Serenity

Saw it last night. Worth the price of admission. In fact, worth the price of two admissions, if you're paying for a date.

As much as I love the show (yes, I own the box set) I've come away from the movie with a few mild complaints. First off, the problem with the movie is that it really was meant to be a television show. So as well written as it was, I think it would have worked much better as a dozen television episodes, instead of two hours of film. The movie was fast-paced, but it felt a bit too compressed, if you ask me.

(Of course, I'd just recently seen Wong Kar-Wai's 2046, whose pacing - while beautiful - could best be described as somewhere between "geologic" or "glacial". So maybe my beat is off.)

There's another problem in terms of the writing, but I'd have to spoil it for some people, which I don't want to do. It's a pretty fanboy kind of gripe to begin with, so I'll just say that I wasn't entirely satisfied with one of the big changes near the end.

Now, these are the only two problems I had in two hours of what was otherwise excellent writing and a fun action movie, with standard-excellent visual effects. I see that Ebert and Roeper gave it two thumbs up, and I'd really, really recommend it to all and sundry. As for non-nerd perspective, my father saw it yesterday based on the previews, and enjoyed it as well.

I'd say a fair consensus among the people I've talked to is: good, go see it. Not mind-blowing, but good.

I'd also encourage people to go see a good movie that has exactly zero big stars. Hollywood needs to encourage new talent, and the only way to do that is to go see movies with new talent. Believe it or not, they do try and respond to the market. (By the way, I was amazed to see that Wedding Crashers and 40-Year Old Virgin were still playing.)

So, short version: Go see Serenity.