A Pretty Impressive Capper, But Vader Should Still Seek Revenge for Defamation of Character

“Star Wars is the defining event of our lives,” my dad remarked to my mom on our way home from seeing Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. “The first one came out just as we entered adulthood, and the last one just as our kids are entering adulthood.” It’s a formidable thought. Nearly 30 years for George to complete his legacy. Unless he still has the triple trilogy in mind… It’s strange, setting up a series in such a way that everyone knows how the story ends long before it begins. We all knew that this third installment leading directly into the epic that started it all would be by far the darkest of the six. It makes for a slightly surreal experience, knowing that everything has to go wrong, watching in revulsion but stopping just short of willing it not to happen because you know it’s required for the glorious events of the original trilogy. In the end it begs the question: Did we really need these prequels in the first place? I’m not a hard-core enough fan to answer that question. But I recognize this is the end of an era, and I celebrate it by making it my 600th review – one hundred for each movie if you like. No matter what, you have to admit George Lucas had a pretty impressive accomplishment.

So, how was it? Well, I missed the mayhem of opening night, though my brother and our exchange student got in on the fun. My parents and I saw it three days later. We still had to buy our tickets three hours in advance and wait in line for an hour after turning in our tickets in order to be assured decent seats. Aside from a few light sabers, ours was not a costumed audience. Only one man had the full regalia, a fellow who’d been there for the first showing (and maybe every night after) in his $2700 Darth Vader costume. I want one. Not really. I’d rather have a life-size R2-D2. Anyway, we were treated to a rather unusual occurrence that night. Just before the previews were about to start, the lights went up and a man, armed with the disclaimer that he had nothing to do with the movie, announced that he was attending with his girlfriend, who was very special to him, and he requested that she join him in front of the screen. Then he proceeded to get down on one knee and propose, and her affirmative answer was met with rapturous applause. Oddly enough, I think it was the loudest applause of the night…

Trouble is, Revenge of the Sith is rarely a movie that makes you cheer. It’s like a Shakespearean tragedy, with Anakin (Hayden Christiansen) in the spot occupied by Othello and MacBeth and other anti-heroes who leave the audience groaning and thinking again and again, You moron! Anakin is a decent guy at the start of the film, teaming up with master Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) to battle evil robots while rushing to the defense of indispensable little R2-D2 (Kenny Baker) when his mentor maligns him. His passion is his undoing, however. In spite of Yoda’s warnings to release himself from attachment to anything he fears to lose, he is increasingly driven by paranoia brought on by a series of disturbing dreams about his beloved secret bride Padme (Natalie Portman). Christiansen doesn’t bug me as much in this movie as he did in Attack of the Clones, but he’s still too moody and whiny to be very likable, or very impressive. I can put up with Luke’s petulance at the outset of A New Hope; at least he comes across as a sweet guy. I don’t know how I wanted Anakin to be, but I think I preferred having his origins ambiguous. Darth Vader is arguably the most formidable movie villain in cinematic history, and I find him cheapened by an inadequate history. And while we are supposed to believe that the intensity of his love for Padme is so great that he is willing to all but destroy the Jedi order to ensure her safety, they always seem wooden in their scenes together. It doesn’t help that they’re still hampered by the occasional excruciating dialogue. If my husband had just told me that he wanted to take over the galaxy, I’d like to think I could have come up with something more useful to say than “You’re breaking my heart.”

If Christiansen still lacks chemistry with Portman, he demonstrates it with McGregor. They kick off the film together with a dizzying action sequence at the conclusion of which a light-hearted conversation between Obi-Wan and Anakin reveals just a hint of jealousy that the padawan is outranking his teacher. Theirs is a relationship torn by the tension between affection and ambition. For the most part, we do get the sense Obi-Wan accepts the notion that he is training a Jedi who will become more powerful than him and resents the fact that other members of the council find Anakin less than trustworthy. Anakin, however, is less generous, always grumbling about Obi-Wan standing in the way of what he wants to do. It doesn’t take him long to abandon concern for his master. As Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid) leads him further down the path of corruption, Obi-Wan looks more and more like the enemy. McGregor helms most of the film’s truly emotional scenes, most notably the culmination of their climactic battle in which an agonized Obi-Wan is forced to admit once and for all that he has lost his padawan forever. We see a great deal more from McGregor this time around, and I would classify him as a much better actor than Christiansen. It’s just a shame that one of the most beloved Star Wars characters was played by two different actors who’ve seemed almost resentful of the fact that they were involved. I suspect McGregor’s recent comments on his fans may have alienated a few people; I guess he has a hunch now how Sir Alec Guinness felt.

I found it very hard to feel sorry for Anakin throughout the film, even if his initial motivation was noble. It’s sad to see him manipulated by Palpatine, who is perhaps the true star of the film as McDiarmid takes him from benign presence who nonetheless seems to possess a slightly sinister air to fully disclosed evil emperor. But it seems good judgment should have tipped him off early on that Palpatine was up to no good. He recoils at Palpatine’s request to kill Count Dooku (Christopher Lee, who must be getting tired of playing second-tier villains with somewhat embarrassing death scenes) and refuses to acquiesce to his demand that – supposedly in the interests of time – they leave Obi-Wan behind. But apparently there are years of influence at work that we don’t see on screen. Palpatine is truly frightening for most of the film, evoking a moral crisis in Anakin, particularly when he announces his familiarity with the dark side and offers to pass on his knowledge. I found the altercation in the theater unsatisfactory on Christiansen’s end, or at least whoever wrote the dialogue. Palpatine’s fine, but Anakin again seems stiff and unconvincing. The scene sets us up for the moment that should demonstrate to him once and for all that this guy is extremely bad news but instead seems to eradicate any trace of a decent human being in young Skywalker. Perhaps he sees himself as party to such a calamity that he already deems himself irredeemable. All he supposedly cares about now is Padme, though once he begins to carry out Palpatine’s orders it can hardly be said that thoughts of her have any influence over his actions. The last indication in the film that she still means anything to him is so excruciating, one wonders how James Earl Jones could have been convinced to decimate his dignity by agreeing to it.

Mace Windu (Samuel L. Jackson) embodies the struggle for the Jedi to remain relevant in a time of great change. He is a formidable force, rather like the man who plays him. I find it amusing that he talked Lucas into giving him a purple light saber so he’d stand out and that he actually included a stipulation in his contract that his character had to have a noteworthy death scene. Visually, it’s pretty riveting. Emotionally, it’s the turning point of the whole film. Yoda (Frank Oz) spends much of the movie hobnobbing with the Wookiees, and while I was looking forward to this aspect of the film, it didn’t really satisfy me. For one thing, I imagined the planet as an idyllic locale, and it might have been if not for the fact that it was a war zone. The Wookiees almost looked like Klingons with all their ammo and war decorations, and when it came right down to it the whole interlude at their planet seemed to serve little purpose other than to get Yoda out of the line of fire for a while. Chewy (Peter Mayhew) shows up, but we don’t get any sense of his personality except that he’s on Yoda’s side. So that was a bit of a disappointment, but Yoda never fails to come through for me. He’s one of my three favorite characters in the trilogy, all of which conveniently appear in the prequels portrayed by the same actors. I still prefer the swamp-dwelling Yoda to the more dignified personage of the prequels, but he’s still the same delightful character, and he radiates wisdom and heart in a film whose protagonist stands in sore need of both.

The droids are my other favorites. There is precious little to be seen of C-3PO, though when he is on screen he certainly attracts attention with his ultra-shiny new frame. Generally he’s a great chatterbox, and I could have used more of his silly comments. I was also rather perplexed by his appearance just after Anakin departs to subvert the inevitable altercation between Palpatine and Mace Windu. It cuts to Padme, and C-3PO waddles up to her, and then it cuts to a completely different scene. Those five or ten seconds seemed completely superfluous, and I was left with the impression that a scene had been deleted and due to sloppy editing or a teaser for the DVD or whatever, they left the beginning of it intact. R2-D2 shines in Sith, however, particularly at the beginning. He is as much a hero as Anakin or Obi-Wan in the opening minutes, and he handles his sticky situation with typical good humor. Most of the movie’s funniest moments involve him. When we bought our tickets, we received a complementary copy of Flick, a Cinemark magazine, and this issue focused entirely on Star Wars. One page advertises various available merchandise, including life-size cardboard stand-ups that come equipped with a chip allowing them to speak quotes from the movie. One of the figures is R2-D2, which begs the question, of what significant quote my favorite little garbage can-like being could boast. Still, he’s awfully expressive for a guy who speaks exclusively in a series of unintelligible squeaks, beeps and whistles, and you can never really accuse him of having a lame line.

So did Sith deliver all that I expected? I can’t say for sure, though a hunch still tells me no. Phantom Menace was a lot more fun, and I rather liked our feeling of jubilation as we exited the theater. It seemed the only appropriate reaction to the end of Sith was pensiveness. But it wasn’t any more depressing than I expected, and less violent than I thought it would be. It was visually stunning, though it lacked the beauty of Naboo as revealed in different forms in the first and second installments. The dizzying chases through space and sky threatened to give me vertigo, while Palpatine passed on the creepy crawlies every time he appeared on screen. Anakin, too, mainly in the horrific scenes following Mace Windu’s death that are as distressing for what they don’t show as what they do. The most tragic moment for me in the entire film was when a young Jedi, eyes wide with fear and trust, turned to Anakin for protection and received something entirely unexpected. In ten seconds, that young man packed an emotional whallop infinitely greater than what Jake Lloyd was able to accomplish in the course of an entire movie.

I won’t say that Sith impressed me as much as I thought it could have, but all in all it was a pretty affecting film and a mostly satisfactory link between Episodes I and II and the original trilogy. But I still think Darth Vader will never be quite as cool as he was before the prequels exposed Anakin as a character most undeserving of being the subject of a grandiose 6-part space epic.

Clint Eastwood's Baby Worth Millions of Dollars in Ticket Sales

The 2004 Oscars were very exciting for me. Though I missed the beginning, I was there to watch Return of the King pick up an award in all the remaining categories for which it had been nominated. It was thrilling to see a film for which I had so much passion receive such resounding recognition from the distinguished Academy. This year, I didn’t really care. I was mildly interested, but I had no personal stake in it since I’d only seen a couple films under consideration, and those were just in editing categories. There was hardly a Jacksonesque clean sweep this time around, but Million Dollar Baby still managed to fare quite well, garnering awards in four major categories. As I watched the end of the ceremony, I couldn’t help but be a bit intrigued about this film that was getting so much attention. When my dad later saw it and gave it his stamp of approval, I knew it wouldn’t be too long before I checked it out for myself.

I finally got around to it last week. I can’t say I’m too fond of boxing as a sport. Watching two people try to knock each other out is more likely to make me cringe than cheer. Nonetheless, Far and Away is one of my favorite films, so I wasn’t going to prejudice myself against the movie on that account. I was also warned that the movie was a bit of a downer, which tends to make me rather reluctant to watch a film. I don’t usually go to the cinema to get depressed. Still, if Million Dollar Baby ends on a tragic note, the echoes of triumph can’t be denied. In any case Clint Eastwood has another fine film to add to his intimidating resume.

Eastwood portrays gruff trainer Frankie Dunn. He’s skillful in spying and cultivating talent in the boxing ring, but he’s weighed down by a burden that prevents him from taking potential champions to the highest level. His is a lonely life, and at the start of the movie his only meaningful relationship is with Eddie Dupris (Morgan Freeman), a former prizefighter who now helps run Frankie’s training center. Frankie has more than boxing woes to pester his conscience; each week he receives unopened letters from his daughter, a visible reminder of their estranged relationship. Perhaps that is part of the reason he is so reluctant to accept the task of training Maggie Fitzgerald (Hilary Swank), though it probably has more do with fears that he will put her into a situation in which she is not properly protected. Certainly he has a hefty load of guilt on his shoulders, as his beleaguered priest points out.

Swank turns in a sincere performance as determined, endlessly optimistic Maggie. Frankie tries to thwart her attempts to join his gym again and again, but she perseveres, practicing long into the night and always insisting upon each meeting with him that he is the only trainer for her. She is fiercely loyal, curiously so before he finally gives her the time of day. One explanation is that she craves a challenge and sees him as the man who can take her where she wants to go. Another is that, as she confides later, he reminds her of her father. It’s amusing to observe his frustration as she shows up, day after day, with a smile on her face and the slightest indication that she may be receiving a little inside help.

Eddie seems to be far more in control of things than Frankie. He’s accepted his lot in life and is spared the torture of the demons that haunt his friend, even when they involve him. Initially, it is he who gets in Maggie’s corner and refuses to abandon her. He is a benevolent if rather grimy presence, always willing to help the underdog. When Frankie finally accepts responsibility for getting Maggie into gear, Eddie remains as a mentor and comforter, while focusing his physical energy on young Danger Barch (Jay Baruchel), an eager but inept young man with a heart inversely proportional to his mental capacities. Freeman brings boundless grace to each scene in which he appears, and he acts as a calming, confidential narrator. I confess I did sometimes find him – and occasionally Swank as well – difficult to understand, but not so much that I couldn’t follow what was happening. All three lead actors play well off each other, lending warmth and believability to their portrayals.

The look of the film is dark and gritty, mostly taking place in Frankie’s dimly lit center or some boxing ring in the center of a packed arena. Though an advertisement for The Apprentice places the action firmly in the present, there is usually little to indicate just what the time period is. The gas station they patronize looks like it could have come straight out of the fifties. I’m guessing this is to indicate that they live in a rather backwards community. I found Frankie’s fascination with Ireland an intriguing part of his character, and his appreciation for William Butler Yeats and silken Gaelic garments taps into something undeniably sweet beneath his harsh exterior.

Though the film’s conclusion has been deemed controversial by some, there’s little in this film that should offend. There are a couple heinous acts by unaccountably brash individuals, but it seems Eastwood’s intentions are always to extol the virtues of love and loyalty, faith and fortitude. While I generally consider profanity as polluting to my ears as cigarette smoke is to my nose, I couldn’t help but be amused by the single use of the f-word in this film. Usually the single instance of that word allowed in a PG-13 movie is a throwaway, leaving you wondering why they even bothered to insert it. Here it certainly gets the audience’s attention by its unlikely placement, cementing the movie’s impression that when it comes to the really tough theological questions, you have to battle things out for yourself. Moreover, there are no easy solutions, but greater fulfillment may lie along the more difficult path.

Million Dollar Baby is a movie that encourages its audience to think and to feel. For that, it is well worth the millions of dollars it generated.

Prelutsky Gives Something Big to Teachers Eager to Inspire Young Readers

The past couple years have been fairly unproductive for me as a writer, but recently it seems I’m getting the knack back. I’ve spent the past couple weeks writing a proliferation of poems as if to make up for lost time. They’re not all masterpieces, to be sure, but it’s nice to feel like I can write something creative again. In my quest to get my creative juices flowing, there were two poets I knew I had to turn to first. My college professors would perhaps shake their heads and sigh if they knew which poets I hold in the highest esteem. We certainly never studied them in any of the classes that led to the conferring of a bachelor’s degree in English on lowly little me. But I have no shame in proclaiming that aside from lyricists (and that is a rather pointless exclusion since these two both have been occasional songwriters as well) my favorite poets are Shel Silverstein and Jack Prelutsky.

Silverstein seems to be the more universally known of the two. His distinctive pen and ink style, his poignancy in works such as The Giving Tree, his contributions to the musical world with such classics as The Unicorn and I’m Being Swallowed By a Boa Constrictor, the silliness he brought to so many poems collected in books ostensibly for children but just as much for adults… Say the name, and most people will know whom you’re talking about. For some reason, this doesn’t seem to be the case with Prelutsky, though his verse is just as accomplished and accessible. I was introduced to him at a tender age with the volume The New Kid on the Block. It recently occurred to me that I do not possess that seminal book, an omission I mean to rectify before too long. In fact, I only own one collection of Prelutsky’s poems, a most unfortunate oversight. I owe my aunt a debt of gratitude for giving me Something Big Has Been Here so many years ago. It holds a place of honor on my shelf.

I read that before Prelutsky fell into writing verse, his primary interest was in art. Thus, it seems rather strange that his poems are not accompanied by his own illustrations. I won’t complain, however. In all honesty, I’m not a huge fan of Silverstein as an artist. He holds his own, but I probably wouldn’t give his drawings a second look independent of his writing. So maybe it’s just as well that Prelutsky leaves the illustrations in this book to James Stevenson. They are far more detailed and realistic than Silverstein’s drawings, and I find them much more enjoyable to look at.

While Silverstein’s poems are occasionally serious, Prelutsky is silly across the board, at least in Something Big Has Been Here. The books is dedicated to children’s booksellers, and he clearly had kids in mind when choosing his subject matter. Many poems are written from a child’s point of view, often complaining about some gross unfairness or another. Several conclude with a twist at the end. In addition to amusing juvenile exploits, there are plenty of unusual animals, including some creatures Prelutsky invented himself.

When my aunt presented this book to me, she made note of several favorites, and I admit I’m biased in their favor, particularly Belinda Blue, which describes a temper tantrum of seismic proportions that I suspect I may have at one time had myself, and The Zoo Was in an Uproar, which features a vast cast of incensed creatures. Both are ideal examples of the two elements, aside from rhyme, that are most prevalent in Prelutsky’s poems: big words and alliteration. His poems roll off the tongue. They are fun to read, and a young child reading them aloud can’t help but feel a bit intellectual. Prelutsky was building kids’ vocabularies long before Series of Unfortunate Events was a twinkle in Daniel Handler’s eye. An excerpt to demonstrate: ”Repellant!” puled a puma, / “Bizarre!” a badger bawled, / the donkeys were disgusted, / the pandas were appalled…

My biggest complaint with Prelutsky is his almost blanket use of commas at the end of his lines when they are often clearly uncalled for. I’m not sure why he does this. Is it to make the poems easier for a child to read aloud, equipped with a reminder as to when to take a breath? It grates on me after a while, and I find myself mentally putting in the appropriate line-end punctuation (or lack thereof). Aside from this minor quibble, Something Big Has Been Here is a superior collection of poems that I would recommend to elementary school students and to older folks who still dare to admit that this stuff resonates with them. With a hundred poems in the collection, there’s bound to be something in there for any child. If you’re a Shel Silverstein fan, you definitely should check out Jack Prelutsky. He may not be quite as well-known, but he’s just as likely to inspire a love of reading in the impressionable and imaginative minds of the young.

Will Smith Tries His Best to Get Deserving Guys Hitched

Back when I went to see Pooh’s Heffalump Movie, the day before my birthday, Hitch was playing in the other theater. Although going to see Winnie-the-Pooh was her idea, my friend has playfully rubbed it in ever since that she could’ve seen Hitch one time, but instead we had to go see that dumb Pooh movie… So last night we finally amended that. It’s nice to have a six-screen dollar theater. It means that most of the movies we wanted to see when they first came out make it to the more affordable big screen before landing on video.

The first thing we noticed was the apparent randomness of the previews. Usually there is a certain overriding theme. Revenge of the Sith boasted previews for action / adventure flicks, predominantly involving superheroes. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe probably aims a little younger than the other films, but it qualifies as an epic fantasy and probably will be this Christmas’ big blockbuster. And after all, C. S. Lewis did say that really great children’s literature appeals as much to adults as kids, and that’s especially true when the current adults were kids when the book in question came out and recall it fondly. But I’m in danger of losing myself on a tangent. The point I wanted to make is that the previews here ranged from Kicking and Screaming to The Interpreter, apparently indicating that Hitch is a film with a diverse audience. To my surprise, none of the trailers were for a romantic comedy.

I go into most movies without terribly high expectations. I expect to be entertained, and usually I am. But I leave the “You’d better wow me or else” attitude for monumental movies like the LOTR trilogy. I had heard a lot of good things about Hitch, so I figured I’d like it, but for a buck I didn’t really care too much if it fell a little flat. Luckily, it turned out to be a dollar well spent.

Will Smith plays Alex Hitchins, known to his clients simply as Hitch. He’s a rather unlikely date doctor, given the fact that in college he had all the panache of Steve Urkel (and looked suspiciously like him too). But a longtime lack of luck with the ladies must have inspired him to concentrate on tapping into their psyches, because in the present day he is smooth and savvy, sure he’s discovered all the tricks for getting a girl’s attention. For the most part, he focuses that inside information in a positive direction, helping hopelessly geeky guys win the affections of the women they adore – as long as they really are interested in a relationship and not a sleazy one-night stand. It’s an altruistic pursuit, particularly when he takes on the case of Albert (Kevin James), a clumsy, bespectacled accountant head over heels for beautiful heiress Allegra Cole (Amber Valletta).

Smith is the film’s focal point. He often directly addresses the audience, imparting his wisdom. At several points in the movie, the scene alternates between Hitch giving Albert advice on an upcoming date and Albert doing his best to take it and fly with it once he’s in the actual situation. The first half of the movie is full of disastrous hilarity, not only on the part of the perpetually klutzy Albert but also Hitch, who finds his own insight seems to fail him miserably when he’s faced with the prospect of pursuing a serious relationship of his own. The object of his affection is Sara (Eva Mendez), a career-centered journalist who’s always first on the scene when the fodder for juicy gossip is born. Both Allegra and Sara seem pretty receptive to the advances of their wooers, though Sara is hard-pressed to admit it. I heard many comments about the lack of chemistry between Smith and Mendez, but I thought they made a fairly convincing couple, while James and Valletta were adorable together. The most chemistry, however, is clearly between Smith and James, whose scenes together are both riotous and touching. If Smith is suave and debonair, James is sweetly bumbling, and it’s easy to see why an heiress would fall for his character.

There’s nothing terribly unpredictable in this film, but when’s the last time you were shocked by a romantic comedy? Though my friend loved the beginning, she though the movie descended into implausibility, but I thought it was all pretty cleverly done, and while it may have been a tad over-the-top, the film illuminated some of the difficulties that two people who could make a beautiful couple create for themselves. Mainly, though, this film is simply a lot of fun.

Minnesota Gives Indiana a Run For His Money

I arrived home the other day to a delightful surprise: a VeggieTales ambassador kit containing promotional materials and a preview copy of Minnesota Cuke and the Search for Samson’s Hairbrush. I have to get busy distributing the activity packs and seeing about showing the movie at church before its release date the end of next month. But first I need to record my impressions of the latest offering from my favorite brand of Christian entertainment.

The show begins, as most do, with a letter, though in this case it winds up being two letters, both addressing the same distressing topic: bullies. I recently saw an episode of Dr. Phil in which his battered young guests received a shot of encouragement from the exquisite Clay Aiken, who has never hidden the fact that before his rapid rise to stardom he was looked upon as a loser by many of his peers. By the time he left high school, he’d learned how to stand tall in the face of bullies, and I think he would heartily appreciate the episode’s message. I, meanwhile, would heartily appreciate the possibility of a guest appearance by him in a future video. If Rebecca St.-James can do it, why not Clay? A girl can dream.

Anyway, the topic at hand is bullies, and who better to demonstrate that affliction than juvenile goody-goody Junior Asparagus? Some folks don’t care much for Junior because of his preciousness, not to mention the self-righteousness he displays in several episodes. I, however, still think he’s darn cute, and his segment of this show is most enjoyable. It plays a bit like A Christmas Story as we are treated to visions of his wild imagination. In these daydreams, he fills the shoes of Robin Hood (accompanied by some marvelous minstrel music), a star quarterback and a starship captain. But his real-life problem is as daunting as any his overactive imagination can cook up. With a little help from his dad and his friends (among them, the adorable bespectacled Annie, who rather resembles me), he comes to a conclusion by the end of the tale about how to deal with a particularly ferocious bully so that he can get back to his merry-making on the playground. Keep an ear out for a soft echo of Little Guys Can Do Big Things Too from Dave and the Giant Pickle as Junior, inspired by something greater than Garrison Keillor’s famed powder milk biscuits, goes out and does what needs to be done. Incidentally – and I may have mentioned this in my review of Duke and the Great Pie War because I was so impressed with it just from the preview – Junior has a really cool tree house. It’s just your basic tree house, really, I suppose, but I envy him. I always wanted one but never had a tree big enough to support it. Oh, well, that’s a subject for another episode, I suppose…

For the astute observer, a scene near the beginning of Junior’s escapades provides us with a glimpse of the next segment, a Silly Song entitled Pizza Angel. It’s reminiscent of His Cheeseburger, in which Mr. Lunt croons passionately about Jerry Gourd’s unrequited love affair with a cheeseburger. Here, Larry is doing the singing for himself, moaning about the fact that his beloved pizza is taking far too long to arrive. The tragic ballad recalls such maudlin fare as Leader of the Pack, while I assume the title is a play on Johnny Angel. Larry sings with such gusto, you’re likely to catch your tummy rumbling just a bit by the end of the song. You may even be inspired to order a pizza yourself – or, given the outcome of the song, perhaps it’s more likely you will be dissuaded from your next attempt at a quick and yummy meal. Kudos to the ever-savvy lyricist for the reference to ordering pizza online.

Minnesota Cuke (Larry) is the main attraction, and he draws us in right from the outset, clutching a golden carrot while he frantically sleds away from the noseless snowman head relentlessly pursuing him. As if sudden near-avalanches aren’t enough, he has to deal with Professor Rattan (Mr. Lunt), who has undermined every mission he’s ever undertaken. In fact, their rivalry dates all the way back to early elementary school, when Rattan replaced the gummy worms in Minnesota’s lunch with real worms, fostering a lifelong hatred of the invertebrates akin to Indiana Jones’ ophidiophobia. (What a cumbersome word to describe “fear of snakes” I think I fear the word more!)

This is not Minnesota’s first appearance. He also starred in a video game, which I admired but never wound up buying. Maybe one of these days. I hope he becomes a recurring character like Larry-Boy. His posse includes his assistant Martin (Bob), a pair of barbers (of Seville) and the lovely Julia, apparently sliding into being typecast as Larry’s love interest, which is basically a new direction for VeggieTales. She was first seen as Petunia in Duke and the Great Pie War. I wouldn’t be shocked if she showed up in the next video as an elf maiden with a name suspiciously similar to Arwen. The two have great chemistry in this adventure, and we’re treated to several exciting feats of daring-do in which both are participants. The soundtrack is inspiring, with its swelling heroic backdrops, including a nod to the all-time most popular Silly Song.

I found it amusing that this adventure revolves around Niagara Falls. We just visited the falls last weekend with our exchange student, Cathi, who had to settle for the American side due to visa complications. Thanks to the Maid of the Mist, however, she managed to get a pretty up close and personal look at both majestic waterfalls. Every time I visit Niagara Falls, I am reminded of Superman II and that delightful scene in which he rescues a child who falls over the railing; as he flies her up to safety, an elderly woman in the crowd comments, “What a nice man!” One would think that such a national landmark – not to mention the honeymoon capitol of the world – would make an ideal location for many a movie, but the only other film reference we could come up with was Bruce Almighty. Now I have another movie to add to my flimsy arsenal. I have a feeling I’m missing a lot of movies…

VeggieTales is usually pretty good about rewarding those fans who are faithful enough to sit through the credits, and in this case those who persevere are rewarded with the Minnesota Cuke theme song, performed by bluegrass legend Charlie Daniels. It all adds up to a wildly entertaining ride, one of the best Veggie offerings yet, making me even more optimistic about their November release – one video to rule them all.