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     There use to be a time in this country when Hollywood made movies for adults.  The aging of the Baby boomers, however, has now clouded this line between who is a child and who is not.  Viagra ads illustrate this superbly.  So does the sight of these geezers riding on Harley Davidsons.

     I have nothing against the movie Batman.  I'm sure its a well-made film.  I enjoyed "Batman Begins" and the acting of Christian Bale.  What worries me most is the lack of critical discernment in America's taste in movies.  It seems to me that a movie such as "Hellboy II"  getting  "critical" acclaim-- from the Wall Street Journal, no less, indicates the very decline of American culture.  Was "Hellboy I" not enough to assuage the Baby boomer masses and their insipid children?  How many Marvel comic book movies do I have to endure? 

     In college, I remember a history professor showing us two examples of Roman poetry.  One was from about 100B.C.,the other from 400A.D., just before Rome was sacked.  The professor was quite exercised over how much better the earlier piece was and was convinced the decline in standards contributed to the fall of Rome.  At the time, I didn't know what the hell he was talking about.  I was probably too busy looking at girls.  Unlike Baby boomers, however, I began to exercise control over my primal instincts and started examining my intellectual questions. I think they call it Western Civilization.

     All my cultural resentments seem to begin and end with the Baby boomers.  Go figure.  Even with age, their moral and cultural depravity know no ends.  The mere mention of movies such as "American Beauty" or "The Horse Whisperer" leave them cooing with delight. It seems all Baby boomer introspection begins with cheating on their spouses.

     Those are my choices in film today: A comic book character or a Baby boomer who can't get enough sex or money.  God save the republic.  Occaisionally a work of art slips through the cracks such as  "There Will Be Blood."  Hopefully they will put this movie in a time vault to let the future invaders of Rome know that some people in this century  did more than just read comic books .