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SIGNS There's been much discussion about how the unofficial cinematic theme of the summer has been father-son relations (Road to Perdition, Minority Report, Austin Powers In Goldmember), but it seems to me that the unofficial theme of the entire year has been the ability of deceased wives to reach out from beyond the grave to offer guidance to their emotionally floundering spouses. Like The Mothman Prophecies and Dragonfly, the latest yarn from writer-director M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense) is at heart a story about a man, in this case a former reverend (Mel Gibson), whose faith is tested after the loss of his wife but who slowly comes around once he opens his mind to the possibilities of supernatural intervention. Yet since that plotline won't have 'em lining up at the box office, Shyamalan wraps his metaphysical musings around a rickety story about how the crop markings in Gibson's corn fields might be early clues that an extra-terrestrial invasion might be imminent. As long as Shyamalan keeps his film swathed in shadows, it achieves its goal, with the director's understated style and Gibson's strong performance working nicely in tandem with the overall air of ambiguity. But once matters are spelled out in the second half (think Independence Day without a budget), the movie loses its potency, limping its way toward a highly contrived finale that's supposed to tie everything neatly together but instead merely comes off as Shyamalan's latest desperate attempt to one-up the twist ending of The Sixth Sense. 
1/2
SIMONE Certainly the oddest picture to come out of Hollywood this summer, Simone stars Al Pacino as Viktor Taransky, a self-important but sincere director whose precarious community standing tumbles even further when his leading lady (Winona Ryder) walks off the set of his latest picture. All seems doomed until an inventor (Elias Koteas) provides him with a computer program that allows him to "create" a new lead for his film: an artificial being named Simone (an uncredited turn by model Rachel Roberts) that he's able to digitally insert into his movies. Soon, Simone turns out to be an international sensation, meaning Viktor has to work overtime to prevent anyone from discovering that this actress isn't even a real person. The extent of each individual filmgoer's charitable assessment of the picture will eventually determine their overall enjoyment, as Simone can be viewed from more than one angle. Is it an obvious and overblown comedy blissfully unaware of its own ludicrous plot twists, or is it a sharp satire that beautifully skewers our society's desperate need to worship at the altar of stardom? In other words, is writer-director Andrew Niccol aware that the movies Viktor makes look truly awful, and that Simone has no more personality or acting ability than your average bland supermodel (in which case the movie's mocking our susceptibility to manufactured goods), or does he mean for us to take the components of his film seriously (in which case he's as clueless as the masses he derides)? Considering Niccol wrote the razor-sharp The Truman Show, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, but the result is still only partly successful, with some solid laughs scattered throughout a herky-jerky piece that remains more clever in theory than execution. 1/2
SPY KIDS 2: THE ISLAND OF LOST DREAMS Until Shrek came along and conquered all, 2001's biggest commercial and critical success in the family film sector was Robert Rodriguez's Spy Kids, which owed more to Roald Dahl and Dr. Seuss (not to mention the 007 canon) than the standard live-action Disney flicks. Spy Kids 2 is a spirited attempt to recapture the first film's offbeat appeal, but this time the results, while still enjoyable, are decidedly less satisfying. Practically the entire original cast returns for this outing (albeit some in glorified cameos), which finds the members of the Cortez family -- parents Gregorio (Antonio Banderas) and Ingrid (Carla Gugino) and kids Carmen (Alexa Vega) and Juni (Daryl Sabara) -- investigating the mysterious occurrences revolving around an island that's inhabited by a meek scientist (Steve Buscemi) and his mutated creations. If anything, Spy Kids 2 is bursting at the seams with even more gadgetry and more eccentric characters than its predecessor, but rather than building on the sense of wonder and fun, this overstuffing only slows the picture down; for example, did we really need to add the siblings' secret agent grandparents (Ricardo Montalban and Holland Taylor) to the mix, especially since they're given so little to do and could have easily been excised from the final product? The kids and their parents are still appealing, though, and some of the special effects (such as those animated skeletons) pay satisfying homage to the fantasy flicks of the great FX innovator Ray Harryhausen. 1/2
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