Red Tails: George Lucas strikes again (and not in a good way)!

A group of African American pilots, who were part of the Tuskegee Airmen training program, are finally given the chance to engage in aerial combat over the skies of Europe during World War II.

You knew that since this film had George Lucas as its executive producer and it was being produced by Lucasfilm, the CGI and action sequences were going to look and sound amazing. In those aspects, Red Tails did not disappoint as the dogfights, bomber runs and other aerial action kept the audience engaged and intently watching the exploits of the squadron. However, the story and characters tried too hard to fit into the mold of all of those other Hollywood war films and came off as cliched and uninteresting. Films like Glory, which examined the first black regiment in the Civil War, worked so well because the ferocious action on the screen was accentuated by the thought-provoking storytelling and dynamic acting. With Red Tails, the story seemed out of focus, trying to deal with so many insipid and unnecessary subplots, and the characters failed to add anything more than mediocre performances.

If the story could have been reigned in to focus specifically on the bonds between the pilots and show their struggles in combat, as well as in facing bigotry from their own white counterparts, perhaps Red Tails would have been more than a standard war film which never distinguished itself from the rest.

Grade: D+

Rise of the Planet of the Apes: Get your stinkin paws on a copy of this movie!

Dr. Will Rodman is attempting to find a cure for Alzheimer's disease. One of the chimpanzees who is exposed to the drug shows an incredible amount of human - like intelligence and emotion, so Will raises him like he was his own child. He is named Cesar and he lives peacefully with Will until he is taken from him and sent to an ape sanctuary. It is there that he is exposed to the inhumane treatment his fellow primates receive, so he formulates a plan to not only help them all escape, but rise up against their human captors.

Prequels are never easy to make (just ask George Lucas). A prequel not only has to acknowledge and pay homage to the original film, but also present its own compelling story to fall in line with that of the original. The original Planet of the Apes (not the 2001 remake by Tim Burton, which was a mistake on a number of levels) carved out a niche for itself as a sci-fi classic, as well as creating a loyal fan base, due to its imaginative story - telling, an extremely quotable leading man in Charlton Heston (even if you have not seen the movie, you are no doubt aware of lines such as "take your stinking paws off me you damn, dirty ape") and ground-breaking makeup effects which made the talking apes believable. This meant that director Rupert Wyatt, James Franco and the rest of the cast and crew of "Rise" had quite a task in front of them but thankfully, for fans and regular film - goers, they were more than ready and created a film that not only does right by the original Planet of the Apes but holds its own.

The story revolved around how Will was trying to find a cure for Alzheimer's (a disease that was afflicting his father Charles). To that end, he experimented on chimpanzees, one of which (with a name that fans of the series will recognize) has a child that Will adopts and raises as his own after she dies. If handled incorrectly, this story could have devolved into a cliched summer action film which would have concentrated more on the destruction and chaos caused by the primates as opposed to the intelligent and thought - provoking film it was. Wyatt took the time to build the story, as well as the characters, allowing the audience the chance to get to know Cesar and empathize with him as he faced emotionally situations. It also helped that the gentleman playing Cesar (Andy Serkis) was able to provide so much emotion in his performance. Serkis is the same guy who breathed life into Gollum and King Kong but this performance has to be considered his finest. Add to that the spectacular finale, which featured the primates ripping up downtown San Francisco as well as the Golden Gate Bridge, and Rise of the Planet of the Apes turned out to be one of those rare prequels that came close to topping the original.

Grade: B+

Spaceballs: May the Schwartz be with you!

Parody, when it is done right, it can not only pay homage to the subjects it is parodying but also take on an existence of its own, becoming something more than a series of bad one - liners and pratfalls. When done badly,...well you get most of the Scary Movie sequels or any of the most recent parodies done by the guys who wrote the Scary Movie sequels. Leave it to comic legend Mel Brooks to deliver a parody that hits the mark.

When Princess Vespa is captured by Dark Helmet it’s up to Captain Lone Starr and his sidekick Barf to save her. But after they rescue her they must evade capture by traveling, (actually crash landing on) to a distant planet where they encounter a mystical being named Yogurt who teaches Lone Starr about the ways of the “Schwartz” so he can defeat Dark Helmet.

The film not only excelled in parading Star Wars but other science fiction movies like Star Trek, Alien, Planet of the Apes, and others. Fans of the aforementioned Star Wars films easily distinguished which characters in the film were lampooning those of the beloved trilogy. There were numerous scenes which made laughing quite easy including Dark Helmet (Rick Moranis at quite possibly his funniest) playing with toys of himself and other characters of the film, a cross-eyed gunner on the Spaceball ship doing his best to fire a warning shot, and Yogurt revealing how “merchandising” was where the real money of the movie was made (damn you George Lucas, you're the one that forced me to spend all my allowance money upon action figures and other assorted pieces of plastic!). From sight gags like jamming the radar with a really big jar of jam to the use of an instant VCR tape to discover where the heroes escaped the jokes came at lightspeed (yes, I wrote that, it was cheesy but hey, it's six in the morning, what are you going to do?) and left the audience begging for more. It's true that if a person was not a fan of the science fiction films lampooned in Spaceballs, they might not have caught some of the jokes. But Spaceballs the movie is something everyone can enjoy.

Grade: B

Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith; The circle is complete (for now)

Fans all over the world were excited when George Lucas announced he would be making a new trilogy which focused upon the rise and fall of Anakin Skywalker, aka Darth Vader but after the release of Episodes I and II, even the most ardent faboy wondered if any of the new trilogy would come close to matching any of the original films. Revenge of the Sith was their only hope.

As the Clone Wars draw to an end, Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker finds himself at an impasse. His loyalty to Supreme Chancellor Palpatine is questioned by his fellow Jedi Knights and their apparent lack of faith in him and his abilities leads to his seduction by Palpatine to the dark side of the force. Anakin is then consumed by his new persona, Darth Vader, and becomes the ultimate evil in the galaxy.

The film was chock full of wonderful special effects and CGI work, but two sequences stood out above everything else. The first was the epic space battle which opened the film. Even when one was following the main characters of Anakin and Obi-Wan in their respective ships, it was hard not to become distracted by the other layers of action happening all around them. That battle was topped only by the climatic lightsaber duel between Anakin and Obi-Wan on the volcanic planet of Mustafar. This was the lightsaber battle fans had been longing to see and writer/director George Lucas delivered with more than ten minutes of the most insanely cool swordplay ever committed to film. That battle alone was worth the price of rental. And while the prior two prequels were remembered for their excellent special effects/CGI work and dreadfully wooden acting, Revenge had not only the special effects, but also some effective acting. Ian McDiarmid brought an evil glee to his performance as Palpatine and Ewan McGregor excelled once again as Obi-Wan. One of the most emotional scenes, Padme’s confrontation with Anakin on the planet of Mustafar, was perhaps the finest in all of the prequels for it dripped with actual emotion. The film was everything a fan of the series could have hoped for, complete with the births of the heroes of the original trilogy; Luke and Leia, and of the most feared villain in the galaxy, Darth Vader. There will be critics who bemoan the fact that this film had stilted acting, no real emotion and only good special effects but don’t believe them. This one delivered the goods on all accounts

Grade: A-

Fanboys: One of us! One of us!

Disclaimer: I am a giant Star Wars dork. I swear, George Lucas could do a puppet show and, so long as one of those puppets mentioned the Force or used a lightsaber, I'd see it five times and go out and buy the corresponding action figures. So when a film comes out that not only shows, but celebrates that kind of passion (or blind faith depending on who you talk to) that people like myself have, I am going to definitely check it out. Fanboys is that movie.

The year is 1999 and the world is anxiously awaiting the release of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. But four friends in Ohio just cannot wait to see it, so they hatch a plan to drive cross country to George Lucas' Skywalker Ranch home in California and swipe a copy for themselves.

Sounds ridiculous right, even more so if you are not a fanboy and your life doesn't revolve around figuring out things such as why Greedo shot first in the Special Edition of Episode IV (probably lost some of you there, let me get back on point). But to the four friends, Eric, Linus, Windows and Hutch, this is what their lives are composed of. They dress like characters from the Star Wars movies, quote the films constantly and it leads to some awkwardly funny moments as they make their way to California. However it's also cool to hear those guys have some of the same arguements regarding the Holy Trilogy that I myself have been in. This makes the film more endearing to fanboys who are aware of the in - jokes and will shout the answers to the various quizzes that the group faces throughout the film to prove their fanboy-ness. But beyond the typical road trip movie trapping which litered the film, beyond the appearance of Kristen Bell (who played Zoe) in a slave girl Leia outfit (one word, spectacular!), beyond the cameos of Star Wars vets such as Billy Dee Williams and Carrie Fisher and other stars such as William Shatner there was a soul to Fanboys. The film effectively showed how the love of a group of movies and their characters could bring friends together to just geek out and be who they are (unless you're a Trekkie).

Yes, the regular viewer might not like Fanboys because they have no clue as to why grown men and women would get so emotional over Wookies or a small green Jedi Master, and the sight of a Ewok humping a leg during a peynote enduced hallucination might go over their heads but for those of us who live and breathe with everything coming from the mind of George Lucas, it is an ode to the joys of never really growing up and still being able to enjoy adventures that happened a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.

Grade: B