What? Snap Judgment is BACK??

Well, that's a fine kettle of fish! I suppose after hearing this news, you'll be expecting me to start dumping on this week's releases. Okay, fine, I think I'm up for that.

Yeah. I can totally do this.

Um... LonelyGirl15 jokes are still totally hip, right?

Oh boy. Here goes.


College Road Trip (rated G, directed by Roger Kumble, written by Emi Mochizuki, Carrie Evans, Cinco Paul, Ken Daurio)

[Note: With this edition of Snap Judgment, I am pleased to announce the arrival of the Wikipedia ReferenceXplainer 9000, an artificially intelligent device that should pull those previously over-your-head jokes right back down to eye level.]

Okay, fess up, Disney. Whose bright idea was it to put Martin Lawrence back in a car? Did you forget so soon what happened the last time he was out on the road?

While filming A Thin Line Between Love and Hate, Lawrence had a violent outburst on the set and began taking drugs. He became increasingly erratic and was arrested after he reportedly brandished a pistol and screamed at tourists on Ventura Boulevard in Los Angeles.

Hey, thanks, ReferenceXplainer 9000 (hereafter referred to as RX9K)! You're already making my job a whole lot easier. Anyway, let's get back to this ridiculous film.

Film is a term that encompasses individual motion pictures, the field of film as an art form, and the motion picture industry. Films are produced by recording images from the world with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or special effects.

That's... uh... thanks, RX9K, but I think most people already know what film is. So, this movie co-stars Raven Symone, famous not only for her pivotal role in the Full-House-ization of The Cosby Show (c'mon, she had to be as adorably cloying as both Olsen twins put together!) but also for lending her considerable talent to the pop culture phenomenon That's So Raven, which I think we can all agree was--

Raven is the common name given to the largest species of passerine birds in the genus Corvus. Corvids are also commonly referred to as crows and other species in the same genus include jackdaws and rooks.

[Note: The Wikipedia ReferenceXplainer 9000 has been disabled until further notice.]

[Additional note: Jackdaws? Who knew?]


10,000 B.C. (rated PG-13, directed by Roland Emmerich, written by Roland Emmerich & Harold Kloser)

"The first hero"? Really? Recent NASA estimates have pegged the age of the universe at 13.73 billion years, give or take a hundred million. Are you telling me that for the first 13.729999 of those 13.73 billion years, there was not a single hero anywhere? No renegade Cro-Magnon who stood up against his Neanderthal oppressors (or vice versa) to bring freedom to his countrymen, William Wallace-style? No ass-kicking australopithecine who assembled a ragtag band of fellow missing links to steal from the stingy rich for the benefit of the lower classes? No fishy mammal who used his newfound legs to climb up onto shore and claim the dry land bounty for his people? No strong-willed protozoa who refused at any cost to surrender his share of the primordial ooze? C'mon.

The Bank Job (rated R, directed by Roger Donaldson, written by Dick Clement & Ian La Frenais)

I love a good heist movie as much as the next guy, but with the good/suck ratio of this genre running at about 1 to 8 trillion these days, I have to admit I'm skeptical. And that skepticism leads, as it inevitably does, to speculation (since the two words are kind of similar if you don't think about it too much). Such as: what if the movie really were about a bank job? You'd have your same memorable team of misfits, each member with his or her unique specialty, except instead of robbing the bank, their goal would be to provide top quality customer service at an efficiency rate that enables long-term financial growth and market competitiveness. In the first 15-20 minutes of the movie you'd see the group being recruited, one by one, until they get to the last guy whom they desperately need but refuses to join. And then instead of convincing him to come along by revealing that the bank manager was responsible for putting his brother in jail, they'd bust out a well-oiled Powerpoint presentation detailing his highly competitive salary package (including his choice of PPO/HMO plans and tax-deferred 401(k) with matching employer contributions up to a ceiling of $20,000/year). The climax would take place at 4:59 P.M. on a Friday, when everyone's ready to clock out and enjoy the weekend but an irate customer holds things up by demanding an immediate cash withdrawal that exceeds his daily limit. What does the team do? Have security escort the guy out, thus betraying their unflappable commitment to 100% consumer satisfaction? Or stay long enough to resolve the situation, putting their sought-after dinner reservations in jeopardy? Luckily, just when all hope seems lost, the Asperger's-afflicted hacker who avoids human contact at all costs manages to break out of his shell and come forward with a two-stage payment compromise that appeases the customer and gets our heroes out of the office with plenty of time to go home and shower before dinner. You'll pay for the whole seat, but you'll only need the edge!