Hancock (Single-Disc Unrated Edition)

Academy Award® nominee Will Smith (Best Actor, The Pursuit of Happyness, 2006) stars in this action-packed comedy as Hancock, a sarcastic, hard-living and misunderstood superhero who has fallen out of favor with the public. When Hancock grudgingly agrees to an extreme makeover from idealistic publicist Ray Embrey (Jason Bateman, Juno), his life and reputation rise from the ashes and all seems right again--until he meets a woman (2003 Academy Award® winner Charlize Theron, Best Actress, Monster) with similar powers to his and the key to his secret past.

Hancock turns the standard superhero movie inside-out: The title character (Will Smith) can fly, has superstrength, and is invulnerable, but he's also a sloppy, alcoholic jerk who causes millions of dollars in property damage whenever he bothers to fight crime. When he saves the life of a public-relations agent named Ray (Jason Bateman, Arrested Development), Ray decides to improve Hancock's image--starting by having Hancock surrender himself to the authorities and go to prison for his lawless behavior. The idea is that once he's in prison, the crime rate will go up, and people will start to realize Hancock might be of value after all. This is only the first act of Hancock--from there, the movie takes several clever turns that shouldn't be revealed. Hancock isn't a great movie (among other things, director Peter Berg overuses close-ups with a hand-held camera to a degree that may cause motion sickness), but it is an extremely entertaining one. The script, which holds together far better than most superhero movies, has a propulsive plot, good dialogue, some compassion for its characters, and even an actual idea or two. The spectacular action at least gestures towards obeying the laws of physics, which actually makes the special effects more vivid. The three leads (Smith, Bateman, and Charlize Theron as Ray's wife, Mary) deftly balance the movie's mixture of comedy, action, and drama. All in all, a smart subversive twist on a genre that all too often takes itself all too seriously. --Bret Fetzer

Stills from Hancock (click for larger image)

Wheelhouse Diner
453 Hancock St
Quincy, MA 02171
(617) 328-3666

(open 5 AM-3PM all week)

There was a bit of unfinished business to attend to.

I had planned to give this place a try on Thursday. I was giving my dad a lift to the airport shuttle in Braintree and I had a hankering to add another diner to my Life List. As usual, I sang that stirring old spiritual "What A Friend We Have In Google" to find diners in the vicinity, and the Wheelhouse leaped to the top of the list.

Unfortunately, Murphy's Law was in full effect at my folks' house and we left too late for him to make the 11 AM shuttle as planned. He still would have made his flight if he took the next one, but not if he ran into any more bad luck, so I successfully urged him to let me drive him the way to Logan International.

My Inner Child wasn't pouty or anything over the turn of events. All the same, a bit had been flipped inside my CPU's status register and the only way to flip it back to zero was to hit the Wheelhouse and spend six bucks on breakfast.

Taken on the way home. On board a 737-800. We arrived early and had to wait for our ramp spot to clear. This was the day the Icelandic volcano eruption grounded international flights. As you can see by the tails we are looking over the international terminal.

Legends of the Guardian King, book 2, from the award-winning author of Arena. Karen Hancock brings to imaginative life the supernatural battle between good and evil, the preconceptions that keep us from embracing truth, and the distortions that trick and trap us. Four years have passed since the conclusion of The Light of Eidon. Abramm has been living peacefully abroad, but when he hears of trouble in his homeland, he returns to claim the crown he thought he'd never wear. But he has many enemies, including his murderous brother. The only thing that will save him is the Light that lives within him, but to appease his critics, he hides this. Before he can ful?ll his kingship, he must reveal the truth and be reminded, painfully and powerfully, that his destiny can only be realized through humbly acknowledging his own weakness and the utter suf?ciency of the One who created his destiny in the ?rst place.