Summer '07 - Blockbuster 8 - The Simpsons Movie

Not a big fan of "The Simpsons" am I. I have watched many episodes, but almost entirely by chance. I have consistently laughed at them, but not enough to make me want to chisel out a part of my schedule - or put discs on my Netflix queue - to really be a part of the Simpsons frenzy.

So, I went to the movie with a single hope. That I would laugh. And laugh I did. At the pig. At President Schwartzenegger. At Homer and Marge's romantic sequence. At Bart's naked skateboarding. At just about everything. It's really funny.

But I didn't expect to find a touching story in there, too. About Bart losing faith in his Dad, about Marge finally calling Homer on his inability to be a good husband and father, about Lisa finding love. It's a little sappy, but not sappy enough to take the sting out of the jokes. And it gives the collosally weird storyline -- yeah, the EPA are the dome-wielding bad guys -- an emotional grounding that I didn't see coming.

Also, Maggie's first word is pretty funny.