A Fistful of Fall Anticipation 2014! (Matt’s Picks)

    It’s that time of year again.  Heading into the final stretch, we look at the movies we’re most looking forward to in the final months of the year.  Without too much preamble, here are mine:

5.  Interstellar:  I feel very weird about this film.  On the one hand, it’s absolutely the kind of thing I should love.  On the other, from the first trailer, I simply haven’t been able to work up any particular interest.  Something rings hollow, and I can’t say what.  So, I’m hoping it’ll be the movie I want it to be and not the movie I kinda think it’s gonna be.

4.  A Walk Among the Tombstones:  Liam Neeson.  Liam Neeson being mean to people…with his fists.  I’m there.

3.  The BoxTrolls:  This, along with Big Hero 6 and The Book of Life make the family film market look pretty good.  The BoxTrolls looks like a good mix of cute and weird, with family friendly, but not condescending humor.  Hopefully, it lives up.

2.  The Zero Theorem:   Terry Gilliam continues his sometimes depressing but often exhilarating quest to slap mainstream movies in the face.  I love Gilliam's work, and I always hope he'll pull out a victory over the cosmic opposition he always seems to be up against.

1.  Tracks:  Seriously.  I want to see this movie.  It was supposed to come out at the beginning of the Summer, then just before being released…disappeared from schedules.  Months later, it showed up again with a September release date.  So, fingers crossed it’ll actually hit the screen this time ‘round.

     Hopefully, half my movies won't get delayed again.  That would be swell.  Honestly, I'm not too jazzed, going into the Fall.  There are a few other films I do want to see, but few I expect to be super-thrilled by.  Still, this year has been pretty darned good, and you never know what'll cap a year like this.  Heck, I'd never heard of The Artist a few weeks before it became one of my favorite films of 2011.

-Matthew J. Constantine

Dork Art: Alex Ross' Django Unchained

Oh good golly.  This is beautiful.  These days I think it's easy to take comic cover superstar Alex Ross for granted.  He's pumping out the covers for Dynamite - Shadows & Spiders & Lone Rangers.  Heck, he even does Star Trek model kit boxes now.  But then something like this comes around and knocks you on your ass.  This piece will be the cover for issue #6 of the DC Comics adaptation.  I still haven't delved into that series, but I'll dive in once it's all complete.

--Brad

The Oscars 2013 - Predictions & Desires

The Oscars are a joke.  We all know this.  But let's just set that aside - like we do every year.  What I love about the Academy Awards is that it gives us a moment where we can just ramble on about movies with the regular people.  You know, those nice folks out there that don't devote hours & hours upon a nerd blog, obsessing over every frame and hidden reference of the latest Quentin Tarantino flick.  It's the Super Bowl of Cinema - and as is, they usually get all the nominations wrong and it's mostly just a fashion parade for US Weekly then it is an exploration of art.  That being said, I think the nominations are much stronger than they have been in year's past which I find rather amusing since I felt that 2012 was one of cinema's weakest.

BEST PICTURE:

AMOUR
ARGO
BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD
DJANGO UNCHAINED
LES MISERABLES
LIFE OF PI
LINCOLN
SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK
ZERO DARK THIRTY

This is the second year in a row where my Favorite Film of the Year got a Best Picture nomination, but like last year, my pick doesn't have a chance in snowy hell of taking home the little gold guy.  Django Unchained is not Quentin Tarantino's best film (that's Jackie Brown), but it is most certainly my favorite.  The pacing is choppy; some claim the lack of editor Sally Menke is to blame, but I think Tarantino is just doing what he does best - elevation through mimicry.  The Spaghetti Western is a genre defined through false starts & endings, and it's an aspect I cherish when done properly.  Django pulls the rug from under you multiple times and what feels sloppy to some feels like perfection to me.  We will never know what this film would look like if cut by Menke, but I genuinely feel like it wouldn't appear to be much different.  But Django Unchained is the film with the least likely chance to win.  It's genre, B Movie territory.  Strike One.  It's an extremely angry film.  Not the revenge drama some make it out to be.  This is not Kill Bill.  It's a Campbellian Hero's Journey.  The revenge aspect is on us, Django Unchained transforms the audience into Khan.  Strike two.  Finally, it's a Tarantino movie.  He's the new Hitchcock and he'll never take home a statue.  Strike three.

So, who gets it.  There are only two films of the nine nominations that I absolutely destested: Life of Pi & Les Miserables.  Their nominations are not surprising, especially when considering last year's Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, but Life of Pi is confusing mumbo jumbo & Les Miserables is a musical embarrassment.  Lincoln is my second favorite flick in the pack, sharp tight narrative highlighted by an outstanding lead performance.  Silver Linings Playbook is fun, sweet, romantic and a complete fantasy.  Amour is a beast of emotion.  No other film tortured me quite like that movie.  Beasts of the Southern Wild is beautifully odd world building with a firm backbone supplied by a six year old actress.  Zero Dark Thirty is CSI: Bin Laden.  An intense procedural deepened by our own 9/11 memories.  Argo seems to be the frontrunner at this point.  Fascinating, given Ben Affleck's lack of nomination in the Best Director category.  The last time a film took home Best Picture without even a director nomination was 1990's Driving Miss Daisy.  Argo is a solid flick.  I just don't love it.  The first half is intense as hell, and I love all the Hollywood craziness but I just can't get behind the final ten minutes.  The airport chase nonsense.  Yes, both Lincoln & Zero Dark Thirty have they're way with history, but this feels the most Hollywoody.  Still, far worse films have taken home the gold.

Prediction: Argo

Desire:  Django Unchained

BEST DIRECTOR

ANG LEE (Life of Pi)
BENH ZEITLIN (Beasts of the Southern Wild)
MICHAEL HANEKE (Amour)
STEVEN SPIELBERG (Lincoln)
DAVID O. RUSSELL (Silver Linings Playbook)

This is a tough category.  I'm gonna immediately dismiss Ang Lee cuz as stated above, I hated his movie.  But if I'm going to be fair it was fun to watch him play with technology - taking on James Cameron's 3D, David Fincher's digital zooms, and playfully experimenting in a similar fashion to his Hulk adaptation...and we all saw how well that went down (Screw it - I Love HULK!).  Silver Linings Playbook is a lot of quirky fun, but I found David O Russell continues push-in closeups to be rather annoying.  Steven Spielberg has an obvious mastery over his craft, but Lincoln's success mostly comes from Tony Kushner's screenplay and Daniel Day-Lewis' deep diving performance.  Benh Zeitlin's Beasts of a Southern Wild has the feel of a young man's camera - eagerness mixed with blunt whimsy.  He could be great someday, but he ain't there yet.  Michael Haneke is a mad man.  Sitting down to one of his films, you know your psyche is in danger.  Whether he's documenting a home invasion (Funny Games), the hidden violence of a pre-WWI village (The White Ribbon), or the slow death of a loved one (Amour), Haneke has been accused of relishing in human horror.  Maybe.  But what impresses me so much about Amour is its claustrophobia.  We're stuck in this tiny Parisian apartment.  One character is slowly deteriorating in front of us.  The other character is struggling to maintain his wife's last moments.  Haneke never lets the room become tiresome.  He finds new ways to shoot it, and concentrates the lens on the humanity of the structure.  It's a daunting screenplay for a director to tackle, but Heneke as both writer & director was obviously up to the task.

The question becomes though, with Ben Affleck out of the running, where do the Academy voters cast their ballot?  Zeitlen is too new to the game.  Haneke's an outsider and in their eyes its enough that the film will most likely take home Best Foreign Film.  Ang Lee certainly offers the visual feast and Life of Pi apes a lot of its praise from the novel's pre-owned enthusiasm.  So could Spielberg take Oscar home?  His last nomination was in 2007 for Munich, and he won in '99 for Saving Private Ryan & '94 for Schindler's List.  No.  I think Lincoln is not a significant enough departure from the Spielberg norm to land him back at the podium.  David O Russell lost to Tom Hooper in 2011; I think we make up for that now.  Silver Linings Playbook is not a showy picture, but neither was Hooper's The King's Speech, and performance can carry this category.  Plus, Hollywood mogul Harvey Wienstein knows how capture Oscars via politics.

Prediction:  David O. Russell

Desire:  Michael Haneke

BEST ACTOR

BRADLEY COOPER (Silver Linings Playbook)
DANIEL DAY-LEWIS (Lincoln)
HUGH JACKMAN (Les Miserables)
JOAQUIN PHOENIX (The Master)
DENZEL WASHINGTON (Flight)

Well, lets just yank Hugh Jackman out of this category immediately.  I thought he was atrocious.  The man can sing, he's proven that before, but the man is no Jean Valjean.  Especially when you have Colm Wilkinson, the real deal, putting him to shame in the Bishop cameo.  I guess Denzel Washington does a decent job as the alcoholic cokehead pilot in Flight, but the movie is so run-of-the-mill that to grant him any acknowledgement would give Zemeckis' live action pap too much credit.  Bradley Cooper has never been better than he is in Silver Linings Playbook, and I could see him winning if Harvey Weinstein manufactures a clean sweep for that movie.  Definitely possible.  I'd love to see Joaquin Phoenix take it; his turn as the sex starved madman in Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master is a masterpiece of anxiety, and makes Bradley Cooper's kooky nutjob look absolutely adorable.  But there is no question who's taking home Oscar this Sunday.  Daniel Day-Lewis puts in another one of his method absorption pieces as Abraham Lincoln.  I appreciated his choice of accent, going for realism and dropping the iconic stature we're used to seeing on the five dollar bill.  There is more humanity in his portrayal of Lincoln than we've yet experienced, he showcases the badass bravado we want from the great emancipator but I love the little moments with his bickering wife, and his war-thirsty son.  And if we weren't allowed to give it to him for Bill The Butcher than we most certainly give it to him for the 16th president.

Prediction:  Daniel Day-Lewis

Desire:  Daniel Day-Lewis

BEST ACTRESS

JESSICA CHASTAIN (Zero Dark Thirty)
JENNIFER LAWRENCE (Silver Linings Playbook)
EMMANUELLE RIVA (Amour)
QUVENZHANE WALLIS (Beasts of the Southern Wild)
NAOMI WATTS (The Impossible)

This category is even tougher than Best Director.  I don't know if you remember or care, but as 2012 was winding down and I had to put together my Dorkies, I could not list five female roles to save my life.  Since then I've managed to watch all the above flicks and I think that each of these nominees turned in killer performances.  As Hushpuppy, the adventurous orphan wandering the bayou wastelands of The Beasts of the Southern Wild, Quvenzhane Wallis delivers the most naturalistic realization.  Jessica Chastain is all macho bravado, a little too on the nose, but solid.  Naomi Watts is a tattered mess - flesh ripped, torn, and bleeding for nearly 90 minutes.  Jennifer Lawrence is the It Girl of the moment, and as much as I was unimpressed with her previous nomination for Winter's Bone, her dullfaced turn in The Hunger Games, and her sourdough smirk in X-Men First Class, I have to admit that I was captivated by her mentally unbalanced love interest.  And I think she might have this locked - and part of me wants to bet on all the Silver Linings Playbook nominations.  But Sunday is also Emmanuelle Riva's 86th Birthday.  Wouldn't it be a wonderful gift to win the big prize?  And her slow decay on screen is pure Oscar bait gold.  Utterly heartbreaking even if I think her partner, Jean-Louis Trintignant has the real winning role.

Prediction:  Jennifer Lawrence

Desire:  Emmanuelle Riva


BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

ALAN ARKIN (Argo)
ROBERT DE NIRO (Silver Linings Playbook)
PHILIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN (The Master)
TOMMY LEE JONES (Lincoln)
CHRISTOPH WALTZ (Django Unchained)

Why is Alan Arkin on this list?  I mean, he did a fine job in Argo but there was absolutely nothing special about his character.  A Best Actor nomination for Ben Affleck would make more sense.  Robert De Niro is a lot of fun as the gambling addict father struggling to understand his son's crazy.  He manages to be sympathetic one moment, and infuriatingly obtuse the next.  It's been a long time since he's won the hearts of the Academy but I'm just not sure this role is showy enough to make them care again.  Phillip Seymore Hoffman is the internet critic's pick.  And he's darn good, but not a standout like his partner Joaquin.  Christoph Waltz gets my vote.  As the Obi Wan to Django's Luke Skywalker, King Schultz has all the happy mannerisms of the villainous Hans Landa (the role Waltz won for just a few years back) but pacts the film with warmth and understanding.  The Landa/Schultz coin is a showcase for Waltz's incredible talent.  Put him in every movie, I say.  Tommy Lee Jones, though?  He's grumpy, adorable, and powerful.  He's a miserable old bastard of righteousness in Lincoln, and the emotional wallop of the climax is delivered through his character.  I'd be perfectly happy to see him win.

Prediction:  Tommy Lee Jones

Desire:  Christoph Waltz


BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

AMY ADAMS (The Master)
SALLY FIELD (Lincoln)
ANNE HATHAWAY (Les Miserables)
HELEN HUNT (The Sessions)
JACKI WEAVER (Silver Linings Playbook)

This is a less exciting race.  Jacki Weaver is perfectly fine as the delicate wife to Robert De Niro's bull in a china shop.  And it's lightyears away from the psychotic matriarch of Animal Kingdom, her previous nomination in 2011.  Another loser from that year was Amy Adams (The Fighter), and she's going down this year as well.  She's perfectly troubled as the wife of Hoffman's cult leader, but her best scene involves an epic handjob which of course makes it hard to showcase during the sizzle reel.  Sally Field is good in Lincoln.  But the character is a touch annoying.  The tight focus of Lincoln's screenplay doesn't allow for Mary Todd showboating, but there are one or two moments in the film that might land her on top.  I think Anne Hathaway is the winner though.  She's the only good thing in Les Miserables, and her snotty/teary rendition of "I Dreamed A Dream" will get her the win.  My pick, though, is Helen Hunt.  The Sessions is the type of indie darling that stormed Hollywood during the early 90s, but despite its twee narrative centered around John Hawkes' quadriplegic virgin, I found myself suckered by its sweetness.  And a lot of that has to do with her welcoming, forgiving, and accepting smile.  Not to mention her sexual sincerity.

Prediction:  Anne Hathaway

Desire:  Helen Hunt


ANIMATED FEATURE

BRAVE
FRANKENWEENIE
PARANORMAN
THE PIRATES! BAND OF MISFITS
WRECK-IT-RALPH

There is no denying that Brave is a lesser Pixar.  It's perfectly suitable, but the mother/daughter story is less interesting than the female empowerment quest that the trailer promised.  The Pirates! Band of Misfits is a ton of fun.  It's winky, jokey, and very British.  Wreck-It-Ralph is gleeful, but I was kinda hoping for a Who Framed Roger Rabit reference-a-palooza and I found the Candyland setting a bit claustrophobic.  Still, this seems to be the film that gets the most attention.  Frankenweenie has no business here.  It doesn't celebrate the oddity of youth, it mocks it.  And Tim Burton just needs to take a break from filmmaking for a while.  His ideas are played out.  Old.  Tired.  Boring.  Paranorman is everything that Burton was trying to do, but done successfully.  It celebrates the strange of youth, it tells kids that it's your weird, unique talents that make you special.  To ride ahead of the pack and not with the herd.  And it's properly spooky the way Halloween stories should be.

Prediction:  Wreck-It-Ralph

Desire:  Paranorman

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

5 BROKEN CAMERAS
THE GATEKEEPERS
HOW TO SURVIVE A PLAGUE
THE INVISIBLE WAR
SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN

As usual, the Best Documentary category is loaded with a lot of downers.   In 5 Broken Cameras, a Palestinian farmer records the Israeli occupation of his backyard.  Protests inevitably turn to violence.  Friends & family loose their lives.  The Invisible War is almost unfathomable with its nearly endless interviews of women raped while serving in the military.  I never managed to catch The Gatekeepers.  Can't comment on it.  How To Survive A Plague left me a weeping mess.  Following two bands of protest groups in late 80s New York while the Aids epidemic spread and politicians sat quiet.  Searching For Sugar Man is the frothiest story depicting the mysterious rise of a Detroit castoff in the music scene of South Africa.  While incredibly engaging it doesn't quite hold the terrifying punch of the other nominations.  For it to win over How To Survive A Plague seems as insulting as Driving Miss Daisy taken the big prize from the nominationless Do The Right Thing.

Prediction:  Searching For Sugar Man

Desire:  How To Survive A Plague

CINEMATOGRAPHY

SEAMUS MCGARVEY (Anna Karenina)
RALPH RICHARDSON (Django Unchained)
CLAUDIO MIRANDA (Life of Pi)
JANUS KAMINSKI (Lincoln)
ROGER DEAKINS (Skyfall)

Based on the trailers, Anna Karenina sure does look artificially pretty.  Spielberg's longtime collaborator Janus Kaminski knows how to fill a room full of light.  I think Life of Pi has the most attention for its animated beauty, but how much of that is Miranda's skill and how much is it the FX company?  Ralph Richardson would normally take home the glory for me and if this was Kill Bill in the hot seat than he most surly would.  However, Roger Deakins delivers the most beautiful Bond film in the franchise, and with it he proves that digital photography is the future.  Seriously, can you tell me that this does not look like film?  No.  The fiery Scottish moors.  Shanghai's neon assassination.  The gray windy skies of London.  An absolutely stunning action film.

Prediction:  Claudio Miranda

Desire:  Roger Deakins


ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

AMOUR (Michael Haneke)
DJANGO UNCHAINED (Quentin Tarantino)
FLIGHT (John Gatins)
MOONRISE KINGDOM (Wes Anderson & Roman Coppola)
ZERO DARK THIRTY (Mark Boal)

I won't drone on and on here.  You already read my Django Unchained rant.  I still feel it.  And I'm fighting myself from diving back into the theater for a fourth go around, the blu ray will be here soon.  I thought Flight was barely above an After School Special.  Amour is more about the performances than the screenplay, but the life brought into that tiny apartment started here on the page.  I'm happy to see Moonrise Kingdom get some love, but no one really seems to care.  I loved it.  But compared to previous efforts I think it's lesser Anderson.  Zero Dark Thirty is not going to be taking home any of the top awards, so if the Academy wants to throw it a bone it'll happen here.

Prediction:  Zero Dark Thirty

Desire:  Django Unchained

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

ARGO (Chris Terrio)
BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD (Lucy Alibar & Benh Zeitlin)
LIFE OF PI (David Magee)
LINCOLN (Tony Kushner)
SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK (David O. Russell)

Another tough selection.  Argo will take home the Best Picture, but as stated above, I felt that the screenplay took one too many liberties with the event.  Life of Pi might nab this with its confounding, muddy morals.   No one has read the source material for Beasts of the Southern Wild, so that's out.  Silver Linings Playbook might have a shot, but I think it suffers the same problems as Beasts.  Lincoln is the obvious winner here.  Adapting Doris Kerns Goodwins' Team of Rivals was a beastly challenge, but Tony Kushner's choice to focus solely on the passing of 13th amendment was inspired.  Taking what could have been another blathering, sweeping biopic and transforming it into a taught, political thriller.  In that one month of January you get all the greatness & humanity of Lincoln boiled down to its essence.

Prediction:  Lincoln

Desire:  Lincoln

Olly Moss' 85 Years of Oscars

--Brad

New Django Unchained Posters

We've got some new Django Unchained banners and they're pretty darn cool.  Love Christoph Waltz Dr. King Schultz.  He looks like some serious trouble.  Jaime Foxx is smokin' mad.  Dig Leo's Calvin Candie ring.  And Kerry Washington shows off her rack.  But the above Sam Jackson poster...I find his stare freaking terrifying.  There's something incredibly disturbing about his Stephen.  Really curious to see how his character plays out in the film.

--Brad

Django Unchained Trailer #2

Looks pretty wacky.  And badass.  But definitely wacky.  Still not sure what to think or how to feel.  Definitely excited to see QT crack into the Western and I want to love, love, love it.  But there is some serious weirdo comedy at play and sometimes you just don't know how that's going to play.  Jaime Foxx certainly looks cool holding twin revolvers.  And Leo is all kinds of scary crazy.



Below you'll also find both variations of the comic art for DC Comics' upcoming adaptation.  The top one is done by fanboy favorite Jim Lee.  Honestly, I'm almost as excited for the comic as I am the movie.  As was announced at this year's San Diego Comic Con, the book is based on QT's original script (not the shooting script) and will have several differences from the finished product.  It's five issues and should be hitting the stores December 5th.

--Brad

Trailer: 60 Seconds of Django Unchained

This 60 second trailer only offers a few bits of new material but it's enoiugh to get excited over.  Love love love that stare down between Sam Jackson & Jaime Foxx, and the crazed scream face of Leonardo Dicaprio is abso-freakin-mazing!  I have high hopes for the flick and I want to see it take the number one spot for my Best of 2012 list.

--Brad

International Trailer: Django Unchained

Below is the International Trailer for Django Unchained featuring some never before heard dialog and a brief look at Samuel L Jackson's character.  Both trailers have a lot of goof to them and I've got a feeling this will be a little more Kill Bill than Inglorious Basterds (even though that had a heft of goof as well).  And it's still my most anticipated film of the year.



--Brad

Trailer: Django Unchained

Woot!  It's finally here, the first trailer for Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained complete with Johnny Cash and James Brown theme music.  Leonardo Dicaprio sorta steals my heart in the trailer, can't wait to see more of his villainous outbursts.  And yeah, that's MC Gainey taking a bullet.  Cool.  "The D Is Silent."



--Brad

Poster: More Fandom For Django Unchained

Found via Geek Tyrent.  Here's another fan poster for Django Unchained, incorporating the first batch of production photos that recently popped up online.  And yeah, this poster from John "Houser" Smith is my favorite bit of Django art I've seen so far.  Really hope the studio can put out something this simple and pretty.

--Brad

Fan Poster: Django Unchained

First we got some new set photos.  And now we get some fan art photo riffing from Luis Fernando Cruz.  Found via Fuck Yeah Movie Posters.  "The D Is Silent."  Nifty.

--Brad

Photos: Django Unchained

Some more photos from QT's "Southern," Django Unchained and with each new glance from the film I get a little more excited.  Jaime Foxx looks positively amazing as Django and I can't wait to see him unleash his inner Fred Williamson all over Leo's creepy ass slave master.  And, yes, the original Django, Franco Nero appears to be chatting it up with the new Django in Leo's swanky saloon.  Word is that the first trailer for the movie will be attached to next week's Prometheus.  Yet another reason to anticipate the Alien prequel.

--Brad

First Look: The Cast of Django Unchained

Oh yeah.  Django Unchained is definitely my Number One Must See Movie of 2012.  Please don't disappoint.  Just look at Leo's slave master Calvin Candie!  Looks like we've got another contender for A Fistful of Hammers.  And is Jaime Foxx wearing Fred Williamson's cowboy hat from Take A Hard Ride?  Cannot wait to see a trailer for this "Southern."

--Brad

Trailer: Movie The Movie!

I'm betting everyone has seen this by now, but Jimmy Kimmel's epic Movie: The Movie had me busting a gut once the plot was revealed to have a wheelchair bound George Clooney going up against Black Hitler riding an Armageddon Asteroid.  And Christoph Waltz flashdancing?  Oh yeah, that's sexy.

Poster: More Django Unchained Fan Art

Did you know that there is a Django Unchained Poster tumblr?  Neither did we until Fuck Year Movie Posters pointed us in the right direction.  So far, all they've got are the poster above and the one we posted on ITMOD months back.  I expect all kinds of Fan Art madness from them until the Christmas release of QT's latest.

--Brad

Set Photos: Django Unchained

The Assassination of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford

Actor Garrett Dillahunt just tweeted the below photos of the Django Unchained set photos.  First off, I didn't know Dillahunt was on Twitter.  Win.  Second, that's the same set used for HBO's Deadwood (my all time favorite television show) the Santa Clarita Melody Ranch.

Django Unchained comes out Christmas Day and yes, it's still my most anticipated film of 2012.  Again, look at this cast:  Leonardo DiCaprio, Jaime Foxx, Sacha Baron Cohen, Samuel L Jackson, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Christoph Waltz, Kurt Russell, Walton Goggins, James Remar, Kerry Washington, Rza, Don Johnson, Gerald McRaney, Anthony LaPaglia, MC Gainey, and Tom Savini.  Holy Cow, has a cooler cast ever been collected.

Thanks to Bleeding Cool for the headsup.

--Brad

New Release Tuesday (11/1/11)!!!

Must Buy DVD of the Week!

THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (BLU):  Halloween might be behind us, but that doesn't mean we have to give up on the trick or treating.  This new blu ray of the classic silent horror is loaded with special features including the original 1925 edit and two different 1929 edits.  The disc also contains three specially commissioned musical scores one of which is from Alloy Orchestra, which Matt & I were able to experience first hand last week at the AFI Silver screening in Maryland.  Having just watched this film, I must give it my highest reccomendation.  Lon Chaney is just breathtaking as the twisted freak fueled by unreasonable love.

Rent!

TRESPASS:  Nicolas Cage and Joel Schumacher team up again (we all remember the glories of 8MM, right?) for this home invasion thriller and they drag Nicole Kidman into their Direct-to-DVD underworld.  I love Nic Cage as much as anyone, but considering this film's buzz, even I'm not going to blind buy this charmer.  Trailer below seems to depict a rather average adventure.

CRAZY STUPID LOVE:  Steve Carell (Dinner for Schmucks, Date Night) movies just haven't been doing it for me, but Ryan Gosling movies (Drive, The Ides of March) have definitely been on the up & up.  This looks like romantic comedy pap but I've heard good things from friends with somewhat decent film taste.  It's a Netflix.

WATER FOR ELEPHANTS:  Speaking of pap...actually, Water For Elephants was nowhere near the tripe that I thought it was going to be.  Still can't stand Reese Witherspoon and Christoph Waltz is soooooooo on-the-nose with his scummy Mr. Big Top but I did enjoy the Depression era circus setting and it's a given fact that you can't hate on a film with Hal Holbrook.  Even if he's only in it for seconds.

BUNRAKU:  This is another one that is probably complete and utter dreck, but the cast & trailer below is just goofy enough to peak my interest.  That 'do on Ron Perlman...yeah, I want to see that in action.  Poor Josh Hartnett, though.  He was going to be the next big thing but he just couldn't make those 40 Days and 40 Nights work for him.  Oh well, it's Direct-to-DVD land for you even though I thought Lucky Number Slevin was a fine film.

Avoid!

CARS 2:  I love Pixar!  Up and Finding Nemo are two of my favorite films of the last decade, but these Cars movies hold no sway over me.  I never want to watch a film that features the voice of Larry the Cable Guy.  NEVER!  Even if Michael Caine is involved...I'd rather watch Jaws 4 100 more times than suffer that country "comedy."

--Brad