that the script could have easily been crafted by one so bombastic and inarticulate as Donald Trump.

And then, there's the tired regurgitation of the "barbaric German" stereotype.

When a luckless Albatross D.III is shot down during the course of a dogfight, the burning aircraft proceeds to crash within the immediate vicinity of our heroes, leaving these courageous British lads to epitomize the "nobility of king and country" by humanely extracting the German pilot from the flaming wreckage. No sooner has one of our protagonists rushed to a nearby well to fetch their esteemed adversary a pale of water than the "sadistic Kraut" elects to repay their generosity and selflessness by literally stabbing one of them in the back (well okay, technically in the front).

The only other instance of an up-close-and-personal encounter with those "Dastardly Boche" embodies yet another cliched affair. In another selfless inclination to show mercy to their sworn enemies, our sole remaining hero pins a young German soldier to a concrete pillar, clamping a hand over his mouth and silently gesturing that he keep quiet to refrain from alerting his nearby compatriots. Predictably, the German soldier nods in compliance, our trusting hero removes his hand, and the double-crossing "Fritz" proceeds to shout "ALARM!!" toward his fellow comrades, leaving the British solider no alternative but to strangle him in silence.

Another stupid rehash of overused World-War-I-movie tropes concerns the obligatory encounter with the helpless French peasant and her child, who inexplicably seems to be taking refuge in the confines of a long-since devastated town which appears to have been evacuated eons ago.

Predictably, the two proceed to engage in sugar-coated banter through some obvious language barriers. The soldier compliments the beauty of her newborn baby. The woman gushes praise over the troop's kindness and bravery. The noble lad supplies the girl's offspring with some much-needed milk. The two exchange innocent smiles with each other. And blah, blah, blah; you know the drill.

But probably the biggest disservice that this movie provides to the "war to end all wars" is the fact that elects to finalize on a happy ending. Had the operation failed and the British division become decimated in the wake of German deception, the film may very well have left a haunting impression on viewers that properly hammers home the tragedy and senselessness of the First World War.

Speaking of the ending, the resolution in question is supplied through yet another hammy and improbable scenario, in which the exhausted hero arrives at his destination and comes face to face with the resident Colonel (Benedict Cumberbatch, doing his best Benedict Cumberbatch impression), who initially declines to read the General's explicit instructions to halt the impending offensive.

"I've heard that all before!!!", he declares in defiance.

While the chain-of-command should have easily presented sufficient motivation for the Colonel to at the very least consult the orders being presented, it's ultimately a different route which finally convinces him.

"Sir, it's a trap!!", the Corporal intones, leaving Cumberbatch to turn around in perplexity.

"WHATT?!!!" he scoffs.

Evidently, the Colonel seems utterly flabbergasted by the "inexplicable" notion that the Germans might actually be utilizing tactics (who would've thought?!!). At that point, he proceeds to snatch up the letter and shortly thereafter administers long overdue orders for his troops to stand down.

While not as "hip" and prone to 21st century gimmicks, there are tons of WWI movies out there which are far better representations of a conflict in which so many lives were needlessly sacrificed for elusive political objectives, and most importantly emphasize the futility of this particular conflict. For a more meaningful consultation on the subject, go see "All Quiet On The Western Front", "Gallipoli", "They Shall Not Grow Old", "Journey's End", or even the 1976 aviation endeavor "Aces High", to name a few.

All of these alternatives (and more) embody a far more meaningful dedication toward the four-year tragedy of "the war to end all wars" than the grotesquely overrated "1917", which truly epitomizes the essence of a "style-over-substance" flick.

Feel free to gawk in amazement at the gorgeous lighting and cinematography, coupled with the visually impressive implementation of the one-shot effect. But don't be duped into the notion that this movie teaches anything meaningful about the First World War, because it doesn't.

Screen and theater acting techniques may bode well toward establishing a sense of drama within a realm where clearcut emotions, facial expressions, and unnaturally fluent speech patterns may enhanced form of medium clearly intended toward entertainment value, but in terms of attempting to emulate real-life behaviors, these methodologies almost always fall flat.

Thus, therein lies the essence of the problems with this movie, notwithstanding the problems with its storyline, in that the melodramatic clichés, overemotional expressions, unbroken sentence structures and laughable bits of overacting send this movie's pretensions toward realism crashing to the ground with greater impact than the "asteroids" that serve as its subject matter.

Notice how the news anchors maintain persistent eye contact with the camera, never glancing downward to look at their notes, as they are clearly reciting lines from a perfectly memorized and persistently rehearsed script. Seeking the all too recognizable imperfections of everyday conversation, such as "um"s, "yknow"s, apprehensive pauses or even so much as a broken sentence? You won't find it here, as "Without Warning"s depiction of "real life" clearly emits within an alternate universe where every bit of every day conversation is uttered with stringent adherence to grammatical correctness, exaggerated fluctuations in tone clearly designed to emphasize the character's ever present mental status and overzealous emotional expressions, lest the content of one's speech fail to properly clarify one's state of mind for the intellectually impaired.

One will also notice on-site news broadcasts lacking the characteristic confinement of audio cues emitting solely from a microphone, as the camera's seem to pick up background noises and surrounding ambiance with unbelievable clarity.

Minus the expressions, the behaviors of each and everyone involve serve as further reminders to the audience that they are in fact watching a movie. When spotting a girl who appears to have mysteriously been deposited at the center of a meteor impact site, the anchorwoman proceeds to "check on her" by immediately shoving the microphone in her face to record an odd verbal pattern which ultimately serves as one of the movie's preposterous "twists". No examining her. No inquiring as to whether she's okay. No muttering impressions that the child obviously appears to be in shock. Simply setting the immediate stage for a metaphorical "speech" that was clearly all too staged from the get go. At one point, an air force general holds a press conference with which to inform the public as to a series of facts which have already been established by prior broadcasts, then at the first sign of queries, holds an all too obviously "stunned" expression for several seconds, before declaring "no more questions", a gesture that practically screams out, "Yes, I'm definitely hiding something". A) Nice overacting, and B), why hold a press conference if you're essentially not going to say anything that people didn't know already?

One of the most laughable bits that boasts further credentials as to the movie's propensity for melodramatics and lack of logic depicts one of the news anchors on site of the impending impact zone of another "asteroid" amidst the military's plan to demolish it before impact. As the screen brightens, he proceeds to stumble around in the midst of an hysterical panic, questioning his colleague at the news room "WHY AREN'T THEY SHOOTING AT IT???!!!!" A) A one-way ticket to the Royal Hospital For Overracting for you, sir! (consult Monty Python's Ypres sketch for more information) and B) You're colleague is a news anchor; how the F would he know?

Clearly, one would need a twenty-series encyclopedia just to document every instance in which the movie's execution registers anything but the documentary-like impression that the filmmakers were striving for, but the storyline contains enough problems as it is.

One scientist's perfect deductions concludes that the first two "asteroids" were deliberately deposited in sparsely populated zones in preparation for guiding the third "vehicle" to its destination, the latter of which was destroyed by what he considers our "overzealous" use of an anti-satellite missile.

If these aliens needed "beacons" to land their welcome wagon, how did they manage to land the preceding probes with such precision?

The scientist proceeds to berate our "aggressive" behavior as having "declared war" on an alien species, and thus the remainder of the film proceeds to further "document" their revenge. So, this intellectually superior race of extraterrestrials tossed two over-sized rocks at our planet, killed quite a number of people, yet couldn't even contemplate how a civilization on the receiving end might perceive these gestures as a threat? Kudos to the movie for conceptualizing by far the dumbest technologically advanced race ever to permeate the universe.

Other illogical fallacies include the military's decision to transport the scientist in question (from within the country I might add) via F-16 (in order to naturally speed up the ETA). Clearly, given the distance traversed, the use of a fighter jet wouldn't make much of a decisive difference to merit this gesture, while the movie's ostensible implications that the jet would be cruising to its destination at top speed downplays the lack of fuel efficiency accorded the process of proceeding anywhere for considerable lengths on full afterburner.

With its overpopulation of plot holes, clichés, and innumerable little cues in the field of acting that completely foil any impressions to the public that what they're seeing is "real", this pretentious attempt to cash in the mock-documentary genre couldn't have been executed more poorly if the filmmaker's had planned it that way.

Never in my entire life had I remotely entertained the prospect of cheating on a high school exam, and admittedly, only after screening the inept conceptualizations of youth culture all too frequently exhibited by ABC's "Afterschool" series, with a particular emphasis on the contents of "The Cheats", did I actually consider cheating if only for the purpose of defying the message contained within the implications of a laughably ridiculous episode which I found impossible to take seriously.

Aside from suffering under the rigors of such inadequate screen writing, "The Cheats" further undermines it's own foundation by treating the occurrence of mere cheating incident with all the severity and urgency of a political conspiracy. Hence, consider one scene in which two teachers probe a variety of evidence after hours in effort to determine who might have schemed their way into achieving an 'A' which they hadn't earned, which is exhibited with such a morbid level of intensity typically reserved for cinematic depictions of district attorneys presiding over a murder case.

To add insult to injury, the characters exhibit such appalling personality traits through inane dialogue which any rational viewer would find impossible to take seriously.

After honest, straight-'A' student Lynnie Ryan is advised to snitch, under penalty of expulsion, on several of her friends suspected of being culprits in the aforementioned cheating incident, she attempts to console lifelong acquaintance Holly (McAdams) into turning herself in. Foreseebly reluctant to do so, Holly attempts to reassure her that the principal is merely bluffing with the aforementioned threat.

As if propelled by some supernatural form of inexplicable stupidity, Ryan inanely retorts "Are you sure?" "Promise!" Beth reassures her with a wink.

And low and behold, exhibiting a lack of foresight which no homosapien on the planet is possibly capable of, Lynnie buys into her friend's advice, hook, line, and sinker, and foreseeably suffers the consequences, as a result.

Assuming by some freak occurrence that this turkey is somehow destined to be released on DVD, "The Cheats" will certainly more than suffice as perfect viewing material for one's "B-Movie Night".

Not only does Tank offer varied assortments in the ways of wit, action, and humor, I believe that it also accurate portrays the periodic levels of corruption that previously and continue to plague the various small town, white-bred trailer trash communities across the nation, moreover a mild example of which I can personally relate to.

Two years ago, a similar rural community with it's own breed of laws and regulations attempted to suspend my driving privileges upon ticketing a driver for speeding that had confiscated a driver's license that I had previously reported as stolen. My attempts to explain myself only proved a fruitless endeavor, as the community encouraged me to pay up and get over it. Only after I hired an attorney and threatened a lawsuit, did the grit munching scum-suckers in question withdraw their insistence.

Within this film, a corrupt southern bred police department attempts to enslave an Army Major's son after a deputy is justifiable beaten up in retaliation to assaulting a falsely branded "prostitute". As a portion of cover, the malevolent Sheriff runs a broadly defined farm that actually qualifies as a labor camp from which to subject luckless youths to intensive brutality. After failed attempts to appease the Sheriff's fury, James Garner elects to take matters into his own hands, commandeering a personally owned Sherman Tank in which to spring his son, and demolish a few of the corrupt police department's facilities along the way.

Perhaps another reason I enjoyed this movie is the presence of the highly versatile score by the incomparable Lalo Schifrin, who employs every compositional style in the book from Jazz to traditional military marches and a highly catchy disco tune. Unfortunately, the latter becomes a subject of unwarranted contempt from the Sergeant major's redneck upbringing, as he encourages local bars to refit their repertroire to stay any unwanted coersions to "dance the funky monkey".

Overall, the film offers a highly sympathetic premise, that eerily enough seems completely plausible in today's terms, given the prevalence of small towns, isolated from the civilized world and thus prone to erect their own dictatorial policies, no matter how severe.

Talk about ineptitude (among other things), this supposed homage to an actual WWI squadron perpetuates just about every conceivable cliché imaginable, furthermore effectively stealing elements from nearly every aviation flick ever devised, including Blue Max, the Dawn Patrol, Dark Blue World, the Tuskegee Airmen, and even that age-old silent flick from 1927, WINGS. Furtherome, the battle scenes themselves reflect the most cheesy elements of propaganda war flicks, culminating in the endless ranks of snarling villains, the cheering crowds on the ground below as our heroes intercept the strafing Huns to save the day, and even a veritable race against the proverbial clock to destroy a German airship before it supposedly "obliviates" the entirety of Paris.

And as of the various manners in which this film blatantly exhibits its readily apparent lack of prowess for historical and technical accuracies, let me count the ways.

For starters, let's consider the countless manners in which the on-screen aircraft repeatedly defy the laws physics. Admittedly, some reviewers have pointed out Tony Bill's part-time profession as an aerobatic pilot, which in essence appears to compromised his interpretations of World War I combat, as he seems to have derived his perception of first world war fighters from having logged too many hours in Pitts Special as opposed to having derived genuine insight into the performance capabilities and limitations of such elaborate contusions of fabric and wood. For one thing, the aircraft exhibit speeds twice in excess of the actual performance capabilities of World War I fighters, culminating in a host of physical implausibilities as overly efficient climbing characteristics as if instigated in the absence of a stall barrier, low-level maneuvers that would have invariably either stalled the aircraft or resulted in considerable wing shear, not to mention that these biplanes and Triplanes exhibit phenomenal roll-rates which no multi-winged aircraft on the planet could possibly emulate. Evidently, Tony Bill exhibits an accurate conception of three dimensional space, but not of the actual performance characteristics of World War One aircraft.

Furthermore, the movie's glaring affinity for historical inaccuracy reflects the presence of numerous aircraft that never existed during the Escardrille's 1916 escapades, including the SE.5, Handley Page 400, Gotha IV, and of course the Fokker Dr. 1 Triplane, which brings me to another issue that drives me out of my mind, culminating in one of the most trivial misconceptions about World War I aviation. Bottom line, the above depiction stems from a childish conception that by default associates World War One German aviation with countless formations of red-coated Triplanes, as if the Germans had somehow managed to perpetuate endless clones of Von Richtofen, to say nothing about the fact that the Fokker Dr. 1 was ultimately produced in insignificant numbers, culminating in an actual production run of only 160 examples.

In fact, the Lafayette Escabdrille fought the majority of its pitched-battles against outmoded Fokker E.III Eindeckers and two-seat Albatross and Aviatik observation scouts, the superior equipment of the Amercans frequently offset by their readily apparent lack of experience.

And another thing, the average life expectancy of a World War I pilot is actually confined to the space of a single week, unlike the film's more optimistic projection of 3 to 6. Furthermore, somebody should remind the screenwriters never to emphasizes the virtues of German aircraft by citing the presence of all powerful engines, as the rates of horsepower which the Germans managed to conceive lagged considerably behind that of their allied counterparts.

Furthermore, pilots were indeed NOT permitted to instill their own personal insignias, considering that, unlike World War II, pilots were rarely assigned individual aircraft, often dispersing their ranks among the types available and typically sharing planes out amongst each other. Furthermore, as depicted within the closing scene, there is simply no such thing as rejoining one's formation in the event of finalizing an aerial skirmish, as aircraft frequently fought pitched battles at length, scattering miles away from each other, thus relaying each pilot with the burden of utilizing landmarks and navigations skills as the sole means for finding their way home on an individual basis.

Reverting to the film's one and only redeeming feature, the various aspects in which the Flyboys attempts to model battle damage in conjunction with the various behaviors of shedding wings and burning engines bear a more accurate depiction than the remainder of the film. However, given the all too elaborate staging of such sequences through an over use of Green Screen techninques in conjunction with an overabundance of CGI effectively renders the overall appearance as reminiscent of, as one reviewer stated, "playing a really cool video game" as opposed to providing a genuine "in the cockpit" sensation for piloting such frail machinations.

Most offensive, however, is the gratuitous manner in which the movie concocts the entire spectacle within a fanciful dressing of glamour, all the while pedaling it's pretensions for historical and physical accuracy.

In all fairness, perhaps I should lend Tony Bill an additional bone by citing the best moment of the entire movie, in which the guts of that blabbering Christian fanatic splatters the entirety of his instrument panel.

Ultimately, the photograph at the end of the actual members of the Lafayette Escadrille seems like a cruel joke, as if the preceding spectacle of cartoonish escapism somehow culminates in an authentic tribute to the squadron in question.

Considering the shear sparsity of world war one related aviation flicks, it doesn't take a genius to brand this endeavor as by far the worst ever conceived.

For more informative and productive viewing, I can suggest virtually every other aviation flick on the market, from the veritable classics like "Blue Max" and "Aces High" , to some of the more lukewarm efforts of "Ace of Aces" and "Von Richtofen and Brown".

While, all WWI aviation flicks bear their fair share of merits and admirable depictions of warfare over the front(with, of course, the exception of the recent and insufferably cheesy "Flyboys", Aces High ranks as unparalleled champion in depicting the forbidding overall sensation of World War I aerial combat. Unlike the romantic and heroic endeavors as popularized by the recruiters (of which I suppose Tony Bill also qualifies), dogfights are portrayed as a harrowing, fearful, and thoroughly traumatic experience, thus culminating in a host of undesirable personality side-effects as reflected by the various manners in which the battle hardened veterans of 56 squadron have exhibited in order to cope with the prolongued stay on the verge of the frontline.

Squadron leader Malcolm McDowell, for instance, can longer undergo combat sorties without saturating himself thoroughly with liquor beforehand, which he discloses as one of the reasons in which he's socially isolated himself from his wife in order to spare her any habitual bouts of his drunken temperament. As another pilot, Crawford's constant battle-weariness has progressively waned his psychological status to the breaking point, whereby he attempts to fabricate a medical condition in which to be relocated away from the front. Sure enough, by the film's end, Crawford's constant, as he himself characterizes, "frightful funk's" have finally driven him quite literally past the brink of insanity.

As the squadron's sole replacement for the week, newcomer Peter Firth's posting to the squadron is analyzed through the film's progressive subtitles, counting the days in which he survives in order to illustrate the alarmingly brief life-expectancy of a World War I fighter pilot. Needless to say, his dreams of idealism and glory become instantly shattered within a few moments, thus guaranteeing that he himself will come to understand the grim futility of his surroundings prior to his own demise.

While, potentially jarring at first, the progressive series of events begin to justify McDowell's constant sense of anguish at the sight of new recruits who arrive and perish with such intensified regularity.

Indeed, like all war movies, this film suffers from a few if trivial inaccuracies, including the modified wing sections and landing gear of the SE-5a replicas in effort to render the types as more aerobatically feasible, in conjunction with Presentation of German types that, aside from the Fokker Eindekkers, don't exactly embody representations of particular aircraft type, but accurately reflect the colorful and varied assortment in which the German's utilized multiple types within individual squadron's coupled with an habitual refusal to indulge in camouflaged paint-jobs that would have otherwise augmented their fighting capacity.

One aspect, which I greatly appreciated is manner in which Jack Gold accurately establishes how pilots strayed far from one another in the aftermath of an dogfight, thus relaying each pilot with the burden of navigating their own way home. ALso, the widespread devastation of the front is accurately represented as well, as exemplified by a particularly effective moment of solitude, in which Firth and Plummer indulge in picnic at a riverside, only to become flabbergasted at the sight of living fish, swimming upstream. Even within this lull in battle, this moment of relaxation features the ominous but distant rumble of artillery fire in the distance.

Granted, over the past week, I've resorted to an habitual level of repeated screenings of this classic, if only to compensate for having endured the veritable cliché-ridden atrocity otherwise known as "Flyboys", a wildly inappropriate endeavor of cartoonish escapism rendered all the more offensive by its perpetual "fun'n'games" conception of war over the Front.

If anything, when stacked side-by-side, "Aces High" and "Flyboys" embody the veritable epitome of opposing extremities, thus symbolizing the respective "right" and "wrong" manner in which to construct a movie about World War I aviation.

Given that Tony Bill's conception of his own self-styled epic as "the first World War I aviation film in 40 years" reflects his lack of awareness of the existence of this title, I highly recommend that he issue a thorough screening of this movie ASAP. Perhaps then, Tony Bill might learn something outside of his all-too-glamorous and boyish conceptions of aerial warfare over the front, and perhaps a even significant reduction in the overall "cliche factor" to boot.

Bottom line: compare and contrast, one will soon come to acquire further merit in which to conclude that "Flyboys" unequivocally sucks.

Whatever its artistic merits, the subtle implications of Spielberg's Empire of the Sun convey a far more sinister impression both of the director's distorted view of history and his readily apparent hypocrisy.

It still shocks me the sheer number of individuals who seem to have misinterpreted this film as condemning atrocities as perpetrated by the Imperial Japanese Army. As such, consider the facts.

In the film, the Japanese Army regulars never kill so much as a single person, implying that the worst of its conduct relied upon repossessing real estate and partially neglecting the medical and sustenance needs of westerners in captivity.

The Chinese are portrayed as babbling idiots, whose ( as Spielberg implies) readily apparent hysteria ultimately separated Jamie from his family. In fact, the biggest nemesis to Christain Bale embodies that of a homeless Chinese boy who attempts to rob and beat him. Furthermore, the fact that Japanese troops apparently perpetuated little more than a repossession of real estate and confiscation of a slightly greater portion of food resources tends to imply the panicked crowds of Chinese attempting to flee the Japanese occupation as guilty of rampant paranoia and hysteria, considering that (according to Spielberg) they had little to fear from their impending occupants.

Mind you, I have no qualms whatsoever of Spielberg's incentive to portray the Japanese as multidimensional humans, offset by some individuals who perpetrated reprehensible acts; that's fine. However, comparing his readily apparent sense of moral outrage as a contextual misinterpretation leads to the killing of a well-intentioned Japanese pilot by one of the main characters to the more than subtle implications of Saving PRivate Ryan that attempts to perpetuate excuses for Americans who executed unarmed German prisoners lays bear the directors affinity for insufferable hypocrisy.

And, as one reviewer already pointed out, the story focuses primarily on the (not so severe, as Spielberg implies) maltreatment of white detention camp victims, rather than upon the Chinese who endured far worse at the hands of a doctrine that, like Naziism, perpetuated a sense of racial purity. Indeed, one cannot help but wonder whether Spielberg shares this imperial doctrine by envisioning the Japanese as racially superior the remaining occupants of the Pacific and Southeast Asia.

Only after Munich has Spielberg begun to show even the faintest traces of either maturity or objectivity. However, he'll require a lot more deeds before overcoming his legitimate (however non-official) status as one of the world's pre-eminent hypocrites.

Hardly worth more than a secondary glance, this half-baked cartoon adventure suffers from a bland, inconsequential presentation, for which the only meaningful reaction subscribes to a perpetually bemused, "What was the point?"

Granted, the fact that the creators have gravitated toward such a generically inept slogan as "You can't stop the girl" should be ample warning as to the show's readily-apparent lack of sophistication. Furthermore, despite the best efforts of the production team, the leading protagonist never truly resonates with the impositions of true hero. HArdly inclined toward even a broad definition of "butt-kicking", this supposed martial arts expert, more often than not, resorts to simply bouncing her foes into submission, Super Mario Bros-style. To add insult to injury, Juniper Lee herself is far too often relegated to the role of damsel in distress, thereby awaiting the heroic deeds of her little brother or Scottish terriers in order to prevail. Frankly, the prospect of being rescued time and time again by your own baby brother or even the noble deeds of man's best friend doesn't sound particularly heroic, in my book.

Despite the comical distortions of the characters, Juniper Lee is surprisingly devoid of humor, augmenting its so-so foundation with an insufferable tendency for taking itself far too seriously. Perhaps the creators might have benefited from a more serious presentation, ala Ben 10 or Teen Titans. As it stands, Juniper displays a cognitive confusion of combining elaborately "Bugs Bunny"-like characters with nary a single joke in sight.

God, this movie was horrible!

Consider three ominous premonitions with which to conclude that you're in for a particularly lousy alien invasion flick, in that the extraterrestrials in question 1) have adopted English as their own language, 2) visually resemble humans in every manner save for a few isolated patches of superficial make-up, and 3) have allocated their own race with such an innocuously cheesy title as "The CouCou" (Evidently, somebody in the writing staff is more than a little "cuckoo", in this endeavor.)

The premise of the film borrows heavily from the early eighties miniseries "V", in that aliens are actively in the process of harvesting a limited quantity of humans as necessary food supplies. On this occasion, the global spectrum of worldwide government's have conceded to a pact, in which 8 million pre-selected specimens are to be redistributed to the invaders in exchange for avoiding the alternative, that of earth's outright destruction. However, the aliens themselves had apparently left some critical gadgets behind in their 1947 mishap at Roswell. Now, scientist Stephen Chase (Brad Johnson) has enlisted the help of the elusive Dr. Baker (by the way, who the hell ever heard of a Baker with an Eastern-European accent?) for the sake of using the contraptions against them. As astronomical coincidence would have it, the unique DNA-structure of Daddy's little girl (portrayed by Erin Ross) beholds the genetic formula, whereby the extraterrestrials can stave off the spread of a ravaging plague.

Clearly, the plot has effectively relegated the potential of this flick to nothing further than the seen-it-done-it-before variety, and the woefully inept screenplay doesn't help.

Accordingly, the limited imagination of the screenwriters has left little more for Ross to do, other than expound through clenched teeth her endless list of grievances about life and limb as the malevolent E.T.'s proceed to operate on her.

After a temporary jailbreak, the equally-obnoxious Alex finds time to console her with a gist of fatherly advice, "You just gotta keep going', keep going'." (write that down, boys and girls).

When not groan-inducing in its content, the moronic script lends itself to occasional bouts of inadvertent humor.

For example, one particular instance which left me rolling on the floor transpires as Johnson barrels forth toward a low-hovering alien craft as one of the more reluctant fellow resistance members hollers, "You're going the wrong way!!"

Beyond the two-hours worth of cheesy dialogue are the poorly directed battle sequences, in which the combatants on both sides proceed to crouch in spatial areas to blindly exchange gunfire and laser blasts back and forth. You would think that if any of these idiots were actually interested in prolonging their own lifespan, somebody might actually contemplate the prospect of utilizing available cover.

As if the style wasn't bad enough, the structure of the plot itself contains a sufficient number of holes with which to infinitely supply a doughnut factory.

For instance, consider the film's feeble attempt to concoct a "compelling twist" to its barely sustainable storyline. As it turns out, the human-alien pact in question had been erected under the doctrine of a predisposed double-cross. Thus, soon after harvesting their eight millionth specimen, the aliens proceed upon a global rampage, thereby rounding up every last homosapian they can find. Needless to say, this begs the question, why bother to form the pact in the first place?

Clearly, the aforementioned shortcomings merely represent the tip of the scale in the film's ongoing list of flaws. But the above alone is more than sufficient cause with which to give any reasonable viewer incentive to stand clear of this moronic rehash of the alien invasion formula.