"I'm Going To Show You Something Beautiful..." Age of Ultron Trailer Wins The Internet!

Yowza.  The troubling thing about working nights, is that sometimes you come home after a long day, and some bit of movie news has just absolutely devastated the internet in your absence (something that's been happening more often than not around ITMOD lately, sorry folks).  Yesterday, that news was the Age of Ultron trailer.  James Spader's gargley robotic voice promises early on "something beautiful" and Joss Whedon certainly delivers the goods.  Most of the trailer is what we saw at this year's San Diego Comic Con (minus a jovial cocktail party sequence, but Marvel doesn't want to confuse the Empire Strikes Back All-Shit-About-To-Break-Loose doom & gloom of the Ultron plot).  Still, now we can watch it over and over and over again and drool and drool and drool.

HULKBUSTER!  Yes.  We know internet, it is the coolest.  Just another geek miracle Marvel has been blessing fanboys since 2008.  But as much as I love seeing these two titans go at it in Wakanda (rumor mill!), the trailer wins my soul with James Spader's vocal talents - AND! not just because we're crazed Boston Legal fans around these parts.  The Evolution of Ultron from Iron Legion drone to genocidal world conqueror will finally deliver upon the Marvel Cinematic Universe a screen villain worthy of our fear.  I love Loki as much as the next tumblr addict, but he's more putz than terror, and the other bad guy stand-ins have mostly been one dimensional bores.  Ultron here is going to tear The Avengers apart.  Just look at poor cowering Bruce Banner, or that beautiful wide shot of the team separated aboard the quinjet.  Avengers 2 is not going to leave our heroes all buddy-buddy.  Captain America 3 - Civil War is coming after all.  When I left the theater in 2012, The Avengers gave me a giddy buzz of joy.  I imagine when I exit from Age of Ultron that buzz will still be there, but it's going to be birthed from a tremendous emotional bummer.  Not so much of a prediction here, but Avengers 2 is gonna make ya hurt, and there will be very little fist pumping glee from the audience...except for those masochists out there.  Here's hoping (always dangerous in the fan community, stop predicting/anticipating your desires and just enjoy the movies Brad!) that Avengers 3 will see the team come back together in a crowd pleasing Guardians of the Galaxy mashup against Thanos & his Infinity Gauntlet.  Marvel will mic-drop and bow out of the movie making business for good.  Ha.

--Brad

A Fistful of Summer 2014! (Brad's Picks)

May to August, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 to Sin City 2.  Ha! You would not know it from the starting shot or the finish line, but Summer 2014 is going down as one of the better Blockbuster Seasons.  Thank god.  I don't think I could take another drought like last year.  And as you'll see below, this was one of those rare years in which nearly all the films I was anticipating landed in my Top Five.  Financially, fewer butts hit the seats this year, but that didn't stop Guardians of the Galaxy from crossing $500,000,000 worldwide, or that TransFOURmers behemoth from stomping all over Earthly good taste.  Geez.  Rocket Raccoon is a real-deal Hollywood icon!  I can't believe it...can you?  Just a few months ago I was worrying that America wouldn't show up, and we'd be stuck with just Iron Man & Captain America sequels until this whole spandex hype died down.  Looks like that's not going to happen anytime soon.  Bring on Doctor Strange.

However, as great as it is to report the success of the films below, it's a little bit of a bummer to not have a slew of out-of-nowhere surprises.  I enjoyed a batch of mean little dramas amongst the popcorn fare (Locke, The Rover, Snowpiercer), but as fantastic as their lead performances were their narratives lacked a certain punch.  A lot of folks seemed to go nuts for X-Men - Days of Future Past, but as I did with the previous X-Films, I found Bryan Singer's latest to be a mediocre comic book pretender.  Those are just not my X-Men.  Meanwhile, the knives were out for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & The Expendables 3, but I found them both to be disposable fun.  The Rock dropped a deuce with Hercules, yet nothing will kill the charm of that man.  Next summer, say the word - "SHAZAM!" and I'll be all over that film.

And then there were those Summer bookend sequels, Spider-Man & Sin City.  Damn.  They really were the only films this year that I absolutely loathed.  Similar to my X-Men reaction, Marc Webb's Spider-Man just doesn't work for me.  He's now crafted two films in which Peter Parker is defined by death.  Spidey is not Batman.  I'm not asking for a disco strut comedy for ol' Web Head, but Peter Parker lives & breathes through his sense of humor, and it's important to showcase the thrill that his adventures illicit for the woe-is-me nerd.  Sin City's biggest problem is that it is so brutally dull.  Whatever your thoughts on Frank Miller's source material, generally the complaint is not boredom.  As cool as Robert Rodriguez's green screen tapestry was in 2005, the end result here is not nearly as artful as the comic book graphics, and the drag-and-drop performances are absolutely lifeless.

Both Edge of Tomorrow & 22 Jump Street get the Close-But-No-Cigar Award.  I had an absolute blast with each film, but they dragged on a little too long and suffered during their final moments.  It's popular to hate on Tom Cruise these days, but as one-time fans pretend to distance themselves from the Scientologist, I find myself warming up to the Movie Star.  I'm no apologist, and I won't defend crazy, but the man has never phoned in a performance.  From Knight and Day to Rock of Ages, Cruise throws himself into his roles, and as he delves deeper into genre the resulting movies have been rollicking thrill rides.  Edge of Tomorrow is one of his recent best.  22 Jump Street is simply hilarious.  Channing Tatum & Jonah Hill, a buddy cop team equal to Tango & Cash.  And if Tatum's meet-cute had actually traveled its obvious narrative path, then I could have forgiven the overlong runtime.

5.  Life Itself:  I've watched more documentaries this year then any previous.  A lot of them dealt with the arts (Jodorowsky's Dune, The Dog, To Be Takei) and a couple highlighted social injustice (Dinosaur 13, Let The Fire Burn).  On the surface, Life Itself appears to be a simple talking heads tribute to Chicago Sun Times movie critic Roger Ebert.  Sure, it's that.  Although, thanks to Ebert's allowance of Steve James' ever-present camera, the film also captures the universal experience of a life winding down.  What is it to say goodbye to a loved one?  How do you define your existence?  Life Itself is a celebration of the movies, sure, but it's also a celebration of Love itself.  Roger & Chaz.  Heartbreaking, heartwarming.  I imagine the more you appreciate Ebert's work, the more you'll enjoy the film, but I also think Life Itself offers a lot for the uninitiated.

4.  Godzilla:  Unlike Matt, I did not grow up the Godzilla fanatic.  In college, I watched & appreciated the original film, but that's about it.  However, in preparation for this latest monster-mash, I made it my mission to bone-up on the classics.  I succeeded in watching nearly all of my resolutions, and that certainly had an affect on how much I enjoyed this remake.  Obviously, I friggin' loved it.  You might be one of those frustrated folks that felt there wasn't much of the monster, or that the human characters were one-dimensional...I agree with you.  So?  Bryan Cranston & Aaron Taylor Johnson got the job done.  Would I have enjoyed the movie more if they were complex individuals with arcs involving weepy internal struggles?  Maybe.  But I don't need that in Godzilla.  Broad strokes are perfectly apt in Blockbuster magic.  What I need is dread....devastation...and a bastard brawl between beasts.  Gareth Edwards delivers on that.

3.  Cold In July:  Joe R. Lansdale, one of my favorite novelists finally gets a movie adaptation worthy of his twisted stories (I love Bubba Ho-Tep as much as the next blogger, but that's more about Bruce Campbell's charm than a satisfying script).  Michael C Hall is a weak Texas family man who frantically kills an intruder just minutes after the opening credits.  A violent act that ignites a grotesque plunge down a rabbit hole most viewers will not be equipped to handle.  Faint of heart, need not apply.  Cold In July is a mean-spirited flick full of awful surprises, plus a pair of delightfully grizzled turns from Don Johnson & Sam Shephard.

2.  Guardians of the Galaxy:  Fun.  The end.  You probably won't have more of it this year than you will riding around in The Milano with Star-Lord and his gang of intergalactic losers.  It's been 20 years since we've had a space adventure this genuine.  Fanboys love tossing Star Wars around, and they're not wrong, but Guardians feels more like the Star Wars knock-off film folks like Roger Corman were so desperate to recreate in blunders like Battle Beyond The Stars. But, you know, it's actually AMAZING.  Chris Pratt has all the requirements of a Han Solo character - charisma, a bit of a dick - yet he still manages to get upstaged by a raccoon, a tree, and a professional wrestler.  The film is not without its flaws (big bad Ronan The Accuser lacks threat, the hand-to-hand combat is bland, mean green Gamora is disappointingly upstaged by the raccoon, the tree, the pro wrestler, and the Han Solo), but you're having too much damn fun to harp.  Again, I am pleased as punch that Guardians proved to be such a success, and now we're ready for the rest of Marvel's Cosmic Universe.

1.  Dawn of the Planet of the Apes:  A character centric melodrama disguised as a big expensive Summer Blockbuster.  Similar to Godzilla, I hear your complaints about one-dimensional human characters.  So what?  They're barely in it, and they only serve to punctuate the emotions of the film's real leads - Caesar & Koba, a couple of chimpanzees struggling to lead their families from squaller to civilization.  What the animators, Toby Kebbell, & Andy Serkis have accomplished here is the next stage in performance; the subtlety in their movements packs as much of a wallop as the Apes on Horses machine gun climax.  For this fanboy, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes represents the very best of Have-Your-Cake-And-Eat-It-Too filmmaking, and it is the very best of Summer Entertainment.

--Brad

Brad's Week in Dork! (8/10/14-8/16/14)

Why hello there.  Miss me?  This has been one of the busiest summers of my life.  Traveling to France with my 93 year old grandfather so he could be showcased on Brian Williams' Journey To Normandy, road tripping to Memphis with The Wife, devouring my fourth San Diego Comic Con, and having just experienced my first ever Business Trip...to the glorious state of Ohio.  I've been ignoring you guys.  If you've been following my Twitter & Instagram accounts then you know that I haven't ceased on the cinema consumption.  But I have abandoned ITMOD.  Matt's been keeping the fire burning, but it's time for me to get back on board.  No more lazing about.

Yeah, that's right, I met Andy Serkis.  Just one of the many cool moments from this year's Comic Con.  That photo was taken around 1:00 AM in the Hall H Saturday Line.  Spent nearly 20 hours on the grass & concrete and was granted various strange encounters during the wait.  I wish I had slapped a post together about this year's Mega Dork Event, but I figure I'll just sprinkle in the relevant photos as we move through the rest of the year.  For right now, you'll just have to settle for a typical Week in Dork.  Of course, being stuck in Ohio away from friends and family meant that there really wasn't much to do other than go to the movies.  Every night I was in the West Chester AMC.  Not the widest selection of movies, so forgive me if I had to settle on a couple of stinkers.

Lucy:  The set up is dumb.  The execution is dumb.  The performances are often silly.  But I can't help but think the movie was one or two kickass sequences away from being a great film.  Scarlet Johansson is snatched off the streets of Taiwan by Korean gangster Min-sik Choi (Oldboy himself!), and for about fifteen minutes there is some genuinely uncomfortable terror at play as they pack her belly with bright blue super drugs & prepare to ship her across continents.  When rape turns to a beating, and the drugs burst inside her, Johansson is gifted with enough brainpower to join The Uncanny X-Men.  The Black Widow has a couple moments to Matrix it up, but before you know it her cranium needn't bother with roundhouse kicks or gun kata.  The film races to its climax as Lucy taps into the universe, and the film attempts to pass beyond Stanley Kubrick's infinite.  I dig the ambition.  However, the film is too quick, too slight, and too obvious to actually be good.  A solid attempt, but a swing and a miss.

The Purge - Anarchy:  Man, I rally want to love these Purge films.  The idea of a government sanctioned night of violence & debauchery is both ridiculous and rather terrifying.  Yet, these Purge films are just stupid bullshit (Ha! Put that on the poster, "Stupid Bullshit!" - In The Mouth of Dorkness), and worst of all they are boring.  The first film took the Kill Crazy Rampage plot & dulled it into a snoozer of a home invasion story.  The sequel thankfully expands on the universe by taking its characters to the streets, and introducing us to Frank Grillo's Punisher.  If the film had committed to a solo film for Grillo then just maybe we would have had an entertaining horror/actioner.  Instead we've got the usual stupid cliches bumping into each other and falling prey to the spooky masked folk.  Can they possibly get it right for the third outing?  I'll be there to judge.

On Wednesday night I went wandering the back roads of West Chester, Ohio.  Not much to see.  Found the hole in the wall shop Queen Comics & Card Company, and then stumbled upon a White Castle.  In my thirty four years on this planet, I had never had the pleasure of consuming Harold & Kumar's most desired slippery treat.  Now was the time.  I ordered the number 1 Slider combo with cheese and few extra packets of Dusseldorf Mustard.  The bun was greasy, the meat was gray, and the flavor was rank.  I guess I can see the appeal of these tiny burgers, but don't dare rank this drunk food alongside In-N-Out or Sonic Burger.

The Hundred Foot Journey:  After choking down the White Castle and drowning it down with a bucket of soda, The Wife & I synchronized our texts so that we both sat down for The Hundred Foot Journey at the exact same time.  No new ground here, but it was fun to watch this cute little film knowing my better half was enjoying it several states away.  The basic premise of two opposing cultures finding kinship via culinary perfection is scientifically proven to warm the heart.  With the added bonus of Helen Mirren there is no way you can come away hating this movie.  It's sweet.  That's enough.

Sex Tape:  This film pretty much exists to showcase Cameron Diaz's side boob.  It certainly doesn't succeed on the laughs.  Jason Segel better be careful or these slumming it paychecks will result in a career of barely passable comedies.  A bored married couple attempts to rekindle their spark by adapting the Joy of Sex via their plethora of product placement iPads.  Rob Lowe pops up to snort cocaine & bizarrely reference Disney movies.  Sure, I chuckled once or twice, but I mostly sunk deeper into my seat at the thought of Diaz's inevitable future blunders.

Let's Be Cops:  Well it doesn't get much better here.  At least with Let's Be Cops you have two leads with genuine chemistry.  Jake Johnson and Marlon Wayanes Jr are a couple of failing thirty somethings (don't know what that's like???) desperate to recapture their dreams of youth by playing dressup.  What starts off as a quick pickup line swiftly transforms into hardcore vigilantism.  This not-so-high-concept lets its plot get in the way of the funny as villainous gangsters cockblock the jokes, and Johnson & Wayans have their improv stifled by a who-gives-a-shit narrative.  If you laughed at the trailer then you got the gist.

A Most Wanted Man:  This one crept up on me.  On the surface, it's a rather routine bit of espionage in this post 9/11 world.  But as the script ekes out its plot, the futility of the situation reveals itself and the dread ratchets from disgust to outrage.  Phillip Seymour Hoffman is exceptionally quiet in the film.  "Subtle performance" is a term that gets bandied about quite a bit, but I can't describe Hoffman in a better manner.  His stillness, his tiny control over his physicality allows for a final scene that I found absolutely devastating.  The man was one of the greats.  It irritates and bums me out that we'll never get to see an Old Man Hoffman character.  He could have done a Touch of Evil to melt our faces.  Of all the films I watched in Ohio, this was my favorite.

The Infinity Revelation by Jim Starlin & Andy Smith:  A few weeks ago Marvel published a one-shot Thanos Annual from Starlin & artist Ron Lim as a means of previewing this Original Graphic Novel.  That single issue was a trippy mindbender in which an Infinity Gauntlet era Thanos traveled back in time to save his past self from the clutches of Mephisto, all done within the context of Thanos' current failings during Jonathan Hickman's Infinity event.  I LOVED THAT ISSUE.  It was wild, weird, and plunging in batshit Marvel continuity.  It had me totally pumped for this book.  Yet...The Infinity Revelation is not bad, but it is nowhere near as good as that floppy comic.  This story centers around Thanos attempting to reconnect with Death by recreating the universe in his image.  The trouble is that his arch rival Adam Warlock has to tagalong and pester him with mumbo jumbo philosophy.  After the joy of this summer's Guardians of the Galaxy, I have been all about Marvel's Cosmic Comics.  Some are good, some are great, and some are ok.  The Infinity Revelation falls somewhere in the top of the OK category.

First Blood:  "It can be confusing sometimes."  For Saturday night's Late Show, The Alamo Drafthouse had Stallone's first Rambo adventure on the big screen.  Not the silly killfest that the franchise would eventually become, First Blood is probably more relevant today then it was in 1982.  A traumatized Vietnam vet hitchhikes across America in an effort to reconnect with the men he served with during the war.  Brian Dennehy's Korean War veteran turned proud local sherif sees a longhaired vagrant and attempts to run him out of town.  PTSD flashbacks send Rambo into a frenzy and the damaged soldier makes a run for it after humiliating the chucklehead cops.  Dennehy can't take a hint so he escalates the situation into a small town apocalypse.  First Blood is another cinematic bandaid on the festering wound that was Vietnam War, but Stallone's John Rambo could easily be roaming the country today, attempting to bury the trauma of Mission Accomplished.  It's a tough movie.  A sad movie.  A great movie.  Do not dismiss it because of the later films' taglines.

--Brad

Dork Art: Matt Ferguson's Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

Yesterday I posted the latest trailer for Matt Reaves's Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, and already master pop artist Matt Ferguson snatched an insta-icnonic moment from the film for his latest poster print.  One image and BOOM!  Man is done for, this is truly the Planet of the Apes.  I am all a tingle for this film.  I immediately want to marathon the original films.  July can't get here soon enough.

--Brad

"They Want What We Want!" - Dawn of the Planet of the Apes goes to WAR!

If I wasn't already pumped for the latest Planet of the Apes, I am positively rabid for it now.  This is certainly the film I wanted to see the first time around.  I actually dig the original Serkis venture, but I never really wanted to see the origin of the Heston Nightmare - just another anti-scientist Frankenstein plot.  No, it's gotta be Ape vs Man.  Caesar vs Gary Oldman with a little dash of good human Jason Clarke.  WAR!  APOCALYPSE!  APES ON HORSES!  This is the stuff.



--Brad

A Fistful of Summer Anticipation 2014 (Brad's Picks)

So, technically, the Summer Movie Season starts this weekend with the release of Marc Webb's The Amazing Spider-Man 2.  That seems phony baloney to me.  We're already a month into Summer Movies thanks to April's Captain America - The Winter Soldier.  In fact, I don't think this world is ever NOT in the Summer Movie Season.  We've been marching towards this moment since Jaws lined the blocks.  Now, we could all hang are heads and moan at the loss of Big Budget Drama Dramas like Citizen Kane or Kramer vs Kramer.....or we could all just admit to ourselves that we never liked those films in the first place.  I kid!  I kid!  I love Citizen Kane like all self-respecting film freaks should, and I love the little films, the art films, and the serious films as much as I do the spandexed ones.  But I'm a film freak born out of Star Wars, and I will always be a genre boy at heart.  So Jaws gave us B Movies with A Budgets and I've lived my entire life joyfully under its spell.  

2014 has been a lot of fun so far, and as I look at the Summer calendar, I find myself giddy with anticipation.  I feel much better about this year's crop than last; I feel no nagging trepidation in regards to any of the films listed below.  No Star Treks Into Darkness.  No Pacific Rims.  And dear god, hopefully no Prometheuses, as that's a disappointment I'm still kinda in denial over.  Sure, I can't really claim that I'm overjoyed to see the over-stuffed Amazing Spider Man 2 or X-Men Days of Future Past.  In the era of Marvel Studios and the geekgasm of The Avengers, it's hard to take these missed marks coming from Sony & 20th Century Fox.  The Suits, try as they might, don't seem to have an understanding of their characters in the same fashion as Marvel.  I'll be there opening night (got my ASM2 tix already), but the jonzing is simply not there.  Prove me wrong Electro, but I was not impressed by the previous film or any of the 19 millions film trailers you've assaulted the internet with so far.

But I love crap!  And there looks to be a lot of silly movies coming out over the next four months to keep my inner hipster cackling.  The Expendables 3!  THREE!?!?!  How is that possible?  The first two films are so wonderfully dumb, and 99% of my enjoyment is stolen straight from a nostalgia for those beautifully barbarian 80s.  However, that warm fuzzy memory seems poisoned these days.  Dullards like The Last Stand, Bullet To The Head, Escape Plan, and Sabotage have spoiled the childhood sheen a little bit.  Nine years ago, Robert Rodriguez brought Frank Miller's hardboiled terror noir comic Sin City to the masses, and it was a visual feast of unapologetic hedonism.  I have very mixed feelings in regards to that film (Jessica Alba's Nancy as Stripper Goddess?  Uh no), and after a string of DIY disasters I'm not sure I really care for another round.  Transformers Part IV?  Dinobots.  That's cool.  Maybe.  I recently rewatched Michael Bay's autobot behemoths, and I found them culturally fascinating but mostly boring.  Still, the insanity of Pain & Gain is fresh in my noggin and I'll be there for the next wave of Baysplosions.

Crap could turn to gold, or it could just sit there stinking.  Wading through Trans4ormers, Maleficent, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Hercules, etc may leave even the staunchest of Blockbuster Enthusiasts queasy from the sour popcorn dreams.  That's certainly how I felt last September.  This year though, we do have a train of Little Engines That Could hiding under the tentpoles.  I am really excited to see Joe Lansdale's novel Cold in July adapted for the movies; I might not have dropped Michael C Hall into the lead role but Sam Shepherd & Don Johnson are inspired casting.  Filming over the course of 12 years, I am really curious to see how Richard Linklater's Boyhood tackles a coming of age in real time.  Luc Besson promises a return to female ass kickery with Scarlet Johansson and Lucy.  The Weinstein's can't keep a good Korean director down, as Bong Joon-ho's Snowpiercer finally barrels into theaters.  And I am crazy excited to see The Wachowskis tackle John Carter of Mars with Jupiter Ascending.  Don't hate.  These guys are the perfect choice to elevate Flash Gordon family adventure into big dollar mainstream acceptance.  Looks silly?  Sure.  But werewolf Channing Tatum for the win.

And speaking of the adorable genius of Channing Tatum, let's get to this Summer's Big Guns....

5.  22 Jump Street:  Wow.  What a difference a few years can make.  Not too long ago, I had no problem mocking the acting chops of Channing Tatum.  GI Joe - Rise of Cobra...yeash.  But the man kept working.  And he got a whole lot better.  The 21 Jump Street reboot was a serious revelation for me.  Not only did it transform disdain for Tatum into an uncontrollable man-crushing adoration, but it proved directors Phil Lord & Chris Miller to be the saviors of lost causes.  Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, Jump Street, The Lego Movie.  These guys prove that talent can turn any needless cashgrab into art.  Give them Ghostbusters 3.  Give them Freddy vs Jason vs Ash.  Give them Before Watchmen.  Give them whatever, I will anticipate it.  And I sure as hell will show up for another outing between Jenko & Schmidt.  "Fuck You Science!"

4.  All You Need Is Kill (a.k.a. Edge of Tomorrow):  On paper this sci-fi Groundhog Day has very little appeal.  But then you see Tom Cruise in that mech suit...and then Emily Blunt unsheathes a crazy large Warhammer 40K broadsword, and suddenly I'm jittering in my seat.  It's no secret around here that I have a soft spot for late-in-life Tom Cruise pictures.  Knight & Day, Jack Reacher, Oblivion.  Haters gonna hate, f 'em.  The man does earnest, and that's essential to whacked out worlds like this one.  Doug Liman might not be your go-to action director, but the man loves his wonky high concepts, and I'm hoping he's finally struck gold with this robotech thriller.

3.  Dawn of the Planet of the Apes:  Apes on Horses!  Apes on Horses!  That's it.  Done.  Oh, you want more reasons to see this film?  How about the fact that we're finally getting to the hell of living on the Planet of the Apes.  Rises's origin story wasn't half bad, but James Franco was checked out for most of the film and he was easily upstaged by a computer monkey - er, ape.  Andy Sirkis also happened to deliver the best we've seen yet from mo-cap performance, and I have a feeling he's going to hit Oscar heights with this new & improved rebel leader Cesar.  End of the World stories are fun enough, but the Post-Apocalypse has always been the more interesting tale for me.  The Last Men vs The New Apes.  War.  Yes.  Jason Clarke?  Yeah, forget Franco.  Matt Reaves is a director dying to prove his talents, and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes is going to be the film where the rest of the world sits up and notices.

2.  Godzilla:  I spent several months prepping for Captain America - The Winter Soldier.  And boy did that fanboy fetishizing pay off in a big, big way.  Gareth Edwards's Godzilla remake is the next film to entice me into crazed backlog devouring.  I've always been a big fan of the original film, but I'm a late comer when it comes to Mothra, Rodan, Gigan, and friends.  As I've been picking away at the various rubber suits, I'd love to say that my inner kid has been reawakened...but that kid has never been asleep.  I'm a proud stunted youth, and I spend the majority of my time reveling in the art of cartoons, comics, and movies.  Duh.  But that stomp towards the remake has certainly kept the inner kid satiated.  Not just goofy fun.  There is a thrilling display of imagination in those films.  Ishiro Honda may not have had the budget or even the talent to deliver badass monster movies, but he certainly had the freedom to dream whatever kooky world he wanted.  He never let a reality roadblock get in the way of telling a King Kong story.  Now Edwards, he's got the budget.  And based on Monsters, he's got the talent.  I have high hopes that this Godzilla is going to deliver in a way that no other Monster Movie has.  Bold talk.  Bold hope.  I had a similar dream for Pacific Rim.  I like what I'm seeing from the trailers.  Fingers crossed.

1.  The Guardians of the Galaxy:  Iron Man, Hulk, Captain America, Thor.  You may have thought it was all leading up to The Avengers, but you'd be wrong.  All Marvel Studios has built has been leading to The Guardians of the Galaxy.  They've sold the world on Super Heros.  Now, if we're going to continue down this rabbit hole, we need to branch out into the weirder, wilder stories of the four color realm.  Iron Man 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, 14, 20.  How long can that character hold our interest?  If James Bond is any indication, at least 40 years.  But Marvel has a whole helluva lot more characters to offer, and I want more from them than just capes & cowls.  Guardians of the Galaxy looks like it could be an energetic mix of Star Wars knockoffs.  Take the best of Ice Pirates, blend in some Buck Rogers, and a little dash of Krull and you've got what could be a rollicking time out at the movies.  But talking trees?  Rocket Raccoons?  Is the world ready?  I am.  Whatever blood James Gunn squeezes from this stone, I beg of you, please go out and see Guardians opening weekend.  We want more than Captain America Part 15, right?  We want Doctor Strange.  We want Black Panther.  We want another Howard The Duck.

--Brad

Dork Art: Mondo Nazgul

I'm not the hugest Lord of the Rings fan (that's the other Dork, Matt) and I've been kinda lukewarm on Mondo's recent Tolkein tributes, but the above Nazgul print is stunning.  Artist Matt Suftin conjures the horrors of Middle Earth beautifully and the below B&W variant is even more striking with it's Night of the Living Dead undertones.  The print is sized at the typical 24 x 36, the regular release will run $50, and the variant $75.  Artist Paolo Rivera also has a print titled "Precious Cargo," depicting Frodo & Samwise crawling up Mount Doom.  It's also $50 and measures 24 x 36.  All three go on sale tomorrow.  Good luck, cuz yer gonna need it.

--Brad

Brad's Week in Dork! (12/18-12/24)

This week was about cramming as many theatrical films into one week as humanly possible.  I saw a good batch, but I could have done better.  Climaxing the week on Christmas Eve with Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy at E Street Cinema was definitely the highlight.

MOVIES OF THE WEEK!

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button:  After Zodiac, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is my second favorite film from director David Fincher. It's an emotional, magical epic spanning several of my favorite years in history while detailing the effects of life's odd characters upon your intellectual growth. Brad Pitt is brilliant under all that CGI and makeup, and as his story winds down I find it impossible to keep dry eyes. It's melodrama, but wonderful masterful melodrama.

Die Hard:  "Now I have a machine gun...Ho Ho Ho." How does one write a review of Die Hard? It is just so obviously awesome. Bruce Willis' California bewildered, just your average NYPD John McClane is the king of Roy Rogers cool as he picks his way through Euro Trash terrorists led by the ruthless Hans Gruber, aka the diabolically dashing Alan Rickman. Die Hard is THE action movie of the 1980s, brilliant popping squib work peppered with dismissive & sarcastic one-liners. If you don't recognize the genius of it than you just don't like movies.

Bad Teacher:  Cameron Diaz swears a lot and is an awful human being and she's A TEACHER! Funny? No. Not funny. Fifty minutes into the movie I let slip my first chuckle. That's not an exaggeration. After that I chuckled three more times before the hour and a half long film concluded. There could have been a Bad Santa comedy within this craptastic script, but instead what you have is an embaressment for all parties involved. Watching Justin Timberlake dry hump a bored Cameron Diaz is unexplainably painful. Yes, I expect more from you N*SYNC kid.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo:  I tried reading the novel. Couldn't get past the first fifty pages. The Swedish film was decent but couldn't figure out what all the fuss was about. And I'm sad to say that David Fincher's crack at the material doesn't quite impress me either. His eye mashed together with Trent Reznor & Karen O's Immigrant Song makes for a badass movie trailer and one helluva James Bondy opening credits sequence, but the story is barely more than a little meh. Why put me through all that parole officer rape & humiliation? What's it got to do with anything? Frankly, I don't care at all for the gothy female protagonist--yank her outta the plot and I'd be just fine. What you got left is a solid episode of Cold Case.

The Adventures of Tintin:  Whoa. The Adventures of Tintin feels like young Steven Spielberg; a fun, humor rich globetrotting adventure film bringing the international comic sensation to ignorant American audiences. Indiana Jones lite? Yer damn right and I mean that with the highest of compliments. Jaime Bell is wonderful as the heroic investigative reporter, but it's Andy Serkis' Captain Haddock that steals the show when wonder dog Snowy isn't stealing the scene from him. There are at least two absolutely stunning action set pieces, one of which had me literally teetering on the edge of my seat. Forget the doubters, The Adventures of Tintin is the real deal, a stunning work of adventure art that just happens to be mocap.

Warrior:  Not a bad movie, but...Warrior will never get a second's thought after I've typed up this mini-review. Joel Edgerton and Tom Hardy are brilliantly roided-out as their MMA sibling underdog brutes but it's all very typical Rocky emotional pandering pap. Sometimes, I just don't understand these inspirational sports sagas but this horrendously savage sport makes the attempt at spiritual uplift laughable. Nick Nolte does a fine job in the typically drunk dead-beat Dad role but like the rest of the flick it's nothing to write home about.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy:  Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy would make a bloody brilliant companion piece to that other deliberately paced and intricately plotted espionage flick, The Good Shepherd. Gary Oldman gives one of his finest performances (and that's not hyperbole--sorry TIPTOES) as retired Brit spy George Smiley who must maneuver his way through the treacherously murky waters of MI-6 as he attempts to upturn a mole in the Circus. And surrounded by Oldman are some of the U.K.s finest: John Hurt, Mark Strong, Colin Firth, Benedict Cumberbatch--they're all utterly brilliant bouncing around this booby trapped script. Don't expect The Bourne Identity, the action is done in small facial distortions and the violence is short but brutal. One of the year's best movies.

--Brad