Race to Witch Mountain (2009)

Really Surprised!

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

While this kid's movie is more-or-less OK, it's so derivative that the only thing you'll remember it by after a few hours is that the Rock is not bald.To make a better impact, it would have had to explore the story much more, like, why do the alien brother and sister have different "powers", if it's just a matter of "using the full capacity of the brain". Also, there was more fun to be had with their reaction to our world, but, again, without a deeper story about them and their world, we would not have been able to see why do they react that way and thus it would have not been that funny.Also, Carla Gugino and The Rock don't work well together. It was a nice idea - pair him with a sophisticated woman, but, didn't play out.So, it's a misfire, basically, though it's not really bad.

Race to Witch Mountain is a remake that relies much on Dwayne Johnson and Cara Gugino's charm. It is an exciting if bland Disney adventure with too many cardboard characterizations.Johnson is Jack Bruno, a Las Vegas cab driver with a shady past. Some mob figures are after him and he knows how to drive fast.When two kids suddenly appear in the back of his cab wanting Jack to drive them somewhere and offering him a lot of money to do it. The boy and girl are in fact aliens with special abilities, before long they are pursued by government agents and an intergalactic cyborg.Jack teams up with Dr Friedman (Gugino) and has to get the two aliens to Witch Mountain and onto their stranded spacecraft while evading their pursuers.The film is thrilling enough to keep the kids entertained but it is also slightly anodyne. Film director Garry Marshall makes a cameo appearance as an alien conspiracy theorist.

I had seen Escape to Witch Mountain from 1975, and the sequel Return from Witch Mountain, and even the dreadful 1995 TV remake of Escape to..., but it was interesting to see Disney making another more modern version, from director Andy Fickman (She's the Man, The Game Plan). Basically an alien spaceship crashes near Searchlight, Nevada, over one hundred miles from Las Vegas, Henry Burke (Ciarán Hinds) leads a secret Defense Department unit to seize the ship and take the passengers, but none are found. Former criminal Jack Bruno (Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson) has turned his life around and works as a cab driver, one of his passengers on this night is failed scientist Dr. Alex Friedman (Spy Kids' Carla Gugino) who is attending a UFO convention at Planet Hollywood, and Jack no longer wants to accept jobs with the mob. Two teenagers, Sara (Bridge to Terabithia's AnnaSophia Robb) and Seth (Alexander Ludwig), get in the cab are paying him a high fare of $15,000 to head in a particular direction, no given destination, Bruno assumes the government agents following the cab are more mob, he avoids them with his driving skills, and Seth uses his ability to vary his molecular density to allow their escape. The teenagers explain that they are are aliens that look human and have advanced abilities that people on Earth have not discovered yet, including telekinesis, telepathy and varying molecular density, and finding an abandoned house he sees them retrieve a device they will need for their ship, and they are again pursued Burke's agents, as well as powerful armoured alien assassin Siphon (Tom Woodruff, Jr.), but they manage to avoid them and carry on. Bruno takes Sara and Seth to Dr. Alex Friedman, she realises she is what she has been theorising on for some time, she joins the group, the teenagers explain their world is three thousand light years from Earth, despite the idea being unpopular their government plan to invade the planet so that their race can survive, their parents were experimenting to find a way to survive without invading Earth but were arrested before completing, so the teenagers went to Earth to find the successful findings, to save both Earth and their race they must return to their world in their spaceship. Fellow UFOlogist and conspiracy theorist Dr. Donald Harlan (Garry Marshall, director of Pretty Woman) helps telling the group that the spaceship was taken to Witch Mountain, a secret government base in California, they arrive there but are captured and the teenagers are knocked out to be surgically experimented on, and meanwhile the Siphon attacks the soldiers, while Bruno and Friedman get back into the base and save the teenagers. Sara and Seth launch their ship and escape Witch Mountain through the tunnels, the Siphon is finally killed by the high voltage energy from the ship core, once landed the teenagers give Brun and Friedman a tracking device son they always know where to find them, they wish them a tearful farewell and return home with hope they rebuild it somehow, in the end Bruno and Frideman become successful authors with their book about their experience, and as they leave the device activates, this suggests the humanoid alien teenagers may be returning. Also starring Tom Everett Scott as Matheson, Chris George Marquette as Pope, Kim Richards as Tina, Ike Eisenmann as Sheriff Antony and Richard 'Cheech' Marin as Eddie. Johnson isn't the best at acting but proves a good enough being surprised and a hero, Robb and Ludwig putting on British accents and speaking perfect English sentences are likable, the story is simple enough for all the family, and assisted by terrific special effects, a few explosions and cool chase sequences it is moderately exciting, an enjoyable science- fiction adventure fantasy. Good!

I saw Race to Witch Mountain recently when I saw it show up on TV. I read a brief synopsis for it, and saw the cast, and I decided to give it a shot as it sounded like a good movie. Like most of the other Disney live-action movies, I found Race to Witch Mountain to be rather entertaining and fun. Not having seen the original 1975 film, I went into the movie with an open mind. When I was done watching it, my first thought that this movie established a new re-imagining of Witch Mountain and I felt that this movie should have a sequel. However, it is more than four years later and a sequel does not appear to be coming, which is a huge disappointment. I really was looking forward to watching more movies surrounding the principal cast and I could easily picture where Disney could have taken the franchise. The soundtrack was pretty good, the cast really seemed to be trying to play their roles well, and while the story is nothing ground-breaking, it was still entertaining enough to fill its 98 minute running time. I appreciate the combined efforts of the cast into making this production an enjoyable experience. Overall, I recommend the film for anyone looking to have fun for 98 minutes.