By DANNY GALLAGHER

This week, a theater near you saw the release of a movie starring a rising television star trying to escape the prison that is TV Land, an overblown, pseudo-historic movie with enough cushy special effects and "eye candilicious" celebrities to make war tolerable and an Olson Twins movie.

It can only mean one thing, the summer movie season is here. God help us all.

For three very long months, the studios of Hollyweird will unleash their minions of big budget special effects spectaculars on the local theaters where they'll pack with audiences whose combined brain cell cultures couldn't power a Ronco Showtime Rotisserie long enough to cook a hot dog.

But, for me, it's a metaphorical gold mine of movies that suck. For every diamond in the rough that is the summer movie season, there's at least ten that will ensure my work is never done.

So this week, I've decided to put myself to the test. Thanks to the good folks at the Boston Globe's Arts and Entertainment section and Rotten Tomatoes.com, I'm going to predict which films will be the suckiest of the summer. I've picked seven out of those with descriptions from the Globe's annual summer movie preview list and compare my predictions with the results gathered by Rotten Tomatoes.com's Tomatometer.

For Rotten Tomatoes.com, a film that qualifies as sucky or "rotten" must have a 60 percent total of bad reviews. For this challenge, I'm raising the bar or lowering it. All of these films must get less than 30 percent.

Here we go, pray for me...

"Soul Plane" - This one's a cinch, so I might as well get it out of the way. It's basically an "Airplane" take off produced by the folks who brought you stale racial stereotypes and the "Wazzzzup!" guys from the Budweiser commercials. I know this film sucks because even one of it's stars (D.L. Hughley) said on Comedy Central's "Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn," "this is a #$&^ movie." If movies like these keep getting the greenlight, pretty soon the stars are going to start pleading with the audience to leave while they're actually on screen.
PREDICTION: The only thing that could make me watch this is if the plane gets overtaken by fundamentalist terrorists and Tom Arnold is the first hostage executed.

"The Day After Tomorrow" - Personally, I'm sick of watching movies that remind me the world could cave in and kill me at any moment. But this tree hugging hippie's wet dream looks just too depressing for words, not to mention just plain bad. In this one, global warming plunges the world into a cold bitter darkness leaving a scientist (Dennis Quaid) to find his son who's trapped in New York (Jake Gyllenhaal). It looks like a political statement wrapped in Hollywood fluff. And besides, any film that gets a recommendation from Al Gore can't be all that great in my book. It has nothing to do with my political ideals, it's just that Gore's favorite movie is "Tron."
PREDICTION: Oh, if only the world would end while I watch this one.

"Garfield: The Movie" - It pains me to say this, but I don't have much hope for the funny paper's favorite fat cat. The preview's looked downright sad. This computerized cat, voiced by personal god Bill Murray, dances on the screen and looks like the guy in my dorm room who would do anythin
g he could to get a laugh including wearing women's clothing. Ok, that guy was me, but that's besides the point.
PREDICTION: This one belongs in the litter box.

"Around the World in 80 Days" - Enough with the remakes! Isn't there at least one good original idea floating around Hollyweird that isn't based on a book, movie, film, song, TV show, video game or cereal box character? In this remake, Jackie Chan and Steve Coogan take the title roles in what's sure to be a bad chop-socky flick that'll make the third "Matrix" movie look like the next "Lawrence of Arabia."
PREDICTION: Stop this world, I want to get off.

"White Chicks" - Granted, white people don't get made fun of nearly enough as they should in modern motion pictures. I think the story of the Bush Twins would make for a particularly funny film. But the Wayans Brothers latest yuck-fest just looks yucky. It stars Sean and Marlon as two FBI agents who have to go undercover as (you guessed it!) white chicks in a film that's sure to set back what's left of racial harmony at least twenty years. The commercials show the twosome in all the usual predictable bits - the boys as whitey grooving to hardcore rap and accidentally breaking out of character - but, worst of all, they look like a couple of mutated albino sloths who wandered in off the set of "The Island of Dr. Moreau."
PREDICTION: If I'm right about "White Chicks," then I don't want to be wrong.

"Catwoman" - The online movie geeks have united against the release of this comic book adaptation, which just goes to prove that fifty million "Ain't It Cool News" talkbackers can't be wrong unless it's about what to say to a girl. It stars personal love goddess Halle Berry as the leather clad heroine who kicks ass and whips butt in the name of ending female oppression perpetuated by the tyrannical male, which is kind of hypocritical when she's doing it in a get up that leaves less to the imagination than her nude scene in "Swordfish."
PREDICTION: (See Garfield Prediction)

"Alien vs. Predator" - Since we're talking about geek movies, let's throw a video game remix into the pot. This one's directed by Paul W.S. Anderson who also did the big screen remakes of "Resident Evil" and "Mortal Kombat," enough said.
PREDICTION: The only losers in this battle will be the audience.

"Cheer Up" - Ok, wrap this one around your head. Tommy Lee Jones stars as a Texas Ranger who must protect a group of University of Texas cheerleaders who are witnesses to a horrific murder. I haven't seen any previews or trailers for this stinkburger-to-be but if it features Jones dressed in a burnt orange cheerleader outfit, I'll be running to the exit faster than a cheetah on two espressos chasing down an injured wildebeest.
PREDICTION: SAY HEY! SAY HO! THIS DUMB ASS MOVIE'S GOT TO GO!

"Anacondas: The Hunt for the Blood Orchids" - It seems that being roasted in the papers and by the critics wasn't enough of a hint. This sequel stars a bunch of good looking unknowns who travel back to the jungle to do battle with the giant snakes to find a rare flower that can prolong human life. Once they find them, they'll be turned into drugs and advertised in vague commercials starring former football giant Mike Ditka.
PREDICTION: In the words of Indiana Jones, "Why'd it have to be snakes?"

Remember to check back on the week of Sept. 1 to see if my predictions were correct. If you've ever wanted the opportunity to laugh in my face, this will be your chance. The rest of you will just have to wait for my first on camera sex scene.

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©2004 by Danny Gallagher

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