Everybody would probably like to re-live one day of his or her life. Everyone makes a mistake or two that they'd like to fix. But what if you had to live the same day over again, and again, and again, and again...?

Phil Connors goes through this strange cycle of life in "Groundhog Day," an undeniably strong comedy that features a great script and cast. It's like a Frank Capra story with sarcasm. And it works perfectly.

Bill Murray plays Connors with all the air of a frustrated cynical everyman who is fed up with his job and life. Phil is a weatherman for a local news station, and every year he goes to Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania for the Punxsutawney Phil event: commonly recognized as Groundhog Day. You know how it goes. The groundhog comes out on February 2nd. If it sees its shadow, it's six more weeks of winter. If it doesn't, it's spring.

Well, the only problem about going to this event every year for Phil is that he hates it. He hates the cheery people. The little town. The weather. The event. The story. Everything. He hates it. He is a lonely, desolate, forsaken soul. With a great cynical side.

Andie McDowell plays a new manager--err, womanager--who goes with Phil to the event, along with Chris Elliot, the cameraman. Phil reports, they tape it, it's a done deal. The end. Phil goes back home. It happens every year, and this year should be no exception.

Keyword: Should.

Because this year isn't like most years. Due to severe weather, the roads have all been closed, leaving only one option: Stay in Punxsutawney until the storm blows over. So, Phil heads back to his cheery hotel, and tucks in for a dreaded nap. But when he wakes the next morning, something odd happens. The day is the exact same day as before. It is Groundhog Day.

Again.

Waking up to the same Sonny and Cher song as the morning before, Phil panics as he finds everything exactly the same, just as it was the day before. He knows everything that is going to happen. He shrugs it off as a weird case of deja vu and heads back to sleep. But when he wakes up, alas! The day is...yesterday--again. Well, technically.

So Phil comes to terms with the fact that there is now way out of this small little town. He tries everything. He steps in front of a moving car. He electrocutes himself. He jumps off a building. All to no avail. Oh, he dies, all right. But the next day he's back and it's Groundhog Day again.

Part of what makes "Groundhog Day" so excellent is the story. The characters and actors alone are great enough to recommend this movie, but the truth is, I cannot think of a better story to throw someone like Bill Murray into. He uses his smart-alecky ways to a new extreme. His character is a bit like Scrooge from the tale "A Christmas Story," which is ironic, because Murray was in a parody on Scrooge's tale called "Scrooged."

But regardless, Bill Murray is perfect as the irreverent and cynical Phil. Everything he does he carries out with a dumb, "I'm-smarter-than-you" face. He considers himself better than everyone else. He thinks he is smart by skipping the big Holiday ordeal. It is all so stupid to him. But, as this story teaches us, having an attitude like that can get you in big trouble.

Another thing that is great about "Groundhog Day" is that Phil Connors does what we would do. For example: When he finds out he has this ability to repeat the same day over and over, he does things the average person would do. The human weakness. Too many comedies with the same formula don't try to exploit this human weakness, but "Groundhog Day" does. We see Phil memorize the steps to successfully robbing an armored truck filled with cash. But the reason he can go to bed with a clear conscience is because he knows the next day that everything will be back to normal again. He will never have robbed the truck; never have bought a Ferrari, etc. Phil does what WE would do, and that is one importance aspect of "Groundhog Day." I would never rob an armored truck, but if I was stuck living the same day over and over, it would do no harm to take the cash--it would be back in the truck in the morning! So, I might do that. (Although my conscience would still get in the way.)

There was a little comedy a few years ago that starred John Candy. The movie was named, "Delirious," and it was about a soap opera writer who bumped his head and woke up trapped inside his own written world. And everything he would write on his typewriter came true.

I was reminded of that film while watching "Groundhog Day," which is undeniably a stronger comedy. While the movie "Delirous" was good, and pretty interesting, there were so many things Candy could have done with the ability to create and control everything, and he didn't do them. I think that's where "Groundhog Day" steps in, filling in the blanks. There's nothing I love more than watching a comedy where the main character divulges into the human nature.

In other words, I love watching characters on-screen giving in to the same human weaknesses that we all exhibit.

And that's exactly what Phil does in "Groundhog Day." And that is why, among other reasons, it is one of my favorite films.

With each and every passing of a week it becomes evidently clearer that Hollywood's fixation on making the almighty dollar is much more important than creating quality material. Alas, when the great films do eventually come our way, they seem like masterpieces. Hence this entire "Lord of the Rings" craze.

"Primal Fear" is a quiet masterpiece. It's an Oscar contender at heart, hidden beneath a layer of assorted cliches and plot twists. Does that mean the movie is bad? Not by a long shot. It's terribly entertaining and splendidly acted, particularly by a young Edward Norton. It's a fine movie in almost every respect, although it has a few minor flaws that prevent it from becoming completely excellent.

In a nutshell: Norton is the 19-year-old who kills the archbishop of a church in Chicago; Gere is his attorney who takes on the case.

Gere doesn't care whether his clients are guilty or not. "I just do my job. It's not like I'm friends with them," he says. But he connects with his newest client in a way unlike he ever has before. "I think he's innocent," he tells one of his co-workers. "I think he's telling the truth."

The stuttering 19-year-old Kentucky boy has no clear motive for killing the archbishop. They are related only through the fact that he was a choirboy for the church and the archbishop had taken him in off the streets. But the clues start to connect and soon they find out that sweet ol' choirboy may have split personality disorder--his other side, Roy, comes into play when his normal side becomes hassed and hurt. The stutters fade away and an evil side shines through--an evil side that admits to killing the archbishop.

Of course, we all know that it doesn't stop there. Movies like these never stop once they start going; it's like when you flatten a poster and it keeps rolling back up. Only in this case, everything's unrolling itself until we finally get to see the full picture on the front of the poster. Sometimes it's different than we think it'll be. Sometimes it's exactly what we knew it looked like.

The latter is the case with "Primal Fear." I guessed every twist early on, and who didn't see the ending coming? But this is simply one of the best Hollywood thrillers in years. When the twists finally reveal themselves, the impact is still as startling as if you were totally blown away and unsuspecting of any more surprises.

The cast is certainly top-notch. Along with Gere and the then-unknown Norton, there is Frances McDormand, Laura Linney, John Mahoney and Steven Bauer (Tony's pal from DePalma's "Scarface," in case you're wondering).

Richard Gere is undeniably good at playing lawyers. He played one in "Chicago" last year, and he also plays one in "Primal Fear" (which takes place in Chicago). The reason, I think, is because he's sleazy--or at least good at playing sleazy. He was sleazy in "Pretty Woman" and pretty close to a lawyer there. "Primal Fear" is one of his greatest roles--but he's really not the reason it works.

Edward Norton makes this film work. It takes a great kind of character actor to be able to play such versatile roles, like the stuttering farmboy in "Primal Fear" and the mentally-challenged-conman-who-isn't-really-mentally-challenged in "The Score" (another terrific film). In the same vein of "Fight Club," this is a film about identities and coming to terms with the fact that you aren't who you think you are--which is, in a way, one of Hollywood's most overused ideas as of recent years. ("Total Recall," "Identity," "Impostor," "Fight Club," "The Matrix," "The Thirteenth Floor," etc.)

But this is one of the best examples of the formula done justice.

More often than not, it's much better to show nothing than anything at all. Hitchcock knew this, and that's how he essentially became known as The Master of Suspense. Had he shown Norman's "mother" from "Psycho" killing the girl in the shower in greater detail, the horror of the scene would have been more greatly ineffective as compared to just how haunting it is today.

Jacques Tourneur obviously understood this idea and used it to his advantage in "Cat People." An experienced director of cult horror films from the 30s and 40s, Tourneur's story of a woman with a mysterious background still works as a pinnacle thriller sixty years later. Movies like this aren't made anymore--and I mean that in a literal sense. A more modern director would use bad CGI effects to reveal the "cat woman" for what she is, and I can only imagine how an idea like this would translate to the screen nowadays. But the key to "Cat People" is that we never even see the cat people. We don't see anything. We don't want to see anything.

"A Kiss Could Change Her Into a Monstrous Fang-and-Claw Killer!" boasted the tagline in 1942. Of course, this is an ancient filmmaking technique for that age--symbolic of the loss of one's virginity, the essential background of the tale is rooted deeply in the nature and misconceptions of sexuality at the time.

The monogamy of it all is very subtle and, at first glance, nonexistent--but the deeper you look into the hints the clearer the signs appear. Irena is not allowed to kiss a man or she changes into a monstrous beast. A metaphor for loss of virginity and the result stemming from this is old folklore, and the film's use of Irena's background is more than just an explanation for her genetic traits--it is a way of creating the central idea that she lives in fear of her own background of sexuality. It's as subtle and effective as the entire film's approach to horror.

Irena Dubrovna (Simone Simon) is a fashion artist living in New York City. Born from a Serbian background, she lives under the impression that her own family's roots lie in an ancient curse of the "cat people" that were thrown out of a city in Serbia hundreds of years before.

Animals do indeed react strangely to her. She is unable to enter into a pet store, because the squawks of scared birds and the barks of sensitive dogs drown out the entire area. It is almost as if she is truly an animal. When she is given a pet kitten, she takes it back and exchanges it for a bird. The bird dies from fright weeks later.

When she meets Oliver Reed (Kent Smith) downtown in the city, she falls desperately and hopelessly in love, but the depression of her own fear of unleashing the cat within prevents her from coming in close contact with her own boyfriend--and eventual husband.

Left untouched by his own wife, Oliver eventually turns to his co-worker Alice Moore (Jane Randolph) for satisfaction (only lightly hinted at by the film), which ends up sparking a terrifying anger and hatred within Irena. Hounded by a curious psychiatrist (Tom Conway) and feeling like an outcast around her own husband, Irena's inner cat is indeed released and wreaks brief havoc upon those around her.

We never see the cat, and we never see Irena's transformation into another species. But, as I said before, it's much better--and certainly more effective--this way, as the suspense and mystery of the film propels it towards repeat viewings. The movie is even a bit like "Ginger Snaps," in a way, only it's certainly more moody and suspenseful. And there aren't any fake-looking dog puppets in this version of the tale.

It's always pleasant to watch classic movies late at night on a Friday or Saturday night. No one cares about them anymore--cheap straight-to-video movies air on television earlier than the classics. But these are the staples of every existing genre--specifically horror, when it comes to films like "Cat People." These types of films should be appreciated much more than they have been in the past, say, sixty years.

"Cat People" is an amazing achievement with a distinct sense of classic horror and a good dose of suspense. If you like horror--or if you don't--this is a must-see film, and it is certainly one of the most memorable cult horror classics of all time, led by some great performances and a very talented director behind the camera. What a treat.

"That's it, nobody calls me Ed McMahon!"

- Emilio Estevez saying the funniest line from a rather dry sequel

"Another Stakeout" was six years in the waiting. After the first film, "Stakeout," made a huge splash at the box office in 1987 (the same year another cop-buddy film came out--can you guess which one?), everyone anticipated an unnecessary--but perhaps funny--sequel that would inevitably result after box office earnings were tallied up by film executives in an office somewhere.

Alas, the six years passed, and we got...this mess?

Richard Dreyfuss and Emilio Estevez reprise their roles as stakeout cops who get paired with a new partner in this watered-down sequel. The new partner is played by Rosie O'Donnell, who is so startlingly unfunny in this it almost makes you involuntarily switch off the television as soon as you see her chubby face smiling at you.

The story starts with a bang--literally--as a trial witness being protected by the CIA is unsuccessfully assassinated--and by that I mean: They die, she lives. What a surprise. (This is the type of scene where the villain is able to blow up a house but the witness just happens to be taking a stroll outside as it happens--or something like that--preventing her from dying along with the other agents who were previously protecting her. This type of thing was spoofed greatly in the truly underrated "Last Action Hero." It's not a joke in "Another Stakeout.")

Unfortunately for the United States, the trial witness never returns--she runs away and doesn't let anyone know where she is. Afraid she may be in danger, afraid to lose a star witness, and believing that she might try to contact old friends, the gruff chief of police assigns the unlucky trio of Dreyfuss, Estevez and Donnell to watch the her old pals to see if she turns up.

She eventually does, of course, but first we get some painfully unfunny buddy-buddy moments between Dreyfuss and Estevez and O'Donnell. She brings a bunch of clothing and a dog with her. They don't like it. Har-har. This was used a bit better in "Spaceballs," in which Princess Vespa brought along that entire luggage through the desert (remember?). This is just a copy of that scene, minus the punch line.

Estevez also shaves his mustache, which is supposed to be a type of sacred moment and is referenced at least ten times throughout the film (he goes to stroke his mustache, he complains about chopping it off, Dreyfuss complains about it, etc.). But for heaven's sake, he's only been in one film so far--we've only seen the mustache once--so a better thing to do would have been this: make a few more sequels and, when the last entry comes, have him shave it off. By then the audience realizes that his mustache is part of him, and that losing it is like losing part of his soul.

But I'm glad they didn't make any more than one sequel.

One of the things that kept the "Lethal Weapon" franchise going was the fresh ideas, fresh buddies, and fresh scripts. (Great actors never hurt an action comedy, either.) The "Stakeout" franchise--which didn't even last long enough to spawn more than one sequel--tries to copy this formula but isn't sure how. The introduction of Joe Pesci in "Lethal Weapon 2" was great because he thereby became the Third Stooge, whereas O'Donnell's entry into the series is nothing but a humiliating reminder that talk show hosts can't always act in front of a camera and maintain the same type of humor they may (or may not) exhibit on their (awful) TV "talk show." (Which is, by the way, consumed of entirely staged so-called "interviews.")

And whereas Pesci, as Leo Getz, added a type of silly vibe to the "LW" series, O'Donnell just seems like a carbon copy clone of Estevez from the first "Stakeout." Dreyfuss didn't like him at first, and--guess what--they suddenly became best buds. The same thing happens in the sequel, much to the audience's chagrin.

Of course, "Lethal Weapon" and its sequels were never more than a few years apart (the first coming out in 1989, two years after the original). But "Stakeout" had six years to make a respectable sequel, and it fails. It fails the same way that many prolonged sequels do. But, for once, it's not because the audience has forgotten the original film--it's because the audience is fed up with the same routine.

The film was directed by John Badham, which is surprising, since he's a talented director ("Saturday Night Fever," "The Hard Way," "Stakeout"). Here he jumps through all the hoops, turning his own series into a pale retread of the original--only watered down: minus the violence, language, nudity, and humor. I'm not saying a movie has to be R to be funny. But if you've got a sequel to an R-rated movie like "Stakeout" and you decide to turn its sequel into a cutesy-tutesy children's entertainment program, you'd better advise the audience before they sit down expecting something funny and fresh.

What a disappointment.

Having lived around the outskirts of Washington, D.C. myself, it's always a nice treat to watch a film that literally takes place right where I have stood, at one time or another. It's just very fun to know that a famous movie was shot where you once walked. (Although I now regret visiting the set of "101 Dalmations" in London--that's one story I don't often tell people with a smile on my face.)

At the beginning of "No Way Out," we get to see Washington from above as the camera glides through the air, swerving and going around in circles, until we land inside a small interrogation room housing a convicted murderer (Kevin Costner), who is in fact innocent and has been framed. "When's he coming out?" he asks as he walks over to a one-way mirror and looks through the glass. Right as we start to think, "Whom is he talking to?" (Or "Does he mean Hackman?" if you've read anything about the film), we fall backwards in time and land in the same place some number of months earlier.

"No Way Out" is a government thriller about an officer wrongly accused of murder--when the Secretary of State himself is the culprit trying to avoid a scandal by launching a top-secret cover-up. Costner is the officer, and Gene Hackman is the Secretary of State. After meeting a beautiful young woman (Sean Young) at a party, Costner takes her into a limo and they have a quickie--before they even know each other's names.

What's this got to do with anything? Why is my review so choppy and linear-challenged? We'll get there.

The relationship between the two turns into a big romance until Costner is sent out to sea, where he saves a sailor from falling overboard and is praised in all the papers--where his girlfriend back home sees his face and is reminded of him. (Now she's the mistress of Hackman, by the way--that complicates matters quite a bit.)

When he arrives back home, they go on a romantic getaway--but Hackman finds out and accidentally murders the girl while trying to get her to tell him the name of her lover. Ready to turn himself in, Hackman is persuaded by his gay friend to cover everything up and blame someone else. The gay man even goes and gets rid of the evidence himself--with pride, I might add. (It's like Mr. Burns and Smithers from "The Simpsons"--the latter loves the former, but the former is too powerful and naive to ever notice.)

The clever twist in "No Way Out" is that Costner knows Hackman killed Young, but Hackman doesn't know that he knows that. (Get it?) As he runs around the Pentagon and other government establishments, the evidence starts to pile up against him--the negative off the back of a Polaroid camera, a few eyewitnesses who claim they saw a man outside Young's apartment the night of her murder, etc.

The great thing about "No Way Out," and another factor that separates it from the rest of its kind, is something that's hard to explain to someone who hasn't seen the film. Essentially, no one knows who killed the girl--and Costner isn't placed under arrest straight away because no one has uncovered any evidence pointing towards him. As the negative off the back of the Polaroid is scanned through a computer and painstakingly altered to reveal the man's face on the photo, Costner runs around trying to eliminate evidence before anyone finds out. The photo will eventually reveal his own face, yes, but he has a number of hours until then to find the true evidence that convicts Hackman.

This is a smart thriller with a few pleasant twists, particularly the very end. It's not a great movie by any means, but it's well-acted and solidly directed by Roger Donaldson, who also made last year's "The Recruit" with Al Pacino and Colin Farrell. The guy obviously likes government thrillers. This one is a lot more plausible than "The Recruit," too.

It's amazing how many pleasant treats you'll find on TV Friday nights at one o'clock in the morning. Take "Roadgames" (or "Road Games") for example: The Hitchcockian story of a trucker delivering meat across Australia who becomes entangled in a possible mystery involving an unapprehensible serial killer who may or may not have murdered a helpless hitchhiker traveling the roads he's driving on.

Often referred to as "Rear Window" on the road, self-proclaimed Hitchcock enthusiast Richard Franklin has directed a quaint, low-budget thriller with a likable (although quite unusual) lead actor in the role of Frustrated Hero.

Pat Quid (Stacy Keach--who is indeed a man) is driving across Australia in a meat truck when he thinks he's noticed a strange happening--a man in a van seems to be burying a bag in the middle of a desert in Australia, and when he is noticed he climbs back into his blue van and speeds away into the distance.

Pat puts this event into the back of his mind when he decides against regulations to pick up a wandering hitchhiker named Pam Rushworth (Jamie Lee Curtis), who has run away from home in an effort to escape her famous father's life. The two bond together on the road and have some fun playing various games--until she is kidnapped by the same strange man in a van. At first, Pat thinks he's just being paranoid--he even starts to think that Pam left him for the man.

But then he realizes that Pam has indeed been kidnapped, and he suspects that the strange man in the van might be a notorious serial killer who has been killing young women and scattering their body parts miles apart from each other.

After the police offer no help, Pat takes matters into his own hands and sets off on a quest to bring back Pam to safety and apprehend the killer before he can strike again. Some twists and turns ensue, although nothing very surprising.

If this were a mainstream horror film with an overblown budget and big-name actors, I'd probably give "Roadgames" a bad rating. But this is the type of pleasant, likable low-budget thriller that is easy to watch and knows it's nothing more than a shadow of greater film noir mysteries/thrillers like "Rear Window" or "The Third Man"--the type of film that thrusts its hero on a one-man venture into the heart of darkness in order to find out the truth.

Stacy Keach is strikingly likable as the lonely trucker who talks to his own pet dingo as he drives along, contemplating all types of conspiracy theories about serial killers and mysteries. What could definitely become tiring--listening to a man talk to his dingo for the majority of a movie, that is--actually becomes quite fun. Keach is funny, nice, and just...likable! Too bad his career was put on hold years later after he got arrested for smuggling cocaine...

The director, Richard Franklin, is a huge Hitchcock fan--and it shows. This film is like a sort of remake of "Rear Window" and other such mystery-thrillers. It's loads of fun and an easy watch. (Trivia note: Franklin directed "Psycho II," the sequel to Hitchcock's 1960 classic original.)

I can definitely say that this film is most like "Breakdown," the Jonathan Mostow movie starring Kurt Russell as a man who loses his wife to a trucker and tries to get her back, even though there seems to be no evidence of her disappearance. But unlike the great "Breakdown," this film doesn't wither away in the second half and turn into a disappointing movie--it remains strong throughout, and yes, it has plenty of nods towards Hitchcock. (Check out the magazines Curtis starts sorting through--there he is!)

What is there to say about a film that features John Travolta in a cowboy hat and loads of awful honky tonk music? Not much. Let's just say that "Saturday Night Fever" this is not.

But still, it surprisingly created an entire fad of modern-day cowboys across the entire United States of America, which is a sad thing to think about, given that the film sucked to begin with. Honestly, why in the world would a movie like this inspire Americans to go out to their local city costume shops and dress up as urban cowboys? Apart from looking absolutely, astonishingly ridiculous, what else does this accomplish? The funniest thing about fads is that I often find they're started by stupid, stupid things.

Surprised as I was to see this being featured on AMC, I gave it a chance and can't find anything very commendable or recommendable. Riding the waves of 1977's smash hit, "Saturday Night Fever," which of course starred John Travolta in that niiiice white suit, "Urban Cowboy" is about as close to a remake as one can get. Change the locations, change the co-stars, and change the music. It's all the same. This could be considered an unofficial sequel to the film if there weren't one already (the forgettable sequel to "Saturday Night Fever," "Staying Alive," directed by Sylvester Stallone, was even worse than "Urban Cowboy," which is some sort of miracle).

Basically, the plot is this: Bud David (Travolta) moves out to the big city in order to visit his uncle. Once there, he goes to a country bar named Gilley's, where he meets and falls in love with Sissy (Debra Winger), who suddenly marries him and then gets in a fight with him after he sees her with a con man named Wes, who plans to rob Gilley's. Meanwhile, in the "main plot" of the film, Bud applies for a mechanical bull contest and tries to patch up his relationship with Sissy. That's basically the plot. No emotional underpinnings like "Saturday Night Fever," no message about trying to break away from boredom and be someone--anyone--for a single night other than yourself.

Just dancing. Dancing, singing, and bad direction. In "Saturday Night Fever," the dance floor was used as a backdrop. Sure, it was shown on screen a heck of a lot, but it was also used as a metaphor. Tony Manero wanted something more than the life he was living. Disco dancing was his one way out, his chance to be king for a night rather than schmuck for a lifetime.

None of this is present in "Urban Cowboy," which is sort of sad. The film tries to make us feel for Travolta's character by using ancient plot cliches. And we're supposed to feel uplifted and inspired when he gains the respect of a bunch of boot-wearing, leather-laden, drunken cowboys? Whatever.

You know when a movie boasts "and Keanu Reeves" you're in pretty big trouble.

Sometimes I go with the general flow when I put down actors. For example, Adam Sandler doesn't really bother me. He was perfect for "Happy Gilmore" (which I think is a great mindless comedy). But Keanu Reeves is one actor that I, personally, have never considered a great--much less good--actor. In "Bill and Ted" and "The Matrix" he's fine, yes, because he fits the parts given to him (new generation slackers)."Speed" is one of my all-time favorite action films, but not really because of Reeves himself.

The movies in which he is supposed to display true emotions--such as "Feeling Minnesota" or "A Walk in the Clouds"--are the ones that bother me, because I know that there are better actors putting on school plays who aren't getting paid--yet he's raking in the millions. Many of his dramatic roles are rather dry and laughable. When it comes to *real* roles, Keanu just fails miserably.

I'll explain why, since I'll probably get angry letters from "Matrix" fans and teenage girls with posters of him on their walls if I don't. My main problem with Reeves is that he's always the same. His face is always the same. His tone of voice. His expressions. His mannerisms. For the sake of comparison, imagine Dustin Hoffman in "Rain Man." Now imagine Keanu Reeves trying to play Raymond Babbitt. See what I mean?

I've been observing Reeves since his days of "Bill and Ted," and my aunt adores him. I've been fed his movies for a long time. When I saw him in "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure," I thought he had talent. That he could really fit roles easily. Then I realized that he really WAS Ted, and that's when my expectations dropped.

But I don't want to turn this into a Keanu Reeves hating fest. The point of all those paragraphs is just an explanation of why I'm not a big fan of Mr. Keanu "Whoa" Reeves, or his dramatic cinematic ventures. I say that he should stay close to what he's good at (dumb slackers). But that's just me.

In "The Watcher," Keanu is a serial killer who toys around with an ex-FBI Agent (James Spader) whose lover Keanu killed years before in a fire. (Bad, Keanu, bad!) In fact, Joel Campbell (Spader) moved all the way to Chicago in order to escape his past, and even retired from the FBI.

Now David (Reeves) is back in Joel's life, sending him pictures of victims a day before they are to be murdered. He has twenty-four hours to find them before David does.

What a great premise. A pleasant twist on the serial killer routine, right? Err...no, not really. The direction feels like a long action-packed music video--from the opening titles blaring a loud Rob Zombie song to the end, complete with the stereotypical Killer's Point of View that was original in 1978 when John Carpenter's "Halloween" first invented it (and when it was indeed a very controversial filmmaking technique), but is now getting old since it's frequently being used incorrectly, particularly in the case of "The Watcher." Keanu's character seems to see things through some type of strobe music video vision--perhaps that explains his love of music in the film. "This is a good song," he says to one victim before strangling her.

In all honesty, "The Watcher" isn't really a truly "bad" movie (in fact, I've seen much worse), but if I had to pinpoint the problems with "The Watcher," it would be these three things:

1. Direction. Joe Charbanic, a first-time director with his outing in "The Watcher," proves that he should never get behind a camera ever again. As I mentioned before, there are just too many moments when I felt that I was watching some music video or product placement commercial instead of a smart serial killer film. Some people just aren't meant to get behind the wheel of a moving car. The same goes for a moving reel of footage.

2. The Script. What starts interesting and even compelling soon turns into a routine chase-the-killer film with extravagant car chases and bad character introductions. (Marisa Tomei's student psychiatrist is obviously there for two reasons--to fall in love with the hero and to be kidnapped by the villain. Take a wild guess if it happens or not.) In fact, this film had loads of potential to stand out amongst the rest of its kind by using the original plot--twenty-four hours to find the victim--but it is soon left forgotten and too many plot holes (why wouldn't the victim see herself on TV or on one of the millions of ads placed around Chicago?) are left unchecked.

3. The Acting. James Spader is at the very least marginally convincing as a gruff I-Don't-Care-Anymore cop, but he's no Martin Riggs. Instead, he comes off as a whiny, selfish little creep who likes to inject drugs into his body to get a momentary high. This is are hero, folks.

Also, is Keanu an invincible boogeyman or not? Lord knows that his mysterious character, David, is untouchable--he survives a foot chase without being seen, he manages to sneak past security cameras and cops and manages to kidnap/kill female victims; he survives a truly ludicrous car chase (that lowered my score for the film by a half a notch), gets shot, caught on fire, and STILL manages to jump out of a window on fire and into a lake? I half expected him to get up once more and give us all one last scare. Honestly, in "Halloween," the insinuations of Michael Myers' invincibility were more than hinted at. Here, we are left to wonder whether or not the killer is some type of supernatural force or not. The film is too eager to wrap all the loose ends up without digging deeper into the material.

Pairing Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson together may seem the most unlikely thing to do since color televisions were first invented. But both of these actors are funny, in one way or another--Chan through his innocence, Wilson through his sarcastic, snide remarks. Wilson is as impressive an actor as he is a writer--he shares writing credits on such films as "Rushmore" and "The Royal Tenenbaums."

Chan, on the other hand, is a better martial arts master than Jet Li and a more likable character actor than Chow Yun Fat (whose disastrous film "Bulletproof Monk" made me want to split his head open to prevent him from ever making another American mainstream motion picture ever again).

In "Shanghai Noon," Chan plays Chon Wang, a 19th century Chinese martial arts master who ventures out to Nevada in order to rescue the kidnapped Princess Pei Pei (Lucy Liu), whose name is misused by Roy O'Bannon (Wilson) on at last one occasion.

After Chon Wang (mistakenly pronounced "John Wayne") meets up with Roy, the two decide to form an alliance and rescue the princess -- one for honor, the other for loads of money awaiting them upon her safe arrival back home in Imperial China's Forbidden City.

Roy is a lousy wannabe cowboy who used to stage clumsy train robberies along with his band of thieves, who betrayed him and left him for dead. He offers his help to Wang, and tries to play it cool, but he can't -- after all, he's not a very convincing cowboy. But, as the smarmy wisecracking sidekicks always are, O'Bannon just wants money. But as his friendship with Chan grows stronger, he realizes that money isn't everything.

Sounds routine, doesn't it? Well, it is, to a certain extent. But it succeeds due to a fine cast -- Chan and Wilson are extraordinarily good together; so good, in fact, that Chris Tucker is just a forgotten memory by the time that the film is over.

It's a classic spin on the Old West formula; what "The Princess Bride" or "Shrek" did for fairy tales, "Shanghai Noon" does for Westerns. All the old cliches are poked fun at in a light way. And as great as Chan is, and as much as he carries most films he's in with his sweet charms and likable personas, Wilson comes across as equally likable as Chan.

Chan's martial arts are usually the highlights of these films, but in this he proves he can do more than just kick -- he can be funny. Well, okay, he proved that in "Rush Hour" (1998), but I like this better.

The jokes in "Shanghai Noon" aren't "great," but I laughed a lot at this film. It's smarter than one might think, and is certainly one of the most enjoyable experiences I've had in quite some time. Probably years. I wasn't expecting much (especially because I wasn't an enormous fan of the sequel--see below), but if fun could be rated on a scale of 1 - 10, this would be an 11.

I give this film nothing more than four out of five stars because it's not a great film on all critical levels. But it's certainly fun--likely more fun than any film you'll see for quite some time--and for that it will soon be earning a place in my sacred DVD collection.

I must say that I wasn't a huge fan of "Shanghai Knights," the sequel to "Shanghai Noon," which involved Chon Wang and Roy O'Bannon venturing to England in order to save Wang's sister. But after seeing this film I'm thinking I might just have to pay a small revisit the sequel again.

You may remember Christopher Guest from "This is Spinal Tap." You may also remember him as the six-fingered man in "The Princess Bride." Both were Rob Reiner films, but with 1996's "Waiting for Guffman," he created his own post-"Spinal Tap"-mockumentary about a small town that put on a pageant, despite lack of interest.

Then, four years later, he struck gold again with "Best in Show," reuniting many of the actors from "Guffman" for a documentary-style parody of modern day dog competitions. It was a very funny film, but like "A Mighty Wind," its humor is very subtle, and therefore some audiences just don't "get it."

I got it. I like subtle humor and laugh-out-loud humor; I appreciate subtle humor as a smarter type of humor, on most occasions, and laugh-out-loud humor is respectable in a different sort of way. "Dumb and Dumber" always puts a smile on my face, but so does "The Odd Couple," and though the two films are similar in nature they are also wholly different. It depends on what mood I'm in.

Make sure you're in the right type of mood when you sit down to watch "A Mighty Wind." It's Christopher Guest's worst mockumentary film to date, but then again, that hardly makes it a bad movie at all, does it?

"A Mighty Wind" returns to the "Waiting for Guffman" roots; it's about a television-broadcast reunion of folk music icons, all joining together again as they were in the sixties to say a fond farewell to their old manager, who has just passed away from old age.

The two primary bands are The Folksmen, led by Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry "Principal Skinner" Shearer, and Mitch and Mickey, led by Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara. Mitch and Mickey used to be a couple back in the sixties, but as all the fame and glory stories go, they broke up and haven't spoken for years. The Folksmen are just three ordinary guys with a talent for being quite unlucky (even the song they choose to sing at the reunion has already been taken and they have to quickly think of another to play).

These mockumentary comedies are all made up of quirky characters, and "A Mighty Wind" is no exception. Catherine O'Hara's Canadian accent is splendidly funny to listen to, Michael McKean (his most memorable role being his smallest as the state trooper in "Planes, Trains and Automobiles") is subtly funny as always, Christopher Guest is...well...Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer will constantly remind you of Principal Skinner from "The Simpsons" (his own voice), and "SCTV's" Eugene Levy is the highlight, channeling a sort of Ozzy Osbourne persona for the character of Mitch, the nice singer who slumped into an era of drinks, drugs, and depression during the 70s after his romance with Mickey broke apart -- or so we can only assume from the wasted look in his eyes and the staggering walk of a permanently drunken man.

The other key to these movies is not only its characters but also its delightful realism. "A Mighty Wind" has created an entirely false universe for itself, much like "Adaptation" did with some of its in-jokes regarding "The 3" and so on and so forth. Guest provides us with clippings of black and white music performances by the singers, and lots of other fake footage and album covers that are all false but look so very real. It helps the audience believe what they're seeing is truth. Without little things like old footage, the film would simply not be as funny.

Much of the cast ad-libbed in "A Mighty Wind," and it shows. The film's weakness is that it seems to move slowly with long absences of laughter. But when the laughter comes -- and it will -- you'll be howling. I rarely laugh when I'm watching a film by myself (usually this only occurs while watching funny segments of "Saturday Night Live"), but one scene in "A Mighty Wind" did make me laugh out loud quite hard with no one else in the room. The scene is that in which Eugene Levy's wild-eyed character Mitch is brought into the basement of Mickey's house, where her husband shows Mitch his obsession: model railroads. Mitch making comments about Crabville just cracked me up. After a long scene of Levy doing hilarious Ozzy Osbourne facial expressions and saying funny things, Mickey's husband says, "It's Crabtown, not Crabville." You've got to see it to get it.

The other highlight of the show is Fred Willard, and I'll summarize his character by saying, "Wha' happened?" Watch the movie and you'll get that, too.

"A Mighty Wind" wasn't quite as funny as I had hoped it would be, and the whole joke is starting to wear a little thin by now. Christopher Guest is both a talented actor and director, and though I enjoyed and recommend "A Mighty Wind," I think that it's about time he either moved on or dramatically increased the wit of his script for the next mockumentary he may decide to make, because as it is, "A Mighty Wind" is starting to show signs of formula weakness.