Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate’s life for me.
I saw this on a Sunday afternoon matinee. Was bored, why not.
It was okay.
Johnny Depp remains a fine actor, and his character was enjoyable.
Unfortunately, the movie ran too long, left some interesting puzzlers (how did he use the manacles to slide down the rope.. no really, how’d he do that when was bound by them and thus formed a complete circle with no break?), and was dominated by skinny men.. aren’t pirates supposed to be swarthy? Arrrrrhhh.

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Out of deference to Alan Moore and great admiration for the graphic novel that spawned this movie, I will pretend the graphic novel does not exist.
That said, League sucked.
It had fantastic set design, great props and costumes, and excelled in displaying the wonders of Captain Nemo’s Nautilus. Unfortunately, the plot was pathetic (I’d say ridiculous but comic book hero movies are ridiculous… they just have to be good in their ridiculousness), and for all of it I simply blame Sean Connery’s executive producer credit.
Leave well enough alone and just act cantankerous on the screen. You could see the potential in the film is the sad part… you could see where it could have been a fun movie. Ah, well. Lesson learned, I hope. I fear the $23 million opening weekend will encourage a lower-budget sequel — let’s just hope Mr. Connery keeps his mitts off the directing and writing, eh?

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I avoided seeing this on opening night because the trailers looked like crap and I really had no desire to see Arnold try for one last hurrah. Then a week later, Han calls me up and tells me that T3 is good. He put good and T3 together in the same sentence. This was astounding. I was already perplexed about the decent reviews by snobby critics, but now Han was giving a thumbs up. Hell’s bells. I made a deal with his ass: if T3 was worse than 2 Fast 2 Furious and Charlie’s Angels, he would refund me half my ticket.
So I went to see it, and dragged Sunyoung along with me against her will. And afterwards, as we walked out, she turned to me and said, “”You know that was actually pretty good.”"
“”I know!”"
So Han didn’t owe me a fiver, and I actually enjoyed the movie.
Go figure.

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I had a good 4th. Sunyoung and I went down to De Anza Cove in San Diego for the SoCalEuro barbecue at De Anza Cove in San Diego. I arrived a little after three in the morning, wanting to beat the traffic and not feeling like sleeping a little then driving. Instead, I drove down, then slept in the car. A few were already there, having pitched a tent to protect the firepit from claimjumpers. The party started slowly at seven in the morning, and by ten everyone was having a nice old time of it. Food got under way around eleven, though the lumpia I had brought down was gone by 8:30 (snooze you lose). Pictures here.

Formulaic fun knows no bounds. Go in realizing this, and you’ll enjoy yourself. I did.

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