Horton Hears a Who! (**3/4)

On the fifteenth of March, a theater was where,
I saw Dr. Seuss as animated fare,
Horton’s an elephant, as you probably know,
With voice by Jim Carrey, he’s the star of the show,

What Horton hears is a barely heard yelp,
A speck on a clover is calling for help,
And so Horton tries to help out a bit,
But all of the others think he’s just full of it

Now more plot is needed than supplied by the book,
So Whoville's wee mayor gets a much longer look,
Seuss’s cartoon version took a half hour on TV
This remake seemed padded, a bit long to me

Just as Horton makes folks apoplectic,
Whoville’s mayor finds everyone a skeptic,
Each can’t convince folks of the other’s existence,
Ideas they can’t see, are met with resistance

The villain kangaroo’s played by Carol Burnett,
Her henchman’s an eagle, voiced by Will Arnett
The mayor’s shrill voice is that of Steve Carrell,
Who sounds too Dana Carvey, but otherwise does well

The movie’s no classic, but it’s better by far
Than Cat in the Hat, which was clearly subpar,
Though true to the book, from what I’ve seen,
It’s better to read than to see onscreen.

viewed 3/15/08; review posted 3/19/08

IMDB link

The Protector (**3/4)

? A pissed-off Thai guy (Tony Jaa) heads for Sydney to recover his stolen elephants and kick some Aussie butt.

+ The obviously incredibly skilled Jaa uses fists, feet and the occasional weapon to face off against an amazing array of opponents, including the seven-foot Nathan Jones, who appears concurrently in Jet Li’s Fearless. All of the very many apparent broken bones mustn’t be real, but it looks close enough. The stolen-elephant idea seems novel.

- There’s a back story mentioning some family lore and explaining how the elephants are supposed to provide power to the king and are supposed to be protected and all, but basically everything else is just an excuse for the numerous fight scenes. Jaa is great at fighting but not the most expressive actor. Half of the Aussies sound more like Americans. The villains are supposed to have half the Sydney police force in their pockets but can’t even find a gun to shoot the hero. The editing is clumsy. And so on.

= **3/4 Nothing to recommend except the fight scenes. But the fight scenes are very impressive.

IMDb link