In 1955, ten-year-old Lewis Barnavelt (Owen Vaccaro) moves in with his uncle Jonathan (Jack Black) in his mysterious old house. Recently orphaned, Lewis struggles with trying to balance making friends at his new school and the realization that his uncle is a warlock (n. male witch).
Our Take: If you have children, it’s a decent way to spend 104 minutes of your weekend.
Post-credit scene? No, but the credit animations are adorable.
Two popular action stars with vastly different styles and backgrounds. Dwayne Johnson seems to be in everything these days and for good reason: he emulates all you want in an action star and always has. Chris Pratt, on the other hand, is the antithesis of action film hero and perhaps that’s what we used to find so endearing about him being cast in big films like this. But while the reign of Dwayne Johnson might be faltering just slightly, it seems that Chris Pratt’s time in the sun will soon be over.
These films have a lot of other things in common too, though. Ridiculously expensive and ill-advised man-made creations are being attacked by bad guys with foreign accents. Rescue operations are being conducted by the aforementioned hunky male protagonists. There are very expensive CGI budgets for all the fire and explosions they feature. And both require a great deal of suspension of disbelief. (To be honest, the plot of Jurassic World is more believable than the plot of Skyscraper. And that’s sad because JWFK is about dinosaurs.)
Double Take: In the end, neither of these films is really worth the money spent on their CGI budgets, much less on paying the big-name headliners that anchored them. Don’t waste your time watching either.
In 1979, young Donna, Tanya, and Rosie graduate from Oxford University — leaving Donna free to embark on a series of adventures throughout Europe. On her journeys, she makes the acquaintances of Harry, Bill, and Sam — the latter of whom she falls in love with, but he’s also the man who breaks her heart. In the present day, Donna’s pregnant daughter, Sophie, dreams of renovating a taverna while reuniting with her mother’s old friends and boyfriends on the Greek island of Kalokairi.
Our Take: See it. And then go see it again. And then get the DVD and…watch it again. Because it’s not called Mamma Mia: Here We Go Once.
Post-credit scene? Yes.
During a tough point in his life, foulmouthed mercenary Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) meets Russell (Julian Dennison), a teen mutant angry with the world. When Russell becomes the target of Cable (Josh Brolin) — a supersoldier from the future — Deadpool has to put his pain and anger aside to save Russell.
Our Take: You’ll buy it because you think you need it for your collection, but we all know you’re only ever going to watch the digital copy the Blu-ray comes with.
Post-credit scene? No
Smash and Nasty go to the movies 