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MAN ON FIRE This is a remake of a forgotten 1987 flick starring Scott Glenn; that version barely ran 90 minutes, and it's a sign of director Tony Scott's arrogance that this ugly revamping clocks in at 140 minutes. The movie starts off OK, with Denzel Washington effectively cast as a former government assassin whose constant boozing is interrupted once he agrees to serve as the bodyguard for an American girl (Dakota Fanning) living with her parents in Mexico City. Scott's meaningless stylistics immediately grate on the nerves, but the strong work by Washington and Fanning -- and the bond they create together -- cuts through all the hipster b.s. and draws us into the picture. But once the child gets kidnapped and is then believed to be dead, this turns into a tedious revenge yarn. 
1/2
MEAN GIRLS Like Heathers and Clueless, here's that rare teen comedy that refuses to be pigeonholed as a teen comedy. Even more remarkably, it's also that rare Saturday Night Live-sanctioned film that's actually funny. Scripter Tina Fey elected to adapt Rosalind Wiseman's Queen Bees and Wannabes, along the way turning a nonfiction book into a fictional story spiced up with her own pithy, piercing observations. Lindsay Lohan stars as a naive teen who, upon making her public school debut after a lifetime of home-schooling, finds herself being courted by the "bitch-goddess" crowd. Director Mark Waters and Lohan previously worked together on the Freaky Friday remake; I'm not prepared to elevate them to the level of Kurosawa-Mifune or Scorsese-De Niro, but they've clearly got a good thing going.
RAISING HELEN Director Garry Marshall makes shiny, happy movies for shiny, happy people -- even Exit to Eden, a film about S&M, turned out to be about as threatening as a butterfly with a broken wing. Therefore, the plot of Raising Helen alone is enough to break even the most hardened of criminals and leave him blubbering in the corner: It's about a perky modeling agency executive who's forced to change her fast-lane lifestyle after her sister dies and leaves her in charge of her three children. The film is the sort of sitcom-by-way-of-Hallmark material we can expect from Marshall, yet it's marginally easier to take than one would expect from this reliably clumsy moviemaker -- for that, he can thank Kate Hudson and especially Joan Cusack for contributing with conviction. 1/2
SHREK 2 While most sequels slide down that slippery slope of diminishing quality, the eagerly awaited Shrek 2 is on a par with its predecessor. In this outing, newlywed ogres Shrek (voiced by Mike Myers) and Fiona (Cameron Diaz), with the self-professed "annoying talking animal sidekick" Donkey (Eddie Murphy) in tow, travel to the Kingdom of Far, Far Away to receive the blessing of Fiona's human parents, King Harold (John Cleese) and Queen Lillian (Julie Andrews). Little kids will enjoy the colorful characters, while older audiences will dig the inspired sight gags and sly references to other films. But the movie's real ace is Puss In Boots (Antonio Banderas), a debonair swashbuckler -- or at least when he's not busy coughing up hairballs. In a movie filled with imaginative bits, he emerges as the cat's meow.
SOUL PLANE As punishing as a four-hour flight delay. Bland Kevin Hart stars as a young man who, after winning millions in a lawsuit against a major airline, decides to use the settlement to create his own afro-centric company, NWA Airlines. The maiden voyage (Flight 069 -- how ingenious!) is packed with nothing but formulaic figures: a dope-smoking pilot (Snoop Dogg), a randy homosexual flight attendant (Gary Anthony Williams), a dope-smoking lavatory assistant (D.L. Hughley), a randy security guard (Mo'nique), and a white nerd (Tom Arnold) who's actually named "Elvis Hunkee" (pronounced "honky," of course). Writers Bo Zenga and Chuck Wilson should be ashamed of themselves, not only for a lazy script that staggers between brain dead crudity and cheap sentiment but also for reinforcing infinite stereotypes.
13 GOING ON 30 Starting off in 1987, this engaging comedy centers around 13-year-old Jenna Rink, an awkward girl whose only desire is to be "thirty, flirty and thriving." She magically gets her wish granted, waking up in 2004 at the age of 30 and not remembering anything that has transpired over the course of the last 17 years. As she begins to piece together the missing years, she realizes that she doesn't like the person she's become. Jennifer Garner, the versatile star of Alias, is irresistible here -- she possesses the flair and instincts of a screwball comedienne -- and if her performance ultimately isn't quite as moving as Tom Hanks' in the thematically similar Big, that might be because the script by Josh Goldsmith and Cathy Yuspa doesn't delve as deeply into the dark side of being a child trapped in a grownup's body.
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