Black to the Future

My partner and I found ourselves on the wrong side of a sold out showing of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel on Memorial Day. We were hellbent on seeing a movie, though, so we chose, instead, to go see Men in Black 3 (2012, directed by Barry Sonnenfeld). Personally, I kind of dreaded it. The last couple of Will Smith/Barry Sonnenfeld projects were debacles of the highest order (including the last Men in Black movie), and, truthfully, I would much prefer it if Sonnenfeld would head back into Get Shorty territory rather than make his living as Tim Burton lite. But the MIB movies have made enough money to gold plate Rhode Island, so this movie was inevitable. This film isn't nearly as bad as its predecessor. If I'm completely honest, it's a better film than the first installment, but I'm not much of a fan of that film, either. There's a low cunning in how this film is built that elevates it over its predecessors. Because it's a time travel story, this has to pay closer attention to how the cogs of its plot fit together than it might otherwise, which means that it doesn't rampage off in odd directions for the sake of quirkiness. Not often, anyway.

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