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‘Planes: Fire and Rescue’ – poor characters, lackluster voice-acting, flimsy story, and overall cheap feel

There’s a moment in Planes: Fire and Rescue where one of the sentient vehicles is prompted to “drop the needle.” The request is followed by a series of quick cuts: a small anthropomorphic forklift pulls out a record from its sleeve, slams in onto a turntable, and lowers the tonearm. Then, the unmistakable infinite-hammer-on riff to AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck” appears on the soundtrack, accompanying a getting-ready-to-slay-a-fire montage sequence.

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‘Planes’ a limp and uninspired entry in the ‘Cars’ universe

The story goes, per a five-part PBS documentary back in the early 2000s about the history of the Broadway musical, that when Andrew Lloyd Webber was shopping around Cats to be performed and produced in the United States, he reached out to iconic producer/director/Stephen Sondheim collaborator Harold Prince. Webber pitched Prince on Cats, inspired by T.S. Eliot’s book of feline-centric poetry, and when he was finished, Prince admitted to not grasping the deeper metaphor. Were the cats representative of the English class system? Was one of the cats a member of the royal family? What piece had Prince not figured out yet, he wondered. Webber paused, then said, “Hal. It’s about cats.”

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‘Identity Thief’ a grating, unfunny, and mean-spirited road-trip comedy

Identity Thief Directed by Seth Gordon Written by Craig Mazin USA, 2013 Identity Thief is the latest in a disturbingly long line of mainstream American comedies that requires both its audience and its “normal” leading characters to fall under a form of Stockholm Syndrome. These movies shove a straitlaced man or woman with someone who’s …

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