Obvious Casting of the Day

According to a tip on AICN, Johnny Depp has been attached to the role of the Mad Hatter in Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland movie (coming in 2010).

Well, DUH. Could it have ever been anyone else? Tim Burton doesn’t audition. He just watches his old movies to cast his next one.

That means that the Queen of Hearts will DEFINITELY be played by Lisa Marie.

Oh wait…I forgot…He’s boning Helena Bonham Carter now. Scratch that. Helena Bonham Carter will get the job.

Sorry Lisa! If you’re looking for work, I just heard they’re opening a new Sonic location in the Puget Sound area!

Tags: alice in wonderland, casting, johnny depp, movies, tim burton

Hellboy II: Creature Overload

I feel the need to refute every other review out there for this film. The majority of reviews are raving about Hellboy II: The Golden Army. But the reasons they love it are the same reasons I think it fell flat. Guillermo Del Toro is a fan-boy director. He is a 13-year-old boy trapped in the body of an arrested adult. Sometimes that works. But in this case, it did not.

The plot is completely nonsensical. One of the last of the albino elves wants to re-raise an army of gold transformers in order to destroy all humans and Hellboy must stop him. Fair enough, but I have questions. Why did the Albino Prince wait so long to attempt this? Was he just working out one day in his lair next to the Subway and decided he was done with humanity? His plan seems to have several steps involving unleashing various monsters upon the Earth. He must also find his twin sister who has the last piece of the crown with which to control the Golden Army. But according to her they have a psychic connection so he can just find her whenever he wants. So why does all of this take so damned long? Just so Abe the fish man can fall doomedly in love with the Albino Princess? So Hellboy and Liz Sherman can have that cliche movie argument where she is pregnant but instead of just telling him like a normal person would, she gets all pissy and throws fire balls?

No. It’s so little Guillermo can make more creatures. CREATURES! OMG! CREATURES! Look at them all! Goblins apparently come in all shapes and sizes. There are some flat-faced dudes too. And some small leachy things. And tumor babies. And this guy with big teeth and no eyes. And a big-assed Treebeard/Godzilla hybrid…and…and…Where was I? Oh yeah. In the middle of a movie. I guess we can have the bad guy battle Hellboy now. He’ll do all those flippy moves we saw him do earlier. But this time it will be against HELLBOY so it will feel fresh and new.

Also, why did the Albino Prince sacrifice the LAST of the Elementals when he knew that Hellboy would have to fight it? So he could get even madder at the humans? Did he think he could win Hellboy over by telling him, after the thing had destroyed half the city, that it was the last of its kind? Albino Prince should take those odds to the roulette table and stop messing with endangered species.

Still more questions: Why the hell do the Dream Team give Jeffrey Tambor such a hard time? As far as I can tell, the man is just trying to do his job directing the B.P.R.D. He has some pretty valid points about Hellboy being insolent. I guess no one likes their boss. But really. Give the guy a break. What are they going to do instead? Open a bakery? Work on their doctorates?

OK, so it wasn’t ALL bad. There were a few shining moments. Ron Perlman is at the top of his game any time Hellboy acts like Hellboy, accepting cigars as motivation and drinking beer. One scene involving drunk Hellboy and Abe talking about women and singing Barry Manilow was a highlight. Though it definitely felt like product placement for Hellboy to have a locker filled with Tecate LIGHT. That’s right. Those silver cans sheath the low calorie version of the classic Mexican beer. I love a cool, refreshing Tecate myself, but I greatly doubt a candy enthusiast like Hellboy would bother with light beer.

Product placement aside, those moments felt like a callback to the comics. But a Hellboy movie should be ALL callback. Del Toro is too easily distracted by his creature-making abilities to bother with a script. And America is too dazzled by his world to pay attention to why we are there in the first place. Why am I the only one who sees this?

Man. I need a Tecate.

Hellboy II: The Golden Army is in theatres now! Check out the trailer on ReelTime.com.

Tags: guillermo del toro, hellboy ii, jeffrey tambor, movies, reviews, ron perlman, selma blair, tecate

Meet Dave: A Spiritual Experience

I just got out of a press screening for Meet Dave, the new Eddie Murphy comedy, by the director of his last big hit Norbit, and what can I say? Meet Dave is a spiritual experience like no other movie I have seen all summer. Forget Iron Man, The Happening, and even The Incredible Hulk. Meet Dave is right up there with Return of the Jedi, Explorers, and The Shawshank Redemption. Not only is this a movie, this is a true film!

The story concerns Dave, who looks like a human, but is really an alien spaceship, piloted by cute little aliens, who look like little humans.

Eddie Murphy is pretty funny in classics like Shrek 2 and The Nutty Professor 2, but in Meet Dave his comic timings take on a truly mythical quality. And because the story concerns the great mystery of life on other planets, (like Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Alf) there is a great spiritual weight and dimension to this comedy. You are not going to see anything else this summer quite like Meet Dave.

I don’t use words like life changing experience often, but this movie will change your life. I know I have taken movie fandom to the extreme in the past, but seriously, seriously, seriously:

This is the best movie of the century. And the last one, too. You can quote me on that one. At least until The Dark Knight, LOLZ!

Tags: best movie ever, eddie murphy, hyperbole, joey knows, meet dave, movies

The End of the A-List

I love the heat of Southern California. I love the sun. It rejuvenates me; I’m like a solar cell. Heat itself, I love.  George Hamilton turned me on to the curative properties of saunas. He learned it from a Native American shaman named Lizard’s Dance. George and I would have some peyote and enter Lizard’s Dances’ sweat lodge. For a long time we both thought Lizard’s Dance was female, but on entering the sweat lodge on one occasion, we were presented with a naked Lizard’s Dance, and found that despite the long hair, breasts, and feminine curves, the wise shaman had been born with one important piece of the male anatomy. I never let George forget that one.

But I digress, what I really wanted to talk about was heat. It’s hot in Hollywood this summer, and it’s getting hotter with a SAG-AFTRA strike looming on the horizon.

This industry is changing; the town is different. It was changing when my dad’s studio was going out of business. It’s always changing. This is the way of the biz; but also the way of the world.

If you would have told me 20 years ago that A-List actors opening a picture didn’t really matter anymore, I would have also told you to take a hike. There will always be a new crop of A-List stars, regardless of their actual talent, I would have said then. In ‘88 I would have extolled the merits of Kevin Costner, Tom Cruise, Tom Hanks, maybe even the future ‘Govenator’ of my fair state, as the A-List, or at least the future stars of such a list. I would have shown you the numbers and told you that stars carry pictures.

But it’s 20 years later, and I’m not quite sure that the star factory works the same way, kiddies. Certainly the A-List of 20 years ago is invalid, but 20 years is a long time. Who, then, is the new A-List? Who are the new actors who can carry a movie on their Olympian shoulders, the New Gods of the Silver screen?

I hear crickets, babies. The BO doesn’t show it. In 2007 we have Spiderman 3, Shrek 3, and Transformers, leading the pack. Sure, fine acting talents in all three, but stars? The stars in each are the computer effects, the action sequences, the spectacles, not the actors. Of course this is not new. Who saw Jaws(1975) for Roy Scheider, A or B list? The gradual changes have taken the industry to a new place.

The actors threatening to strike are bargaining from a position of weakness in my opinion. The writers were certainly in a similar situation, but from what I understand you still need writers on these so-called ‘reality shows,’ so those fellows had a trump card. But you actors, I don’t know what to tell you. I don’t think a strike is in anyone’s best interest, especially when I know 3 or 4 waiters who are just as good an actor as that Shia LaBeouf kid I saw in the Indiana Jones picture.

But again, I digress. Perhaps the best answer, in these tumultuous times is to look to the example of Lizard’s Dance. First, enjoy the heat. Second, things are not always as they seem.

Ciao.

Disney’s Dumbo, When I See An Elephant Fly!

When Walt Disney delivered Dumbo to RKO Pictures for distribution, the studio demanded that the film be lengthened from its 64 minute running time or cut up into short subjects. Disney refused. RKO then suggested that a 64 minute film would work better as a B-movie, under a live-action picture. Again, Disney refused, and the frustrated studio bosses at RKO released Dumbo as a feature length cartoon.

Released on October 23, 1941 Dumbo was instant hit with kids and adults. Although Pearl Harbor and the United States entrance into World War Two two months later was at first thought to be a hindrance to the film’s success, audiences wanted a distraction from the horrors of war, and this made Dumbo extremely profitable for Walt Disney’s company.

Dumbo was the first Walt Disney picture to be released on videocassette. It was released in 1981 for rental only. In 1982 it was put on sale for the first time. Dumbo has never been out of print, since then. Therefore, it’s fitting that Dumbo is part of the first group of Walt Disney pictures streaming on ReelTime. Almost 70 years after its initial release, Dumbo still entertains young and old, with a classic story that resonates with anyone who has felt like an outsider.
Dumbo
Tags: 1941, disney, dumbo, streaming video

http://blog.reeltime.com/rtime/img/reviews/DUMBO.jpg

Hulk Smash!

Go green or go home! Incredible way of saving money on gas, power, energy, election predictions and more. No wait it is just The Incredible HULK!

Here’s a shocker. I actually liked The Incredible Hulk.

In general, with these sorts of movies, it helps to have low expectations. In this case, they were as such because of all the whining I’d read from star Edward Norton about how all the best scenes were cut. I recognize that Eddy wasn’t in and therefore probably hadn’t seen any of the action sequences, and, as a result, had a very different image in his mind as to what the final picture would look like. But surely he must have READ THE SCRIPT which no doubt contained stage direction such as “HULK notices abandoned police cruiser, smashes it in half with his fist and then uses each half to beat the pulp out of TIM ROTH MONSTER”. Furthermore, I find it difficult to believe that the cut scenes were SO TRANSCENDENT that this VERY comic book-esque film would, with their inclusion, somehow be transformed into high art. There is just no way.

So at the start of the film, after a fun little montage which catches us up to speed, we join Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) living a quiet life in Brazil, watching Portuguese Sesame Street and taking lessons on how to make your stomach concave. He has also taken a job in a GREEN soda bottling plant which primarily employs brutes and supermodels. All the while he is messengering with a scientist back home as they work on attempting to cure his affliction. His location is compromised when some of his blood gets into one of the sodas, thus poisoning Brazilian Soda enthusiast, Stan Lee. Bruce Banner is on the run again! Teaming up with his estranged girlfriend, Betty (Liv Tyler), Bruce must find his scientist friend and cure himself before Betty’s daddy gets a hold of him.

Ironically for Norton, the biggest problem with the film is its attempt to follow in the footsteps of other comic book films of late, and make this fantastical story somehow relevant to the real world. X-Men works on an allegorical level. Iron Man and Batman are almost plausible. But a scrawny dude exposed to lethal levels of gamma radiation, who survives but gains the pesky side-effect of, whenever he gets angry, scared or excited, turning into a 9-foot-tall ball of testosterone? Who is also GREEN? Because of the radiation? I’m sorry to burst your bubble but THAT COULD NEVER REALLY HAPPEN. So stop trying to act like an IFC Films-approved version of the Hulk story is possible. Stick with the “Hulk Smash” which, in this case, works really well.

Unlike the first attempt at a Hulk movie, which pretty much everyone agrees sucked, The Incredible Hulk really captures the spirit of what the Hulk is like when he’s all Hulked out. While he’s a completely different entity than the mild-mannered Bruce Banner and certainly not what you would call an intellectual, he’s not a monster either. He knows who the bad guys are and he smashes accordingly. At no time do we think he is going to hurt Betty or any other creature of light (like, say, kittens). But if you have evil in your heart, Hulk knows it and you are screwed. I think this is an important point that was completely missed in the first movie. It explains why Hulk eventually becomes part of the Avengers. Bruce Banner yammers on about finding a cure and living a normal life yet he is compelled to help people. Deep down he knows he has a calling which will make his life complex but ultimately more meaningful than would just boning Liv Tyler and playing with beakers.

Without a doubt there are many snicker-inducing moments in The Incredible Hulk. For instance, the prevalence of the color green. I’m no scientist, but I have a hard time believing than gamma radiation poisoning (even this special variety) turns your blood cells green and you know you are cured when your blood cells once again turn red. Also, did Bruce Banner turn down jobs at other bottling plants who were making orange or grape soda? Is General Ross really a Midori Sour man?

What’s more, let’s talk about pants. I appreciate their attempt to explain how Hulk, whatwith his 80 inch waist, manages to keep his hulkhood covered by the pants of a much smaller man. Bruce Banner buys elastic waist pants! But it seems like after he buys some Brazilian hemp trousers, he reverts to the Double Denim look pretty quickly, even scoffing at Betty when she bring him the classic purple sweat pant of comic book Hulk. At the climax of the film, Banner is definitely wearing well-fitting JEANS that remain mostly in tact when he hulks out. They do MAKE stretch jeans, but the size difference is still too vast. Bruce Banner would have to rock the hip-hop-boxer-flash to accommodate the metamorphosis.

These are small criticisms, however, of an overall enjoyable film. Liv Tyler as Betty is sweet and likable (albeit unconvincing as a molecular biologist); a welcome replacement to the cold, wooden Academy Award Winner Jennifer Connelly. She brings much genuine affection to her character’s complicated relationship with Bruce. You really feel for her when she begs her father to stop trying to kill Hulk and when Bruce insists on jumping out of a plane with uncertain results instead of staying behind and being her boyfriend.

Likewise, Norton adequately channels the tortured altruist that Bill Bixby brought to the character on the TV show. Tim Blake Nelson is super character-actory as the over-exuberant scientist who may or may not have found a cure for hulkism. Tim Roth is always at his most compelling when playing a villain. In this case he uses the desperation of an aging solider as the motivation for undergoing experiments which would give him Hulk-like abilities and later cause him to ravage the city in a fairly awesome smash battle.

In short, The Incredible Hulk is a smashing good time. Especially if you hate helicopters as much as Hulk does.

Tags, go green, save money on gas, cheap gas, green, green electricity, edward norton, the incredible hulk, the hulk, movies, new movies, movie reviews, download movies, stream movies, new releases, hul, liv tyler, tyler

The Real Love Guru

I’m not too familiar with the work of Mike Meyers, but it seems to me he’s trying to become some kind of later-day Peter Sellers. I’ve heard some pretty wild stories about his on-set antics as a prima dona, which make me hesitant to work with the guy, but truthfully, I’m sure they’ve said the same about me, on occasion.

No, I didn’t see The Love Guru (2008) this weekend, but neither did most of you out there in the Magic Kingdom. What I did do was get a call at about 2AM Sunday night. I was having a sauna in the carriage house at the time when my phone vibrated.

It’s a young friend – the English director. He’s shooting a movie in Tunisia and the ol’ ball and chain is giving him problems. Two artists, you know? I just don’t think it works. Better you find yourself a nice young schoolteacher, Guy, I tell him, like my first wife. He’s freaking out a little, I imagine he’s in his trailer, either they’re waiting for him on set, or he’s got a little time before they start waiting on him. We met at Cannes in ‘98 and kept in touch. I liked his style and I’m always interested in the European sensibility. I don’t know the wife, but I do know, as you know, yourself, she’s a big star. I never quite got her, to be honest. Disco was never really my thing.

I tell him this, but he’s unimpressed. He’s in love. Have you told her this, I ask? He grumbles. The worst part of it all, he says, is that she leaves the cap of the toothpaste covered in sticky blue goo. She does? This sounds like a sexual problem, to me, Papa Freud. Are you two shagging, I ask. Not in a long time, he mopes. We’re too busy.

There’s your problem, I say. I tell this to my kids, all the time: ‘if you’re too busy, maybe you’re too busy.’ They don’t get it, but The Director does. I should get down to Malawi, huh, he says. Get down, babe. Get down.

I press the phone off and pour a plastic cup of water onto the rocks. Steam rushes up with a hiss and quickly fills the room with white smoke. I can’t believe the kid listened to me. I give ‘em six months.

Tags, reeltime, movies, movie streaming, movie reviews, new releases, the love guru, mike myers, at the theaters, reeltimes, funny, austin powers.

Indiana Jones: A Joke?

So this time on my reeltime blog I am brining you normal movie news:

Indiana Jones and the story of the lost script:

http://www.the-editing-room.com/indianajones4.html

John Wayne’s Teeth… No Bob Hope’s

At this moment on ReelTime Weblogs of movies, spruce geese and hamburgers… we have our newest entry on Bob Hope.

Life is good; while you’re alive, that is, I guess was for Mr. Hope

Earlier this week, Linda Hope announced an estate sale of the late Bob Hope’s personal belongings. Times are hard everywhere, I suppose.

There are many items going to the block. A lota funny hats and golf clubs, I’m told. One interesting thing on the block will be Hope’s dentures, which definitely have my interest as a buyer.

The way I see it, his papers and pictures, even the golf clubs are far too ephemeral.

The teeth, why, that’s like buying a piece of the man, himself. And I’m sure high quality dentures would last hundreds of years. I have scripts from 10 years ago that have fallen apart. Why would I want to buy that? The teeth on the other hand. Ah, the teeth!

I have good memories of Hope, even though he called me a “bum.” “Your father didn’t make pictures with so much blood, you bum!” He yelled at me in ‘69 at a party with Peter Sellers and an elephant.

Movie Review at ReelTime:The Happening

This week at ReelTime movie reviews, The Happening

This weekend I saw M. Night Shamalyan’s The Happening! True, The Incredible Hulk came out, and also true I love, love, love, love computer animated movies, but c’mon, guys, this was the guy who gave us Lady in the Water! I had to see it! So after Twins of Glimmer practice with Renald, (where I did an extended-extended version of Emotional Rescue, which we will probably include on our upcoming CD, FYI.) we went over to the theater.

And I was not disappointed! I should warn you that is a very strange movie. Even stranger than Lady in the Water! But wow it packs a punch! I’m not really even sure what it’s about – something causes people to start killing themselves in big cities in the Northeast. There are lots of theories, but no one knows why. And then it stops, just as mysteriously as it started.

Much like The Birds, there is no explanation for the “act of nature.” It just happens. The Happening, get it? It reminded me of the time my cousin Andrew fell from his roof trying to get his Frisbee. He fell and hit the fence around his house. If he would have hit the ground, he would have died, but the way he hit the fence, he just got cut really bad. It also makes me think of that movie Magnolia, which wasn’t a fave because it was so darn long, but they talk about how strange things happen all the time. And that is so true!

The only thing I would have changed is that I would have had Zooey Deschanel singing at the end, because she is a good singer.

Hey, if you didn’t notice it’s summer, again!!! And it’s darn hot! I am going to go get an Otter Pop and chill inside. I’m thinking The Quick and the Dead (same director as Spiderman, natch!) CYAZ!!!

They might look bored but they are scared out of their minds.