Will Smith is trying to reclaim his throne as the July 4 killer. For a few years, his movies dominated the Independence Day holiday weekend for movie grosses. While his latest movie will probably do that by default (Men in Black was such a popular movie), many will leave the movie at least a bit disappointed.
In the second movie, Agent Jay (Will Smith) is assigned to a job that brings back people who Agent Kay (Tommy Lee Jones) had thought he had finished dealing with 25 years ago. Kay, who had his memory removed after he retired from the Men in Black five years ago, has his memory revived by Jay and they work as a team again to deal with aliens trying to get back the light of Zartha, played by Lara Flynn Boyle and Johnny Knoxville.
The movie itself is light, which is nice to kick back and enjoy during the summer, but there is a taste left in your mouth at the end of the movie that this was mainly planned to jump start Will Smith’s singing and acting career again and get an extra $100 mil.
Product placement is obvious; a Sprint Store and Burger King are featured prominently within the Men in Black base, with Lara Flynn Boyle eating a Whopper during one scene and asking the head of the Men in Black to “make a call” using a Sprint phone in various places of the movie.
The movie’s comedy falls flat in some areas, while it succeeds in others. The movie’s special effects, as expected, are top notch, but anything less than that would be just unacceptable. The plot itself moves quickly, but that’s because there’s not much to it. It could’ve been shot as a half-hour cartoon just as easily.
Overall, the 90-minute movie’s ticket price is probably only worth it as a matinee. However, it’s still a nice relaxing break in an air-conditioned theater with the computer animation opening telling you to shut off your cell phone. Odd, considering how prominent Sprint is in the movie.
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