Take Two

JUMPER & r & & r & by BEN KROMER & r & & r & & lt;span class= "dropcap " & N & lt;/span & o movie in years has inspired the feeling of impending doom the way Jumper has. That's mostly a personal issue, though; every time I saw a Jumper commercial I thought, "Oh God, I hope I don't end up watching that." But I did, and now I pass my wisdom on to you: If you want to see a movie, don't see Jumper. If you're walking and you find dog poop in your path, don't put it in your mouth. Does anyone need to be told these things? Jumper isn't worth even 90 minutes of your life. It may not even be worth the 90 seconds you'll spend reading this review. Seriously. Because you've seen the previews, and you should already know how lousy Jumper is.





In the world of Jumper, there are people who have the same superpower as Nightcrawler from X-Men. Note that whoever created Nightcrawler wasn't under the misapprehension that Nightcrawler's superpower was interesting enough in itself to support an entire movie or comic book series. It could be interesting, I guess, but you'll have to think of all the interesting parts yourself. If there's any dramatic potential in a story about a guy who finds out that he can teleport to and fro, the makers of Jumper didn't find it.





Jumper stars Hayden Christensen (Star Wars: The Crappy Ones), whose career is the result of George Lucas's tragic senility. Critics pick on Christensen because he's boring, but they should pick on his girlfriend Rachel Bilson instead. I'm informed she's from TV. Maybe so, but she's obviously some kind of Frankenstein's monster made from pieces of discarded Maxim models. I challenge anyone to look at her doll-like face and tell me that she/it has a soul. Last and absolutely least is Samuel L. Jackson as the antagonist. His personality consists of having white hair. He's a Paladin, which is some kind of quasi-holy order that goes around killing jumpers. While I generally oppose holy warriors, I support the Paladins entirely.





Jumper is supposed to be an action movie, but the action consists entirely of guys teleporting around while Paladins try to nab them with a device that is a combination of a Taser gun and a futuristic Taser gun. Needless to say, watching this sucks.





As I said, most of this information could be attained from a 30-second commercial. The movie itself is like watching the commercial 200 times in a row, but with an ending. Jumper doesn't have the brains to ask many questions, but there is one: Can a jumper jump and carry a whole house with him? The dramatic answer is yes -- but only when he's trying to save his girlfriend and he jumps really hard.





Some condescending critics maintain that moviegoers can enjoy movies like Jumper simply by turning off their brains for a few hours. Those critics should worry about someone yanking their feeding tubes before the end credits. If nothing else, Jumper can help us more thoroughly appreciate M. Night Shyamalan's understated, non-comic-book-based superhero flick, Unbreakable, which rocks in most of the ways that Jumper sucks. (Rated PG-13)