philmguy

It's impossible to watch Tom Cruise leaping across a broken bridge in "Mission: Impossible III" and not recall his couch-jumping incident. His period of boistrous craziness that began about a year ago lingers into each of his films and takes you away from the moment. You're not seeing Ethan Hunt, you're seeing a starry-eyed, often manic scientologist.

The film is nearly perfect for what it is - director J.J. Abrams avoids the usual threequel plummet by crafting a reasonably fresh, twist-filled explosionfest that's exactly the sort of action flick summer movie audiences are addicted to. It could have been even better without Cruise.

One of the only fates worse than never being able to hit the big time is becoming famous then being cast aside as a nobody. And what's worse than that is having your lack of fame rubbed in by journalists with smarmy writeups. Oh well. If any of these folks are sleeping on your couch or pumping your gas, print up this article to help them out.

1. Leelee Sobieski

Good Times: 2001 was the year of the Leelee. The then 19-year-old busted out in a big way, hitting with an indie comedy ("My First Mister") and two high-profile thrillers, "The Glass House" and "Joy Ride."

When even Robin Williams is starring in an entertaining comedy, you know the mojo is really going strong.

After catching "Stick It" - unscreened in Tucson - at the first show today, I've made the amazing discovery that April 28 will go down as the first Friday of the year with universally strong wide release openings. At least in my opinion, but let's get real here - whose voice besides mine matters when it comes to film criticism?

Out of the blue, Nintendo announced today that it's new console, set for release this holiday season, will not be called the Revolution, but "Wii" (pronounced "we"). If the goal was to get a catchy shorthand term to compete with PS3 and 360, they may as well have gone with "WTF?"

That's certainly been the reaction of the gaming community in the hours since the announcement, but then, the Wii's remote-control style, motion sensor controller sparked similar debate. Nintendo, seemingly driven crazy by the defeat of the GameCube at the hands of Microsoft and Sony, is going way off on its own now. This can be a very good thing for gamers, and if the beloved DS is any indication of the company's direction, the Wii could open up new realms of innovation and immersion. On the other hand, it could also spell complete disaster. If the Wii's motion detection works as erratically as the "Donkey Konga" bongo drums or the screwy voice command software in "Odama," the system could be an outright failure. Of course, better to be an interesting failure than a lame, unexciting stillbirth, as the Xbox 360 has sadly proven to be in its first half year of existence.

From the age of 8 I decided that if I were ever able to catch a leprechaun, genie or any other magical being capable of granting me three wishes, the first wish would be for infinite wishes, rendering the wishcap obsolete. Well, I've caught my leprechaun, and it answers to the name Nintendo DS. It grants me infinite wishes, with a catch - it only handles the same wish over and over again.

That one wish is that boredom and angst would go away whenever I'm in a situation in which I'm at the mercy of someone else's slowness. I've never had patience, and thankfully I don't need it anymore thanks to my little electronic buddy, who's commandeered my entire left pocket, forcing my keys, wallet and cell phone to cluster in my right pocket as the DS fills its place of honor. Whenever called upon, it leaps forth to do battle with any enemy of tedium that might confront me.

Pleased to meet yas, Internet readers! I'm Philmguy, AKA Phil Villarreal, movie and video game critic for the Arizona Daily Star, and I'll be using this Brainsplainer* to spread my musings, insights and inappropriate comments on movies, DVDs, video games and whatever else. I'll try and keep your mom out of it, but no promises.

Anyways, I've had my job for five years - I lucked into it straight out of college and have fought to keep it ever since. I've got 20 years' experience playing video games, and at least that much time as a movie nut. I know I've seen 3,150 of movies available on Netflix.