In a near-empty Northfork orphanage, Father Harlan gently tends to Irwin, an eight-year-old who lies between a dream state and death. As orphanage caretaker Harlan reads aloud about Northfork’s years-ago forced evacuation to make way for a hydro-electric dam, Irwin’s imagination takes flight. While a team of six men evacuate the last remaining citizens of the town, Irwin, too, invents a cast of characters to prepare himself for his own evacuation. (the above states the caretaker - who is actually the priest - is reading about a years-ago evacuation. In the movie, the evacuation is taking place as the boy lays dying!) Written by Sujit R. Varma

This lavish small-screen adaptation of Homer’s ancient epic–replete with exotic Maltese and Turkish locations, state-of-the-art special effects, and many bronzed muscles gleaming with sweat–chronicles the voyage home of a Trojan hero, Odysseus King of Ithaca, and includes many more scenes of his faithful, beautiful wife Penelope dodging leering suitors at home than Homer ever composed! Written by Anthony Pereyra {hypersonic91@yahoo.com}

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The Ghosts of Romantic Comedies Past must have visited writer/director Jeff Lowell as he pounded out the screenplay. Even if we haven’t witnessed these exact scenes before, we’ve watched enough movies with scenes just like them to know exactly how everything is going to play out.

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This witty tale of a young woman who’s the victim of an age-old family curse may sound like a chick flick but, truthfully, the humor, production design, and cast make this a film even guys can sit through without too much fidgeting. It’s fresh and fun, and while the lesson of the story isn’t subtle, it’s not so distracting as to make the film annoyingly preachy. The message is clothed in clever dialogue so while the film’s straightforward storyline is a simple one, Penelope manages to be entertaining even while pounding you over the head with its “I’m okay with myself” hammer.

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The main character (John Travolta) observes a strange light on his birthday at a bar. The following days he becomes very intell-i-gent and puts the intell-i-gence to good use in his community. When word gets around he becomes known as a freak and everyone wants to figure out why this happened to a car mechanic. The government also wants to get their hands on it to put it to other uses. Written by Ryan Taylor {raytay@psyber.com}

Hollywood’s really got a thing about threesomes this summer. Not content with a simple sequel, studios responsible for some of the major blockbusters have done their best to cash in on audience goodwill by setting highly anticipated number threes in the Spider-Man, Shrek, and Pirates of the Caribbean franchises upon audiences hungry to lose themselves in big screen fantasy adventures. Spider-Man 3 obliterated box office records even while critics blasted away at its many downfalls. Likewise Shrek the Third was met with less than stellar reviews and still broke a couple of box office records.

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Taken just at face value, “Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl” has a lot going against it. First, it’s loosely based on a popular Disney theme park ride - and tagging “The Curse of the Black Pearl” after the title doesn’t soften the initial blow. Secondly, it’s a pirate movie and that particular genre hasn’t done very well in the past 10 or so years. And finally, it’s hitting theaters at the same time as every other big effects/action drama seems to have chosen to set upon audiences.

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Sally and Gillian Owens have always known they were different. Raised by their aunts after their parents’ death, the sisters grew up in a household that was anything but typical–their aunts fed them chocolate cake for breakfast and taught them the uses of practical magic. But the invocation of the Owens’ sorcery also carries a price–some call it a curse: the men they fall in love with are doomed to an untimely death. Now adult women with very different personalities, the quiet Sally and the fiery Gillian must use all of their powers to fight the family curse and a swarm of supernatural forces that threatens the lives of all the Owens women. Written by WARNER BROS.

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Stuart Townsend, Marguerite Moreau, and Aaliyah combine talents in a blend of sex, vampire violence, pulsating rock rhythms, and erotic fantasy in director Michael Rymer’s vision of Anne Rice’s third novel in the “Vampire Chronicles.”

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