Broken Little Person Sitting On A Tree Limb

Starring: Josh Lucas, Jessica Biel, Jamie Foxx, Sam Shepard

Director: Rob Cohen

Studio: Columbia

Year: 2005

Alrighty then ...so you've got this top-secret military plan, see? And this entails having a top-secret three-person squadron that only goes on top-secret covert missions, see? And then you add to this squadron a top-secret fighter plane that's loaded with top-secret A-I to learn from the top-secret pilots so that eventually the ways of war can be conducted without having to throw humans into the fray, see? And when they're coming back from a top-secret mission the top-secret A-I plane is hit by lightning (I'm guessing with the existence of Doppler Radar the lightning wasn't so top-secret) and develops ......wait for it ......sentience and a self-identity. Yow ...brilliant! Oh no ...wait a minute ...boring, predictable, and repetitive! (I'm guessing Jamie Foxx signed on the dotted line for this one before he won his Oscar).

I had very modest hopes that there would be some level of originality in this, since the screenplay is by W.D. Richter (director of that cult-gem 'The Adventures Of Buckaroo Banzai: Across The Eighth Dimension'), but no ...no originality to be found here ...move along. Take 'Blue Thunder', mix it with 'Short Circuit', add a dose of 'Wargames', and stir in a too-small helping of a 'Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue Video' (since the only worthwhile bit of the film was a few minute segment of a bikini-clad Jessica Biel cavorting in an idyllic jungle setting) and you pretty much have this movie. Oh, and lest I forget, let's throw in the ingenious plot device of the top-secret black-ops base in Alaska that almost no one knows about, but interestingly enough the character played by Shepard (who is only at the level of captain) is not only aware of, but has enough of an in to divert someone there to get killed ...yeah, ingenious.

At least there were plenty of scenes of things getting blown up ...blowed 'em up good ...but even that eventually became boring. Oh well ...at least the popcorn was tasty.