Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road” gets an eerie first trailer!
See it at widescreenwonderland.com
Leave it to J.J. Abrams and the Bad Robot team to hit it out of the park…again! “Star Trek” is officially this year’s most balanced and freakin’ entertaining tent pole film.
In the ‘not really new information/ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC news that I haven’t commented on yet’ category comes last week’s article from the MTV Movie Blog. The article addresses the progress being made on the potential movie adaptation of Stephen King’s “The Dark Tower” series and mentions that J.J. Abrams and Damon Lindelof have already secured the rights to produce movie versions of the Dark Tower story and are actually pretty amped about getting it going.
Hi all,
Just in case you haven’t heard, I’ve moved the site to Widescreenwonderland.com!
See you there!
Bill
widescreen.wonderland@gmail.com
HitFix has three new stills from the upcoming “Kick-Ass” movie. Click here to go see all three of them.
For anyone unfamiliar, ‘Kick-Ass’ is the brutally violent upcoming film from director Matthew Vaughn. It’s based on the comic book series of the same name created by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr. on the Marvel imprint, Icon Comics.
The premise is simple: A comic book reading geek in high school decides to become a real life superhero and bring justice to his city. The result is him getting his ass whupped and him whupping ass. As the story develops, he meets other self-made superheros.
In all honesty, with all of the popularity of comic books and comic book movies, I’m surprised we haven’t heard of this already happening. It doesn’t take much for someone to dress up and act like a vigilante. If Miller and Romita Jr. thought about it enough to make a comic about it and I’ve thought about it, I’m sure others have thought about it.
Prediction: After the release of “Kick-Ass”, it’s going to happen.
Prediction 2: The guerrilla marketing strategy for the film will involve the release of a YouTube video of a masked vigilante superhero kicking someone’s ass. It happened in the books so it’s the perfect tie-in for the film.
Collider.com today has a red carpet interview with Pixar producers Jim Morris and Lindsay Collins from the Los Angeles Film Critics Awards event.
You can see the story and video here.
Anything Pixar gets me excited. Plain and simple. The stories are great. The attention to detail in every film is second to none and thus far, they have yet to release a dud. The entertainment value of any of the Pixar movies for kids and adults are huge. So the news that the “Toy Story” films are getting the 3-D treatment for re-release is very interesting. In terms of kids films, you can’t get any better. The creativity of the toys and the work done by the voice cast is great. I’m also interested to see what they do with “Toy Story 3″ when that gets released in a few years.
Written and directed by Woody Allen, “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” is the story of two best friends who take a summer jaunt to Barcelona only to get wrapped up in another of Woody’s experiments of love. Vicky, played by Rebecca Hall, thinks she has her life going according to plan, is studying for her thesis, and is getting married in the spring. Cristina, played by Scarlett Johansson, has no idea what she wants to do with her life or how she wants to contribute. The only thing she is sure of is what she doesn’t want.
The moment that they meet Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem) everything changes. He is a free spirited painter who challenges what each of them think about love. What plays out is a complex mix of emotions and sexual experiences.
I loved seeing how each of the character’s flaws and needs dictated exactly how the story for them was going to play out. This was superb character development on the part of Woody. There wasn’t one action or line that was out of place. The dialogue on the other hand, it was pure Woody Allen. I’m sorry but the best person to deliver Woody Allen dialogue is Woody Allen…not Javier Bardem. In general, I found that the repetitive nature of Woody’s dialogue in this film and the pacing came off as labored. Javier’s scenes with his ex-wife (Penelope Cruz) on the other hand, were awesome. Very natural and spoken in Spanish, you could feel the passion and tell that their relationship had many layers. On top of that, the scenes between Hall and Bardem, because of their quiet intensity were fun to watch. Scarlett unfortunately was a wet blanket.
Barcelona itself gets big props. It was refreshing to see Woody choose a unique backdrop for this film. It heightened the romantic elements and provided for additional eye candy… as if the cast wasn’t enough. Had this been located in New York or London, as many of his previous films have been, it would’ve just been another Woody Allen movie.
The bottom line: 3.5/5. A good job all around. While there were a few things that kept me from completely enjoying this film, fans of any of the cast members or Woody Allen in general will enjoy this movie.
Notes:
Let me know if I’m the only one but c’mon, would Juan Antonio’s approach work in real life? I find it hard to believe that there are many people who would decide, spurr of the moment, to follow a lonely painter into a prop plane for a weekend of seeing the sights, wine, and sex.
Penelope Cruz, Rebecca Hall, and Javier Bardem were nominated each for a Golden Globe. The film won for Best Film, Musical or Comedy. I personally don’t see why the film won. If anyone absolutely had to be recognized for the film, it should have been Javier Bardem. He did a really good job juggling his character’s emotions towards each of the female characters plus his scenes with Penelope Cruz really stand out.
Variety has released the box office numbers for the second weekend of 2009.
The big winner of the weekend was Clint Eastwood’s ” Gran Torino”. This was it’s first weekend in wide release and finished Sunday with a gross of $29 million. This is his biggest opening as both an actor and director. Apparently Eastwood still appeals to women. 52 % of the audience was female while, no surprise here, 40 % was over 50 years old.
So what did the youngsters go see? “Bride Wars”, despite getting panned by critics (currently at 12% on Rotten Tomatoes) came in second with $21.5 million and in close third was the horror/thriller “The Unborn” with $21.1 million.
The rest of the top five consist of:
“Marley and Me” with $11.4 million and “Curious Case of Benjamin Button” with $9.5 million.
Unless someone told you, would you have any idea from which of James Cameron’s movies this is from? 20th Century Fox released this “promotional” still from the set of James Cameron’s upcoming sci-fi hit “Avatar”. What does the photo promote exactly? I don’t want to see it any more now then I already did. I can tell you though that from the looks of it, everyone on the set needs to cut their hair.
A blurb on “Avatar” from IESB.net:
An Avatar, a human mind in an alien body, finds himself torn between two worlds, in a desperate fight for his own survival and that of the indigenous people. With Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Stephen Lang, Michelle Rodriguez and Sigourney Weaver. Written and directed by James Cameron. Also in Imax 3-D. 20th Century Fox, Dec. 18.
Below is a rundown of the categories, my picks and the winners of last nights Golden Globe awards ceremony. You can also see them at the Hollywood Foreign Press Association website. 13 correct out of 25 is only 52%… I’m a little bit ashamed but I don’t feel too bad. “Slumdog Millionaire” was the big winner of the night with Best Film, Director, Screenplay, and Score. I went with my gut instead of heeding the warning of the Critic’s Choice Awards. “Slumdog Millionaire” won the bulk of these as well.
All in all, it was a so so event. Nothing too exciting happened although WTF was up with Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange? They couldn’t stop grabbing onto each other… Of the moments I particularly enjoyed were Tracey Morgan’s speech for “30 Rock”, Ricky Gervais’ little schtick with drink in hand, Ledger’s win and Chris Nolan’s acceptance speech and Steve Spielberg’s acceptance speech for the Cecile B. DeMille award. Say what you will about some of his more recent films (Indy 4), Spielberg is a Hollywood master. I don’t think there is another director that has created so many consistently great and innovative films. He knows what the audience in each case wants and delivers exactly that.
Best Motion Picture – Drama
My Pick – The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button
Winner – Slumdog Millionaire
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama
My Pick – Meryl Streep – Doubt
Winner – Kate Winslet – Revolutionary Road
Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama
My Pick and Winner – Mickey Rourke – The Wrestler
Best Motion Picture – Musical Or Comedy
My Pick – Burn After Reading
Winner – Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy
My Pick – Frances McDormand – Burn After Reading
Winner – Sally Hawkins – Happy-Go-Lucky
Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Musical Or Comedy
My Pick – Javier Bardem – Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Winner – Colin Farrell – In Bruges
Best Performance by an Actress In A Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
My Pick – Marisa Tomei – The Wrestler
Winner – Kate Winslet – The Reader
Best Performance by an Actor In A Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
My Pick and Winner – Heath Ledger – The Dark Knight
Best Animated Feature Film
My Pick and Winner – Wall-E
Best Foreign Language Film
My Pick and Winner – Waltz With Bashir (Israel)
Best Director – Motion Picture
My Pick – David Fincher – The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button
Winner – Danny Boyle – Slumdog Millionaire
Best Screenplay – Motion Picture
My Pick – Frost/Nixon written by Peter Morgan
Winner – Slumdog Millionaire written by Simon Beaufoy
Best Original Score – Motion Picture
My Pick – The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button composed by Alexandre Desplat
Winner – Slumdog Millionaire composed by A. R. Rahman
Best Original Song – Motion Picture
My Pick and Winner – “The Wrestler” – The Wrestler music & lyrics by Bruce Springsteen
Best Television Series – Drama
My Pick and Winner – Mad Men (AMC)
Best Performance by an Actress In A Television Series – Drama
My Pick – Sally Field – Brothers & Sisters (ABC)
Winner – Anna Paquin – True Blood (HBO)
Best Performance by an Actor In A Television Series – Drama
My Pick – Hugh Laurie – House (FOX)
Winner – Gabriel Byrne – In Treatment (HBO)
Best Television Series – Musical Or Comedy
My Pick and Winner – 30 Rock (NBC)
Best Performance by an Actress In A Television Series – Musical Or Comedy
My Pick and Winner – Tina Fey – 30 Rock (NBC)
Best Performance by an Actor In A Television Series – Musical Or Comedy
My Pick and Winner – Alec Baldwin – 30 Rock (NBC)
Best Mini-Series Or Motion Picture Made for Television
My Pick and Winner – John Adams (HBO)
Best Performance by an Actress In A Mini-series or Motion Picture Made for Television
My Pick and WInner – Laura Linney – John Adams (HBO)
Best Performance by an Actor in a Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television
My Pick and Winner – Paul Giamatti – John Adams (HBO)
Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television
My Pick – Dianne Wiest – In Treatment (HBO)
Winner – Laura Dern – Recount (HBO)
Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television
My Pick and Winner – Tom Wilkinson – John Adams (HBO)
