Glorious, Inglorious Bastards!

Just got back from Inglorious Bastards, Tarantino's latest classic.

The guy is the master. He's a big music fan, so, I love his use of music in film. The movie also stars my favorite actor, Brad Pitt. He plays this Sgt. Slaughter lookin' guy from Tennessee who's in the Nazi killin' business and, as his character says, "business is a-boomin'". It can be best described as a Nazi Revenge Fantasy Film. And, boy, is it wild. You'll be on the edge of your seat for most of it, because you know its about to go down, but you never know when.

Well worth the price of admission.

So much so, I'm going to pay to see it again. A personal honor I bestow on very few films.

Peep it.

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From the looks of it, this movie will be a watershed moment in the history of cinema.

Truly stunning stuff.

You heard it here first...

District 9

I haven't been excited to see too many films this year. That all changed when I read this article. A taste:

This week’s Entertainment Weekly names District 9, a sci-fi thriller with no big stars and a small budget, the must-see movie of the summer. While those who missed last month’s Comic-Con probably have yet to hear of it, by next week it may be all moviegoers are talking about.

Made for only $30 million by a 29-year-old South African-born director, Neill Blomkamp, the action-packed movie is tinged with a surprising moral intelligence — it’s also an allegory about apartheid — and may become the most unlikely sci-fi blockbuster of the season. Says District 9’s single A-list name, producer Peter Jackson (Lord of the Rings), “In an industry that’s looking to make movies out of every obscure TV show, District 9 is unlike anything you’ve ever seen.”

Coming soon to a screen near you...

IN THE LOOP Trailer Premiere Starring James Gandolfini - watch more funny videos

Looks kind of quirky, but the great ones walk that fine line without crossing over. May be worth a gander...

The Next One....

All those who grew up in the 80s, stand up and be counted:

Get Excited

Its time:

Slumdog Becomes King

In case you missed it, Slumdog Millionaire swept the Oscars last night. I was so happy to see the Indian culture lifted up in such a public way. It has been a long held belief of mine that Americans aren't exposed to other cultures enough. Congrats to The-Little-Movie-That-Could.

I told you it was good.

Watchmen, Ctd.

Counting down to March 6th, EW does another cover story on the first must-see movie of the spring.

I'm excited to see how they adapt that crazy story to the screen. I don't promote lousy movies. Go see it.

Don't Bet Against Him

My man Nate Silver of fivethirtyeight.com fame has put his unmatched predicting reputation on the line and is forecasting this Sundays Oscars. If you saw his projections for the election (he had Obama smashing McCain in June) then you know not to take this lightly.

A sample:

Lead Actor
Mickey Rourke.........................71.1%
Sean Penn.................................19.0%
Brad Pitt.....................................5.9%
Frank Langella..........................3.4%
Richard Jenkins........................0.5%

Sean Penn and Mickey Rourke have split the two awards that traditionally predict success in this category, with Penn winning Screen Actors Guild and Rourke the Golden Globe. But Rourke has an additional advantage: If an actor, like Penn, has been nominated several times without nabbing a statue, his odds of winning increase. Once he does win, odds go way down. Penn won Best Actor five years ago for Mystic River.

A Real American Hero

If you grew up in the 80s, seeing this will really excite you:



Getting the hype in early, aren't they?

Watchmen, Ctd.

OK, so, I just finished reading the Watchmen book. Well, its a "Graphic Novel", but your mom would call it a comic book. But whatever you want to call it, it was wild. Its going to be very interesting to see the screen adaptation (My preview here.).

I can understand, now, why the big fans of the book considered its story impossible to put on the screen. So, I hope it is done justice.

You guys will dig it.

Watchmen

By now you've certainly seen the trailers for Watchmen. I've got to say, I'm pretty excited about this one. Before I saw any trailers for I read about in in EW. The concept is very interesting: Its the superhero tale told in a cultural context. All of them are generally told in a fake universe. In this one Nixon is president and we're still at odds with the Russians. I bought a copy of the novel since its considered the standard for great graphic novel writing, I figured it might be worth a look. Time named it to their "100 great novels of all time" list.

The story explores the question:''What if superheroes really existed? How would they really think? And how would they really affect the world?'' according to one of the creators.

Check it out.

I Won't Steer You Wrong

I have advocated two movies on this blog, Slumdog Millionare and The Wrestler. Last night at the Golden Globes Slumdog won best drama and Mickey Rourke won best actor. I figure that puts my batting average pretty high, no?

Slumdog Millionare Review

I encouraged you to go see Slumdog Millionare and I finally took my own advice this Saturday, and I was glad I did.

I don't really feel qualified to write movie reviews, but I figure I can at least let you know how it hit me. You can do with that what you will:

My first reaction was "Whoa! They took you right into the nasty underbelly of India and didn't sugar coat it". They set up cameras in places that must have been nightmares to get to. There were scenes in the move where the main character is being shown as a child, no more than 5, sleeping in a garbage dump. Flies and all. They're not showing you this to win sympathy or to demonize any particular group, its just presented as life for these people, like they were sitting in front of a TV or something. I appreciated that.

I was also struck by the beauty of the people. Its a culture that, as an American, I don't get to see much of. I loved how the actors were young talented and beautiful, and I had never seen any of them before. It helped me remember that the world is a lot bigger than my drive to work.

The story wasn't particularly clever, although it was a different way to have an excuse to tell a story, so I guess it was effective. I never found myself wandering, it kept me curious the whole time.

All in all, a great 2 hours of entertainment. Its different enough from your typical movie that you may even feel like you grew in some small way for having seen it.

Bush, Ctd.

Scott McClellan, a former White House Press Secretary under George W. Bush and author of the No. 1 New York Times best-seller "What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception", has written a review of Oliver Stone's depiction of Bush and his Presidency. I found it interesting since he was actually there for a lot of the events in the film. Scott had been with Bush since Texas. I expected him to dump on a lot of it as I would expect from anyone who watches a Hollywood depiction of anything they know a lot about. But he wasn't too hard on the film and gave it what I thought was a pretty fair viewing, all things considered.

You can relive my brief review here.

Valkyrie

I went to go see Valkyrie on Friday with my family with reluctance. I had read a few reviews that had removed any desire I had to see it, so, I went in with rock-bottom expectations. That being said, I really enjoyed the film. It being a true story immediately gave it added weight and a seriousness not present in most movies. I wasn't familiar with the story, so, I learned a lot and was entertained.

The main thing I walked away from the movie with was a sense that I had seen what true patriotism is all about. Patriotism isn't about chanting at a ball game or about agreeing with every decision made by your government, but about doing whats right for the country. Especially when the government is unwilling to.

The movie is about Nazis in Hitler's army who didn't agree with what he was doing and their attempt to take him out. They don't succeed, obviously, but it was a powerful testament to what a few men of good will can accomplish.

Looking at the movie through the prism of our current government was the next logical step. When we look back on the last eight years of US history we'll find a preemptive war against an imaginary foe, the greatest economic collapse in a generation, the worst terror attack ever on our soil, torture sanctioned by the highest levels of our govenment, and God knows what else. The men in the Valkyrie story frequently say "We don't want Germany to go into the history books as Hitler's Germany. We were not all like him." I ask myself sometimes, what have we allowed the United States to become? I hope we have some patriots left...

Slumdog Millionare

I hadn't planned on watching this movie, but everywhere I look it keeps popping up as one of the best films of the year and I'm beginning to wonder if I'm passing on a good thing. It looked to me, at first, as another sappy love story, but it appears to be much more than that. I suggest you give it your attention.



Roger Ebert:

The film uses dazzling cinematography, breathless editing, driving music and headlong momentum to explode with narrative force, stirring in a romance at the same time. For Danny Boyle, it is a personal triumph. He combines the suspense of a game show with the vision and energy of "City of God" and never stops sprinting.

I can invest in something like that. You?

Wolverine

When I first heard about this movie, I wasn't too excited. I was a big X-men fan as a kid, but Wolverine wasn't one of my favorites.

Looks like I may have been way off base:



And, yes, that was Will-I-Am you saw...

(Hat Tip: Adrian L.)

2012

I'm a sucker for doomsday movies:

2012 - Teaser HD [VO]
by Lyricis

Terminator: Salvation

It won't be the same without Arnold. But I guess Batman is an acceptable fill in: