http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/style/movies/reviews?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsNews (www.washingtonpost.com)en-us1514020http://www.washingtonpost.comhttp://media.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/hp/image/wp_web.gifhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60122-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60122-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMTIF I WERE grading "The Perfect Score" like the SAT, I'd give it a 650 in verbal and a 400 in math. Good enough to get into a half-decent school, but sub-Ivy League. The comedy about a coterie of high school seniors plotting to steal the answers to the dreaded standardized test talks a pretty good game, but in the end the numbers just don't add up to much. By Michael O'Sullivan.By Michael O'Sullivanhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61980-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61980-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMTOwen Wilson has his own peculiar charisma. He comes on like a SoCal stoner, but he's wired for East Coast irony. There's a charming alertness in there somewhere. And you can't help liking a Hollywood actor who refuses to fix a nose that seems to have been hammered repeatedly with a nine-iron. By Desson Thomson.By Desson Thomsonhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60121-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60121-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMTHOW IS IT possible to make a movie set in a Hawaii filled with beautiful women -- or at least one very beautiful bikini, courtesy of model-turned-"actress" Sara Foster -- and larded with scenes of surfing, sex, skinny-dipping and colorful, wisecracking criminals played by the likes of Gary Sinise, Bebe Neuwirth, Morgan Freeman and Owen Wilson -- and still end up with it feeling like a documentary on sub-Saharan microeconomics? By Michael O'Sullivan.By Michael O'Sullivanhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60124-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60124-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMTTHE HEBREW HAMMER (Unrated, 85 minutes) Life is tough for New York City private detective Mordechai Jefferson Carver (Adam Goldberg), aka the Hebrew Hammer. The "Shaft"-style hero is still tormented by having been the only Jewish kid at Peter, Paul and Mary elementary school. He's feuding with the Jewish Justice League's eye-patched honcho (Peter Coyote). His mother (Nora Dunn) keeps pressing him to get married, not to mention changing the cat's diapers at the dinner table. Santa Claus's evil son Damien (Andy Dick) has taken control of Christmas, and is planning to destroy Hanukah. Plus, everyone Hammer knows is a racial or ethnic stereotype. The hero of "The Hebrew Hammer" seems not to have noticed the latter dilemma, but it's the central problem of Jonathan Kesselman's crudely executed farce. After Damien assassinates his liberal-minded daddy and becomes the latest Bad Santa, Hammer turns to the leader of the Kwanzaa Liberation Front, his pal Mohammed (Mario Van Peebles, who took Black Power rather more seriously when directing 1995's "Panther"). Reconciled with the Jewish Justice League, Hammer pairs with Esther (Judy Greer), the JJL leader's marriageable daughter, and the two contend with neo-Nazis, Damien's anti-Hanukah plot, and bad parodies of Isaac Hayes and Curtis Mayfield's early '70s hits. Although the movie is modeled on blaxploitation flicks, most of the jokes needle the protagonist's co-religionists. When Hammer and Mohammed first meet, they greet each other with ethnic insults too hurtful to be repeated here -- and then quickly inform a hapless white bystander that only they can use such terms. Much the same is true of the film's digs at American Jewish culture: They can't be quoted by a gentile without special dispensation from, well, perhaps the Jewish Justice League. Also, revealing any of these gags would risk depriving the movie's viewers of a laugh, and "The Hebrew Hammer" doesn't exactly have guffaws to spare. Indeed, desperation is thttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60125-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60125-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMTIN "THE STATEMENT," the latest Nazi-themed film from screenwriter Ronald Harwood ("The Pianist," "Taking Sides"), the character of Pierre Brossard (Michael Caine) is shown to be a very bad man. By Michael O'Sullivan.By Michael O'Sullivanhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60126-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60126-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMTTHE BIG BOUNCE (PG-13, 88 minutes) "The Big Bounce" adds up to far less than the sum of its parts. A smart-aleck caper comedy with a talented cast and a lush Hawaiian setting, the movie (based on an Elmore Leonard novel) has a few droll moments but is so slight, so lacking in characters we care about or emotional punch, that it barely sustains itself over a mere 88 minutes. It also offers yet another example of a PG-13 that aspires to be an R. Inappropriate for teenagers under 15 or 16, "The Big Bounce" has side and back-view nudity; drinking; profanity; a nasty racial slur (inserted to make the film's antihero seem like a good guy when he objects to it); verbal and visual sexual innuendo, some of it quite steamy; and violence with guns and a baseball bat, none of it overly graphic. By Jane Horwitz.By Jane Horwitzhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61979-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61979-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMT"The Perfect Score" is about what happens when college applicants go bad -- or perhaps when movies about them do. By Desson Thomson.By Desson Thomsonhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62037-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62037-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMTHave you heard of B2K? Those of you entertaining vague notions of vanity license plates or Burger King promotions are probably too old, too unhip, too just plain out of the loop to care much about "You Got Served." Then again, those who know B2K is a cult hip-pop band have no need for... By Ann Hornaday.By Ann Hornadayhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60123-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60123-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMTOVERFLOWING with madcap visual flair and following a rambling thread of a plot that seems, at times, more the product of free association than an actual script, "The Triplets of Belleville" is a triumph of animated style over substance. Unlike, say, "Finding Nemo," which was both emotionally affecting and beautiful, however, this feature-length cartoon's main target is the eyeball -- with a peripheral focus on the funny bone. It's a grandly giddy meringue of inanity, a towering froth full of empty calories meant not to be digested by the intellect but to tickle the senses. By Michael O'Sullivan.By Michael O'Sullivanhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60127-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A60127-2004Jan29.html?nav=rss_style/movies/reviewsFri, 30 Jan 2004 9:14:15 GMTTots on Up "Teacher's Pet" (PG). Delightful hour-long animated feature, based on popular segments by artist Gary Baseman on Toon Disney cable, about a smart dog named Spot (voice of Nathan Lane) who disguised as a kid attends fourth grade with his boy, Leonard (Shaun Fleming). Wanting to become a real boy, Spot hitches a ride with Leonard and his teacher mom (Debra Jo Rupp) and goes in search of a scientist (Kelsey Grammer) who claims he turns animals into humans. Hugely witty, smart, crayon-colored tale has punch lines, parodies to tickle adults, while kids enjoy all its many other levels. Jokes about doggie doo-doo, mice, cockroaches, mutant animals; smart-alecky tone.