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“It” Remake in Limbo, Loses Director
Those who were excited to see Cary Fukunaga’s rendition of the Stephen King classic It are going to have to find something better to do with their lives now, as the director and New Line Cinema have parted ways over budget concerns and disagreements about how best to structure the marathon story. Fukunaga, best known as the director of eight episodes of True Detective, was keen on casting Will Poulter of Maze Runner fame as the iconic Pennywise, and wanted to structure the film similar to the ABC two-part miniseries from the early 1990s by crafting the story as two separate installments. New Line Cinema was less keen on the idea of shooting two complete films, and would prefer a more recognizable actor play the eponymous creature in clown form. Unfortunately, these differences appear irreconcilable, and the director and production company have thus parted ways.
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“Black Mass” First Trailer Reaction: Here’s Johnny!
When was the last time you were legitimately excited about a Johnny Depp movie? Be honest. Maybe you thought he and Tim Burton would pay appropriate homage to Alice in Wonderland (and were wrong). Or, before that, perhaps you thought a more faithful take on Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was warranted (also wrong). Mortdecai? The Lone Ranger? Dark Shadows? Holy shit, Depp probably hasn’t done anything worthwhile in this century, with the possible exception of the first Pirates of the Caribbean flick. So, it is a relief to see him put down the makeup and funny hats and return to a serious role with Black Mass, which released its first full-length trailer recently.
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“The Raid” is Martial Arts Action at its Very Finest
The best action movies succeed by crafting sequences with jaw-dropping visuals and physical stunts, hopefully with characters that we care about and in a way that advances the story. More and more often, action movies in this century lean hard on the crutch of CGI to dazzle us, and usually they are happy to dispense with the story and characters in favor of large explosions, cartoonish monsters, and entire sequences “filmed” in a computer program. Used well, CGI is a powerful tool which can instill a film with detail, and acts to enhance that which appears on the screen – but we seldom see such restraint (the revelatory Mad Max: Fury Road is the most recent exception). In light of this trend, it is an absolute and almost visceral pleasure to experience The Raid from director Gareth Evans. The Raid (aka The Raid: Redemption) is a hybrid between your standard crime film and a martial arts escapade with a story semi-reminiscent of Dredd: an elite police team stages a raid on an apartment building controlled by a crime lord, but things go horribly wrong about six floors up, and the team is forced to fight their way out and struggle for survival as the crime lord’s henchmen descend upon them,
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“Pitch Perfect 2”: a Suitable Encore
There was never a reason to expect the sequel to Pitch Perfect to be very innovative. If you thought that the first movie was a tired exploitation of the popularity of Glee with a half-hearted attempt at comedy, then that’s what you’ll get with this rendition. Similarly, if you were amused by the a cappella mash-ups of recognizable hits and idiosyncratic humor of the original, then you’ll find much in which to delight with this continuation. There are a definite nods to the original, and I feel like the weaker parts of the first installment were minimized with the sequel, resulting in a slightly better movie overall.
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Ten Must-See Films from the Cannes Film Festival
I try my best to limit the number of listicles that I post, which simply amount to some number of things ordered for people to bicker over the order or exclusion of particular things. But, this isn’t so much something like “Harrison Ford’s Top 10 Movies (You’ll Never Guess what #3 is!)”, but instead a brief recounting of my highly-anticipated films to come out of this year’s Cannes Film Festival (which closed yesterday). These aren’t presented in any particular order, but I will mention those which have me the most interested. Almost all of the films that I am excited over competed for the Palme d’Or, but a couple of the films shown outside of competition have me intrigued as well. To make this as easy as possible, each film that I mention will contain a link that film’s imdb page. So, if you find yourself interested, you can find more information with a single click.
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World War Z Sequel Set for July 2017
It looks like we’re actually getting a sequel to World War Z, which had exactly zero to do with the anthology of stories by Max Brooks (a similar phenomenon can be experienced by watching I, Robot after paging through Asimov’s collection of stories of the same name). This isn’t entirely unexpected, as the original grossed over half a billion dollars at the box office worldwide, and various news items have announced that the film would contain Brad Pitt, be directed by J.A. Bayona, and would work from a script written by Steven Knight. Those involved with the film are being very close-lipped with regards to the plot of the film, but apparently they believe that they have a vast array of stories at their disposal. Since there are not any interesting plot details to discuss, I’d like to talk about the original film and the talent assembled so far.
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How to Murder Children in Your Trailer: “Cooties” Reaction
Sometimes you just want to watch disease-ridden schoolchildren getting murdered by adults. For those times, there is the Cooties Trailer, released yesterday. I had heard absolutely zero about this movie before the trailer dropped online, so I was intrigued by the idea of small children contracting a zombie disease from questionable school cafeteria chicken nuggets. The children then infect each other, attack their teachers and parents, and generally create a terrifying and awkward situation for all those involved.
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“Batkid Begins” Trailer Reaction
I made sure to write this trailer reaction a good three hours after I first saw the trailer to Batkid Begins this morning, otherwise it would have basically been three paragraphs of teary-eyed blubbering. The story was vaguely familiar to me from various news articles, but I didn’t really know too much about it. Presented here, in all its onion-chopping glory, is the Batkid Begins trailer. It tells the story of Miles Scott, a 5-year old leukemia patient, and his Make-A-Wish Foundation wish to become Batman for a day. Produced and directed by Dana Nachman, Batkid tells the story of what transpired behind the scenes of the fulfillment of this wish, and documents how the story propagated around the world, inspired many, and eventually culminated in the entire city of San Francisco banding together to grant Miles’ wish.
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“Mad Max: Fury Road” is a Masterful Action Film
Have you ever seen a Mexican standoff fist fight – with two of the combatants chained together? Mad Max: Fury Road treats us to this scene during a lull in the action, as a way for the audience to catch our breath. This film is an absolute assault on the senses in the very best way possible, and when the credits finally rolled at the end, the reality shock was palpable. I felt as though I needed my mind to recover, to slowly remove itself from the astounding world of George Miller’s action masterpiece, which may be the best action film of the decade, if not the century.
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Latest “Pixels” Trailer Adds Little
If you have very little knowledge of the upcoming Adam Sandler and Kevin James comedy Pixels, in which alien forces invade Earth in the guise of 80’s video game characters, the most recent trailer will certainly give you the aesthetic that the movie is attempting to capture. However, this trailer is likely very bad news, especially in light of the previously released trailers for this movie. The film itself certainly looks interesting, but for me it is difficult to tell which group of talent I should use to gauge the promise of the movie. Further I fear that the repetitive nature of this second trailer will anticipate the paucity of original jokes when the film releases.
Film Criticism and Fiction Writing by Derek Jacobs
