Journey to the Center of the Earth

From the desk of The Movie Snob

Journey to the Center of the Earth (B-). Yes, this weekend while everyone else was watching The Dark and Stormy Knight, I was seeing the new family-adventure movie starring the Kurt Russell of our day, Mr. Brendan Fraser (Encino Man). You know exactly what you're getting -- decent sequences of roller-coaster-like action, punctuated by corny dialogue and phony "family moments," in this case between intrepid scientist Trevor Anderson (Fraser), and his angsty nephew Sean (Josh Hutcherson, Zathura). Mix in a pretty Icelandic mountain hiking guide (Anita Briem, TV's The Tudors) and a quest deep into -- duh -- the center of the earth, and you have what you should expect: a decent, family-friendly B movie. It's rated PG for a reason, though; the littlest kids would be pretty terrified by some of the monsters and stuff. At least I would've been. Maybe kids are tougher today.


"Say, do all Icelander mountain hiking guides look like you? And why does this giant fossilized jawbone float on water, anyway?"