GOD BLESS POLICE!

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MAKAYLA JANE:
GOD'S Spirit Reborn With
HIS Loving
JESUS HEart.

MAKAYLA JANE: GOD'S Spirit Reborn With HIS Loving JESUS HEart. MAKAYLA JANE: GOD'S Spirit Reborn With HIS Loving JESUS HEart. MAKAYLA JANE: GOD'S Spirit Reborn With HIS Loving JESUS HEart.

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/27/24

TITLE:  Pan 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR:  2015 Warner Bros. Pictures / Ratpac-Dune Entertainment / Berlanti Production 

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie is a story about how some enemies become friends and some friends are actually your enemies and began with a unstable woman named Mary left her infant son, Peter, on the doorstep (dark night) of the Lambeth Home for Boys in London. Some questionable and strict nuns eventually found baby Peter. Twelve years later during WWII, Peter was still at the orphanage. The orphan boys were fed gruel and Peter figured that Mother Barnabas was stashing away the good food in her office after he spotted the overweight lead nun eating some of the better quality food rations meant for GOD’s children. When the air raid sirens went off in the building, everyone went to the shelters to take cover from the missiles, except Peter and his friend Nibs who broke into Mother Barnabas’s office. The boys discovered that by turning the nose on the Virgin Mary statue, a secret passageway opened up and inside was all the food and the orphanage records. There was a note that supposedly Mary had left with Peter explaining that she would be back for him soon. Mother Barnabas caught the two boys and punished them both with a beating, and then she ripped up Mary’s note. Boys started disappearing from the orphanage and Peter and Nibs suspected Mother Barnabas was selling the children. That night, a group of pirates kidnapped some of the boys and took them away on a flying ship. Nibs jumped from the ship onto the orphanage roof and stayed behind in London but Peter was too afraid to jump and was taken away on board the pirate ship. Air Force planes fired at the ship, but the pirates escaped straight up into the sky into outer space that was too high for the pilots to follow them without their planes burning up. The ship arrived on a floating island called Neverland, where the wicked pirate Blackbeard collected orphan children from all over the world of all races and creeds to build a new society.The workers were forced to mine fairy dust called Pixum, which Blackbeard hunted the fairies to extinction but refused to reveal why he wanted the fairy dust (possibly immortality). When Peter found Pixum, another miner stole it and then lied that Peter stole it from him. Peter and other boys were taken before the miners to be judged for their crimes, and all were unfairly condemned and supposed to be knocked into a pit. However, Peter didn’t fall to his death and discovered that he could fly. Blackbeard had a private meeting with Peter and offered him chocolate, and then Blackbeard held a sword to Peter’s throat before giving Peter the sword. Blackbeard explained that he wanted to steal the land belonging to the native tribes so he could continue mining Pixum, but the natives refused to give up their land and attacked the pirates and their ships while keeping the location of their camp a mystery. There was a prophecy that a boy who could fly would be born to a fairy prince and a human girl in love, and the boy would help the native tribe rise up against Blackbeard and defeat him. The natives had been waiting for the boys, their messiah, to appear and save them. Blackbeard believed that Peter was the boy from the legend and put him in a cell. An adult digger named James Hook had been in the mines for many years and figured the only way out was using Peter’s flying abilities. James blew a hole in the wall and rescued Peter, and James promised to help Peter find mother Mary who he believed was in Neverland. James and Peter asked Sam “Smee” Smiegel for help out of the mine, and he went with them to the Skyport. They launched a flying ship and dodged the cannonballs fired at them from the other pirate ships. They made it over the wall and James planned to leave Neverland instead of honoring his deal with Peter. They made a crash landing in Neverwood, and Peter set off to ask the natives where Mary was. James and Smee eventually agreed to go with Peter. They were surrounded by vicious Neverbirds and ran, and the birds carried Smee away. The natives fought off the birds but then took the trio as hostages and forced James to fight the Pan, the tribe’s lead warrior named Kwahu, and win otherwise the tribe would kill the trio. Kwahu beat James up, and when Peter tried to help it was discovered that he wore a panpipes necklace. The fighting stopped, and Princess Tiger Lily explained. Blackbeard went after the Pixum and destroyed everything, and the chief of the native tribe made a pact with the fairy king so the two peoples could fight the pirates together. Mary was Blackbeard’s love interest and he held her captive on his ship. The king’s son, the fairy prince, found Mary and fell in love with her so he kept returning to visit her. When Blackbeard found them he was angry, so the prince turned himself into a human in order to rescue Mary. The prince could only exist in human form for one day, so they two spent the day having sex and then the human prince died (and could no longer be a fairy either) and nine months later Mary had a baby boy. The child was Peter, and Mary and the tribe hid Peter in the human world by dropping the baby off at an orphanage to be raised. They gave him the necklace so he could be identified if he ever went to Neverland. The fairies were not extinct as everyone thought but instead hid away in the secret fairy kingdom with Mary, who became a warrior and trained Princess Tiger Lily. It was the tribe’s duty to protect the kingdom, so Chief Great Little Panther insisted that Peter prove he was Mary’s son before they took him to the kingdom. If Peter could prove that he could fly in three days’ time, then the tribe would know he was the chosen one but he was a fake if he couldn’t fly. Peter was skeptical because he hadn’t been able to fly since the last incident. Blackbeard, his head pirate Bishop and the other pirates found Smee and planned to kill him, so in order to save his life Smee betrayed everyone and told Blackbeard about the hidden fairy kingdom. James tried to flirt with Princess Tiger Lily, but she slapped him and was upset that he thought the fairies didn’t exist and Peter shouldn’t have to prove himself by flying. The pirates then attacked the village, and Blackbeard threatened to kill the chief if he didn’t reveal where the fairy kingdom was. The chief refused so Blackbeard shot him to death and then threatened to do the same to Princess Tiger Lily. Princess Tiger Lily wouldn’t reveal anything, so James announced that there was a map to the fairy kingdom. Peter rode a Neverbird to the village, but then Blackbeard, who claimed that he killed Mary, confronted him. James and Princess Tiger Lily rescued Peter before Blackbeard could kill him, and Tiger Lily was angry with James that Smee was his friend and ratted them out. Princess Tiger Lily then admitted that Mary was dead and Princess Tiger Lily lied because finding Mary was Peter’s incentive to help the tribe and he wouldn’t have helped them if he knew the truth. Princess Tiger Lily took James and Peter to Mermaid Lagoon, where the pirates couldn’t get them because of the giant crocodiles. However, the crocodiles then rammed the boat and Peter was knocked into the water. Three mermaids fought the crocodiles off and brought Peter to the surface. Princess Tiger Lily helped Peter to have a vision in the magical waters, and he saw Mary and Blackbeard fighting. Blackbeard killed Mary accidentally and then grieved over it. James fled from the pirates and tried to convince Princess Tiger Lily to go with him, but she refused. Peter told Princess Tiger Lily that he didn’t believe he was the chosen one but he would fight Blackbeard. Peter insisted that Princess Tiger Lily take him to the fairy kingdom, and they arrived there just as Blackbeard and the pirates did because Smee found the map to the kingdom in the village. Blackbeard captured Princess Tiger Lily and Peter and took the necklace from Peter. Peter’s necklace turned out to be the key to unlock the kingdom, and Blackbeard planned to burn the fairy hive to kill all the fairies and then harvest the endless supply of Pixum. Peter could understand the words of a fairy named Tinkerbell, and Peter begged for Blackbeard not to hurt the fairies. Blackbeard demanded that Peter kneel to Blackbeard, but Peter refused. Blackbeard was about to kill Peter, but then James decided to come back and rammed the side of the ship with his own ship. Blackbeard and Princess Tiger Lily fought while James and Bishop fought. James’ ship crashed and he was knocked off, and Peter was able to catch James and fly him to safety. Peter flew to Blackbeard’s ship and sent the fairies to attack the pirates. Blackbeard held a knife to Princess Tiger Lily’s throat, but then the fairies zapped Blackbeard and the ship crashed into the abyss below. Mary’s spirit then appeared to Peter and told him that he needed to stay in Neverland and live with her people (no adult village people took Peter in though so it had the boy an orphan there too), the tribe and the fairies. Peter returned to the London orphanage and collected Nibs and the other boys to take them to Neverland to live with him. James and Princess Tiger Lily had romantic feelings for each other, and James became Captain Hook and flew the ship to Neverland. This movie had a budget of $150 million and grossed over $128 million at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Kylie Erica Mar, Made In Hollywood, “Enchanting!” Cindy Pearlman, NY Times Syndicate, “The family adventure of the year.” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/26/24

TITLE:  Lady and the Tramp II

BOX OFFICE RATED:  G

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2001  Walt Disney Pictures / Walt Disney Television Animation / Walt Disney Animation Australia / Walt Disney Home Entertainment 

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 2

REASON: This cartoon movie takes place in a New England town in 1911, where Jim Dear and his wife Darling owned two dogs, Lady and Tramp, and their four puppies. The three girl puppies, Annette, Collette and Danielle were all prissy, except tomboy Danielle. The one boy pup, Scamp, was mischievous and liked to cause trouble and make messes. Jim was upset with Scamp’s behavior and chained him up in the doghouse as punishment. Tramp scolded Scamp, but his son wouldn’t listen and announced that he would rather be a stray dog running wild and free than part of the family. Meanwhile, a group of strays went by and were able to outrun and outsmart the dogcatcher. The hood gang was led by Buster and consisted of Angel, Sparky, Ruby, Francois and Mooch. Scamp was impressed and wanted to be just like the stray gang with total freedom and no boundaries instead of being a neat and well-behaved house dog who followed the rules. Scamp was able to get free from his chain and escaped the backyard. The young pup followed Angel to the junkyard where the strays lived. Scamp wanted to join them, and Buster didn’t think he had what it took but Angel vouched for Scamp so Buster agreed to test Scamp. Buster challenged Scamp to retrieve a can from under the paw of the fearsome dog, Reggie, as he slept. No dog had ever accomplished the feat before and even the strays were all scared of Reggie. Scamp roused the vicious Reggie from his sleep and was chased. The dogcatcher captured Angel, but Scamp rescued her and the dogcatcher captured Reggie instead. Scamp was accepted into the gang, and he learned that his dad Tramp used to be a stray and belonged to Buster’s street gang. However, Tramp had fallen in love with Lady and started a family with her. Buster believed that Tramp betrayed him and threatened Scamp if he was related to Tramp, so Scamp told the gang leader he wasn’t. Angel confided in Scamp that five human families deserted her but she was desperate to have a forever home. Angel begged Scamp not to tell Buster (who always claimed that Angel was his girl) so she wouldn’t get kicked out of his gang, and Scamp agreed. The two small dogs then realized they were on the train tracks with an oncoming train approaching, so they fell into the water below. Scamp’s family realized Scamp was missing. Scamp’s sisters hoped that Scamp would receive harsh punishment for running away. Lady, Tramp and their dog friends Jock and Trusty went out looking for Scamp. They pulled something out of the water by the train tracks, but it was a wig and not Scamp. As it happened, Scamp was hiding out across the pond. Scamp and Angel figured they were in love and went to Tony and Joe’s Italian restaurant, where the two pups devoured a plate of spaghetti like wild animals, unlike Scamp’s parents who used manners when they shared the noodles. Scamp hid when his parents and Jim Dear appeared. Later on, Angel looked through the window of Scamp’s home and saw Jim Dear and Darling’s toddler son Junior upset about Scamp’s disappearance. Angel couldn’t believe that Scamp would run away from a loving family that she would give anything to have, and she thought Scamp was better than a junkyard dog but Scamp refused to accept that fact. There was a Fourth of July parade the next day and the town celebrated. Aunt Sarah and her cats, Si and Am, came for a visit. Sarah didn’t seem to like Scamp and thought it was nonsense to waste time searching for him. Buster figured out that Scamp was part of Tramp’s family and gave Scamp his final test to steal a chicken from his family’s own picnic. Angel told Scamp not to, but he did anyway and stole the chicken. The other dogs joined in on the raid and wrecked the parade, and Tramp went after Scamp. Scamp refused to go home and confronted his dad about never revealing that he was a street dog. Tramp explained that he fell in love and found a better life and he wanted that for Scamp. Scamp announced that he still wanted to be a stray, so Buster removed Scamp’s collar and Tramp left upset. Angel protested and went against Scamp, so Scamp mad at Angel for turning on him then told Buster that Angel wanted to be a house dog. Angel left then, and Scamp went to find her and apologize. Buster and Francois got the dogcatcher’s attention and then disappeared, so the dog catcher would capture Scamp. The two stray gang dogs refused to help him. Scamp was taken to the pound and put in a cage with scary Reggie. Angel went to Lady and Tramp to get their help, and they made it to the pound just as Buster broke free from his chain. Tramp held Reggie off, and Scamp was knocked unconscious during the fight but recovered. The dogcatcher went after Tramp and Scamp, but Angel fought him off. Scamp went back to the junkyard gang to retrieve his collar and dumped a pile of junk on Buster. The other dogs left, and Scamp realized that a loving and caring family like the one he had was what he wanted so Scamp went home with them. The rest of the family was happy to see Scamp and they also accepted lil Angel into their big family and Angel was happy to have her forever family at last. The movie cover art listed, Bill Hoffmann, New York Post, “A very worthy successor to the Disney classic.”

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/24/24

TITLE:  Turbo 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2013 Dreamworks Animation SKG / 20thCentury Fox 

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 2

REASON: This cartoon movie takes place in Van Nuys, California, where a group of garden snails worked in a human garden harvesting tomatoes. One snail named Theo lived in the garage, and his dream was to be an Indy 500 champion like his idol Guy Gagné, the French-Canadian racecar driver.Theo was upset when he accidentally broke the TV that he watched Guy’s races on. The other snails, including Theo’s brother, Chet, thought that Theo’s dream for speed was unrealistic. Theo tried to race and reach a fallen tomato before the lawnmower could, but he didn’t reach it and Chet and the other snails rescued him from certain lawnmower death. Theo was discouraged and left to watch the fast cars on the freeway. He was knocked off the freeway and ended up inside a racecar participating in a high-speed street race. The driver used nitrous oxide to power the car, and the gas supercharged Theo’s snail body and turned him into a racecar complete with headlights, taillights and a radio. Theo used his new abilities to scare the little boy who terrorized the garden bugs and ran them down with his tricycle. The tricycle crashed into the garden, so the boss fired both Theo and Chet, which upset Chet. His brother got carried off by a group of crows, so Theo raced after him through traffic and saved him. Theo and Chet were then captured by a human called Tito Lopez, who took him to the hangout at the auto shop in the rundown Starlight Plaza where the shopkeepers raced their pet snails (Whiplash, Skidmark, Smoove Move, Burn and White Shadow). Theo outpaced the other snails and they were impressed, so Theo told them that his name was now Turbo and brother Chet thought Theo was a freak. Tito and his brother Angelo owned the Dos Bros Taco shop, and Angelo wanted Tito to focus on selling tacos but Tito thought Turbo was a get rich quick moneymaker ticket to success. Turbo called the other snails slow and challenged them to a race, and Turbo almost won but didn’t. In hopes of starting a “taco-volution,” and making Dos Bros famous, Tito put up a billboard inviting visitors to come see the world’s fastest snail. However, no one stopped by. Tito thought male Chet was female and was Turbo’s girlfriend. Turbo indicated to Tito that they should enter the Indy 500 in Indiana, so Tito told Angelo that they should sell the food truck to pay for the $20,000 entry fee. Angelo thought it was a crazy idea and wanted nothing to do with it, and neither did the other shopkeepers (Paz the manly female mechanic, Bobby the store owner and Kim Ly the manicurist). The snails took matters into their own hands and put nails in the tires of a tour bus to force them to stop in Starlight Plaza. The visitors got lunch at the taco shop and saw Turbo race, so the other shopkeepers decided to give Turbo a chance. They, Tito and the snails set off for Indianapolis without Angelo knowing. When they arrived, Tito tried to talk an official into letting them register for the Indy even though they had no official team. Tito was escorted out by securityand everyone laughed when they learned that Tito’s driver was a snail. Turbo then proved his skills on the track, so everyone and their brother fanatics were now obsessed with California snail Turbo in Indiana and Turbo was all over the news. The CEO of IndyCar announced that he wouldn’t allow a snail to race in the Indy, but everyone, including Guy, chanted to let Turbo race so the Indiana CEO caved and then went against the rules and agreed with the debatable majority. Turbo checked out Guy’s racecar and trophies and was glad that Guy believed in him. French Canadian Guy then showed him ugly side and declared that nobody, especially not a snail, would stand between him and the trophy and he threatened Turbo if he didn’t back out. Chet thought Turbo was delusional for thinking he could race against cars, so brother Chet refused to watch the dangerous race. However, a little boy put brother Chet inside a cup with front-row seating to the race. Tito and the other humans had planned to be Turbo’s pit crew, but there wasn’t much they could do so the snails took over. Chet decided to watch the race and cheer Turbo on as his celebrity brother figured out how to maneuver between and under the cars. Guy was in the lead, and Turbo got trapped against the wall and Guy’s car and cracked his shell. Turbo’s superspeed started wearing off, and Tito planned to take Turbo out of the race but he decided to give it another shot. Turbo passed Guy and was ahead of him, so Guy did a risky move to get back in the lead. Guy lost control of his car and crashed into the others, and then he knocked a hole right through Turbo’s shell so his powers disappeared just a short distance from the finish line. Three crows surrounded the other snails and planned to eat them, but the snails gained control of the crows and rode them like horses to the track. Turbo was discouraged, so Chet gave his brother a pep talk and he slowly crawled towards the finish line. Guy refused to give up and tried to manually pull a piece of his car to the finish line and then tried to kill the other competitor, but Turbo won the Indiana Indy 500 by a rigged shell. The victory put Starlight Plaza on the map and all the shopkeepers had regular visitors and more business. Tito upgraded the food truck and kitchen for Angelo, who had been watching the race and couldn’t believe that Turbo won. Turbo decided that he would race the other snails even without his powers, and Chet became an ambulance snail and got together with Burn, the female snail. This movie had a budget of $127-135 million and grossed over $282 million at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Lou Lumineck, New York Pos,t “Fast and funny, fresh!” Shawn Edwards, FOX-TV “Four stars.” Pete Hammond, Movieline, “The best animated movie of the year.” Jake Hamilton, FOX-TV, “Hilarious.” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/23/24

TITLE:  Like Stars on Earth (Taare Zameen Par) 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2007  Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment / PVR Pictures / Aamir Khan Productions Film 

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie takes place in India, where eight-year-old Ishaan “Inu” Awasthi failed in all his classes at St. Anthony’s school. The young boy was interested in nature and animals, and had difficulties learning academics the same way other children did. An older bully boy named Ranjeet started a fight with Inu and both children ended up battered and bruised. Inu was upset and smashed Ranjeet’s pots outside his home, so Ranjeet’s mom scolded Inu’s dad Nandkishore “Nandu” for Inu’s behavior. Nandu and Inu’s mom, Maya, didn’t understand that Inu was a special needs child, so Nandu smacked Inu and threatened to send him away to boarding school if another person complained about him. Maya tried to help Inu with his homework and learn to read and write, but Inu didn’t listen and was unfocused. Maya nursed Inu’s wounds and Nandu upset Inu by saying he would be gone forever when he was going away on a work trip for a few days. Maya wasn’t happy about giving up her job to stay home and help teach Inu, because he still couldn’t read and write and wouldn’t concentrate and had a wild imagination. Inu was asked to read something at St. Anthony’s school in English class, but he couldn’t so the teacher screamed at the little boy and kicked him out of her class because she believed the child mocked her in front of the other students and didn’t understand his difficulty when he told her that the letters danced on the page. While he waited in the hallway, Inu flicked his boogers and licked the wall, and then he left St. Anthony’s school and skipped the rest of the day and explored the big city all by himself for many hours. Later on, he told his older brother Yohan, who excelled in all his subjects at schoolthat he skipped school.  Yohan planned on telling their parents. Inu convinced Yohan to write a forged absent note to the St. Anthony’s school from mom Maya saying that Inu was sick and missed school. Inu’s parents then found the note, and Inu admitted that he wandered the city alone but refused to say who wrote the note. Nandu was angry and swore at Inu calling him names and threatening to beat him because he was able to leave school grounds and nobody would have known where he was, especially his stay at home mom. Maya and Nandu met with the school officials and learned that Inu got rid of his exam test papers so his parents wouldn’t know he failed in all subjects. The female St. Anthony’s principal suggested that Inu go to a special school, but Nandu had connections and didn’t believe that Inu was retarded and arranged for him to be sent to a boarding school in the middle of the year even though they couldn’t afford it. Inu didn’t want to go, and Maya and Yohan were also upset at sending Inu away. Inu had a bad dream that he and Maya got separated on the train. Inu was unhappy at his new school, the New Era High School, because the teachers were strict and smacked him with a ruler and the kids laughed him. Inu found a new friend with Rajan Damodaran, who used crutches for a leg injury. When Inu’s parents came to visit him on the weekend, he was in tears and refused to speak to them and they left. Maya called Inu to tell him that the family couldn’t visit the next weekend because of Yohan’s tennis match, and Inu said nothing. Ram Shankar Nikumbh was hired as a new art teacher, and he dressed up in a silly outfit and entertained the kids with games and songs. The other teachers told Nikumbh that the headmaster wanted discipline in all classes and Nikumbh should not behave as he did with the special kids at the Tulips school where he also worked since those kids at the special school had no future and were mentally challenged for the rest of their lives. Nikumbh noticed that something was seriously wrong with Inu and asked Rajan about it, and Nikumbh told his coworker Jabeen Khan the trouble. Nikumbh looked through the scribbling and misspelled words in Inu’s workbooks. The special kids at the Tulips School put on a dancing performance for their parents, and Yohan lost his tennis match so Nandu was disappointed. Nikumbh went to see Inu’s parents and they looked at the works of art created by Inu, who loved to draw and paint. Nikumbh informed Nandu and Maya that Inu was not lazy or dumb but was dyslexic, which caused him to have difficulty recognizing letters and calculating and judging things normally. Inu was also confused by instructions and unable to follow them, and he had no self-confidence and was disobedient as a result. Nandu took it to mean that Inu was mentally retarded and he was only concerned about how Inu would be able to compete with others in the world and make something of himself like Yohan would. Nikumbh (bonded with Inu more than his birth dad) believed that Inu had his own abilities and talents and shouldn’t be forced to be like others. Later on, Maya watched home videos of Inu when he was younger. Back at school, Nikumbh explained to his students that Einstein, da Vinci and Edison were all dyslexic but were geniuses, and Abhishek Bachchan was the same way but he became a famous singer. Picasso, Walt Disney, Neil Diamond and Agatha Christie were also dyslexic and were ridiculed by the world for being different, but then they were applauded and praised when they persevered. Nikumbh told Inu that they were very similar because Nikumbh suffered the same problems as Inu when he was younger and his own dad misunderstood him. Inu made a model boat that worked in the water, and the kids were impressed but only Nikumbh knew that Inu made it. Nikumbh told the principal about Inu’s dyslexia and explained that he had above-average intelligence and deserved to be in a regular school but he needed extra help from the teachers. The male principal didn’t think it was possible for Inu to be given individual attention, and Nikumbh showed the principal Inu’s creative and colorful paintings that were outside the box. Nikumbh dedicated his time and service to his student and offered to help Inu with his reading and writing after school, and the principal agreed to let Inu take oral tests instead of written ones. Nikumbh tutored Inu and he excelled from his teachings. Nikumbh set up a painting competition for teachers and students to compete in. Nandu visited and told Nikumbh that he and Maya were caring parents and were reading about dyslexia on the Internet. However, Nandu had a guilty conscience when Nikumbh gave him the definition of caring, which was not being upset with Inu for messing up and showing him extra attention with hugs and nice words so he would feel wanted and loved. Nikumbh added that when the tribal people on the Solomon Islands cursed and abused a tree, it died on its own (Nandu’s treatment of Inu). Nandu left the school and was shocked to hear Inu reading words for the first time outside and left in tears to return home, without speaking to Inu. Inu was finally able to get dressed for school by himself at boarding school. Lalitha Lajmi as herself appeared to judge the art contest, and she was a teacher, painter and Nikumbh’s guru. Inu was missing from the outdoor Sunday art contest because he went for a walk by himself for hours early that morning by a high ridge. Nikumbh was concerned, but then Inu finally appeared and Inu went off by himself to paint with the watercolors that Yohan gave him as a gift. Inu had studied that wild landscape he saw and then painted a colorful masterpiece. Nikumbh painted a portrait of Inu so they were both happy after they saw one another’s paintings. It was then announced that Nikumbh would remain the art teacher at New Era, and Lalitha had a tie between Inu and Nikumbh’s paintings. Lalitha chose Inu’s picture to be on the cover of the school yearbook, and everyone applauded with a standing ovation. Inu wasn’t used to and didn’t like the attention but was encouraged by Nikumbh to come to the stage and receive his award and a hug from his mentor. At the end of the school year before summer break, Maya and Nandu met with the principal. The parents were surprised to see Inu’s painting and impressive progress report, and the teachers told them to thank Nikumbh for helping Inu, because without Nikumbh’s constant sacrifice, teaching and dedication to GOD’s child, Inu never would have been able to learn and grow in a healthy way that enabled him to succeed and stay focused. Inu’s parents couldn’t believe the changes in him, and Nandu cried and hugged Nikumbh. Inu was reluctant to leave his teacher, the one person who believed in him and actually helped him be best so he ran from the car back to Nikumbh and gave him one more goodbye hug, and leave his safe place to spend the summer with his family. The movie cover art listed, BBC Movie Review “A little twinkling star of a movie.” CNN-IBN “[It] may change your life.” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/22/24

TITLE:  Big Miracle 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2012 Universal Pictures / Anonymous / Working Title Films

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie is inspired by a true story and takes place in Barrow, Alaska, in 1988. Adam Carlson, a Channel 2 news reporter, visited the 49thstate in the USA and reported on local stories, such as having an authentic Mexican restaurant with real avocados that far north of the Southern border. Adam and Pat Lafayette with the Alaska Wildlife Management found a family of whales, the parents and their baby, off the coast of Barrow. The whales were supposed to be migrating 5,000 miles to Baja, Mexico, but they were trapped by the ice and only had a few days to get to the ocean before their breathing hole froze over. The whales were injured from trying to keep the hole open. In Anchorage, Alaska, J.W. McGraw, the owner of the Alaska Northern Oil Company, had the highest bid and received the drilling rights for Bristol Bay. Rachel Kramer, a Greenpeace activist, protested that all the bids, including the Greenpeace bid, should be read since drilling the area would put several animal species in danger. Activist Rachel and reporter Adam used to date, and after she saw his news report about the whales she wanted to help. Rachel asked Governor Haskell to have the National Guard break through the ice with their ship and free the whales, but Governor Haskell thought it was ridiculous and refused to put the lives of the Guard at risk. NBC Studios in New York and KABC Studios in Los Angeles got wind of the story and reported it on national news. Reporter Jill Jerard at KABC offered to go to Barrow and cover the story since Wes Handrick didn’t care. J.W.’s wife, Ruth, in Boulder, Colorado, called Rachel (without telling her husband) and told Rachel that J.W.’s company owned a barge that could be used to break the ice. The National Guard could use a helicopter to pull the barge from Prudhoe Bay to Barrow within a couple of days. J.W. wanted nothing to do with the whales, but Ruth (hinted that the people might back him and help get his drilling approved faster if he were a hero) talked him into it so he could get good publicity and get approved to drill. Now onboard, J.W. also planned to pay for the helicopter gas so he would look like a good guy and no one would be against him. Rachel said terrible things about Governor Haskell on the news, so he hated Rachel but quickly changed his mind and decided to help the whales since Rachel’s attack didn’t make the governor look good for re-election. J.W. called in Colonel Scott Boyer of the Alaska National Guard from Eagle River to fly the towing helicopter 270 miles to Barrow. Scott was skeptical because of the dangers, but he agreed and soon after others (more reporters too) from all over the country traveled to Alaskabecause of the whale story and arrived in Barrow. The local Inupiat fishermen relied on whale hunting to feed their people, and they called a meeting to decide if they would be allowed to kill the whale family for food. Rachel argued that the Inupiats shouldn’t kill the baby whale (yet people eat veal), but they disagreed and told Rachel she shouldn’t be there because she was a white girl and did not know anything about their way of life. The Inupiats didn’t think that the money they received for the drilling rights to the oil on their land was a steady income to pay for other food and their basic needs. However, Malik the whaler was able to convince the whalers to free the whales. They and other volunteers used chainsaws to cut away the ice from the whales’ breathing hole and give them more time. Adam named the parent whales Fred and Wilma and the baby Bamm-Bamm (since the baby was not female Pebbles). No one was allowed to go into the pool with the whales because it was too dangerous, but Rachel decided to swim with them. She removed the net that was wrapped around Bamm-Bamm’s tail, but he was sick with pneumonia. Kelly Meyers worked for President Reagan and informed him of the situation. She thought helping the whales and taking an environmental stand would improve Vice President George Herbert Walker Bush’s chance of being elected as President as he went on the campaign trail. In order to get what he wanted (drill oil) J.W. bought Superbowl Ads and put $2 million into the save-the-whales operation, and he claimed that he cared about God’s creatures. Kelly arranged for President Reagan to call Scott and thank Scott personally for his efforts. In Minneapolis, Karl Hootkin and his brother-in-law, Dean Glowacki, built the homemade Hootin De-Icer. Karl wanted to go to Barrow, and Dean didn’t want to but changed his mind because of the publicity they would get. Karl and Dean asked Rachel if they could use the de-icer to help the whales, but Rachel didn’t know they were coming and didn’t want their help. The volunteers struggled to keep the breathing hole open with ice picks, and the temperature dropped rapidly below zero and they couldn’t keep up. Greenpeace activist Rachel in charge sent for Karl and Dean, and they came with their De-Icers but couldn’t get them started because the generator was frozen. Wes decided to go to Barrow, Alaska after all to take over Jill’s story. She told Adam, who liked Jill, that reporting wasn’t for and she was thinking about becoming a teacher. However, Jill then changed her mind and decided to cover the story when Rachel asked her and Adam to bring a generator to the breathing hole. They took a risk by leaving the helicopter doors open and running the generator so it wouldn’t freeze. The pilot’s eye froze shut in the 50 below temperature, so Adam licked his eye to unstick it. The de-icers worked and kept the hole open. Jill’s KABC producer liked her reporting and called to ask Adam for his reel. The kids at school were obsessed with the whale story and all reported about it in class many times a day and the teachers were burnt out about it. J.W.’s barge was then trapped in an unforeseen pothole in the ice and couldn’t be pulled out, so the mission failed. President Reagan was informed that their only chance of saving the whales was to ask for help from a nearby Soviet icebreaker close to Alaska, but Reagan didn’t want to trust Gorbachev. Since Kelly and Scott didn’t want to let the Soviets come to the rescue, activist and ungodly Rachel planned to tell everyone around the world that President Reagan killed the whales for refusing to enlist the help of Russia and possibly ruined the chances of Bush being elected. However, it was decided that the Soviets would help, and they headed toward Barrow to break through the wall of ice that stood between the whales and the ocean. Malik and the Eskimos used their chainsaws to cut a five-mile path of breathing holes for the whales. Fred and Wilma started moving to the holes, but Bamm-Bamm didn’t surface and Malik announced that the baby whale was dead. Rachel was upset and was comforted by Adam, and Malik said a prayer and song for Bamm-Bamm’s soul. J.W. told Rachel that she was the one to thank for keeping the whales alive, and he promised to save the remaining two so Rachel figured he had a good side. The Spanish, Hindu and German reporters arrived in Alaska to report the event and see the Russians. The town of Barrow was shut down so its inhabitants could help the whales and volunteers. The Soviets arrived with the icebreaker, and the vibration from the impacts of the ship hitting the wall scared the whales back the way they came in the direction of the breathing holes that were now frozen over. The Soviet captain insisted they keep striking the ice, and they succeeded in making a large hole. The two whales reappeared and swam through the hole out to the open ocean, and everyone celebrated.  J.W. used his publicity to get a huge contract cleaning up oil, while Dean and Karl used their publicity to improve their business. Kelly and Scott got married in 1989 and spent their honeymoon in Baja Mexico with the whales. Jill went through three more news stations before she finally made it to a national news station. It was said because of the Russia Alaska worldwide whale event, Greenpeace membership increased by 400%. Adam decided not to go to a job interview in Pittsburgh and instead reporter Adam stayed in Anchorage with activist Rachel where they passionately kissed and got together. Adam got many job offers for other news stations, but he stayed in Anchorage. This movie had a budget of $40 million and grossed $24 million at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Janet Stokes, Film Advisory Board, “A perfect family adventure!” Pete Hammond, BOXOFFICE, “Inspiring and heartwarming. A whale of a great tale!” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/21/24

TITLE:  Drowning Mona 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2000  Columbia Tristar Pictures / Destination Films / Neverland Films / Jersey Shore Production

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie takes place in the rural small town of Verplanck, New York, where the Yugo car company released their new small cars so most of the citizens drove one. Mona Dearly was baffled why the keys that had a key chain with her name on it did not open her own car. Mona then decided to see if the keys fit her son’s car, Jeff. Sure enough, somehow the keys got switched so she decided to use Jeff’s car rather than going inside and getting the keys to own car that probably had Jeff’s name on the keychain. As Mona drove Jeff’s car down the steep hill, she soon discovered that Jeff’s car had no brakes. Mona ended up driving off the road and the car landed in the river far below. A local man, Clarence, fished close by and witnessed Jeff’s car plunging into the water but did nothing to save Mona from drowning. The manly female mechanic, Lucinda, called the police station and told Lieutenant Feege Gruman that Mona was dead. Officer Feege told Police Chief Wyatt Rash the news. Adults Jeff Dearly and Bobby Calzone owned the JB Landscaping Company. Jeff hit on a 13-year-old girl and flirted with her. Chief Wyatt and Officer Feege pulled the car out of the water and Dr. Schwartz made a quick appearance and confirmed that Mona was dead. Jeff was then told the news of his mom’s death by two police officers (his dad didn’t want to tell him) and Jeff was more concerned about his car than his dead mother. Bobby was upset about Mona’s death, but his live in fiancée Ellen “Ellie” Rash, Police Chief Wyatt’s daughter, wanted to celebrate that the witch was dead because Mona and her brain dead husband Phil and nutty son Jeff called Bobby a kiss-a** and didn’t support his business. Both Ellie and Bobby wished that Jeff had been in the car and Ellen wanted Jeff fired because Jeff was the reason they lost customers. Clarence gave his statement, and Officer Feege knew Mona from when he pulled her and Jeff over. The officer remembered that awful time when Jeff threw up on Feege because he was drunk, but Mona got out of the passenger side of the vehicle and declared that Feege scared her baby boy Jeff so she smacked the officer in the head and told him to leave. Everyone in town had a grudge against Mona, and Lucinda wanted to wrap up the case and write it off as an accident. As it so happened, Phil had been cheating on Mona with his mistress Rona Mace, a waitress at the Palace Diner for a while. Rona suggested that Phil murdered Mona since such good luck as Mona dying only happened to Madonna, and Phil denied it. Bobby’s older brother Murph was a bartender at and owner of the Hideaway. Murph frequently had to cut off drunken Father Tom from having any more alcohol. Murph claimed Bobby as a dependent on taxes since Bobby’s landscaping business was not doing well and he had to keep giving his brother money. Murph wanted to know if Bobby murdered Mona since it was because of Mona’s family that JB’s landscaping was in serious trouble. A man at the Hideaway bar the previous night punched Valerie Antonelli in the face and it left a huge shiner on her eye. Chief Wyatt asked Jeff about Mona. Jeff said his mom had a personality disorder and he then lied that Bobby was a raving lunatic who killed Peaches the dog with the lawn mower (In fact Jeff had chased the helpless small dog with the mower until he ran it down and killed it for fun.), and he added the Bobby strangled Mona threatening to kill her.   Chief Wyatt spotted Phil and Rona outside their Charm motel room kissing. Lucinda later confirmed to Chief Wyatt that Mona’s death was no accident because the car’s brakes were sabotaged and it was fixed to kill. Bobby offered his condolences to Phil and Jeff but they didn’t care and made fun of Bobby for showing up. Waitress Rona eavesdropped on Ellen and Chief Wyatt’s conversation at the Palace diner and figured out that he was investigating Mona’s death and was going to ask everyone questions. Rona quickly called to tell Phil, who was in the process of dumping all of Mona’s belongings and loading them up in the back of his car. Chief Wyatt then appeared to question Phil, and Phil told Wyatt about how Mona hit Phil in the head with a frying pan when she figured out that he was playing Wheel of Fortune (sex game) with someone else. Phil had denied having an affair and told Chief Wyatt (who already knew Phil was having an affair) that Mona battered him. Phil added that Jeff was very drunk out of his mind that night and left after arguing with Mona. Chief Wyatt talked to his future son in law Bobby then. Bobby made a claim that Mona smashed his headlights with a golf club after he delivered Jeff’s pay to him and Mona and Jeff accused Bobby of keeping most of Jeff’s pay for himself. Another time, the uniformed officers at the Palace joked about possibly ways that Jeff had lost his hand…bit off by a lake monster, or him reaching into the tree shredder to retrieve his beer bottle, or having his arm cut off by a saw also while trying to retrieve a beer. Phil had to practice and pretend to be sincerely upset at his dead wife’s wake held at Cubby’s Funeral Home that night. Nobody showed up at the wake and Phil and Bobby only wanted to stay ten minutes. Cubby tried to hide a prostitute in his back room that he was taking pictures of unclothed. Phil and Jeff didn’t want to wait any longer, so they went to the diner and Jeff noticed Phil smack Rona on the butt and didn’t like it at all. Ellie got upset when Bobby asked about the Mona conversation Ellie had with her dad Chief Wyatt. Bobby and Ellie went to the wake, where Ellie sprayed perfume on dead Mona to make her smell better. Chief Wyatt showed up and asked Cubby about Mona, and he said no one that attended was upset about her death. Chief Wyatt watched his officers from outside as the ones inside the diner building, including the police, made mean jokes about Mona and laughed it up. Chief Wyatt left knowing that everyone was at the diner and tried to pick the lock on the Dearly house, but then he found the spare key under the doormat. Inside Phil’s room was a heavy metal Kiss doll. There was a portrait of Mona inside the house too. Chief Wyatt remembered the knife-throwing contest at a community event where Clarence, Chief Wyatt and Phil all voted for Bobby instead of Mona and she was upset because she had wanted to win and Mona couldn’t believe her husband voted against her. Chief Wyatt then discovered that Mona and Jeff’s keys were switched because Jeff’s keychain was hanging up in the house with Mona’s car keys on it while Mona’s keychain was in the wrecked car with Jeff’s keys on it. Chief Wyatt told officer Feege, and officer Feege wanted to dismiss it and leave it as an accident instead of uncover the mystery because everyone believed Mona deserved to be dead. There was no big funeral and Bobby and Jeff put up a tombstone for Mona that called her a demoted wife, mother and dressmaker (neither knew that Mona made dresses). Phil felt Rona up and grabbed her breasts while the two were in the back at her work, and she told him not to bring attention to them because some of the cops were smart and would catch on that they were having an affair. Phil went to the Hideaway bar and told Bobby that he was going to jail for killing Mona and thanked him because he did Phil a favor. Bobby later confessed to Ellie that he accidentally killed Mona because he no longer wanted to be a partner with Jeff so he sabotaged Jeff’s car hoping that Jeff would die in an accident. Bobby said hadn’t planned to go through with it. Ellie was then very upset and told Bobby it was still a bad f-ing idea. Ellie was worried since her dad was the chief of police that her fiancé committed murder, and then young Ellen announced that she was pregnant. Clarence sat in the woods nearby and listened to their conversation. Chief Wyatt went to talk to Phil, and Phil finally admitted that he spotted Bobby messing with Jeff’s car after Phil’s frying pan argument with Mona. When asked about Rona, Phil lied that he didn’t have an affair prior to Mona’s death. Jeff was doing landscape work around the shady motel and then burst in on Rona and Phil in their motel room and broke up the adult sex Wheel of Fortune gaming and discovered that his dad was cheating on Mona. Jeff couldn’t believe it and called Rona his lover too, “baby.” Cubby and another Palace waitress were next door renting a room for sex with dog collars and whips, and they yelled at the others to keep it down. Chief Wyatt found out that Ellie was pregnant, and Bobby gave Chief Wyatt real story that was opposite of Jeff’s about how Jeff really killed Peaches and Mona strangled Bobby and threatened him. However, Bobby then lied that he was at the Hideaway on Wednesday night when he sabotaged the car. Chief Wyatt found Valerie on the side of the road with a punctured tire caused by a JB Landscaping that fell out of their truck. He asked about Valerie’s black eye, and she said that Bobby wasn’t at the Hideaway on Wednesday. Jeff wanted to marry waitress Rona, but she told him that she was thinking about marrying Phil so she could have sex with both the father and the son as she had been doing all along. Jeff played sex Wheel of Fortune with Rona in a sexual way like Phil did, and Phil watched from the window. Bobby went to the hideaway and asked Murph, who was passed out drunk, to cover for him about the murder and be his alibi. Murph agreed and then lied to Chief Wyatt when the police showed up that brother Bobby was at the bar on Wednesday night. Outside the motel, the officers found Phil drowned in the lake and Chieff Wyatt showed up and told his employees to remove the body from the water and then went to talk to Clarence who sat off in the distance. Murph told Ellie that Phil was found dead, and she thought it was Bobby’s doing. She hysterically cried that Bobby was a murderer and was so upset that she didn’t put her car in park and it crashed into something outside the police station. Lucinda was there and comforted Ellie and then kissed pregnant Ellen on the lips. Chief Wyatt witnessed and promised not to tell anyone since he experimented too when he was younger. Murph picked Bobby up, and the waitress who Cubby was with told Rona that Phil was dead. Rona packed her bags to leave and accused Jeff of killing Phil. Jeff remembered it as arguing with Phil after he saw Jeff with Rona and then Phil falling into the water and Jeff not pulling him out. The police and others arrived, and Chief Wyatt didn’t plan on arresting his future son-in-law and told Bobby to be quiet so he could coach him on what to say in order to be clear of all charges. Lucinda announced that Jeff was at the cemetery holding a gun to his head, so Chief Wyatt told nobody to move while he and officer Feege went to handle things. Everyone quickly skedaddled to get to the cemetery and watch the fireworks action (including the other two officers that were supposed to stay behind and make sure nobody left that area). Ellie went in her gay pal Lucinda’s car. At Mona’s tombstone, Jeff denied killing his parents and explained that Phil wasn’t his birth dad and Mona cut Jeff’s hand off with a butcher knife when he tried to grab her beer. Everyone got in an argument about whether or not Jeff should pull the trigger and kill himself until Chief Wyatt grabbed the gun from Jeff. The two wrestled with the firearm and it went off, and Deputies Tony Carlucci and Jimmy D. ran away from everyone to a safe place until they found out Chief Wyatt had the gun and were not going to get shot at. Chief Wyatt told Bobby that Clarence admitted to drowning Phil earlier that day. Clarence declared that Phil was the true murderer because he was the one who cut the brakes lines on the car and switched the keys to make sure the driver would die, whereas Bobby only punctured a valve which would not have caused the breaks to go out or the death of Mona. Clarence thought Bobby was a decent person who didn’t belong in prison with a baby on the way, so Clarence killed Phil by drowning Phil that night in the water after Jeff walked away. Chief Wyatt told Clarence that he did everyone a favor but it was still bad, and Clarence justified his actions as being fair because a bad person died. Chief Wyatt told Bobby that he would die before he let Bobby ruin pregnant Ellie’s (Ellen) life (gay), and Bobby would suffer the wrath of God through Chief Wyatt if he messed it up for the whole family because he wanted to be like the Sound of Music. Soon after, Bobby and Ellie got married, and the locals all attended (including lovers Jeff and Rona). Clarence was allowed to attend the ceremony in handcuffs but was then taken to prison by Deputy Jimmy. The movie cover art listed, Bill Zwecker, WMAQ-TV (NBC), “It’s a wonderful off-beat comedy!”

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/20/24

TITLE:  Black Panther 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2018  Marvel Studios / Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures / Buena Vista Home Entertainment

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie takes place in the African nation of Wakanda, where five tribes lived at war with each other until a shaman had a vision from the Panther Goddess Bast. The Goddess gave him the Heart-Shaped Herb, and he took it and received superpowers. He became king and the first Black Panther, the protector of Wakanda, and all kings afterward were granted the powers of the Panther using the Herb. Four tribes united under the new king, but the Jabari Tribe stayed in the mountains isolated from the others. Wakanda used a highly valuable metal called vibranium as the foundation of their wealthy cities and leading technology that the people disguised and claimed to be a third world country. In Oakland, California in 1992, Prince N’Jobu, the brother of King T’Chaka, had left Wakanda and was the leader of a War Dog gang who the Feds were after for California shootouts and criminal activity. T’Chaka visited N’Jobu with two female warriors (the king had only women bodyguards) who were members of the all-female group the Dora Milaje who protected the king. T’Chaka informed N’Jobu that Ulysses Klaue, a South African black-market dealer, stole vibranium from Wakanda and got away under the cover of a staged bomb at the border that killed many. T’Chaka accused N’Jobu of being a traitor and giving Ulysses inside information, and N’Jobu denied it. However, N’Jobu’s best friend in California, James, then revealed himself to be Zuri, one of the spies that T’Chaka sent to find out if brother N’Jobu was the traitor. N’Jobu was shocked to find out that his closest friend had been spying on him and then T’Chaka decided to bring his brother before the Wakanda Council so he could be punished for his treason. There were a bunch of neighborhood boys playing basketball outside the apartment building and they were surprised at the sight of the Wakandan spacecraft flying over. In present day, King T’Chaka and many others died in a terrorist attack at the United Nations. King T’Chaka’s son, Prince T’Challa was also present, and Prince T’Challa regretted not being able to save his dad. Since T’Challa was next in line, Prince T’Challa would be crowned king the following day and was already the new Black Panther. Prince T’Challa wanted his ex-girlfriend, Nakia, to be at his ceremony, so he compromised her spy mission to tell her and bring her back with him. To make that happen, T’Challa and Okoye, the head of the Dora Milaje, fought the militants who Nakia pretended to be a hostage of so she could save the other females from being smuggled. Prince T’Challa, Nakia, and Okoye all returned to Wakanda after taking out the smugglers and setting the women free. It was there in Wakanda that Prince T’Challa’s 16-year-old sister Princess Shuri gave Prince T’Challa the middle finger for making a joke about her, with the Queen mother present. Meanwhile, Erik Stevens “Killmonger,” visited the museum of Great Britain in London and corrected a female in charge employee that the axe on display was from Wakanda and was stolen by the British and not Benin like she said. The London museum employee then collapsed because Killmonger had her coffee poisoned, and used that as a distraction and called the paramedics who came but turned out to be men with guns, led by Klaue, and they shot the security guards dead. Killmonger, his girlfriend and Klaue stole the vibranium axe that Klaue planned to sell later to an American buyer. M’Baku, the leader of the Jabari Tribe, challenged T’Challa for his throne at his crowning ceremony. The two men fought each other, and M’Baku beat T’Challa up and stabbed him in the chest to show everyone that he shouldn’t rule. T’Challa made a comeback and had the chance to kill M’Baku, but instead the defeated man surrendered so T’Challa was crowned king. T’Challa’s powers were taken away for the fight, and Zuri restored them by giving T’Challa the Heart-Shaped Herb. He was buried with sand and transported to the Ancestral Plane to get advice about being a king from T’Chaka. Nakia suggested that Wakanda give foreign aid to refugees and other people in need of help, but T’Challa refused to help because he didn’t want anybody to get ahold of the vibranium. T’Challa then learned that Klaue planned to sell the vibranium artifact to an American buyer in South Korea the following night. T’Challa planned to finally capture Klaue and put him on trial, and T’Challa planned to take disguised Okoye and Nakia with him. Shuri, who was in charge of the technology for Wakanda would help the trio from her Wakanda home office, gave her brother communication gadgets and an upgraded bulletproof Black Panther suit that became charged with more kinetic energy as it was struck with bullets. The trio headed to a secret casino in Busan, South Korea, where T’Challa confronted Everett K. Ross, the CIA agent who was buying the vibranium for the US government. Ross told T’Challa that he was going through with the deal no matter what. Klaue and his men then escaped the casino after they started a shootout. Nakia and Okoye followed in their car while T’Challa followed in a car being driven virtually by Shuri. T’Challa disarmed Klaue’s fake left arm cannon and threatened to kill him, but the Korean people were watching and videoing so T’Challa instead took Klaue hostage. Ross picked them up in his vehicle and Nakia and Okoye, whose car was blown up by Klaue. Ross interrogated Klaue, who revealed that he didn’t steal all of the vibranium as T’Chaka told the UN but in fact only a tiny portion of it because the Wakandans were hiding a mountain of it. T’Challa lied and denied that. Killmonger, his girlfriend and other mercenaries then blew up the wall using dynamite and rescued Klaue in the midst of another shootout. Ross jumped in front of a bullet intended for Nakia, so they headed back to Wakanda to have Ross healed at Shiru’s lab overnight using vibranium. T’Challa’s advisor and friend W’Kabi, the leader of the Border Tribe, was disappointed that both T’Challa and T’Chaka failed to capture Klaue. Meanwhile, Killmonger turned on Klaue with his gun but Klaue grabbed Killmonger’s girlfriend and threatened to kill her. Killmonger shot his girlfriend and then shot Klaue, and he told Killmonger not to go to Wakanda. Killmonger revealed that he was Wakandan and then shot Klaue dead. T’Challa had noticed that Killmonger wore a ring like the one T’Challa wore, so he demanded that Zuri tell him why. Zuri explained that T’Chaka sent him to spy on N’Jobu and his War Dog assignment in California. N’Jobu had a son with an American woman, and he saw the violence and suffering in the world caused by countries in power so he wanted to use the vibranium to overthrow those powerful countries where Africans would have control over all the power and wealth. However, King T’Chaka didn’t approve so N’Jobu and Klaue worked together to steal vibranium and accomplish their goal. N’Jobu pulled a gun on Zuri, so T’Chaka killed his brother in California before he could take him back to Wakanda. T-Chaka then returned alone to Wakanda without N’Jobu’s son which upset T’Challa. Killmonger went to the border and W’Kabi took him to the palace before T’Challa and the elders of the other tribes. T’Challa learned that Killmonger was a mercenary and former US seal whose body was covered in hundreds of scars, one for each person he killed. Killmonger asked for vibranium so he could take over the world, and since the Council refused Killmonger revealed that he was Prince N’Jadaka, the son of N’Jobu and cousin of T’Challa. Prince Killmonger challenged King T’Challa for his throne and King T’Challa accepted the battle to the death. Prince Killmonger stabbed and sliced King T’Challa severely and then killed Zuri when he offered himself in place of King T’Challa. Prince Killmonger threw King T’Challa off the waterfall, and the Dora Milaje pledged their loyalty to Prince Killmonger. Princess Shuri and Ramonda, the Queen Mother of Shuri and T’Challa, grieved for T’Challa’s death. Nakia tried to convince Okoye to help her overthrow King Killmonger, but Okoye refused to go against the new king. King Killmonger specialized in gaining control of governments and their military during election years and using them to his advantage. He ordered for the garden of the Heart-Shaped Herb to be burned so no one else could have the power of the Black Panther. Nakia was able to save one of the Heart Herbs before the garden was destroyed. King Killmonger planned to send vibranium weapons to the War Dogs in London, New York and Hong Kong. They would give the weapons to people all around the world, who would then use them to kill those in power who were oppressing the weak. That was Killmonger’s revenge against those who oppressed the black people and crushed them because they had no way to fight back and win the revolutions. Nakia, Queen Mother Ramonda, Princess Shuri and Ross headed to Jabariland with the Herb in hopes M’Baku would take it and use the power of the Black Panther to defeat King Killmonger. Queeen Mother Ramonda wanted Nakia to take the Herb herself, but she refused and offered it to M’Baku. He revealed that his people found King T’Challa and they were keeping him alivein a coma in the snow. The women gave King T’Challa the last heart herb and King T’Challa traveled to the Ancestral Plane, where he told Father King T’Chaka that he couldn’t join the ancestors until he stopped King Killmonger. King T’Challa was upset that his son King T’Chaka didn’t use Wakanda’s technology to help other nations weaker than theirs for fear their power would fall into the wrong hands. King T’Challa then woke up, and M’Baku agreed to keep Queen Mother Ramonda safe during the upcoming battle but refused to let his army sacrifice their lives for T’Challa’s cause. King Killmonger sent out planes to deliver the weapons, and W’Kabi and the Border Tribe were loyal to evil King Killmongerand used their warrior rhinos against King T’Challa the Panther and the Dora Milaje who were helping him. Okoye and a few of her warriors confronted King Killmonger, and he killed one of them. Princess Shuri instructed CIA Agent Ross on how to virtually fly a plane and shoot down the weapon-carrying planes before they could reach their destinations. The lab was under attack by one of King Killmonger’s warships, and Agent Ross was being trailed by two other ships but was able to get rid of them by forming an X as Princess Shuri told him to do and then shot down all of the planes with weapons. Nakia and Princess Shuri fought King Killmonger, and he was about to kill Princess Shuri but King T’Challa stopped him. The two Black Panthers fought in a zone where their suits didn’t work, and the Jabari Tribe, led by M’Baku, changed their mind and came to fight King Killmonger’s Border Tribe. Okoye confronted W’Kabi, and he and his tribe threw down their weapons and bowed to military head female in charge Okoye. King T’Challa was able to stab King Killmonger in the chest, but he then took pity on his dying royal cousin and took him outside to see the Wakandan sunset that his dad told him was the most beautiful in the world. It was there on foreign land that King Killmonger didn’t want to be healed of his wound and died. Ex-lovers King T’Challa and Nakia then kissed. King T’Challa took Princess Skiru to Oakland, California where King T’Chaka killed N’Jobu. Princess Skiru wasn’t happy about going to Oakland and thought they would go someplace cooler like Disneyland or Cochella. King T’Challa announced that he bought all the buildings around the neighborhood and would turn them into the first Wakandan International Outreach Center. Nakia and Princess Shuri would oversee the operation of the center and use Wakanda’s resources to help people around the world. This movie had a budget of $200 million and grossed over $1.3 billion at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Richard Roeper, “One of the best superhero movies of the century.” Peter Travers, Rolling Stone, “You’ve never seen anything like it in your life.” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/19/24

TITLE: Pretty In Pink 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 1986  Paramount Pictures

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie takes place in Elgin, Illinois where senior high school teen Andie Walsh got dressed for school and then woke up her dad, Jack, so he could get to an interview for a full-time job. Jack’s wife left him a few years earlier and Andie too because the unstable female couldn’t handle family life and preferred single life. At school, student Philip F. “Duckie” Dale propositioned two girls and offered to get them pregnant, so they punched him. In class, the students learned about the New Deal and Roosevelt and the emergency banking policy and socialism. The teacher punished mean girls Benny Hanson and Trombley for picking on Andie’s clothes that she made herself from thrift store shopping. Steff McKee, another senior who was from a wealthy family, liked Andie and had wanted to date for many years, but she turned him down again so he called her a bit** in the school parking lot. Andie had no date for the prom and wasn’t sure if she wanted to go to the prom. Andie talked to her boss, Iona, at the Trax record shop mall area store where Andie worked. Iona listened but then shot a staple using a staple gun near the eye of a boy trying to steal records. The boy left the store and then Iona took a call from her boyfriend and she argued with him on the phone and told him no more bondage after he left her tied up in her car. Another rich boy named Blane McDonnagh had his eye on Andie and went to the record store to see her, but did not ask her out then. Duckie repeatedly went to the nightclub hangout where Andie went with her friends Jena Joeman and Simon. Duckie liked Andie so much that he waited outside for her for hours since he wasn’t allowed in the club, but Andie and her other high school friends were. Andie gave Duckie a ride in her pink car when she left the club. Duckie searched for a love song in the radio, and Andie wished she was a millionaire and not low-class so she could live in one of the big houses she drove by. Another day, at the library, Blane sent messages with pictures of himself and Andie to her computer from his and Andie liked that. Duckie told Jack that he eventually wanted to marry Andie, and Jack told Duckie that Andie might not love him like he loved her. Duckie irritated Andie at work by messing with the backdoor alarm system. Blane showed up at Trax and Andie told him she liked Madonna’s style but he didn’t care for that album recommendation from her. Andie went home and hoped for a message from Blane, but Duckie left her many messages instead so she was disappointed. Andie didn’t have to drag her dad out of bed the next morning because he said he got a job. Blane visited Andie at the outcast kids’ handout on school grounds and asked her out on a date, and she agreed but didn’t want to be picked up at her house. Jealous Steff saw and told his buddy Blane that Andie didn’t have anything worth going out with. Andie and Duckie studied together in her room, and she suspected that he was flunking school on purpose because he didn’t know what he would do after he graduated. Duckie denied it, and he planned to tell Andie that he was in love with her but then decided not to and went home. Jena, a frequent smoker like many other high schoolers, got kicked out of gym class for talking bad about Benny and Andie was sent to the principal’s office for agreeing with Jena. Andie told Principal Donnelly that she was glad the rich community allowed her to attend that school but she would stand up for herself and her friends because she was tired of the mean girls hating on them. The principal decided to let Andie and Jena off the hook. Duckie badgered Andie, and then some mean boys threw Duckie into the girls’ bathroom. Duckie then lip-synced and danced wildly at Trax to try and impress Andie, but she was waiting for Blane. Duckie wasn’t happy to see Blane and argued with Andie about it. Blane convinced Andie to go to a party at his friend Steff’s house, but she wanted to leave because the girls were putting Andie down and unsupervised teens were heavily drinking and dancing in their bras and underwear. Blane and Andie ran into Steff and his girlfriend Benny on the bed drunk. Benny gave Andie a hard time, so Blane and Andie went to the nightclub where Iona was able to get Duckie in by saying he was her son. However, they quickly left because Duckie was rude to Blane, and then Duckie kissed Iona and told that she got replaced but Iona liked the kiss. Blane wanted to drop Andie off at her house in his BMW, and he swore Jesus when Andie refused. They went to her house anyway, where Blane asked Andie to the prom and she accepted by passionately kissing him. Andie told dad (dressed only his bath robe again) once inside the house that it was complicated because her friends and Blane’s friends wouldn’t accept their dating. Jack told Andie that the others opinions shouldn’t matter if she and Blane really liked each other. Andie went to Chinatown to Iona’s apartment in Chinatown, and Iona had a pink prom dress that Andie liked. Iona was dating new guy Terrence (Terry) who owned the pet shop. Duckie had followed and waited outside for Andie. Meanwhile, Steff told Blane to keep away from the rich gang if he had a thing for trashy girls like Andie and he should just have sex with Andie and end it instead of trying to start a pointless relationship. Andie went shopping for prom dresses but they were too expensive. Andie called Blane several times but he wouldn’t answer because of the conversation with Steff. Jack bought Andie a pink prom dress, but then they argued because she knew that he didn’t get a job and wondered where the money came from to purchase the dress since he didn’t work. Andie accused Jack of constantly thinking about his estranged wife and wanted him to forget her like Andie already did. Andie told her dad that she knew since she was five years old that her mom didn’t love her or Jack when she left and didn’t return one time but then showed up again. Andie also said that her (no) mom eventually deserted them both when she was 14 and her dad was 50 years old. Dad told his daughter just because she had a scholarship and was not 18 and almost a high school graduate didn’t make her an expert on adult marriage relationships or love for that matter.  At school (dating drama not academics), Blane lied that he didn’t get any of Andie’s messages when she confronted him and then he told Andie that he had asked someone else to prom a month before and had forgot about it so he could not take Andie. Andie screamed at Blane that he was an f-ing liar and knew that he didn’t want to be seen with her. Steff overheard and was satisfied with that and congratulated Blane on breaking up with the “nobody” girl. Duckie overheard and started a fight with Steff, and after they were separated in the hallway Duckie tore down the prom king and queen poster on his way out. Andie went to see Iona, in Chinatown again and she met Iona’s new boyfriend Terry from the pet shop. Iona was a transformed person and was almost unrecognizable from her usual goth attire. Andie cried and told Iona her troubles, and then she asked for Iona’s pink prom dress, which Iona gave to Andie. Andie used both pink dresses to make her own, and she told her dad that she was going to prom alone to show everyone that they didn’t break her. Steff wanted to go upstairs and have sex with Benny since the hotel room was $300/ night, after only being at the prom for an hour. Duckie showed up at prom too and he escorted Andie inside. Blane then realized that Steff tried to keep Blane and Andie apart because his best friend Steff was jealous of them together and Steff couldn’t buy Andie and Andie wanted nothing to do with shallow Steff. Blane told Andie that he loved her always and left the prom because Blane did not have a date. Duckie thought Blane was a stand-up guy for coming alone and told Andie to go after Blane and be with him. A teen girl then eyed Duckie and they got together. Andie went outside where she and Blane kissed passionately. This movie had a budget of $9 million and grossed over $40 million at the box office. 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/18/24

TITLE:  She’s Out of Control 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 1989  Weintraub Entertainment Group / Columbia Pictures / Stephen Deutsch Productions

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie takes place in California and began with Doug Simpson attacking two people at the 97.5 KHEY radio station where 37-year-old Doug was manager. Doug fell out the upper story glass window and ended up in the hospital with a sprain and a neck brace. The doctor recommended that Doug stay for observation, but was detained by the police at the hospital to give a statement before he left. Doug basically said he wasn’t going to press charges on himself. Doug was a single parent (wife died but did not say how) story started with Doug’s eldest daughter Katie’s 15th birthday. He gave her a teddy bear and a TWA (Trans World) plane ticket to Europe for her summer school trip. Katie didn’t want to go and leave her dad alone, but he insisted that she go on her class field trip out of the country with minimal supervision for all the young teenagers. At a club celebrating that night, Katie announced that she was breaking up with Richard, the neighbor boy she had been hanging out with since elementary school, because there was no passion in their relationship and they were more like siblings than anything else. Doug left for a radio convention with his girlfriend, Janet Pearson, in charge of his children. Because of the influence from Janet, Katie then decided that she wanted a makeover so she could be more attractive and date other boys. Janet took Katie to the dentist to have her braces yanked off even though they weren’t supposed to be removed for another two months. Janet also took Katie to the salon, the eye doctor to replace her glasses with contact lenses, and new sexier shoes and clothes. The moment Doug arrived home he received several calls from boys who wanted to talk to Katie, and his daughter wouldn’t take any of them because she was in her bedroom on her private line talking to another one. Katie then came downstairs with her new do and miniskirt and went out with another boy who came to the door, and clearly the female was addicted to all the attention. Doug was shocked, and Janet told him that the new Katie would appear sooner or later and Doug couldn’t do anything about it. Doug decided to try total control and keep away the boys who came to the door to see Katie and called for her night and day. Meanwhile, the ratings were steadily dropping at KHEY from Doug’s absence at work, so the employees at the radio station wanted Doug to do a sex therapy talk show or topless bikini contest to improve ratings. As it turned out, Katie was so distracted with her dates that she failed in school, and Doug warned Katie that she shouldn’t waste a good mind and Katie’s younger tween sister Bonnie (copycat) said the same of a good body. Doug paid his youngest daughter, Bonnie, to keep an appointment book of Katie’s dates, and Doug begged Katie to cancel one day so Dad could have a date with his eldest daughter. On daddy daughter day, Doug, Janet and the girls went out for a beach picnic, and Katie snuck off to be with her newest boyfriend, Joey. Katie’s floozy behavior and sexy attire led to all the tween and teenage boys and even adult men eyeing her and father Doug tried to chase the oversexed males away from his child. Doug went to see a local shrink, Dr. Herman Fishbinder, about his problem. Dr. Fishbinder informed Doug that almost half of teenage girls in the country were not virgins and almost all of the other half lied about being virgins. Also, teenage boys thought about sex over six hundred times a day so Dr. Fishbinder recommended that Doug immediately put Katie on the pill. Dr. Fishbinder gave Doug a book that he wrote about dads raising their teenage daughters. Katie came home one day and asked Doug about sex, and he told her that God and science gave her plenty of years of life so she didn’t need to rush sex. Katie didn’t like that answer and decided that she would make her own decision and never ask Doug another question about teen sex again. After talking to Dr. Fishbinder again, Doug decided to go to Janet’s apartment and propose marriage to her. Janet seemed more in love with the ring and wanted to have sex with Doug before she even said yes to marriage. Doug was upset that sex was all Janet thought about when he spent hours trying to figure out if he ought to marry Janet and wasn’t certain about the shrink’s advice to begin with. Doug called Katie, and Joey answered so Doug realized the teens were alone at the house. Doug went to talk to Dr. Fishbinder, who was having a party at his California mansion that he owned in addition to his home in France and a Rolls Royce. The mind doctor advised Doug to befriend Joey and make Katie see him as he truly was instead of talking bad about Joey, which would lead to Katie’s rebellion and getting more serious sexually with Joey. When Doug got home, Katie had invited over some other teen kids over to the unsupervised empty house and they were dancing to old records. Doug tried to be one of the kids, and Joey thought something was up because none of the parents of the other girls he dated liked him. Joey changed his mind when Doug soon let him drive his own Jaguar. Some high schoolers challenged Joey to a race so Doug decided that Joey would street race them. Joey beat his opponent, but then the Jaguar stalled on the train tracks. The first train was on a different track and didn’t hit the car, but the second totaled it and it ended up in the garage, with the insurance no doubt covering the damage that happened as a result of the illegal racing. Doug got a rental car until the Jaguar was fixed up, and Katie announced that she broke up with Joey but would soon be over her phase where she used her popularity with boys and power over them to her advantage to go places and get things the boys paid for. Richard later came to the door dressed like Joey and told Doug that he wasn’t going to the Europe trip with Katie in case she met Prince Charles, or duke and the young teen girl hit it off with one of the royals. Joey then told Doug that he still wanted to hang out with him since he was the only dad who liked Joey. Katie’s new boyfriend, Timothy Mitchell arrived, and Doug figured Timothy was a gentleman because he was sophisticated and was a senior headed to Yale soon. However, Doug then realized that Timothy was too perfect and consulted Dr. Fishbinder, who suggested that Doug spy on Timothy and Katie. Doug took pictures of the two teens kissing every chance they got and swimming in the pool topless. Doug’s radio station assistant, Jeff Robbins, informed him that they were at 34 in the ratings and were in serious trouble. Doug grounded Katie from dating after “he caught his eldest teen daughter sneaking back into her room through her bedroom window at four in the morning after she hung out with Timothy at the beach.” Doug wanted to know if Katie had sex with Timothy and told her that if she did there was nothing special about it if she had to sneak around. Doug tore up the pictures he took and then had the tree outside Katie’s window cut down so she couldn’t sneak in and out of her bedroom window again. Doug told Dr. Fishbinder that he was in control of everything and the last time Katie would see Timothy before he left for Yale would be prom night. Dr. Fishbinder was upset that Doug didn’t read the part in the book about how 80% of American girls lost their virginity on prom night. Dr. Fishbinder announced that their sessions were for nothing and he wanted to give Doug back his money and kick him out, but the two agreed that Doug would cancel his daughter’s prom night. Dr. Fishbinder then wanted Doug to do him a favor so he could have a talk show on the radio and discuss his book with callers. Doug made dinner reservations with fiancé’ Janet and her parents at the same hotel as Katie’s prom so he could keep an eye on her. Janet’s parents thought something was up with Doug the way he stared at the teenage girls, and Janet tried to tell them it was nothing and Doug loved her. Doug spied on Katie at the prom until he got kicked out, and then he sped off in the wrong tricked-out car to the motel to try and stop Katie who left prom to go to the hotel and from making a mistake. Inside the hotel room, Katie had second thoughts and announced that she didn’t want her first time to be with Timothy and asked him to take her home.However, Timothy locked the door and called Katie a bit** for teasing him. The soon to be Yale student tried to grab her, so she screamed and then Doug broke the door down after he got into the hotel by pretending to be a waiter. Katie ran away in tears when she learned that Doug followed her to the hotel and his eldest daughter made him out to be the bad parent for doing so since it was her decision to have sex at such a young age that could result in another of GOD’s children being born when she herself was a child and had yet to come of age, and he went to find Katie. Doug then heard Dr. Fishbinder on the his 97.5 KHEY radio station revealing that he didn’t even have a daughter or family and couldn’t believe the shrink was giving advice about being a dad. Doug went to the station and burst in on the recording at KHEY and confronted the questionable shrink. Doug wrestled with Dr. Fishbinder and Jeff and fell through the glass window(and Dr. Fishbinder also ended up with a neck brace). Doug finished telling the police officers his story, and the police gave him and Janet a police escort to the airport to say goodbye to Katie before she left for Europe. Doug made amends with Katie before she left. Katie and Richard then met up together on their Trans World plane. KHEY was back to number six on the list, and Jeff suggested that Doug and Dr. Fishbinder do a weekly debate segment on the air. In the end, a tween boy came to the door to take Bonnie out since Janet also gave her a makeover and dressed her up like Katie. Bonnie and her date left the house alone to go out to a movie.  Doug and Dr. Fishbinder decided to use tween dating as their new topic on their radio show. This movie had a budget of $12 million and grossed $12.1 million at the box office.

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/17/24

TITLE:  Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2004  20th Century Fox / Red Hour Production

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie began with Peter LaFleur, owner of Average Joe’s gym, asleep on the couch as a commercial by White Goodman, the owner of the Globo Gym mega franchise, was on TV that encouraged people to hate themselves enough to go to his gym and do something about their fatness and ugliness with workouts and plastic surgery that he offered onsite.Peter woke up because his dog, Crash, was licking Peter’s private parts and Peter thought he was dreaming until he woke up and realized it was not another human giving him sexual pleasure but a canine. Peter hadn’t paid his bills in eight months so his water and power would be shut off later that day. Peter owned the dingy Average Joe’s, a gym across the street from Globo where average people worked out. Later on, Peter reassured his employee Owen Dittman that he would eventually find a date, possibly two. Justin, a high schooler who went to AJ’s, planned to try out for the cheerleading team again this year (he did not make the cheer squad last year) to impress cheerleader Amber, the high school girl he liked. During last year’s tryouts, Justin dropped Martha Johnstone, a very overweight teenager, during their routine and the two teens fell on each other’s private parts.At Joe’s business, Steve Cowan, another employee, held a large knife on Peter during his game of acting, talking and dressing like a pirate. Katherine “Kate” Veatch, a real estate and tax lawyer from Peter’s bank (threatened Peter with Sexual Harassment case because Peter thought she was hot) showed up at Average Joe’s and informed Peter that the gym was in foreclosure and he had 30 days to pay off $50,000 or he would lose the gym. White wanted to buy Average Joe’s and destroy it to make an overflow parking lot for his Globo gym’s customers. Peter and White weren’t on good terms because Peter had sex with three of White’s female trainers and sent White a male strip-o-gram. Peter and his employees and customers started an all-male carwash to raise money, but they couldn’t compete with the sexy bikini-clad women at the other carwash and the guys’ only customer was a man who liked to watch Justin wash the truck in his underwear. Peter was ready to give up, but then Gordon Pibb came up with the idea to enter the Las Vegas dodgeball tournament with a cash prize of $50,000. Peter was skeptical since none of them could professionally play dodgeball, but the others convinced him to enter a regional match and win it so they would qualify for Las Vegas. Meanwhile, White, who used to be more than 600 pounds overweight, teased himself for fun with a doughnut and electrocuted his nipples as punishment when he tried to eat it. In preparation to meet with Kate who was now worked for White, he inflated the crotch on his bodysuit to be bigger. He hit on Kate and wanted to date her, but she wasn’t interested. Peter and his group watched an old video about dodgeball, where a young boy named Timmy learned that dodgeball was a sport invented by opium-addicted Chinamen who used severed human heads instead of balls.Patches O’Houlihan, a retired seven-time ADAA dodgeball champion, taught Timmy a few things and advised him to pick stronger kids for his dodgeball team so they could gang up on weaker kids like Winston. Timmy demonstrated by hitting his weaker boy victim Winston in the face with a dodgeball and breaking his glasses. White put a cutout figure of himself at Average Joe’s, and it was a hidden camera that White used to spy on Peter’s team and learn their plans. The Average Joes lost their dodgeball match against the girl scouts who brutally beat up the men. However, the girl scouts were then disqualified and the Average Joe’s won because one of the girls was a boy in disguise and had steroids and a beaver tranquilizer in their system. White then introduced his dodgeball team, the Purple Cobras, to the Average Joe team. They were White’s henchman…Me’Shell (White’s possible male love interest), Blazer, Laser, Blade and Fran Stalinofskivitchdavitovichsky from Romanovia who Owen fell in love with. White helped the dodgeball chancellor lose weight, so now the chancellor returned the favor and allowed White’s team enter the Las Vegas tournament without winning any matches. Patches then appeared and announced that he was going to be the Average Joe’s coach, and he claimed that he drank his own urine because it was sterile and he liked the taste. Patches had the team practice dodging balls by dodging wrenches, and they were painfully hit by the wrenches if they failed to catch them. They practiced dodging traffic and were hit by cars, and Patches tried to make Gordon angry enough to play rough by whacking him hard in the crotch. Kate could throw a dodgeball well because she used to play softball, so the guys figured Kate was a lesbian but wanted her to join their team. Kate refused to compete against White while she was working for him. When White found out, White told Kate that he got her fired from her attorney bank job because he lied to the bank that Kate was stealing and drinking on the job. White then tried to date Kate and made sexual advances, but Peter interrupted him. Kate bashed White’s head into the wall and he gave them the middle finger and left with his male friend Me’Shell. Peter went to Kate’s home and it was full of fairies and unicorns, and Peter tried to bribe her into joining their team but Kate didn’t want the bribes and agreed to join the team so she could beat White. The Las Vegas tournament was covered by ESPN 8, where the female dodgeball dancers wore pink bras and underwear and touched their breasts and bodies as they pole danced provocatively. Owen had ordered team uniforms for the Average Joes, but the uniforms got switched with biker goth leather and chain sex attire and the announcers, Cotton McKnight and Pepper Brooks, believed it was like Cher wore and belonged in the bedroom. The Average Joes wore the uniforms anyway, and they would have lost if not for Kate’s skills. Patches gave Peter his scarf as a gift and suggested they go have fun with the hookers that Patches hired, but Peter refused and Patches called him queer. They ran into Amber and her boyfriend Derek who were both cheerleaders and were In Vegas for a national cheerleading competition. Derek made threats to Justin if he didn’t stay away from Amber. The Average Joes made it to the semifinals and so did the Cobras, who threw balls at the heads of the officers from the Las Vegas police department who they were competing against and knocked the law enforcement team out. Gordon was the last player standing against a tough team, and when he spotted his mail-order wife with another man Gordon used his anger against his opponents to defeat them. Patches was then crushed and killed when a casino sign fell on him, and the Average Joes felt lost without Patches. White and Me’Shell then confronted Peter and announced that they were opening a new gym location in Mexico City. White told Peter that his team would blame him if he lost the gym and offered him $100,000 if he signed Average Joes over to White. Peter took the deal and told his team they would probably lose the finals against the Cobras. Owen talked to Fran at the bar and told her his feelings for her, and Peter upset Steve by telling him that he wasn’t a pirate. People on the streets of Vegas threw food at Steve and gave him the middle finger telling him to go back to Treasure Island. ESPN Cotton announced that the dodgeball finals were a David and Goliath story truer than the Bible itself. Amber told Justin that Derek fell off a rollercoaster and broke all his bones, so Amber wanted Justin to take Derek’s place at the cheerleading contest since he knew the routine and would be back in time for dodgeball. Amber and Justin’s team, the Donkeys, did well in the competition. Peter talked to Lance Armstrong himself who was a fan of Peter’s. Lance explained that he was diagnosed with brain, lung, and testicular cancer but was encouraged by his family and friends to win the Tour de France five times. The Average Joes had to forfeit because Peter was gone and needed six players. Right before the trophy was given to the Cobras, Peter appeared because Lance’s speech gave him confidence. The tournament committee could overturn the chancellor’s vote by two thirds, and the crowd chanted to let the Average Joes team play. The first judge (male) voted yes, the second judge (female) voted no and the third judge (male), Chuck Norris himself, said yes. The Average Joes played against the Cobras and made a comeback after they were down to one player. Kate jumped in front of a ball meant for Pete, and then White hit Kate in the face after she was already out so the Cobras got only a warning from the ref. It was two to one, and Peter knocked out Me-Shell but then White hit Peter. The Cobras thought they won, but the ref called a double fault because White stepped over the line. It was then a sudden death match between Peter and White. Peter had a vision of Patches giving him advice, so he tied Patches’ scarf around his eyes as a blindfold. Blindfolded Peter ducked White’s dodgeball and quickly threw his own, and it downed White and gave the Average Joes an instant victory. The ESPN announcers were shocked because they thought they had seen it all after going to the Great Wall of China and pyramids of Egypt. Teens Justin and Amber kissed and exchanged love-yous, and Owen and Fran kissed passionately.The Average Joes accepted their $50,000 check, and then Peter revealed that he did sign over the gym and accepted the $100,000 offered to him by White. However, Peter then revealed that he bet the bribe money on the Average Joes team to win and because of the odds in Vegas they won $5 million. Peter decided that instead of buying back Average Joe’s, he would invest it in the controlling stake of Globo Gym so he could own Globo and Average Joes. Steve appeared, and he now looked normal and no longer like a pirate so Peter showed Steve his chest of money and pirate Peter was happy for it. Kate’s girlfriend Joyce arrived for the show, and Kate passionately kissed her and then she turned and kissed Peter passionately and announced she was bisexual as though a cool thing and not mentally unstable. Justin and Amber got together and in the end of the movie teen Amber was very pregnant. Peter used the money to upgrade Average Joe’s and add a kids’ dodgeball team. White gorged himself on junk food and was hundreds of pounds overweight again. White then watched Peter’s commercial in the company of a topless female mannequin and f-ed Chuck Norris for his deciding vote. This movie had a budget of $20 million and grossed over $168 million at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Dark Horizons, “Hands down the funniest film of the year!”

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/16/24

TITLE: Doogal (The Magic Roundabout) 

BOX OFFICE RATED: G (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2005 The Weinstein Company / The UK Film Council / Pathé Renn Productions / Pricel/France 2 Cinema / Canal+ / Les Films Action / SPZ Entertainment / Bolex Brothers Production / Action Synthese

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This cartoon movie takes place in a town where a talking dog named Doogal was so obsessed with candy that he put a nail in the road to give the candy cart a flat tire. He knew the human owner would leave him in charge to watch over the candy while he went to get some tools to change the flat. After the vendor left his cart, Doogal tried to take the candy but lost control of the cart and crashed through town. Doogal’s human child friend Florence and some other kids got trapped on the carousel as it spun around. The roundabout freed Zeebad, an evil wizard that Zebedee the good wizard imprisoned inside the carousel for trying to freeze the world. Zeebad froze the carousel and trapped the children inside, and then he took control of Sam, the British toy soldier whose job it was to guard the carousel, and forced him to be a henchman. Zeebad planned to find the three enchanted diamonds from the carousel so he could freeze the sun and take over the world. Zebedee informed Doogal that he and his friends needed to use a map and go into the mountains to find the diamonds before Zeebad could and put them back on the carousel. Zebedee put Doogal and his friends on a talking train and sped off. Doogal’s friends were Ermintrude the dairy queen cow who wanted to be an opera singer, Brian the snail, who was in love with Ermintrude, and Dylan the rabbit, who was a band member. The animals blamed Doogal for causing the incident and gave him the silent treatment, so he wandered off and was captured by Zeebad. A moose that Zeebad turned blue helped Doogal’s buddies find him and rescue him from his cage in Zeebad’s ice lair. Zeebad went after them, so the group summoned Zebedee to fight Zeebad’s ice powers with his fire powers. However, Zebedee was overwhelmed and wanted the animals to find the diamonds instead of help him. Zebedee fell off the icy cliff and was presumed dead. The group continued on and retrieved the first diamond after crossing a bridge over a pit of boiling lava. Zeebad and Sam followed, and they stole the diamond and the map that would lead them to the other diamonds. They then destroyed the bridge of the animals were trapped, so Dylan pressed the button on the magic box that Zebedee gave him and boat appeared. Dylan used tents as a balloon for a flying boat, and they followed Zeebad and Sam to Skull Island. Zeebad planned to let Doogal’s group go first and set off all the booby traps inside the cave temple so then Zeebad and Sam could easily get the second diamond. In order to retrieve the diamond, Ermintrude stepped around the laser maze but Doogal set the lasers off with his gum when he accidentally spit it out. That caused evil skeleton guards to appear and surrounded the animals, but they used karate moves to knock them out. Zeebad and Sam stole the second diamond, but then Doogal and his companions trapped the two bad guys in the temple. They found hieroglyph on the wall and realized that the third diamond was located inside the carousel, so they set off on the train. Zeebad and Sam escaped from the temple and followed them in a makeshift train. Dylan accidentally ejected Brian from his seat, so he ended up on the top of Zeebad’s train and accidentally mentioned that they were going to the carousel to get the diamond. Ermintrude rescued Brian, and then Zeebad’s train crashed when Sam used too much coal and overloaded the train at Zeebad’s request. The talking train was injured and couldn’t walk, so the animals went on without him. They struggled through a raging blizzard caused by Zeebad and were discouraged because they were lost and were going in circles. The next morning, the blizzard was over and the animals discovered that home was only a short distance away. Zeebad was mad at Sam for crashing the train and left him to die, but the moose rescued Sam. Sam decided to turn against Zeebad and followed him to town, but Zeebad froze the moose and then zapped Sam. The third diamond was inside Sam, so Zeebad removed it and put all three diamonds together in a magic circle so he could freeze the sun. Doogal’s group arrived, and Ermintrude sang loud enough to break the ice on the carousel. She and Brian worked together to break the magic circle, and the others worked on catching the falling diamonds and putting them back in their places on the carousel. They succeeded with two diamonds, and Zeebad grabbed the third. Dylan pushed the button on the magic box, but nothing happened. The train recovered from his injures and came to the rescue to knock the diamond out of Zeebad’s hands. He and Doogal ran after the diamond, and Doogal was able to retrieve it and put it back on the carousel. All the snow and ice caused by Zeebad melted, and he was dragged back into the carousel where he was imprisoned again. Young Florence was the only one on the train who appeared frozen dead, but then the little girl woke up when Doogal started crying. He was happy that Florence was alive and decided that he would give up candy. Zebedee then appeared and revealed that he was still alive and was melted out of the ice that trapped him on the cliff. He put the diamond back into Sam’s body, and the British soldier came to life again and was returned to his place guarding the carousel. Zebedee returned the moose to his normal self, and everyone celebrated their victory and took a group picture. The movie cover art listed, Janet Stokes, Film Advisory Board, “Laugh-out-loud funny! An adventure that both kids and adults will love!”

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/15/24

TITLE:  Aladdin 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2019  Walt Disney Pictures / Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures / Rideback Productions

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 2

REASON: This movie began with a mariner telling his young children Omar and Lian the story of Aladdin. Aladdin was a parentless street thief in the Arabian kingdom of Agrabah where Aladdin and his pet monkey Abu stole things and traded the stolen goods for food. In Agrabah, a woman called herself Dalia and took bread from a vendor and gave it to hungry children, so the merchant accused her of stealing and wanted her gold bracelet to pay for the bread. Aladdin tricked the merchant and was able to escape from the city guards without giving up the bracelet. Aladdin knew that Dalia was from the palace and was a handmaid for Princess Jasmine, whose dad the Sultan hadn’t allowed her out of the castle since her mom the queen was killed (did not say who killed his wife) because he wanted to protect Jasmine. The Sultan’s vizier (advisor) Jafar had evil intentions to steal his master’s throne. Jafar dispatched a henchman for believing that second was good enough for Jafar, who did jail time and killed people to get in power. He planned to obtain an oil lamp from the Cave of Wonders so he could overthrow the Sultan. Dalia wanted back the bracelet that belonged to her mom (the queen, since Dalia was in fact Jasmine), but Aladdin didn’t have it so Dalia accused him of stealing it when Abu took it. Prince Anders from Skånland then arrived in Agrabah as a suitor for Jasmine, but she didn’t like him. Jafar scolded the Sultan for letting Jasmine dismiss Anders because a marriage between them would form a military alliance between Agrabah and Skånland and help them fight their enemies. Jafar tried to hypnotize the Sultan into agreeing to invade Shirabad, the Queen’s kingdom, but Jasmine interrupted. Jasmine wanted to rule Agrabah as Sultan instead of marry a foreign prince, but she couldn’t because it was against tradition and Jafar told her that she should be seen and not heard. Aladdin snuck into the palace that night to see Jasmine and return her bracelet to her, and he took her hairpin so he would have an excuse to return it to her the following night. Aladdin was then nabbed by Jafar and taken into the desert, where Jafar explained that he was once a thief like Aladdin and revealed that Aladdin’s love interest was Jasmine and not Dalia. Jafar offered Aladdin enough riches to impress Jasmine if he retrieved the oil lamp from the Cave of Wonders. Aladdin agreed, and Jafar warned that he must only take the lamp and no other treasure no matter what the temptation. Aladdin grabbed the lamp, but then Abu touched a jewel and the cave crumbled and overflowed with lava. A magic carpet tried to carry Aladdin and Abu to the entrance. Aladdin gave Jafar the lamp in exchange for his help out but Jafar refused to help. Abu stole the lamp from Jafar before he left, so Aladdin rubbed the lamp. A hotshot genie that had been trapped in the lamp for a thousand years was released, and he explained that Aladdin was now his master and Genie would grant him three wishes. Aladdin tricked Genie into wishing them out of the cave, so the first wish didn’t count. Aladdin planned to return to Agrabah to make his wishes, so Genie disguised himself as a human. Genie revealed that his own personal wish would be freedom so he would no longer had to serve the masters of the lamp. Aladdin decided that he would use his third wish to free Genie. Aladdin used his first wish to become a prince and was decked out in royal clothes to win over Jasmine, who had to marry a prince according to the law. Aladdin’s title would be Prince Ali of Ababwa, a fictional kingdom, and the magic of the spell meant no one would recognize Ali as Aladdin unless he did something to reveal his true identity. Genie turned Abu into an elephant, and they made a grand entrance into Agrabah with dancers and music. The male Genie briefly dressed up as one of the women who were gaga over Prince Ali. Aladdin awkwardly went before the Sultan and presented gifts to him and Jasmine, but the princess left when she got the impression that Aladdin wanted to buy her. At the celebration that night, Genie tried to help Aladdin prove himself to Jasmine by taking control of him so he could dance with her. Jasmine walked away when Aladdin showed off, so he and Genie came up with a plan. Genie had his eye on maidservant Dalia and asked her out for an evening stroll. Genie then added Ababwa to her maps after Jasmine was skeptical about its existence. Aladdin took the princess on a magic carpet ride around the kingdom to show her a new world. Jasmine accused him of being Aladdin, and he claimed that he was a prince but disguised himself as a thief on the streets where he met Jasmine so he could learn about the city. Aladdin brought Jasmine home and they kissed. Jafar’s macaw, Lago, watched the two lovebirds and reported back. Aladdin was later captured by the guards and tied to a chair. Jafar knew Aladdin’s true identity and demanded to know where the lamp was, but Aladdin insisted that he was Ali so Jafar pushed him off the balcony into the water below. Aladdin sunk and would have died if the monkey Abu hadn’t tossed the lamp to Aladdin, which summoned the Genie. However, Aladdin was passed out and was unable to make a wish to get out of there, so Genie bent the rules and used Aladdin’s second wish to rescue him. Jafar lied to the Sultan that Prince Ali planned to conquer Agrabah with his army, and then Aladdin appeared. Jafar tried to hypnotize the Sultan into having Aladdin arrested, so Aladdin grabbed Jafar’s snake staff and smashed it. The Sultan snapped out of his trance and learned that Jafar was a traitor who wanted his throne. He had Jafar put in the dungeon, but Iago freed Jafar by giving him the key. The Sultan apologized to Aladdin for doubting him and announced that he would accept the prince if he wanted to marry his princess daughter, Jasmine. Genie wanted Aladdin to tell the truth about his thieving self, but Aladdin planned to use his last wish to continue the prince lie and be with Jasmine. Aladdin accused Genie of only caring about his selfish self and only wanting Aladdin to use the last wish to set himself free. Jafar then stole the lamp from Aladdin in the market without him knowing and went to the palace, where he wished to be Sultan and Genie was forced to grant the wish. The soldiers, led by the Sultan’s most loyal soldier, Hakim, were afraid for their lives so they pledged their loyalty to the new Sultan. He ordered them to invade Shirabad and take Jasmine away, but the princess decided that she wouldn’t be silenced or speechless. She asked Hakim to stand with her and do the same and fight against the injustice, and he agreed. However, Jafar then wished to be the most powerful sorcerer and sent Hakim and his soldiers to the dungeon. Aladdin came to his senses when he found the lamp missing and went to retrieve it, but Jafar stopped him. Jafar revealed that Aladdin was not who he said he was and banished him to the frozen ends of the earth to die with Abu. Jafar inflicted pain on the Sultan and Dalia, so Jasmine agreed to marry Jafar so he would stop. Jasmine grabbed the lamp from Jafar before the marriage ceremony was complete, and then she jumped onto the magic carpet with Aladdin after the carpet rescued him and Abu. Jafar turned Iago into a giant vicious birdand sent him after the trio, and when Jasmine dropped the lamp Abu went after it. The Sultan knocked Jafar’s staff away and thought he destroyed it, but it was still in one piece and Jafar used it to create a storm which swept Aladdin and Jasmine back to the palace. Lago got the lamp and gave it to Jafar, who planned to destroy cities and kingdoms and become the most powerful empire in the world. Jafar, wanting to be second to none, asked Genie to make him the most powerful being in the universe, more powerful than Genie.  Genie caught on the Aladdin’s scheme and happily granted Jafar’s wish and turned him into a genie confined to a lamp and trapped in the Cave of Wonders for the next few thousand years. Genie suggested that Aladdin use his last wish to either be a warrior prince or dissolve the law stating that a princess must marry a prince because the Genie could wipe out laws. Instead, Aladdin wished to set the Genie free, and he became human and hugged Aladdin. Genie and Dalia got married and traveled the world together in a boat, and Genie was the mariner telling the story to children Lian and Omar. The Sultan decided to let his daughter Jasmine become the next Sultan and rule their people as well as change the law so she could marry Aladdin, and there was a big wedding with fireworks. This movie had a budget of $183 million and grossed over $1 billion at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Mark S. Allen, ABC-TV “A classic is born!” Sean Keane, CNET “an entertaining magic carpet ride for fans old and new.” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/14/24

TITLE:  The Sixth Sense 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 1999 Hollywood Pictures / Spyglass Entertainment / The Kennedy Marshall Company / Barry Mendel Productions / Buena Vista Pictures Distribution 

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie takes place in South Philadelphia, and started with Dr. Malcolm Crowe and his wife Anna celebrating with a vintage wine from their stocked cellar because Malcolm was given the Mayor’s Citation award for his years of service as a child psychologist that helped numerous families and it made the news. Malcolm and Anna went to their bedroom to have sex, but then Anna saw the broken window glass on the floor and knew somebody was in their house. The couple saw a mentally disturbed adult man, Vincent Gray, stripped down to his underwear standing nearby in the bathroom. Malcolm told his wife not to move and thought Vincent was in search of prescription drugs. Vincent soon remembered his now grown up former patient and treating Vincent’s emotional disorder that Malcolm believed was caused by Vincent’s parents’ divorcing when Vincent was a ten year old boy. Vincent screamed that his parents divorcing wasn’t the problem and Malcolm failed to treat him, and then Vincent shot Malcolm in the stomach before shooting himself dead in the head. The next fall a year later, Malcolm seemed to have recovered and compared Vincent’s child case with that of his newest patient, nine-year-old child Cole Sear. Both cases had many similarities, such as divorced parents (Cole’s dad left to live with a woman in Pittsburgh), mood disorders, anxiety and social isolation. Malcolm followed Cole into a local Catholic church, where Cole spoke Latin. Dr. Crowe told Cole that churches was where people claimed sanctuary from people who were after them and/or hurting them. Malcolm noticed the scratches on Cole’s arm. As Cole left the church building, he stole a Jesus figurine and added it to his collection of other figurines inside his safe tent in his bedroom. Malcolm went home to his office basement and translated Cole’s Latin words into “Out of the depths, I cry to you O Lord.” Cole’s mom, Lynn, getting ready to work one of her two jobs the next morning was shocked when she stepped out of the room for a minute and came back into the room to find Cole at the table with all of the cabinets and drawers open because he was looking for Kellogg’s Pop-Tarts. Cole attended St. Anthony’s Academy. After school Malcolm gained Cole’s trust by playing a mind game with the boy based on the facts he used from Vincent’s case. Malcolm wasn’t correct about everything because Cole was different, and Cole didn’t believe Malcolm could help him. Cole admitted that he got in trouble at school for drawing a picture of a man stabbing another man in the neck with a screwdriver, so he said he resorted to drawing smiling people and (GOD’s) rainbows so he wouldn’t get in trouble. Malcolm’s marriage suffered and he missed his anniversary dinner at a fancy restaurant because he was too wrapped up in his job and lost track of time so Anna paid the bill and left when Malcolm showed up. It bothered the doctor that he couldn’t figure out the scratches on Cole’s body, but he ruled out mom Lynn because she loved her son dearly after he observed the family together in their home. Cole later told Malcolm that he and Tommy Tammisimo walked to school together because Cole’s mom set it up. Cole admitted that Tommy put on a show when Cole’s mom watched them leave from the window and Tommy really hated Colebut Cole didn’t hate Tommy. As she looked at photos on the wall taken throughout the years, Lynn noticed an orb by Cole’s head in all the pictures that had been taken of him. Lynn also found papers in Cole’s bedroom where he scribbled down his thoughts (Dr. Malcolm’s suggestion) and the disturbing words were about quieting the damn baby and killing and cutting people. Malcolm wanted Cole to think of a goal they could achieve, so Cole replied that he didn’t want to be scared anymore. Malcolm considered that maybe Cole scratched and hurt himself. One day, Malcolm overheard Sean, Anna’s employee at the antique shop where she worked, stop by the house and try to take Anna out, but Anna refused so Sean was upset and hit his vehicle. In class, Cole answered the teacher’s question that the school building used to be where people were hung and spit on. Stanley Cunningham the teacher corrected Cole that it was a historical courthouse, but Cole insisted that the lawyers hung people in what was now the St. Anthony’s school. Stanley looked at Cole in a way that made him feel comfortable, so Cole called teacher Stanley by his mean grade school nickname Stuttering Stanley. Stanley started stuttering and wasn’t sure how Cole knew that name so the teacher called Cole a freak and told him to shut up. Cole didn’t want to talk to Malcolm at his next session, so Malcolm went home and watched wedding videos and saw Anna naked in the shower. Malcolm then discovered that Anna was taking Zoloft, anti-depressant pills, and he couldn’t understand why the cellar door where he had his office was locked again. Cole was invited to fellow student, Derrick’s, birthday party but didn’t have fun. While there, Cole was ignored so she followed a balloon upstairs and heard a madman from the closet screaming at him to unlock the door. Mean boys Tommy and Derrick decided to play “Locked in the Dungeon,” and locked Cole in the closet where the ghost was. Cole screamed hysterically and was terrified of being trapped in the same place the voice came from. Lynn heard her son below stairs and frantically rushed by the mean boys and tried to open the door with no key as everyone (other parents and kids) gawked and did nothing to help. Lynn was able to open it when Cole passed out. Lynn was upset and knew something was physically wrong with Cole from his ordeal at the unfriendly birthday party, so she took him to the hospital. Dr. Hill questioned Cole’s cuts and bruises, and Lynn claimed that they were from sports at school but Dr. Hill assigned Mrs. Sloan, a hospital social worker, to ask Lynn questions. Afterward, Cole told Dr. Malcolm that his eyes were sad, so Malcolm explained his own issues since it was against the rules for a professional doctor of the mind (who did not treat patients with Jesus first) to speak about his problems on the job, so the doctor explained his marriage and other issues in a bedtime story that had no ending yet to the young child. Malcolm’s said his wife wasn’t happy with the way he was, and he was helping Cole because to him it felt like he was also helping Vincent, the one child who Malcolm couldn’t do anything for. Cole cried then and decided to tell Malcolm his secret that he could see dead people all the time and everywhere while he was awake. They didn’t know they were dead and walked around as if they were still alive, and they were the ones hurting Cole. Cole was afraid and wanted Malcolm to stay by his bedside, and Malcolm promised not to tell anyone but the doctor had been recording the conversation with the child. Malcolm then diagnosed Cole with visual hallucinations, paranoia and school-age schizophrenia and suggested medication and hospitalization. Lynn took Cole home and put him to bed with his Husky puppy Sebastian. She found rips in Cole’s sweater and noticed the scratches on his back, so she called the parents of the schoolkids to tell them to keep their hands off Cole. Cole got up in the middle of the night to pee and left the door open, and then the temperature in the house dropped significantly. Cole was aware of someone in the house and went into the kitchen in his underwear to find a dead woman screaming that her husband Neddy was terrible and he couldn’t hurt her anymore because she slit her own wrists. Cole ran and hid in his tent, where he sat with Jesus and all the other figurines that he believed couldn’t help him. Dr. Malcolm went to Cole’s school play, and then the two agreed that Tommy was a bully kid. Cole then saw two colonial-dressed parents and their son hanging dead from the school rafters, and he told Malcolm that when the dead people got the mad the prickly hairs on your neck and arms stood up and it got cold. At home, when the cough syrup commercial that Tommy acted in came on, Cole threw something at the TV to shut it off. It was still cold in the house, and Lynn tried to fix the thermostat but it was broken. Lynn had found in Cole’s dresser drawer the bumblebee pendant that belonged to her mom and was important to her since her mom died, so she confronted Cole about taking Grandma’s pendant again. Cole denied taking the pendant, and Lynn didn’t believe him and told him to leave without eating the rest of his meal. Lynn couldn’t understand what was happening to her son and the odd things that constantly surrounded them and it frustrated her to no end because Cole refused to talk about it and tell her the truth. Not long after, Sebastian ran scared out of Cole’s room, because a dead teen ghost with a bloody gunshot wound in his head was there and had invited Cole to come see his dad’s gun. Lynn tried to coax Sebastian out of his hiding place, and she knew something was wrong when Cole came running too and wanted to sleep in her bed that night and was shaking scared. Meanwhile, Anna continued to work at an antique store, where she talked an Indian couple into buying a Burmese sapphire engagement ring that was way over their budget. Anna then gave employee Sean a first edition book for his birthday, and they almost kissed but Malcolm smashed the window when he saw him and ran off. Dr. Malcolm later told Cole that his own family was falling apart so he needed to take time off and planned to transfer Cole to two psychologists. Cole started crying because he wanted Malcolm to help him but didn’t think Dr. Malcolm could help if he didn’t believe Cole’s secret. It dawned on Malcolm that Vincent was afraid when he was alone too, so Malcolm listed to session tapes of Vincent in his home basement office. Vincent had said it was cold in the room and he was scared too, and then the recorded tape captured a man speaking in Spanish telling Vincent that he didn’t want to die when Malcolm was no longer in the room and left Vincent alone to take a phone call. Malcolm realized that Cole was telling the truth and he wasn’t psychotic, so he went to see the boy at the church. Malcolm agreed with Cole that the ghosts wanted help, and Malcolm’s idea to make them go away was to have Cole listen to what the ghosts wanted from Cole. Cole was worried the ghosts would try to hurt him again but he agreed to listen to them. Malcolm spotted Sean leaving Anna’s house and wasn’t happy when Sean ignored him. Lynn was up in the middle of the night with a bad dream that someone was hurting Cole, and Cole went to her bedside and calmed his mom from her bad dream. It got cold in the house again, so Cole hid in his tent. A young girl named Kyra Collins took Malcolm’s tent apart and then appeared inside it vomiting heavily. Cole ran out crying, but then he went back and faced his fear to ask Kyra if she wanted to tell him something. Cole later told Malcolm about how Kyra traveled a long way to see Cole. Together, Dr. Malcolm and Cole traveled on train to Kyra’s funeral and Cole explored her room full of dolls and a jester toy. Ghost Kyra grabbed Cole’s leg from under the bed and gave him a box and wanted him to give it to her dad. Cole did so, and inside was a video tape. When dad played the video, it showed Kyra putting on a play show with her puppets and then quickly jumping into bed as she heard the door to her room opening so she faked sleep. It was Kyra’s mom who came to give her daughter food but then mom also added poison ito the food to make her child sick and die. Kyra’s younger sister was becoming ill too, and Cole gave her the jester. Kyra’s dad next called out his evil wife in the house filled with Kyra’s funeral guests. Back at school, Stanley let Cole play King Arthur in a school play. Stanley caught Cole talking to a woman who died in the fire that burned down the theater, but Cole lied and said he was just practicing his lines. All the children hailed King Cole when he pulled the sword from the stone, and then the kids fell down laughing. Cole suggested that Dr. Malcolm talk to Anna while she was asleep and she would respond to him then. Cole was now cured and didn’t need any more sessions, and Malcolm wanted Cole to tell his mom about his ghostly secret. On the way home, there was a traffic accident up ahead where a car hit a bicyclist. Cole told Lynn that the bicyclist died because he could see the dead female standing beside his car door window. Cole revealed that he was able to see ghosts and communicate with them, and they were the ones who used to hurt him. Lynn didn’t believe him and started crying, so Cole proved it by telling Lynn that Grandma visited him and took the pendant because it was her favorite thing. Cole went on to say something only Lynn would know about how Grandma and how Grandma secretly watched Lynn dance at her recital and thought her daughter danced like an angel. Cole added that Grandma’s answer to the question Lynn asked at her gravesite was that Lynn made her mom proud “every day.” When Dr. Malcolm got home, he found Anna asleep from watching more wedding videos and breathing cold air. He discovered that his wedding ring wasn’t on his finger and there was blood on his shirt, and he remembered what Cole said about ghosts not knowing they were dead. Malcolm realized that he died from the gunshot wound and was a ghost, and Cole was the only person who could see him. Malcolm said his goodbye to sleeping Anna and told her that she was never second to his career or anything else. He told Anna that he loved her and she said good night, and he added that everything would be different in the morning when Malcolm was gone since he fulfilled his mission of helping Cole when he had failed Vincent. This movie had a budget of $40 million and grossed over $672 million at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Good Morning America, “The most involving, intelligent psychological thriller I’ve seen in a long time!” ABC-TV, “Bruce Willis has never been better!” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/13/24

TITLE:  Country Strong 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2010  Screen Gems / Material Pictures / Sony Pictures Releasing / McGuire Pictures

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie began in one of the many rural areas surrounding the biggest city in Tennessee, Nashville, where singer-songwriter Beau Hutton and his band sang “Silver Wings” at a local honky-tonk. Beau had a day job and worked at a rehab center where Kelly Canter, a country singer superstar and six-time Grammy winner, was committed and recovering from alcohol and drug abuse again. Kelly helped Beau write lyrics for his next song, and Kelly’s husband and manager James showed up and wasn’t happy to see Beau in Kelly’s room as she lay sexy on the bed with her lover Beau beside her in a chair. Beau was skeptical that Kelly was getting out of rehab a month early but James wanting his wife back on the road and making money thought Kelly was fine and already set up an Encore tour with shows in Texas. Kelly wanted Beau to open for her at the shows, but James already chose Chiles Stanton, the beauty queen and former Miss Dallas whose parents were teachers, and would only consider Beau if Chiles was a dud when she performed at The Stage that night. At the secluded and woody Rehab facility, Kelly had found a baby quail in the woods that was abandoned by its mother, so Kelly cared for it, kept it in a box, and named it Loretta Lynn. However, James took the bird away from Kelly, knowing the little one made Kelly happy, and said he would take care of it. Later on, Chiles and Beau met up again and she claimed that she wrote her own songs and got over her stage fright that she had with him at the county fairs. Beau tried to tell the bar’s owner to not let Chiles perform and knew Chiles was a fake, but the owner said that James was in charge so Beau put up with Chiles even though he thought she was a joke. Beau was right and Chiles had stage fright, but he couldn’t let her be humiliated any longer so Beau went on stage and rescued her and sang with her to give her confidence. James then asked Beau to go on tour with them as Chiles’ duet partner and get in the big time, but Beau said he was just having sex with Chiles’ friend and didn’t want to leave his band. James suggested that Beau come as Kelly’s sponsor to come along to Dallas to help take care of Kelly, so Beau agreed. There was a bad history in Dallas from a year ago when Kelly was in there and sang on stage. Kelly was later arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct in Texas. She was five months pregnant and lost the baby when she tripped over a microphone cord at a stadium concert and fell 10 feet off the stage and they found a lot of alcohol in her blood. Before they left Tennessee for Texas again, Kelly apologized to her husband for the Dallas incident but James didn’t want to talk about it. Kelly and James encountered harassing reporters who wanted to know if Kelly and James were going to get divorced and if he forgave her for Dallas. Chiles asked Kelly to sign a CD and told Kelly she was her idol since she was a little girl and wanted advice so Kelly wrote on her autograph cd for Chiles to stay away from husband on tour. The Nashville gang headed to Houston, Texas, which sold out in 15 minutes, where Chiles and Beau would do a duet. Chiles was upset that she had to travel with the band in the small van instead of on the luxury tour bus with Kelly and James. Upon arrival, the married couple went out to dinner at a fancy restaurant. They talked about how they were from Bristol, where Kelly sang in the church choir and he was an insurance agent. They remembered when Kelly was 20 and just married to James, and one of her Lee press-on nails ended up in the meatloaf she made for him and he bit into it. Before the Houston show, Kelly dismissed everyone for a few minutes as they were getting her makeup and wardrobe ready backstage so Kelly could have alone time with her lover (with her husband in the next room). Kelly and Beau kissed, and she told him not to sleep with anybody else except her even though she still slept in the same bed as James. Beau saw the many pills Kelly took that were put out on her assigned makeup vanity desk so he questioned James about Kelly’s pills after he asked Kelly who told him that she took whatever was placed there for her. James confirmed that he was the one who dished out the pills for his wife and knew how many Kelly took because he controlled Kelly’s medication and drugged state. James told Beau that it was the job of Beau to make sure that Kelly didn’t mix the pills with alcohol, since James was busy with Chiles, and Chiles was with James as he said it. Kelly was upset that James did not come see her after she summoned him and then looked around the corner to his room and saw her husband flirting with Chiles. Another gift was delivered to Kelly in her dressing room right before her performance. However, this gift box contained something morbid and inside was a dead baby doll covered in blood with a note that said “baby killer,” that the sender knew would set Kelly off and interfere with her performance (something a gaslighter would and perhaps someone very close to her). James appeared instantly (taking control of the situation or mayhap he caused it) and called for security and so the husband blamed the staff for allowing that to happen. Kelly was beyond upset. Kelly had a breakdown and locked herself in the closet to drink vodka. Beau couldn’t get her out and James was with Chiles. James arrived on scene and told Kelly to get onstage and he didn’t want her to consider having another baby, so she slugged him in the nose. Kelly apologized and told James she would do whatever he wanted.  James kissed Kelly to appease her but he looked totally sickened by her affection. Before stepping off onstage, Kelly kissed her cross necklace (Jesus was not visibly in the lives of any of these people and that was very clear…addicts, cheaters, liars, wicked mind gamers, women degrading themselves wearing scanty clothes because she can’t sing or have need to satisfy cravings for ungodly attention by dancing sexy that wrongly teaches God’s children to copy and do same) that she always wore, and stepped out onstage. No surprise, Kelly could hardly get started singing and broke down in tears in the middle of her song. James took Kelly away and accused Beau of giving Kelly the vodka. Beau argued that he was onstage at the time it all happened and he was the one that got off stage to check on Kelly. Beau added that Kelly shouldn’t have been taken out of rehab yet. Before they left South Texas, Kelly got food sushi food poisoning in Houston. The Tennessee band roadshow then headed to Austin. Chiles read trivia cards so people wouldn’t think she was brainless. At a press conference, Kelly was asked about the Dallas arena where she would perform her last show. Chiles told the news people that her idols were Kelly and Jesus Christ (WOW). Kelly and Beau took a day off and hung out on a freight train and then took showers afterward in the room. Beau wanted to end his sexual relationship with Kelly because she was married, and she was upset about it. Kelly then lied to James when he arrived on scene about what happened with her and Beau that day. Beau then went to Chiles’ room and convinced her to strip to her bra and underwear while he wore his underwear since it was just like wearing swimsuits. However, their sex play didn’t last long because James knocked on Chiles’ door and interrupted them. James informed Chiles that she was the next Carrie Underwood and she and Beau were on the list of top ten rising country singers. Another time, Chiles finished Beau’s lyrics for his song, and he was a jerk to her in front of his band but then regretted it after he read the lyrics. Kelly walked in on James recording Chiles singing “Coming Home,” which was the song Kelly wanted to sing. Kelly was upset, and James said the song wasn’t right for his wife. James then decided to give birdy Loretta Lynn to Kelly to look after, and the bird cheered her up. Beau told James that they should put Kelly back in rehab because she still wasn’t recovered, but James wanted to keep pushing her to perform. Beau admitted to James that he was never Kelly’s sponsor, so James punched James in the face for being Kelly’s lover, which Beau already knew he was. Late that night, Beau stumbled across Kelly at a honky-tonk drinking and pole dancing, and he called Chiles for help and he brought her to the waiting taxi cab and put her in the backseat with Chiles and Kelly’s head on Chiles’ lap. Kelly told Chiles that she and Beau had a sexual relationship and Kelly had always wanted a daughter. Kelly was late to her next concert and too drunk to perform, so JJ announced that there was no sponsor or show and Kelly was done. Beau did a duet with Chiles. After he left the stage, Beau went to check on Kelly and he found JJ in the bus taking advantage of Kelly sexually while she appeared drugged. Beau kicked JJ out and then smashed Kelly’s hard alcohol bottle that she retrieved and had hidden. Inside the bus, Beau dressed Kelly and put her to bed and then went to the bar. Chiles then showed up at Beau’s hotel room, where Beau and Chiles had sex and later sang more duets on stage together. James made his appearance and her husband told Kelly that he was going to give Loretta Lynn to someone who could take care of the bird because Kelly left the bird in a box at the bar and they called him and said the bird was going to be thrown out as garbage. James told Kelly she didn’t have to go to the Make A Wish appointment in a classroom full of students for Travis, a young boy who had leukemia and was a huge fan of Kelly’s. James told his wife he could only imagine how she was able to change JJ’s mind (sexual favors wise) now that Dallas show was back on. Chiles, in bed with her new lover Beau, then admitted to Beau that she was almost Miss Dallas but didn’t make it because she choked and mentioned something about global warming like a sweater that her grandmother made wrapped around the world. Kelly went to a school classroom to meet Travis, and she and her band played a song she made up for Travis. Kelly was happy dancing with Travis, and then everyone joined in. James watched and then took Travis away from his wife so he could dance with Kelly, and he knew that would make her emotional and cry so he broke off the dance and walked away from crying Kelly in the classroom where she was happy with Travis minutes before. James went out in the hall to have his own staged drama moment. Soon after the Tennessee folks arrived in Dallas at the same arena where Kelly had her wild and crazy delinquent behavior incident that resulted in the miscarriage of God’s baby. Beau surprised his new lover and gave Chiles the diamond star earrings she had always wanted and then announced that he was going to California after the show so he could work at a ranch on the beach. Beau wanted Chiles to go with him and sing at a bar until they could write their own album, but she didn’t want to go because she had enough empty lyric pop country songs for an album. Beau thought Chiles was better than that, and she decided she would think about it. Beau went onstage and dedicated a newly written solo song to Kelly, the reason he was on the Texas tour. Before her performance onstage, Kelly on a mission with a plangave Chiles advice about performing and told her the most important thing was to not be afraid to fall in love with as many things (and people) as possible. It was then that Chiles admitted she lied about her parents being schoolteachers and they were in both in prison for violent crimes. Kelly suggested that Chiles work with publicists to get it settled because singers shouldn’t hide anything from their fans. Chiles then took the stage. Beau left stage and went to talk to Kelly, who was looking at a tasteless gossip celebrity magazine with a front page stating that she was battling mental illness. Beau didn’t think Kelly was that bad, and Kelly told her ex-lover that she planned to give everyone in Dallas a good show. Beau listened to Chiles perform and realized that she might never go to small-town bar in California with him now that she knew what big stadium fame felt like. Just as Kelly was about to go onstage, James called Kelly by her pet nickname Dove and told her that he loved her like no other but she didn’t want to talk about it at all. Kelly made it through all her songs, and Chiles was amazed because she had never heard Kelly sing like that in person (Kelly bombed in Houston and Austin). Kelly started with “Country Strong” and finished her performance with “Coming Home,” and had home videos from her childhood playing on the TVs. As she walked offstage and passed by Chiles, she told her minion that was how it was done, and then Kelly locked herself in her dressing room and went through with her final step of her plan. The horrible news that gang hated on their victim, Kelly, wondered how long her sobriety would last. Beau, Chiles and the band celebrated the success of the show backstage. JJ left the Texas party and planned to meet up with James and his wife back in Nashville, Tennessee with more shows and songs for Kelly. Chiles planned to write more songs. Beau then noticed that Kelly was missing so he confronted James about it. James knew Kelly was not there and brushed it off as her needing time in her dressing room. That didn’t sit well with Beau so he rushed to find Kelly and broke the door down. Kelly was found unconscious because she supposedly overdosed on many pills. At the hospital, the doctor gave James the news that Kelly died and Beau watched from the window as James appeared upset and collapsed to the floor. There was a funeral for Kelly, and afterward Beau packed his bags to go to California, alone. Beau found a note from Kelly in his pocket telling him he had a right to disappear as Waylon sang to Willie. Time passed, and Chiles showed up in California as Beau took the stage. He called his lover up onstage, introduced her, and the two sang their love song together, as they did so many other times on tour in Texas. The movie cover art listed, Judi Diamond, WILF-FM/St. Louis, “You don’t have to be a country fan to love this movie.” Jim Ferguson, KGUN-TV (ABC), “Gwyneth Paltrow in one of her best performances.” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/11/24

TITLE:  Mother’s Day 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2016  Universal Pictures / Open Road Pictures / Capacity Pictures / Wayne Rice / Gulfstream Pictures / Aperture Media Partners / Mayday Movies / Triad Films Works / Beatnik Films / Palmstar Media 

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie takes place in the Atlanta, Georgia area, where Sandy Newhouse had been divorced from her ex-husband for many years, but Henry still hung around her house to be around the young kids. He gave their sons, Mikey and Peter, and their friends donuts for breakfast and let them go to school with no underwear while mom Sandy only wore a bath towel after her shower as she came into the kitchen with many young boys since Henry was carpool. Meanwhile, Sandy’s friend, Jesse, had a gay sister named Gabi. Gaby and her gay wife Max made a Womb on Wheels float for the upcoming Mother’s Day parade, and their adopted son Charlie (the young boy told everyone he came from a sperm donor) had emerged from the vagina on wheels. Gabi and Max used GOD’s Rainbow as their gay adult sex symbol on their Rainbow Girls catering service vehicle, and the float represented that everyone came from the same place whether they were gay, straight, transgender, black or white. Another scene had Zack Zim (and it was said he was a British bartender from England…a country which gave everyone colonialism, Hugh Grant and the plague) and his young adult girlfriend and co-worker, Kristin, worked at the Shorty’s Saloon. Kristin arrived at the workplace bar with their baby Katie. Zack announced that he was accepted into the Buckhead Standup Comedy Contest with a top prize of $5,000 and he went there and gave his stand up comic performance. Another Georgia family, Bradley Barton, was a former Marine and his wife Dana, a lieutenant in the Marine Corps, died (didn’t say how she died) and they had two daughters, Rachel and Vicky. Bradley owned a local fitness gym and was the coach for his eldest daughter Rachel’s soccer team. At Bradley’s gym, three of his women friends tried to hook him up with a divorced, big-boobed teacher. Bradley wasn’t interested and decided to not celebrate Mother’s Day that year. As it turned out, Jesse hadn’t talked to her mom Florence “Flo” ever since Flo threatened to disown Jesse for dating an Indian doctor named Russell Kohli who Jesse was married to but kept it a secret from her Texan parents. Gabi made up a false story to tell her Texan parents, Flo and Earl, who lived in a trailer park, about how she was engaged to a man named Steven and didn’t tell her parents the truth about being married to a female, and lied like her sister Jesse. Jesse and Gabi skyped with their parents. Later on, Henry told Sandy (Sandy thought that Henry was going to get back together with her again) that he eloped and married Tina, who he dated a long time ago and broke up with because of a stripper but then he decided to get back together with Tina who moved back to Georgia from LA. Sandy was shocked, especially since Henry told the children Mikey and Peter first on the way to school. Sandy took Mikey and Peter to a sleepover at Henry and Tina’s house and told them not to call Tina mom since she was a very young model and was into Twitter tweets and Instagram. Henry wanted to have the kids for half of Mother’s Day since Tina was now a step-mom, and Sandy was upset and suggested he have the kids for Flag Day or anything else. Meanwhile, HSN TV celebrity, Miranda Collins, one of Forbes top 50 female entrepreneurs in the country, was on a book signing as it televised at Kristin and Zack workplace bar. Miranda sold Mother’s Day crystal mood pendants live on HSN in Atlanta, and Gabi bought one for her mom, Flo. It was then suggested to Miranda’s agent, Lance Wallace, that they hire Sandy as an interior designer for Miranda. Bartender Zack and Waitress Kristin (both in their early twenties) had been together for five years and he asked her many times to marry him, but she turned him down each time so he wanted to take a break, even though they had a young child of GOD to raise. Kristin asked Sandy and Jesse for marriage advice, and they told her that she would have to wait and see if it worked out and if she would get more space if divorced happened after marriage. Jesse wasn’t worried about her son Tanner, who was eating sand that possibly had cat poop in it because it was said that kids recover from practically everything as she hung with her girl pals. Kristin told Jesse that she felt her life was incomplete because she was adopted and her birth female (Kristin didn’t care to meet her birth sire) abandoned her (but in reality it was because her wonderful adoptive parents that raised her were both dead). Kristin considered going to meet the birth female but wasn’t sure if she could, so stranger Jesse encouraged Kristin to make contact. Sandy went to Mikey and Peter’s school play show. Brother Peter put Mikey’s lion body costume on backward so the tail dangled in the front of the costume resembling a male body part. Everyone laughed when Mikey touched and played with the “tail,” and Sandy was mortified for her son and upset that Tina took the seat next to her. The eldest daughter sent her dad, Bradley, shopping for her, and he was embarrassed to buy tampons for Rachel at the local Sprout’s store. At Sprouts, Bradley and Sandy met each other as actual cashiers were checking them out in line (not self check). Henry called Sandy then as she was in her car in the Sprout parking lot to tell her that he and Tina were taking Mikey and Peter to Paris for summer vacation and he needed passports for the boys. Sandy was upset because she didn’t get to go and had an f-ing breakdown in her car that Bradley noticed as he walked to his vehicle and steered clear from. At Rachel’s next soccer game, Bradley told off the ref for not calling a play that caused them to lose. Bradley blew the ref’s own whistle and stormed off after the ref told him to go. Not long after, 16-year-old Rachel swore and told her dad that she was the mom now and had to do everything around the house and take care of younger sister, Vicky. Rachel then took off in a car with Tommy, a boy from school who liked her as her dad told her not to go and get out of Tommy’s car. Sandy got an interview with Miranda, but she was late and accidentally ripped her shirt badly as she entered the building. Sandy had a meltdown as to why she was late (broken down vehicle, wardrobe malfunction, ex husband issues) after she found out that she missed her interview in front of Miranda. Miranda was busy but overheard because Sandy made a huge scene, so then Miranda called Sandy back. After hearing about Sandy’s family life, Miranda hired Sandy and gave her a special gold bracelet and told her she got the job because she made a scene and that gets attention and told her she would get enough money to buy a nice vehicle. Jesse skyped with her parents again, as she changed her shirt because Gabi spilled liquid on it. Jesse was still getting dressed when Flo and Earl burst in the house and announced that they drove from Texas to Georgia in their RV for Mother’s Day. Jesse went into panic mode and told Russell and Tanner stay in the garage but they didn’t. There was a Jerry Springer moment when Flo and Earl learned that Max and Gabi were wives and Gabi lied about being engaged to the fictional Steven. Jesse had told Russell to stay in the garage, but he didn’t and revealed that Jesse was indeed his wife and told the racist Texans Earl and Flo not to call him a towel-head or Dr. towel-head. Russell had learned that both sisters Jesse and Gabi had lied to him for years about their parents and he could see that Earl and Flo were not mentally incapacitated in an Arizona dementia facility as the two had him believe. Earl and Flo were upset and shocked that both of their daughters had kids and Charlie was from a sperm donor. Dr. Russell was so upset about the lies and deceit from his wife that he packed to go stay next door with gay Gabi and Max. Jesse explained that she lied about her parents because she grew up in a trailer park. Earl and Flo’s RV had a flat tire so they were stranded for the night, otherwise they would have left Georgia. In another scene, Bradley asked the three women at the gym if he should let his teen daughter, Rachel, date teen Tommy, and they told him yes because if he said no it could lead to teen rebellion, running away, drugs and prostitution. The RV was sabotaged then so more repairs had to be done to it before Gabi and Jesse’s folks could leave the state. Sandy threw a party for Mikey and Peter to be mean to her ex, and when Henry came around he spotted Sandy’s new expensive SUV ride with personalized plates. Henry collected the boys because Sandy was intentionally keeping the children with her and not dropping them off with Henry and Tina at the right time out of spite. Mikey and Peter didn’t want to leave because of the petting zoo in their yard, and when Henry tried to go after one boy the waterslide deflated on top of him thanks to his ex-wife letting a young girl pull the plug. After her ex and children left the out of the blue for no reason party, a clown cheered Sandy up and said that was her kids’ mom no matter what. At Miranda’s book signing, Rory told Miranda that he bought Miranda’s jewelry for himself and his gay partner Jerald. Kristin appeared then and told Miranda that she was her daughter. It did not go so well as others claimed to be Miranda’s lost child in the past so it meant nothing to Miranda or Lance who said that Kristin’s birth certificate paperwork might be forged since Kristin wasn’t the first person who claimed to be Miranda’s daughter. Kristin realized that she made a mistake and left. Russell’s mom Sonia skyped with Flo, and neither moms were happy about their kids being of different races and marrying. Close to Mother’s Day, Lance gave Miranda a pep talk and told her that his real name was Ramone Navarro and he was from the Bronx where he collected soda bottles for food money before he changed his name and became an agent. Bradley spotted Rachel and Tommy kiss when he dropped her off at home and the bad behaved teen who often begged her dad for her mom’s car (dad said he was selling the car for money) came inside the house and ignored her dad and went to bed. Zack was in the finals of his comedy contest and called Kristin many times to talk to her about their relationship and him needing her help to watch the baby while he went on stage. Kristin listened to the messages but she didn’t call him back. Zack decided to take baby Katie onstage but then handed her over to an overweight gay man called Tiny when Katie started wailing. Katie stopped crying, and Tiny said he wanted to sleep with Zack while Kristin slept on the couch as payment. Kristin finally showed up. Zack had told everyone while he was onstage that a mom knew what was right for her children and their families but not necessarily a dad. Katie was announced the winner of the $5,000 prize. The next morning on Mother’s Day, Mikey and Peter accidentally gave Sandy the gift that was meant for Tina. Sandy announced that she was okay with sharing the boys with step-mom Tina, and she dropped them off with Henry and Tina for the rest of the day. The parents scolded Jesse and Gabi for lying. The sisters complained about how Earl and Flo didn’t want Jesse to have a minority roommate at college and spanked Gabi for wanting to dress up like Liberace for Halloween when she was a young girl. Bradley found his girls missing that morning but then Kimberly from the gym called to tell Bradley the girls were with her and she took them to the cemetery to leave flowers on their mom’s grave. Jesse left Russell a message and lied that she and Tanner were going to live with Flo and Earl. That got Russell running out of the house in a female robe and into the RV, where Sonia was on skype and told Russell that he should make amends with Jesse. Russell didn’t want to make up and wouldn’t accept Jesse’s apology for lying. Gabi revealed that she had Charlie tamper with the RV so her parents would not leave, and then as Earl drove down a steep incline he announced that he didn’t get the brakes fixed and drove really fast downhill. The Womb on Wheels was in tow. The fear that that they were all going to crash got Jesse and Russell back together, and that’s when Earl stopped the huge recklessly driven RV and revealed that he lied and nothing was wrong with the brakes. A police motorcycle officer and police squad car had chased after them and the officers confronted dysfunctional mostly Caucasian American family. The Georgia officers signaled Russell out because of his skin color and made only him get on the ground but then the African American female officer cleared it up that the Indian American Russell was her doctor (nobody was arrested or ticketed). Everyone then had a picnic since they missed the queer Mother’s Day parade. When Kimberly took Rachel and Vicky home, Bradley had set up decorations and flowers to celebrate Mother’s Day. Bradley then gave Vicky a karaoke machine and his eldest daughter, Rachel, the keys to their mom’s car to drive. The guests arrived, and Tommy was among them because Bradley asked him to come. Tina called Sandy with an emergency because Mikey had Asthma and couldn’t breathe and was out of his inhaler while her husband and other step-son were away and not answering the phone. Sandy gave Tina instructions to have Mikey breathe in the cold air from the freezer until Henry came in the door and took Mikey to the ER since his son’s color didn’t look good. At the party, Bradley led the hump dance after doing his own rap song but he fell over the balcony and hurt his leg so Kimberly blamed it on a white boy wearing pink pants trying to be a rapper. Bradley was taken to the hospital too on Mother’s Day. As it happened, Miranda showed up at Kristin’s house and explained that she and her boyfriend were 16-year-old teens when Miranda got pregnant. His parents wanted nothing to do with Kristin and moved to another city, whereas Miranda’s parents pulled her out of school for a year and put the baby up for adoption and after that Miranda and her mom were never the same again. Kristin told her bio female that her adoptive parents in Hawaii were wonderful parents and there was a void in her world after they both died (didn’t say how both of the parents who raised her the majority of her life had died). Miranda said both her parents were also dead. Miranda told Kristin every year she received a photo of Kristin, but she was never allowed to contact Kristin since that was the adoption deal (obviously other adoptions are different when birth female and birth male endangered child’s life repeatedly and can not have contact with GOD’s child for life because of it).  Miranda said she chose to be a career woman and not marry and have children. Miranda then met Katie and Zack, and soon after Miranda used her publicity and went on HSN to introduce Kristin and claimed to be her mom. Kristin enjoyed the spotlight and proposed to Zack on TV, but it turned out to be pre-recorded. As Zack watched in the bar, Kristin appeared and Zack accepted the short proposal on Kristin’s terms. Another young couple, also employees at the same drinking bar, left quickly to go to the hospital because she went into labor and was going to have a baby too. Sandy went to the Georgia hospital, where Mikey overcame his medical emergency. Mikey wanted candy, so Sandy went to the vending machine and got her gold bracelet caught in it after it got stuck when she reached in to grab the candy. Bradley was there to get his leg fixed with his girls, but he decided to stop and help Sandy. After Bradley untangled Sandy’s bracelet, Sandy stole exra candy from the vending machine while she had the chance. Bradley’s daugther’s told him to give Sandy his card for the gym where the females pole danced, but Sandy said she already signed up and went to his gym (Bradley saw Sandy at his gym but thought she was nutty so he hid from her). Vicky and Rachel were happy that Sandy would get together. Sonia came to Georgia from Las Vegasfor the picnic that Jesse’s family planned since they missed the parade. Sonia, Earl and Flo planned on staying awhile. At the bar saloon, Kristin and Zack got married by Lance, who had a license from the online church of Idaho to marry people and Miranda paid for it. This movie had a budget of $25 million and grossed over $48 million at the box office.

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/11/24

TITLE:  Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 1988  MGM / Nelson Entertainment / Interscope Communications / Orion Pictures / De Lurentiis Entertainment / Soisson / Murphey Productions 

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie takes place in San Dimas, California in 1988, where brainless high schoolers Bill S. Preston, Esquire, and Ted “Theodore” Logan led a rock band called Wyld Stallyns which was unsuccessful and short-circuited in their garage causing smoke. Bill and Ted did terrible in history class, and teacher Mr. Ryan informed them that they would both flunk the class if they didn’t get an A plus on their history report about what the famous leaders of history would think about modern day San Dimas. Bill’s new stepmom, Missy, was only three years older than Bill and Ted and both boys had sexual feelings towards her. Missy and Bill’s dad, Mr. Preston, had sex in Bill’s room. Ted’s dad, Police Captain Logan, threatened to break up the band and send Ted to Oates Military Academy in Alaska if he flunked history. Meanwhile, Rufus, a man from the future was sent to San Dimas from the year 2688 (700 years in the future) to help Bill and Ted with their high school history test. Rufus appeared to them in a telephone booth (British Dr. WHO / TARDIS) outside a Circle K store. The phone booth was a time travel machine. Identical versions of Bill and Ted also appeared and convinced present day Bill and Ted to go back in time using the phonebooth in order to see historical leaders and get their thoughts on the future. Rufus demonstrated by taking Bill and Ted to Austria in 1805, where Napoleon Bonaparte and his French army invaded. Napoleon got trapped in the circuits of history when they returned to present day. Ted paid off his younger brother Deacon to watch Napoleon while Bill and Ted continued to travel back in time, but this time to steal away the historical figures for show and tell to go along with their history report. Rufus left and gave Bill and Ted a phonebook full of numbers to dial that would take them to different times and places in history. Bill and Ted headed to a saloon in New Mexico in 1879, where Billy the Kid picked them to play cards. The other outlaws started a violent barroom brawl when the trio was called out for cheating, but they were able to escape to Athens, Greece in 410 B.C., where they picked up Socrates. In 15th century England, Bill and Ted decided to check out King Henry’s two daughters, Princess Joanna and Elizabeth. They snuck into the castle wearing suits of armor, and they were messing around fighting with swords and Ted fell down the stairs. A guard thought Ted was an intruder and stabbed his armor, so Bill thought Ted was dead but then Ted revealed that he got out of his armor and was alive when he knocked out the guard Bill was fighting. Bill and Ted asked the princesses to go to prom with them, and they wanted to but couldn’t because their dad wanted them to marry two old men that day. Bill and Ted agreed to help the princesses escape, but then King Henry had them put on the chopping blocks to be beheaded. Billy the Kid and Socrates rescued Bill and Ted and they escaped from the guards chasing after them. They ended up in the far future where Rufus came from, and they met the Three Most Important People in the World who spoke no wordsbut played electronic music. Bill and Ted’s group continued their “excellent adventure,” back in time. They abducted Sigmund Freud in Austria in 1901, Ludwig van Beethoven from Kassel, Germany in 1810, and Joan of Arc from New Orleans, France in 1429. From there they seized Genghis Khan from Outer Mongolia in 1209 and then captured Abraham Lincoln from his White House office in 1863. Meanwhile, Deacon and some kids took Napoleon out for ice cream but ditched him when Napoleon made a fool of himself at bowling and was thrown out. Bill and Ted’s group ended up in San Dimas in 1,000,000 B.C., where they all chewed gum, combined the wads and used them to stick the pieces of the broken antenna on the phonebooth and put it back together. They all returned to present day San Dimas. Missy, in her outdoor flower garden, told her step-son that she wouldn’t give any of them a ride unless his chores were done around the house, so Bill and Ted made the historical people do all the housework chores (Lincoln) ironed Socrates’ toga as Socrates in his underwear stood in front of Lincoln with Lincoln’s head bent down, (Beethoven) washed the windows and (Joan, Billy) did the dishes and Billy dumped leftover food in drawers, (Khan) cleaned the toilet and (Freud) vacuumed. Bill and Ted then took everyone to the mall to hang out. Billy the kid, Socrates and Freud tried to hit on girls, Beethoven performed on the electric pianos, and Genghis attacked a mannequin with a baseball bat and outwitted the security guards. Joan led an aerobics class, and when Lincoln posed for a picture the photographer believed his hat and beard were props and tried to forcibly take them off. The mall security, led by Police Captain Logan, then arrested them and took them to jail. Bill and Ted learned that Deacon ditched Napoleon for being a dick, so Missy took them to Waterloo water park to pick up Napoleon, who was keeping busy on the waterslides. Bill and Ted went to the police station, where Captain Logan refused to release the historical figures and sent Ted home to pack for military school. Bill and Ted stole the Police Captain’s (dad) keys, distracted him, released the prisoners and sped off after putting a trashcan on the Police Captain’s head. Police Captain Logan and Mr. Preston followed Bill and Ted to the school, and the Police Captain scolded Mr. Preston for him and Missy not keeping Bill in line so he wasn’t a bad influence on Ted. The historical figures gave speeches and presentations about their time eras for Bill and Ted’s high school history project. Lincoln changed the Gettysburg Address to quote Bill and Ted and tell everyone to be excellent to each other and party on. Socrates was compared to Ozzy Osbourne in the way he corrupted the young. Bill and Ted received a standing ovation for their report and then returned the historical figures to their own eras. Bill and Ted got an A plus in history, and they decided they would change things and actually learn how to play their instruments. Rufus then appeared and revealed that he rescued Princesses Joanna and Elizabeth from marriage to the old men in England. He took the England girls to the USA mall to get new clothes and announced that they would be members of the USA band. The princesses kissed Bill and Ted, and Rufus asked the foursome to sign a copy a Wyld Stallyn album for his kids because their Brit American band would eventually become extremely popular in the future. Rufus predicted that Bill and Ted’s music would end war and poverty and align the parents in harmony so all life forms, including aliens and pets, could communicate with each other. Rufus surprised Bill and Ted with two electric guitars, and he demonstrated how to play and then they all jammed together. This movie had a budget of $10 million and grossed over $40 million at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Blockbuster Entertainment Guide, “Three and a half stars! Hard to beat!” The Hollywood Reporter, “spirited performances.” Time, “snappily directed.” The Boston Globe “bouncy good time.” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/10/24

TITLE:  Ender’s Game 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2013 Summit Entertainment / Oddlot Entertainment / Chartoff Productions / Taleswapper / K/O Paper Products / Digital Domain / Sierra / Affinity / Lionsgate

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie is based on a worldwide bestselling book series. It began with the International Fleet organization recruiting groups of very smart borderline genius children under 15 years of age to attend Battle School and learn to fight the Formic aliens, which attacked Earth 50 years before but were destroyed by Commander Mazer Rackham. Millions of people died in the battle because Earth wasn’t ready for the invasion, so the International Fleet created Battle School using children in preparation for another attack. The children played war games and had their intelligence tested. Young Andrew “Ender” Wiggin was a genius and therefore the best candidate for commander to save the world. Colonel Hyrum Graff and Major Gwen Anderson tested Ender’s reaction to rejection by leading him to believe that he was being kicked out of the program. They tested what would happen when they removed Ender’s tracking monitor from the back of his neck, which the nurse said wouldn’t hurt but caused Ender excruciating pain and left blood on the removed device when the robot yanked it out. Graff and Anderson used cameras to witness a bully kid and his thugs ganging up on Ender after Ender’s monitor was gone. Ender beat up the bully and kicked him while he was down multiple times and threatened to do the same to the other bullies if they tried to hurt him again. Ender’s brother Peter was angry that he wasn’t chosen to be part of the program, so he tried to strangle youngest Ender, and had locked sister Valentine out of the room while he did it. Valentine wasn’t chosen because she was too compassionate and emotional. Ender was discouraged and believed he should never have been born since he was the third of his siblings and his parents, John Paul and Theresa, had to obtain government permission in order to have a third child, Ender. As it turned out, Graff and Anderson were impressed by Ender’s actions and confronted him back on Earth at his home. They told him that he passed the test after the monitor was removed and was graduating to Battle School because he formed a tactical strategy to prevent further bullying attacks. The officials hoped Ender would become the next commander to fight the Formics in a war that would prevent future wars since the alien Formics were strengthening and planned to attack Earth within a month. Ender and the other recruits were put on a spaceship and headed to Battle School, which was located in outer space. Graff made Ender look more intelligent than the other recruits, which caused them to hate Ender and make him an outcast so Ender realized he had no allies and everyone was against him since they were all enemies, which is what Graff wanted all along. The tough Sergeant James Dap threatened to neuter any of the minor recruits who tried to use a shower not intended for their gender. In the zero gravity Battle Room, the recruits practiced for a competition where they would shoot other child gamers of the opposing team to immobilize them. Ender wrote emails to his sister Valentineand the other kids wrote to their families, but the emails were intercepted and there were never any replies because Graff blocked the email responses and he wouldn’t let the students communicate with anyone on the outside and reveal what was going on inside the Battle School. Bernard’s friends left him and decided to hang out with Ender. Gwen Anderson wanted to know all about Ender’s mind to assess him, so she gave him access to the Mind Game. Hyrum Graff was angry and didn’t want Ender to have the game. Ender figured out the game was bogus, so he went through the eye of the monster and killled it, and did choose again one of the two obvious choices that had both previously failed. Graff and Anderson were shocked that Ender was the first person to ever win the game. Bonzo Madrid, the commander of Salamander Army, wanted a replacement for one of his members so Ender was promptly reassigned to Salamander. However, Bonzo wasn’t impressed with Ender and wanted him to do stay out of the way until Bonzo could trade him. Petra Arkanian was the only girl in Salamander, and she showed Ender some moves in the Battle Room in his free time. Bonzo was mad about it, so Ender came up with an idea for Bonzo to save face in front of his army by not letting Ender have his way that night but then changing his mind and letting Ender train as if it was Bonzo’s idea. Ender told Bonzo that the training Ender would receive would also enable him to be quickly traded to another army. Bonzo told Ender to stay back during the next battle, but he didn’t and was able to defeat many opponents when Bonzo and his other gang members could not. Ender trained with Petra again, so Bonzo punched Ender and threatened to kill him for making Bonzo look like a fool in battle. Ender continued playing Gwen’s Mind Game, but this time sister Valentine led Ender, in mouse form, into a crumbling castle. He turned into a person and killed a snake, and then brother Peter appeared in the game as his evil self. Graff ordered Gwen to erase the game to keep young Ender away from his psycho eldest siblingand then offered for Ender to lead his own team, the Dragon Army. The dragon soldiers were the misfit kids, which included Alai, Bean, Bernard, Dink and later Petra when Graff decided to give her to Dragon. Graff quickly arranged for Dragon to fight two teams at once, the Salamander and Leopard teams in the Battle room. Ender’s idea was to have his army do a formation, and they made it to their opponent’s side and won instantly since the rules were if another team reached the other’s team side that qualified as an automatic win no matter how many points a team had. Bonzo was angry and confronted Ender in the shower where young Ender quickly grabbed a towel to cover his naked body. Ender sprayed Bonzo with hot water, and the two fought until Ender kicked Bonzo in self-defense and he fell back and hit his head against the shower floor and was lifeless. Bonzo was seriously injured, if not dead, so the robots operated on him. Graff wouldn’t let Gwen apologize for not watching the children and dismissed her and Petra so he could speak to Ender alone. Graff announced that Bonzo would be sent back home to Earth, and Ender wanted to go home too but couldn’t because the Fleet owned the child. Ender quit anyway. Gwen resigned her position. Graff showed up at Ender’s home and took took Valentine to see Ender and he refused to let Ender see his parents, and only talk to his sister because Graff knew Valentine would side with Graff. Valentine then convinced Ender to re-enlist and become the next Rackham, and Graff agreed not to block Ender’s emails anymore. Graff took Ender to Command School in space, the next step up from Battle School where Ender would finish his training and command the invasion fleet against the formics aliens if he succeeded. Colonel Mazer Rackham became Ender’s teacher, and they watched the footage from Rackham’s defeat of the Formics, many years before. Rackham used thermal imaging to pick out the mothership, which housed the queen of the colony (like ants). Once the queen was destroyed, all the other ships (the worker ants) gave up. The entire video was never shown to the recruits and Rackham’s face was never shown because he was dead to the world. Rackham’s dad was a Maori, and his face tattoos were his way to speak with the dead. Ender was reunited with his dragon army, who were also brought to Command School. The Formics aliens were overpopulating on their planet where they were trapped, so they planned to continue to increase their military power and overtake another planet before they became extinct, the people in charge believed. Petra was the only person trained to fire the MD 500, a $70 billion weapon of mass destruction, while the other soldiers piloted the fighter drones. Dragon did well in the simulations, but the battles weren’t always won as they became more intense. Rackham and Graff scolded Ender for micro-managing his team and not giving them more control to help. Rackham had trained others but they failed, so Ender was their last hope and would fight the Formics for real if he won the final simulation battle. Ender had a thought that the Formics could communicate telepathically, and he wanted to know more about the aliens prior to battling them. Ember was worried the dragons would be defeated in their last simulation battle. The Strategos boss came to watch the last simulation set around the Formics’ home planet, and if Ender succeeded in defeating the Formics then the Strategos would endorse Ender’s promotion to Battle Commander of the fleet. Ender’s game plan was to use the MD 500 to destroy the home planet and the queens. It worked and the planet burned up. After that final simulation battle was won, it was then brought to the attention of the Dragons made up of children that it was not a simulation but in fact the real thing and the alien Formics were destroyed. Graff and Rackham congratulated Ender the child genius on figuring out the solution that the adults couldn’t, which meant all future battles were won. Ender was very upset because in his battle game Ember didn’t know the game was real and therefore abandoned 1,000 men on the transporters and was then told by those in charge that those people all died proudly to save Planet Earth. Graff insisted that they won, and Ender argued that the alien Formics didn’t come back to Earth for 50 years and might have been a peaceful civilization that just wanted to colonize on Earth. Ender was sedated with a gun to the neck, and Petra was allowed to stay with him as he was left unconscious on the bed. When Ender woke up, he showed Petra the place he dreamed located outside the planet Command School on the foreign planet. Ender realized that the Queen accessed Gwen’s Mind Game and his dreams to try and communicate with him through sister Valentine. Since Ender stole the alien Formics’ future from them, he went to meet with the dying queen and made amends. The Queen showed Ender an unborn queen, and Ember promised to find a new home for the aliens. Ender was promoted to Admiral and given freedom in his spaceship to roam anywhere, so Ember set out on his own to explore the galaxy and find another planet where the alien Formics and Queen could restart their civilization. This movie had a budget of $110-115 million budget and grossed over $125 million at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Pete Hammond, Movieline, “Spectacular!” Mark Adams, Sunday Mirror, “Four stars. An action-packed adventure.”

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/9/24

TITLE:  Captain America – The Winter Soldier 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2014  Marvel Studios  / Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie began with Avenger superhero Captain America (Steve Rogers) returning to Washington D.C.to settle down after he completed a few missions. He met Sam Wilson, a former Air Force man who suggested that Steve add Marvin Gaye’s 1972 to his list of pop culture to help readjust to society. Steve and Natasha (Black Widow), an Avenger and member of the S.H.I.E.L.D. organization, led the S.T.R.I.K.E. team to free a group of hostages from the Lemurian Star, a SHIELD launch ship that was hijacked by French mercenary pirates led by George Batroc. The terrorists wanted a billion-dollar ransom for the hostages, but SHIELD refused to give the money so the pirates threatened to kill their captives. STRIKE fought and killed the mercenaries and succeeded in rescuing the hostages. Steve and Natasha were almost injured when she tried to copy SHIELD information from the ship. At SHIELD headquarters in the Triskelion, director Nick Furywas the head of Project Insight, a program that would use three helicarriers to fight terrorists and stop threats before they happened. Steve visited Peggy Carter, a now elderly retired military agent who cofounded SHIELD and Steve used to like romantically. Peggy was now very ill, but she was glad to discover that Steve was still alive. Nick asked Alexander Pierce, a senior official with SHIELD and member of the World Security Council and Nick’s friend, to have the World Security Council delay Project Insight temporarily. Police then surrounded Nick’s smart car and rammed him from all sides and fired machine guns. The SWAT team tried to break the bulletproof window, but Fury was able to shoot down the officers as the car drove him away from the scene. More officers chased after Furyand he came close to death in the many traffic accidents that followed. An assassin flipped Nick’s car over and tried to kill him, but he escaped and let himself into Steve’s apartment. He tried to explain to Steve what happened, but before he could the assassin shot Nick through the wall and injured him. His last words to Steve were to trust no one and then he gave him a drive with data on it. Steve’s neighbor, Kate, revealed that she was not a nurse but in fact Sharon Carter (Agent 13) who was assigned by Nick to protect Steve and he didn’t know it. Steve went after the assassin but he got away. Fury was rushed to the hospital for medical attention, but he died and Natasha was upset. Steve was taken to SHIELD to be questioned by Alexander. Alexander explained the theory that Nick was a traitor who hired the pirates to hijack the Lemurian Star as a cover for Nick to sell classified SHIELD information. However, the sale didn’t go through so Nick was killed. Steve didn’t believe it and had no answer as to why Nick came to his apartment. Alexander believed Steve was hiding something and threatened to harm the person responsible for Nick’s death. In the elevator, Steve noticed that his fellow STRIKE members, led by commander Brock Rumlow, were all armed. They attacked Steve and he was able to down all of them. More agents went after Steve, but he jumped out of the skyscraper window and crashed to the ground. He sped off on his motorcycle and escaped from the battleship that shot at him. Jasper Sitwell, one of the rescued hostages from the ship, led the STRIKE agents and he ordered his people to hunt Steve down. Steve confronted Natasha, who explained that she knew Nick hired the pirates and Nick’s assassin was Winter Soldier, a mercenary who was a ghost story. Alexander argued with the Council officials that Nick was not a traitor, but they believed he was and that he had Alexander delay Project Insight so it wouldn’t expose Nick’s illegal activity. The Council decided to reactivate the project. Steve and Natasha went to the mall to check out the drive on a display computer. She wasn’t able to hack it and read the information, but she did trace it to its source at the army base in Wheaton, New Jersey, where Steve was trained to fight in World War II. The drive had a tracking device that enabled the dirty SHIELD agents to track them the moment they plugged it in. Steve and Natasha were able to escape and headed to the army base, where they found a control center. There was a message from Arnim Zola, a Nazi scientist in WWII, who identified Steve’s birthdate as 1918 and Natasha’s as 1984. Zola explained that SHIELD hired him during the war, and the organization known as HYDRA secretly existed inside SHIELD with the plan to create a new world order and world domination scheme. The people posing as SHIELD agents were in fact HYDRA agents, and Zola created an algorithm. Sitwell then fired a missile at the base, and Steve and Natasha were trapped inside when it blasted the building but were able to get out as HYDRA searched the debris for them. They went to Sam’s house, where he agreed to help them kidnap Sitwell. Meanwhile, Alexander met with the Winter Soldier and organized some assassinations. Alexander shot his employee maid, Renata, dead after she overheard his conversation to assassinate people. Sitwell refused to talk, so Natasha threw him off the top of the building and then Sam rescued Sitwell using his military wing pack that earned him the name Falcon. Sitwell explained that the algorithm used information, such as people’s medical records and voting patterns, to predict their futures and target them as threats to HYDRA. The Insight helicopters then killed those people in the millions, and Steve (Captain America) was one of the targets. The trio took Sitwell as a hostage and headed to stop the helicarriers from launching in 16 hours. However, Winter Soldier and the HYDRA mercenaries attacked them on the highway and they violently battled with guns. Winter Soldier went after Natasha and shot her in the shoulder, which caused her to bleed profusely. Steve fought Winter Soldier, and when his mask came off it was revealed that he was Bucky Barnes, Steve’s former best friend who fought with Steve in WWII but was supposedly killed. Bucky was now an inhuman assassin who didn’t recognize Steve because his memory had been wiped. HYDRA appeared and arrested the trio. Steve figured out that Zola captured Bucky during the war, experimented on him and gave him a metal arm and enhanced superhuman abilities. One of the HYDRA agents then turned out to be Maria Hill, Nick’s friend, who helped them escape. Maria brought them to a facility for Natasha to be treated, and Nick was there injured but alive because his death was faked. Winter Soldier told Alexander that he thought he knew Steve from somewhere, and Secretary Alexander ordered for Winter Soldier to be put in the painful torture machine to wipe his memory again. Steve’s team plotted to sneak aboard the helicarriers and replace the blades with their own to stop the machines before the satellites could activate their deadly weapons. Steve insisted on shutting down both SHIELD and HYDRA, and Nick was reluctant but agreed. Steve then stole the Captain America uniform from the Smithsonian, which had a display dedicated to Captain America and his team of soldiers (including Bucky) who fought HYDRA in WWII. Steve, Sam and Maria broke into the Triskelion, where Steve told the employees who didn’t know what was going on the truth about how the SHIELD agents were in fact HYDRA and dirty Alexander was their leader. Steve encouraged them to stand against HYDRA and stop the deaths of many that would occur if the helicarriers were launched. An employee that heard Steve’s speech, then refused to launch the ships, so Rumlow put a gun to his head. Sharon then did the same to Rumlow, so he used his knife to slice her leg and then retrieved his own gun. A shootout followed, and Rumlow launched the ships. Alexander planned to kill the Council members, but Hawley (dressed up in disguise) turned on Alexander and fought off the HYDRA agents. Hawley revealed that she was Natasha and took off her fake face, and threatened to spread all of HYDRA and SHIELD’s secrets on the Internet. Alexander threatened to reveal Natasha’s past with the KGB. Nick then appeared and refused to help Alexander kill 20 million people to bring order to 7 billion. Alexander was forced to use his clearance to disable the encryption on the files, and Nick was able to use his as well since Alexander didn’t erase the retinal scan of Nick’s fake eye in the system. Nick removed his pirate eye patch and used the fake eye to gain control. Alexander had given the Council agents pins to wear on their clothing earlier and told them it was necessary for security and then Alexander used the pins to burn holes in the chests of his victims once he activated the secret weapon devices. Natasha put her gun down so the same wouldn’t happen to her. Meanwhile, Sam, as Falcon, distracted the helicarriers and they shot missiles at him. He was able to switch the blades in two of the helicarriers while Winter Soldier shot the real SHIELD agents and hijacked a battleship. The SHIELD employees evacuated the Triskelion as Winter Soldier attacked Sam and tore off his wings to ground him. Steve and Winter Soldier fought one-on-one, and Steve choked out his opponent to retrieve the blade that Winter Soldier took. Winter Soldier then shot Steve multiple times, but he was able to plug the blade into the third helicarrier before the helicarriers could kill the hundreds of thousands of people in D.C., including those in government buildings, who were picked out as targets. The number of targets was then changed to three, which were the three helicarriers that were then blown up. Natasha tased herself to distract Alexander so Nick could shoot him dead. Sam was out fighting Rumlow, so Nick and Natasha flew a helicopter to rescue him. Steve went to help Winter Soldier, who was trapped under heavy debris. Steve refused to fight Winter Soldier anymore, and he called Bucky by his real name and told him he was with him until the end of the line like they used to say to each other. Winter Soldier attacked Steve anyway and let him fall from the helicarrier into the Potomac River. Winter Soldier had second thoughts and decided to pull Steve’s unconscious body out of the river and then Winter Soldier walked away. Steve woke up in the hospital. Later on, Natasha walked out of her government hearing after telling them that they couldn’t arrest her or any of her associates because they were needed to defend the world. Nick burned his records to make it look like he died in a fire, and he created a tombstone for himself and told Steve and Sam that he was going to Europe under the radar to be a spy. They refused to go with him, and Natasha gave Steve a file from her Kiev contacts on Winter Soldier and suggested that Steve call Sharon the nurse she wanted to hook him up with. Steve Rogers (Captain America) and Sam Wilson (Falcon) agreed to go find Winter Soldier (Bucky Barnes) together. This movie had an estimated budget of $170 million and grossed over $714 million at the box office.

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/6/24

TITLE:  Million Dollar Baby 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG-13 (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2004 Warner Bros. Pictures / Lakeshore Entertainment / Malpaso Productions / Ruddy Morgan Productions / Epsilon Motion Pictures

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This movie takes place in Los Angeles and began with Mary Margaret “Maggie” Fitzgerald who traveled all the way from her home state of Missouri to Frankie Dunn’s gym in California because she wanted him to train her to be a professional boxer. However, Frankie wasn’t interested in training females. Frankie attended church every week for years and was still confused about the Holy Trinity. Frankie asked Father Horvak, the priest at St. Mark’s if God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit were like Kellogg’s Rice Krispies...Snap, Crackle and Pop. Horvak actually called Frankie a fu@@-ing pagan and didn’t want to see Frankie at church and to take a break from attending. Danger, a white special needs adult male, went to Dunn’s gym from Broward County, Texas and wanted to fight but he had never fought before so he told the black caretaker Eddie “Scrap-Iron” Dupris he had nothing against niggers like Scrap, who lived in the gym and was a former boxer. Frankie was angry when Maggie showed up at the gym and insisted on having Frankie as her trainer but he refused again. Frankie also didn’t like the “boss” nickname Maggie kept calling him. Maggie worked as a waitress and took home leftover food to eat herself and kept her coins in a jar. Maggie paid for six months of training so Scrap showed her a few moves at the end of the day and Frankie suspected that Scrap was helping Maggie. Shawrelle Berry picked on Maggie’s breasts and Danger’s girly tights. Frankie told Maggie that she was too old to start training at 32 because it took four years to be fully trainedbut let her keep his old speed bag for practice because he thought she was about to cry. Willie “Big Willie” Little, who had been training with Frankie, decided to leave Frankie for a different trainer. Big Willie had been with Frankie for the last eight years and he knew it was time to get a title but he felt Frankie kept holding him back. The big title match was only a couple of matches away so Willie took a better offer from Mickey Mack. Frankie hadn’t already let Willie do the title fight because he didn’t think he was ready. Scrap, who used to fight under Frankie’s guidance, had lost sight in one eye in a match long ago, thought Frankie was wrong for that. Maggie came back to the gym every day to train and bought her own speed bag. It wasn’t long before Willie had his title fight and then became the new world champion. Maggie told Frankie that her brother was in prison and her sister was cheating the welfare system and got money for a baby that had already died, her dad was dead and her mom was extremely overweight and boxing was all she had. Frankie offered to teach Maggie a few things and then find her a trainer. However, Maggie only agreed to a deal if Frankie would be her trainer. Frankie agreed and said once they were done training Maggie would have to get a manager. Frankie added that he wanted no complaints or questions from her and they made a deal. Frankie soon set Maggie up with Sally Mendoza as a trainer to be rid of her, and Sally put Maggie in a fight against another female boxer. Maggie as getting beat up badly in her first fight so Frankie decided to claim Maggie as his fighter and Sally gave Maggie up as worthless. Frankie then gave Maggie advice and she did better in the ring. Soon it got to the point that Frankie paid other managers on the side to get Maggie a decent fight since she was good and knocked out most of her opponents in the first round. He then moved her up in the ranks, and when she broke her nose she wanted to keep fighting so Frankie popped her nose back into place and then she beat her opponent. After Maggie was deemed the winner, she went to the hospital. Frankie went back to church, and he told Father Horvak that he wrote to his estranged daughter Kate every week, but the man of God wasn’t certain he was telling the truth. Maggie had an offer to go up against Billie “The Blue Bear” Osterman, a former prostitute from East Berlin who was now a dirty and vicious fighter who was the welterweight world champion. Frankie turned the offer down and lost money. Scrap took Maggie out to dinner for her birthday, and he told her that he had 109 fights and he lost his eye when he got injured. Scrap lost the eye because he kept fighting when he shouldn’t have and it was his own bad choice to try to get 110 wins and that drove him to keep going and made his lose his eyesight. Scrap told Maggie that Frankie wasn’t the person to take her to the title like with Willie, and she didn’t like Scrap saying that about Frankie and refused to let Scrap pay for her meal. Scrap told Maggie maybe she should let Mickey Mack be her manager, who sat at the counter bar at the eatery. After Scrap left, Maggie told Mickey that she would never leave Frankie. The mailed letters that Franke wrote to Katy all came back and were not delivered…return to sender in the postal system. Frankie then decided to let Maggie go to England for a title match. Before they went out to the London ring, Frankie gave Maggie a green colored boxing robe with the words meaning “mo chiushle,” which meant my darling, my blood but Frankie would not tell Maggie what it meant. The audience chanted mo chiushle and Maggie won the London fight. Maggie fought in more matches in Europe and got more experience in the ring before she returned to America. Maggie, mad a great deal of money in her boxing winnings, so she bought a house for her mom Earline instead of one for herself like Frankie wanted her to. They went to see Earline. Maggie told her mom the house was for Earline, and Maggie’s sister and her sister’s other child, and Maggie’s brother, J.D. who was getting out of prison soon could all live there in the nicer house with their mom. However, Maggie’s so-called kin were horrible and none of them appreciated the home because then Earline wouldn’t have Medicaid paying for her medication and her welfare would stop. Earline told Maggie she would have preferred the cash instead of a house. Maggie promised to send Earline money. Earline saw the bruises on her daughter’s face knowing they were from her boxing fights but accused Frankie anyway of beating Maggie up, and she told Maggie that the yahoo people were laughing at Maggie because she needed to find herself a man instead of being a boxer. On the way back to California, Maggie told Frankie about the time when she was young and her family used to have a German shepherd named Axel and Axel could hardly drag himself around the house and her brother and her used to laugh at the poor animal until one day her dad left with Axel and came back alone with his shovel and had buried the dog in the woods and put it down. Maggie told Frankie she felt like she had no family with her blood relatives but felt at home with Frankie and Frankie felt the same about Maggie and she was his family too. Frankie and Maggie next headed to Vegas to fight the Blue Bear for $1 million. Frankie asked Scrap to join them but Scrap didn’t want to go and insead stayed behind to keep the gym business going. Scrap later fixed an overflowing toilet and wished he were elsewhere like Vegas looking at naked women and drinking heavily. Afterward, Scrap went out to the boxing ring area and rushed to stop Shawrelle from beating on “special needs” Danger anymore as Danger was bloodied badly by the time Scrap arrived from fixing the toilet.  Scrap jumped in the ring and then knocked one of Shawrelle’s teeth out and the man out cold with an ungloved hand. Scrap then said he won his fight number 110 after all. Frankie got bagpipers to play for Maggie’s (mo chiushle) entrance in the Vegas ring. Maggie’s fight was against the Blue Bear, who used illegal moves and hit Maggie when she was down. The Ref eventually took points away from Blue Bear and threatened to disqualify her. The scantily clothed women in the ring walking around as the female boxers took a break were paid sex entertainers, professional eye candy. Maggie was battered and bruised and Frankie told Maggie before the third round to hit Blue Bear in the back and be where the ref could see Maggie and Blue Bear. The referee called another break and right after that Blue Bear took a cheap illegal shot while the ref’s back was turned at Maggie. Blue Bear sucker-punched Maggie and she went down hard and fell on the chair that Frankie had already put in the ring for Maggie to sit on. Maggie hit the chair hard and injured her neck badly. Maggie was in and out of consciousness at the hospital. Frankie and Scrap were with her. Maggie’s spinal cord was broken beyond repair and she was paralyzed for the rest of her life and needed help breathing from a machine 24/7 since she couldn’t by herself. Maggie didn’t want to tell Frankie the details so she let the doctors break the news to Franke. Maggie told Scrap that she blamed herself because Frankie always told her to be on guard and protect herself, but she didn’t listen. Scrap refused to tell Frankie that Maggie was sorry. Frankie blamed Scrap for convincing him to train Maggie when he didn’t think he should. Frankie planned to find a different doctor who could help Maggie and get her out of that facility. Maggie couldn’t be moved for two months and there was no hospital or doctor that could help heal her. Maggie couldn’t move at all and got nasty skin ulcers wounds, so Frankie helped give her sponge baths and nurse her. Maggie was later taken to the Serenity Glen rehab center and had it took the medical staff hours to get her into a wheel chair. Maggie’s family finally decided to visit and had checked into a hotel room but they all went to Disneyland for a week before they finally made it to visit Maggie at the rehab facility. When they did show up, it was with a lawyer, Mr. Johnson. They wanted Maggie to sign (using her mouth since she had no feeling below the neck) her wealth and money over to her mom for guardianship of the assets, even though the boxing commission was paying for the hospitalization bills. Frankie protested and wanted to read the documents to Maggie later, but the family told him it was none of his business.While Frankie waited outside the open doorway, Maggie refused to sign the documents and spit out the pen her mom put in her mouth and announced that since Earline didn’t sign the house papers, Maggie still owned the new house they all lived in and Maggie would sell it if they ever came back to see her again. Maggie later got a seriously large infected ulcer on her leg and as a result her leg was amputated. Maggie told Frankie to search for a cabin to retire to and find peace there. Maggie then asked Frankie to do her a favor and to take her off life support so she wouldn’t have to live like that anymore since she got everything out of life that she wanted and she wanted it to be like what her dad did for their dog, Axel. Frankie said he couldn’t do that. Not long after, Maggie found her own way out and so she bit her tongue and almost bled to death, but then she was stitched up but soon she ripped the stitches out so the staff stitched her tongue again, and then padded her tongue so she couldn’t bite it again and then they kept her under sedation (heavily medicated and her eyes were jittery). Frankie went to the church and asked Father Horvak for advice, and Father Horvak told Frankie not to help Maggie commit suicide and instead leave it to God otherwise his soul would be lost. Later on, Frankie told Scrap he thought he killed Maggie. Scrap told him that he did not kill Maggie because Frankie got Maggie to the championship and gave her a shot that she would never have had and that happened in less than two years. Scrap told Frankie that Maggie was happy with what he was able to do for her and it was not his fault and people died every day. A short time after that, Frankie got some drug supplies from the gym and then snuck into the facility without any staff seeing him and then into Maggie’s room and told her that “mo cuishle” meant “my darling, my blood,” and instructed her that he would remove her air supply and then give her a shot from a syringe he snuck in and she would go to sleep forever. Maggie understood him and cried silent tears. Frankie gave her enough adrenaline in the shot to make sure she was dead so he wouldn’t have to go through it again. Frankie then left the building unnoticed and as quietly as he came in. Danger showed up again at the gym and took Scrap’s advice not to let losing one fight get him down and “special needs” Danger asked to keep training and Scrap agreed. Frankie had never returned to the gym, nor made contact with anyone from the gym again, and nobody knew where Frankie went. Scrap wrote a letter to Katy and told Katy about the man Frankie was because Scrap believed Frankie did right by Maggie in the assisted suicide. This movie had a budget of $30 million and grossed over $216 million at the box office. The movie cover art listed, Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times “The best film of the year.” John Anderson, Newsday “Remarkable.” 

  

DATE REVIEWED: 5/4/24

TITLE:  Worms 

BOX OFFICE RATED: PG (This is not suitable for GOD’s children.)

PRODUCTION YEAR: 2013 Vertical Entertainment Glaz Entretenimento / Fox Film Do Brasil / Fox International Productions / Globo Filmes / Animaking 

RATING [1 LEAST FAVORITE TO 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED]: 1

REASON: This cartoon movie takes place in the underground world of the worms, where the young worms bullied Junior and were mean to him because he wasn’t good at Wormball. He felt embarrassed by the girly ringtone his mom Martha put on his phone and he was mad at her for constantly calling him to check on him. That night, Junior and his family watched Mister Jumping, the stunt worm, put on a performance above the surface. Big Wig, an evil roly-poly, interrupted and he was the only of his kind that could speak. Big Wig tried to hypnotize and brainwash the worms into being his slaves by using a shell to amplify his voice. Big Wig didn’t succeed, and because Grandpa was deaf, Grandpa wasn’t affected but he couldn’t convince Junior and his parents what just happened after they snapped out of it. Junior’s parents gave him Mr. Jumping’s slingshot toy as a gift. The other young worms dared Junior to use the slingshot to jump across Centipede Valley on the way to the human world above without using the safety net. Junior agreed, but before he could jump a construction vehicle from above broke through the surface and picked up Junior and his friend Nico. They were taken away in the back of a truck to a garden center, and from there they met Linda, another worm their age. The zombie worms captured Junior and Nico and took them to their lair, Big Wig’s headquarters. Big-Wig’s diabolical plan was to enslave the world’s worms as revenge against them for using roly-poly bugs as kickballs for their Wormball game, even though the roly-polies were more like pets than balls and liked playing the game. Big Wig made Junior’s roly-poly, Zap, his disciple. Big Wig then turned Junior and Nico into drooling zombie slaves, and they were forced to work for Big Wig and his minions, the Mud Gang. The three members of the gang were worms that usually lived in animals’ intestines, but these three preferred live earthworms so Big Wig agreed to let the Mud Gang eat the tips of the worm slaves’ (which grew back) if they did his dirty work. Linda tried to snap Junior out of his trance, but it was his ringtone that un-hypnotized him and the other worms. The Mud Gang chased after the worm trio, captured them and brought them before Big Wig. They refused to reveal how they un-hypnotized the worms, so Junior and Nico were tied up while Linda was put in a bottle. The boys built a slingshot like Mr. Jumping’s, and Junior tried dozens of times to get to the top of the bottle. He finally succeeded in knocking the bottle over and freeing Linda. She revealed that her parents split up, and she lived with her mom and never saw her dad. Linda argued with her mom and ran away from her home in Wormville, and she ended up aboveground because of humans. The trio ran into Mr. Jumping and tried to ask for his help to stop Big Wig, but he refused because he only cared about having fans and publicity and treated his announcer Florence like a slave. Big Wig put his slaves to work building a giant hypnotizer mother shell and hooking it up to the TV transmitter. Big Wig planned to use it during Mr. Jumping’s next stunt broadcast to hypnotize all the worms that watched the show. Junior realized what was going on, and he, Nico and Linda plotted to destroy the shell machine. Junior distracted the Mud Gang while Nico and Linda played Junior’s ringtone on the big shell and un-hypnotized the other worms. The first shell belonged to a French snail named Francois. Junior activated the soil cleaning process and the mega shell was destroyed. The trio made a run for it with the first shell, and Big Wig and the Mud Gang chased after them. Big Wig attempted to retrieve the shell from them on the dirt roller, and when Linda tried to stop him she fell. Junior rescued Linda and they kissed, and then they and Zap knocked Big Wig off the rollers and he was gone. Junior was knocked out in the process, and Linda and Nico thought he was dead and cried but then Junior woke up and was okay. The first shell that Big Wig had stolen had belonged to a snail named Francois, so Junior, Linda and Nico gave Francois back his shell and then returned home underground. They all played Wormball and Junior finally caught the ball, and then all the young worms watched horror movies with Grandpa. The movie cover art listed, Nell Minow, The Movie Mom, “An exciting adventure…great for families!”


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