SUMMER 2011 IN MOVIES

The movie Green Lantern served a very important role this summer--it reminded me that perhaps I had been way too tough on the movie Thor.

See now,after I saw Thor, I left saying it was a crummy movie. Maybe it was, but Chris Hemsworth, who played George Kirk in Star Trek, has a good sense of humor about himself. For me, Thor worked more as a comedy than it did as a superhero movie.

Green Lantern, on the other hand, just plain did not work. I mean, here is a guy with GOD-like powers. He can create anything he can think of.

So what happens, he's being chased by a gigantic planet-chewing dust/gas monster and he lures it into space. Why not create a super-sized Hoover vacuum cleaner and suck the dust bunny up?

Okay, on my summer loser list, I must also include Cowboys and Aliens. It wasn't that it was especially bad, but Come On! This is Jon Favreau movie. Favreau created Iron Man. In my book, Favreau walked on water without getting wet.

It appears Daniel Craig, yes the immortal iconic new James Bond, can't do an American accent. In case you were wondering, for the last few years I have considered Daniel Craig among my favorite actors. In this movie, because he could not maintain an American accent, they had to feed him all of his dialog in one-liners. Frankly, he sounded like Duke Nukem, and that's bad.

The problems with Cowboys and Aliens cannot all be blamed on Daniel Craig. The script was a meandering mess, the aliens were dull, and I am still wracking my brains to come up with the western movie cliche that did not appear in this movie.

My favorite movie of the summer was Harry potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, which should come as no shock. The first half of the novel seemed unfocused as did the first have of the Deathly Hallows du-ology; but the second half made up for past sins in both cases. (My favorite scene in any Harry Potter book, a vision Harry has in which he finds himself in the Valhalla version of London's King's Cross Station, was brilliantly translated to the screen.)

This final Harry Potter flick was not without faults. Let me tell you, there is a flashy little scene in which Harry and Voldemort fly around Hogwarts while trying to scratch each other's face that was a waste of celluloid. There were smaller peccadilloes, too; but on the most part, this was a fine movie and a perfect conclusion.

I guess I consider Harry Potter a superhero on some level. I mean, what's the difference between his power and the Green Lanterns. So, after Green Hornet, X-Men, Green Lantern, and Thor, I had just about finished watching superheroes for the year... and then came Captain America.

I like Chris Evans. Even when he's playing Johnny Storm in Fantastic Four movies, there is something likable about him. In Captain America, which may be the most predictable superhero movie of 'em all, Evans is more likable than ever. First we see him photoshopped as a ninety-pound weakling, then we see him photoshopped as a pro-wrestler with an Army helmet and a shield. Either way, the man comes across as perfectly believable.

So, having survived yet another superhero movie, I went with my wife to see Crazy Stupid Love and loved almost all of it. I had forgotten what it felt like to see a nice, simple, non-special effects fest movie with good acting and an original storyline.

Crazy Stupid Love did not replace Deathly Hallows in the top slot. It might have made it there but the critical climax of this movie as as hackneyed as you can get. Still, in a summer of big-budget action flicks, Crazy Stupid Love comes in as a significant second placer for me.

So that's it for me and movies for now. I may go see Rise of the Planet of the Apes next week, but I don't know. After Daniel Craig, Ryan Gosling, Chris Hemsworth, and Ryan Reynolds, can my dying self-esteem really stand a screenful of gorillas?

Maybe I'll just stay home next week and watch Anne of Green Gables with my wife.