One of those rare flicks that lives up to the hype. Flashy. Imaginative. A lot of adventure and a few well-placed twists and turns. A speedy two-and-a-half hours. The late Heath Ledger’s performance is brilliant, arguably besting Jack Nicholson’s penultimate Joker of nearly two decades ago—but the cast as a whole is great (i.e., Ledger didn’t steal the show). The plot grows complicated—bordering on convoluted at times—but you still get the gist of things throughout...and that’s enough.

Will Smith plays a modern-day superhero who’s immortal and invincible (well, 99.99 percent of the time—hey, even Superman was dogged by Kryptonite). The problem is that Hancock is a surly, depressed drunk who causes so much property damage and general mayhem while doing in the bad guys around Los Angeles that the citizenry and head honchos no longer want Hancock around. (Not unlike “Dirty Harry” on ginseng, steroids, and Cutty Sark.) 

For a flick that borrows heavily from The Matrix (think stunning special effects, cartoonish gun violence, vague nods to spirituality, and a main character snatched from a humdrum, oppressive life by a band of renegades in the hopes that he can discover his unique identity and do a job none of them have the ability to pull off) and just a tad from Office Space (think sad-sack, pencil-pushing cubicle drone constantly pushed around by a nauseatingly repellent boss and only slightly less boorish girlfriend), Wanted doesn’t feel like a knockoff. In fact, it’s quite entertaining. 

If you like a movie that rolls the nostalgia of the Hulk of old in with the hi-tech CGI of today’s top computer programmers, this is a flick for you. You’ll flash back when you see the “lonely man walking down the empty highway” scene that closed each Hulk episode during it’s TV run, smile at the cameo appearances by Stan Lee (the creator of all things Marvel Comics), Lou Ferrigno (the original TV version of His Hulky-ness) and even one of Bill Bixby (TV's Banner) shown on a television screen. You may even laugh out loud when Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) stops by Stanlee’s Pizza (Stan Lee’s...get it?). Then you’ll either be totally mesmerized, or sea-sick, by the whirl of non-stop special effects that take place in the 3 or 4 major fight scenes.

In 1920, a committee was formed to investigate allegations of the throwing of the 1919 world series by the Chicago White Sox. As “Shoeless” Joe Jackson – one of the most revered member of that infamous White Sox team – exited the hearing, a small young fan was waiting for Joe on the courthouse steps. The young boy, with tears in his eyes, looked at Shoeless Joe and uttered those now famous words, “Say it ain’t so, Joe. Say it ain’t so.” Joe never answered but his career was over.

Near the end of this bloody piece of celluloid, when wickedly conflicted vice detective Tom Ludlow (Keanu Reeves) asks his aptly named boss, Capt. Jack Wander (Forest Whitaker), “What happened to just locking up the bad people?” Wander responds with a little dose of Romans 3:10: “We’re all bad, Tom.” That’s the essence of Street Kings, a dark-cop flick sprung from the dark-cop minds of writer James Ellroy (L.A. Confidential) and director David Ayer (Training Day).

This polarizing documentary features writer-comedian Ben Stein (“Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?”) as a narrator/court jester who interviews academics and scientists on both sides of evolutionary theory and basically asks, “It’s been 150 years since On the Origin of Species was published, we now know the human cell is way more complex than Darwin could’ve imagined, so can we revisit evolution and debate it?” Problem is, Stein & Co. don’t merely want to debate the reliability of evolution itself—they want to debate it using the theory of intelligent design.

Titling your movie Superbad would appear to be the work of an extremely confident (or extremely arrogant) filmmaker--as any reviewer looking for an open door to describe how wretched your movie is would need to search no further than your title. Fortunately for the folks behind Superbad (notably writer-producer-actor Seth Rogen of Knocked Up fame and his collaborator, Judd Apatow, who also produced The 40-Year-Old Virgin), the badness is all on the surface. Not that it'd help your job security if your kids' parents found out you took the youth group to see this extremely raunchy teen comedy in the theater; but if you're the curious type and rent the DVD this fall, you might find a few scenes worth using as discussion starters.

Given the recent ballyhoo over possible Christian themes running through the final book in the J.K. Rowling series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, it seemed fitting to investigate if similar themes show up in the most recent celluloid creation of an earlier book in the series, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. (Plus, given all the controversy that's percolated in Christian circles regarding the witchcraft-oriented influence Harry Potter could be having on kids, seeing things with my own eyes seemed like a sober, thoughtful plan of action.)

Beating the system—especially when the means of beating it is perfectly legal, and the results can mean big money—is an intriguing premise. Exhilarating. Even tempting. That’s what’s on the table for M.I.T. senior Ben Campbell (Jim Sturgess, Across the Universe), a 4.0 GPA math and statistics whiz, longsuffering hard worker, and notoriously poor sap with no way to pay the $300,000 he soon must shell out for his forthcoming foray at Harvard Medical School. Relax, Ben, help is on the way.