Let me see if I’ve got this straight: GI Joe is an elite military task force tasked with stopping COBRA, a nefarious terrorist organization who spend all their time attacking GI Joe. Viewed from this perspective, this is completely, inexplicably irrational, making it perhaps the most brilliant satire of military history ever to appear on syndicated TV, save for “Charles in Charge.” More likely, though, is that the whole thing is just an elaborate ruse by the armed forces aimed at keeping their most inept recruits busy with their most incompetent foe while the grown-ups get on with the real work of defending the country. That would go a long way to explaining their piss-poor marksmanship, not to mention how William “The Refrigerator” Perry wound up in their ranks.

Still, to their credit, the Joes clearly embrace their diversity. Anyone can be a Joe, provided he isn’t like anyone else on the squad. The practical upshot of this is that they only have one guy capable of doing each job: One pilot, one gunner, one… ninja. (If I ran the military, every battalion would have at least one ninja.) The One Guy Policy either incredibly efficient and optimistic, or the stupidest strategy ever. COBRA may have been inept and ass-backwards, but at least they had a little built-in redundancy. Not to mention really cool headgear. And a floating fortress of death! For a group with no discernible goals or income, they do all right for themselves. Yep, if it weren’t for the whole yelling-their-name-when-they-attack thing, I would totally join COBRA.

At least I would have before GI JOE: THE MOVIE, when we found out that COBRA were really just a front for Cobra-la, an ancient snake cult that lives in the Himalayas. Which makes about as much sense as a bunch of Saharan tribesmen worshipping polar bears, but whatever. Yes, to recap, COBRA, the feared international terrorist army, are being secretly manipulated by an ancient race of reptilians who live in one of the coldest climates on earth. It makes so much sense that I think we should demand that the government send ridiculously expensive expeditions into northern India just to ensure that there aren’t any snake cults lurking there.

Apparently the cultists decided that the mid-80s was finally the right time to emerge from the mountains, perhaps because their outfits had finally come back into fashion. More likely, however, they were looking to turn the human race into drooling, mindless animals, and they figured that “Battle of the Network Stars” had already done most of the work for them. To finish off the other half, they needed to seize control of the transmitter for (and this is true) something called BET, which GI Joe is testing out at the start of the film. How exactly Black Entertainment Television figures into world domination is never made explicitly clear, but it’s a safe bet that it involves the mobilization of several hundred Wayanses and possibly a WHITE GIRLS sequel.

Apparently, with the aid of BET, the Cobra-lalians will release spores into the atmosphere. Fortunately for us, since they’re using the COBRA army, we know there’s little chance they will succeed. Unfortunately for us, the Army let GI Joe guard the BET thing, which means there’s a good chance that it will get captured. Apparently for the Joes, guarding a priceless piece of equipment means one or two guys, tops. Maybe if they let themselves have, I don’t know, more than one MP or something. Hell, he doesn’t even have to be a full-timer. Get yourselves a temp, guys, and save on the benefits.

Instead, they task Duke’s mildly retarded brother Falcon with watching the transmitter, which he promptly screws up by bringing an in-disguise COBRA operative in to show it off. Maybe I’m out of touch, but are women really that turned on by giant military vehicles these days? Somebody needs to tell Falcon about tequila shooters. They’re easier to get your hands on, and that way it’s two people at most who are likely to end up brain damaged, not the entire human race. But we all know how little brothers are…

So the BET thing gets stolen, and one of the COBRA bigwigs escapes from the brig, all because Duke was too busy to take his little brother out and get him laid. Sad, really. So what happens to the little runt for crippling the war effort and possibly dooming the entire race to Death by Wayans? Military prison until he’s 80? A severe beating from his fellow Joes? No, he’s sent for more training, which probably should have happened before they let him guard priceless equipment.

In the end, Falcon redeems himself by infiltrating the Cobra-la headquarters and shutting off BET, probably right before “Martin” came on, for which we should all be grateful. COBRA, it seems, will have to live without Sheneneh for one day more.

Alas, the next day, Destro had digital cable installed, which not only had BET but also TV Land and three channels of MTV. I guess you can’t win ’em all.

As we strive to preserve the greatest films in cinematic history, we here at the Criterion Collection have to ask ourselves a lot of difficult questions. Would Kurosawa have removed that conspicuous hair from the lens in THE SEVEN SAMURAI, had he been able? What is the proper framing of the final battle in SPARTACUS? Is ARMAGEDDON and THE ROCK director Michael Bay functionally retarded?

In the end, we have to trust our instincts. Just like when it came time to select one film deserving of the Criterion treatment from all of the great releases of the late 1980s. Although the early 70s gets so much of the attention and praise, the late 80s actually gives that time a run for its money as one of the most daring and interesting periods of 20th century cinema. Just listen to some of the top-grossing movies of this era, and try to pick one that isn’t a bona fide classic: PLATOON. ALIENS. FATAL ATTRACTION. TOP GUN. Moviegoers at the time could pick from any of dozens of brilliant films like THE LAST EMPEROR, THE COLOR OF MONEY, THE PRINCESS BRIDE, THE KARATE KID PART II, THE GREAT MOUSE DETECTIVE, MEATBALLS III, SHANGHAI SURPRISE, PETER PORN, PSYCHO III, THROBBIN’ HOOD, DEATH NURSE, and, of course, Jon Cryer’s magnum opus HIDING OUT.

But those films, each a great success in their own way, don’t quite fit the Criterion bill. It takes a truly special film to warrant one of our definitive edition DVDs. We prefer to focus our attention on overlooked or neglected masterpieces, which is how we came to our latest release. This film was unjustly overlooked during its initial release, perhaps because it was a small, foreign-produced character piece up against blockbusters like Demi Moore’s ONE CRAZY SUMMER and the Blake Edwards-Ted Danson combo, A FINE MESS. The film, MOKUSHIROKU: MATRIX YO EIEN NI, tells the story of a lone soldier who inadvertently causes the brutal death of his army’s leader, which leads to a massive slaughter by enemy forces. Then, this soldier, in spite of being a whiny jackass with no practical leadership experience, somehow manages to guide his army to victory. He largely achieves this by opening a futuristic Chinese puzzle box.

Also, it stars robots who can turn into cars.

Released in the United States as TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE, this film never achieved the widespread success that a work of this caliber deserves, perhaps because it was so far ahead of its time that audiences mistook it for an incomprehensible piece of crap masquerading as a 90-minute toy commercial. But that meant viewers missed career-defining performances by the “Unsolved Mysteries” guy, the BREAKFAST CLUB guy, and that one guy who talks really fast. And who could forget Orson Welles, in his final role, as a giant talking anus? Certainly not us, and we’ve tried.

The Criterion edition finally gives this visionary film the treatment it deserves. The three-disc set contains three versions of the film: the theatrical release with a new transfer personally overseen by a crack-smoking hobo, a rare director’s cut that features .5 seconds of extra footage, and a new, never-before-seen “tolerable” cut consisting of ten seconds of TRANSFORMERS followed by the entirety of John Huston’s THE MALTESE FALCON.

That’s not all! All-new special features include:

• “Some Robots Have Breasts: The Arcee Story.”
• Commentary by renowned film critic Rex Reed, who repeatedly begs the audio engineer to kill him.
• An interview with legendary Internet personality “Wierd Al” Yankovich, who denies any involvement with the film.
• Long-lost alternate takes of the infamous “S word” scene, featuring the “F word,” the “MF word,” the “HMFS” words, the “Q word,” and a particularly blue take featuring a five-minute string of obscenities that would make Lenny Bruce blush.
• A behind-the-scenes documentary that dares to ask composer Vince DiCola why every single minute of the film is plastered with obnoxious, intrusive music.
• Excerpts from the “60 Minutes” investigative report, “TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE – Why?”
• A coupon for aspirin, to treat movie-related headaches.

And much, much more!

Yes, now you can experience the movie the way that director Nelson Shin intended it: alone, bored, and shunned by your friends. So get yours now… because you should never put off ruining another fond childhood memory until tomorrow.

Everyone knows that holidays and movies go together like monkeys and tuxedos, and yet, year after year, we see the same three or four of them on screen, as though those were the only ones worth mentioning. Is Halloween the only scary holiday? Did they forget Valentine’s Day? Tax day? What about a horror movie set on President’s Day, when all of the mattress and car salesmen come out of their caves to make loud, annoying commercials and feed on unsuspecting consumers?

Admittedly, when Hollywood does try to mix things up, it’s rarely pretty. SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT is, for all intents and purposes, basically MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET with a few more axe murders (although barely half as many as in the original MIRACLE book), but NIGHT has so far failed to make it onto the schedule even half as much as the feel-good “classic” does. Even worse, IT’S SECRETARY’S DAY, CHARLIE BROWN hardly ever gets played anymore, and the less said about BENJI’S TAX DAY ADVENTURE the better.

Still, hard as it may be to believe, there have been worse:

A FINE MOVING PHOTOPLAY OF LADIES ENJOUYING AN OUT-OF-DOORS PICK-NICK LUNCHEOUN ON THE DAY OF LABOURS (1892): Perhaps the earliest known “holiday” film in existence, this was merely one of Edison’s early cheapies, a depiction of several women eating lunch on Labor Day, which, at the time, actually honored America’s butlers. The film had a short run before being withdrawn over a scandalous glimpse of one of the ladies’ exposed philtrum. Also, in one frame, it was claimed that you could see the silhouette of a child who had died on the site years ago. Later, this was proven to be a cardboard cut-out of President McKinley.

LAUREL & HARDY’S FATHER’S DAY FRACAS (1936): Following a bitter feud, the duo’s legendary producer, Hal Roach, attempted to assert ownership of the characters with this misguided story in which neither Laurel nor Hardy actually appear. Instead, their elderly “fathers” accidentally kidnap Pope Pius XI. The film was never released. Interestingly, this marks the one time that the word “Fracas” was used in a movie title that wasn’t gay porn.

THE ROAD TO PUNXSUTAWNEY (1947): The only Hope and Crosby “road” movie to take place domestically, the film tells the story of two escaped convicts who systematically murder and then dismember dozens of people in a PCP-fueled rampage as they attempt to make it to Pennsylvania for the annual Groundhog Day festival. Features Crosby’s chart-topping toe-tapper “Where’s My Damn Money, Bitch?”

MEMORIAL DAY VACATION (1995): This ABC “Movie of the Week” starred C. Thomas Howell as Clark, and depicted the Griswold’s trip to Iwo Jima. The film culminates with Audrey being sold into white slavery while Clark is thrown in a Singapore prison for fondling the prime minister. Widely considered the second least funny of the VACATION films.

CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD (1998): Although it is never mentioned on screen or the script, and has never been acknowledged by Carrot Top or anyone else associated with the production, the film takes place on Arbor Day. Anyone who says differently is lying, and a communist. And sells crack to infants.

BILLY BOB THORNTON EXPLAINS DAYLIGHT SAVINGS TIME (2002): Thornton, a well-known time enthusiast, produced, wrote, directed, edited, and catered this feature-length documentary on the benefits of Daylight Savings Time, which, according to the actor, include “improved Japanese-American relations, higher sperm counts in many species of toad, better tasting coffee, and an overall decrease in the number of reported zombies.”

NICK AND JESSICA’S VALENTINE’S ADVENTURE (unproduced): Originally planned to be a modern-day remake of MY FAIR LADY, the script was rewritten several times at the insistence of the soon-to-be-divorced Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson. Jessica insisted that Nick’s character, Rick, change from a promising architect to a syphilis-ridden mental patient. The next draft saw Jessica’s character, Cathy, violently die in a flaming bus crash in the first two pages, never to appear again. After another rewrite, Nick’s character, now called “Rancid Bag of Vomit,” confesses on national television that he is into unspeakable sex acts, many of which involve lighting small animals on fire. He spends the rest of the film being savagely beaten. Subsequent drafts see representations of acts that could never be depicted on screen. The project is currently being developed as a vehicle for Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown.

Happy holidays, everyone!

It’s a well-known and completely scientific fact that I’m not making up that we are suffering from a major catchphrase glut. People who study these things (“nerds”) estimate that new ones are being added faster than society can process. (Phrases, not nerds.) The problem has become so widespread that children today are almost completely incapable of having a conversation that doesn’t refer to words uttered by a wacky neighbor.

TIMMY: (witnessing a diabetic friend going into insulin shock) Fo shizzle, my nizzle.

BILLY: (rushing to the aid of their friend) Bada bing, bada boom!

TIMMY: (administering first aid) I am indeed fed up with the legless reptiles on this most unpleasant airborne contraption!

BILLY: (dialing 911) That’s hot.

911 Operator: 911. What’s your emergency?

TIMMY: (scared) We are two wild and crazy guys!

911 Operator: Sir, that’s not an emergency.

TIMMY: I got a fever. And the only prescription… is more cowbell!

911 Operator: Understood. I am dispatching a licensed percussionist to your location.

TIMMY: (angry) My milkshake brings all the boys to the yard!

It wasn’t always this way. As little as 100 years ago, before senses of humor were widely available, children communicated in a direct, unironic manner, the way the Lord intended. However, with the introduction and subsequent popularity of radio, the first inklings of true catchphrases began. On the streets, youth could be heard repeating the Lone Ranger’s famous “Hi yo, Silver!” and Davy Crockett’s slightly less well-known “I smell a badger in your drawers!” Unfortunately, the two subsequent World Wars forced the nation into slogan rationing mode to save much-needed sayings for boys in the trenches. More effective ones like “Loose lips sink ships” were immediately shipped out, while lesser phrases like “Whatchoo talkin’ ’bout, Hitler?” were stored for later use.

Unfortunately, once the second war ended, these expressions languished, unused, in warehouses across the country until an enterprising producer at Paramount inquired about them. As an experiment, budding comedienne Lucille Ball was given dozens to use in her show, “I Enjoy Lucy’s Comedic Antics” (soon renamed to the less cumbersome “Goddammit, Lucy!”, which was later followed by “Lucy, You Filthy Whore!”). The show (and its memorable catchphrase “Who’s your bitch?”) was a hit, and ever since then, the government has unloaded billions of the things on the unsuspecting public, most infamously when the CIA reportedly spread inexpensive, dangerously pure catchphrases in America’s inner cities in the late 1980s, starting with the ironic use of “bad.”

Which brings us to YOU GOT SERVED. With such a preponderance of slogans, why did the producers feel the need to foist an awkward legal term on us all. Why “you got served”? Why not something that actually makes sense, like, I don’t know, “res ipsa loquitur” (“it speaks for itself”)?

GENERIC EVIL WHITE DANCER GUY: You call that dancing?

ELGIN: Res ipsa loquitur, fool!

CROWD: Ooooh! No, he di’n’t!

Alas, it was not to be. Instead, we got served with an awkward combination of BREAKIN’ (minus the Adidas) and BRING IT ON (minus the cheer). The film concerns itself with best pals David and Elgin, who participate in dance battles that are refereed by a grown man who allows himself to be addressed as “Mr. Rad.” And see, right there, the movie loses all credibility. How can you take a movie seriously when the screenwriters don’t even have the energy to come up with a convincing contemporary nickname? Are we supposed to believe that this man hasn’t changed his nickname since 1985? It’s a good thing that the movie didn’t try to add any other adults or they could have ended up with names like Ol’ Doc Spaz, Ms. Fur-Shur, and Dr. Stan Cougar-Mellencamp.

Anyway, David and Elgin are the best dancers in town, and regularly “serve” the other dance groups. What they serve them is never made clear, but I’m guessing a heaping helping of shame. They supplement the income from these dance-offs (because apparently, even in the 21st century, “dance-off participant” still isn’t a valid career choice) by delivering gym bags for the local Notorious B.I.G. impersonator. Unfortunately, David is busy hitting on Elgin’s little sister when he should be helping her brother deliver a particularly big gym bag, and El ends up in the hospital. This sets off a series of events (mostly dance-related) that culminate in the most intense chess match ever put to film.

Okay, fine: It all ends at the big dance competition, where the big prize is, coincidentally, just enough money to pay off Biggie, and the chance to be cut out of a Lil’ Kim video. Now, I don’t want to give anything away, but let’s just say that it involves a lot of serving and Lil’ Kim being more or less topless.

Sadly, being gotten served never really caught on, although I hear Kim is still mostly topless. Which is probably for the best. Kids have enough to deal with these days, what with having to get real, non-dancing jobs and all, without having their friends mock-threatening them with legal action at every turn.

Statistics is the science of proving that everyone you meet is a either a pervert, a criminal, or has a rare, communicable disease. Usually this is done at the behest of a local news program, who uses the numbers to scare old people. Which in turn causes more old people to die, thus providing statisticians with more data. And that, my friends, is the circle of life.

Regardless, statistics tell us that, out of any group of 100 people, 99 of them will suffer some horrible misfortune during their life, and the 100th still won’t win the lottery. Which is why it’s so hard to believe in the so-called “Superman Curse.” Sure, Superman creators Jerry “Joe” Shuster and Jerry “Joe” Siegel died penniless, begging on the streets and selling their bodies to Japanese businessmen in exchange for a warm place to sleep and a half-empty Snapple, but that’s more an indication of the predatory business practices of the 1930s comic book industry than it is some sort of supernatural curse against people connected to the character. Name me a legendary comic creator who didn’t wind up broke, disillusioned, and trading his body to perverse Asian millionaires for cash and/or soft drinks. Apart from George Papp (who had a taste for Austrians and Mr. Pibb), it can’t be done.

Which isn’t to say that there aren’t some comic book movies that are, indeed, stricken by widespread afflictions that some say border on the paranormal. For instance:

BATMAN: Actors playing this character have all later been diagnosed with “tennis elbow.” (See photo.) Also, actresses appearing as love interests for Bruce Wayne have all been revealed to be completely and utterly insane.

SPIDER-MAN: At least three actors associated with the character are chronically unable to match their socks. In addition, many of the silver screen’s Spider-Men look really stoned, even when they’re not.

THOR: Two of the men who have portrayed this character on screen have later gone on to be Cardinals in the Catholic Church, but have always been passed over for Pope.

TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: Every single performer in these films has had a sex change operation.

SWAMP THING: My friend tells me that he knew this guy who worked on SWAMP THING 2: EVEN SWAMPIER who swears that there’s one shot in the movie where you can totally see Dick Durock’s taint. More a curse for the viewers than the cast, if you ask me.

THE FANTASTIC FOUR: Gerald Mohr, who originated the part of Reed “Mr. Fantastic” Richards on the 1967 cartoon, suffered from crippling bacharachornithophobia, or a fear of birds owned by singer-songwriters. In the 1990s, Cam Clarke, who portrayed the same character, had the exact opposite condition, bacharachornithophilia, or an unusual sexual attraction to birds owned by singer-songwriters.

THE CROW: Nothing bad has ever happened to anyone from these movies, ever.

GHOST RIDER: Actors associated with this role have a history of appearing in awful movies about motorcyclists with flaming heads.

BLADE: Spooky but true: 37 crew members became ill on the set, first getting a high fever and then nausea, followed by their internal organs turning into a fine paste. However, this was later discovered not to be a curse, but botulism poisoning.

SPAWN: Everyone associated with this film has at one time or another been described as “a total dink.”

CONSTANTINE: Strange things were constantly being reported around this film’s set. Trained performers, called “actors,” would show up each day, having learned pre-rehearsed sections of written conversations, or “dialogue,” which they would enact in front of “cameras” loaded with “film” that would record the entire thing. Later, these “scenes” were taken to a lab, processed, and then carefully thrown away, replaced by total, unfiltered crap.

In PURE COUNTRY, country music megastar George Strait plays country music megastar Dusty Chandler, who is definitely not George Strait because he has a ponytail. Also, “Dusty” is written everywhere, even on his clothes, as a friendly reminder that he is Dusty, not George. Which is good, because George definitely looks like he could suddenly forget and slip back into George at any moment. And then, how would viewers know who he was? Thank goodness the filmmakers took this valuable and potentially life-saving precaution.

Every night Not George gets on stage in his trademark rhinestone-studded, white “Dusty” cowboy suit with his 12-piece band and his pyrotechnics and lighting rigs, and he sings irony-free songs about being modest and hard-working out in the country for thousands of middle-aged suburban moms with enormous, aerodynamically unsound bangs. If you thought that dressing up like a freak and performing for scores of women each night would make Not George happy (hey, it worked for Wilt Chamberlain), you would be wrong: Not George would much rather be doing the things he sings about; or, at the very least, he would rather sing about them in a slightly less fruity manner.

His manager/girlfriend, however, will have none of it. Dusty is just giving the people what they want: Men in awful, awful clothes who sing while things blow up, apparently. And she’s right: Take a poll of the average American, and watching fashion-challenged men sing during explosions ranks just above kickboxing but below home videos of testicle trauma. But Not George knows that his shows have not been Pure Country, but rather Artificial Country Substitute, and he will have none of it. He storms off the tour and heads back to the Heartlandâ„¢ where he promptly gets drunk, picks up a bar skank, gets in a fight, oversleeps, and misses work. Yep, that’s pure country all right.

Say what you will about Enron and Worldcom and Tyco, at least they never allowed their artificially intelligent mainframe to kill all the employees of their secret underground headquarters after a killer virus was unleashed by mercenary techno-terrorists. Yep, you can say a lot of things about those companies, but their underground headquarters weren’t at all secret.

No such luck in RESIDENT EVIL, the “film” based on the “popular” video game about shooting things, where employees of “the Hive” are drowned, decapitated, and brutally edited right out of existence by the Red Queen, the holographic representation of the Hive’s supercomputer, modeled (we’re told) after the programmer’s extremely creepy, extremely English daughter. I’m not blaming these workers for winding up dead of a flesh-eating virus and all, but maybe the first clue that you had made a poor career choice was that the interface for your timesheet is a weird little holographic girl. That, and your office is called “the Hive.”

And, as anyone with a bee infestation can tell you, hive residents are not easy to get rid of. These particular ones are more difficult than most, as they have a nasty habit of coming back from the dead. (Or maybe they’re just really hung over. And missing eyeballs. Hard to say.) Enter Ukrainian supermodel Milla Jovovich, fresh from being annoying and mostly naked in THE FIFTH ELEMENT. Here she wakes up naked and curled up in the shower with no memory. Which, I have to say, really brings back memories of that one summer I was a roadie for Motley Crue…

Eventually Milla finds some clothes and wanders around the house a bit, getting frightened by curtains and animals that appear for no scientifically valid reason. Then, sensing a trend, armed commandos burst in through the windows for no reason and grab her. Bolstered by the success of this utterly pointless move, they elect to bring the amnesiac supermodel along on their highly dangerous mission into the top-secret hot zone, grabbing a few additional random people along the way just for kicks. Because what’s a highly sensitive mission without a bunch of untrained, useless deadweight along to really screw things up?

Miraculously, they arrive at their destination with only half their team dead. Their mission is to shut down the creepy little girl computer, who doesn’t have an “off” switch, which should definitely be a feature on Creepy Little Supercomputer Girl 2.0. Honestly, no one wants to carry around an electromagnetic pulse generator just so they can reboot whenever Outlook freezes.

Before she’s pulsed, Li’l Creepy warns them that shutting her down will have serious consequences, but, in keeping with the sort of decision making that got half their team killed, they do it anyway. And right on time, the zombies show up and mistake the group for bacon. They have been ravaged by a virus that brings the dead back to life by, in effect, jump starting the body’s engine, but not the stereo or the odometer or the little computer that controls the fuel mixture that costs $650 to repair. I’m pretty sure the cigarette lighter works, but the ashtray’s full. At $3200, it’s a steal.

So apparently, these jumpstarted dead people’s only remaining drive is hunger. And, for the undead, they sure seem to be picky eaters, because they never try to eat the drywall or the light fixtures or each other. Which brings up a worrisome issue: We see the zombies eat at least two guys, but what happens then? Can zombies be full? Can they gain weight? Do they poop? Because if they do, I’m pretty sure it has to be the worst thing in the world. But then, maybe the whole purpose of the Hive’s research is to harness the awesome potential military uses of zombie poop.

The movie, sadly, never delves into the obvious potential of the dung of the dead, instead preferring to let Milla kick things, mostly in the head. But like most movies adapted from video games, it’s akin to having a dickweed friend who never lets you have a turn with the controller. And with friends like that, who needs creepy English computer holograms?

Every other week, Addicted to Bad rummages through Hollywood’s junk drawer, looking for the worst of the worst. This week, Patrick administers his inner child a firm spanking with PAY IT FORWARD, starring Kevin Spacey and Helen Hunt, who really should have known better…

Everyone remembers the teacher who changed their life. For me, it was Ms. O’Connell, a kind and generous geography teacher who not only taught me the principle exports of Mongolia and Yemen, but also the utter necessity of questioning authority. Her message to us was, “You only accept the rules of this patriarchal, elitist society if you choose to.” She never actually came out and said as much, but you could tell she meant it by her sincere dedication to low-cut tops and her complete unwillingness to wear a bra.

I understand, however, that many students aren’t lucky enough to have teachers who care enough to inspire their pubescent students through partially exposed cleavage. Although it’s hardly fair to blame the teachers themselves: Without exception, every state legislature in the union regularly declares it more important to supply our schools with items like “books,” “chalk,” and “metal detectors” instead of push-up bras and v-necks. Is it any wonder that our educational system is failing?

Which means that even fictional teachers like PAY IT FORWARD’s Mr. Simonet (played by Kevin Spacey under six metric tons of latex burn makeup), having no sweater puppies of his own to speak of, must resort to inspiring his students through bribery, otherwise known as “extra credit assignments.” Inevitably, of course, some overachieving snotbag is going to game the system and get 82 million extra credit points, thus throwing the curve for the rest of the class. And now, because Mommy potty trained him too early and his Daddy didn’t hug him enough, little Billy gets to sit out the final and the rest of the class gets a D-.

Simonet’s assignment challenges his students to come up with a plan to change the world and put it into action, which everyone in the class wisely ignores, save snotbag Haley Joel Osment, who presumably has lots of spare time now that he only sees dead people on alternate weekends and holidays. Not ten minutes after the bell, Haley has adopted a friendly homeless heroin addict, played by Jim Caviezel, whose research for his role apparently uncovered lots of addicts who eat bags of Oreos and then don’t brush.

When Haley’s mom (played by Helen Hunt, looking like she tried to do her hair and makeup in a wind tunnel) catches on to the assignment after she finds all her cookies are gone and one of the addict’s drawings is on the fridge, she is understandably upset. Taking time off from her busy schedule of working at one of those PG-13 strip clubs where the men don’t seem to mind that the women never quite get around to taking off any clothes, she storms down to the school and demands that Mr. Simonet stop encouraging his students to adopt random street people. At the very least, could he advise them to be a little pickier about dental hygiene? The two of them argue furiously, thus assuring us that they will have sex before the third act, in accordance with internationally recognized Movie Law.

Haley’s first attempt at extra credit foiled, he decides that the best way to ensure his grade is to get his teacher laid, possibly the best way to assure an A ever devised. Or maybe he just saw the previous scene’s fight and realized that it was pointless to resist the inevitable. Either way, he schemes like a “Scooby-Doo” villain to get the pair together, even going so far as to pull the old “fake apology note from the other person” gag from that episode where Fred and Daphne got in an argument and weren’t speaking. Lo and behold, the plan works even on non-cartoons, and the two go at it like horny badgers. Pretty soon, Haley’s sure-fire, albeit creepy, way to get A’s (AKA “Hooking Teachers Up With Your Mom”), which he codenames “Pay It Forward,” spreads through schools like wildfire. Teachers are getting laid right and left. Grade point averages are at historic highs. Wars end, tax revenues skyrocket from all the birth control and “gold star” sticker sales, and the world enters a new renaissance. Who knew?

Unfortunately, though, Haley’s not around to enjoy it all, because he was fatally wounded in a knife fight. Whoops! Apparently the filmmakers wanted to remind the audience that helping your mom score has a downside. Not since Bobby walked out of the shower on “Dallas” has Hollywood tried so hard to harsh the audience’s buzz. I’m surprised more films haven’t borrowed the technique:

BATMAN: Whew. Sure was tough beating the Joker. Guess I’ll go get a burger. [Gets hit by a bus.]

I predict that by 2010, all movies will end this way. Just you watch.

So, two hours later, where are we? Haley’s dead, and his mom still has awful hair, and Mr. Simonet has to put up with every C student in the school trying to set him up with their mom. Pay it forward, indeed. You know, all of this could have been avoided if Spacey had just worn a halter top like I suggested in the first place.

Dispirited

In the months leading up to its release, FINAL FANTASY: THE SPIRITS WITHIN, based on the long-running video game series, was hailed as a wonder of technological achievement. Reports surfaced that dozens of programmers spent more than a year animating just the lead character’s hair, while other sources claimed that the programmers took about three weeks to do the hair, and spent the rest of the year trying to look busy when anyone was looking. Regardless, with a four year development period, at a cost more than $130 million, FF arrived as the most ambitious video game adaptation ever created. Subsequently, when the film made an estimated -4 cents its opening weekend, a lot of hopes were dashed, not the least of which were those of little Billy Daniels, age six, who was forced to resign as Columbia Pictures’ Head Accountant.

What went wrong? Were audiences turned off by the director’s bold, innovative use of tedium as a central component of his action movie? Or was it the reviews from the likes of Gene Shalit (who called the film “a giant, steaming bag of mouse puke”), Kenneth Turan (“like a scenic tour through Hitler’s colon”), and Roger Ebert, who famously quipped that the film made him want to savagely beat a mime to death with his bare hands, just to feel alive inside again? (That summer’s string of brutal street mime deaths in the Chicago area were later proven to be a complete coincidence, and hilarious.)

That said, FINAL FANTASY is far from the worst-received video game adaptation ever to hit the screen. Many were quickly produced to cash in on fads, while others were so awful that they never even made it to production. Here are some of the worst of the worst…

CASTLEVANIA: A lone hero takes on the most horrific being ever to walk the earth, a timeless, evil creature, a destroyer of countless men. Long in development, the film actually stalled long before the release of FF when producers were unable to negotiate a reasonable fee for Cher’s likeness.

DONKEY KONG: Shortly after the “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” craze of the late 90s, Warner Bros. developed a game show where players attempted to answer a series of questions while an enraged ape threw barrels at them. The show was shelved in the United States over safety and animal rights concerns, but went on to be a huge success in Japan, where it goes by the name “Super Happy Bam-Bam Donkey Punch!”

SPIDER-MAN: THE MOVIE: THE GAME: THE MOVIE: Released direct-to-video, this film was actually just two solid hours of watching some kid (played by Kieran Culkin) attempt to beat this game, punctuated by surprisingly foul language that invokes, at various times, sex with animals, relatives, dead mimes, friends’ relatives, furniture, “the pan-roasted corpse of Pia Zadora,” Dickens characters, and even very small rocks. In one of the more pointless wastes of money in cinema history, producers actually commissioned their own version of “Spider-Man: The Movie: The Game” for the film.

MIKE TYSON’S PUNCH-OUT: Produced almost two decades after the original game hit the streets, this movie is little more than a video of a destitute Mike Tyson offering to beat up random strangers on the streets of Prague for money. Perhaps unsurprisingly, people get beat up regardless of their decision.

DIG DUG: Deviating considerably from the source material, apparently someone at Paramount thought that audiences desperately wanted to see a short, fat man (Danny DeVito) fight crime using a bicycle pump.

CONTRA: This little-seen documentary attempts to prove that President George H. W. Bush was involved in giving power-ups and extra lives to the Nicaraguan rebels.

BLADES OF STEEL: With no plot to speak of, this project went through dozens of scripts before producers realized that most of the original game’s appeal stemmed from getting into fights and hearing the occasional awkward, synthesized speech from the Nintendo. The resulting plot found a group of former boxers who are drafted by a failing hockey franchise owned by a tobacco company. The fight-prone players all get throat cancer and have to use electronic voice boxes. In an effort to be socially conscious, one of the boxers turns out to be a gay robot astronaut from the future.