The Last Airbender was way too long, too slowly-paced, especially the action sequences, and on top of being a very boring film, it was also very sloppy.

I knew my kids weren’t liking the film because they were very fidgety and kept asking me questions — not their usual behavior during a movie they like. And the fate was sealed when my 7-year-old turned to me when the credits rolled and said, “Mom, that was long.” This from a kid who waited in line for an hour to see Avatar on opening day (without complaining) — and then sat through the entire running time of 2.5 hours enthralled with all the 3D Blueness. Not so with Airbender.

The Last Airbender is an amazing story — a huge sweeping epic, with characters who have amazing powers — and it was absolutely ruined by this movie. I don’t know who’s responsible, but I hope whoever made it so crummy doesn’t get to make the rest of the franchise.

Kenneth Turan, of the Los Angeles Times, says it’s a film only a 10-year-old could like, but I can assure you, my 10-year-old did not.

The movie opens with text scrolling by, explaining the backstory, which immediately bored me. I mean, they had the rights to the animated show — they could have done an animation to illustrate the backstory and lead into the film. But alas, no. Sloppy Number One.

Then, once Aang, the Avatar, is discovered by the very nice Southern Water Tribe kids and brought back to their village to warm up, Sloppy Number Two happens: Katara walks in, and in the very first close-up shot of Aang, asks him if he’s still upset — which makes no sense because we’ve only seen him unconscious, not upset, in the previous scene. Sloppy.

There are numerous annoying shots where they hold the background out of focus for way too long — but that is a personal pet peeve, not really a Sloppy. It just annoyed me.

I know there are people boycotting the film because of the casting — the film used Caucasian actors for the “good guys” and Asian and actors of other ethnicities for the “bad guy” roles — and it was quite striking, especially the Grandmother in the Southern Water Tribe: so white! I guess it was part of the sloppiness — Bad Casting.

Anyway, the point being: there are plenty of reasons to boycott this movie.

If you like your Greek Mythology as much as I do, you’ll love Percy Jackson And The Olympians: The Lightning Thief. And if, like my kids, you’ve never even heard of a Greek Myth, you’ll still love this movie. It’s full of plenty of action and special effects, and the characters are great.

The movie was released in February, but the DVD & Blu-Ray come out today (6/29), so you can now enjoy all the mayhem and mythology at home. The film stars Logan Lerman as Percy Jackson, the demi-god son of Poseidon, and he’s a great choice. He’s a little bit adorable, but not so over the top that the movie becomes a total drool fest. Percy must set off on a quest to find and return a very special lightning bolt to its rightful owner, Zeus, who mistakenly thinks Percy has stolen it. (Long story — but watch the movie to find out who really stole it.) He’s accompanied by Annabeth (played by Alexandra Daddario), the demi-goddess daughter of Athena (and a terrific warrior) and Grover, a satyr who’s been masquerading as Percy’s best bud for years in order to protect him – and Brandon T. Jackson is excellent – he’s funny without becoming ridiculous comic relief, especially considering he spends the entire movie either on crutches or goat legs. Percy and Annabeth have a little flirtation going, but it doesn’t play out as a romance, which keeps this film more appealing to slightly younger kids, like my 7 and 10-year olds.

Of course the quest takes many turns and the three intrepid teenagers must travel far and face many harrowing challenges – all the while keeping my kids’ interest and mine – AND keeping a PG rating. It’s very exciting and the special effects are great.

My 7-year-old loved the cool gadgets Percy is given in order to fight off attackers, like what appears to be a ball point pen but actually turns out to be a sword when you click it. Or the shield that articulates out when necessary. Very Fun Stuff.

My 10-year-old liked the Medusa scene best, and I can’t blame him: a woman’s head covered in snakes is very compelling, after all.

I loved being reminded of all the myths I loved as a kid – and the things I might have forgotten – like if you cut off a Hydra’s head, apparently 2 grow back in it’s place, so you gotta watch out for that.

And I really loved all the fantastic cameos by terrific actors along the way: Pierce Brosnan plays a centaur named Chiron who’s been passing himself off as a paraplegic teacher of Percy’s in order to keep an eye on him. When he finally can be his true self, in the demi-god woodland safe house and training grounds where they hang out – he is resplendent in his horsiness. It’s hilarious and I have to respect anyone who’d go from James Bond to “horse’s ass”, as he refers to himself in the film. (Totally off-topic, did you know that Pierce Brosnan designed the Spay & Neuter license plate for California? He did. Check it out.)

More cameos: Uma Thurman plays the coolest Medusa in all of cinema history, I feel pretty safe saying – she looked AMAZING, even with the snake-do. Steve Coogan plays a very funny Hades and Rosario Dawson is his self-actualized sometime prisoner Persephone. Catherine Keener is Percy’s mortal mother, still carrying a torch for Poseidon, but married as a cover to a very smelly Joe Pantoliano.

And in a very nice touch, Melina Kanakaredes plays Athena, Annabeth’s mother, and possibly the only Greek in the entire cast. She is perfect as Athena — just as I always pictured her. We can all recommend this movie very easily — and on DVD and Blu-Ray you’ll get extras like deleted scenes.

{FULL DISCLOSURE} {I was given the DVD to review and given permission to post these photographs from 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment.}

I was raised without any religion, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t thought about Why We’re Here. Practically daily. Apparently, even being raised Episcopal (“Catholic Light”, according to the him), filmmaker Roger Nygard also spent time wondering about the Nature of Existence, hence the documentary of the same name he spent 5 years making.The film explores Nygard’s own search for meaning in his life, and he takes the viewer on a trip around the world and through many spiritual, religious and scientific paths to see how other people answer the same question: Why Are We Here? (Plus he then went on to ask 84 more questions of everyone he interviewed. All 85 questions are on the film’s website and you can answer them for yourself.)

I’ve known Roger for over 20 years, having worked on his first short film, and honestly, at the time, I had no idea he even thought about stuff like this. He was pretty focused on getting the film made at the time and I realize that does take focus. But in the years since, I’ve watched Roger grow as a filmmaker, and I really think documentaries are his niche. He has the ability to present slightly strange (and often VERY strange) people and their passions and prediclitions — and not make fun of them. Witness the Klingon Language School scenes in Trekkies for an example.

In The Nature of Existence, Roger showcases people with beliefs that are all over the proverbial map, and yet each person is treated with dignity. It’s a nice touch. But don’t get me wrong, there are still some truly strange moments and characters in the film, and plenty of laughter.

The film lets the viewers come to their own conclusions about their own Reasons For Being, of course, this is not a propaganda piece — but it’s clear that filmmaker Roger Nygard also came to his own conclusions about why he’s here.

My only complaint about the film is that the pacing is too fast: It’s boom-boom-boom, no pausing for reflection between presentations of ideas. But the truth is, that’s the Nature of Roger’s own Existence — he’s a fast-paced guy, looking for answers and in a hurry to get them.

I showed the movie to my kids to see what they would make of it all. Turns out it’s true what all those research books say about kids’ brains — very concrete at this age. Abstract concepts like God and afterlife are expressed in very black and white, simplistic terms and the subtleties are pretty much lost. But I’m happy to have started the ball rolling by watching the film with them. I am all about letting my kids ask questions, and they had plenty after this movie. Mostly about why we don’t go to church on Sundays.

Which is the topic for another post, another day.

The Nature of Existence opens in select theaters this Friday, June 18th, and in Los Angeles on June 30th.

If you have a Wii and a wireless broadband internet connection in your house, you can subscribe to Netflix’s new on-demand movie and TV service. We were already Netflix subscribers and we have a Wii and the wifi, so we were able to start right up. And we highly recommend it — even the Mar Vista Dad got in on this one.The good: you can instantly watch anything Netflix has in its Instant View list, and the picture quality has been great for us so far.

The bad: The Instant View list is kind of short, shorter than their regular list. And an annoying thing — it seems to change every day. One day there was SpongeBob Season 2 available, then the next day it was gone and Season 3 was there instead. Fine for me, rotten for my 7-year-old who wanted to watch the same episode again (and again).

On balance, it’s still very cool and I am glad we have it. I can’t compare it to other on-demand services because I don’t have those. If you do, please leave a comment below and we’ll compare.

PS — if you need help connecting your Wii to the internet, this is a very handy video tutorial Nintendo produced.

Imagine this: you’ll never have to look for the remote control ever again. Sound good? Well I have seen the future and it is XBox 360 Project Natal. No remotes; not necessary. Just use your hands. And arms. And legs. And the rest of your body.

The Xbox 360 Project Natal system has a sensor that reads your body and responds to your movements. It’s really amazing to watch it in action — take a look for yourself as my son tries it out at the demo event we were invited to: 

And here are a couple of stills of the action of each of my sons getting into the game. It’s still in demo mode at this point, but it’s coming for Holiday 2010 and I’m really looking forward to seeing what they’ve got in store for it. It really gets you up off the couch, that’s for sure. Could be a great way to be indoors and still be active.

Stay tuned.

{FULL DISCLOSURE} {The Xbox 360 people hosted us for a demo of the game system where we shot this video on an adorable FlipCam they gave us. They also took the photos and gave me permission to post them here. As always, my opinions are my own and have not been influenced by any compensation.}

Konami invited a group of mom bloggers and our kids over to take a look at their games. I realized that they have basically two categories of games — Kid-Friendly and Not Kid-Friendly. We only got a glimpse of the Not Kid-Friendly ones — because they’ve apparently won awards for them and have the awards displayed in their offices — we didn’t see or play them, because , need I say it? Not kid-friendly.

Anyway, the Konami Kid-Friendly games are pretty fun, and very appropriate. The two we liked the best were Dance, Dance Revolution and Karaoke Revolution. They also have Frogger and Storybook Workshop, but those didn’t really appeal to my kids. Dance Dance Revolution is very fun to play and is kind of tricky if you’re not on the beat! You get a floor mat to go with it to be able to play. It’s very fun and I could see it being a hit for a playdate or party. Same with Karaoke Revolution: fun for a group and somewhat tricky if you don’t already know most of the words to the song. But that’s what also makes it fun — messing up a little bit!

Thanks to Konami for showing us their games and for providing these pictures!

Avatar was released on DVD on Earth Day, which you probably know unless you were out of town on Pandora last week, and my kids and I were given a copy to review. Well, here goes: We love this movie!! Even on DVD, even on our puny TV set, even though it’s not in 3D. We all love this movie. We stood in line at the theater on opening day last December because we were so excited for it to come out and we were thrilled with the 3D — it was truly magical. And the DVD does not disappoint, even though it’s only 2D. The story is still gut-wrenching (there are tears shed when Home Tree falls — and not just by me) and exciting (who among us can resist a blue guy flying in on a giant red dragon?). It’s sure to be watched many, many times in our house. What’s very cool about the DVD launch is that Fox has also launched the Home Tree Initiative and aims to plant 1 million trees worldwide  – here on Earth. We were invited to watch James Cameron, the writer/director/producer, and Jon Landau, the producer, (among others, including CCH Pounder, pictured above) participate in the ceremonial planting of the first tree in North America as part of said initiative, and while there, Charlie got to ask them some questions. He got to ask 2 questions of Jon Landau, the first was, “How did you like working with James Cameron?” And here is Mr. Landau’s response:

Then he got to ask James Cameron a question, “How’d you get inspiration for writing the script for Avatar?”

Great questions, Charlie! Nice job! And now it’s time for mom to Avatar-ize:

Photos provided by me and Fox Home Entertainment, video provided by Charlie.

I recently finished reading The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart with my kids and 2 of us have declared it a fantastic book. My 10-year-old and I both loved it, but my 7-year-old wasn’t that enthralled. He still prefers books that have illustrations and this is a real-live chapter book.

The story is a bit bleak, with a genius madman named Mr. Curtain who’s trying to take over the world with evil mind-control methods. But the protagonists are 4 kids who never intended to be, but must become, super secret agents in miniature! They each have a special skill which they employ at just the right time to get them out of a tight spot. There’s Reynie, Kate, Sticky and Constance, who are all recruited for the dangerous yet vital work of saving the world by Mr. Benedict.

There are fantastic characters, mayhem, peril and no shortage of adventure. And the cliff-hanger chapter ends are very exciting! More than once, we stayed up a little bit extra late to read on.

We were overjoyed to have found that it’s the first of a series, and so we’re deep into book number two: The Mysterious Benedict Society and The Perilous Journey. Then comes book three: The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Prisoner’s Dilemma. Can’t wait!

The Chipmunks are back in a Squeakquel and it’s now out on DVD – and this time they’ve been joined by the Chipettes. My kids and I have seen the Squeakquel, and they really love it. They thought the little furry creatures were cute and funny and they loved seeing the Chipettes doing “Single Ladies”. I think it’s really not very good, but the movie was meant for the kids, not me.  I recently had the chance to speak with Director Betty Thomas, which was a bit of a trip in a time machine. Back in my former life, the one prior to having children, I was a Script Supervisor and actually worked 2nd unit on Dr. Doolittle, which Ms. Thomas also directed. The state of visual effects art has come a long way since Eddie Murphy needed to act with a tennis ball in place of the Tiger they would add in later in post. In the Squeakquel, the actors would rehearse their scenes with stuffed animals (affectionately known as the “Stuffies”) and then they shot the scenes with nothing there so that the visual effects team could digitally animate in the Chipmunks and Chipettes later. They didn’t even run a 2nd Unit. Things have sure changed since I was “in the Biz.”