Film School Rejects » The Good The Bad The Ugly

The Good the Bad and the Ugly – May 4

Nathan Deen — Mon, 05 May 2008 00:58:11 +0000

The Good

Iron Man (In Theaters): Unlike Spider-man 3 last year, the summer movie season started with a global shockwave of fanboy and critical acclaim. We were all pumped for this one, but honestly, if someone told you that Iron Man would be the best reviewed movie of the year on RottenTomatoes before the movie was released, you probably would have told them they were off their rocket. Oh, and it also grossed $100 million on opening weekend. Jon Favreau has hit it big with this one.

New Trailers From Iron Man Screening: Of course, the most important responsibility for the summer igniter, besides entertaining the hell out of us, is to get us ready for what the rest of the season has in store for us. The sneak preview I went to featured a smorgasbord of The Dark Knight, Indiana Jones, and The Hulk and I thought all of them, with the exception of one rotten egg mentioned at the bottom, were fantastic.

The Band’s Visit (In select theaters): This is a tie with Iron Man for my film pick of the week and you should see my review here. It’s a light and honest film with an excellent script by newcomer Eran Kolirin and one of my favorite’s of the year so far.

The Golden Compass and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (On DVD): Anyone with a predilection for fantasy films should find themselves right at home here with the visually stunning The Golden Compass. It’s not quite Harry Potter, but it’s still pretty good. But if you want to see something really fascinating, go rent The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, which ended up being my favorite film of 2007 and that’s in a year that gave us No Country For Old Men, Jesse James, Once, American Gangster, and Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead. Plain and simple, this is one of the uber-masterpieces of the decade. Period.

Ian McKellen to play Gandalf in The Hobbit: Thank goodness for this, it just wouldn’t have been the same without him. I’m glad Guillermo Del Toro is getting as many original cast members as possible back together.

The Bad

The Lovely Bones: Speaking of hobbits, Peter Jackson is having a lot of trouble with his first feature film since King Kong. There has been reports of dissension among the cast and crew. Two cast members, including Ryan Gosling have even dropped out. And now the release date has been pushed back. Sounds like a nightmare.

Miley Cyrus: I feel sorry for any young teenage girl who has to deal with celebrity status and is expected to be a perfect role model. I’m not saying I approve or disapprove of her recent photo shoot with Vanity Fair, in which her bare back was shown. I’m saying that it’s no big deal. It’s not like she dressed up like Marylin Monroe and posed nude. It’s not like she was arrested for a DUI. She doesn’t even have a fucking drivers license yet and we’re already assuming she’ll be the next Lindsay Lohan. People need to calm the fuck down and stop rushing to hasty conclusions. And it doesn’t help that the media watches her like a hawk and is ready to make a huge deal out everything she does.

The Ugly

Speed Racer Early Buzz: Now, I’m a big supporter of the Wachowski’s. The Matrix is one of my favorite sci-fi films and I also dug V For Vendetta. I had been looking forward to this until the early buzz came out. And that buzz definitely meets the criteria of the word ugly. The average user rating on IMDb so far is a 5.4. Not good, not good at all.

New Trailer From Iron Man Screening-The Love Guru: Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a Mike Myers hater. I do love me some Austin Powers but the man can also make dreck like The Cat in the Hat. I have a feeling that The Love Guru is going to end up like the latter. Why, do you ask? For one, the trailer makes the film look absolutley horrendous. There’s not one laugh to be found. Not one! If that’s not enough, then the fact that Jessica Alba is in it should convince you. Bad movies tend to follow her around like a shadow.

The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly – April 27

Nathan Deen — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 01:55:41 +0000

The Good

Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay (In Theaters): With a sequel that’s even better than the original, Kal Penn and John Cho have officially become the best comic duo working today. I thought this thing was hysterical from start to finish. With a broad range of racial, political and sexual humor, no one is safe in Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay. I don’t think I’ve laughed as hard as I did since 2005’s The 40-Year Old Virgin.

The Orphanage, The Savages, Charlie Wilson’s War and Cloverfield (On DVD): It was another solid week for DVD releases. If you’re a horror fan, then this week’s releases are definitely for you. The Orphanage is one of the best ghost stories in a long, long time and Cloverfield is one of the best monster movies in a long, long time. If you’re looking for a comedy, then your covered as well. The Savages is a smart film about the bond between siblings and Charlie Wilson’s War is a sharp political satire.

Guillermo Del Toro confirmed for The Hobbit: It’ll be interesting to see how the visionary director of Pan’s Labyrinth is able to fill the shoes of THE director of the decade in Peter Jackson. Personally, I don’t think there’s a more creative mind out there today than Del Toro’s.

Wesley Snipes sentenced to three years in prison: Everyone breath a sigh of relief, we are officially immune from Wesley Snipe direct to DVD action films until at least 2011 and hopefully for good. Can you think of another actor in the last ten years that completely threw his career away like Snipes did?Even Cuba Gooding Jr. would say WTF? Not that he was that talented to begin with but he was good enough to play in mainstream films like U.S. Marshalls. He shouldn’t be thought of as the black Steven Segal for sure.

Summer movie season is almost here: Well, for me it kicked off this past weekend with the hilarious Harold and Kumar, but that’s just kid’s stuff compared to what the glorious month of May has instore for us. Iron Man, Speed Racer, Prince Caspian, and Indiana Jones! Let’s just hope that this year at least one of these movies will live up to the hype where as Spidey, Shrek and Pirates all failed to do so last year.

The Bad

Deception: Ouch, thrillers go 0-2 on back-to-back weeks. Surprisingly, each of them had a pretty good cast with Ewan McGregor, Hugh Jackman, and Michelle Williams in this flop and Al Pacino in 88 Minutes. This thing really tanked at the box office too. $2.2 million, yikes!

Trailer for College: It’s supposed to be Superbad meet Animal House, but the movie looks about as lame as its title. Seriously, that’s all they came up with for the title? That’s a pretty good sign of half-assed laziness right there, so don’t expect the film to be much more.

The Ugly

One Missed Call on DVD: One of the ugliest DVD’s covers I’ve ever seen and according to just about everyone who has seen it, one of the worst movies ever made. A zero percent rating at RT and a 2.3 user rating on IMDb. Yeah, no question about what category this belongs under.

The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly – April 20th

Nathan Deen — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 17:56:24 +0000

The Good

Forgetting Sarah Marshall (In Theaters): If you’re looking for a date movie or a movie where you can laugh consistently, then look no further than my film pick of the week. This is a totally solid comedy, the latest from the Apatow group, and you’ll have the pleasure in discovering some new talents with its fantastic cast that includes writer Jason Segel, Kristen Bell, Mila Kunis and Russell Brand.

Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead, Juno and Lars and the Real Girl (DVD): What an awesome week it was for DVD releases. If you’re looking for a thriller, then check out the film that blew me away and landed a solid spot on my Top 10 list last year (which I revised many times but this film was on it every time). If you’re in the mood for a comedy, then you really can’t go wrong with either Juno or Lars as they rank among the best comedies of the last two or three years. All films feature absolute dynamite performances. You can see two premiere actors in Phillip Seymour-Hoffman and Ethan Hawke at the pinnacle of their games, or you can fall in love with the performances of Ellen Page as Juno or Ryan Gosling as Lars. Hell, the best thing you can do is just rent all three of them.

Iron Man Gets Good Early Reviews: As if the buzz around this movie wasn’t loud enough, what with the awesome ass-kicking trailers and what not, now we’re hearing that the movie is actually good. With the speculation around Indiana Jones and the jury still out on Speed Racer, it looks like Iron Man is going to be the film that sets the tone for the summer.

The Bad

Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker want to reunite: Whether or not we should be thankful that it is NOT for a Rush Hour sequel has yet to be determined. But we’re probably screwed no matter what. You know that some hack director is going to be involved and the acting is going to be atrocious.

The Incredible Shrinking Man remake: Apparently, Universal wants to remake the 1957 sci-fi film The Incredible Shrinking Man. I haven’t seen the original but I can tell you right now that it will be infinitely better. If you thought Chan and Tucker were a formula for disaster, then get a load of some of the names attached to this turkey: Eddie Murphy (to star), Brett Ratner (to possibly direct) and Reno 911! cast members Thomas Lennon and Ben Garant (to scribe). This is like one of those Spider-man issues where Spidey has to fight off Green Goblin, Doc Ock, and all of the other major villains at once. And if Spidey symbolizes us, then we have found ourselves in a whole world of shit.

Val Kimer, 50 Cent and Sharon Stone to play in Katrina movie: Okay, not only does the cast raise a question mark, but how about the title. Streets of Blood? What we’re they thinking? How is a Katrina survivor going to respond to that? This movie may end up being as much of a disaster as the hurricane itself.

The Ugly

Al Pacino in 88 Minutes: I haven’t seen the movie myself, but I think it’s safe to take the word of the 5% rating at Rottentomatoes and jump to the conclusion that it is a giant bag of douche. 5%! That number is almost shocking. I mean this movie is going to go down as one of the worst reviewed movies ever at RT. I smell a razzie in the near future for Pacino. You really hate to see this happen to great actors.

Earl Dittman raves over 88 Minutes: In the war against the “critic whores” we won a great victory after Pete Hammond was removed from his post at Maxim. But there are others like him that are still out there people, preying on all the innocent people who don’t follow movies online and who have never heard of RT. Dittman (Wireless Magazine) is one of the worst. He gave 88 minutes four stars and called Pacino electrifying. He’s an insult to individuals such as myself who actually take film criticism seriously and try to provide unique insight about movies. Not only that, he gets paid for it. Life’s a bitch sometimes isn’t it?

The poster for the upcoming Eddie Murphy movie Meet Dave: I saw it for the first time on Friday at my local theater, and I just wanted to punch it. If you haven’t seen it, it features Murphy with a big bright smile. That’s why I wanted to punch it. Now until July, everytime I walk into the theater, I have to look at that stupid fucking smile. Then I looked on IMDb to see what it was about. Brian fucking Robbins is directing? After Norbit last year, these two assholes are teaming up again? Why is it that Uwe Boll gets all of the attention. There are other filmmakers that are equally as bad. Robbins is one of them. And if you put him together with Murphy, you basically have the Antichrist.

Film School Rejects » The Good The Bad The Ugly

The Good the Bad and the Ugly – May 4

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