I have tried to tune out the entertainment “news,” such as it is, this week. I may have gotten my wires crossed on this one, but is it true some theaters in Kentucky are boycotting films because of Darth Vader’s involvement in the Vietnam War? That’s a shame. If these prequels have shown us anything, it’s that he deserves a break. How would you like to have been Hayden Christensen in your early life? Heartbreaking. But enough of the news and pathos, I move on to the DVD reviews.

Kinsey
I missed this once last week. Perhaps I mistook it for a Star Wars prequel prequel—Qui-Gon tinkers around with the homosexual side of the force. In all seriousness, there’s nothing terribly wrong with this movie; nothing terribly notable about it either. Your standard brilliant mind/tortured soul run through the theater. I think we’re more in need of a movie studying our current hobbled sexuality, which explodes in the most bizarre ways—“all-Playmate Fear Factor,” anyone? But if I were going to remake every film I wanted to have been different, I would probably make them all non-existent. Leaving myself out of a job. So let’s move on.

The Aviator
A long-awaited Oscar contender finally comes to DVD, where everyone can finally realize the hype wasn’t worth it. Not Star Wars-quality over-hype, but not worth the adulation. Not quite the “brilliant mind/tortured soul” formula, more like “half-insane/tortured soul.” The Academy really loved this mash letter to old Hollywood, but then, last year everyone was Hobbitt-crazy. Hollywood prefers its characters far more fictional. Watch for Cate Blanchett in a strangely shake-free impression of Katherine Hepburn.

Pooh’s Heffalump Movie
Winnie the Pooh was neutered, bland entertainment back when kids were used to seeing people get murdered and beaten to death in their cartoons. Yet somehow, even in this day and age, when all children’s entertainment is castrated, Pooh remains duller than ever. The audiences at a showing of Pooh’s Heffalump Movie were in a catatonic state children haven’t been seen in since TeleTubbies left the air. I myself was nearly lost forever to this film’s coma-inducing power, but the cleaning lady happened to pull the plug while vacuuming, freeing me from its spell. I warn you all not to rent it, and whatever you do, do not mix it with alcohol or medication.

The Boogeyman
Speaking of dullness. Like you all, when I was younger, my parents told me horrifying tales about a movie this awful being under my bed. A horror movie so atrocious it couldn’t even make an old man with loose bladder syndrome wet himself. I can think of no excusable reason to see this movie. If you take a date to it, he or she will think you are afraid of real horror movies, and couldn’t get a ticket to Heffalump. If you are caught vandalizing mailboxes and assigned to six months in jail or seeing this movie, I can guarantee you the jail time will pass faster. You are also likely to find more feminine creatures in the joint than Lucy Lawless.

That’s all for this week. And please, Southern theater owners, forgive Darth Vader already. For all his questionable behavior in the 1960s, at least his films contain almost epileptic action sequences that keep you from drifting away into limbo. If you can’t do a good movie, at least make a kinetic one.