Stabbone and McGraw: McBone Mini-Reviews; The McBone Week in Movies

Monday, October 4, 2010

McBone Mini-Reviews; The McBone Week in Movies

Friday - Touted as a bizarro Boyz in the Hood, Friday is actually three movies rolled into one big fat doobie. What begins as an amusing go-nowhere comedy about smoking weed on a lazy Friday suddenly becomes a High Noon-inspired race against the clock when our two heroes Craig (Ice Cube) and Smokey (Chris Tucker) are ordered to deliver the local drug dealer 300 dollars by 10 PM or face getting 'dealt with.' Another swing brings us home with a coming of age story when Craig faces a tough decision: whether to use his fists or his firearm in dispatching the neighborhood bully. Annoying fat and fart jokes abound, but Friday overcomes its infantile leanings to deliver a smart comedy loaded with classic characters (notably Tiny Lister as hulking, villainous Deebo) and an important condemnation of the gun violence that plagues many black neighborhoods in LA. 4.0 McBones

Serenity - Summer Glau is a refugee telepath on the run from a government assassin. She's also mentally unstable and prone to fits of deadly violence. What makes her so compelling that a crew of misfits would risk almost certain doom in transporting her across the galaxy? I was told I needed to watch the TV series Firefly for this Joss Whedon flick to make any sense. I didn't, and I had a hell of a good time anyway. Jaunty, jokey and imaginative, this sci-fi romp steals from Star Wars, Star Trek and zombie movies in the best ways possible. Though the acting is roundly bad (Chiwetel Ejiofor, cool and menacing, is a notable exception) and the cgi cheesy as hell, Serenity shows us how a great story (and an ass-kicking young woman) trumps all. 3.5 McBones

Let Me In - Speaking of women kicking ass, Chloe Grace Moretz knocked it out of the park as Hit-Girl in Kick-Ass, and she's at it again as a 12-year-old vampire in an adept yet pointless remake of a genuine modern masterpiece. Director Matt Reeves treats his material with an artist's touch, but don't dilute your experience with the vastly superior original by watching this first. 3.5 McBones

nwb

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The Legend of Stabbone and McGraw

In 1967 the world's most powerful criminal super-genius, Stabbone, stole ten trillion dollars worth of gold boullion. Police, baffled as to the whereabouts of Stabbone's purported impenetrable underground lair, called on top investigator Rock McGraw to crack the case. Working tirelessly day after day, McGraw eventually tracked Stabbone to an abandoned latex mask factory. While McGraw radioed the boys for backup, Stabbone made his daring escape. In the chaos that ensued, both disappeared. Thirty years later, the case of Stabbone and McGraw remains a mystery, though some say that McGraw remains undercover, in relentless pursuit of his evil arch-nemesis.