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Friday, December 12, 2008 12:00 AM

"The Day the Earth Stood Still"

This supremely lame update of the sci-fi classic, starring Keanu Reeves, is assembled out of bits of every movie where an unknown whatzit threatens our way of life.

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Thursday, December 11, 2008 07:38 PM

And Ringo Starr appears where?

Science fiction is too important to be left to Hollywood sleaze merchants, especially ones with big budgets. I've felt for a long time that the Michael Rennie original could be redone, but that it would take more imagination than I've seen displayed in any mainstream scifi film, ever--and that goes for anything from Spielberg or Lucas.

The remake should've been tasked to some lean, hungry outsider with a real love for classic SF. Instead, if O'Hehir's review is accurate, we get CGI and what passes for humanoid emotion these days.

I still plan on seeing this--maybe some shred of the original, which is an essential experience, remains. I suspect that Mr. O'Hehir, like most non-SF people, has little patience with the rather elaborate suspension-of-belief mechanism needed to get through the door with most SF. But for devotees it's worth the cover charge.

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