The video for the big song from Begin Again came out yesterday and I'm already kind of in love with it. Written by former New Radicals (remember them?) frontman Gregg Alexander and performed by Keira Knightley in the movie, but this is the studio produced, official release version, and I have to say I think it's definitely the best one. In fact, I'd be willing to bet money right now that this is our Best Song winner at next year's Oscars.
TRAILER: "Dracula Untold"
A very silly looking new Dracula is set to come out October 17th. Supposedly this is the story about the guy who would become the Dracula myth, but it looks kind of like a bland ancient warfare kind of movie to me. That Luke Evans guy doesn't look very good either. They've got to get somebody charismatic and charming for Dracula, not someone who looks like he was rejected from Game of Thrones.
Jennifer Lawrence, Angelina Jolie among Forbes' Most Powerful Actresses
Forbes has released its list of the ten most powerful actresses in Hollywood, according to earnings and fame over the last year:
- Jennifer Lawrence
- Sandra Bullock
- Angelina Jolie
- Scarlett Johansson
- Jennifer Aniston
- Amy Adams
- Gwyneth Paltrow
- Meryl Streep
- Cameron Diaz
- Natalie Portman
Pretty unsurprising bunch, except for Natalie Portman. Really, why is she on this list? Because of the last Thor movie? Everyone else makes sense though. Jennifer Lawrence also ranked 12th overall on Forbes' 100 Most Powerful Celebrities list, making her the highest ranked actress. Not bad for a 23 year old, huh?
POSTER: "Foxcatcher"
The poster for Foxcatcher, the Cannes hit and early Oscar favorite from Capote and Moneyball director Bennett Miller, puts Channing Tatum front and center (even though Steve Carell is by most accounts the star of this movie). I have to say, it's not really a great picture of him,either. Couldn't they have had one with him making less of a squiggly face?
TRAILER: "The Skeleton Twins"
The Bill Hader/Kristen Wiig sibling dramedy from Sundance is coming out September 19th and it looks really good. Bill Hader especially got raves out of the festival but he and Kristen Wiig have had great chemistry together ever since their days on Saturday Night Live (as part of a cast I would now do anything to get back, believe it or not). Can't wait to see this.
BOX OFFICE 6/27-6/29: 'Transformers' Dominates with $100 Million Opening
Unsurprisingly, the fourth entry in the series that just won't quit, leapt to the front of the pack this week and pulled off the biggest opening of the year, with just over $100 million from Friday to Sunday. The abysmally reviewed Transformers movie (17% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes) got an "A-" Cinemascore from the audience and played to a crowd that was 64% male and also 72% over 18 amusingly, so you can lay the blame for the appeal of this franchise not on kids but on young men who can't get enough incomprehensible, meaningless CG action in their lives (is it a video game kind thing, maybe? I don't know). The movie also brought in a massive haul from overseas, earning $201 million from 37 countries, $90 million in China alone, which happens to be an opening weekend record there. So, don't count on an ending to this series any time soon.
Meanwhile 22 Jump Street came in second for a total of $138 million so far, while How to Train Your Dragon 2 continues to underperform, having earned just $121 million after three weeks in release. Look like the family audience just didn't want to bite on this one, despite the popularity of the first along with stellar reviews. Think Like a Man Too fell to fourth with $10 million over the weekend (a lot of Kevin Hart's movies seem to have big openings with little to no staying power after that), while Maleficent made another $8 million, bringing its total over $200 million domestically, and its global take to an enormous $585 million.
Top 5:
- Transformers: Age of Extinction- $100 million
- 22 Jump Street- $15.4 million
- How to Train Your Dragon 2- $13.1 million
- Think Like a Man Too- $10.4 million
- Maleficent- $8.23 million
In limited release world, the two openers from The Weinstein Company both got off to a strong start this weekend, with Snowpiercer and Begin Again earning a $20k and $29k per screen average, respectively, on just 8 and 5 screens. Begin Again's expanding over the next couple weeks and has a decent shot at becoming a breakout hit with people looking for counter-programming this summer, while hopefully Snowpiercer can earn enough to justify expanding wider, but we'll see. Next week it's the horror movie Deliver Us From Evil and Melissa McCarthy's comedy Tammy, along with the alien flick Earth to Echo and the Roger Ebert documentary Life, Itself in limited release.
TRAILER: "The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby"
James McAvoy puts on an American accent for this relationship drama with Jessica Chastain, which was shown at Toronto last year, then at Cannes this year, and is now finally coming out September 26th. It's from first time writer-director Ned Benson, but the two performances were highly praised out of both film festivals, and it's even started some slight Oscar buzz for Chastain, who's set to have another prolific year with at least three films coming out this fall. You know, this movie actually looks a little bit like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind to me, but without the sci-fi angle. What do you think?
FEATURETTE: "Guardians of the Galaxy"
This behind the scenes look at Marvel's upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy movie shows us all the different characters in the ensemble (and hey, you get to see Zoe Saldana's Gamora actually talk in this!). With the movie coming out August 1st, it's uncertain whether this lesser known property of Marvel's can really make a big splash, but since it's directed by James Gunn, the guy who made Super, the odd, faux superhero film from 2010, it might have a shot at standing out from Marvel's other movies (then again, they all have to fit in the same universe, so I wouldn't bet on too much creativity being allowed).
'Gravity,' 'Iron Man 3' and 'Her' Win Big at the 2014 Saturn Awards
The awards for genre films for the last year were announced today (I think these are the last of any kind of movie awards for 2013). Gravity and Iron Man 3 seemed to be the most popular movies with the sci-fi/horror crowd. But what's this Big Bad Wolves movie? Never even heard of it:
- Best Comic-to-Film Motion Picture: Iron Man 3
- Best Sci-Fi Film: Gravity
- Best Fantasy Film: Her
- Best Horror Film: The Conjuring
- Best Thriller Film: World War Z
- Best Action/Adventure Film: Fast & Furious 6
- Best Independent Film: 12 Years a Slave
- Best International Film: Big Bad Wolves
- Best Animated Film: Frozen
- Best Actor: Robert Downey, Jr., Iron Man 3
- Best Actress: Sandra Bullock, Gravity
- Best Supporting Actor: Ben Kingsley, Iron Man 3
- Best Supporting Actress: Scarlett Johansson, Her
- Best Performance by a Younger Actor: Chloe Grace Moretz, Carrie
- Best Director: Alfonso Cuaron, Gravity
- Best Writing: Her
- Best Editing: Gravity
- Best Production Design: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
- Best Music: Big Bad Wolves
- Best Costumes: The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
- Best Makeup: Prisoners
- Best Special/Visual Effects: Gravity
REVIEW: "Snowpiercer" (2014) Chris Evans, Song Kang-ho. Dir. Bong Joon-ho
Snowpiercer, the new action sci-fi thriller opening this week is one of the best movies of the year so far, and that's because it impresses upon you a world of originality and creativity that makes it something that you haven't actually seen before. And in this spring and summer of sequels and superheroes, that in itself is a desperately needed jolt to the system, when you can sit and watch a movie, and be reminded what it's like to not know what's going to happen next or feel that the story will ultimately follow a formula, even if there are dashes of cleverness along the way. No, this is a true original, and we have South Korean director Bong Joon-ho to thank for it.
Joon-ho (who directed acclaimed films Memories of Murder and The Host, both highly recommended) has his own style, and in his first English-language film with mostly American and British actors (although he brings along South Korean star Song Kang-ho in a small role) he doesn't cater in the slightest to western tastes. This film was delayed months due to a battle over the final cut between Joon-ho and distributor Harvey Weinstein, which Joon-ho eventually won, determined not to cut his film to cater to American audiences, no matter how much it may lose in box office appeal. Well, having now seen the film the way it was supposed to be seen, I'm glad they haven't butchered it, as it maintains that distinctive tone of Joon-ho's films that make them stand apart from the crowd. There's a slightly surreal, somewhat over the top, faux campiness to some scenes, with jarring tonal shifts in brutal violence or philosophical grandstanding in others, but it remains specifically South Korean in flavor, and though that may not be to everyone's tastes, the experience is all the better for it.
Chris Evans stars in a near future (the year is 2031) in which global warming has destroyed the earth, turning it into a swirling polar vortex uninhabitable for human kind. What remains of humanity has been ushered onto a kind of bullet train, miles long with thousands of residents, all of whom have been segregated and put in their "pre-ordained" places, with the abused working class citizens slogging away in the tail end, fed disgusting "protein bars" made out of bugs and insects, while the upper class slovens hang out in the various other cars, which are made up by spectacular sets that show us pools, saunas, greenhouses, nightclubs, and classrooms of indoctrinated children filled with bright, neon lights and wildly colorful costumes that make these elites seem like escapees from the Hunger Games universe. Evans is Curtis Everett, leader of an outcast group among the bottom-feeders who plan to rebel and make their way forward through the cars to the "sacred engine," which is where they can control the train and take back their lives from the oppressors. This kind of revolution has been tried and failed before, but with an obvious limited supply of weaponry in this environment, the soldiers who put down the workers may be close to finally being taken out of commission. Tilda Swinton plays Minister Mason, assistant to Mr. Wilford, the creator of the train and God-like figure in this universe, and in typical Tilda Swinton fashion, she goes all out with a nutty, bizarre and insanely campy performance that's as entertaining to watch as anything else on the screen, and that's saying a lot.
The visuals are striking in this film, and worth the price of admission alone. Joon-ho still appreciates the art of set design, as the creation of the train, with all its different cars is like walking into a new room in Willy Wonka's chocolate factory with every door Curtis manages to unlock. He does so with the help of gate opener Minsu (Kang-ho), an upper class citizen who's been drugged into a blissed out oblivion by the elites with his daughter Yona (Ko Ah-sung). The two actors help to blend the largely American cast with a South Korean perspective, but every actor who shows up gets a juicy bit part to play (watch out for Alison Pill and Ed Harris in particular, the latter of whom's Truman Show-esque role is just the latest in the actor's recent habit of playing parts that recall his most famous earlier performances). There is some CGI in this, seamlessly blended with the art direction to include absolutely breathtaking shots of a frozen and desolate planet that Wilford claims will kill anyone who sets foot on it, but will it really? There's some mystery that has to be solved in that question, but the plot twists are mostly secondary, and I don't even care if they make sense or not- the allegorical details get a little too messy and complicated to keep track of, as a lot of high minded science fiction does (this material was adapted from a French graphic novel). The movie itself is about the action, the set-up, and most of all, the train. It's a beautiful, thrilling and exciting experience that I guarantee you will be unlike any other action movie you'll pay to see this summer. So seek it out and give it a chance, if you're interested in something different. It may surprise you.
* * * 1/2
TRAILER #3: "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles"
Here we go with another TMNT trailer, and finally this one gives you lots of footage of those scary, freakish looking CG turtles. Blech. The characters seem right, but they're just so ugly! The story also looks pretty close to the original 1990 movie's plot, if anyone remembers that one (which I liked as a kid, actually). It looks a lot more action-packed though, as anything from producer Michael Bay would suggest (I'm sure he's responsible for casting the now Kardashian-resembling Megan Fox as April O'Neil, too).
TEASER: "Mockingjay, Part 1"
The new teaser for Part 1 of the final Hunger Games film has President Snow (Donald Sutherland) addressing the citizens of Panem in a bid to create hype and fan frenzy for the new movie. Something tells me they won't have much of a problem with that. Mockingjay, Part 1 is coming out November 21st, the weekend before Thanksgiving.
