TRAILER: "Fruitvale Station"

A movie coming out in limited release this weekend that's worth looking out for is Fruitvale Station, which won the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award at the Sundance film festival this year. It's writer-director Ryan Coogler's feature film debut and is already earning raves from the critics. It stars Michael B. Jordan (who I LOVED on Friday Night Lights) in the true story of a young man named Oscar Grant, who was involved in a tragic accident on New Year's Day, 2009. This one will probably be in the mix for Oscar season, so keep an eye out.

 

FIRST LOOK: Tom Hanks as Walt Disney

Indiewire's got the first set picture of Tom Hanks as Walt Disney and Emma Thompson as P.L. Travers for the upcoming Saving Mr. Banks. The movie is supposed to be about the making of Mary Poppins - Travers was the author of the original books and had to be persuaded to give up the rights.  Sounds to me like a My Week With Marilyn kinda thing, but we'll see. It's from The Blind Side director John Lee Hancock and coming out December 13th.

 

Blu-Ray Pick of the Week: The Producers (1968)

One of the very best Mel Brooks movies was his directorial debut, and it's out on blu-ray now. With the great Gene Wilder (also in his debut) and the late Zero Mostel as two down on their luck producers desperate to make a "flop," this is one of the great comedies of all time. You owe it to yourself to check it out.

Here's a sampling of the nuttiness:

"I'm hysterical and I'm WET!"

REVIEW: Side Effects (2013) Rooney Mara, Jude Law. Dir. Steven Soderbergh

Side Effects is a twisty Hitchcockian thriller from Steven Soderbergh, and is supposedly his last theatrical film (well, we'll see how long that promise lasts). If it is his last though, he went out on a relative high note. The story is about a young woman named Emily who is struggling with depression (Rooney Mara), and whose husband is released from a lengthy prison stint for insider trading. This would make anyone's life stressful and she starts seeing a psychiatrist (Jude Law) after multiple suicide attempts. The shrink attempts to treat her in the ways he knows how, including prescribing all different kinds of drugs, which leads to a fatal accident involving Emily and her husband. For awhile you think this is a serious look at prescription drug culture in America, but the plot twists and surprises in the last half hour will leave you reeling as you try to figure out what kind of movie it really is. For that you have to give it credit- it's unpredictable and appropriately leveled with an anxiety ridden tone, much of that due to the uneasy and nervous performance from Rooney Mara as Emily. She leaves you questioning her motives just as often as sympathizing with her condition. In another unexpected turn, Law as the psychiatrist is actually the wronged man in the Hitchcock plot; we rarely get insight into his character as he begins to piece together the loopholes in her story, but we don't really need to- he's a vehicle for uncovering the truth, ala the Cary Grant role. The movie isn't flawless- Catherine Zeta-Jones gives a much too hammy performance here that undercuts what should have been another surprise twist involving her role as Emily's previous doctor, and the last minute revelations may be somewhat over the top. But Soderbergh effectively unravels the story with minimal flash- the last couple years he seems effortlessly able to toss off genre flicks while we know he's capable of much more complicated storytelling (Traffic and even Out of Sight), but this is a solid popcorn entertainment well worth your time. Hopefully Soderbergh will find the inspiration to come out of that "retirement" sooner rather than later- he's a great talent who never makes an uninteresting film, and for that we need him to stick around.

* * 1/2

Trailer: 

BOX OFFICE 7/5-7/7: "Despicable Me 2" Soars, "Lone Ranger" Bites the Dust

Over the long 4th of July weekend, Universal's Despicable Me 2 flew in way above expectations, hauling in a $142 million total since Wednesday, which sets a record for the biggest animated 5 day opening ever. The marketing dream that is the little minions were multiplied in this film, so you can credit the animating team for giving the kids what they wanted, I guess. Meanwhile, Disney's The Lone Ranger crashed and burned, with a $29 million 3-day, adding up to a $48 million total since opening, which is a disaster for a movie that cost $250 million to produce. The movie wasn't helped by dismal reviews (25% Rotten Tomatoes, 37 Metacritic), and limited audience appeal for a franchise that was last popular in the 1940's. Looks like Johnny Depp's appeal can only go so far- but international grosses, where he's an even bigger draw, are still to come.

TOP 5 3-Day:

  1. Despicable Me 2- $82.5 million
  2. The Lone Ranger- $29.4 million
  3. The Heat- $25 million
  4. Monsters University- $19.6 million
  5. World War Z- $18.2 million

In the holdovers, The Heat held on strong, for a gross of $86 million so far, and giving it a chance to make or beat the $169 million total of Bridesmaids, while Monsters U clearly had its thunder stolen by the minions, falling all the way to No. 4 from the top spot last week. And WWZ has held up very well over the last few weeks as America's disaster movie of choice, with a total of $158 million so far. Next up, it's Adam Sandler in Grown Ups 2 vs. Guillermo del Toro's Pacific Rim.

A New Grapes of Wrath?

According to Deadline, Dreamworks Studios and Steven Spielberg are planning to produce a new film version of John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath. The 1940 John Ford film remains a masterpiece though and it's hard to see them outdoing it. One of the reasons the story was so powerful was because it was an encapsulation of what America had experienced during the Great Depression- maybe they ought to do an updated-to-present day version concerning the recent economy instead? At least it would be something different. I can't imagine who'd take over the Henry Fonda role, but I have just one name for the new Ma Joad- Margo Martindale, from Justified and The Americans. Seriously, cast her now.