His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass - 2007

What It Is: One of this year's slew of big budget fantasy films based on the book.

Why I Watched It: Battling polar bears!

What I Thought: The film was pretty enjoyable, but definitely not what I expected. I knew nothing of the story going in, so The Golden Compass was a pretty big surprise. It wasn't better or worse than I expected, just very, very different.

1. Daniel Craig should not have been listed in the top billing. He might have had a full five minutes of screen time. I was really looking forward to seeing him again, but it looks like I'll have to wait till the sequel.

2. The movie wasn't as much about epic fantasy combat (what they're all really about) as it was about rescuing kidnapped children from a secret lab. I kept being reminded of The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T and that was very, very unexpected.

3. The protagonist was compulsive liar. Seriously. The one girl to receive the magic truth-finding device was the one girl that couldn't tell the truth about anything. Weird.

The list goes on, but I think those are the points that stick out the most. So all in all, it was a weird movie, but pretty watchable.

Highlights: The shapeshifting animal companion was pretty cool, Sam [fucking!] Elliot, and a kick ass polar bear vs polar bear duel to the death!

Who Should See It: Fantasy fans and people that enjoy some good CGI.

How Soon: You could probably wait for DVD.