Plot: A Las Vegas cabbie (Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson) inadvertently becomes embroiled in an alien plot when he picks up two children that possess strange paranormal powers.
Review: Like the recent BEDTIMES STORIES, RACE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN is yet another example of Disney’s slick movie making machine- designed to churn out sleek family flicks with the sole objective of making mountains of money. Whether or not the films are any good seems to be irrelevant. As long as the trailers are slick, and the leading actor is bankable, families will flock to see them- even if the film is the cinematic equivalent of a happy meal.
As the paranormally gifted child heroes, Anna Sophia Robb, and Alexander Ludwig are both fine and they interact well with the CGI. The always smoking hot Carla Gugino shows up as The Rock’s obligatory love interest (lucky guy!), and is good, despite the fact that she doesn’t really have much of a role in the film until the last half hour or so. I also liked seeing film director Garry Marshall pop up as an eccentric UFO guru, and villain extraordinaire Ciaran Hinds is on hand to play the requisite evil government agent.
Grade: 6/10