Monster House & The Crimson Rivers

Monster House: I'm torn here. Again, I think my disappointment with Monster House is a result of my high expectations. I'd read such good things about it that I was expecting something on par with The Incredibles. What I got was a lot better than Polar Express (the first animated movie to use "performance capture"), a little better than the middle of the pack (i.e., Over the Hedge, Robots, Shark Tale, Madagascar), but nowhere near as good as The Iron Giant. I guess I should just stick with Brad Bird movies. (Which reminds me Ratatouille is coming out in June.)

Where Monster House succeeds is in capturing the poignancy of early adolescence, when you're leaving childhood behind but not quite a young adult. My big knock against it, though, is that a) the house itself is not scary and b) the explanation behind the house's animation, so to speak, is kind of lame. Also, Bones, voiced by Jason Lee, is supposed to be dating D.J.'s teenage babysitter, but he's drawn like a 40 year old hippie burnout. Weird and distracting.

(But how much scarier is the French poster (above) than the dull American version?)

If Netflix had half stars, I'd tack on a fraction. As it is: 3 stars.



The Crimson Rivers: A serial killer thriller directed by Mathieu Kassovitz; he played Amelie's boyfriend and the toymaker in Munich. Pros: Visually imaginative and a good excuse to watch Jean Reno for an hour and forty six minutes. Lots of helicopter shots of sweeping French alpine scenery. Cons: The first hour is awkwardly structured, you follow two separate investigators around wondering when, if ever, their storylines will intersect. Jean Reno has an unresolved, or at least unimportant, fear of dogs. And in the end, the twist is a cop out.

Also, and this is probably more important than I'm giving it credit for, but the subtitles (it's in French) weren't synced correctly with the dialogue on the copy I watched, and I really struggled to stay in the moment.

In this case I'd take my half a star back if I could. 3 stars.