Nov 12 2009 Things Being in Theaters This Weekend
I sure hope you like movies--because some are opening this weekend! Such as:
2012
Director: Roland Emmerich
Starring: John Cusack, Amanda Peet, Thandie Newton, Chiwetel Ejiofor
Good if you want to see: shit gettin' fucked up, dudes!
Fantastic Mr. Fox (limited)
Director: Wes Anderson
Starring: George Clooney, Bill Murray, Meryl Streep, Jason Schwartzman
Good if you want to see: Wes Anderson's typically meticulous filmmaking applied to Roald Dahl and stop-motion woodland animals; a fox in a corduroy suit; probably some furries in the back row quietly masturbating
Pirate Radio
Director: Richard Curtis
Starring: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Bill Nighy, Nick Frost
Good if you want to see: some guys running a radio station out of a boat; Nick Frost for once not playing Simon Pegg's fat and stupid yet lovable friend
Uncertainty (limited)
Director: Scott McGehee
Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Lynn Collins
Good if you want to see: a Joseph Gordon-Levitt indie melodrama and a Joseph Gordon-Levitt cell phone thriller epoxied together into Sliding Doors 2: This Time One of the Doors leads to Eagle Eye
Nov 5 2009 The Weekend's New Moving Picture Releases
Don't just sit at home playing your CD-ROMs; enjoy a film this weekend. Here are some options:
A Christmas Carol
Director: Robert Zemeckis
Starring: Jim Carrey, Gary Oldman, Bob Hoskins, the leads from The Princess Bride
Good if you want to see: disgusting near-humans acting out the well worn tale of Scrooge yet again
The Men Who Stare at Goats
Director: Grant Heslov
Starring: Ewan McGregor, George Clooney, Jeff Bridges, Kevin Spacey
Good if you want to see: Coen Brothers-esque comedy from non-Coens; George Clooney killing goats with his BRAIN
The Fourth Kind
Director: Olatunde Osunsanmi
Starring: Milla Jovovich
Good if you want to see: aliens! Or something like that.
The Box
Director: Richard Kelly
Starring: Cameron Diaz, James Marsden, Frank Langella
Good if you want to see: a Twilight Zone episode stretched out an extra hour; whether or not they're going to push that box button for a million dollars (they're totally going to push that box button for a million dollars)
Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire (limited)
Director: Lee Daniels
Starring: Gabby Sidibe, Mo'Nique, Mariah Carey
Good if you want to see: the depressing story of an obese, illiterate teen twice impregnated by her father and abused by her mother; future Academy Award recipients; whatever Oprah and Tyler Perry want you to see, as usual
Oct 29 2009 New Movies Are Coming Out This Weekend!
See a movie this weekend. Might as well. No one at any Halloween party is going to get your "Mike Seaver in the Growing Pains where he writes test answers on his shoes but ends up learning the answers" costume anyway. Why didn't you consider no one would ever see the bottom of your shoes? An inwards-facing watch doesn't cut it.
Anyway, here are your new options:
This Is It
Director: Kenny Ortega
Starring: Michael Jackson
Good if you want to see: Michael Jackson singing, dancing, posing with his arms out; Captain Eo sans sci-fi; some people in the audience unironically wearing sequined gloves
Gentlemen Broncos
Director: Jared Hess
Starring: Michael Angarano, Jemaine Clement, Mike White, Sam Rockwell
Good if you want to see: hyper-stylized Napoleon Dynamite-ism taking its next logical, fateful step into near-universal hatred; deer outfitted with weaponry
Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day
Director: Troy Duffy
Starring: Norman Reedus, Young Indiana Jones, Head of the Class
Good if you want to see: Dude, you GOT to see this shit, bro! You GOT to!
The House of the Devil
Director: Ti West
Starring: Jocelin Donahue, Tom Noonan, Mary Woronov
Good if you want to see: a horror film that most reviewers have found both reminiscent of '70s classics and fresh in its own right; where the Devil lives, obviously
Oct 22 2009 The Weekend in Moving Pictures
Looking for a way to break up your weekend of binge drinking away your sadness? See one of these new releases:
Saw VI
Director: Kevin Greutert
Starring: Saw, some people Saw will make chop of their foot or some garbage
Good if you want to see: Jesus, another fucking Saw movie?
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant
Director: Paul Weitz
Starring: Chris Massoglia, John C. Reilly, Salma Hayek, Paul Dano
Good if you want to see: a kid become a vampire, thanks to John C. Reilly the Vampire; some sort of freak show? I don't know, I'm just basing this off the commercials. It's not like I'm going to read the book or something.
Amelia
Director: Mira Nair
Starring: Hilary Swank, Richard Gere, Ewan McGregor
Good if you want to see: Hilary Swank play a somewhat masculine woman, which history tells us is a popular way to view Hilary Swank; a lady flying a plane!? Crazy!
Astro Boy
Director: David Bowers
Starring: Freddie Highmore, Nicolas Cage, Kristen Bell
Good if you want to see: a man create a robot boy for himself, but not in a creepy way.
Ong Bak 2 (limited)
Director: Tony Jaa, Panna Rittikrai
Starring: Tony Jaa, his many victims
Good if you want to see: Tony Jaa fucking destroy some people with all these awesome moves (if you've seen Ong Bak, you know how legitimately awesome that is).
Antichrist (limited)
Director: Lars von Trier
Starring: Willem Dafoe, Charlotte Gainsbourg
Good if you want to see: just watch the trailer. If you're into that, go for it.
Oct 2 2009 NEW! RELEASES!
These movies come out in theaters this weekend. Will YOU see one of them?
The Invention of Lying
Director: Ricky Gervais, Matt Robinson
Starring: Ricky Gervais, Jennifer Garner, Louis CK, Jonah Hill, Rob Lowe, Tina Fey, Jeffrey Tambor, John Hodgman, Jason Bateman, Christopher Guest--all those laff-'em-up types
Good if you want to see: a humorous account of the first person to lie in a world devoid of untruth; The Office co-creator's big screen directing debut; ATHEIST PROPAGANDA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Zombieland
Director: Ruben Fleischer
Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone, Abigail Breslin
Good if you want to see: a road buddy comedy mixed with zombie horror; Michael Cera's chief competition for Meek, Awkward Performance of the Decade; zombie killin'.
Whip It
Director: Drew Barrymore the Director
Starring: Ellen Page, Kristen Wiig, Jimmy Fallon, Drew Barrymore the Actress
Good if you want to see: the girl from E.T.'s directorial debut; girls rollerskating and knocking each other down, with a plot; a less sensational Rollerball, with Juno instead of Chris Klein or James Caan.
Sep 25 2009 The Weekend in Film Releases
This weekend, know what movie you're going to see before you dash into a cinema to escape an evil gang of karate experts. Study this list:
Surrogates
Director: Jonathan Mostow
Starring: Bruce Willis, Ving Rhames, Radha Mitchell
Good if you want to see: Bruce Willis vs. our new robot population of surrogate people; Bruce Willis with Craig Kilborn's hair for a while, then back to standard Bruce Willis Bald.
Fame
Director: Kevin Tancharoen
Starring: Kelsey Grammer, Bebe Neuwirth, I assume the rest of the cast of Frasier
Good if you want to see: kids singing and dancing and doing drama stuff, because Glee just isn't enough to sate your singing/dancing kid needs.
Pandorum
Director: Christian Alvart
Starring: Dennis Quaid, Ben Foster, Cam Gigandet
Good if you want to see: something like Event Horizon, I think? Maybe more like a shitty Alien, or Sphere?
Sep 18 2009 New Releases: Food Precipitation v. Love Occurring v. Megan Fox's Body v. Informant v. Poet
Would it kill you to get out of the house and see a movie this weekend? Here are some options:
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Director: Phil Lord, Chris Miller
Starring: Bill Hader, Anna Faris, Bruce Campbell
Good if you want to see: falling food; fat kids squealing in delight.
Love Happens
Director: Brandon Camp
Starring: Jennifer Aniston, Aaron Eckhart
Good if you want to see: love happen; the heirs apparent to the Hanks/Ryan throne; the prequel to Affection Exists.
Jennifer's Body
Director: Karyn Kusama
Starring: Megan Fox, Amanda Seyfried, Adam Brody, Johnny Simmons
Good if you want to see: Megan Fox in demon mode; Megan Fox in standard babe mode; what new catchphrases Diablo Cody has in store ("Tweet all about it"?)
The Informant! (limited)
Director: Steven Soderbergh
Starring: Matt Damon, Buster Bluth, Quantum Leap, The Soup
Good if you want to see: corporate thriller as madcap comedy; fatter Matt Damon.
Bright Star (limited)
Director: Jane Campion
Starring: Abbie Cornish, Ben Whishaw
Good if you want to see: if John Keats in Love can match Shakespeare in Love's Oscar bait quotient.
Sep 11 2009 Coming To Theaters This Week's End
This weekend in theaters, you have your pick of goggle-eyed dolls, snowy murder, girls gone wild murder, or a Madea, you lucky dog.
Details:
9
Director: Shane Acker
Starring: Elijah Wood, Jennifer Connelly, Crispin Glover
Good if you want to see: Post-apocalyptic rag dolls; this short, but longer, and now one of the guys sounds like Elijah Wood.
I Can Do Bad All By Myself
Director: Tyler Perry
Starring: Taraji P. Henson, Tyler Perry, obviously.
Good if you want to see: thick, thick melodrama, and then, out of nowhere, Madea bein' all sassy; what everyone will be talking about at your Baptist church this Sunday; if someone can do bad unassisted.
Whiteout
Director: Dominic Sena
Starring: Kate Beckinsale, Gabriel Macht, snow
Good if you want to see: MURDER! In ANTARCTICA!
Sorority Row
Director: Stewart Hendler
Starring: Briana Evigan, Rumer Willis, Old Leia
Good if you want to see: I Know What You Did Last Summer, now with more sorority girls and a tire iron.
Aug 28 2009 Movies Coming to Your Theaters This Weekend
Halloween II
Director: Rob Zombie
Starring: Tyler Mane, Malcolm McDowell, Scout Taylor-Compton
Good if you want to see: if that man in the white mask is still stabbing people; a man in a white mask stabbing people.
Taking Woodstock
Director: Ang Lee
Starring: Demitri Martin, Emile Hirsch, Anton Yelchin
Good if you want to see: How the original Woodstock (not Woodstock '94) started; probably a montage set to "Age of Aquarius" or "Turn, Turn, Turn."
The Final Destination
Director: David R. Ellis
Starring: Some pseudo-teenagers who will mostly die
Good if you want to see: Final Destination--now with more "The"!; what the director of Final Destination 2, Homeward Bound II: Lost in San Francisco, and Snakes on a Plane has been up to (hint: this); some teenagers dying in absurd ways.
Big Fan (limited)
Director: Robert D. Siegel
Starring: Patton Oswalt
Good if you want to see: a Giants superfan get beat up by his football idol, then face those consequences; my Movie Pick of the Week™.
Aug 14 2009 Opening This Weekend, in the Movie Theatres
So many movie choices this weekend, you'll feel even more miserable when you just stay inside eating Stouffer's French bread pizzas:
Bandslam
Director: Todd Graff
Starring: Alyson Michalka, Vanessa Hudgens, Gaelan Connell
Good if you want to see: that this wasn't just a bizarre nightmare you had when you passed out on your couch with the Disney Channel on--it's real!
The Time Traveler's Wife
Director: Robert Schwentke
Starring: Eric Bana, Rachel McAdams, Ron Livingston
Good if you want to see: time travel; monogamy; borderline pedophilia?
District 9
Director: Neill Blomkamp
Starring: Sharlto Copley, David James, Jason Cope, aliens!
Good if you want to see: apartheid with an alien twist; well-reviewed, grounded sci-fi; what this ninth district is all about.
Ponyo
Director: Hayao Miyazaki
Starring: A bunch of celebrity voices replacing the Japanese voices, making it less offensive to our stupid American ears.
Good if you want to see: I think there's like a fish who becomes a girl, and the ocean turns into giant fish? I don't know. I'm sure it's pretty good if you take a child who won't freak out at seeing a fish/girl hybrid.
Spread
Director:David Mackenzie
Starring: Ashton Kutcher, Anne Heche
Good if you want to see: an hour-and-a-half Nikon CoolPix commercial; who's been sending all your favorite Twitters.
The Goods
Director: Neal Brennan
Starring: Jeremy Piven, Ving Rhames, David Koechner, Ed Helms
Good if you want to see: Jeremy Piven being Jeremy Piven--now in a car sales environment!
Grace
Director: Paul Solet
Starring: Jordan Ladd, Samantha Ferris, Gabrielle Rose, a gross babything
Good if you want to see: a gross babything; flies.
Jul 31 2009 New Moving Pictures Shows!
This weekend, treat a lady to dinner, then to one of these new releases. Congratulations: you just went on a "classic date."
Funny People
Director: Judd Apatow
Starring: Adam Sandler, Leslie Mann, Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill, Jason Schwartzman, other amusing humans.
Good if you want to see: the director of The 40-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up edge towards the drama side of the scale; Adam Sandler essentially acknowledge that an "Adam Sandler Movie" is terrible; reasons for and against becoming a successful stand-up comedian, moving on to soul-sucking Hollywood roles, and then getting leukemia.
Aliens in the Attic
Director: John Schultz
Starring: Kevin Nealon, Tim Meadows, I think one of those Disney-bred girls is in it
Good if you want to see: all these fucking aliens in this fucking attic.
The Collector
Director: Marcus Dunstan
Starring: Madeline Zima, Andrea Roth, Daniella Alonso, Robert Wisdom
Good if you want to see: yet another insane serial killer setting up elaborate traps for his unsuspecting victims; people dying gruesome, Looney Tunes-style deaths (see above).
Thirst (limited)
Director: Chan Wook Park
Starring: Kang-ho Song, Ha-kyun Shin
Good if you want to see: "a priest transform into a vampire after a failed medical experiment, plunging him into a world of unknown sensual pleasures"; isn't that enough?
Adam (limited)
Director: Max Mayer
Starring: Hugh Dancy, Rose Byrne
Good if you want to see: you can still find true love with a normie even if you're a space-obsessed dude with Asperger's; saccharine on the autism spectrum.
Jul 9 2009 Movie Shows in Your Town This End-of-Week!
Some films open this weekend; here are some of them:
Brüno
Director: Larry Charles
Starring: Sacha Baron Cohen; oblivious fools, many of whom will be revealed as homophobes
Good if you want to see: further Borat-like exploits, this time with a flamboyant Austrian; what people will be quoting for the next few months.
I Love You, Beth Cooper
Director: Chris Columbus
Starring: Hayden Panettiere, Paul Rust
Good if you want to see: A high school nerd pining over a popular girl? I don't really remember, but I did hear that Heroes' much-talked-about nude scene is from behind, so don't go in looking for boobs.
Blood: The Last Vampire (limited)
Director: Chris Nahon
Starring: Gianna Jun, Allison Miller
Good if you want to see: Blade with an Asian girl.
Humpday (limited)
Director: Lynn Shelton
Starring: Mark Duplass, Joshua Leonard
Good if you want to see: heterosexual best friends attempt to make a gay porn together; the "bromance" genre reach its logical conclusion.
Jun 29 2009 'Watchmen' Back in Theaters--and Now Incredibly Long!
If your primarily complaint about Watchmen was that it wasn't excruciatingly long enough, I've got some happy news, you: to promote Zack Snyder's director's cut on DVD, out July 21, the 25-minute longer edit will also be showing July 17 in venues in New York, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Minneapolis! According to Box Office Mojo, just twenty-five thousand dollars in ticket sales should push the film's all-time domestic gross just above the Tom Hanks/Madonna/Rosie O'Donnell baseball comedy A League of their Own! Let's get Fandangoing!
For those on the fence about whether or not they want to sit all the way through the new, 186-minute Watchmen, understand that there will be a brief intermission when Alan Moore rushes the stage and disavows himself from both the film and society as a whole before finally being pulled off stage by security guards who assume the insane, caveman-haired man is a street vagrant.
'Watchmen' director's cut to bigscreen [Variety]
Jun 26 2009 There's More Than Transformering to See This Weekend
Looking for an incomplete list of new releases? Hey, here's one!:
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Yes, it already opened Wednesday. You got me.)
Director: Michael Bay
Starring: Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, CGI
Good if you want to see: giant robots; explosions; mild racism and sexism; absolutely nothing but the previously mentioned items.
My Sister's Keeper
Director: Nick Cassavetes
Starring: Cameron Diaz, Alec Baldwin, Abigail Breslin, Speed 2
Good if you want to see: a child harvested for her organs; melodrama; Cameron Diaz shave her head--so daring! Give her a Golden Globe!
Cheri (limited)
Director: Stephen Frears
Starring: Michelle Pfeiffer, Kathy Bates, Rupert Friend
Good if you want to see: period romance; an audience of weeping/applauding middle-aged women; your testicles wither and magically transform into a set of beautiful opalescent earrings (males only).
Hurt Locker (limited)
Director: Kathryn Bigelow
Starring: Jeremy Renner, Guy Pearce, Ralph Fiennes
Good if you want to see: how the military's bomb squad technicians deal with their dangerous job in some of the world's most hostile territories; possibly tips for how to diffuse your own bombs at home, giving you an impressive party trick; one of the best-reviewed movies of the year, if you care about that kind of thing.
Jun 18 2009 Moving Pictures Opening This Weekend!
Treat yourself to a movie this weekend. You've earned it. Here are some new releases to choose from:
The Proposal
Director: Anne Fletcher
Starring: Sandra Bullock, Ryan Reynolds
Good if you want to see: Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds play characters pretending to be engaged, when in actuality they are not engaged.
Year One
Director: Harold Ramis
Starring: Jack Black, Michael Cera, cameos
Good if you want to see: a return to late '70s/early '80s, History of the World/Life of Brian/Wholly Moses!-style historical comedy; a preview of how well screenwriters Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg, currently writing Ghostbusters III, work with Egon as a director (Rotten Tomatoes says not well).
Whatever Works
Director: Woody Allen
Starring: Larry David, Evan Rachel Wood
Good if you want to see: Larry David in a Woody Allen movie, which, despite lackluster reviews and an unimpressive trailer, still sounds intriguing to this guy; Woody Allen explore the idea of an older Jewish guy with an attractive young blonde; the source of the thick fog of neuroses that will be drifting through select cities.
Dead Snow
Director: Tommy Wirkola
Starring: Norweigan names, many of which require specialized characters.
Good if you want to see: Nazi snow zombies. Either that sells you or it doesn't, OK?
Jun 12 2009 Will You Watch Eddie Murphy and His Magic Daughter, or Something Else?
Forget that number you call to find out what movies are playing (I've already forgotten it)--HERE are the new releases this weekend. I guess you'll still have to call for showtimes, but whatevs.
Imagine That
Director: Karey Kirkpatrick
Starring: Eddie Murphy, Yara Shahidi, Thomas Haden Church
Good if you want to see: the notable rarity of a single Eddie Murphy; something where a girl experiences financial premonitions through elaborate, metaphorical fairy tale hallucinations? Honestly, who approved this as a concept?
The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3
Director: Tony Scott
Starring: Denzel Washington, John Travolta
Good if you want to see: Sleepless in Seattle reworked into a subway-hijacking film; John Travolta chew the scenery so hard it will give you TMJ syndrome.
Moon
Director: Douglas Jones
Starring: Sam Rockwell, Kevin Spacey's voice
Good if you want to see: a small-scale sci-fi film that relies more on ideas than flashy effects; the sights of New York or LA, because I'm pretty sure those are the only places it's playing.
Food, Inc.
Director: Robert Kenner
Starring: Talking heads, cattle
Good if you want to see: why you should feel crippling guilt about buying food from anyone but farmer's market people and relatives; an audience full of the kind of people who make it a point to mention they don't watch television.
Jun 4 2009 Movies You Can Take Mom to This Weekend
Here are your options:
The Hangover
Director: Todd Phillips
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis, Ed Helms, a baby, Mike Tyson, a tiger.
Good if you want to see: post-debauchery comedy; a fat, bearded man in his underwear; a baby; Mike Tyson; a tiger.
Land of the Lost
Director: Brad Silberling
Starring: Will Ferrell, Danny McBride, Anna Friel
Good if you want to see: dinosaurs; nightmarish, dead-eyed lizard men; a campy children's television series from the '70s remade as an insanely expensive film for some reason.
My Life in Ruins
Director: Donald Petrie
Starring: Nia Vadalos, Rachel Dratch, Richard Dreyfuss
Good if you want to see: that those previews you keep noticing for My Big Fat Greek Wedding are actually for an entirely different movie.
Away We Go (limited)
Director: Sam Mendes
Starring: John Krasinski, Maya Rudolph.
Good if you want to see: how hard it is to be a directionless 30-something, you know?
May 29 2009 See You Guys at 'Tintin' Around Christmas 2011
Something for your kitten calendar: Steven Spielberg's The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn will be released internationally in late October/early November 2011 before arriving in US theaters December 23. Try to mark it down, but in case you forget, I'll try to remind you sometime that calendar year.
On a somewhat related note, I finally started reading the Tintin comics, and they are nuts. Every page introduces a new conflict that is serendipitously resolved by the next page. For example: "Ut oh, Tintin has been tied to a massive dumbbell and thrown into Lake Michigan! Oh, phew, it turns out they accidentally tied him to a circus strongman's fake, wooden dumbbells that float. Tintin is safe!" Something like that happens every page. It's madness. Who knew the series would be so amazingly ridiculous, besides the millions worldwide who read it decades ago?
May 28 2009 Films You Could See in a Theater This Weekend
Keep seeing trailers, posters, and clips that catch your interest but unsure of when the films are being released? How about I start telling you what's coming out every week? So you can ask girls on dates to movies. I'll try to come up with a better title by next week.
Anyway, this weekend:
Up
Director: Pete Docter
Starring: Ed Asner, Christopher Plummer, Delroy Lindo, some other voices.
Recommended if you want to see: the elderly as three-dimensional computer-renderings; the delighted faces of children exiting the theater; a talking dog; an obviously good movie because it's a Pixar.
Drag Me to Hell
Director: Sam Raimi
Starring: Alison Lohman (that girl from Matchstick Men), Justin Long (that guy who is a Mac commercial).
Recommended if you want to see: Raimi's favorably-reviewed return to horror; a bug crawl into a girl's nose (I think that happened in one of the TV spots); someone forcibly pulled into a fiery netherworld.
Departures
Director: Yôjirô Takita
Starring: Masahiro Motoki, more Japanese names that will mean nothing to you.
Recommended if you want to see: an Academy Award-winning, moving, sometimes comical, beautifully-shot film from Japan; how this thing managed to lose you the Best Foreign Language Film point in your office Oscar pool when you heard that Holocaust movie was a fucking lock.
What Goes Up
Director: Jonathan Glatzer
Starring: Steve Coogan, Hilary Duff
Recommended if you want to see: confused families saying, "I thought this was supposed to be the animated thing with the old guy."
