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'Gone' contrived and bland

Arizona Summer Wildcat

Jolie needlessly 'erotic'

Has anybody realized that Angelina Jolie can't act yet?

Here she is cast in "Gone in 60 Seconds," a movie about stealing cars and being in car chases. Her character, Sway, is Nicolas Cage's ex-girlfriend and she "boosts" cars along with the rest of the thieving gang. That's about it. Her character isn't interesting, she really isn't important and she's barely in any of the movie anyway. Then why, pray tell, is she second billed?

Because of her unique style of "performing" - a technique often found here in Tucson on Miracle Mile around two in the morning - called whoring. OK, so Jolie isn't as obnoxiously bad as say, Denise Richards - although that's pretty much a given everywhere from third grade skits to B-grade pornos.

Jolie at least delivers her lines like she knows what they mean. But whenever she's not speaking, she is in the background trying really hard to be sensual.

Enough already. The entire world now knows that you like to engage in life-threatening sex, have used knives in bed and are now madly in love with, god knows why, Billy Bob Thornton. OK. You're weird and you have really big lips. Mmm, sexy. Alright.

Now let the world see you do something else for a change. In every scene of "Gone in 60 Seconds" except for one, Jolie is needlessly "erotic." Going into the movie it's clear that her relationship with Cage is probably going to be fixed up - sorry if you didn't figure that one out already - and so, OK, she has to flirt with him. That's understandable.

But does she have to talk about each car she drives - there's quite a few - as if she's having sex with every single one of them? And does the film really need a scene in which nothing happens except Sway puts on lipstick - which, by the way, mysteriously disappears from her lips in the next scene?

In the place of character development in which normally Jolie and Cage would talk about getting back together, they simply watch a couple having sex and make out themselves for a while. The audience's understanding of the two characters went from "they used to date and steal cars" to "they like to steal cars and have sex."

To top it all off, the last five minutes, after all the problems are resolved, Sway is seen intimately touching three men. Three men. For no reason. She helps an injured friend cut his food - and then seductively sucks ketchup off of his finger. Cage hugs his brother - and then she comes up behind him and slips her arms around him too. And then she and Cage make out, at the dinner table, in front of everyone. OK, so they're back together, but please. How many people would honestly French kiss in front of their co-workers in broad daylight while they are EATING, much less eating two feet away from them at the same table? Alright, so these are crazy people who steal cars, but they've got to have manners or dignity or something. They're eating for christ's sake.

Oh yeah, the rest of the movie is pretty stupid. They have to steal 50 cars in 24 hours. If you've seen the preview, you've seen the movie. Car, car, car, chase, car, chase, car, car. Blah, blah, blah.

At least it beats the Tucson heat - assuming you can steal yourself from being turned on by the "oh so hot" Angelina Jolie that is.