'Yogi Bear' Trailer Delivers Weak Results Online

According to the most recent WebWatch report for theatrical trailers, Yogi Bear holds a 7.67% share of opinions, which puts it behind only TRON Legacy and Machete. In the report for unreleased films, the Warner Bros. release ranks 12th with a 2.46% share of opinions and a disconcerting 542 positive opinions vs. 272 negative opinions.

Yogi Bear certainly has its work cut out for it since it's opening on December 17, the same day as TRON Legacy. The latest TRON trailer inspired great reactions online, while Yogi Bear is off to a weak start. Luckily, with theater chains expanding their 3D capabilities at a healthy pace there should be room for two major 3D releases during the same weekend. There won't be too much overlap between the two flicks, because TRON's trailer plays as dark and brooding and that may keep families with young children away.

Yogi Bear opens a week after Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader and Gulliver's Travels hits theaters on December 22. Both of those films will dilute Yogi's audience slightly, but there's always a need for family entertainment during the holiday season. It'll be a case of healthy competition.

The Other Guys

Funny but forgettable

When a bomb explodes before Bruce Willis, his cheekbones are highlighted with ash. When one explodes before Will Ferrell, he collapses in a puddle sobbing, "I've got blood blisters on my hands! I call bullshit on that!" The joke isn't just that he's a wuss (he is), it's that movie violence never measures up to the human pain of the real thing. Does The Other Guys measure up to a dumb summer comedy? Sure: it's dumb and consistently funny, and the weekend high in Manhattan is 88° which means the sizable audiences who'll escape to the movie theater for some air conditioning will find The Other Guys as good and fleeting as a street corner popsicle.

In dog years (or dog days of summer years), it's been eons since big-ticket action films were pure, raw action. (Though Sylvester Stallone is out to change that with The Expendables.) Instead, in a nod to audiences who fake-gripe that, "There's, like, no way he could have survived all those bullets, man!" Hollywood's made action flicks where comedians joke through hailstorms of lead, where there's no risk that Seth Rogen might actually die and, therefore, no real thrill or flutter of tension.

Into this mock-machismo climate struts--or really, tiptoes--Will Ferrell, who's spent his career lampooning masculinity. He's either under the bar (Step Brothers, Elf) or far, far over it (Anchorman, Talladega Nights). Here, he's femme. According to sour new partner Mark Wahlberg, demoted to a desk job after accidentally capping Derek Jeter in the knee during Game 7, even the sound of Ferrell's pee is feminine. Wahlberg is half a foot shorter than Ferrell, but he makes up for the height with a glower that could kill pigeons. His career's being kneecapped by this namby pamby transfer from Forensic Accounting who drives (gasp!) a Prius, which in this world is like cruising in a Barbie bike. (Quick! Somebody warn Leonardo DiCaprio!) And now while real cops Damon Wayans Jr. and Rob Riggle, and superstar cops Samuel L. Jackson and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson are out cracking skulls, these two are stuck at NYPD headquarters where Ferrell whistles the theme to I Dream of Jeannie while Wahlberg plays solitaire and grumbles.

With the entrance of shyster stockbroker Steve Coogan (whose motto is "Live for Excess!") and the $32 billion lost investment he's scheming to recoup, director Adam McKay gives this undynamic duo a chance to prove their mettle. Problem is, no one else cares, not Captain Michael Keaton (having a lark) and definitely not the audience. How can we when even McKay and co-writer Chris Henchy's script would rather squander time on Ferrell's sonorous Irish singing and supremely hot wife, Eva Mendes? (It's meant to be funny that the goon treats her like garbage despite having a doctorate and a killer push up bra, but that joke wears thin fast.)

At least unlike those uppity, over-achieving women, the movie knows its place as multiplex fast food. Or does it? At the credits, McKay runs infographics on real life Ponzi schemes, as if to suggest all the earlier shenanigans were just a warm-up for some learning. And it turns out that fact still beats fiction. While Coogan's scrambling for $32 billion, McKay reminds us that Bernie Madoff swiped double that ($64.9 billion). Of course, by this moment in the running time, choppers have now exploded next to Ferrell and left him without a scratch; they're fittingly harmless in a movie that will sell you anything for a laugh.

Distributor: Columbia
Cast: Will Ferrell, Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson, Samuel L. Jackson, Steve Coogan, Andy Buckley, Ben Schwartz and Anne Heche

Director: Adam McKay
Screenwriters: Chris Henchy and Adam McKay
Producers: Patrick Crowley and Jimmy Miller
Genre: Action/Comedy
Rating: PG-13 for crude and sexual content, language, violence and some drug material.
Running time: 107 min
Release date: August 6, 2010

Inception Review : A Fun, Intellectual Thrill Ride! -spoilers warning

A Fun, Intellectual Thrill Ride! -spoilers warning Great movie, there were some pre-teens behind us in the theatre and they all hated it repeatedly saying how confused they were. That made me laugh as I enjoyed this fun and fast-paced romp. If you went in with no expectations and a semblance of an intellect, you probably were thrilled and still challenged to keep pace with the events. If you came in expecting a bubble-gum action pic, you got disapointed and I am glad you did, wait for the next Transformers movie. This movie required patience and thought to follow so if you hated it you probably don't posess those qualites. I thought it was an inventive and well resolved plot, Yes, the ending leaves you guessing if it too was a dream, but that's what the Director wanted to do. At least respect Nolan had a vision for his film. I find it interesting that in the final level with the partial repeated opening scene that Saito was very old. This means he lived a long time in the dream, trapped for decades and waiting for Cobb to find him. And when he was asking Cobb if he was going to kill him he was actually saying are you going to rescue me now? I find that revelation to be chilling and very effective. This one is well worth repeated viewings and I am going to be waiting for the blu-ray with great anticipation!