Category Archives: Movies/Films/Flicks

Thor and Bella Team Up Against Meredith Vickers in “Lord of the Apples: Return of the White”

June 24, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

In the 2012 Snow White theatrical-reboot cage match, I declare Show White and the Huntsman the winner. Largely that’s because I plan to avoid Mirror, Mirror for the rest of my life, based on the unfunny trailers and my track record for refusing to watch every Julia Roberts film since Ocean’s Eleven. I confess the cage match was fixed. I’m fine with unbalancing the scales intentionally and will lose no sleep over it.

I can’t say I liked Show White and the Huntsman as a whole, but I wouldn’t give it an F-minus, as have other Internet participants who reject it on the principle of starring Kristen Stewart. I’m not a Twilight fan, but my apathy for the series isn’t borne of defensive rage about how Real Vampires should be portrayed, nor do I condemn any of the actors for their mere participation. A quick IMDB check confirms the last two Stewart films I saw were Jumper (my dislike of which can be pinned on another cast member, not her) and Zathura (in which her big-sister character was supposed to be irritating). That’s not nearly enough grounds for me to jump on the anti-Bella bandwagon.

That said: to be honest, Show White and the Huntsman doesn’t provide her with much in the way of superstar material to prove herself. Her dialogue in the first half of the film is minimal. When she speaks in the second half, it’s largely either shouting while on the run or grunting while taking damage. She does have two (2) opportunities for quiet, smiling moments, as well as one troop-rallying speech which seemed to go over well. That’s a start, but she’s largely overprotected or out-bellowed by all the other characters. That’s not too prominent a place for a main character to act very main. Perhaps it wouldn’t help to mention a few scenes where Snow is so beloved by Mother Nature and so essential to the very fabric of her kingdom that she’s actually followed and celebrated by assorted happy woodland creatures. One can only imagine the Internet’s own Kristen Stewart Revenge Squad going into convulsions at the very sight.

Her general character arc also doesn’t help. Her entrance in the film is after years of dungeon imprisonment, which should have left her a drained, emaciated mess. She escapes from Point A Prison with some pluck and a single-minded goal to reach Castle Point B, because then and only upon the arrival of their exiled figurehead will the people of the kingdom unite, grow a collective spine, and stage a coup against their all-powerful oppressor. Fortunately for Ms. White, days of fleeing, watching others die because of her, fleeing some more, and being saved by the grace of others all somehow provide her with enough exercise and fresh air to overcome her years of imprisonment, reach a semblance of physical competence, and assume the role of Eowyn for the film’s climactic, chaotic assault on Poor Man’s Minas Tirith.

As the Evil Queen who is her opponent, longtime captor, and Evil Stepmother, Charlize Theron nearly makes her own head explode as she goes over the top, pauses for a tea break while her servants construct a new top thousands of feet above the previous top, then sails over that top with feet to spare. She’s allowed a few moments of vulnerability as it’s suggested that she was cursed by her mother with beauty to use as a dangerous weapon against a misogynist world (so it’s Man’s fault she has to be beautiful! And, um, not her wicked mother’s…), but moments later she returns to her previous state of apoplectic fury. I’m willing to bet her on-set line-shouting was so vehement, it made the film crew cry. Those scenes alone are worth seeing if your constitution isn’t too delicate.

As Snow’s trusty sidekick, Chris Hemsworth is allowed to inflict more damage and use pointier weapons than in his previous films. Like Snow, he also has one good speech-ifying scene, in which he laments the needless passing of so many lives that have touched his. The rest of his scenes alternate between barking at Snow and pounding on her assailants. We don’t even know he’s approaching his own private Inigo Montoya moment until seconds before it’s upon us. It’s over in a heartbeat, with nary a whit of closure, an ounce of emotional satisfaction, or even a great kiss-off line.

In case those three stars aren’t enough to hold out attention, there are dwarves. Singing the complete opposite of “Hi-Ho” are a troupe of known quantities as varied as Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins, Ray Winstone, Toby Jones, and Nick Frost. Dwarven CG technology has come a long way since the days of Gimli and company, but here it’s more of an eyebrow-raiser than a triumph of art. I just couldn’t get past them. I found myself staring at them in every scene as if they were hideously deformed. The jocular Frost very nearly fit, but I’m not sure I’ll ever forget the image of scary, glowering Ian McShane trapped and required to act melancholy while his re-proportioned head is attached to the body of Billy Barty.

I was so distracted, I hardly paid attention to the unnecessary love triangle that remained buried, bordering on subtextual, throughout the film’s second half, with neither closure nor even much resulting conflict. I also ignored several scenes of men in armor swinging their weapons through demons made of glass shards. Ground wars between anonymous participants don’t thrill me like they used to, even if magical CG is involved. Yes, it’s pretty. How encouraging it must be to aim for the low bar of “pretty”, all the better to celebrate when it’s quickly met.

It goes without saying that the sum of SWatH’s parts don’t hold a candle to the vastly different Once Upon a Time, though I do think Kristen Stewart could take li’l Mary Margaret in a fair fight, either in Storybrooke or in her original homeland. And yet, despite the flaws it evinces as it attempts to dazzle with medieval warfare and to rely upon the power of its stars without arming them sufficiently, I’m convinced it’s still better than Mirror, Mirror, sight unseen.

(I’d love to step out further and compare all of them unfavorably to Bill Willingham’s Fables, but I’m at least five volumes behind the present, having dramatically paused months ago at volume thirteen, The Great Fables Crossover. Eventually I’ll attempt to move forward on that.)

2nd Teaser for PT Anderson’s “The Master” Stars Philip Seymour Hoffman as Bell Bon Bubbard

June 20, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

In the first teaser trailer for Paul Thomas Anderson’s next film, The Master, we saw Joaquin Phoenix as an uneasy rapscallion on the verge of doing something different with his life. In the new teaser, Philip Seymour Hoffman is a jack of several trades probing Phoenix with questions and strange reassurances. While the Internet is firmly convinced The Master chronicles the secret origin of Scientology with all the names changed, let it be known Hoffman here distances himself from the late L. Ron Hubbard in a very concrete way: he disguises himself with a mustache.

Not only do we finally see and hear costar Amy Adams, we also hear her hint at Hoffman’s character working on his most important text, a revolutionary self-help tome possibly to be titled Ianetics-Day.

Meanwhile at home, the most optimistic Scientologists hope this film will be, best-case scenario, their version of The Last Temptation of Christ. If it’s not, Anderson may look forward to being banned from working in their half of Hollywood in the future, and resigned to working in the Jewish half instead. If all else fails, there’s always work to be done in the malnourished field of Christian direct-to-DVD.

Who Will Strike More Fear into the Hearts of The 1%: Bane or the “Step Up” Dancers?

June 20, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment

The American upper class has now replaced other races and nations as Hollywood’s go-to nemesis du jour. We’ve already seen them criminalized in Tower Heist and countless other films whose titles I don’t feel like brainstorming right now. Trailers for two upcoming films show no sign of anyone giving that beleaguered minority a break this summer.

In the case of The Dark Knight Rises, the conflict will be a twisted case of evil-vs.-evil, if we infer correctly from previous trailers that Bane and his henchmen mean to bring the pain to the lives of the few remaining upper-crust Gothamites that didn’t already wisely evacuate to the suburbs after the city-wide calamities of the last two films. A new, sponsored trailer was released Monday that shows more of Bane and his plainclothes lackeys without revealing more details about how destroying a football field will in any way inconvenience the billionaires of Gotham, all sitting in their skyboxes above the tumult with easy access to their escape pods.

Other sites are busy scouring that video for clues to the true nature of Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s enigmatic character. All I know is, if the success of TDKR means he’ll never have to return to the role of Cobra Commander, so much the better.

For those who would prefer to see stands taken through nonviolent means — stands that includes more women, non-whites, and colorful costumes — Step Up Revolution offers a viable, funky alternative:

The new girl in town shows off her moves, learns a very important lesson about performance art, then inspires her new flashmob friends to bust a move for social justice. I look forward to learning how this flagrant disruption of dull real estate negotiations will result in tense cinematic drama. Also, I’d love to see Bane try performing a one-handed Centipede.

You’ll note in both trailers the police are completely ineffective against the threats of grass-roots disobedience. If anything, it appears the Step Up cops will be persuaded to join the Occupy Solid Gold movement, unless we’re to believe that they’ve implemented krumping as a new form of riot control. I’d love to see Denis Leary as Arthur Stacy from the most recent Amazing Spider-Man trailer pay them a visit and compare notes.

US Postal Service Rewards Old Snail-Mail Diehards with Classic Film Directors’ Stamps

June 14, 2012 By in Misc. Media, Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

I’m no stamp collector, but even in this modernized world, my wife and I remain regular USPS customers for a variety of purposes, and not just for receiving grocery circulars or avalanches of unread political ads during every election season. When it’s time to restock our stamps, I prefer not to settle for buying the commonest sets available because I’m enamored of the notion of stamps as a decorative flourish, even if they’re affixed to envelopes that no human will ever directly see or handle. I appreciate that the clerks at our regular post office are patient with me whenever I ask to see all the available varieties on hand. I especially appreciated their tolerance the year my wife and I exercised a random whim and mailed some of our Christmas cards using a sheet of Hanukkah stamps. They certainly had plenty of sheets available.

The USPS previously captured my attention and fandom with stamp series devoted to super-heroes and Pixar. Now they’re blatantly baiting me again with their new Great Film Directors sheet, which celebrates four legendary men and one each of their celebrated films: Frank Capra and It Happened One Night; John Ford and The Searchers; John Huston and The Maltese Falcon; and Billy Wilder and Some Like It Hot. I refuse to believe it’s coincidental that they chose four films I’ve actually watched and liked. Someone in the Postmaster General’s Office is clearly angling for me.

The stamps are available online now, but I’m resisting the urge as of this moment. If I do yield to temptation and buy a sheet, the hard part will be letting go of them when their time comes. Like it or not, I’ve already come to terms with knowing deep down that I don’t have the predilection for full-time philately. I accepted this after coveting the Pixar stamps for months, letting them stay in my greedy possession and gather dust in an out-of-sight drawer, until I finally relented and set them free to serve their intended purpose. I try to kid myself that if just one mailroom intern at just one of our utility companies glanced at our monthly payment and felt a frisson of delight at the sight of Sheriff Woody’s twinkly smile in the middle of their humdrum workday, then setting those stamps free was worth it, I guess.

Either way, I appreciate the efforts of the USPS to atone on behalf of the AMPAS for The Searchers‘ complete shutout at the 29th Academy Awards. How ’bout them apples, whoever made Around the World in 80 Days for me to snooze through? Have fun waiting for Cantinflas ever to grace the corner of my mortgage payments.

“Men in Black 3”: the Casual, Relaxed Viewer’s “Prometheus”

June 14, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

I realize this summer’s careful studio negotiations of their blockbuster release schedule intended MIB3 to be the opening act for Prometheus, but I defied their release-order mandate and saw them in reverse order, four days apart. I’m a loner, Dottie. A rebel.

I was a little surprised at the superficial similarities. Behold the flimsy case for their separated-at-birth pedigree:

* Hurray for sci-fi guns, vehicles, aliens, and slime! All given, of course. Getting the easy points out of the way first.

* Directors with impeccable art decoration and set design. Barry Sonnenfeld doesn’t have nearly the resumé that Ridley Scott has, but his settings likewise have nary a drab space. Always a treat, even when the characters inhabiting them are less than captivating.

* Farewell to former series regulars. Setting aside the Alien vs. Predator apocrypha, Prometheus marks the first Alien invasion without Sigourney Weaver — no unbilled surprise cameo, not even an Easter-egg hint of a Grandpa Ripley (unless I missed it, though I’m sure the Internet would’ve trumpeted it by now). Meanwhile in MIB3, we rejoin our old friends Jay and Kay as they attend the funeral of their former commanding officer Zee. Rip Torn is present only as a single large photo, thankfully not a souvenir mugshot from the various legal scuffles cited on his WikiPedia page. Also MIA from MIB, sadly, is our old pal Frank the Pug, except in two wall-sized tributes impossible to overlook. That’s just not good enough.

* Don’t call it a prequel. The past prologue of MIB3 is simple, simplified time travel as Jay absconds to July 1969 to save Kay’s life from retroactive elimination, but the movie keeps the Mad Men and hippies in the back seat. Since we’re back in time anyway, the movie graciously offers insight into Kay’s early days on the job, the tools and methods of the golden age of ET management, and Kay’s very different, much more gregarious relationships with his coworkers. Much insight is provided as to what turned Kay into a gruff old coot, and even the returning but underused Emma Thompson has a ’60s counterpart who’ll be most fortunate if she grows up to be anything like her. It’s not a direct prequel per se, but it’s a strong argument for the superiority of contained flashbacks over feature-length prequels as a secret-origin device.

Prometheus, on the other hand, avoided using the P-word in its publicity as much as possible, though they didn’t exactly sue the media or fans who refused to judge it as anything but. It’s obviously a predecessor in the same Alien timeline, no doubt, but any hardcore fans insisting on the complete origin of Alien‘s mysterious dead Space Jockey despite Scott’s modest pre-release protestations should’ve seen their own expectations deflate in the first reel. Alien took place on a heavenly body designated LV-426. Prometheus takes place on LV-223. BAM. DONE. End of Internet arguments. At best, Prometheus is now Alien Episode One: the Menacing Phantom. Moviegoers will have to wait with bated breath and years of message-board debates until they reveal how the xenomorph forefathers migrated from LV-223 to LV-426 in Alien Episode Two: Clone of the Attacks and Alien Episode Three: the Last Dangerous Visions. (Look, I couldn’t think of my own catchy title, and no one else was using it.)

* Haggard old man played by younger famous actor. Guy Pearce in several pounds of artificial wrinkles versus Josh Brolin as Tommy Lee Jones. Different angles, different results, both with accents not their own.

* The nonchalant black guy is only the second-most magnetic character. Michael Fassbender’s complicated android stole the Prometheus show, but Idris Elba’s just-a-pilot provided the only other relief from a cast of sourpusses. MIB3 isn’t nearly as grim, but Will Smith’s natural charm takes a back seat in several scenes to the hyper-verbal Michael Stuhlbarg (whom I last noticed and enjoyed in the Coen brothers’ Oscar-nominated A Serious Man) as a fifth-dimensional tourist who views multiple timelines simultaneously and hopes to see Earth live into the correct one. (The worst part of living with such a talent must be perceiving all of Schrödinger’s cats at once, then watching helplessly while half of them die.) Stuhlbarg’s jittery nattering upends the film and then grounds it solidly with one ecstatic monologue about synchronous miracles, delivered in a fever pitch rivaling Jim Dale’s narrator from the Sonnenfeld-produced Pushing Daisies. And I’m a big fan of anything that reminds me of Pushing Daisies.

* A spaceship takeoff is a major plot point. And another victory for subwoofers nationwide.

* There will be sacrifice. In each film, at least one person dies so that others might live. That’s a little deeper than anything I recall the first two MIBs attempting. For its achievements in the areas of depth and narrative competence, I’d go so far as to say that MIB3 is the series’ best entry to date.

Then again, with a decade between this and the first two, I wouldn’t be surprised if I’ve forgotten more about those than I think. I remember Lara Flynn Boyle not doing much, the giant subway worm thing, the Unisphere, Vincent D’Onofrio as a demented farmer bug alien, and our old pal Frank the Pug. Alas, poor Frank. What are the odds we’ll see you again in MIB4? Better or worse than the odds of seeing you in Alien Episode 2?

“Prometheus” IMAX 3-D: Panoramas, Subwoofers, and Questions Begetting Questions

June 11, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

From an audiovisual standpoint, the IMAX 3-D version of Prometheus was one of the most overwhelming, immersive experiences I’ve ever encountered. Beyond that, results varied. Possible spoilers abound, but nothing intense enough to require the services of my usual spoiler guardian.

I’ve only seen one full episode of Lost, but I got the impression from its viewers (haters who refused to stop watching as well as genuine fans) that they had to answer all the deepest questions themselves. Much of Prometheus was like that for my son and me. We liked its approach to the spiritual questions it raises, as well as the additional questions engendered by those questions in turn. In my experience that’s par for the course in any serious reexamination of What It All Means. Even if the movie’s answers and suggestions don’t remotely match mine, it’s intriguing to watch other people’s thought processes at work through the constructs built from their own set of evidence.

If we’d seen it on a smaller screen, I might’ve been more disappointed. Luckily for Prometheus, I have a hard time concentrating on aesthetics when my field of vision and my limited hearing range are in maximum sensory overload. Whenever vehicles crashed, it was like a full body massage as the whole theater vibrated with malevolence, and a special treat for my ears that cause such despair when they miss little sounds and entire conversations in everyday life.

As far as people go: Lisbeth Salander Prime was in top form as our main character. It’s refreshing to see a film where a character can wear a cross, stand their ground, and espouse non-Jewish religious views without being a source of intense comedic ridicule or die a grisly death. Granted, she’s the subject of mild comedic ridicule, but then there’s occasionally satisfying retribution in the form of grisly deaths. I also approve of her enduring the most excruciating of hardships while armed only with canned space epidural.

I was enthralled by Michael Fassbender as the android David, who combined Data’s existential aspirations with Wall-E’s cinephilia and Crow T. Robot’s amoral curiosity. Idris Elba seemed an odd choice for the role of the cantankerous, nebulous pilot, but the Stephen Stills squeezebox went a long way. I was mollified by the one or two human moments that Charlize Theron was allowed to experience in modes other than hard-as-nails. The Tom Hardy lookalike met the minimum requirements of the standard skeptical-significant-other role. I barely recognized Guy Pearce disguised in gallons of elderly makeup as Professor Farnsworth and wish he hadn’t been irrelevant to the entire third act.

In general I wish more had been done with the supporting cast. I wouldn’t’ve minded an extra half-hour of character moments, which were the hallmark of some of the previous films. When characters are pondering deep subjects and waxing philosophical, it means a lot more if I’m given reasons to care about their opinions, regardless of whether they’re informed or shallow. Without that emotional foundation, the inevitable kill-spree meant no more to me than one from an average horror film, which is all the more disappointing if you consider that the majority of the film was more sci-fi than horror.

About that kill-spree: although the creature effects achieved their goals, the simplistic drives for some beings and unexpressed motivations for others each failed to coalesce into an effective bad-guy presence. Yes, they were big and strong and physically menacing, but I’ll be really surprised if I can remember any of them fondly three years from now. Prometheus achieved the rare reaction of creating backgrounds and settings that were more vibrant eye-candy than the beings gallivanting in front of them and blocking my view. When you find yourself wishing that movie characters would move aside so you can see what cool things they’re blocking, the movie has gone wrong somewhere.

Perhaps my opinion would’ve improved if I’d consumed any of the pre-release viral-video supplements. I ignored all of them for two reasons: avoidance of spoilers, and preference for experiencing the movie as a work of art unto itself. I grow impatient with any movie that requires homework before I’m supposed to see it. I’m fine with viewing such material months after the fact in the form of DVD extras, but I’m of a mindset that doesn’t yet appreciate movies as the climax of an interactive cross-platform viewing game. If character moments in the movie were minimized with the expectation that the viral videos would pick up the slack in that area, then this isn’t my kind of filmmaking.

It’s possibly my kind of DVD-making. But I’m gonna need a bigger TV.

Disney’s “Wreck-It Ralph” Has First Trailer Ever to be Made Entirely of Easter Eggs

June 9, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

This week saw the release of the first trailer for the next Walt Disney Animated Classic, Wreck-It Ralph, which promises to do for video game characters what Who Framed Roger Rabbit? did for cartoon characters — namely, see how many entertainment companies are willing to stuff theirs into the same clown car as their competitors’.

Casual gamers should obviously recognize King Bowser from the Super Mario Bros empire. Anyone who doesn’t know Clyde from Pac-Man won’t be using the Internet to see this trailer or watching movies made after 1980 anyway. I like to think I made it to level 3 by recognizing a King Malboro from Final Fantasy X-up.

After watching the trailer a second time, I suspect all the pieces and clues of this clever how-many-can-you-name trivia game have also been used to construct a sort of movie to connect the various stages of the game. The difficult part to perceiving this value-added extra is ignoring the game and paying attention to the dialogue instead. That’s harder than it sounds, considering this may be the first recorded instance of a modern game whose cutscene graphics are of equal quality to the in-game graphics. (Sorry, Agni’s Philosophy — you were so close. If only graphics processor technology had progressed at a more supernatural rate for your sake.)

The Wreck-It Ralph Theatrical Trivia Game stars Academy Award Nominee John C. Reilly (Chicago, Step Brothers), Jack McBrayer (30 Rock), Jane Lynch (Glee), Brandon T. Jackson (cruelly underrated in Tropic Thunder), and hopefully hundreds of video game voice actors. If Steve Blum isn’t somewhere in this film, then there’s no point to its existence.

James Bond vs. Not-Jason Bourne: Who Will Be America’s Next Jason Bourne?

June 8, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Last weekend I finally watched Daniel Craig’s second James Bond film, Quantum of Solace after years of stalling due to unenthusiastic reviews. I’ve never been a big James Bond fan and, to be honest, have seen less than half the films — one Connery, a few Roger Moore, all the Brosnan ones except Goldeneye, and both Daniel Craig joints. So far, Casino Royale is the only one that I would rate above a B. That may be because Craig is less suave and sophisticated, more pragmatic, and definitely more bruised and bloodied. Not that I crave movie blood, but his Bond sweats and struggles more on the job than his pampered alternate-Earth predecessors did in my limited experience. Heroes spoiled rotten don’t appeal much to me. Batman may be rich, but you can tell he still has to put effort into what he does.

Perhaps it helps that Craig’s Bond seems less like traditional Bond and more like Jason Bourne — an unlikely hero who saves the day through determination, intense fist-fighting, handheld cameras, and smash-cuts into smash-cuts. Quantum of Solace seems brazen about its co-opting of the Bourne method. I didn’t mind at all until the action paused for character moments, few of which stacked up to the quiet moments and tense complications (exception: any and all uses of Dame Judi Dench). With half the movie sturdy and half of it wanting, Quantum didn’t quite find the same balance that director Paul Greengrass did in the second and third Bournes.

It remains to be seen, then, which of the upcoming spy films will rise above and bear the crown of the Bourne heir apparent. In this corner: Craig’s next Bond film, Skyfall:

This first teaser doesn’t offer nearly enough fluid fight samples for my taste, though that shadowy figure near the end is rumored to be special guest villain Javier Bardem. If anyone can grace us with a far more memorable presence than either of Craig’s last two opponents, Bardem is a safe bet.

In the other corner: The Bourne Legacy, starring Jeremy Renner as a spiritual doppelgänger of Matt Damon.

Stars a-plenty in that one. Edward Norton! Rachel Weisz! Joan Allen! Albert Finney! Rhys Ifans! David Strathairn! And is that Zelkjo Ivanek? (Well, I thought it was him.) And I probably missed even more. The Alley-Swoop-Cam shot at the end shows promise, though it’s a wee derivative of the window-jump shot from The Bourne Ultimatum.

Despite the months separating their release dates, I look forward to the cage match.

America Salutes Time Traveler Who Killed Wrong Butterfly, Extended Ray Bradbury’s Life 50 Extra Years

June 6, 2012 By in Comics/Lit, Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , Leave a comment

The Internet already paid all the best tributes to legendary fantasy/sci-fi author Ray Bradbury, who passed away June 5th at age 91. All I can add are my votes for favorite Bradbury moments:

Favorite movie adaptation: Something Wicked This Way Comes. Sinister carnival comes to small town; ringmaster tries to lure local kids into the exotic carny life…of eeeeevil. I first read about it in Muppet Magazine in a silly movie review section “written” by Statler and Waldorf. Even their crotchety descriptions made it sounds appealing. I caught it on cable TV as a preteen and loved every uneasy minute of it. Young, creepy Jonathan Pryce is all promises and temptations, lording his slithery nefariousness all over Jason Robards and a couple of meddling kids. To this day I’m still a little edgy around merry-go-rounds because of this flick.

Favorite audio adaptation: “A Sound of Thunder”, as part of “Bradbury 13”, a one-time BYU/NPR co-production of radio-drama performances of classic Bradbury shorts. I own six of them on audiocassette, including such suspenseful tales as “Kaleidoscope” (think Cast Away in the vacuum of space, minus hope) and “The Wind” (panicky man terrified by alleged killer weather), but “Thunder” was my favorite of the sextet for introducing me to the now-famous “butterfly effect” concept, and for fun foley-artist dinosaur sounds. Not too long ago the same story was adapted into a full-length made-for-cable movie that I’m afraid to watch because I don’t want to know how much they padded it.

Favorite short story: “The Pedestrian“. In a future where no one takes a walk for pleasure, a man decides to take a walk for pleasure and is branded an unfathomable lunatic. For anyone who’s ever engaged in a simple pastime that no one else gets (collecting Hummel figurines, paint-by-numbers, unicycling, solitaire with real playing cards, blogging), Bradbury knew your discomfort long before you did.

If only the rest of us could live so long, and with even a fraction of his imagination.

Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Indirectly Saluted with Viewing of “The King’s Speech”

June 3, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , Leave a comment

My wife is a much greater fan of British royalty than I’ll ever be. She’s studied and retained much of their history and knows the order of succession to a fair magnitude. As far as my superficial interest is concerned, if they’re not frequently mentioned in entertainment headlines, they’re not in line for the throne. Whenever we see Oscar-nominated movies about British kings and queens, she explains their history and context anew every time with the patience of a saint. Of all the responsibilities and skills we’ve divided between the two of us in our blissful marriage, Knowledge of European History is firmly in her bailiwick, just as Slightly Advanced Math is in mine.

I knew nothing about Queen Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee until I learned how it would interfere with this week’s release schedule for British comic shops. As usual, my shoddy post-school method of learning about history brings me new awareness of my surroundings from unexpected sources. I knew she’s been queen longer than I’ve been alive, but I had no idea her reign is about to enter its seventh smash decade.

Today we had company over for a few hours, with tentative plans to watch a movie. I thought to pop in something vaguely on-topic, but we don’t have The Queen. I went with the closest possible film on hand — The King’s Speech, the story of how her father Colin Firth learns about leadership and friendship from Captain Barbossa after Dumbledore passes away and Firth’s older brother Memento Guy abdicates the throne for the sake of true lust. Or something like that.

Elizabeth and her sister appear in just a few key scenes. From ages eight to thirteen, Elizabeth and her sister Margaret, who I’m told was also eventually well-known, are among those few subjects who demonstrate patience with their king, fully understand his impediment, and respond to him with love and encouragement anyway. This positive reinforcement is in direct contrast to the hundreds of other characters and extras, whose expressions of awkwardness and discomfort would fit right into a typical episode of The Office (either version). Having never been under the Queen’s rule, I’m not in a position to draw any parallels, whether genuine or ironic, between that portrayal and her reign to date. I tend to think the filmmakers were aiming for utmost respect.

As tributes to HRH go, I could’ve gone with much worse. I also have the entire Naked Gun trilogy on hand. Those cameos by her convincing, put-upon stand-in may not have sent the right message this weekend.

So, happy Diamond Jubilee, then!

“Hunger Games” Sequel Renamed to Avoid Sounding Like Manly Gun-Battle Flick

May 24, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , 2 Comments

Crowds who flood to theatres next year for the follow-up to this year’s second-largest event movie should note the reworked title that will take up twice as much marquee space. Lionsgate announced today the rechristening of the largest event film of 2013 as The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, as a kindness to those of us who keep their DVDs alphabetized and still struggle over whether to file The Dark Knight under ‘D’ or ‘B’.

No word yet about whether this change was strictly the fault of the marketing department, or if any input was welcomed from incoming director Francis Lawrence (I am Legend). Fans fervently hope the title format is the only element of the series to be even remotely inspired by Twilight.

Ten other new titles may or may not have been under consideration:

Katniss: the Hunger Games, Part 2
The Even Hungrier Games
Hunger Games 2: Hunger Harder
Hunger-Catching Firegames
Katniss Everdeen and the District of Secrets
HG2: Tributes United
The Hunger Games, Episode 2: Catching of the Fire
Peeta: the Hunger Games, Part 2
Panem Has Always Been at War with Eastasia
Hunger Games II with Last-Minute Slapdash 3D Conversion

Also worth noting is the best of the rejected poster taglines:

“No more games. The hunger just got REAL.”

1st Teaser Trailer for PT Anderson’s “The Master” Avoids the 11-Letter S-Word

May 22, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

From Paul Thomas Anderson, the director of There Will Be Blood, comes another fictional biopic about a potentially disturbed self-made man whose work would come to affect millions in ways not necessarily for the better. Despite Anderson’s own denials, parts of the Internet swear The Master is thinly veiled nonfiction about L. Ron Hubbard, Dianetics, and/or the creation of Scientology. Any similarities to any movements living or dead, real or fictional, will no doubt be left to the viewer to decide and write pretentious essays in response.

(That’s not meant as derogatory. Seriously, I look forward to reading said essays. Some days I thrive on pretentiousness.)

The cast includes Joaquin Phoenix, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Laura Dern, and Kevin J. O’Connor (the lanky toady from Stephen Sommers’ The Mummy). As with Blood, Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood is composing the presumably eerie, non-traditional score. This first teaser avoids any overt hints of its ostensible subject, instead focusing on flashbacks of Phoenix’s shenanigans while an obscured interrogator watches his immature smugness melt into unease.

[Content warning: teaser contains brief clip of bawdy sand-sculpting.]

I’ve played this a few extra times for the soundtrack alone, but I’m also savoring the one-minute sample of Phoenix’s performance that hints at grander, controversial, hopefully pretentious things to come.

Reviews Mocking “Battleship” Drive Product Placement for Other Board Games Up 4000%

May 21, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

This month’s most popular Internet pastime has been writers jabbing the latest Transformers sequel by asking the rhetorical question, “What’s next, ________?” and filling in the blank with the one game they were most frequently beaten at as a kid. Unable to settle on just one punchline, the May 25th issue of Entertainment Weekly even provides a full page of Photoshop humor that name-checks five different classic games. Naturally this list includes the commonest punchline of the day, Hungry Hungry Hippos, which in the past month has skyrocketed to 192,000 Google results, up from a pre-Battleship all-time high of twenty-three Google results, twenty of which were disturbing fetish sites.

I expect most of the true classics have already been snatched up by large studios with massive budgets. Fortunately, if I were a Hollywood executive in need of more properties to license, I have memories from childhood and adulthood to plumb for potential licenses I could plunder that few of my arch-rivals would be equipped to translate to the silver screen.

My hypothetical release slate for summer 2015 would include:

Dungeon! — Someone brilliant at TSR boiled Dungeons & Dragons down to its essential elements: dungeon-crawling, simple hack-‘n’-slash, and treasure-hoarding. When my friends tired of the RPG aspect of Advanced D&D (i.e., whatever TSR module connected their AD&D battles into a story), we’d put away their character sheets and most of the dice, break Dungeon! out of the box, and go mindless.

In the movie version, the dragons, trolls, and other monsters would be replaced by giant alien robots. The titular dungeon would exist beneath a large European city that spectacularly collapses throughout the film from all the explosions undermining it.

Dark Tower — Another fantasy board game, this one dominated by a large electronic tower (batteries not included) that stood at the center of the board and determined the course of events on each player’s turn via LED numbers, flashing pictures, and annoying sound effects. The day mine broke down for good was a sad day indeed, except to adult family members who spent the evening sighing with joy.

In the movie version, the Tower itself is like an undertall Unicron ordering hordes of giant alien robots to overrun the lands of Ripoff Middle Earth. The original sound effects are cranked up to 11, distorted through several filters at ILM, and earn an Academy Award nomination. The movie’s release will be accompanied by vigorous lawsuits against any Stephen King adaptations that attempt to use the same name.

Run for Your Life, Candyman! — I was introduced to Smirk and Dagger Games at their 2009 GenCon booth. Not long after, I made a point of ordering a copy of this early release, a Candyland spoof that adds the single most crucial element the original game always lacked: a violent combat system. Each player is an armed and dangerous gingerbread man, opening fire on opponents while absconding through nightmarish candy-themed badlands. It’s a black-humor hoot that’s much more challenging and disturbing than its predecessor.

In the movie version, all those candy building blocks are the MacGuffin sought by a race of giant alien robots who need sugar for fuel. Firing nuclear weapons point-blank in each other’s faces over the centuries has resulted in a species-wide genetic deformity that prevents them from metabolizing raw cane sugar, so the processed sugar of faux-Candyland is their only hope. This would merely be an adaptation of the original Candyland if it weren’t for the gingerbread men’s extremely loud machine guns.

Bargain Hunter — This shopping game taught kids how to search store ads patiently for the lowest prices on furniture, appliances, and pets, as well as how to buy them with either cash or credit card. It came with a plastic credit card machine and several pretend credit cards that you inserted into the machine. You ran the cards through like a real machine, and prayed for purchase approval just like a real shopper. The rules for credit card interest accrual were sketchy and failed to reflect the realities of APRs, annual fees, and predatory lending, but you learned pretty quickly what a fair price was for an exotic lizard.

In the movie version, every department store in the Big City is taken over by a race of giant alien robots calling themselves The Bargain, who aim to dominate Earth’s economic infrastructures from within. Humanity’s last hope against this one-percenter allegory is a single man with a whip-smart attitude and no credit cards to max out. This hero will be played by Dave Ramsey.

Clue: the Great Museum Caper — I’m not sure this sequel ever became a household name, but it’s still a favorite in our family. One player is a thief sneaking through an art museum to steal paintings, recording their movements on a secret notepad in lieu of a physical playing piece on the board itself. The other players are detectives hoping to land blindly on the thief’s space as the disappearing paintings and disabled security devices give away his position. C:tGMC offered more variation in its gameplay and used none of the original characters, not even that cursed Miss Scarlet who was guilty in nine out of every ten times I played.

In the movie version, we pick up where the first Clue movie left off, wherever that was. I never saw it or its three different endings. Clue 2: Dark of the Monet will replace the art museum with the first game’s mansion setting and have twelve different endings. In each ending, the culprit is a different giant alien robot who retaliates against arrest attempts by blasting apart the study, the ballroom, and the conservatory.

File 13 — An integral part of my D&D experience was a subscription to Dragon Magazine, which occasionally came with free cut-out board games designed by a cartoonist named Tom Wham. My favorite was File 13, in which players were game designers attempting to shepherd their silly-named creations through a game-design flowchart. If one of your games reached the end of the chart, your game was published and you won. The board was a pull-out double-page spread; the pieces were tiny colored squares you had to cut out yourself. I still have my copy of the game tucked away in a Ziploc bag somewhere ’round here.

In the movie version, we replace all the games with giant alien robots, the flowchart with a giant alien robot factory, and the name File 13 with the title Transformers 5: Real Steel 2. Otherwise it’s an utterly faithful adaptation.

Did One Awful Line Cost “Dark Shadows” Millions of Ticket Sales?

May 14, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

In its second weekend of release, Joss Whedon’s Marvel’s The Avengers raked in yet another $100 million at the US box office. By next Friday its grosses should surpass 2012’s previous champ, The Hunger Games. Running a distant second place, Tim Burton’s $150 million reboot of 1979’s Love at First Bite should be proud that it earned in a single weekend what Disney’s Chimpanzee has earned in four, but appears unlikely to catch up to Disney’s John Carter by the end of its run.

I’ve seen six of the seven previous collaborations between Tim Burton and Johnny Depp (Sweeney Todd continues to elude me) and respect their general track record as a team despite my misgivings over Alice in Wonderland. However, this weekend’s performance implies I wasn’t alone in being repulsed by the trailers.

Strike One was the music selected from old K-Tel disco compliations. I’m not a big fan of trailers augmented with overplayed Top-40 oldies, which don’t score nostalgia points with me as they do my peers and elders. In my ’80s youth, we were used to the occasional ’60s hit here and there in our trailers, frequently even sung by the characters. In the grand scheme, a twenty-year-old song was forgivable. Whoever edited the Dark Shadows trailer was required by the setting to indulge in a musical generation gap twice as wide. This year Curtis Mayfield’s “Super Fly” will celebrate its 40th birthday, and the other tracks weren’t much newer. Disco would be the perfect bait if the film’s target audience were former polyester dance-floor kings over age 60.

I realize the filmmakers chose 1972 as their landing point for a specific purpose, but did the trailer need to sound like every other 1970s spoof ever made? Was disco the only genre of choice for musicians from 1970 to 1979 in the same way that the 1990-1999 Billboard charts were comprised entirely of sad-sack grunge acts? Somehow I don’t remember it that way.

Think about that number again: forty years. Perhaps rose-colored glasses have obscured my hindsight, but I don’t recall ads for the original Fright Night featuring much Bing Crosby, or the Jimmie Dorsey Orchestra luring the kids in to see Jim Carrey’s Once Bitten. I am similarly unconvinced that The Lost Boys would have doubled its grosses if the Saxophone Guy had been replaced by the Andrews Sisters belting out “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy”.

Strike Two was Depp’s portrayal of Eddie Munster as an anachronistic stiff with the self-awareness of Michael Scott. I hope the actual film at least avoids the hackneyed man-out-of-time joke from other movies in which a displaced hero looks at a modern car and thinks it’s a dragon, despite having wheels just like any known wagon from any previous millennium.

Strike Three was this slow-paced exchange of comedy death:

“Are you stoned or something?”

“They tried stoning me, my dear. It did not work.”

This was the exact moment that certified the movie as unwatchable for me. I know from bad puns. This is not how you construct a good bad pun. This…is a bad bad pun. This is humor for viewers who still chortle anytime someone says, “Ya think?” Those same fans are probably skipping theaters and waiting for its release on DVD, which might have been a better first home for this flick. I have no intention of getting past the trailers and finding out objectively whether or not this “joke” is an isolated instance, either in theaters or months later at home.

When it comes to TV-show remakes as self-parody, that quota is already filled on my shelves by The Brady Bunch Movie. I’ll pass.

Countdown: Four Weeks Until US Release of Last Ten Unspoiled Minutes of “Prometheus”

May 11, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

Ridley Scott’s newest science fiction milestone commands the cover of the May 18th issue of Entertainment Weekly, whose sidebars in previous issues about the Alien prequel/spinoff/homage/whatever may already have said too much. If the official American trailers, several international trailers, viral-marketing future DVD extras, epic-length WikiPedia entry, and half-baked rumor sites haven’t whetted your appetite for advance knowledge (true or false), EW’s article also reveals which character is not quite human, which ones are corporate toadies, and which one is our primary protagonist. Along with those Dell-logic-problem clues, factor in the Hollywood pecking order of Academy Award Winner Charlize Theron, Academy Award Nominee Young Magneto, Lisbeth Salander Prime, Stringer Bell, Leonard Shelby, two male unknowns, and one female unknown. Savvy viewers should be able to calculate their order of elimination in the finished product with a margin of error of ±1 corpse.

If you mean to save yourself for the American release date of June 8th, hiding from the Internet will not be enough. TV ads have now been unleashed to the networks so that the Midwest will finally get a look-see. Expect more magazines to follow in EW’s footsteps in the weeks ahead, including the inevitable TV Guide cover straining to cash in on the hype with the most tenuous of TV connections. I predict a showcase along the lines of “Twenty Best Movies Starring Actors from The Office: Prometheus, Bridesmaids, Get Smart, and More!” I won’t be surprised to see ancillary merchandise at the comic shop. The true danger zone begins June 1st when the movie opens early in England because of favoritism. Expect Internet hall monitors to place their sites futilely on emergency spoiler lockdown when waves of soccer-hooligan trolls begin tweeting drunken screen shots and plot-loophole complaints live from their theater seats.

I count myself among the wave of fans who saw James Cameron’s Aliens before seeing the original Alien and consequently have a hard time discussing contrary opinions with old-school fans who were marked for life when they saw the classic chest-bursting surprise on the big screen. I may rank the four films differently, but to this day I don’t hate any of them (the two crossovers are another story). I hope not to hate this one as well, but with so much time remaining for so much more to be ruined, I may need to play the hermit card and go underground like Newt till it’s safe. I can’t just nuke the Internet from orbit, so there’s no way to be sure.

My Geek Demerits #1: No Midnight Showings

May 3, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , Leave a comment

As I write this, millions of hearty moviegoers in the EDT zone are high on anticipation of tonight’s midnight premieres of Marvel’s The Avengers. Part of me wishes I could join the party and stay ahead of the curve on the online chatter and spoilers. Unfortunately, the majority of me has a full-time day job and a finicky attitude toward use of my vacation time. I’m weak like that.

Even if I’d taken the time off, my family would also like to see it, but they aren’t in a position to drop everything and go nocturnal. Sure, I could hit a midnight showing solo and plan my second screening with them at a later, mundane hour. That would be a boon if I love it enough for multiple showings. That worked for Chronicle, but what if something goes wrong? What if the movie is constructed entirely within the framework of the common Joss Whedon motifs of All Fathers Are Monsters, All Corporations Are Evil, and Destroy All Couples, all of which set me on edge? What if I hate it and find myself forcibly sequestered at the shunned contrarian end of the Internet next to Armond White and Cole Smithey?

I shudder to imagine enduring an encore for the sake of family quality time under those circumstances. I’m reminded of my final theatrical viewing of The Phantom Menace, in which I slept through the entire Tatooine sequence, even the podrace, as a defense mechanism. Knowing that I blew actual money on an extra ticket for that avoidable privilege added insult to injury.

Most problematic for me: my body can no longer handle gallivanting around town till 3 a.m. anymore. In my youth, I knew the occasional evening that ended with bedtime after sunrise. Today, retiring at midnight is normal for me (if not for others my age), but if I push too far beyond, the following day is made of regret, stupor, and double the normal assault of old-man muscle aches. Braving those hours of discomfort is not as fun a dare as it used to be.

I’ve had to learn to be patient and resist the temptation. For the sake of recognizing my limitations, I accept my geek demerit and will bide my time till Saturday without grumbling. I wish all the best to those superfans lining up hours ahead of the rest of us to see the best Greatest Film of All Time of the year.

Before you exercise your bragging rights too brashly, keep in mind: if you were a true hardcore Marvel’s The Avengers fan, you would’ve arranged to catch it last week in Australia. Waiting till it’s cordially escorted to your spoiled American front doorstep is weak.

Batmania Returns, Preempts Avengermania One Week Ahead of Schedule

May 1, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Please allow this old newcomer to practice inserting video links. Chances are you’ve already seen this one. Nothing for you to lose if I screw it up, then.

I was viewer #303 when that landed on YouTube circa 11:30 p.m. EDT Monday night. Bragging rights for being slightly ahead of the curve for that brief moment are mine.

And yet…my head failed to explode. I’m trusting the finished product will be exciting and as vital as any other Nolan film. Maybe the ads for this year’s Best Picture winner, Marvel’s The Avengers, have desensitized me to awesomeness. Whatever the reason, I have yet to burst into Caps-Lock cheers or pound my exclamation mark key until it cracks.

Mostly what I see is:

Bale grimaces and suffers. His two previous Bat-performances were much more than that, especially when he wasn’t being outshined by all those elderly Oscar vets. The evidence for this installment is thus far concealed. Again, I trust all the meaty soliloquies and jump-cut brawls are being saved for the actual viewing experience.

Bane sounds stilted instead of garbled. I’ve enjoyed Bane as a comics character in recent years, particularly as a demented father figure among younger villains in Gail Simone’s unfairly canceled Secret Six. There, he was well-spoken and had a twisted sense of honor that spurred him into the most unpredictable decisions in any given situation. In this trailer, his two lines wouldn’t sound out of place in any other Batman film or TV show. Any of them.

Anne Hathaway does martial arts. I’ve had a hard enough time coping with the reality that Princess Diaries graduated to nude scenes. Seeing her perform snippets of rehearsed chop-socky was only slightly less disorienting. In her defense, it doesn’t help that I’ve never cared for Catwoman as a character, not even Julie Newmar’s version. It’s one of my many secret shames that bars me from attending all the really good comic conventions.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is mysterious beat cop. I suspect his average-Joe character will bring unto the film Great Meaning. Either that or he’s undercover Dick Grayson, and/or by film’s end he’ll be the new Batman. His nebulous nature frightens and confuses me. Let’s hope it was worth walking away from playing Cobra Commander.

Batplane Returns. Whether live-action or animated, nine out of every ten Batplane appearances follow the same pattern: Batman flies somewhere he would normally drive. He activates one or two weapons. He fails to win. Sooner or later, it explodes. Spread across his appearances in various media, Bruce Wayne by now has spent hundreds of billions on single-use disposable Batplanes. The Nolan version looks sleeker than most previous versions, but is doubtlessly just as fragile.

Midair plane stunts! Between Bane’s apparent jailbreak and the BatKamikaze, TDKR looks to stay airborne at length. After the accomplishments we’ve seen in the occasionally intersecting oeuvres of Jerry Bruckheimer and Michael Bay, are there truly any new stunts left to perform above the horizon?

There shall be Occupying. Please, no.

MPAA Downgrades “Wings” from Unrated to PG-13 for Sake of Teens That Need to See It

April 30, 2012 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , Leave a comment

Variety reports the very first Best Picture Oscar winner, 1927’s silent WWI aerial dogfight drama Wings, will receive a limited theatrical re-release in May at select Cinemark theaters nationwide. At the request of the MPAA, Paramount submitted it for review and received a PG-13 for “war violence”.

This newly restored, MPAA-approved version will feature no bloody decapitations, all F-words removed, and several exposed ankles pixilated for younger eyes. Now that the MPAA has removed the stigma of sharing the same non-rating as 2011’s sexaholic character study Shame, families nationwide can safely satisfy the silent-film withdrawal that has kept them debilitated in these waning days of post-The Artist-mania.

Children under 12 will still require parental approval, or else wait for the 2014 edited-for-Nickelodeon version which will delete all human-related scenes, be digitally recolored in shiny blues and oranges, and grant wacky cartoon voices to each of the planes.