My twin 7 year olds love this movie - if kids like the movie, that should really be all that counts because **drumroll** it's a kid's movie! Always interesting screen visuals and some nice performances from the cast. George Lopez is great in the role - just great. This guy should be doing more films (I sound like his publicist or mother but it's true!). Not a huge fan of Robert Rodriguez but he did well with this one.

"The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl" is not a very good film and the 3D is terrible. "Spy Kids 3D: Game Over" looked the same and I still can't believe Sylvester Stallone was the villain in that film. I kept thinking he was broke and that was his excuse for doing it. I have no doubt this film will do well among the children that go to see it but the adults will find themselves sleeping in their seats. Robert Rodriguez is known for his violent films and it would occur to me that he made this film for his kids, which is true. With a budget of $50 million, we should get more out of it that than agonizing 3D. The story is bland, the action is ridiculous and the acting is terrible.It's about a young boy, Max (Cayden Boyd) who creates an imaginary world called Planet Drool. Here, he creates two characters; Sharkboy (Taylor Lautner), a boy raised by sharks and Lavagirl (Taylor Dooley), who lights everything on fire. When a bully, Linus (Jacob Davich) steals Max's Journal, a tornado rages outside his school so Sharkboy and Lavagirl appear to take Max on an adventure to save their home planet.If you can make it through this picture without the 3D hurting your eyes, you're a trooper. It's the same 3D used for "Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over" and Rodriguez seems intent on being the first director to use 3D technology in a long time. The 3D to the film is called "Anaglyph 3D" which is a stereoscopic 3D effect achieved by encoding each lens using filters of different colors. When viewed through the glasses, they reveal an integrated stereoscopic image. When you go to the theater, you are given the glasses and they are made of crappy old cardboard. The real irritation is trying to wear these for 90 mins. I'm not sure why Rodriguez decided to use this old technology when new 3D technology exists.I found myself doing some research on the film after viewing it because I knew there had to be an origin story of some sorts. If you know some of Robert Rodriguez's previous films "From Dusk till Dawn," "Desperado" and "The Faculty," he is no stranger to gory violent pictures. Anyway, the idea for this film came from his son Racer who told him a story about a boy who grew up with sharks and a girl who had fire elements to her body. He encouraged his son to keep working on the story and now he has brought his son's vision to life but why not make it a good one? He scored a home run with "Spy Kids" and "Spy Kids 2: The island of Lost Dreams" so we know he can do kids movies.As the film progress, we are told at certain points to put on the 3D glasses. The 2D scenes are the real world and the fantasy scenes are the 3D but I had to rub my eyes a few times because it got annoying really fast. There is an innocent and interesting idea here but it feels lazy. The special effects are boring and the characters are just not interesting. Sharkboy and Lavagirl take Max to their home planet which he creates in his mind to save it from destruction in 45 mins. It has the same feel as "Spy Kids" and it resembles a lot of that picture. With a screenplay written by Racer Rodriguez, you can expect a lot of weirdness: The Steam of Consciousness, The Sea of Confusion, The Train of Thought and something called a Dream Lair. These all left me with questions marks in my head. Since this is a children's movie written by a child with a wild imagination, maybe I'm not supposed to understand this picture but I would like to.There's an interesting idea to explore at the beginning of the film involving bullying but it doesn't even touch on this subject. The idea of a boy in a shark suit and a girl wearing a pink suit resembling fire must be more appealing and it leaves the idea alone. The young boy Max is a loner who loves to use his imagination and that's the basis for this story. We are given scenes that show how Sharkboy was raised by sharks. His father studied Great White Sharks, that talk, and his dad called him Sharkboy. A storm causes them to drift apart in rafts and the sharks choose not to eat them citing "Don't take a bite out of him, he's a friend." They take him to their cave and raise him in the ways of the shark. Somehow a boy is born half human and half shark and after being raised by the sharks, he grows gills, a fin, and his teeth become sharp. I suppose we're supposed to suspend disbelief because this is a kids movie.When this picture is released on DVD, in a few months, audiences will be able to see it as it should have been in 2D. When "Spy Kids 3D was released on video, it came with the horrible glasses so I'm sure this one will to. However, I am not recommending this picture to any audience. Everything is lazy, the characters are boring and Sharkboy's Sharkship that he uses to transport the kids to Planet Drool looks ridiculous. None of the characters are worth mentioning and performances from David Arquette and Kristin Davis are wasted and George Lopez as the villain with plughounds, Mr. Eletric is cardboard. What we have is a good looking children's movie, minus the 3D, that fails in every way as an adaption when it could have been much better.

I love the film's plot summary. Max (Cayden Boyd) realizes that his dreams turn for real, incarnating Sharkboy (Taylor Lautner) and Lavagirl (Taylor Dooley), but also bringing to life some danger to the real world. But the CG is very distracting to watch. It's very obvious.I enjoy the movie. I love their adventures. I love the components of Planet Drool. I love the creativity invested in the villains and challenges. But this is a fantasy movie that suppose to convince you that the fictional world is real. Planet Drool looks like a video game background, and it should like alive.One SFX guy from "Resident Evil: Retribution" said, "The more you can shoot for real, the more salable you're visual effects are going to be." The director and the production crew should have used real props and set pieces.I guess the CG worked against them.

The Adventures of Shark Boy and Lava Girl in 3D (2005): Dir: Robert Rodriguez / Cast: Taylor Lautner, Taylor Dooley, Cayden Boyd, George Lopez, David Arquette: Morbid piece of eye candy crap about a boy who imagines Shark Boy and Lava Girl and is the brunt of bullying at school. Shark Boy is raised by sharks and Lava Girl burns everything she touches but unfortunately not the script. They enlist their young creator in saving their dream world. Lame plot tries to be creative but ends upon a foolish note. Directed by Robert Rodriguez with a production about as fetching as dog vomit. Rodriguez pulled off the creative elements to great degree with Spy Kids but here he gains a production that is on the same level as something you might fish out of a cereal box. Embarrassing performances by Taylor Lautner and Taylor Dooley as Shark Boy and Lava Girl. Why anyone would combined a shark with scorching hot substances is beyond me unless he was simply having a hot and cold faze. Cayden Boyd plays their earthling creator who needs juvenile therapy after this. George Lopez does his best as the electrical villain with plug hounds but the role is simply cardboard. David Arquette can add this to a stream of shitty films that includes See Spot Run and Ready to Rumble. This is empty headed entertainment that should be torn by sharks or burned in lava. Score: 1 / 10