Entertainment : From the Front Row of the Balcony: Cars 2 is worth the five-year wait

Abby and I got to the Palace early, where we listened to the original "Cars" movie soundtrack while waiting to see the sequel. I wondered at what point of "Cars 2" I would hear Brad Paisley, whose familiar country voice brought us "Behind the Clouds" and "When you Find Yourself" the first time that Lightning McQueen, Mater and the rest of the Radiator Springs crew met.

The Story

Radiator Springs is still sad; Doc Hudson (voiced in the original by Paul Newman, who passed away in 2008) is dead. Although Lightning has won his fourth Piston Cup (which is now named in honor of Doc Hudson), he is handed another challenge: Facing the fastest race cars of the entire world, including Formula 1 champ Francesco Bernoulli.

Francesco is on television, bragging to a talk show host that he is the fastest, when Mater calls in to tell him that Lightning could beat him.

So the challenge is on. Lightning and his small-town pals will travel the world, racing in Japan, Italy and England.

But there is also an international scandal going on; something nefarious that threatens the future of transportation, including the race car industry. Mater accidentally finds himself in the middle of a transaction between spies, and ends up getting an initiation into international espionage.

The challenge of working with Lightning while also being dragged into the spy world strains Mater's friendship with our favorite No. 95.

Why you should go

It's Cars. It's not, perhaps, quite as great as the original, but it's better than almost all sequels, and better than just about anything else on the big screen this summer. Michael Caine joins the cast as the voice of the lead spy, Fin McMissile, and he brings a terrific blend of levity and gravity to the story. You will also see very beautiful animated views of Paris, London and Tokyo (spelled Towkyo, to go with the them of car-based names).

What you should know before you go

Only 38 percent of the critics on Rotten Tomatoes gave "Cars 2" a "Fresh" rating, which means that 62 percent of movie critics are highly overpaid.

There are some animated versions of the high-speed shoot-and-chase scenes we are used to seeing in spy movies. I always find these to be boring and predictable, but they are less so in the animated version.

The sequel, like the original, is G-rated. Hollywood would do well to find ways to make more of its movies more funny while also making them clean enough to show watch with your kids without blushing. But either Hollywood script writers are not smart enough to do that, or they think the audience is too dumb to appreciate good, clean fun. Either way, there should be more movies like "Cars."

I hope "Cars 3" does not take five years to make. I was very mildly disappointed that Tom and Ray, the Car Talk guys, did not make an appearance. But lots of other big names have at least small parts; see if you recognize any familiar voices.

My favorite part

"A wise car listens to one word, and hears two."

P.S. Brad Paisley does show up; stick around to listen; it's worth the wait, too. There is also another treat that both the adults and kids applauded, a short film featuring the Toy Story 3 characters.