Inkheart **1/2

Cast: Brendan Fraser, Eliza Hope Bennett, Paul Bettany, Helen Mirren, Andy Serkis, Jim Broadbent, Sienna Guillory
Director: Iain Softley
Running Length: 1:46
MPAA Classification: PG

Mo Folchart (Fraser) and his daughter Meggie (Folchert) travel the world in search of the hard to find book “Inkheart”. He is a silvertongue, and when Meggie was younger, Mo read from the book and brought the story to life. But, when something comes out of the story, something, or someone, must take its place. In this case, it was his wife, Resa (guillory). They are chased by two characters from the book, the evil Capricorn (Serkis), who wants to rule the real world, and Dustfinger (Bettany), who just wants to go home. With the help of Mo’s Great Aunt Elinor (Mirren), they set out to find the author of the book (Broadbent) to set things right.

“Inkheart” could have been much better. The solid cast is there, and they all do credible jobs in their roles. The effects are there – they are as good as any special effects laden film of late. The problem lies in the story. Not that it is bad; one just gets the feeling that something was lost in the translation from book to film. I have been told that things have been changed, and I cannot help but think that they were for the worse. The ending itself suffers from what “Hellboy II” suffered from: a sense that things could have been resolved much earlier and easier given what resolves things. (Of course “Hellboy II” was a better film and able to overcome this problem.) If more movies are made in this series, the moviemakers need to tighten the story a little more and stay truer to the author’s original vision.

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King ***

Cast: Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin, John Rhys-Davies, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Miranda Otto, Bernard Hill, Andy Serkis, John Noble, Liv Tyler
Director: Peter Jackson

The trilogy based on the classic novels by J. R. R. Tolkien finally comes to an end as the forces of good and evil have the mother of all battles at the city of Minas Tirith. Bigger than than even the battle of Helm's Deep from LOTR 2, this is an impressive sight to behold. And while this battle rages on, Frodo and Sam, accompanied by Gollum approach Mordor and Mount Doom, determined to destroy the One Ring once and for all. ROTK is a well made and entertaining film, that is on par with the first to films. And while I do not consider these films the best ever made (like some people), it is well worth seeing. Now we just have to sit back and hope that Peter Jackson is able to get the rights to The Hobbit so that he can complete the whole story.