April 28, 2006
Summer Movie Preview 2006
I just haven't had a darn thing to say lately. That's all about to change, what with the summer movie season starting up. This summer looks to be a hot one as far as the weather is concerned, and the movie theaters have got to be loving that. The appeal of a cold theater and a crappy movie has to beat the thought of your skin melting. And they said that nobody benefits from global warming. Jack Valenti may have retired from the MPAA, but I'm betting that when he figures out that hot summers = profit in the theater, he'll be out shooting cases of Aqua Net with a shotgun in a heartbeat. But enough politics, let's set our brains to "numb" and look at some of this year's prize pigs in the summer movie season
It used to be that summer movie season started on Memorial Day and lasted until Labor Day, but just like everything else in America it has gotten bigger. This year, I'm marking the summer movie season open on May 5th with the release of "Mission Impossible 3". It seems that in the last 5 years, everyone and their cousin has been attached to either direct or star in this film, with the only known quantities being Ving Rhames returning and Tom Cruise doing a side-profile picture for the movie poster. Phillip Seymour Hoffman plays the baddie in this one, and I can't figure that out. Sure, he can be menacing in that "sitting outside the playground every day even though he doesn't have kids" way, but as a super terrorist evil man? I just don't see it.
Also due out on May 5th is "Bandidas". This collaboration between Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz (remember when Tom Cruise was dating her? Man, did she disappear or what?) is an old west action/comedy movie involving bank robbery and a lack of clothing. Is it worth seeing? Who cares? It gives you something to see other than the older half of TomKat. My advice: stay home that weekend.
May 12th brings yet more action your way with "Poseidon". Sure, this remake won't have Shelley Winters' panties on screen, and the cast has about a tenth of the talent of the original, and yes it will be just a big CGI lovefest.....wait, why am I trying to sell this movie? Stay home, rent the original and take a drink every time Red Buttons is on screen. You'll have more fun.
Sequels, remakes and adaptations, oh my! Here comes some of the latter on May 19th with "The DaVinci Code". Opie and Forrest team up for a third time to bring this super ultra mega bestseller to the big screen. They got special permission to film in the Louvre. They even hired some people who speak fluent French! How can it go wrong? Easy: the secret that's hidden in the code is the Colonel's 11 herbs and spices.
May 26th is your Memorial Day weekend, and it brings to the big screen one movie: X-Men 3. Officially titled "X-Men: The Last Stand", this movie will have all you've come to love about the X-Men series. Mutants galore, things going boom, Shakespearean actors playing super villains and tight costumes, all the usual suspects plus a few new faces. The only question here might be if new director Brett Ratner can make a movie without Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. Regardless, they have Kelsey Grammer playing The Beast, so I'm in.
Is it real or is it fiction. Vince Vaughan and Jennifer Aniston star in June 2nd's "The Break Up". And I could care less. Bring on the snooze button, I'm cruising until that next weekend when I get my animation on.
Current animation powerhouse and recent Disney acquisition Pixar brings another summer blockbuster to the screen in "Cars". Somehow they're going to try and de-hickify auto racing through computer animation. I say good luck to that. Also due out that weekend is director Robert Altman's "A Prarie Home Companion". Might be worth a double feature, if only because of the cast list. This thing's got more names in it than a Christopher Guest movie. I might be able to handle The Lohan for the duration of this movie, but only if Lily Tomlin promises to make with the funny.
Do yourself a favor and drink heavily if you're going to the movies on June 16th. Out then are two sequels that didn't need to be made in "The Fast and The Furious 3" and "Garfield 2, plus one movie that makes me think it'll set the immigration debate even further back than it already is: Nacho Libre. Jack Black just isn't my cup of tea, and seeing his hairy, hobbit-like physique stretching the limits of spandex would make me poke my eyes out. Go rent the only tolerable Jack Black starring vehicle in "School of Rock" and love the scene where Joan Cusack sings Edge of Seventeen.
What the hell? How many times can we remake the story of the magic remote control? Apparently one more, this time with it in the hands of a retarded man. Adam Sandler can control time. That's the premise of June 23rd's release, "Click". Now if only his remote had Tivo so we could watch the game while crap like his movie is recording in the background for a drunken viewing later on.
I could have sworn the Strangers with Candy movie was relegated to the same phantom zone of Roger Corman's Fantastic Four movie, but I guess I was wrong. The movie with a million release dates and half a million distributors is supposedly coming out on Wednesday, June 28th. Great timing, folks. You have absolutely no competition that following weekend...
Except the MAN OF FREAKIN STEEL!!! Superman is back, and he's going to try and make you forget Richard Prior and that awful nuclear man. Sure, everyone from the original cast has moved on (some have moved further than others), but Christopher Reeves wasn't the first Superman, either. Director Bryan Singer (of The Usual Suspects and the first two X-Men movies) made a smart move by bringing in newcomer Brandon Routh to play the last son of Krypton, and surrounding him with a few name performers. His old pal, Kevin Spacey, takes a turn as the bald genius Lex Luthor, and he looks sufficiently sinister and brilliant in the skullcap. Top it with a healthy dose of dragging Marlon Brando out of the grave to play Jor-El, and you've got yourself a movie I'll pay to see.
July 7th. Still recovering from the hangover? Well then, get yourself a flask of rum and head on down to the local megaplex. You've got a choice of "Pirates of the Caribbean 2", which has the original cast returning and an abundance of swashbuckling, or Austin's own Richard Linklater's "A Scanner Darkly". The latter film basically looks like A-ha's "Take On Me" put in a blender with "The Matrix". I'm waiting until I hear more about it, but it got raves from the secret screening at South by Southwest.
Let's skip on down to July 21st. Perhaps one of the more controversial movies reviewed here on CCB has been "The Village". Well, M. Night Shyamalan is back at it again with "Lady in the Water". As always, expect an unexpected twist somewhere in the movie. But hey, it's got everyone's favorite loveable loser, Paul Giamatti in it. How bad can it be? Remember "Duets"? Well, neither does anybody else.
August is usually a crap month for movies. The big studios have already blown their wad on June & July, so you never know what they'll pull out for August. First up is Will Ferrel, who hasn't had a #1 comedy in a while. Well, this time he's playing a Nascar driver in "Talladega Nights". Come on, Will, play that sarcastic character we know you do so well. This movie looks beneath you.
Who's ready for another 9/11 movie? Anybody? Well, you're getting one anyway, this one on August 11th. Oliver Stone tries to breathe more conspiracy into the events of that day with Nicholas Cage running around in the ruins of the WTC. I'm not really keen on 9/11 movies yet, so I'll give this one a pass.
August 18th, you will find me at the movie theater. There's no two ways about it. First, I'll be watching that one trick pony Kevin Smith cart out the 6th installment of the Jersey Trilogy in "Clerks 2". But the masterpiece of that weekend has to be the Samuel L. Jackson vehicle "Snakes on a Plane". How simple a movie is this? It's snakes...on a plane. You don't need more than that. Except, of course, for Sam to say "I'm tired of all these motherfuckin snakes on this motherfuckin plane!" Word is, that line of dialogue was added into the movie when someone made a mock internet trailer and somehow pieced that line together.
The last weekend in August has something to do with a beer drinking competition. Looks like a drunken version of "Dodgeball" to me. Whatever.
Are there more movies than this coming out? Of course. I'm just picking a few that you might be interested in hearing about. Love it or leave it, this is my summer movie preview.
April 23, 2006
Review: Hammer Horror Series 2-DVD Set
Our friends at Universal Studios have done quite well by classic horror fans. Their "Franchise Collection" entry titled The Hammer Horror Series contains eight films on two discs that, while not on Hammer's A-list (like "Horror Of Dracula" or the still unreleased-on-DVD "So Long At The Fair"), are significant entrants in the Hammer saga. In order of appearance, they are
Brides Of Dracula (Peter Cushing, Freda Jackson 1960)
The Curse Of The Werewolf (Clifford Evans, Oliver Reed 1961)
Phantom Of The Opera (Herbert Lom, Michael Gough 1962)
Paranoiac (Janette Scott, Oliver Reed 1963)
The Kiss Of The Vampire (Clifford Evans, Edward DeSouza 1963)
Nightmare (David Knight, Moira Redmond 1964)
Night Creatures (Peter Cushing, Patrick Allen 1962)
The Evil Of Frankenstein (Peter Cushing, Duncan Lamont 1964)
The Kennedy Administration high point of Hammer Studios, much like Hitchcock's TV series begun a few years earlier in the States, was not only a house of enviable regular talent (such as Cushing) but an incubator for future careers (note the early work of Oliver Reed). Most selections give a good taste of the famous Hammer atmosphere ("Frankenstein" and "Nightmare" are the main entries for this) but others show the diversity of the catalog:
Night Creatures (alternate title: "Captain Clegg") - although ghost story elements are present, this is actually an action-adventure story set in the late 1700's (in the manner of Disney's "Dr. Syn alias The Scarecrow"). Cushing is a village pastor trying to shepherd his flock during complicated times, with the coastal fishermen caught in between operations of piratical smugglers and the rough King's brigades opposing them with land-based and flintlock-toting foot patrols.
Brides Of Dracula - the often confusing entrant in the Hammer Dracula series, it involves the Van Helsing character (Cushing) after the death of Dracula in the 1958 first film but before his reanimation in the 1966 second appearance of Christopher Lee as the Count. This 'further adventures of Van Helsing' is helped by the strong foil of Martita Hunt as the current Countess in charge of the castle.
Phantom of the Opera ('62) - An all-around acceptable budget retelling of a story that's been done at least 20 times. Above average music, acting and effective use of soundstage sets in spite of limitations. The phantom's character is properly motivated and the romantic-school pursuit of the main characters of answers and resolution is unbroken in the build toward the climax.
Kiss Of The Vampire - One of the earliest and best Hammer films to deal with period vampirism without specific reference to the Stoker character. The particular Count in the case of this village is more of a cult leader than predatory loner, and the undead have a limited ability to move in low indirect daylight. This more gregarious vampire brood is less obtrusive than usual, covering its tracks well and provoking confusion in their victims.
At around 29$ at Sun Coast video (at Baybrook), it's a bargain, and a must-have for those pursuing old-school character development and plotting, not to mention high-quality melodramatic atmospherics.
April 18, 2006
Web Link of the Day
Are you sure you want to do this?
April 11, 2006
April 04, 2006
For the record, I was not in San Diego on this date in question:
5) When I saw you guys in San Diego, this guy was standing in front of my girlfriend and me who, well the guy was pretty f*cking creepy. By Jen's estimation, he never looked away from you the entire show. Do you get a lot of that? Does Brian?Can't blame the guy. We're asking for it.
With a witty answer like that and a video like the one below, I think I'm in love.
Ummm, I should point out that at about 10 minutes in, the video is no longer safe for work viewing.
Texas Terri Bomb
Why am I just now discovering this?