In Theaters: Men in Black 3 ***

There's not much to say here, really.  The Men in Black franchise was never all that great, despite its relative popularity.  The first installment had its moments, particularly in the humorous interplay between Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones.  The second movie was completely forgettable.  The only thing I remember is that they were looking for some alien treasure/power source and that, in the end, it was not an object, but a person they were looking for.  Oh...and Johnny Knoxville had two heads.

That brings us to the third movie, which wasn't half bad.  I actually think that Men in Black 3 is probably the best of the franchise.  It has some solid laughs, a story that keeps moving and stays interesting throughout, and the introduction of a fascinating supporting character, whom I'll get to in a minute.  Other than the very end, which tries to wrap up the whole franchise into one amazing and pointless coincidence, I really don't have any complaints about this movie.

Will Smith, in his first film appearance in nearly four years, reprises his role as Agent J, an agent of a secret organization tasked with monitoring extraterrestrial life on planet Earth, yada, yada, yada.  Tommy Lee Jones is once again Agent K, the surly senior agent with the impenetrably gruff exterior.  In this movie, that exterior -- particularly his refusal to talk about himself -- becomes a focal point.  If you simply thought K's persona was just that of an angry old man because it was a conveniently humorous contrast with Will Smith's animated style you were sorely mistaken.  Apparently, something happened in K's past to make him that way.

In the movie's first scenes, an alien by the name of Boris the Animal (Jemaine Clement from Flight of the Concords) escapes from a high-security prison on the moon.  Eventually, we learn that K arrested Boris in 1969 and that it was some sort of trauma surrounding the arrest that explains why K is the way he is.  Everyone, particularly K, is on high alert after learning of Boris's escape.

Then, K disappears.  J goes to work in the morning and finds out that K was actually killed in 1969 while trying to arrest Boris.  Needless to say, this confuses J to end.  Soon thereafter, Boris's race returns to Earth in a massive invasion, which is surprising to J because the race was supposed to have been wiped out in the events of 1969.  It's then that J and his new boss (Agent O, played by Emma Thompson), deduce that Boris went back in time, killed K, prevented the genocide of his people, and returned to his home planet.  So, J, utilizing the same mode of transport that Boris used, goes back in time to save K and set history straight.

Soon after arriving in the past, J runs into a younger K, played by Josh Brolin.  Now, critics have been praising Brolin's performance in this movie quite extensively.  I'll be honest, I didn't see what all the fuss was about.  Sure, he does a fine impression of Tommy Lee Jones and the performance is great homage.  But, let's take a look at what some have been saying.

Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly:

But most of all, MIB3 is one giant leap for mankind because Josh Brolin shows up to play the younger Agent K. And he just nails the feat, triumphantly creating a riff on/homage to the Tommy Lee Jones-ness of K that goes much deeper (and funnier) than a simple imitation of drawl and speech patterns. Brolin conjures up a man in full, just as taciturn but not nearly as closed as the craggy puss he is when Jones does the squinting. 

It's a great performance, one for the thespian yearbook.

Really?

Peter Travers of Rolling Stone:

What works, like comic hellfire, is the casting of Josh Brolin as the young Agent K. Brolin's take on Jones' deadpan delivery (they co-starred in No Country for Old Menis spot-on and spectacularly funny. Better yet, Brolin brings in a true actor's grace, adding humor and heart that help explain the origins of Agent K's moody blues. 

Again, I just didn't see it.  I laughed and enjoyed the performance.  But, to me, it really wasn't anything more than a good impersonation.  And, it some scenes, particularly those where he had more than just a few lines of dialogue, the wasn't even all that good.  For what it's worth, I felt pretty much the same about Brolin's performance as George W. Bush in W a few years back.  I'm a Josh Brolin fan, but I just don't think either of these roles represent his best work.

Anyway, moving on.

Once J and Young K team up, they embark on a mission to track down Boris and return history to it's rightful course.  Doing so requires that they find and protect an alien by the name of Griffin (played by the magnificent Michael Stuhlbarg), who can simultaneously see all of the universe's possible time-lines at once, but he can't necessarily identify which of the time-lines he is actually in.  Yeah, don't worry, you're not really supposed to get it.  Basically, it means that he can tell the future...but not with 100 percent accuracy.

Griffin ended up being my favorite character in the movie, probably because I'm always happy to see Stuhlbarg in a movie.  A few years back, he was in the lead in A Serious Man, one of the best and most underrated movies of the last decade.  He's also great on HBO's Boardwalk Empire.  As Griffin, he portrays a character that is hopelessly naive even though his knowledge of the universe borders on being infinite. It's great to watch him work.

And, of course, Clement is pretty dang funny as Boris.  A scene in which present-day Boris meets up with 1969 Boris is a scream.

The film moves swiftly towards its climax which surrounds the 1969 moon landing.  The climactic sequence is brilliantly choreographed and executed.  As I watched it unfold, I was almost ready to give the movie high marks across the board.  But, then comes the aftermath and the sorry explanation for future K's silent sadness.  I won't spoil it here.  I'll just say that it was lazy...very, very lazy.

So, in the end, Men in Black 3 won't light the world on fire.  Sure, it's a sequel that few people, if any, were clamoring for.  But, for the most part, the lack of anticipation and the subsequently lowered expectations meant that it was a pleasant surprise, at least for me.