By Austin Lynch
Last week we had the excellent debut of Daniel Craig as Ian Fleming's famous British spy James Bond '007' in 'Casino Royale'.

After just its first week at Irish cinemas 'Casino Royale' has done over a million euro worth of business and, even at this early stage, the new Bond film has been seen by three times more people than watched the next most popular film on release at the moment - that being Sasha Baron Cohen's 'Borat'.

Indeed, after selling out its first weekend almost completely 'Casino Royale' is still proving popular this week, and there may still be a bit of business left for it to do locally.

Although December is almost upon us it's still a little too early for the obligatory Christmas movies, so we are in kind of a 'no man's land' when it comes to new and exciting things to see at the cinema.

We were truly spoiled getting something as big as a new Bond film in November and, I suppose, this kind of raised our expectations. But these get quickly, and suddenly, lowered this week with the release of two films that, while both have their merits (and both will definitely have their own fans), have nowhere near the universal appeal of a new James Bond flick.

The first film released this week is 'Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny', a comic spoof starring Jack Black.

Now I might be wrong but I think 'Tenacious D' is actually a rock band fronted by two people, one of them being Jack Black - the actor. And so this film is a kind of rock spoof in which Black combines his considerable comic talents, and his musical ability, to entertain the troops.

Black has been doing rather well for himself recently having starred as the star in 'Nacho Libre' earlier this year and being one of the stars of last year's big blockbuster 'King Kong'.

Having also starred in such films as 'School of Rock' (2003) and 'High Fidelity' (2000) not to mention a large number of other film and TV credits Black has earned himself an army of fans who find his humour funny and his music 'rocking'.

And, presumably, safe in this knowledge he has decided to make this slight movie where his fans get him doing comedy and music - two for the price of one, if you will.

The plot in 'Pick of Destiny' is slight but involves something about one of the devil's teeth falling out and being fashioned into a guitar pick and Tenacious D wanting to get their hands on said item.

The film pokes fun at heavy metal music while featuring some of the band's material sung by Black and friend, Jake Gass.

Those already converted to Jack Black's way of operating should really enjoy this while non-converts, or bemused others, may wonder what all the fuss is about.

Also out this week, and worth a mention at least, is the latest feature length episode from Johnny Knoxville and those crazy guys in the Jackass team.

Cleverly titled 'Jackass number two' this is just another collection of mad, dangerous, painful and completely gross stunts by a group of adults who really should know better.

For the uninitiated, 'Jackass' started as a half hour show on MTV in which Knoxville and his buddies play juvenile pranks on each other - and sometimes on unsuspecting members of the public - as well as daring each other to do the most silly (and often dangerous) stunts. And when they end up falling over, or worse, the rest of the gang fall around laughing.

'Jackass Number Two' follows this formula containing a sequence of short, unrelated sketches with no joining narrative running through the proceedings.

While infantile, silly and sometimes dangerous 'Jackass' can be really funny, if you like laughing at the misfortune (albeit their own fault) of others.

'Number Two' seeks to go further than ever before - more stupid, more dangerous and definitely more gross than the team have ever endured before. They gang are very lucky they're still in one piece after this one.