Donald Duck attempts to prune an oak tree that happens to be inhabited by the chipmunks Chip & Dale, and like the best cartoons this turns into a battle between elemental forces.

I'll start this review with these three words: �Not that bad�. More on that later. I'm not going to beat around the bush, Alvin and the Chipmunks is at times more a pinball machine than a movie, but what else should you expect from a movie about three CGI rodents who sing, dance and go crazy?

Dave Seville (Lee) unsuccessfully tinkers away on bland, mordant pop tunes, while his college-friend tries to get him to pack it all in. Across town, a �Bad Day' in the world of the chipmunks (their tree home is repossessed as a Christmas tree) brings Alvin, Simon and Theodore to Dave's house to ransack the place. Dave finds the chipmunks, overcomes the shock of talking rodents much faster than most of us would, and quickly discovers their knack with a song.

No sooner can you hum, �Let me take you to�Funkytown�, the Chipmunks are rocking on tour with hit singles, DJs and a light show. But all is not as rosy as it seems.

All in all, it's a fun ride for the kids, and not too painful a one for the adults. It's not that bad a way to spend a helium-filled afternoon.

P.

S. � I Love Chip-munk-flicks.

Michael Clayton (Clooney) is a 'fixer' or, in his character's own words, a 'janitor' who cleans up legal messes for corporations on behalf of a prestigious New York City law firm. Clayton is divorced, deep in debt, and frustrated that he has worked for his firm for 17 years and has never been made a partner. His boss (Pollack) assigns him a task to 'fix' a potential legal mess surrounding a class action suit against a major agrochemical company. Its defence lawyer Arthur Edens (Wilkinson) has a bipolar breakdown, compounded by his guilt that he is defending a company knowingly responsible for deaths of individuals. Edens intends to switch sides, and the company's CEO (Swinton) will stop at nothing to prevent Edens from losing the case. Clayton must assess Edens's sanity, what evidence he has against the company, the ethics of his actions, and how much it will cost Clayton's career. This is the first feature film directed by Tony Gilroy (who previously co-scripted the Bourne trilogy), and it is a tense and intelligent thriller with outstanding performances from all parties. The film resembles some of the best of the 'paranoia' thrillers of the 70s, such as Three Days of the Condor (which coincidentally was directed by Pollack).