Welcome to Land of The Nerds, where I, Lisa Laman, use my love of cinema to explore, review and talk about every genre of film imaginable!
Thursday, March 31, 2016
Director Of Shark Tale Will Direct New Feature Film Adaptation Of Dungeons & Dragons
Do you know who Rob Letterman is? Well, if you're familiar with films like Gulliver's Travels, Monsters Vs. Aliens, Goosebumps and Academy Award nominated feature Shark Tale, you know his work all too well. His most recent feature, Goosebumps, was a solid effort, but his DreamWorks Animation efforts were as generic as imaginable while Gulliver's Travels was...the film that cost Emily Blunt the chance to play Black Widow in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Manhattan Review (Classic Write-Up)
Certain filmmakers have a recurring feature in their filmography to utilize their city/state of birth as a prominent figure in their motion pictures, taking a well-known location and attempt to weave in more nuance and depth into an environment and its inhabitants that many may normally dismiss as just a tourist trap. Jean-Luc Godard has Paris, France. Richard Linklater has Texas and, of course, Woody Allen has New York. For his ninth motion picture, Manhattan, (one that came two years after Annie Hall, Allen's movie that won Best Picture at the Oscars), the importance of New York to the filmmaker can be seen in how this film is titled after one of the five boroughs that can be found in New York City.
Tuesday, March 29, 2016
Where Does The DC Extended Universe Go From Here?
Batman v. Superman: Dawn Of Justice is a big fat hit. Grossing over $420 million worldwide in just a few days, this thing is easily headed to over a billion dollars worldwide and has fulfilled the faith Warner Bros. had in this franchise when they announce half-a-decades worth of movies based on various DC Comics characters back in October 2014. The DC Extended Universe, as it's being called, is here to stay. And, as someone who hated Batman v. Superman, I have some mixed feelings about this whole thing, to say the least.
Woody Allen's Next Movie, Cafe Society, To Open The Cannes Film Festival!
The Cannes Film Festival is a little over a month away and while which films are specifically during the high-profile event is still a hotly debated topic, we do now know which motion picture will be opening the prestigious occasion, and it's a director whose works have been a frequent participant at Cannes. The one and only Woody Allen will debut his next film, Cafe Society, at the festival as the opening film of the 2015 Cannes Film Festival on May 11th.
Monday, March 28, 2016
Batman v. Superman Breaks Box Office Records In Its Gargantuan Opening Weekend
It is done. Batman v. Superman now has the biggest March opening weekend of all-time, the biggest opening weekend for a Batman movie ever and the second biggest debut weekend ever for a Warner Bros. title. How much did this gargantuan tentpole make this weekend? About $170.1 million, the sixth biggest opening weekend in history as well as the largest opening weekend ever for a Warner Bros. motion picture. It also gobbled up an enormous $424.1 million worldwide in its opening weekend, the fourth biggest worldwide opening in history. The DC Extended Universe is finally up and rolling, despite the best efforts from the critics who were all part of a very much real (and not at all something fictitious conjured up by mentally and emotionally disturbed individuals on Reddit) conspiracy against the movie.
Friday, March 25, 2016
Batman v. Superman Gets Off To Massive Box Office Start At Thursday Night Showings
Night (or should I say knight) has fallen on the box office as Batman v. Superman: Dawn Of Justice got off to a massive $27.7 million start last night at Thursday night screenings that began at 6 PM. That's the second biggest gross for a superhero movie at these kind of screenings, only behind the $30 million sum garnered by The Dark Knight Rises at Midnight showings back in July 2012. This $27,7 million sum puts Batman v. Superman puts this Zack Snyder film ahead of The Avengers, Man Of Steel (which grossed $21 million at 7PM screenings, tickets to which could only be bought at Wal-Mart, and midnight showings) and Avengers: Age Of Ultron. It's also, just from these screenings alone, already the eighth highest grossing movie of Jesse Eisenberg's career.
Batman v. Superman Review
"She's talking to angels
Counting the stars
Waiting for Superman to pick her up
In his arms" - Daughtry
In the final scene of the 1959 Francois Truffaut film The 400 Blows, the lead character, a young boy named Antoine Doinel, finally makes it the beach, a serene domain full of the kind of peace and tranquility he's been yearning for. Yes, he's made it...but at what cost? He's alienated his parents, turned to a life of crime, sullied his reputation, he's sacrificed so much to get here. The closing shot of the motion picture focuses solely on the face of Antoine Doinel, an expression of remorse and confusion over realizing all that has been lost in his pursuit of escaping his demanding life. It's a haunting facial expression....and the very same one that was etched onto my face when I emerged from my Thursday night screening of Batman v. Superman: Dawn Of Justice.
Counting the stars
Waiting for Superman to pick her up
In his arms" - Daughtry
In the final scene of the 1959 Francois Truffaut film The 400 Blows, the lead character, a young boy named Antoine Doinel, finally makes it the beach, a serene domain full of the kind of peace and tranquility he's been yearning for. Yes, he's made it...but at what cost? He's alienated his parents, turned to a life of crime, sullied his reputation, he's sacrificed so much to get here. The closing shot of the motion picture focuses solely on the face of Antoine Doinel, an expression of remorse and confusion over realizing all that has been lost in his pursuit of escaping his demanding life. It's a haunting facial expression....and the very same one that was etched onto my face when I emerged from my Thursday night screening of Batman v. Superman: Dawn Of Justice.
Thursday, March 24, 2016
Watchmen Review (Classic Write-Up)
Perhaps the greatest testament to how much of a pop culture phenomenon 300 was upon its initial 2007 release was that director Zack Snyder somehow got Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures to pony up $130 million for him to film an R-rated adaptation of one of the most beloved graphic novels of all time, Watchmen. This adaptation would have no A-list stars, tons of blue penis, graphic violence and would contain numerous monologues centered on weighty themes and concepts. Total crowd-pleaser right?
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Wednesday, March 23, 2016
Disney And Marvel Announce Protest Against LGBTQA-Discriminatory Bill In Georgia
Over in the state of Georgia, there is a "religious liberty bill" that will allow businesses to discriminate against same-sex couples. How far has this bill gotten? Well, the only thing preventing it from being enacted currently is the approval of Governor Nathan Deal. Numerous figures have already showed resistance to such a law coming to fruition, for obvious reasons, including the NFL (who are noting that such a law being passed could put Georgia out of the running for being a state to host the Super Bowl) and now, another big company has thrown their support behind dismissing the bill.
Spider-Man 2 Review (Classic Write-Up)
Every summer blockbuster sequel wants to be The Empire Strikes Back. After all, that was one of the first major summer blockbuster follow-ups of its kind in a post-Jaws/Star Wars/Superman: The Movie world and it's still regarded today as the best film in the entire Star Wars saga. What many take away from the artistic success of The Empire Strikes Back is that it was solely the darker elements of the story that made it good. Thus, ya get a lot of summer blockbusters that tweak the color grading to harsher colors and toss in a lot of violence in order to become the next Empire Strikes Back. But that specific element is not what made that Irvin Kershner film so beloved. It was the fact that Empire Strikes Back dove deeper into its characters psyche, tested them, put them in new more morally complex situations that challenged them and the audience. Oh, and it was also well-made, full of fun action, Yoda was an incredible creation from his first line of dialogue onward, ya get the idea.
Tuesday, March 22, 2016
Five Underrated Disney Songs
It's hard to resist the various musical numbers found in a number of the 55 films in the Disney Animation canon, but in my book there's a couple of these tunes that could definitely stand to be more well-known. Thus, I've compiled a piece to examine five songs from classic Disney features that really do deserve more recognition for their accomplishments in numerous areas. For full disclosure, the only criteria to be eligible for this list is that the song had to be from the Disney Animation canon (which excludes films like Enchanted) and could not be nominated for a Best Original Song Oscar.
Now, let's get this started, shall we?
Now, let's get this started, shall we?
Sunday, March 20, 2016
Spider-Man Review
For 50 years, the thought had crept into the minds of everyone across the planet...what would a Spider-Man movie look like? For some, it was just a passing mental diversion, a notion that would fade as quickly as it came. For others, it was a concept that persisted in their cranium, imagining what the web-crawler would look like in the realm of live-action cinema. Considering how much of a grip Spider-Man had had on pop culture, it's understandable why such a proposal would have inhabited the imaginations of billions of individuals around the world. The comic book saga of meek Peter Parker gaining superhero abilities had emerged as one of the great modern-day fictional media creations.
Zootopia Is Number One Movie At The Box Office Three Weeks In A Row While Allegiant Falls And Midnight Special Hopping
A little movie called Zootopia continued to easily rule the box office with a hearty $38.9 million in its third weekend of release, a 24% decline from last weekend. That's a pretty spectacular number for a movie's third weekend, placing it as the seventh biggest third weekend of all-time, putting it ahead of the third-weekend haul of box office juggernauts like The Dark Knight Rises, Iron Man 3 and Avengers: Age of Ultron. Zootopia has now grossed $202.7 million domestically, and with no new family movies entering the marketplace for another 4 weeks, it ain't slowing down anytime soon.
Saturday, March 19, 2016
Catwoman Review (Classic Write-Up)
In many superhero origin movies, there's that moment where our protagonist decides to finally fight crime and fulfill their potential as a superhero. Remember when Peter Parker realized he could have stopped the mugger that murdered his Uncle? Or when Tony Stark realized the consequences of his actions of selling weapons? Or when Scott Lang was offered the chance to become a better man by the kindly Hank Pym? All emotionally resonant sequences that emphasize who our lead is and why they're going down the path of superheroics. Catwoman also has a scene like this. After giving herself a major makeover, our hero, Patience Phillips (Halle Berry), hops onto a motorcycle, speeds around her city and then stops at a jewelry store to gaze at a necklace that has caught her fancy.
Friday, March 18, 2016
Allegiant Shows Worrisome Shrinkage In Middling Thursday Night Numbers
The third entry in the Divergent saga, Allegiant, got started last night with only OK results, taking in $2.35 million, a sharp decline from the Thursday night grosses posted by its predecessors. Divergent grossed $4.9 million at these screenings two years ago while Insurgent made $4.1 million at Thursday night showings just last year. To put that into perspective, that means Allegiant made 52% less than Divergent and 42% less than Insurgent last night. Yikes. Due to its smaller Thursday night numbers, allegiant will likely be less front-loaded than its predecessors, though it'll be interesting to see if it can crack $30 million for the weekend. Either way, it's unlikely to take away the number one spot at the box office from Zootopia, which has been performing like gangbusters all week and brought its domestic haul to $163.8 million yesterday.
Thursday, March 17, 2016
The Brothers Grimsby Review
In the decade since the massive box office and critical success of Borat, Sacha Baron Cohen has struggled to replicate the affluence of that 2006 feature. He attempted to bring the mockumentary format back for Bruno in 2009 to far smaller success while his 2012 effort The Dictator went for a conventional narrative structure to no better results. His newest feature film, The Brothers Grimsby, is the first movie for Cohen to incorporate action and to not be directed by Larry Charles, instead going for Transporter 2 and Clash Of The Titans helmer Louie Leterrier. Unfortunately, Grimsby has also been a box office dud and, in my book at least, also fails to restore any luster to Cohen's lackluster post-Borat projects.
The End May Be Near, But The New X-Men: Apocalypse Trailer Is Already Here!
This summer, the X-Men face their greatest challenge yet...trying to get out of Deadpool's shadow. After the levity-driven Deadpool, will audiences gear up for a more somber X-Men adventure? I'd say probably (Days Of Future Past and First Class had plenty of light-hearted moments after all) but it is a good thing to keep in mind. Even after Deadpool's record-shattering box office, 20th Century Fox isn't adjusting the marketing of X-Men: Apocalypse to include more jokes or anything like that, instead continuing the more reserved tone of the teaser with this new trailer that you can watch below.
Wednesday, March 16, 2016
My Thoughts On The Screening Room Debacle
Sean Parker pretty much changed the face of the music industry with his 1999 company Napster. Today, the majority of people likely don't even know what the hell as "Napster" is, but it set a precedent for how people consume music that iTunes and other companies soon perfected and turned into a revolution. A revolution, mind you, that left many record companies up the creek without a paddle financially. Their entire business model had changed forever and there was noooo going back.
The Danish Girl Review
The best thing I can say about The Danish Girl is that the two main characters are in possession of a Jack Russell Terrier and that adorable doggie pops up frequently in the sequences taking place at their humble abode. I couldn't help but laugh at the dog's facial expressions which range from disinterested to distracted and such emotions amusingly contrast with the more stuffy activities occurring around the animal. Alas, the entire movie does not center around this cute canine and instead focuses its efforts on presenting on a laughably by-the-numbers take on real life figure Lili Ebe.
Tuesday, March 15, 2016
Seth Rogen Brings His R-Rated Shenanigans To Animation In The NSFW Red-Band Trailer For Sausage Party
American animation has been strictly in the family-friendly zone for decades now, with forays into more adult-skewing animated fare being limited to the works of Ralph Bashki and the South Park movie. If Sausage Party, a computer-animated film about grocery food (produced by Megan Ellison, the producer behind Her, Foxcatcher and Zero Dark Thirty), takes off, perhaps that'll change, especially given how my generation is fully accustomed to the concept of animation being not just for children thanks to the ubiquity of programs like Family Guy, South Park & Rick & Morty.
Monday, March 14, 2016
Knight Of Cups Review
Terrence Malick is a filmmaker whose boldness should be rightfully heralded as a wonderful thing. His audacity to challenge conventional forms of narrative storytelling is something that should be looked upon as something truly exceptional. Here is an artist looking to challenge both himself and the art form he calls home. Malick has my undying respect as a director and I can unequivocally say I'll always be looking forward to his features.
I just hope that future efforts from this man aren't as terrible as Knight Of Cups.
I just hope that future efforts from this man aren't as terrible as Knight Of Cups.
Sunday, March 13, 2016
What A Twist!: 10 Cloverfield Lane Spoiler Discussion
Welcome to a recurring feature entitled What A Twist! Here, I'll briefly discuss spoilery aspects of certain movies as well as provide a place for our awesome Solute readers to discuss spoilers in the comments section.
10 Cloverfield Lane Review
"Monsters Come In Many Forms", so says the poster for 10 Cloverfield Lane, a not so subtle nod to the film's spiritual predecessor Cloverfield. No Kaiju or even direct connections to that 2008 Matt Reeves production can be found here, but a foreboding atmosphere can be found in this new movie that's just as terrifying as any big city-destroying monster. The basic premise of 10 Cloverfield Lane emerges from one simple thought; what if you were trapped in a doomsday bunker with an untrustworthy and heretofore unknown individual?
Zootopia Roars Again At The Box Office, While 10 Cloverfield Lane Performs Solidly And The Brothers Grimsby Tanks
Zootopia continued to rule at the box office, dipping only 33% for the weekend for a $50 million haul in its second frame, taking its 10 day domestic total to a great $142.6 million. With no new major family movies entering the marketplace for a good long while, this likely won't be the last weekend for Zootopia to experience a solid weekend to weekend dip. To boot, the film is also killing it overseas, specifically in China, a country where American animation can sometimes flounder (Inside Out only grossed $15.3 million there last summer for instance).
Saturday, March 12, 2016
Zootopia Review
Some of the most loved rhetoric to describe gestating projects by Hollywood producers is "grounded" or "realistic", mainly as a way to give prospective moviegoers the idea that the film in question will be akin to box office hits like The Dark Knight. Typically though, the movies in question end up just diluting the color grading and making everything super gloomy in terms of tone instead of going for the rich characters and thrilling action that made The Dark Knight and other successful "grounded" and "realistic" motion pictures so unique.
Friday, March 11, 2016
Eddie The Eagle Review
Eddie The Eagle is a feature film adaptation of real life figure Eddie Edwards (here played by Taron Edgerton), whose life-long ambitions to participate in the Olympics seem to have a chance of coming true when he discovers the art of ski jumping. With more than a little help from former athlete Bronson Peary (Hugh Jackman), Eddie hopes to beat the odds and fulfill his sports-related dreams. Basically, what ya have here is the prime premise for a conventional inspirational sports drama, and Eddie The Eagle embraces the conventions of this subgenre with aplomb, flaunting its hokey tendencies the way Jeff Wells parades his own blatantly sexist attitude towards women.
Thursday, March 10, 2016
Cloverfield Review (Classic Write-Up)
It's almost become a tradition at this point for blockbusters to feature sequences involving large scale destruction, whether you're film made in the 70's (an era where star-studded disaster movies were all the rage) or modern day big-budget efforts involving Superman, Godzilla and Transformers. Nothing wrong with some big scale chaos utilizing crumbling cities, but some of these films seem to forget that there are people living in these areas where such showdowns occur. The domains where flashy climaxes occur become more of a pile of ash by the time the credits than a proper environment for human beings to live in
Charge Into Battle With The New Captain America: Civil War Trailer!
Howdy-do everyone! I've been quite busy today,went and finally saw Zootopia today (So good!) and grabbed a bite for lunch, so I haven't had a chance to pop up onto the interwebs. Anything big happen while I was out?
Wait...what??? Are you serious???
Oh my God, they're making a TV show out of the recurring Carpool Karaoke skit on James Cordens late night show? How's that gonna work as a recurring television program?
Oh, and there's a new Captain America trailer, that's also big.
Wait...what??? Are you serious???
Oh my God, they're making a TV show out of the recurring Carpool Karaoke skit on James Cordens late night show? How's that gonna work as a recurring television program?
Oh, and there's a new Captain America trailer, that's also big.
Tuesday, March 8, 2016
What Does The Future Hold For Ghostbusters?
This past Thursday, Sony/Columbia rolled out the debut trailer for their big summer 2016 tentpole feature, Ghostbusters. A reboot of the 1984 Ivan Reitman feature, the teaser debut to mostly positive reactions from publications like Forbes and Hitfix, though patrons on YouTube expressed displeasure with a massive amount of dislikes (its like-to-dislike ratio is worse than the trailers for God's Not Dead 2, Pixels and even the Point Break remake) and numerous introspective comments calling for the death of the four lead actors. In terms of analytics, Pro Box Office noted, when looking at its impact on social media websites and view count across multiple platforms four days into the trailers existence, that "as far as trailer impacts and splashes go, they really don't get much bigger than this."
J.K. Simmons Gets On Zack Snyder's Tempo, Will Play Commissioner Gordon In Justice League
After numerous false starts (one of which, back in 2007, even had George Miller onboard to direct!), a live-action Justice League movie is on the way from director Zack Snyder, with filming set to start on April 11, 2016. In terms of new characters in the film, there's no official word on who the bad guy of the production is, but some imagery from the Batman v. Superman promotional materials explicitly spells out the idea that Darkseid will factor heavily into the plot. But we do have word on another new character that'll be in the film, Commissioner Gordon, who will be played by J.K. Simmons in the film, and presumably will reprise the role in future DC Comics features like a solo Batman movie.
Monday, March 7, 2016
The Box Office Goes Wild For Record-Breaking Zootopia
It's clear who was the king of the box office jungle this weekend, as Zootopia easily had the biggest opening weekend for an animated movie in March and beat out the $67 million debut of Frozen to become the largest bow on record for a Walt Disney Animation Studios effort. Zootopia grossed $73.7 million this weekend at 3,870 locations, the second biggest opening weekend of 2016 thus far (only behind the $132.4 million bow of Deadpool) and the fourth largest ever for a March release. To boot, it's the third largest opening weekend for an original film (one not based on any pre-existing material), only behind Inside Out ($90.4 million) and Avatar ($77 million). Finally, it's already the ninth biggest movie ever for Jason Bateman in just three days, while it's the third biggest ever for Ginner Goodwin.
Saturday, March 5, 2016
6 Ways Terrence Malick Is Totally The Realest Filmmaker
This past weekend, a new movie from filmmaker Terrence Malick was released! Yaaaaaayyy!!! Time to celebrate!
In honor of that, I thought it was high time to look at 6 Ways Terrance Malick Is Totally The Realest Filmmaker!
In honor of that, I thought it was high time to look at 6 Ways Terrance Malick Is Totally The Realest Filmmaker!
Seven Samurai Review (Classic Write-Up)
It's a testament to the quality of the 1954 motion picture Seven Samurai that its influence has so permeated American pop culture that we're still feeling it 62 years later. The film has inspired countless feature films over the numerous decades, namely in how it was remade in America into the well-known MGM western The Magnificent Seven (which is receiving a Denzel Washington led remake this year). Even when one separates Seven Samurai from its massive presence in the spectrum of the worldwide pop culture scene, one can easily see why this movies stuck around for so long.
In this Akira Kurosawa film, a village of farmers is coming under attack from ruthless bandits and annihilation seems all but inevitable. A small group of the inhabitants of this residence go off in search of samurai warriors to defend their domain, even though they have no financial way to compensate them (they intend to tide the combatants over with rice and even that goes missing shortly into their journey). Their voyage soon takes them to a ronin named Kambei (Takashi Shimura), who agrees to both aid the villagers in their task and be a master/trainer to a young man named Katsushiro (Isao Kimura).
Over time, Kambei and Katsushiro help the band of villagers acquire the services of five other samurai, with one of the samurai being an individual named Kikuchiyo (Toshiro Mifune), a character who becomes the heart and soul of the entire motion picture. When he first enters the story, he appears as a bumbling drunk, seemingly having all of the combat skills of an inert hippopotamus. Afterwards, he follows the group of six samurai much to their derision and it becomes clear to the audience that Kikuchiyo will be more of a source of effective comedy than anything else in this feature film.
But here's where the true storytelling genius of Seven Samurai is exemplified, as Kikuchiyo soon proves to be far more than what he seems at first glance. Oh he provides plenty of yuks, especially in a sequence where his pride gets the better of him as he attempts to ride a horse. But his backstory is slowly but surely revealed to both the viewer and the other samurai, and it turns out he was an orphaned offspring of villagers just like the ones he's been tasked to protect. The script does a masterful job dispensing this background information in a succinct manner while Toshiro Mifune is similarly in top-notch form ensuring that the more comedic side of this character can co-exist organically with more nuanced aspects of his personality that come forth in the later sequences of Seven Samurai.
Kikuchiyo isn't the only character to garner exceptionally more depth as the story moves along, and that may be the secret to why Seven Samurai works so well. The driving force behind this story is that the titular group of warriors must help protect this group of ragtag villagers and various conflicts and interactions between the downtrodden residents and mercenaries isn't glossed over in a two minute montage. Craft is put into the sundry of character dynamics present in the story, with maybe my favorite being the rapport between Kikychiyo and a constantly sorrowful villager named Yohei (Bokuzen Hidari).
Folks, there's a reason Akira Kurosawa is considered a silver screen legend in the grand scheme of cinema as an artform, and Seven Samurai allows one to see his visual stylings at their apex. There are so many gorgeous shots and pieces of imagery to be found in this motion picture (I particularly like the image of three of the titular samurai walking by the graves of fallen warriors in the last scene of the movie) to keep the One.Perfect.Shot. Twitter feed going for all of eternity. On a similar note, there's also a reason why Seven Samurai continues to resonate as a prominent influence of art in the 21st century. When you make a film this well made and riveting, it's bound to stick around in the pop culture consciousness for awhile.
In this Akira Kurosawa film, a village of farmers is coming under attack from ruthless bandits and annihilation seems all but inevitable. A small group of the inhabitants of this residence go off in search of samurai warriors to defend their domain, even though they have no financial way to compensate them (they intend to tide the combatants over with rice and even that goes missing shortly into their journey). Their voyage soon takes them to a ronin named Kambei (Takashi Shimura), who agrees to both aid the villagers in their task and be a master/trainer to a young man named Katsushiro (Isao Kimura).
Over time, Kambei and Katsushiro help the band of villagers acquire the services of five other samurai, with one of the samurai being an individual named Kikuchiyo (Toshiro Mifune), a character who becomes the heart and soul of the entire motion picture. When he first enters the story, he appears as a bumbling drunk, seemingly having all of the combat skills of an inert hippopotamus. Afterwards, he follows the group of six samurai much to their derision and it becomes clear to the audience that Kikuchiyo will be more of a source of effective comedy than anything else in this feature film.
But here's where the true storytelling genius of Seven Samurai is exemplified, as Kikuchiyo soon proves to be far more than what he seems at first glance. Oh he provides plenty of yuks, especially in a sequence where his pride gets the better of him as he attempts to ride a horse. But his backstory is slowly but surely revealed to both the viewer and the other samurai, and it turns out he was an orphaned offspring of villagers just like the ones he's been tasked to protect. The script does a masterful job dispensing this background information in a succinct manner while Toshiro Mifune is similarly in top-notch form ensuring that the more comedic side of this character can co-exist organically with more nuanced aspects of his personality that come forth in the later sequences of Seven Samurai.
Kikuchiyo isn't the only character to garner exceptionally more depth as the story moves along, and that may be the secret to why Seven Samurai works so well. The driving force behind this story is that the titular group of warriors must help protect this group of ragtag villagers and various conflicts and interactions between the downtrodden residents and mercenaries isn't glossed over in a two minute montage. Craft is put into the sundry of character dynamics present in the story, with maybe my favorite being the rapport between Kikychiyo and a constantly sorrowful villager named Yohei (Bokuzen Hidari).
Folks, there's a reason Akira Kurosawa is considered a silver screen legend in the grand scheme of cinema as an artform, and Seven Samurai allows one to see his visual stylings at their apex. There are so many gorgeous shots and pieces of imagery to be found in this motion picture (I particularly like the image of three of the titular samurai walking by the graves of fallen warriors in the last scene of the movie) to keep the One.Perfect.Shot. Twitter feed going for all of eternity. On a similar note, there's also a reason why Seven Samurai continues to resonate as a prominent influence of art in the 21st century. When you make a film this well made and riveting, it's bound to stick around in the pop culture consciousness for awhile.
Friday, March 4, 2016
Sony Refuses To Learn From Their Recent Mistakes, Greenlights Solo Venom Movie
There was a time, dear reader, when the concept of a live-action Spider-Man movie was an enthralling one to prospective moviegoers. After two decades of trying to get a live-action film off the ground, the Sam Raimi Spider-Man busted box office records in 2002, gained critical acclaim and spawned a sequel that is still considered to be one of the superhero movies of all-time. Then the flawed Spider-Man 3 arrived, followed up the dark era where the two Amazing Spider-Man films arrived. These new features, created solely so Sony/Columbia could cling to the film rights to the character, got worse as they went along, and the cinematic shared universe (complete with Sinister Six, Venom and Aunt May spin-offs) it was supposed to spawn sounded like a nightmare waiting to happen.
Zootopia Begins To Roar With Sizable Thursday Night Grosses
Last nights Thursday night numbers are in for Zootopia (which I won't be seeing and reviewing until Tuesday), as well as London Has Fallen, though I'm still waiting on figures for the third new release of this weekend, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. Anywho, looks like Zootopia is about be a huge box office hit is its Thursday night grosses are anything to go by. It grossed $1.7 million last night, a major improvement on all comparable titles.
They Live Review (Classic Write-Up)
They Live seems like a B-side, if you will, to fellow 1980's sci-fi/action satire RoboCop. Both weave in heavy duty science-fiction elements (robots in RoboCop, aliens in They Live) while diving in head first into satirizing the massive amount of influence big businesses carried then (and, in many cases, still do). They Live doesn't find nearly as much success as an individual movie as RoboCop, but it's still a gonzo trip into an appropriately unsubtle caricature of our world.
Thursday, March 3, 2016
The Trailer For Paul Feig's Ghostbusters Is Here!!
Out of all of this years crop of summer blockbusters, few carry as many question marks as this years Ghostbusters reboot. Can Paul Feig graduate to the realm of summer blockbusters with all the success of Christopher Nolan, the perfunctoryness of Collin Trevorrow or the failure of Marc Webb? Will the new group of Busters (Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones) work well as a team? Will whiny Mens Rights Activists ever shut up about the film "ruining" their childhoods? A trailer for the project has arrived today to answer give us a glimpse into the film that may answerr those questions and more.
Wednesday, March 2, 2016
A New Finding Dory Trailer Has A Certain Memory Challenged Fish Searching For Her Family
PIXAR has a deluge of sequels to their classic films on the way in the next few years, with the next three years bringing (in order of release) Cars 3, Toy Story 4 and The Incredibles 2. Before all of those films, 2016 will deliver Finding Dory, a follow-up to one of the studios biggest features, Finding Nemo. This time, as the title makes clear, the focus has shifted to scene-stealer Dory (Ellen Degeneres) and her own adventure. A new trailer for the movie has been released today, and you can watch it below.
Over A Decade Before Zootopia, Disney Animation Tried To A Create A World Of Animals In Chicken Little
Ah, Chicken Little. As a proud Disney Animation aficionado, I can honestly say that, in the spectrum of the studios 54 (soon to be 55 with the release of this Friday's motion picture Zootopia) movies, Chicken Little easily ranks near the bottom in terms of quality. Since it's November 2005 release, the movie has basically vanished from the face of the Earth, scrubbed from Disney merchandising and swept under the rug. You won't find the likes of Runt Of The Litter as a Disney Infinity figure, and even its online fanbase is basically nonexistent. While the likes of far less financially successful films like Treasure Planet and The Emperor's New Groove continue to find fans, Chicken Little has been sent out to pasture, so to speak.
Tuesday, March 1, 2016
Idris Elba And Matthew McConaughey Set To Star In The Dark Tower Movie
There are movies that spend so long in development hell, one can be forgiven for being more than a tad dubious that such films would ever actually reach the silver screen. Some (like box office smashes Deadpool and Avatar) do eventually get made, while the likes of Hellboy 3 and The Goon are longtime residents of Development Hell, as is The Dark Tower, a feature film adaptation of Stephen King's critically acclaimed novel. Ambitious plans for this film have existed for years now, with various actors, directors and studios circling the project before failing to get it off the ground.
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