Congrats to Lena and Menolly for their 25s this week.

Release date:  9/7/2001

Warner Bros.

Directed by

• Stephen Herek

Produced by

• Robert Lawrence
• Toby Jaffe
• George Clooney (executive)
• Mike Ockrent (executive)
• Steven Reuther (executive)

Written by

• John Stockwell

Cast

Mark Wahlberg

• Chris “Izzy” Cole

Jennifer Aniston

• Emily Poule

Dominic West

• Kirk Cuddy

Initial comments by the hosts:

Darrell points out that this movie was inspired by what happened with Judas Priest when they replaced lead singer Rob Halford with Tim “Ripper” Owens (who had been in a Judas Priest and Pink Floyd tribute band.)

The consensus from all three hosts was that the movie was… okay… filtered, lackluster, problematic in how the story was told.  The basis of the story was less about realizing your dream than it was in living someone else’s fantasy.

David wasn’t thrilled with Jennifer Aniston’s performance, but Darrell and Tony both thought she wasn’t all that bad.  Their complaint was in how the character was written.  Emily (Aniston) seemed completely oblivious to the “rock star” life and her reactions to hers and Izzy’s life were very unrealistic.  The movie seemed to be pandering to much less of a rock ‘n roll audience than a mainstream audience.

Tony listened to the commentary track after watching the movie and stated that some of the most interesting parts of the movie seemed to have been cut out, including one scene in which Emily’s character had taken drugs with some of the other rock wives and girlfriends.  The movie appeared to be designed to make Izzy’s character sympathetic so that the audience would approve of Izzy and Emily getting back together at the end.

Their biggest complaint was not in the acting or the actors, but in the editing, writing, deleted scenes.  Tony would have liked to have seen Izzy’s character be a bit darker, which would have fit more into the story.  They all thought Aniston was miscast in this role.  She was still doing Friends at the time and they thought that having Aniston portray any type of unpleasant character might not have gone over well with fans of Friends.

One of the other issues the hosts brought up was that in Izzy’s life, there was no conflict; he liked his day job, he loved his music and his family and friends were supportive of what he did.  Even when Emily broke up with him, there was no conflict!  The only time Izzy faced any kind of opposition was when he brought some of his own music to Steel Dragon and they dismissed him.  This is what ultimately caused Izzy to leave Steel Dragon (in the same way he joined Steel Dragon).

Many of the musicians in the movie are actual musicians:

Mark Wahlberg – Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch

Jason Bonham (Steel Dragon drummer) –Bonham, and he is the son of John Bonham (Led Zeppelin)

Jeff Pilson (Steel Dragon bassist) – Dokken

Zakk Wylde (Steel Dragon guitarist) – Black Label Society, and he played with Ozzy Osborne

Blas Elias (Blood Pollution drummer) – Slaughter

Brian Vander Ark (Blood Pollution bassist) – The Verve Pipe

Nick Catanese (Blood Pollution guitarist) – Black Label Society

Stephan Jenkins (Black Babylon singer) – Third Eye Blind

Your Producers for this episode were:

• Tony
• Darrell
• David

This episode was recorded: 4/25/2012

Jonathan and Andrew and Scott and William:

1. The Avengers
2. Dark Shadows
3. Think Like a Man
4. The Hunger Games
5. Pirates!

Tony:

1. The Avengers
2. Dark Shadows
3. Think Like a Man
4. Pirates!
5. The Hunger Games

Lena:

1. The Avengers
2. Dark Shadows
3. Think Like a Man
4. The Hunger Games
5. The Lucky One

There are no other wide releases this week.

Thanks to Tad for the voice mail this week.

Release date:  11/9/1998

Miramax Films

Directed by

• Todd Haynes

Produced by

• Christine Vachon
• Michael Stipe
• Bob Weinstein
• Harvey Weinstein

Written by

• Todd Haynes
• James K. Lyons

Cast

Ewan McGregor

• Curt Wild

Jonathan Rhys Meyers

• Brian Slade

Christian Bale

• Arthur Stuart

Toni Collette

• Mandy Slade

Eddie Izzard

• Jerry Devine

Initial comments by the hosts:

Darrell isn’t a big fan of “flash-back” story telling but he liked this movie and thought it offered a nice little history of glam rock.  Jill loved it, thought it had a lot of layers but didn’t see it as a historical piece.  She looked at it not to look back at history but to look forward to where we are now.  David thought he would hate it, but he really enjoyed it because it wasn’t about the music itself, it was about the human interaction.  Tony liked all the pieces of the movie but wasn’t blown away by it as a whole.  He thought that acting, the music and the visuals were great.  Jill, being a big David Bowie fan, said she constantly finds new references every time she goes back to watch this movie again.

The hosts get into an interesting discussion regarding whether culture today embraces the different musicians/styles/visuals the way that Britain did in the early 1970s, and specifically whether America did versus the way Britain adapted to that style.  They also agreed that the movie is more about Arthur’s (Christian Bale) character than either of the musicians.

Jill liked how the music was used to push the narrative along with abstract music video pieces, performance pieces and soundtrack pieces.  It was also impressive that both Ewan McGregor and Jonathan Rhys Meyers both sang for this movie.

Tony brought up that he found the story line very similar to Eddie & The Cruisers in that the lead character faked his death and a reporter tries to figure out what really happened, but the similarity pretty much ends there.  The story itself is more about the reporter trying to figure out who he is, his experiences, and how he related to that movement.

David appreciated that this movie tackled relationships not in a childish way, which he tends to see in music-themed movies, but in a more realistic way that shows relationships as “complicated, messy, and broken.”

It was agreed that all of the acting was outstanding, with extra kudos to Eddie Izzard for stealing every scene he was in.

David brought up the question of whether music played an integral part in your development as a person.  Jill emphatically said “yes” and followed it up by saying that this movie is an indictment of the United States in that the cultural references die away in this country, more so than others.  David stated that, which he has specific memories tied to some music, he doesn’t have any emotional connections to music.  Jill found that this movie resonated with her in that you can be an “alien” and find a world of other aliens/alienated people, through music.  David would have been perfectly fine if this movie had removed the soundtrack because the human narrative spoke more to him than the music did.

The parallel of podcasting is brought up, and both Tony and David talk about how podcasting (though not necessarily in the genre of movie reviews) is an essential part of their lives at this point.  The friendships that have been gained over the years through this shared forum are often closer and/or stronger than friendships gained through childhood.

It was brought up that there were a lot of critical complaints about this movie that there was no real completion to the story lines.  The hosts disagreed with those complaints; arguing that there were, in fact, completed story lines (What happened to Brian Slade?) and also arguing that there didn’t need to be a completion regarding Arthur Stuart’s character.  You don’t know what will happen next with him, you just know that he will move on, move forward, and he’ll be fine.

Jill asked about the similarities between this movie and last week’s movie, Almost Famous.  Tony correlated Russell Hammond and Stillwater to Curt Wild.  One is about being the musician that they want to be and the other is about striving to be an iconic figure/performer that the fans will adore.  Jeff Bebe (Jason Lee, Almost Famous) is the one who wants to be an icon, while Hammond just wants to play his music.

A few trivia bits and pieces:

Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Ewan McGregor sang their own songs, but a few of Rhys Meyers’ songs were overdubbed by Thom Yorke (Radiohead).

A great deal of the dialogue stems from the writings of Oscar Wilde.

The name of Brian Slade’s persona, “Maxwell Demon,” and his band, “The Venus In Furs”, are references to two of glam rock’s biggest artists: Maxwell Demon was the name of a band in which Brian Eno performed in England in the 1960s, and “Venus In Furs” is a Lou Reed and The Velvet Underground song.  Both artists are on this film’s soundtrack.

Curt Wild’s character is largely inspired by David Bowie’s relationships with Iggy Pop and Lou Reed.  Iggy Pop hailed from Michigan and, for a time, had long blond locks, while Reed was forced to undergo shock therapy for bisexuality as a teen and was also rumored to have had an affair with Bowie before their later falling out.

When Brian first sees Mandy, he asks “Do you jive?” This is what David Bowie reportedly said when he first saw his future first wife, Angela Bowie.

During the scene where we’re first introduced to Curt Wild’s character, during the Festival scene, Ewan McGregor was only supposed to moon the audience.  He had been so inspired by Iggy Pop that he improvised and dropped his pants to his ankles and began to jump around the stage.

Your Producers for this episode were:

• Tony
• Darrell
• Jill
• David

This episode was recorded: 4/11/2012

That’s the simple premise to The Avengers, the newest movie from Marvel Entertainment and the culmination of an ambitious undertaking by the studio since the first Iron Man movie. Nothing like this has really been done before theatrically (in America anyway, I suppose you could say Japan did this years ago with their giant monster films) and it truly is ambitious. You start movies featuring individual characters like Iron Man, The Hulk, Thor and Captain America, all with connective tissue between them, yet still standing alone as thoroughly satisfying films. Then you build to a point where the logical thing to do is to bring all of these characters together in one film for one big adventure. And it’s one hell of an adventure…

Joss Whedon is the director and one of the writers behind the movie, and he’s truly the right man for the job. Thanks to his past television work (and theatrical work as well- projects like Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, Dollhouse and the films like Serenity and his scripts for things like Alien: Ressurection, and even the first Toy Story amongst others), Whedon has proven himself to be adept at bringing together disparate characters and making them work in true ensemble pieces. Last week, I was certainly critical of his work with director Drew Goddard on The Cabin in the Woods and I wasn’t exactly that thrilled with Buffy The Vampire Slayer from season five on, but for the most part, I consider myself a fan of his work, and with The Avengers he’s hit a big home run.

The Avengers of course has all of the prerequisite big action and effects that you expect from a movie like this, but most importantly, it never loses sight of it’s characters within that framework. The “voices” for each of the characters are true to what you’ve seen in the prior individual movies and yet Whedon makes them all come together seamlessly and with some truly interesting play. Some real standout character moments for me in the film include the following; scenes between Tony Stark and Bruce Banner as they’re working out the scientific solution to their problem, another scene between Stark and Steve Rogers (Captain America) that tests Stark’s true motivations and if he truly does have the selfless intent to be a hero, and a nice moment between the Black Widow and Hawkeye after Hawkeye’s recovery from being used as a pawn for Loki. It doesn’t just stop there either; S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Phil Coulson is given some terrific depth that’s only been hinted at in the prior films and he’s made Loki into a truly malevolent menace, something which I think was little lacking in the Thor film.

And then there’s the technical side of things. The film just looks fantastic with plenty of terrific set pieces, fantastic visual effects and some really well-choreographed action scenes. One of my favorite moments in the film (and believe me there are plenty) occurs in the third act of the film and the battle with Loki and the aliens in the heart of New York City. This scene is a continuous action piece that shows all of the Avengers in individual action but also going even further with having them teaming with each other as well. How can you not get a thrill when you see Iron Man blasting his repulsor rays off of Captain America’s shield to take out some aliens, or seeing Thor and The Hulk fighting side-by-side high atop a giant alien beast? This is just fantastic stuff.

Whedon’s certainly got a first rate cast, no doubt about it. Everyone has returned from the other films with the one notable exception being Edward Norton from the Hulk movie. Norton’s been replaced by actor Mark Ruffalo, but I’ll get into that even further in a moment. Robert Downey Jr. Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner along with Ruffalo make up the core team and they’re all fantastic, with the standouts for me being both Ruffalo and Evans. The thing that I really admire about what Evans does here (and in the Captain America movie) is his stoic quality and being your literal “old-fashioned” hero who does the right thing without question. Evans looks great in the costume and to me anyway just commands the scenes when he’s in them. As far as The Hulk and Bruce Banner are concerned, well if I had my druthers, I would’ve rather have had Edward Norton here to maintain the continuity, but with that said, Mark Ruffalo does a truly fantastic job as the character. So even with my preference, I don’t want to slight anything that Ruffalo does here at all, and further between his performance and the script’s treatment of the character, I’ve got nothing but praise. There was a very thoughtful direction that The Hulk was being taken in in his own movie, that to me was logically and just as thoughtfully extrapolated on for this film. And of course, thanks to the abovementioned terrific visual effects, The Hulk himself looks more like Ruffalo which further adds to the terrific character quality. Those are my own personal standouts, but really the entire main cast is exceptional.

It doesn’t stop there; Samuel L. Jackson, Clark Gregg, Gwyneth Paltrow, Stellan Skarsgård, and Tom Hiddleston also return from the previous films and the standouts for me here are Gregg and Hiddleston. Clark Gregg has played Agent Coulson in all of the previous films and as I said above, he gets a lot more depth here as well as a turn that I was genuinely sorry to see happen to the character. When I reviewed Thor one of my criticisms there was that I thought Tom Hiddleston was wrong to play Loki, but after this, well I’m eating those words and just thought his game was stepped up considerably here. Hiddleston has real fire here and is, to me, just as commanding a presence as Chris Evans. The newest addition to the cast is Cobie Smulders as Nick Fury’s second-in-command, Maria Hill, a relatively newer character in the Marvel Universe. She doesn’t quite get as much to do as the others, but still she’s good and a good addition. Back in the day, when Whedon was connected with the Wonder Woman movie, Whedon was supposedly eyeing Smulders for the part. I really didn’t see that quality in her before, but thanks to this movie, I can plainly see what Whedon saw in her for that role.

It still doesn’t stop. For the comic fan (and I have to admit, I haven’t read a current Marvel book in the last 3+ years- sorry, it just started to fall off for me with their Civil War magnum opus and I left entirely after Secret Invasion), there’s loads of little easter eggs throughout (I was pleasantly surprised to see Project Pegasus in this as a for instance) that even lapsed fans like myself will catch. The Avengers certainly is a movie for the die-hard comic book fan, but it’s not limited to that. If your only appeal to these characters has been just what you’ve seen in the movies, well you may not appreciate it in the same way, but you should still have a grand time with this.

Of course, there are nits that can be picked, little (or large) things that we fans wish had been done here, but considering the huge quality of the overall film and the terrific performances of this exceptional ensemble cast, it would in fact be nit-picking. if we’ve learned anything over the last few years with all of the various comic book movies that have been made, it’s that anything is now possible as far as the type of material that can be brought to the screen. The Avengers reinforces that in a big way and further opens up even more possibilities. The Avengers might be the culmination of other films, but it’s also a brand new starting point and honestly I cannot wait to see what Marvel does next.

As if you couldn’t tell, The Avengers is for me one of the best movies I’ve seen this year so far. If fulfills on a promise started by Marvel Studios and adds even more. It’s a thrilling, fun and funny ride that will stick with you way after your first viewing and further just makes you want to see it again immediately (and I know I’m going to do that very thing next weekend). As has been the case with all of the Marvel films, there are additional scenes during and after the main credits, so whatever you do, don’t leave, they’re both great pay-offs and a sign of things to come. The Avengers is highly, highly recommended… if you haven’t seen it yet, run, don’t walk, to your nearest theatre and prepare for a 2+ hour thrill ride that you won’t soon forget.

The original is posted here.

Since 3 a.m. last night, I have been singing the praises of The Avengers, the über-anticipated epic directed by one of the deities of fanbois everywhere Joss Wheedon. Now while this may make me sound like I’m looking down my nose at fanbois and geeks, I disagree — I’m just practicing full transparency, just as I practice in my life a blatant display of geekiness. It’s part of my job. It’s part of my life. I have no shame being a geek. It’s who I am.

This morning (as in the midnight showing) Pip and I saw what I would argue is Joss Whedon’s second-best film (still not as shiny as his best) but his greatest triumph as a screenwriter and filmmaker. Whedon took four of Marvel’s heaviest hitters, threw in three more for good measure, shook well, and created a script and a movie that was balanced, entertaining, and good fun. And when I say fun, I mean “original Iron Man” fun. Already on IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes, the reviews are coming in and the movie will, as summer blockbusters do, raise the bar for other movies of its ilk…

I will go on to say, though, if Battleship breaks The Avengers records, I am seriously going to wrap up this blog and hide. For a decade.

There was, though, one venue that did not care for The Avengers: The New York Times. Perhaps the one voice against the film would have gone unnoticed had Samuel L. Jackson not channeled co-star Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk and gone on a Twitter rant.

The backlash, some of which I admit to piling on to, comes across as fanboi rage. It would be just one more incident of fanboi rage that makes geeks look like idiots playing World of Warcraft in the basement of their home, but what makes this fanboi rage different is Samuel L.M.F. Jackson (and you know what the MF stands for…) leading the charge. But why? It’s just a sole negative review, right, amongst a tsunami of positive ones, right?

I can’t speak for Nick Fury but I can speak for myself, and when I did on my Facebook page, comments continued to prod at my (apparent) opinion of theNew York Times review, the summer blockbuster, and how this movie really won’t in the long run further anything in the genre other than Joss Whedon.

Instead of ranting on Facebook, I decided to bring my rant here. Why? Because I feel the need to explain myself…again.

My own stand against the New York Times review is not because (gasp!) they didn’t like The Avengers, because there will be Marvel fans who will refuse to go mainstream and simply protest for protest’s sake. I take more umbrage in theTimes’ apparent disdain for the genre on the whole. Admittedly, the review could have been a lot worse, but it does come across a bit condescending. For example…

“The light, amusing bits cannot overcome the grinding, hectic emptiness, the bloated cynicism that is less a shortcoming of this particular film than a feature of the genre.”

This was the point of the review that made me blink, but not as bad as…

“The price of entertainment is obedience.”

Hold on — was the New York Times review telling me I was being manipulated to enjoy this film? “Obey — as this is a summer blockbuster…” or some such?

At this point, I was reminded of another review from the Times…

“The true perversion, though, is the sense you get that all of this illicitness has been tossed in as a little something for the ladies, out of a justifiable fear, perhaps, that no woman alive would watch otherwise. While I do not doubt that there are women in the world who read books like Mr. Martin’s, I can honestly say that I have never met a single woman who has stood up in indignation at her book club and refused to read the latest from Lorrie Moore unless everyone agreed to The Hobbit first. Game of Thrones is boy fiction patronizingly turned out to reach the population’s other half.”

I have grown tired — very tired — of how Science Fiction and Fantasy is regarded as the red-headed stepchild of storytelling genres, and regardless of accomplishments like Game of Thrones or The Avengers, the NYT has fed into that with ongoing commentary, which I found to be a shallow look at what is a complex, well-written series. The snide remarks about The Avengers, a movie that was a real gamble no matter how you look at it…

And yes, before I get the pile-on about the formulaic summer blockbuster with all the pretty people in the leads, The Avengers was a gamble because Marvel started up the hype four years ago. This movie could have been a steaming turd ala Green Lantern because —Whedonites, prepare your own retaliations now — Joss Whedon isn’t perfect. Dollhouse, for me, was proof of that.

Whedon was given a challenge and he surpassed it. Four years of hype, of buildup, of expectation, all fell into place with this film; but leave it to the New York Times — just as they did with Game of Thrones — to pretend that the argument is invalid, and it’s just more of that Science Fiction and Fantasy crap, designed to appeal to the gamer crowds exclusively.

Perhaps I’m snapping in light of things like people who claim “Oh I don’t read that science fiction stuff, that’s just not my thing…” while they say only a moment later “Oh yeah, I’m reading The Hunger Games on my Kindle right now…” A great comeback to “That sci-fi stuff is too weird for me…” is “Really? What was the last title you tried reading?” To date, only one person has ever come back to me with an answer to that — it was Lani Tupu and the book wasStranger in a Strange Land.

Good on ya, Lani.

My ire is not against the Times’ review. It’s the Times’ attitude about Science Fiction and Fantasy being beneath them. There’s a lot more to this genre than death rays, swords, and magic. When done right, it is about people and the extraordinary challenges they face; and if we are really given a terrific story with amazing characters, it is how we can learn from their struggles and face our own. The NYT critics apparently do not see it in that same light, and as they fail to understand it simply think it’s tiresome.

And to my friends on Facebook who drove me here, no, I’m not angry on you disagreeing with me. That’s not my style. I was growing punchy in my own failure to make clear what I was reacting to. Disagree with me all you want, so long as we’re having the same debate. Right?

Maybe it’s sleep depravation and not fanboi rage that is currently driving me. I’ll take a nap. Let you know how I feel tomorrow…

Tony and Andrew:

1. The Avengers
2. Think Like a Man
3. Pirates!
4. The Five Year Engagement
5. The Hunger Games

Jonathan:

1. The Avengers
2. Think Like a Man
3. Pirates!
4. The Hunger Games
5. The Five Year Engagement

Congrats to Tony, BD and Andrew… who all scored higher than 13.  OUCH!

Release date:                           9/15/2000

DreamWorks and Columbia Pictures

Directed and Written by         Cameron Crowe

Produced by                            Cameron Crowe

                  Ian Bryce                   

Cast

Billy Crudup                           Russell Hammond

Patrick Fugit                           William Miller

Frances McDormand              Elaine Miller

Kate Hudson                           Penny Lane

Jason Lee                                Jeff Bebe

Initial comments by the hosts:

Before discussion of the movie began, the hosts talked about how difficult it was to find Almost Famous in streaming form.  It’s available for rental, and even that is limited, and the movie is also broken up into 12 parts on You Tube.

This is a semi-autobiographical movie of how Cameron Crowe got his start and you really get the sense that this movie feels a biopic, even though it’s a fictional story.  Darrell points out that there are lots of little inside jokes in the movie (some of these will be listed at the end of the notes).  Darrell thought it was funny that, only in the 1970’s, could a 14 year-old boy get a job with Rolling Stone Magazine, go on tour with a band and his mother does NOT completely freak out over this.

Lena (from the chat room – watcher of the You Tube version) noted that it was nice to be reminded that Kate Hudson is actually talented.

Tony thought Frances McDormand was fantastic; her character was a force in this movie.  He also was impressed with the acting talent throughout the movie, not only of the main stars but also of the background/secondary characters, such as Fairuza Balk and Anna Paquin (The Band Aids), Zooey Deschanel, Jimmy Fallon, and Phillip Seymour Hoffman, to name just a few.  Every character had a distinct voice and Crowe did a very good job at capturing and realizing these different people.

Billy Crudup did a very good job at portraying Russell Hammond, the lead guitarist of Stillwater, who struggles through his ascent from musician in an up and coming band to a Rock God.

Two of the favorite “quirks” of controlling single mom Elaine Miller (McDormand) was her referring to Simon and Garfunkel as the devil’s music and her making her kids celebrate Christmas in September, “when it’s not commercial.”

Jason Lee was good at portraying Jeff Bebe as the leader of Stillwater, both insecure and someone who knows what to look for, what can (and eventually does) cause a rift in the band.

Patrick Fugit, as William (Billy) Miller, was able to capture the innocence of a teenager in the 70s, the excitement of a fan travelling with a band and the eye-opening breaking through from adolescence to adulthood as he begins to see what life is really like outside of the world his mother created for him.

The critical scene, near the end of the movie, shows not only the band members crumbling under the threat of their plane crashing, but also Billy Miller’s transformation from boy to man when he confronts the band about how they treat their fans… specifically their biggest fan, Penny Lane (Kate Hudson).

Trivia notes for this movie (this is only a small selection):

This film was Cameron Crowe’s semi-autobiographical account of life as a young Rolling Stone reporter. The actual group that Crowe first toured with was The Allman Brothers Band (Gregg Allman kept asking him if he was a narc).  The near-fatal plane crash happened while traveling with The Who, and the character of Russell Hammond is based on Glenn Frey (Eagles).

The roles of Russell Hammond and Penny Lane were originally offered to Brad Pitt and Sarah Polley.  Polley dropped out to work on her own project, and Pitt worked with Crowe for months before finally admitting, according to Crowe, “I just don’t get it enough to do it.”  Kate Hudson, who took over the role of Penny Lane, had been originally cast as William’s sister.

Crowe wrote the liner notes (at age 18) to the “Frampton Comes Alive!”, and Peter Frampton returned the favor by acting as a music consultant for the film.

Frampton taught Billy Crudup how to play the guitar for the concert scenes.

Stillwater’s songs were written by Frampton, Crowe and Nancy Wilson (Crowe’s wife and member of the band Heart).  This was mentioned early in the credits, although the music acknowledgments credit Russell Hammond and Stillwater as if they were real authors/performers.

Mike McCready (Pearl Jam) provided the guitar track for Stillwater’s songs.

Not only did Patrick Fugit’s voice break during filming, but he also grew three inches, forcing Billy Crudup to wear platform shoes.

Your Producers for this episode were:

• Tony
• Darrell

This episode was recorded: 4/4/2012

Note: Six years ago today, we released the first episode of Fanboy Smackdown… which became Back Seat Producers.  Thanks for 6 great years.  Let’s ROCK!

As The Cabin in the Woods starts, were introduced to two technicians, Sitterson and Hadley, as they’re beginning to start their day. By their conversation, it all sounds like it’s going to be rather mundane, but as the title of the movie comes up, you certainly get the idea that there’s something way more to this than it seems. We immediately flash to a group of five college students who decide that they’re going to get away from it all for the weekend, literally heading to the titular cabin in the woods. but as they leave, we soon find out that they’ve been under some major surveillance and that aspects of their trip and preparations for it have been totally manipulated. As they get to the cabin, they realize that they’re getting way more than what they bargained for and both of the scenarios that we’ve been presented with are about to collide in a way that neither have expected.

Sorry if all of that sounds rather cryptic, but saying much more would lead into some major spoilers for this film, and I just don’t want to give too much away at the start of this review. The Cabin in the Woods comes to us from director Drew Goddard and producer Joss Whedon who also collaborated on the story together. These guys certainly have geek street cred, having worked together on the Angel and Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV series and having separate credits like Goddard having been a writer on Lost and Alias as well as writing the movie Cloverfield and of course, Whedon also being responsible for such things as Firefly and Dollhouse as well as next week’s highly anticipated Avengers film. Lionsgate has been sitting on releasing this one for awhile, though I have to admit after seeing the trailer and knowing the pedigree here, I was certainly looking forward to it. Unfortunately, immediately after seeing it, I really wasn’t that thrilled by it, in fact, I just didn’t like it. Having had a week further to stew on this (and also having a chance to read an extensive interview with Goddard), I appreciate it more now than I did immediately after seeing it, but I still don’t think it’s that successful in getting it’s points across.

The Cabin in the Woods is some pretty ambitious meta-commentary from both Goddard and Whedon, not only on what they see as the state of horror films but also about the ideas of sending the young off to do the bidding of the old. It’s pretty apparent from the start that there’s some sort of master manipulation going on here. But, thanks to the rather snarky treatment that all of the characters and the situations get, it was hard for me to give a damn about either side and so the point for me was to see what exactly the punchline was at the end. And when it does get to the end, it does all get resolved, but to a point where there’s really no “pro” side to what they’re commenting on. Basically, if you look at the implications of it’s final moments, it’s not really saying much for the side of the young, at least from my point of view.

In the interview that I read with Goddard, The Cabin in the Woods was described as a love/hate letter to horror films. While I get Goddard’s points, they just didn’t come across to me in what I was being presented. To me, it’s points about horror films and it’s characters were more on the mocking and contemptuous side more than anything else with their “love” side being more confined to the film’s end and then still just not balanced enough.

And then there’s the characters… Each of the five college students are essentially playing two roles; pre- and post-manipulation. But the pre- side gets quite a bit short-changed, so much so that basically they all just blend together. Kristen Connolly plays the red-headed lead amongst the college kids, Dana, and she’s a bit on the dry side here, having me think that she was cast only because Felicia Day (a perennial Whedon favorite) just wasn’t available (and having said that, I think Day could’ve brought quite a bit more here). Fran Kranz (who played Topher in Whedon’s Dollhouse) plays everyone’s stoner friend Marty and is just too cartoonish to me, so much so that I had a hard time buying that the other kids would even be hanging out with him. It’s also worth noting that Chris Hemsworth is one of the college students having made this film before he ever played Marvel’s Thor character.

Faring better are the characters of Sitterson and Hadley played by Richard Jenkins and Bradley Whitford respectively. There’s certainly plenty of snark shown with these guys as well, but they have their moments where they do display the gravity of the situation that’s about to unfold and that certainly goes a long way. Giving them support, you have another perennial Whedon favorite, Amy Acker as a fellow tech and Brian White who plays security for this group. White stands out for me as he’s all-business in his part, and amongst the cast is the one who totally shows the importance of what’s about to go down. It’s also worthy of note that you do have a big-name actress (who’s a bit of a horror icon her own self) who comes in for a very important cameo.

There’s massive elements of The Cabin in the Woods that are very similar to parts of both the Angel and Dollhouse TV shows (specifically the Wolfram and Hart firm on Angel). The advantage that those shows have though, is that they had time to develop and here, it’s just shown as sketches more than anything else. I tend to think if we’d had just a little more time with the college students at the start and some more time with the organization behind this master plot, this could’ve been a lot more satisfying to me. As it stands, The Cabin in the Woods seems to me to be more concerned with it’s contemptuous lampooning more than anything else. I’m not adverse to this stuff getting fun poked at it all, but here it just went overboard and maybe some more serious development time would’ve helped to balance this better.

Again, I certainly appreciate The Cabin in the Woods more now than I did immediately after seeing it and I certainly admire the massive ambition that’s here. Compared to a lot of reviews I’ve been seeing, I’m in the minority on this one. I think it’s unsuccessful, but… I’m not going to discourage anyone from seeing this, and more, if you haven’t seen it yet and are of a mind to see it, I’d encourage you to do so. It may not have been successful to me, but there’s still some good ideas here and they very well might work for you.

This is the premise to The Raven the newest movie from director James McTeigue and starring John Cusack as Edgar Allen Poe.  Previously, McTeigue has been an assistant director working with the Wachowski Brothers on The Matrix films and more recently he’s been directing on his own with such films as V For Vendetta and Ninja Assassin, both of which I enjoyed a great deal.  Combined with the inspired casting of Cusack as Poe, I was looking forward to seeing this and I had a great time with it.

The Raven certainly salutes a good portion of Poe’s most memorable works like Murders in the Rue Morgue and The Pit and The Pendulum but at it’s core, this is a mystery/detective thriller and that itself, at least to me, is also a salute as many consider Poe to be the father of the modern detective story.  Writers Ben Livingston and Hannah Shakespeare have certainly done their homework and have crafted something here that’s a pretty nice extrapolation of what could’ve led up to the mysterious circumstances to Poe’s own death.

The visual style of the film is first rate and most will likely compare it to more recent films like Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow or more recently, Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes films.  For me, I think McTeigue has gone back a little further and the look  reminds me more of a combination of Roger Corman’s classic Poe adaptations and  the horror films of the Hammer and Amicus studios.  It’s very appealing and doesn’t have overt flash, but certainly the right detail (with the one notable exception being that Cusack is sporting a beard that the real Poe didn’t have- this will no doubt bother some, but I was OK with it).

And speaking of Cusack, I just thought he did a fantastic job here.  To me, it was obvious that he threw himself into his research and it shows on-screen.  Poe’s not made to be some sort of super-hero in this film, he’s basically the picture of desperation at this point in his life and it certainly adds to how he helps solve the mystery.  Luke Evans plays Detective Emmet Fields.  Evans has most recently been seen in movies like The Three Musketeers and Immortals (and will soon be seen in the new Hobbit films).  Evans does a terrific job here and though his role isn’t quite as flashy as Cusack, he still does a great job of keeping up with him and the two have very nice chemistry together.

Alice Eve plays Emily Hamilton more closer to a contemporary heroine, though it doesn’t feel out of place here at all.  Brendon Gleeson, Kevin McNally, Oliver Jackson-Cohen and Sam Hazeldine all fill out the rest of the main cast and do a nice job on the support, though I do want to call out Hazeldine a bit here.  I can’t really say why as I don’t want to spoil things, but I do really appreciate what he did in the film.

Now, The Raven isn’t perfect.  There’s a few plot holes here and there that fortunately don’t really bother me that much thanks to the film’s even pace and strong performances.  Also, it’s main credits sequence is totally out of place- it looks like something that would be used in a contemporary David Fincher film- but fortunately, they’ve kept this sequence to run at the end of the film.  If it had been set at the beginning, it would’ve stood out more on the negative side.  Still, I was plenty entertained by The Raven, primarily due to the performances of both Cusack and Evans, the good uses of Poe’s works in the murders and James McTeigue’s thoughtful visual style.  It’s a fun and cool diversion and certainly worth seeing if you have the chance.

Andrew:

1. Think Like a Man
2. The Five Year Engagement
3. The Pirates!
4. The Lucky One
5. The Hunger Games

Jonathan:

1. The Five Year Engagement
2. Think Like a Man
3. Pirates!
4. The Lucky One
5. The Raven

Safe is also in wide release this weekend.

Jonathan, Mrs. Beast:

1. The Lucky One
2. The Hunger Games
3. Think Like a Man
4. The Three Stooges
5. The Cabin in the Woods

Andrew:

1. The Lucky One
2. Think Like a Man
3. The Hunger Games
4. The Three Stooges
5. The Cabin in the Woods

Father Beast

1. Hunger Games
2. The Lucky One
3. Think Like a Man
4. Cabin in the Woods
5. The Three Stooges

There are no other new wide releases.

Congrats to Tad and Jonathan for their 25s!

Release date:  9/14/1979

The Who Films

Directed by

• Franc Roddam

Written by

• Dave Humphries
• Franc Roddam
• Martin Stellman
• Pete Townshend

Produced by

• Roy Baird
• Bill Curbishley

Cast

Phil Daniels

• Jimmy Cooper

Leslie Ash

• Steph

This recording starts with a discussion about the finale of The Walking Dead.  It contains spoilers so… fair warning… if you haven’t seen the finale yet and don’t want to know what happened or if you don’t watch The Walking Dead and want to skip forward, the section runs from the beginning to 9:55.

Initial comments by the hosts:

David likes The Who (or other “old British bands – The Doors, Led Zeppelin, Rush” but I’m not really keeping score) but this movie makes him not like The Who.  Darrell said it was hard to watch but he made his way through it and kind of liked it, or at least liked the movie.  Tony found the movie almost unwatchable at points.  He thought the movie was trying too hard to be A Clockwork Orange and it was a failure.

There was also a general consensus… or was that confusion… that there was a great deal of naked males but NO naked females.  Even during the sex scenes, there were no female bits and pieces to be seen.

Some of the scenes were much too long, with 360 degree tracking shots and some scenes that seemed more like time fillers.  The hosts thought that the movie could have easily been cut down to no more than an hour (running time is 117 minutes) and been more interesting.

Tony thought that Phil Daniels (Cooper) looked and acted like Christian Bale and David thought that this movie should have won an award for the “most actors who look like other people.”  He thought that one of Cooper’s friends looked like one of the Weasley twins (doesn’t matter which one).

Scott (from the chat room) summed it up with the statement, “This is a cast made up of ugly British people.”

David admitted to jumping ahead in five minute intervals out of sheer boredom and correctly assumed that he really wasn’t missing much.  Tony didn’t understand the angst that the movie was trying to convey.  Cooper comes from a working class background and he has a job.  Given, he doesn’t really like his job but he still HAS a job, which is a hell of a lot more than most of his friends have.

When the discussion turned to the Steph character, Tony thought that the character was written to be a hated person.

Tony admitted that the hosts made the conscious choice to watch Quadrophenia as part of the Rock ‘n Roll series over Pink Floyd’s The Wall… at least he’s proud enough to admit that this might not have been the wisest choice!

And now on to… The Hunger Games! (Starts at 32:07)

It was widely agreed that the best parts of The Hunger Games were Lenny Kravitz (Cinna) and Woody Harrelson (Haymitch).  Tony thought the movie overall was good, David thought it was great (your happy note-taker agreed with David).  They also liked the characters of Rue and Thresh, but David’s only complaint was the District 11 scene (after Rue is… ) because they broke the 1^st person immersion.

David thought that the Katniss character was a strong female heroine that hasn’t been forced into a female “gender” role.  She’s all business throughout the movie and she doesn’t break out of that role.  He also would have liked to have seen more of an interaction between Peeta and Haymitch.

Tony didn’t think the movie lived up to the hype.  Neither did David, but that didn’t change his opinion that he really liked it.

Also listen to Tony’s idea for an earlier story line on Cinna and Haymitch.

Your Producers for this episode were:

• Tony
• Darrell
• David

This episode was recorded: 3/28/2012

That’s the basic story behind The Three Stooges the latest film from Peter and Bobby Farrelly and really this is just a hell of a lot of fun.  I’m a huge fan of the classic Three Stooges shorts and to this day, they still manage to get me to laugh in that sort of big, belly laugh way.  The Farrellys are obviously big fans as well and their little re-invention for a modern audience also manages to be quite the love letter to some classic comedy as well.

The Three Stooges is broken down into three separately chaptered stories all with the same running through-line.  It is one big story, but each individual chapter pays some great homage to classic Stooges situations of the past and I just did not want to see this end.  Now, I understand that some might take offense that this movie was even made, but really, the Farrelly’s hearts are definitely in the right place and they manage to not only pay homage, but re-invent while mixing the Stooges with their own brand of humor.

The best part of the film is the casting of Moe, Larry and Curly.  Chris Diamantopoulos plays Moe, Sean Hayes plays Larry and Will Sasso plays Curly and these guys are just brilliant.  Diamantopoulos has Moe’s look down to a “T.”  Sean Hayes is the only other person who I’ve ever heard pull off a successful impersonation of Larry Fine (the other is the great voice artist, actor and comedian Billy West).  Will Sasso is Curly Howard re-born.  The impersonations are absolutely spot-on, but even better is the timing and chemistry that all three have.  They absolutely excel at the gags, but the Farrellys also manage to bring a little heart to their film, and all three deliver the goods there as well.

There’s solid support for the boys from a great supporting cast including Jane Lynch, Jennifer Hudson, Sofia Vergara, Craig Bierko, Stephen Collins and the great Larry David.  I really have to give high marks to both Sofia Vergara and Larry David amongst the supporting cast.  Vergara plays Lydia, one of the villains of the movie.  She’s of course, drop-dead gorgeous, but also very much willing to put herself in a couple of pretty ridiculous situations and be a good sport about it.  Larry David plays Sister Mary-Mengele, one of the nuns at the orphanage and of course the one that the boys cause the most trouble for.  David’s lapping this whole thing up and you can just tell he’s having the time of his life playing the foil.  Also amongst the supporting cast, you’ll find the entire cast of Jersey Shore who I have to give props to for being good sports for the fun that gets made of them here.  As a downside to that, their appearance will no doubt date the film in later years, but for now, they certainly help generate some laughs.

I absolutely loved The Three Stooges and that’s for me pretty high praise considering I’m not really a fan of most comedies made today.  This one obviously spoke to my own affection for the classic trio, but the Farrellys manage to inject some of their own humor as well and the mix is absolutely hilarious.  I saw this with two other friends and honestly, we were laughing all the way through the film.  I honestly don’t know how this will play with those that aren’t familiar with the Stooges, but if you are a Stooges fan, I hope at least you’ll give this a chance.  Personally, I’d love to see the Farrellys, Diamantopoulos, Hayes and Sasso re-team and do this again.  The Three Stooges is fantastic, slapstick fun from start to finish.

Simultaneously, Emilie Warnock, the daughter of the U.S. President, is taking a little trip to MS One to investigate rumors of experiments involving the prisoners there.  As she’s interviewing one prisoner, a particularly bad piece of work named Hydell, things go awry.  Hydell manages to get a hold of a gun and quickly the tables turn to the point where the prisoners are all freed from their stasis chambers.

Back on Earth, it’s reasoned that the best person to go in and save Emilie is Snow and now he’s making preparations to go aboard MS One.

That’s the premise to Lockout the latest movie from producer Luc Besson’s production company, Europa, and it started as an idea from Besson.  For those that don’t know, as a director, Besson has directed films like La Femme Nikita, The Fifth Element and The Professional. As a producer, Besson’s been behind films like Taken, From Paris With Love and The Transporter series.  Lockout is directed by James Mather and Stephen St. Leger and they also co-wrote the screenplay with Besson.

By it’s trailer, Lockout looks like it should be some pretty good mindless fun.  Well, really it’s just slightly above average as far as an action film goes, though there are a few saving graces.

Strongest of these saving graces is Guy Pearce who plays the part of Snow. Now Pearce has bulked himself up a bit and certainly looks the badass part.  What he does well though is that he doesn’t take the whole thing that seriously and it’s reflected in the character’s wisecracking dialogue.  He’s fun to watch whenever he’s on-screen, but it’s not for great action bits.  The other saving grace to the film is some pretty rich production design.  This has a terrific look to it and the visual effects are all pretty nicely done.

Where this fails though is in part of it’s casting and just the fact that with one exception, there really isn’t any great memorable action scenes.  Now of course, I’m a bit spoiled as I’ve just seen The Raid: Redemption the night before and that was just loaded with terrific and highly memorable action scenes, so much so that it makes Lockout look pedestrian in comparison.  Now I don’t expect every action film to go to the same lengths as The Raid: Redemption did, but I’d like to hope for at least a couple of really great set pieces in most action movies.  To my count, Lockout has only one that’s really inventive and that’s a motorcycle chase near the start of the film, with it’s only problem being that it’s over too fast.  After that, there’s really nothing to speak of.

As far as it’s casting goes, Pearce is the best thing about the movie going in.  Maggie Grace plays Emilie Warnock and she looks terrific, but she doesn’t really bring much else to the table.  Oh the script tries to get some adversarial banter going between her and Snow, but their chemistry just seemed a little too forced for me.  Vincent Regan and Jospeh Gilgun play are main villains aboard MS One.  Gilgun plays the abovementioned Hydell, and Regan plays his brother, Alex.  Neither are particularly effective in their parts and Gilgun is just hard to understand most of the time.  Lennie James and Peter Stormare play Shaw and Langral respectively and both are handling the investigation of Snow.  They’re both solid but man, I’d almost wish they’d been cast as the main bad guys aboard MS One instead as I think both could’ve brought a little more threat to the parts.

Lockout isn’t an offensively bad film, it’s just not that memorable.  It does run at a pretty quick pace (weighing in at 95 minutes) and it doesn’t take itself that seriously thanks mainly to a fun performance from Guy Pearce.  But really, this could’ve used a lot more in the action department and would’ve been helped significantly with better casting in the parts of the President’s daughter and the main villains.  As it is, it’s not a bad diversion, but one that you could probably wait to see when it’s no longer in theatres.

Rama joins a group of 20 fellow SWAT members as they’re about to embark on the mission of their lives.  A ruthless crimelord, Tama, owns a derelict apartment building in the Jakarta slums.  This building has become a safe house for the most dangerous killers and criminals in the area, and they’re all ready to do the bidding of Tama in exchange for his protection.  Now, this 20 member SWAT team is about to attempt to take this 30-story building, floor-by-floor, in an attempt to take out the most notorious criminal in their area and of course… hijinks ensue.

That’s the premise to The Raid: Redemption the new movie from director Gareth Evans who’s previously directed the acclaimed action film Merantau which also re-teams him from his star of that film, Iko Uwais, who plays Rama.  I’ve not seen Merantau yet, though it is in my Netflix Instant Play queue.  If The Raid: Redemption is any indication, then Merantau will get fast-tracked to the top of the list very soon.  This is a lot of fun for any action movie fan.

Now by it’s promotion, The Raid: Redemption sounds almost like it’s little more than a video game brought to life, and as far as I’m concerned, if it’s well-made and stylish with it’s action, then there’s really nothing wrong with that.  Well, fortunately, The Raid: Redemption is extremely well made and features some of the best shot and just balls-out crazy action scenes that you’re likely to see all year.

It’s story and characters are somewhat simplistic, but not in any sort of insulting way.  This movie’s main concern is to get you into it’s action as soon as it can, and it certainly does that.  This sort of reminds me of what you might get if director John Woo and Jackie Chan had ever teamed together for a serious film, and as far as I’m concerned, that’s pretty high praise.

Uwais’ martial arts skills are simply amazing and fortunately he’s got a great partner with Gareth Evans in how it’s presented.  Evans shoots these scenes in what appears to be a hand-held style, but amazingly, he keeps his shots pretty wide and you can always follow the action.  There’s no quick cuts and extreme close-ups that seems like it’s par for the course in American action films (though to be fair, there are certainly American directors who can do that pretty well their own selves).  It’s all right there in the open, just waiting for you to gasp at the amazing stuff that gets pulled off.

Now if you’re going to see this, then no doubt, you’re going for it’s intense action and really that is the star of the show.  As I said above, the story and characters are simplistic, but yet I still found myself caring about what was going to happen to Rama and of course the results of his cryptic message to his father at the beginning.  Well, that certainly does get resolved and kudos to Iko Uwais for a great physical performance that I think helps you get more into his character.  The Raid: Redemption won’t win any major acting awards, but still it’s cast is quite committed to it’s story.  Others who really stand out are Joe Taslim as Jaka, the SWAT team commander, Yayan Ruhian as Mad Dog, one of Tama’s main enforcers (and again another physical marvel to watch in action) and Ray Sahetapy as Rama, who chews scenery with the best of them.

The Raid: Redemption is just a whole lot of fun for any action movie fan.  You will see some truly amazing work here, I have absolutely no doubt of that at all.  It’s extremely well-made and there’s not a wasted moment on screen.  Don’t miss this one…

Jonathan:

1. Hunger Games
2. The Three Stooges
3. Cabin in the Woods
4. Titanic
5. American Reunion

Tony, Lena:

1. Hunger Games
2. The Three Stooges
3. Cabin in the Woods
4. American Reunion
5. Titanic

Andrew, Menolly:

1. Hunger Games
2. Cabin in the Woods
3. The Three Stooges
4. Titanic
5. American Reunion

Mrs. Beast

1. Hunger Games
2. American Reunion
3. Cabin in the Woods
4. The Three Stooges
5. Lockout

Father Beast

1. Hunger Games
2. Cabin in the Woods
3. American Reunion
4. Lockout
5. The Three Stooges

William Pall

1. Hunger Games
2. The Three Stooges
3. American Reunion
4. Cabin in the Woods
5. Titanic

There are no other new wide releases.

Congrats to BD, Scott, Monty, Marc, Jonathan and Art for their 25s!

• Tony
• Becca
• Sam
• William
• Lena

This episode was recorded: 2/22/12

Picks:

Tony, Andrew:

1. Hunger Games
2. Titanic
3. American Reunion
4. Wrath of the Titans
5. Mirror, Mirror

Jonathan:

1. Hunger Games
2. American Reunion
3. Titanic
4. Wrath of the Titans
5. Mirror, Mirror

Father Beast:

1. American Reunion
2. Hunger Games
3. Titanic
4. Wrath of the Titans
5. Mirror, Mirror

Uriah, Lena

1. Titanic
2. Hunger Games
3. American Reunion
4. Wrath of the Titans
5. Mirror, Mirror

There are no other new wide releases.

Edit: Jonathan, in a hunger-induced haze, screwed up his own picks in the show notes. They’ve been corrected to match the audio picks.

Thanks to Tim, Tad and Art for the voice mail.

Roadside Attractions

Based on Mark Millar’s “I Love You Phillip Morris: A True Story of Life, Love, and Prison Breaks

Directed & Screenplay by              Glenn Ficarra, John Requa

Produced by                                        Andrew Lazar, Far Shariat

Cast

Jim Carrey                                           Steven Russell

Ewan McGregor                                 Phillip Morris

Leslie Mann                                         Debbie

Initial comments by the hosts:

Sam really liked this movie.  He thought it was funny and an interesting character study and dubbed it “the two gay guys-funnier Shawshank Redemption.”  Jill did not like the movie at all and had to go back to it three times to finally get through it.  She did not connect with the characters at all and found them to be superficial stereotypes and didn’t see how the relationships made sense.  Darrell thought he wasn’t going to like it and was surprised to find that he really enjoyed it; he thought the story was compelling.  Tony said that the movie surprised him at every turn.  It was not the movie he was expecting it to be, and he was very happy with it.  He’s very hit-or-miss with Jim Carrey, and he really liked him in this performance.

Sam thought the narration worked very well in this movie and Jill thought it was necessary in order to explain some of the more absurd parts of the movie.  Tony liked that the narrator (Steven Russell) flat-out lied, because the character can’t tell the truth.  During Jimmy’s death scene, from AIDS, Steven appeared to be mourning Jimmy’s death but years later Steven faked his own death from AIDS.  So, was Steven really sad when Jimmy died or was he simply filing that bit of information away to possibly be used later?

Jill took issue with how Steven’s life took such drastic changes when #1, he found his mother and #2, he came out of the closet as a gay man and took on that stereotypical, over the top, extravagant lifestyle.  She appreciated, at least, that they also portrayed him as a liar and a jerk.  Sam thought it wasn’t that much of an unrealistic portrayal since the movie would have taken place in the late 1970s and into the late 1990s, as that wasn’t really a set stereotype at that time.  Darrell countered that Steven, who moved to Miami, would have lived during the time of that exact type of life, that stereotype.  Tony thought that this showed one of the flaws of the character.  Steven was attracted to men but he only knew how live as a gay man by fulfilling this stereotype, that this was the only thing he knew.

Throughout most of the film, Jim Carrey played the character in a reserved manner, as he clearly should have, but Jill found a few moments in the film when Carrey let his larger-than-life comedic side come forward, and all the hosts agreed that this was unnecessary.  Darrell brought up the scene where Steven is walking up to his office and finds a slew of FBI agents waiting for him.  In his escape, he took a slightly more physically comedic route, and that would have played much more realistically if it has been played in a more reserved manner.  Sam thought that the movie, in its narration, was framed through the lens of a comedy more than a drama.  He thought that the comedy was Steven trying to poke fun at himself in hindsight.  Tony disagreed with the major life-changing event of the car accident, which then brought Steven to announce that he was gay and this subsequently changed every single aspect of his life.  He found it to be too much of a leap to be believable.

Jill wondered if, without knowing that the movie was based on a true story, the viewers would buy the story?  Tony agreed that he wouldn’t have and Sam stated that he simply enjoyed the movie, true story or not.  Tony thought that if the movie could have earned some of its storytelling points, instead of just leaping at them, it could have gone on to be a good story.

One of the questionable story lines for the hosts is how could someone who spent almost his entire life mired in lies and cons be believable as being in love with Phillip Morris?  Could Steven Russell love anyone other than himself?  Tony said that it was real and believable for him during the early stages of their relationship when Steven and Phillip could only communicate through notes.  You begin to see something deeper develop between them.  On the other hand, the movie never got too deeply into any of Steven’s other relationships (Debbie or Jimmy) so there wasn’t a lot to compare it to.  These were some of the movie’s shortcuts that made the storyline a challenge to find plausible.

They liked Ewan McGregor’s character as the soft-spoken Phillip Morris; they found his naïve character pretty believable.  Even when Phillip knew that Steven was a con-man, his naiveté played well in that he never questioned some of the blatant contradictions in Steven’s character.

It would be interesting to compare the movie to the book to see if the movie took a more comedic turn.  All in all, with the exception of Jill, the hosts found it a fun movie to watch.

Your Producers for this episode were:

• Tony
• Darrell
• Jill
• Sam

This episode was recorded: 3/21/2012

That’s the premise to Wrath of the Titans the sequel to 2010′s Clash of the Titans and it’s also the latest film from director Jonathan Liebesman who directed last year’s Battle Los Angeles.  2010′s Clash of the Titans (a re-make of the 1981 Ray Harryhausen film) is not exactly well liked by most out there; I’m OK with it my own self- it’s not the greatest movie ever made, but it’s far from being the piece of trash that most make it out to be.  The thing that I don’t really forgive about it though is that it was the first major release post-Avatar to jump on the 3D bandwagon with a rushed 3D conversion, and at least in my estimation, was the starting point for the anti-3D feelings that you see from a lot of filmgoers today.  With that sort of pedigree (keeping in mind that Battle Los Angeles isn’t exactly well-liked either- though I enjoyed it a great deal), Wrath of the Titans has a couple of potential strikes against it before it’s even out of the gate.

Fortunately, Liebesman and crew took a good look at what was wrong with Clash and have gone to some considerable lengths to make it’s sequel a lot more fun.  And it is that, quite a bit of fun, but still with a few faults.

Liebesman shot Battle Los Angeles with an effective hand-held style that was great for putting you right in the middle of the action and he does the same thing here.  Now that style isn’t totally prevalent in this movie, and there’s plenty of instances where Liebesman will pull back his camera and give you a much clearer vantage point for all of the action.  While I prefer the hyper-stylized look of a similar movie like Immortals, this is  still a pretty darn good-looking film with some well-choreographed action, a few very cool set pieces and some terrific visual effects (very impressed by their rendition of Kronos which totally looks like it could’ve been a creation by the late, great Jack Kirby).

Now they do play a little fast and loose with the basic mythology and the characters are somewhat simplistic, but the ride is fast-paced and the 3D is absolutely fantastic.  That is the real improvement over Clash.  Clash’s 3D was an afterthought, Wrath’s 3D is well executed especially during the action sequences.

Sam Worthington, Liam Neeson, Ralph Fiennes and Danny Huston reprise their roles of Perseus, Zeus, Hades and Poseidon respectively.  Worthington really looks more the part now with his hair grown out.  He’s terrific in the action scenes and while he won’t win any dramatic awards for this, I thought the final scene in the film between Perseus and his son, Helius (john Bell) was actually pretty cool.  Neeson and Fiennes certainly both add gravity to this, and look like their having their own fun with it as well (especially Neeson).  New to this production are Rosamund Pike, Edgar Ramirez, Toby Kebbell and Bill Nighy.  Kudos to both Kebbell and Nighy for bringing a good sense of humor to the film.  Kebbell plays Agenor, the son of Poseidon and Nighy plays Hephaestus, the god who served as the blacksmith to the gods.  Nighy in particular looks like he’s having a ball with the part.

Wrath of the Titans won’t change anyone’s world, but it is a helluva lot of fun and a significantly better movie than it’s predecessor.  The look of the film is terrific, the action scenes and visual effects are exciting to watch, and the 3D is spectacular.  I had a great time with Wrath of the Titans and certainly recommend it.

Tony, Jonathan, Lena, Father Beast:

1. Hunger Games
2. Wrath of the Titans
3. Mirror, Mirror
4. 21 Jump Street
5. The Lorax

Andrew, Uriah

1. Hunger Games
2. Wrath of the Titans
3. 21 Jump Street
4. Mirror, Mirror
5. The Lorax

William, Mrs. Beast

1. Hunger Games
2. Mirror, Mirror
3. Wrath of the Titans
4. 21 Jump Street
5. The Lorax

Menolly

1. Hunger Games
2. Wrath of the Titans
3. 21 Jump Street
4. The Lorax
5. Mirror, Mirror

There are no other new wide releases.

#DittoWilliam!

Directed by

Matthew Vaughn

Screenplay by

Matthew Vaughn

Jane Goldman

Based on “Kick-Ass” by

Mark Millar

John Romita, Jr.

Produced by

Matthew Vaughn

Brad Pitt

 Kris Thykier

 Adam Bohling

 Tarquin Pack

David Reid

Cast

Aaron Johnson                        Dave Lizewski/Kick-Ass

Nicolas Cage                           Damon Macready/Big Daddy

Chloë Grace Moretz                Mindy Macready/Hit-Girl

Christopher Mintz-Plasse        Chris D’Amico/Red Mist

Happy Birthday, Sam!!

Initial comments by the hosts:

Melina thought it was a great overall movie with awesome acting, writing and music.  Jill enjoyed it and thought there were some neat parallels to other movies and she loved the characters.  Sam thought this movie was surprisingly violent, appropriately voiced-over and he enjoyed the hell out of it!  Darrell thought… simply put… it kicked ass!  David really liked it.  Tony thought it was hyper-violent and hyper-awesome.  One thing the hosts brought up is that they pretty much all thought that the movie was going to be a light comedy with superhero elements… not so much.

As much as Aaron Johnson gave a good, solid performance as Kick-Ass, Chloe Grace Moretz stole the show as Hit-Girl.  Nicolas Cage was fantastic in this movie!  They thought his voice and mannerisms were very Adam West-Batman/Captain Kirk.  The hosts didn’t think that any other actor could have pulled off the father/daughter relationship any better than Cage.

David liked that the arc of this story didn’t follow the typical arc of a comic-book story.  Typically there is one single large-scale event that motivates the character to become a superhero, or an event that physically changes the character. In Kick-Ass, Dave Lizewski (Johnson) is bullied and sees too many people turning the other way when they witness bullying.  This is his motivation.

Favorite “kills” from the movie:

Tony – when Hit-Girl is wearing the school girl outfit and she shoots the other guys in the building lobby through the man’s mouth… and after everyone else is dead, she casually turns back and shoots the first man one more time to kill him.

Melina – her favorite sequence is Hit-Girl’s first scene (where the funky version of the Banana Splits theme was playing) and in between killing people, she looks up at Kick-Ass and gives him a big, creepy smile.

David – his favorite sequence is Kick-Ass’s jet pack scene, completely with a portion of “An American Trilogy” by Elvis Presley.

Darrell – he liked the scene where Hit-Girl had all pretty much lined up and then she’s waiting with guns in both hands and she explodes out and kills them out.  His favorite scene in that part was where she reloaded her guns, by tossing the magazines in the air, while still marching down the hallway.

Sam – as much as he loved the microwave scene, his favorite was when she was in the library and, after she shoots one of the men, he falls and his sawed-off shotgun then shoots him through his chin.

Tony liked how the crime wall and the back story for Damon Macready/Big Daddy were all hand drawn in comic book style.

Nicolas Cage modeled his speech mannerisms as Big Daddy on original Batman – Adam West. According to Matthew Vaughn, Cage started acting out his lines this way at the first costume fitting. The director was happy for Cage to continue with this performance in the film, citing his irritation with the gravelly voice Christian Bale used in “The Dark Knight.”

According to Mark Millar, the “C-word” moment in issue three of the comic ultimately convinced Vaughn that it was a worthy project.

Cage came up with his character’s “disguise”: that Damon Macready would have a mustache, while “Big Daddy” would have an even larger mustache via adhesive extensions.

The comic montage of Damon Macready/Big Daddy’s past life was illustrated by artist/co-creator John Romita, Jr.

In response to criticism towards Hit-Girl’s character, Chloë Grace Moretz stated in an interview, “If I ever uttered one word that I said in Kick-Ass, I would be grounded for years! I’d be stuck in my room until I was 20! I would never in a million years say that. I’m an average, everyday girl.” Moretz has said that while filming, she could not bring herself to say the film’s title out loud in interviews, instead calling it “the film” in public and “Kick-Butt” at home.

There was a cameo of Stan Lee as a man watching news footage.

Your Producers for this episode were:

• Tony
• Darrell
• Jill
• Melina
• David
• Sam

This episode was recorded: 3/14/2012

It’s a non-distinct time in the future.  A dystopian society has surfaced after an apparent uprising between the Haves and the Have-Nots (obviously written during the Bush administration, heaven forbid this could’ve ever been written during the Obama administration) across 12 different districts.  Now the Haves keep the Have-Nots at bay with their force of peacekeepers, but they also give them a little bit of hope in the form of entertainment known as The Hunger Games.  In The Hunger Games, a boy and a girl from each district (aged between 12 and 18) is chosen to engage in mortal combat against the other districts.  24 combatants enter the 2-week long game, but only one will survive, but to that one, fame and riches.

We’re now in District 12 and introduced to the sisters Katniss and Primrose Everdeen.  Primrose is set to be entered into the Hunger Games drawing for the very first time, and of course, her name is drawn to represent District 12.  Katniss, doesn’t stand for it at all, and says she’ll be the first actual volunteer for the games if they’ll let Primrose go free.  And of course, that’s what happens.  On the boy’s side, a young man named Peeta, who has an attraction to Katniss (much to the chagrin of another young man named Gale) is chosen and the two embark on the journey to participate in the Hunger Games.  Happy Hunger Games everybody!

I think the biggest problem that I have with The Hunger Games is just that it’s way too long, boring and just takes itself way too seriously.  Director Gary Ross has previously made films like Seabiscuit and Pleasantville (I actually enjoy Seabiscuit a great deal).  They’re directed in a somewhat safe style and it looks to me like he’s trying to be a bit “edgy” here by using lots of hand-held camera work and quick cuts, with the occasional break to let you bask in the production design.  This needed a real visual punch that, in my opinion, Ross doesn’t have (as much crap as he gets, a Paul W.S. Anderson could’ve really directed the hell out of this).

From what I understand, this is a very faithful adaptation of Suzanne Collins’ original book, and for fans of that, they’ll probably be in total heaven with this (and if our audience was any indication, it was just me and the friends I saw this with that had problems with this, but then we’re all white males near 50 or in our 50s as well).  The film’s vision of the future just doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.  It’s societal breakdown is told in just the simplest of strokes and it’s technology aspects and rules of the game are amorphous, with changes being made simply to advance it’s plot more than anything else.  For example, the games themselves take place in an ill-defined “arena” which is all controlled from a central source that can literally create life when it needs to (talking about the terrible CGI “dogs” seen at the very end).  The rules of the game are abruptly changed twice just to advance the “relationship” between Peeta and Katniss (these names are just soooo precious).  With the second climactic change of the rules, I just literally laughed out loud when it happened… it was just so safe.

I mentioned Battle Royale above and one of the great things that has going for it is it’s variety of characters that aren’t at all what they might appear on their surface.  Now sure, in the end, they might still be considered two-dimensional but that’s still one dimension more than most of the characters of The Hunger Games have.  Katniss Everdeen is the idealized nurturing female protagonist with no real faults at all and no real depth.  She’s told from the start the she has to win The Hunger Games and of course she does, but does it in such a way in which there’s no real blood on her hands.  The only real change for her is in the relationship that develops with Peeta, that just sort of comes to us as a matter of plot convenience.  I mean heaven forbid that she should remember that Peeta at the start of the games hooked up with a bunch of rivals in order to take Katniss specifically down.  Now to be fair, if you see a Die Hard movie with Bruce Willis, you’re sure to see Willis’ John McClane triumph in the end, that will happen, but at least the ride is fun and interesting with lots of great action and some snappy dialogue and one-liners that make it even more entertaining.  That type of movie still manages to build some suspense and there’s really no suspense at all in The Hunger Games.

The production design is… interesting.  It’s sort of like taking the great Ken Adam (who designed so many Bond films) and had him working with Lady GaGa and the Bravo Network at the same time.  There’s aspects to it that I think are quite cool (the control room for instance) and others that’s just perplexing.  I mean really, conservative “Haves” who will dress up in sparkly colors and have the hair colored blue and all bunned up in the future?  Yeah, I sorta find that one hard to buy.

And then there’s it’s whole social commentary, which is simplistic as is it’s cultural commentary.  I’ve read that this is supposed to be a big statement against reality TV shows and it just plays likes it’s written by a writer that just resents the concept of these shows more than one who’s done some actual digging into them.  Reality TV competitions are here to stay just as much as Young Adult genre fiction who’s fans thinks it’s far superior to anything else that’s ever been written before.

Performances… well I really can’t fault Jennifer Lawrence for what she does as Katniss.  She’s doing everything that’s asked of her, I just don’t think it’s asking much. The same can be said with the rest of the young cast as well.  The bright spot for me is in the character of Haymitch played by Woody Harrelson, a former winner of the Hunger Games, and Cinna played by Lenny Kravitz, the stylist for Katniss.  Both of these guys at least give the impression of more depth and have a bit more “lived in” quality to what they do.  I also have to give a little call out to Wes Bentley as Seneca, who I guess is the “producer” of the games.  Not so much for his performance, but more for being willing to let the filmmakers mold him into the cartoon character villain (and appearance wise, really all he needs are real horns coming out of his forehead).  That actually takes some stones to give yourself over to that, so good for Wes.

So in the end, well, The Hunger Games just wasn’t for me.  I’m clearly not it’s intended audience though I was most certainly willing to give it a chance.  It’s intended audience will no doubt absolutely love this to death and if this weekend’s box office is any indication, I think it’s a safe bet that you’ll all get your sequels in the future.  I believe I will pass on those and if I want to see something that uses this similar premise again, I’ll just satisfy myself by picking up the just-released DVD or Blu-Ray of the far superior Battle Royale or else watch something like The Running Man again (which at least knows how to not take itself so damn seriously).  Happy Hunger Games everybody!

Andrew, Tony, Jonathan, William, Lena:

1. Hunger Games
2. 21 Jump Street
3. The Lorax
4. John Carter [of Mars]
5. Act of Valor

Scott, Mrs. Beast

1. Hunger Games
2. 21 Jump Street
3. The Lorax
4. John Carter [of Mars]
5. Project X

There are no other new wide releases.

Directed by                             Spike Lee
Written by                               Spike Lee
Produced by                            Pamm R. Jackson
                  Spike Lee
                  (Credited as Shelton J. Lee)

Cast
Tracy Camilla Johns                Nola Darling
Tommy Redmond Hicks         Jamie Overstreet
John Canada Terrell                Greer Childs
Spike Lee                                Mars Blackmon

Welcome back, David!

Initial comments by the hosts (short and sweet):

David liked the movie, although he expected not to.  Jill liked it, and she’s also a fan of Spike Lee movies.  Sam didn’t like the movie.  Tony thought it was good for an indie movie, it had flaws but it was an interesting character study… he thought he would end up liking the discussion more than the movie itself.

Tony was disappointed in the fact that the three men, who all knew they were in a relationship of sorts with Nola, were “babies” about it.  Each thought they had something more important than the other, some kind of power/control over her, but none of them did.  None of the hosts agreed with Tony, though.  They didn’t see any of the male characters as thinking or feeling as if they “owned” Nola in any way.

While Greer seemed to treat Nola more as an accessory or a trophy than a partner and Jamie seemed to be more the female counterpart of his relationship with Nola, he is also the only one who took a stand and told Nola that she had to make a choice or he was leaving.  Mars appeared to be the only one who had the most realistic view of the relationship, although he also wasn’t too happy about it.

The hosts also discussed the “rape” scene… was it truly a rape scene at all?  Nola never said no to Jamie, never moved to stop Jamie.  She took on the submissive role, for the first and only time in the movie.  Did she force Jamie to play that more violent hand by calling him over in the middle of the night for sex (while he is already in his bed with another woman)?

The hosts discuss what IT might be, but there isn’t a clear answer.  Is it sexual satisfaction, is it a general satisfaction with her life, is it a singular relationship, is it power or control, is it independence?

David brought up the fact that the movie is not presented in a way to portray Nola’s sexuality as negative and was hard pressed to think of other characters treated in the same way.  The only other comparison that was brought up was Samantha Jones in “Sex and the City.”

Tony found it interesting that Nola went to a sex therapist, considering she didn’t have any personal issue with her relationships.  Then Sam brought up the fact that Nola also entered a phase, albeit short-lived, of celibacy.  For someone who seemed so steady in her beliefs and in how she lived her life, she still took in the judgments made by the people in her life and took time for self-examination before returning, again, to knowing that she is who she is.

Tony compared Nola Darling’s character to a precursor to “500 Days of Summer” in that she was always honest and upfront about who she is and how she leads her life.  Sam saw a little bit of a “Chasing Amy” comparison.

Darrell (from the chat room on this night) liked the fact that the actors constantly broke the 4^th wall.  David didn’t like that, reminding him too much of current reality TV.  Tony said it was done in “mockumentary” style.

Tony asked if, at the end of the movie, was Nola truly happy with her life?  David and Jill thought so, even though they show Nola being alone at the end, she is ultimately living the life she wants to live.  She has always known, and after looking deeper into herself, reinforces the fact that she does not want just one man in her life, she is not a sex-addict, she is perfectly fine as she is, and any problems that arise from her multiple relationship are caused by these men, not her.

Jill brought up that, because the film’s budget was so tight, there were no second takes of any scenes.  Also, whenever the cast broke for a meal, Spike Lee instructed them to save their soda cans so they could be turned in for recycling money.  The film was shot in twelve days on a budget of $175,000.

Spike Lee wrote a book detailing the making and distribution of this film, entitled, “Spike Lee’s Gotta Have it: Inside Guerilla Filmmaking.”  His father, Bill (who was also cast as Nola Darling’s father) wrote the jazz score for the movie.

This movie won the “Award of the Youth” Foreign Film award at the 1986 Cannes Film Festival, the “New Generation Award” at the 1986 Los Angeles Film Critics Awards and the “Best First Feature” award at the 1987 Independent Spirit Awards.

Your Producers for this episode were:

• Tony
• Jill
• David
• Sam

This episode was recorded: 3/7/2012

That’s the cryptic premise to Silent House the new horror film (actually more psychological thriller) from director’s Chris Kentis and Laura Lau who previously directed the thriller Open Water.  It’s an adaptation of a Uruguay film called La Casa Muda that I haven’t seen.  Like Open Water, Silent House uses a gimmick to tell it’s story.  The gimmick here is telling the entire series of events with the illusion of one seamless 80+ minute take.  It’s certainly an ambitious move, though it also gets in the way of making this truly effective.

Now, the reason for that, at least from my point of view, comes from the twist revealed at the end of why all of this is happening to Sarah.  This twist doesn’t come out of the blue and there are certainly clues leading up to it, but I think you almost need more time with Sarah to become truly invested in her experience by it’s end.  With that said, I do think that this could be a more fulfilling film on a second viewing considering that you’d now know to look for certain things, but I don’t know if it would make it any more effective.

I’m trying not to spoil anything about this movie, but it’s somewhat hard to do so and still go on about my criticism about it.  While this isn’t a direct spoiler, I’m going to make a comparison here that could certainly act as one, so you’ve been warned and you might want to avoid the rest of this paragraph. If there’s any movie that Silent House resembles most to me, it’s Alexandre Aja’s movie from 2003, High Tension.  If you’ve seen High Tension, then you’re already familiar with it’s twist and the twist there isn’t that far off from the same twist in Silent House.  The threat of this film is from Sarah’s own internalized past history.  The difference though is that High Tension takes a little more time to get you invested in it’s main character and thus makes it extremely effective when the twist is revealed.  Because of the nature of this film (being presented as one long take), you just don’t have the same opportunity to do the same with Sarah.  I give Kentis and Lau a lot of credit though, they try to do what they can within their box, so to speak, but it’s not quite enough.  I’d almost rather that they’d made this more of an external tangible threat and did away with the psychological elements entirely, but doing so would’ve changed this film entirely and would’ve made this a much different piece.

Now with that said, I do think they pull off their illusion pretty effectively even though there are certainly moments that can be picked out where there would be breaks in the filming.  The film’s sound design is extremely well done and for a film like this, it should be.  Elizabeth Olsen (the younger sister of Mary Kate and Ashley) plays Sarah and she’s terrific considering what she has to work with, but what she has to work with is more of a character sketch more than anything else.

I don’t think Silent House is a horrible movie by any means, but it’s just not as effective and horrifying as it could be and most of that is due to the nature of it’s gimmick.  I love a good gimmick movie, but this movie’s gimmick stands in the way of really getting behind it’s main character considering where they take their main character.  There’s certainly stuff here to chew on that I think would certainly be worth a second viewing down the road, but until I do that myself, I can’t say for a certainty that it would make it any more effective.

Andrew

1. 21 Jump Street (Red Band)
2. The Lorax
3. John Carter [of Mars]
4. Project X
5. Act of Valor

Jonathan

1. 21 Jump Street
2. The Lorax
3. John Carter [of Mars]
4. Project X
5. Silent House

Tony

1. 21 Jump Street
2. The Lorax
3. John Carter [of Mars]
4. Project X
5. Act of Valor

Lena

1. 21 Jump Street
2. The Lorax
3. John Carter [of Mars]
4. Project X
5. Act of Valor

Tim

1. 21 Jump Street
2. The Lorax
3. John Carter [of Mars]
4. Project X
5. Act of Valor

There are no other new releases.

Don’t forget, if you get the chance, wish Julie @Juliemast  a happy birthday, tomorrow, March 17!

Congrats to Tim, Andrew and Uriah for hitting 25 this week.

Thanks to Tad and Art for their voicemail contributions

GOOD FOR NOTHING is an adventurous romp set in the sweeping Old West from Mike Wallis in his directorial debut. Inspired by the Spaghetti Westerns and celebrating the Western genre with an interesting twist, the film follows an odd romance and the resulting emotional confusion of an outlaw who reluctantly develops strong feelings for a woman he has kidnapped. Yet when the outlaw (Cohen Holloway) tries to force himself on the young and beautiful Isabella Montgomery (Inge Rademeyer), he finds himself unable to ‘get it up’ due to a surprising bout of performance anxiety.

Unable to understand the reason for his erectile dysfunction, the outlaw goes on a quest to find a solution for his problem with the kidnapped Isabella in tow. He tries various means to cure his ailment – including tracking down fancy doctors and sage medicine men – all in an attempt to fix his problem and finally having his way with Isabella. But the pair are pursued by an unpredictable posse who are set on killing both the outlaw and Isabella, who they have mistaken for a whore and accomplice to the outlaw.

For more information about the film, check out:

http://www.goodfornothingmovie.com/

In the seat on the back of a horse:

• Tony

This episode was recorded 3/12/2012.

Release date:               5/21/82

Universal Pictures

Directed by

Carl Reiner

Written by

Carl Reiner

George Gipe

Steve Martin

Produced by

Carl Reiner

Richard McWhorter

David V. Picker

Cast

Steve Martin               Rigby Reardon

Rachel Ward               Juliet Forrest

This movie was chosen specifically because it’s a comedy, a parody, a satire, and it uses the movies from the 1940s and 1950s interspersed with the modern actors and dialogue.

Initial comments by the hosts:

Tony thought that this movie was the perfect capper to the last month of movies that they’d been watching.  Tony, who isn’t a fan of voiceovers, thought that they were hysterical in this movie.  Darrell agreed in that it was a “relief” after the four more downer-themed movies and it spotlighted and made fun of the tropes that they’d been looking at in the last four movies.  He also compared watching it now to when he saw it when it came out in 1982.  He didn’t have a lot of knowledge about film noir then, so it was simply a comedy film at that time, and not necessarily a successful comedy. Now, having a stronger base comprehension of noir, he could much more appreciate how funny the movie was.  Sam questioned how did that film, relying so heavily on the audience having a noir background, not make it an automatically successful movie?

This brought the discussion back to who this movie is for?  It was a movie that poked fun of movies made 30-40 years earlier, so the audience would need to have a touch point to those older films.  This would be the equivalent to making a movie today that makes fun of movies from the 80s.  Sam brought up Hot Tub Time Machine as such a movie in that filmgoers would need to have some kind of a memory of movies and culture from the 1980s to understand Hot Tub Time Machine.

At this point the discussion turned to the idea that one needs to have particular cultural references to enjoy certain films. Sam stated that American Pie is not going to make sense in 20 years.  Tony disagreed, but Sam thought that technology would advance enough and social interaction will have changed enough that the perils of American Pie simply will not be relevant.  Please feel free to insert your own personal “pie” thoughts and jokes here.  Tony used Animal House as his comparison, and Lena (from the chat room) argued that if Sam’s American Pie argument held up, no one would ever watch Porky’s again.

Sam brought up the fact that everyone probably has a movie or two that, as you watch it again and again over the years, delivers something new each time.  His examples were Blade Runner and Ghostbusters.  Lena also brought up Tootsie and Airplane as her examples of movies that changed/evolved as she’s seen them again over the years.

Other movies that rely on cultural references?  Darrell brought up It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and Sam brought up South Pacific and Rent.  Tony mentions North by Northwest as a movie that can’t be remade for modern audiences due to technological or social advancements, stating that a simple phone call clears up the whole problem, but things are too far gone by the time they get to that point.

Some of the hosts’ favorite quotes from Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid:

Jimmie Sue’s father: Don’t go near my daughter again. Don’t try to see her. Don’t write her and don’t phone her.
Rigby Reardon: Can I use her underwear to make soup?

Juliet Forrest: But what does “FOC” mean?
Rigby Reardon: It’s a slang word. It’s when a man and a woman are in love, the man puts his…
Juliet Forrest: No, no. It’s written here: “F. O. C.”

Rigby Reardon: My plan was to kiss her with every lip on my face.

Rigby Reardon: I hadn’t seen a body put together like that since I’d solved the case of the Murdered Girl with the Big Tits

Cary Grant: You don’t smoke, do you?
Rigby Reardon: No, I have tuberculosis.
Cary Grant: Oh, thank heaven for that.

Performers who appear in this film in footage from earlier classic movies include: Edward Arnold, Ingrid Bergman, Humphrey Bogart, Wally Brown, James Cagney, William Conrad, Jeff Corey, Joan Crawford, Bette Davis, Brian Donlevy, Kirk Douglas, Ava Gardner, Cary Grant, Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, Charles Laughton, Fred MacMurray, Charles McGraw, Ray Milland, Edmond O’Brien, Vincent Price, Barbara Stanwyck and Lana Turner.

Steve Martin suggested using footage of William Hartnell, Red Skelton, Jerry Lewis, Jack Benny, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy.  But Carl Reiner refused, believing it would be funnier if they used footage of actors who spent their careers away from comedies.

Your Producers for this episode were:

• Tony
• Darrell
• Sam

This episode was recorded: 2/29/2012

So yeah, I guess you can say I’m a big fan and so I was very much looking forward to it when Disney announced a big-budget live-action film version which was going to be more spearheaded by some of the Pixar kids more than on the Disney side.  Pixar’s own Andrew Stanton is the director of John Carter making his live action directorial debut after directing such films as Wall•E and Finding Nemo and he’s obviously a big fan as well, he definitely gets it and has made a film that I thought was quite an enjoyable experience.  Sometimes you wonder though if Disney marketing would’ve let him take it as far he did.

See, originally, this was announced under the title of John Carter of Mars and then it was simply titled John Carter as, from what I understand, a result of focus group testing in which a full 50% of the people tested said that they would not go to see the movie if the “of Mars” was in the title.  Oh yeah, there’s scantily clad people running around in battles with swords, there’s airships flying about, there’s a guy who can leap great distances, and let’s not forget the 10-foot tall four-armed green men and women as well… and the “of Mars” would keep them out of the theatres…. You hear about things like this and you sometimes just have to wonder why they even bother.

But no matter… as I said, I thought John Carter was a pretty enjoyable ride.  The basic premise is this: Carter, a former confederate cavalry captain is in America’s west after the end of the Civil War.  He’s about to be conscripted in with the United States cavalry (against his will) and goes on the run.  As he’s on the run, Carter goes into a mysterious cave which he soon finds to be a doorway to the planet Mars.  Once on Mars, or as their inhabitants call it Barsoom, Carter finds that his strength is much greater on the planet, he meets up with the race of 10-foot tall four-armed green people known as Tharks (their leader, Tars Tarkas takes great personal interest in Carter) and soon gets caught up in the struggle between warring City-States of Zodanga and Helium.  Helium’s princess, the ravishing Dejah Thoris, persuades Carter to help her in Helium’s battle with their enemy all the while a greater threat looms.

Now that’s the basic premise, though there’s much more to it than that, but generally speaking, this is extremely pulpy material and there’s nothing wrong with that at all.  During the credits, it will say “Based on ‘A Princess of Mars” where it should actually say “loosely”- again, nothing wrong with that as long as the basic spirit of the piece is preserved, but I just bring that up in case anyone decides that they want to read the book later- well, parts of it will be in the movie.  Fortunately, the spirit is well preserved here and there’s quite a bit that Stanton and company get dead solid perfect in this, but also a few stumbling blocks as well.

The biggest stumbling block is that I think they try to do too much in just this one film and overcomplicate things a bit.  I mentioned above about a greater threat looming- well that threat is certainly true to the books, but doesn’t come along until a little bit later in the series.  What they’ve done here is basically push this into being more of an epic than it has to be, whereas there’s enough basic material in A Princess of Mars to more than make for a good rousing adventure and have the chance to breath a bit when it needs to.

The other thing that bothers me a bit, though I don’t think this will really deter from anyone’s enjoyment of the film, is the relationship set-up between Dejah Thoris and John Carter.  It starts as adversarial when there’s really no need to do so.  Yes, they want to make Dejah Thoris more than just this object of desire, and that’s certainly fine, but I don’t necessarily think you have to go at it with both characters sorta sniping at each other from the start.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s not unbearable and it’s not all pervasive, it’s just a little different from what I’m used to seeing with these characters and thus I question whether it should even be in there.  It’s a moot observation.

When they get stuff right here though, they really get it right.  Carter’s first experiences on Mars, adjusting to the Martian gravity and then coming into contact with the Tharks was just so pleasing to see.  The entire art direction and design should please anyone who’s seen any other visual version of Carter and company in the past.  Carter’s epic battle with one of the White Apes of Mars, is genuinely thrilling and casting through the whole film is right on the money.

Taylor Kitsch plays John Carter and Lynn Collins plays Dejah Thoris.  Both have worked together before on the first Wolverine movie and their casting for this film was announced shortly after that movie came out.  Kitsch wouldn’t have been my first choice for this part (I would’ve cast Lost’s Josh Holloway as the good captain), as he seems a little too on the younger side, but once things get going, you can tell that Kitsch is having a ball with the whole thing.  He may not be my own personal first choice, but still he was a good choice to play the part.  Lynn Collins has moments where she’s just the purest of visions to what I expect Dejah Thoris to look like in live action  To me, that just might be the toughest thing about casting that part- getting an actress who has those looks, can pull off the regality and isn’t a big enough name where her name overshadows everything else, Collins does the job.

Nice support all around, Willem Dafoe is going through the whole motion capture route to play Tars Tarkas of the Tharks, and there are some great moments between him and Carter at various times through the movie. If you know the series, then you know that the relationship that happens between these two is right up there to something like Riggs and Murtaugh from the Lethal Weapon series.  There are glimpses of it here (and there could’ve been more had this stuck more to the source) and it’s always cool when it happens. Ciarán Hinds plays Tardos Mors, the leader of Helium, Dominic West plays the villainous Sab Than of Zodanga, and Mark Strong plays Matai Shang (part of the looming threat I allude to above).  Joining Dafoe in the motion capture end you’ve got Samantha Morton as Sola (Tars’ daughter), Thomas Haden Church as Tal Hajus, a challenger to Tarkas’ leadership and Polly Walker as Sarkoja, a female Thark who absolutely delights in ratting out Sola whenever she can.  And adding even further, you’ve got the great Bryan Cranston in at the start as Colonel Powell, the cavalryman who’s trying to get Carter to join with him.  It’s a terrific supporting cast and my one lone complaint is just not enough Tars Tarkas…

Did I have a good time John Carter? Hell, yes… Was it at the same level as some other big action films like a Mission: Impossible- Ghost Protocol? (and I only use that as an example because it’s another action film from a director who’s best known for his work in animation)  Not quite… I guess I might be a little too close to the source material, but still, I do think it’s very much worth seeing and they certainly do get a lot right here, it’s just that the mix may be a little too filled with some unnecessary (for now) stuff for an introductory movie.  It is a great time and it sure as hell beats the Asylum/SyFy Channel version that stars Antonio Sobato Jr. as John Carter and Traci Lords as Dejah Thoris (though that is good for a laugh, but still, it’s so low budget that they couldn’t afford the four extra feet in height and two additional arms for their Tharks).