It’s a good thing I did that, because the S2 premiere, called “Breaking and Entering”, picks up right where S1 left off. Namely, Michael is sitting in his car in the back of an 18-wheeler waiting to find out what’s going to happen to him next.

I don’t want to go into too much detail about this episode since it hasn’t aired yet (I’ll save that for my recap, which will be posted Friday morning), so let me just say that it was every bit as entertaining and engrossing as the better eps from Season 1 were. We see Michael use his ingenuity and past experience as a spy to help him get out of tight situations; we meet a new character who is obviously going to play a major role throughout the season; and of course we reunite with series regulars Sam, Fiona, and Madeline.

All in all, “Breaking and Entering” was a fantastic way to kick off the season! Be sure to tune into USA Network on Thursday July 10 at 10pm/9C to catch the action, and check back here on Friday morning for my detailed recap!

Plot summary (with possible spoilers): Wesley Gibson (played by James McAvoy) is a doormat of a guy who meekly accepts all the crap that everyone in his life shovels his way. He simply nods and apologizes whenever overbearing boss Janice (Lorna Scott) screams at him for perceived poor performance, and he also pretends not to know that his best friend Barry (Chris Pratt) is sleeping with his girlfriend Cathy (Kristen Hager).

Wesley’s apathetic approach to life changes one night when he visits a pharmacy to refill his prescription for anxiety meds. That’s when an assassin named Cross (Thomas Kretschmann) takes aim at Wesley’s head. Fortunately, an equally skilled assassin named Fox (Angelina Jolie) pulls Wesley to safety just in time, and takes him on a wild ride through the city in an attempt to evade Cross. The two escape to a textiles factory, which is actually the headquarters of an organization called The Fraternity.

A man named Sloan (Morgan Freeman) explains to Wesley that he’s actually the son of a so-called “super assassin” who possessed incredible abilities that include jumping across city blocks, running amazingly fast, and even controlling the path of a bullet after it’s fired. Sloan further says that Cross murdered Wesley’s father, and that it’s up to Wesley to avenge his father’s death. Fortunately, Wesley acquired all of his father’s skills along with his DNA, so now it’s just a matter of undergoing some intensive training in order to develop these skills.

The rest of the film then details Wesley’s complete transformation from apathetic loser to badass assassin as he prepares for his showdown with Cross. Along the way, viewers are treated to numerous action sequences, and even an unexpected (well, at least to those who haven’t read the comics) double cross.

My Reaction: Obviously, Wanted is the kind of movie where suspension of disbelief is necessary right from the beginning. It would therefore be senseless to talk about what actually happens in the action scenes, or about the super assassins’ abilities, or about the magical healing wax, or…. well, you get the picture, right? There’s just a lot of stuff that you’re asked to accept at face value, and really, that’s the only way to enjoy a movie like this.

I’m slowly becoming a fan of James McAvoy, as he’s showing a definite ability to take on a wide variety of roles. I thought he was perfect as the weak loser at the beginning, and by the end, I almost accepted the fact that he could be a smart, savvy, and dangerous assassin.

Angelina Jolie, on the other hand, was incredibly robotic as Fox. It seems as though whenever she’s in an action flick, she plays the exact same character over and over again. I mean, is there a discernible difference between Lara Croft (Tomb Raider), Jane Smith (Mr. & Mrs. Smith), and Fox in Wanted? I don’t think so!

And, I had to laugh out loud when I read that the screenwriter rewrote the script “extensively” to suit the material to Jolie when he learned that she was attached to the project. Was there anything about the Fox character that only Jolie (and not some other actress) could have done? Nope. Maybe the screenwriter deliberately made the character more wooden to match Jolie’s other roles. Who knows, though.

Overall, I thought Wanted was a decent summer movie. I didn’t totally love it, but it was very watchable and was even entertaining in several places. I give it 6.5 stars out of 10.

USA NETWORK’s hit series BURN NOTICE returns Thursday, July 10th at 10pm/9c. Why was Michael Westen burned? And what’s he gonna do about it? The answers every Burn Notice fan wants begin to take shape with the Season Two premiere. The new season also welcomes Battlestar Galatica’s Tricia Helfer as well as existing cast Bruce Campbell and Sharon Gless. Join other fans on the official Facebook Fan Page or visit the official site at burnnotice.usanetwork.com.

One winner will receive a USA Network Burn Notice Beach Bag filled with:

• Burn Notice Season 1 DVD
• Burn Notice Book
• Branded Towel
• Branded T-Shirt
• Branded Frisbee

To enter all you have to do is send an email to contest[at]reviewsandmore[dot]net with “Burn Notice Giveaway” in the subject line between now and 5pm central on Thursday July 31, 2008. After the deadline, I will use an online randomizer to select a winner from all eligible entries, and the prize pack will be sent directly to the winner from the giveaway sponsor.

The winner will have 48 hours after the announcement to get back to me with an address. If I do not hear back from the first winner within this time frame, an alternate winner will be drawn.

The giveaway is open to U.S. residents only.

Get your entries in now for your chance to win all of this cool Burn Notice swag, and be sure to tune in this Thursday night to see what happens to Michael and the gang in Season 2!

The Pixar animated family movie WALL-E dropped to second place with a solid $33.4 million showing, while Wanted held steady with a $20.6 million take.

The only other new entry on the list was Kit Kittredge: An American Girl. This Abigail Breslin vehicle earned $3.6 million, good enough for eighth place.

Here’s the complete Top 10 for the weekend ending July 6, 2008:

1. Hancock, $66 million
2. WALL-E, $33.4 million
3. Wanted, $20.6 million
4. Get Smart, $11.1 million
5. Kung Fu Panda, $7.5 million
6. The Incredible Hulk, $4.98 million
7. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, $3.94 million
8. Kit Kittredge: An American Girl, $3.6 million
9. Sex and the City, $2.35 million
10. You Don’t Mess With the Zohan, $2 million

I’d never seen an episode of either show prior to choosing, so I based my selection solely on the premise of the shows. I thought that a reformed crook trying to change his karma by righting the wrongs he’s committed in his life sounded pretty interesting, so I went with My Name Is Earl.

I borrowed the Season 1 DVDs from a friend, and have watched the first few eps already. I have to say that this is one of the few shows that I’ve liked right off the bat! Usually it takes several episodes in order to start warming up to the characters, but not with MNIE. Even though I’ve never been a big fan of Jason Lee, I think he’s great as Earl, and the supporting cast is pretty good as well.

In case you’ve never seen My Name Is Earl, I’ll briefly explain the premise. It’s about a petty crook named Earl Hickey (Lee) who wins $100,000 on a scratch-off lottery ticket. As he’s celebrating his win, however, he gets mowed down by a car, loses the ticket, and ends up in the hospital — where he sees Carson Daly talking about karma on TV. Earl realizes that he has bad karma, so he makes a list of all the things he’s ever done wrong, and will correct each and every one of them.

After Earl rights the first wrong, he finds his winning ticket, which cements his belief in karma.

Instead of buying a flashy new car or spending a week in one of those luxurious Hilton Head rentals on a prime golf course, Earl just moves into a seedy motel with his brother Randy (Ethan Suplee) and uses his money for regular daily expenses. This setup should allow the show to continue for a good, long time.

I really like My Name Is Earl so far and am looking forward to finishing the rest of these DVDs!

To Radcliffe’s credit, his performance was vastly different than anything he’s done in the Potter films, which shows that he does in fact have some range as an actor. Unfortunately, his presence alone wasn’t able to salvage a film that suffers from a lack of plot and very little character development.

Plot summary (with possible spoilers): Maps (played by Radcliffe), Misty (Lee Cormie), Sparks (Christian Byers), and Spit (James Fraser) are four orphans who have been at St. Gregory’s Orphanage ever since they can remember. They’re all friends, in part because they share the same birth month and are therefore known as the December Boys.

For their birthdays one year, the head nun at the orphanage decides to send the boys away to the coast on holiday. A man named Bandy (Jack Thompson) and his wife Mrs. McAnsh (Kris McQuade) are benefactors of the church, and have offered to host the boys for an extended period. This is an unheard of treat that the boys are happy to accept.

Once at the McCansh home, the boys start exploring their surroundings. They meet Fearless (Sullivan Stapleton), a motorcycle daredevil at the local fair, and his wife Teresa (Victoria Hill), as well as Lucy (Teresa Palmer), a girl of Maps’ age who is visiting her uncle.

After introducing the characters, the rest of the film then deals with the various experiences the boys have during their month-long holiday. For example, Maps falls for Lucy, and ends up having a short affair with her — something that he ends up remembering for the rest of his life. Misty overhears that Fearless and Teresa are going to adopt one of the boys, so he does everything in his power to make himself the chosen one. And they learn of Mrs. McAnsh’s illness and witness the effect it has on Bandy.

Through all of these adventures, the boys discover important things about themselves and learn that their bond with each other goes well beyond simply being born in December.

My Reaction: I was really looking forward to watching December Boys because it was described as a coming-of-age movie, which is one of my favorite genres. So I was quite disappointed to see that hardly anything happened to justify the film’s classification in this category.

Out of the four boys, only Maps and Misty had any kind of character development at all. Maps did have a typical coming-of-age experience with Lucy in that she was his first (and probably only) love. He had his first sexual experience with her, and was heartbroken when she left. The fact that he kept her button for his whole life and wanted his ashes to be scattered at the cave where all this happened shows that he never quite got over her.

Misty’s character development was quite different. He went from wanting nothing more than to be adopted by loving parents to realizing that the December Boys were his true family, and that he couldn’t bear to part with them. I’m not sure how believable that is in a boy of 10 or 11, but whatever. At least the character had something of an arc, and changed from beginning to end.

The other two boys? Well, they barely did anything in the whole film and might as well not have been there at all. I’m looking at the DVD cover right now, and it’s a mere two hours since I finished this film, but I’ve already forgotten which boy was Sparks and which was Spit. There was no effort at all to distinguish these boys, so I guess it’s not surprising that I still can’t tell them apart.

Another problem I had with the film was the lack of plot movement. Nothing happened here! The Lucy and Maps coupling was quick and awkward, while the Misty adoption storyline wasn’t addressed head on until well after the midway point. Other than that, viewers are forced to suffer through endless scenes of the boys running across the sand and seeing weird visions of nuns or the Virgin Mary.

Overall, I thought December Boys was pretty disappointing. Maybe if something had actually happened in the film, I’d feel differently about it, but as it is, I give it just 4.0 stars out of 10.

The main difference between Scoop and Match Point, in my eyes, is the fact that Allen actually appears in Scoop, while he stays behind the camera in Match Point. I quickly learned that I much prefer the latter arrangement!

Plot summary (with possible spoilers): Sondra Pransky (played by Scarlett Johansson) is an American journalism student who is in London visiting friends. While there, she attends a magic show put on Sid Waterman (Allen), who performs under the stage name The Great Splendini.

After Sondra is chosen from the audience to participate in a particular trick that involves a box known as the Dematerializer, she sees the ghost of a dead journalist named Joe Strombel (Ian McShane). Strombel tells Sondra that he has the scoop of the decade for her: the Tarot card serial killer who’s been on the loose in London is actually Peter Lyman (Hugh Jackman), the son of an aristocrat.

Sondra is not quite sure how to make out what has happened, so she confides in Sid. Once she convinces him that she’s not actually crazy, the two team up to try to investigate Strombel’s tip. They arrange for Sondra to run into Peter at a private club, and things become even easier when Peter is smitten by Sondra at first sight.

From there, the rest of the film deals with Sondra and Sid’s attempts to learn more about Peter to find out if he could possibly be the Tarot card killer. Along the way, Sondra must try to prevent her growing feelings for Peter from obscuring her purpose as a journalist as she tries to verify Joe Strombel’s claims.

My Reaction: The first thing that pops into my head here is what a terrible actor I think Woody Allen is! I don’t know if that’s a common opinion since I don’t know anything about his work, but wow… he nearly ruined the entire picture for me! His stumbling, bumbling delivery was god-awful and had me gritting my teeth every time he appeared on screen. If this is par for the course for him, you can bet I’ll never watch another film in which he stars. Ugh.

That being said, I feel the opposite about Scarlett Johansson. She may not have the finest acting chops on the block, but she definitely has screen presence and personality, which helps draw me into whatever character she’s portraying. I enjoyed her work here, even though a majority of her scenes were with Allen. At this point, I’d probably see anything Johansson is in (and yes, I’m a straight woman!).

As for the film itself, I found it to be pretty decent. I mean, it wasn’t a hard-hitting mystery or a laugh-out-loud romantic comedy, but it was still entertaining. Sure, there were dumb moments, like when Peter didn’t make sure that Sondra actually drowned before calling the cops bobbies or when he “hid” the key to Betty’s apartment in the same place he kept the Tarot cards (why would he even still have the key? Why not get rid of it?); however, these lapses weren’t enough to diminish my enjoyment of the film as a whole.

Overall, Scoop is definitely watchable — if you can get past Woody Allen being in it. I give it 6.5 stars out of 10.

Because of my online habits, I try to make sure that my spyware and antivirus software is always up to date. With my current Norton subscription set to run out in a couple of weeks, I’m looking at alternate products for my next purchase. I’m not a big fan of the way Norton slows my CPU to a crawl, so I’d like to try something different.

When I was over at Buy.com earlier today, I landed on the product page for Webroot Spy Sweeper with AntiVirus. After reviewing the features, I’ve decided that this is perfect for my needs!

Webroot provides total protection against the most common threats to safe browsing — viruses and spyware — in a simple program that won’t hog system resources. The software doesn’t come inflated with lots of tools that I’ll never use (just so the manufacturer can slap a “suite” label on it and charge through the nose), and it offers better value than purchasing separate spyware and antivirus utilities.

I haven’t even told you the best part yet! Webroot Spy Sweeper with Antivirus is one of Buy.com’s famous Weekly Deals, and is now on sale for $38 with free shipping. That’s a good price in itself, but the Buy.com savings don’t stop there. You will also get two mail-in rebates (one for $20 and one for $18), thereby making the product absolutely FREE! How can you possibly beat that deal anywhere else?

I can’t wait to get rid of my Norton and reclaim my CPU again!

Then his career took a nosedive when he followed up Wolves with box office flops like Wyatt Earp, The Postman, and the much-maligned Waterworld. Though Costner still found steady work after those flops, he never really regained his status as one of Tinsel Town’s most popular leading men.

Though I usually end up liking Costner’s films more often than not, I didn’t feel that way about his 2003 western Open Range. I rented the DVD last weekend, and could barely make it through the bloated 139-minute running time.

Plot summary (with possible spoilers): Costner stars as Charley Waite, a stereotypically reticent cowboy with a past. He’s been riding for Boss Spearman (played by Robert Duvall) for 10 years, but neither one is the type to spill his guts at the nightly campfire. After all that time together, they don’t even know each other’s real names.

As the film opens, Boss, Charley and their two assistants Mose (Abraham Benrubi) and Button (Diego Luna) are driving their cattle across an open range. They try to steer clear of towns and just stick to their own business, but sometimes they need to go on supply runs. Mose rides into a small town one day to stock up on necessities for the four of them, but doesn’t return when he was supposed to. Boss and Charley investigate the matter, only to discover that Mose got into a bar fight, was badly beaten, and is now spending time in jail.

That doesn’t sound like something Mose would do, so Boss and Charley dig around until they get to the bottom of the matter. It turns out that the town is run by a man named Denton Baxter (Michael Gambon), who doesn’t like the concept of free grazing. That’s his land Boss and Charley are using, and he wants them off. Beating up Mose was just a message.

Boss and Charley aren’t the type of guys to be pushed around that easily, so they ride out to where some of Dexter’s men are camping, ambush them, and scare them away — after figuring out that Dexter’s real plan is to steal Boss and Charley’s cattle, not let them move on. That incident escalates the situation to the point where Dexter sends men in to shoot Mose, Button, and Charley’s dog. Button survives with serious injuries; Mose and the dog must be buried.

From that point forward, the film deals with the way Boss and Charley prepare for what they know will be a showdown with Dexter’s men. Of course, it’s only the two of them, so they’ll be severely outnumbered, but as with most westerns, the good guys come out on top.

My Reaction: Now that I think about it, not a whole heck of a lot actually happened during Open Range, which makes the long running time even more inexplicable. Sure, there was some character development going on here, but that didn’t justify the long stretches of boring scenes.

For instance, I didn’t see the point of the scene where Boss and Charley went into the general store to buy chocolate and cigars. I realize that it gave the filmmakers a chance to show that Charley was falling in love with Sue Barlow (Annette Bening) because of the way he picked out china for her, but still… that was a long-ass scene with very little in terms of payoff.

Also, I thought free range grazing was kind of a ridiculous reason to start that major feud. I mean, this kind of thing probably did happen back then or whatever, but that hardly makes it a suitable topic for a Hollywood movie. The only thing I kept thinking during the film was, “Wait, all these men are dying because of where some cattle are grazing? Really?” The stakes just didn’t seem high enough to me.

The only thing I liked about this movie was the understated love story between Charley and Sue. Usually I abhor these types of subplots because they tend to drag the film down, but in this case the opposite was true. I was more interested in those two characters than what was going on with the Dexter feud and the cattle.

Overall, the abundance of non-eventful scenes in Open Range doomed the film in my eyes. I don’t need constant shoot ‘em up action, but a bit of conflict would be nice. The shootout on Main Street was well done, as was the love story, but not much else was worth watching. I give this movie 5.0 stars out of 10.

Well, I quickly learned that even a roomful of powerhouse actors isn’t enough to make a movie great — especially if the screenplay is fundamentally flawed, as I think this one is. What a disappointment!

Plot summary (with possible spoilers): Robert F. Kennedy was campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination when he was gunned down in the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, CA on June 5, 1968. His assassination shocked a nation that was still reeling from the Martin Luther King, Jr. assassination just two months before, as well as from President John F. Kennedy’s assassination five years earlier.

Instead of focusing on Bobby Kennedy’s politics or personal life, writer/director Emilio Estevez decided to base his film on the lives of a number of random, fictional people who were staying or working at the Ambassador Hotel on that fateful day. Interspersed with scenes of these people going about their regular daily routines, viewers also get newsreel footage of a few Bobby Kennedy speeches and interviews.

The film then culminates with RFK’s assassination, and ends without reflecting on the impact the event had for any of the people viewers had just spent two hours getting to know.

My Reaction: Bobby was one of the most disappointing films I’ve ever sat through! Going into my viewing, I had no idea what angle Estevez would be telling the story from, so I just had to scratch my head in puzzlement when I realized he was introducing all of these fictional characters. What was the point? Why bother forcing the audience to get to know these people when none of them played a role in the assassination or the aftermath? To make it worse, Estevez didn’t follow up on any of these lives, so we don’t know how these people changed as a result of the event they witnessed.

About halfway through the film, I started thinking that there had to be a twist somewhere, that Estevez wouldn’t simply meander through the whole thing without a big payoff. But no, nothing ever tied any of the characters together in ways that weren’t evident from the beginning. As a result, the most interesting part of Bobby was the archive footage of the real RFK talking. I probably would have been better off watching an A&E biography instead.

Overall, Bobby turned out to be an overlong, rambling, disjointed film that wasted the considerable talent of all the actors involved. It wasn’t powerful, moving, or thought-provoking; just boring and tiresome. I give it 4.0 stars out of 10.