Screen Time

by Leroy Grey

Well, May means the end of school, and the beginning of the summer movie season. Each week's got one event movie, instead of a couple of contenders. So, there's about half as movies to talk about this month. Whuzupidat? Consider:

VAN HELSING: yeah, I talked about it last month. But, dollars to donuts, it's the movie everybody's still talking about as you're reading this. Steve Sommers masterminded "The Mummy/ Scorpion King" franchise. So how does he top it? With not just one, but THREE monsters! Mwoo-ha-ha-ha! Vampires and werewolves and Frankenstein monsters; these are a few of my favorite things,... The star of the film, however, is Hugh Jackman as Van Helsing, a trenchcoat-wearing hard-boiled monster hunter that, along with his freaky friends, are the last line of defense against a megalomaniacal supervillain's plan to take over the world.

Yeah, it's just like "Hellboy." Even got "Hel" in the name.

TROY: Director Wolfgang Petersen tries to outdo "Gladiator" with the world's first epic, putting the story of the Trojan War to the screen. (There already was a movie called "The Trojan War," but I think it was about a guy trying to score with Jennifer Love Hewitt.) It's got the cast of thousands and sweeping vistas, but the enticements for this epic is star power: fantasy icon Orlando Bloom ("Lord of the Rings" and "Pirates of the Caribbean") versus Brad Pitt (as a villain) versus Eric Bana ("Hulk"). In skirts. The only name I don't recognize is Diane Kruger, who plays Helen, the woman beautiful enough to start this war in the first place... and push the cause of feminism back to before the Amazons.

BREAKIN ALL THE RULES: Jamie Foxx plays a man that's been played; after his fiancée dumps him, he writes a best-selling book about it. Gabrielle Union is the woman that gets him to reconsider his opinions of women. Good Lord, did Jamie Foxx just remake "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days"?

SHREK 2: When "Shrek" made his debut, I didn't think the movie would be worth a damn; now it's one of my all-time faves. But I can certainly be impartial about the sequel, right? It's a pretty simple setup: Shrek the ogre gets to meet his royal in-laws. And when the in-laws are Maria Von Trapp and the Minister of Silly Walks, I'll give it a shot.

THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW: Director Roland Emmerich knows how to make a disaster movie. He did it with aliens ("Independence Day.") He did it with "Godzilla." Now, he tries to make the ultimate natural disaster movie, showing Earth's sudden lurch into an ice age, which is supposed to be like a taco salad of disaster movies. Riding the storm out is Dennis Quaid, who plays a paleoclimatologist (think researcher for Farmer's Almanac) trying to reunite with his son, played by Jake Gyllenhal- Jake Glylynha- Jake Gylynh- the kid from "Donnie Darko." Basically, the movie's "Finding Nemo at the end of the world."

SOUL PLANE: This movie comes across as a mélange of "Airplane!" "The Wash", and "Doggy Fizzle Televizzle." One bad flight and one big lawsuit inspire a young man (played by "The Big House" TV star Kevin Hart) to start his own funked-up airline. There's plenty of sitcom veterans in the cast, but what I want to know is: if Snoop Dogg and Method Man are part of the flight crew, does the plane even have a non-smoking section?

RAISING HELEN: Kate Hudson plays Helen; as much as I'd like her to be, she is not a trenchcoat-wearing hard-boiled monster hunter that's the last line of defense against a megalomaniacal supervillain's plan to take over the world. I'm just trying to eat up column space. But Kate Hudson's pretty enough to start a fight over, and she does make some freaky friends. Hudson plays a NYC party girl who has to raise her sister's three suddenly-orphaned kids, and do some growing up herself. Brittany Murphy, who only had one kid in "Uptown Girls", will be gnashing her teeth this June.

The late-night Wehrenberg show this month is a personal fave of mine: THE CROW. It's a good pick, considering all the revenge movies that have debuted in the last few months.

Ten years ago, this movie entered theaters; maybe it seemed spookier than it was, because you're watching Brandon Lee in this story of love and revenge from beyond the grave, and you're thinking about his actual on-set death during the making of the movie. The sequels haven't done any favors for the franchise, trying to recycle the plot almost verbatim. But director Alex Proyas definitely has skills (Check out "Dark City" or his upcoming "I, Robot") and the soundtrack was awesome. And, of course, there has never been another Brandon Lee.

"The Crow" plays May 21 and 22. I might check this out both nights.

Not enough movies for you? The summer's just getting started! See you next month...