accessAtlanta

'Sharkboy' sinks into confusion

By MELINDA ENNIS
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

It's no surprise this movie comes from a concept developed by a 7-year-old, director Robert Rodriguez's son, Racer. Kids of that age tend to create harmless stream-of-consciousness rambles best performed in living rooms before audiences limited to their parents. This one, about a kid's adventures on a place called Planet Drool, is no different.

Miramax

'The Adventures of Shark Boy & Lava Girl in 3-D'

The verdict: This not-so-dynamic duo appears in 3-D, but it's not worth putting on the glasses.

Director: Robert Rodriguez
Starring: Taylor Lautner, Taylor Dooley, Cayden Boyd
Run time: 93 minutes
Release date: June 10, 2005
Rating: PG for mild action, rude humor.
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On the web
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When you add in a platitude-laden, incoherent script, which could only be the product of an adult, "The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl" sends those of us not related to the Rodriguez family looking for the nearest exit back to the planet Earth.

Rodriguez directed the delightful "Spy Kids," went downhill with "Spy Kids II" and then even lower with the dismal "Spy Kids III." But with this muddled movie, he's bottomed-out.

As with "Spy Kids III," we occasionally must don annoying 3-D glasses. Our reward is lackluster effects, which mostly involve kids intermittently spewing or spitting into the audience.

The weirdly contrived story is about 10-year-old Max, whose daydreams come alive in the form of a half-boy, half-shark creature called Sharkboy. His odd identity, as explained in a flashback, comes from being raised by sharks after an accident at sea with his marine biologist father.

But Lavagirl, a pink-haired, purple-suited pre-pubescent, lacks an explanative flashback. She just shows up with Sharkboy, for no apparent reason, dripping molten rock and talking about troubles on the Planet Drool, Max's dreamland creation.

The backdrop plot involves Max's quarreling parents (David Arquette and Kristin Davis), who are too busy arguing to listen to Max. Arquette and Davis, alas, can't seem to decide whether the movie is a parable or a parody.

Meanwhile, Max reads his Sharkboy-Lavagirl story to his fourth grade class as a "What I Did Last Summer" essay. In a rare funny moment, the class bully dubs Max "Dork-Boy." And his teacher (George Lopez) admonishes that "dreaming keeps you from seeing what's right in front of you."

In what seems to be a waking dream segment, Sharkboy and Lavagirl show up in class and transport Max to Planet Drool. There, he finds his teacher transformed into a TV-screen-faced villain called Mr. Electric. In an effort to stop the kids (although we're not sure why), Mr. Electric summons his "plug hounds," goofy looking electric light plug-creatures that are about as menacing as a Mixmaster.

Trying to escape the baddies, the not-so-dynamic duo and Max encounter the Train of Thought (a real choo-choo), the Stream of Consciousness and other cliched creations. Ultimately, the audience is left in a ball of confusion.

Successful fantasy films, from the "Wizard of Oz" to "Harry Potter," envision an intricately designed alternative reality to transport "us kids" to another world. But "Sharkboy and Lavagirl" gives us a half-baked world no kid would want to visit.