Here's Your First Problem: Kids Don't Play Board Games Anymore

Americans will have the opportunity to see a peculiar movie this weekend, a flick about two bored little boys who root around in their basement and find a magical, magical board game called "Zathura" that takes them on a magical, magical adventure! The msm seems pretty satisified with another installment in the board-game-based-adventure franchise started by " Jumanji," of which this is some kind of official unofficial sequel. (Clue was not part of that franchise.) As has been the case for the past couple Fridays, it's difficult to get a bead on what bloggers think about "Zathura." The MovieBlog is hot and cold: "With the first trailer I thought Zathura looked just plain silly... but by the time the last Zathura trailer came out I found myself oddly interested in seeing it." SpankGranny could not generally be considered a fan, saying there are quite a lot of similarities to "Jumanji:" "There’s not much difference between either film, so chances are if you didn’t like the first movie, you should stop reading this right now. If you liked 'Jumanji,' however, read on to see if 'Zathura’s' worth the ten bucks." (Ultimately, according to that review, it isn't.) All this talk about game-based movies got us thinking about a screenplay we've been shopping around — hey, this blog thing is ok, but it ain't gonna put a down payment on a house in Malibu — called "Trivial Pursuits," about a group of multi-colored, anthropomorphic plastic discs trapped in a magical world where they're asked questions in order to collect pieces of pie that fit in them. The lukewarm reception to "Zathura" made us thought we might want to option a different game, so we ran the numbers... here's what the data says will test the best:

Posted by Philip Ewing at November 11, 2005 10:19 AM

Category: Moving Pictures