MOVIE REVIEWS: MEN IN BLACK 3D

One thing that the critics all agree on about Men in Black 3: It’s a significant improvement over the first sequel 10 years ago. Indeed, Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times argues that it’s better even than the 1997 original. “I wasn’t particularly looking forward to this belated sequel,” he writes, “But I had fun.” Likewise A.O. Scott comments in the New York Times that going into the theater, “Your expectations may be pleasantly low, and you may therefore be pleasantly surprised when they are exceeded.” Elizabeth Weitzman in the New York Daily News agrees that the film is a major improvement and doles out special praise to Josh Brolin, who plays a younger version of the Tommy Lee Jones character (the movie has a time travel plot). But she then adds, “It’s probably wise not to oversell the movie’s popcorn ambitions. The jokes are comical, but rarely hilarious, while the 3D action is more energetic than truly rousing. And not all of the casting is impeccable. … But that’s okay: Compared to its bloated predecessor, these are minor complaints.” This one, writes Lou Lumenick in the New York Post is “only mildly bloated and convoluted.” But Christy Lemire of the Associated Press has seen those two guys “running around New York in matching dark suits, chasing down aliens and zapping them with their shiny metal weapony doohickeys” one too many times. The film, she concludes, offers “sporadic glimmers” of the original’s energy, “but more often it feels hacky, choppy and — worst of all — just not that funny. And of course, it’s in 3-D for no discernible artistic or narrative reason.”