My favorite kind of movie is a free movie; this is obvious to all by now. I will see any movie if it is free, mostly because they are fun to write about when they fail spectacularly. Anne scored us tickets to see Knight and Day, the new rom-action film starring Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz. First of all: all right already with the movie title puns. Maybe I’m just being a jerk because I recently saw Just Wright, but I think it’s completely fair to say that puns involving characters’ names have no place in movie titles.

Second of all: Both Diaz and Cruise were shockingly likable. I am just as shocked to say that about Tom Cruise as you are to see it. You know the man is charming when he can be crowned the king of crazy (like, universally decided upon by all [including Oprah, who makes all the big decisions for us so we don’t have to]) and still carry a movie so well that the lights came up and all the ladies looked down and were like, “Where are my pants? Somehow my pants came off during the movie. This is weird but also just feels right.”

Third of all: Despite a yucky repeated kind-of-rape joke (you would have to see it to understand the discomfort caused by a seemingly harmless conceit), the movie was often laugh-out-loud funny. How did that happen? The movie just didn’t take itself too seriously; it was The Bourne Identity with more pratfalls. Paul Dano, famous for his amazing acting in There Will Be Blood, played an earnest, adorable teenaged genius; though a small part, his role really represented the spirit of the movie. Diaz played her usual lovable idiot role. Yet, while the beginning of the movie had her mostly either drugged or asleep, her character ended up completely in control by the end, which was refreshing. The chemistry between Cruise and Diaz left a lot to be desired, but as far as action-packed, summer comedies go, this one was actually worth the trip to the theater. Under other circumstances, I might have even paid (1998 ticket prices).