Release Dates Aug 13 2008 @ 02:53 pm
Theater Releases for August 15th, 2008
Um…wow. Summer must be over, because there are more than two releases worth discussing this week (although, as you’ll see, I use the phrase “worth discussing” pretty loosely). I’ve always preferred sleepers to blockbusters, and while I’m holding out hope for most of these, I have to admit that most of them are likely to suck. But you’ll definitely find me at the local multiplex this weekend, taking in at least one of these, and keeping my fingers crossed in hopes that I’m becoming part of history. (Yeah, right.)
Tropic Thunder
I was going to publish this post tomorrow, until I noticed that this one actually gets released today. Carrying on the tradition of Three Amigos! and Galaxy Quest, this high-concept comedy finds three actors hired to film a Vietnam War epic stuck in the middle of an actual war. I wasn’t exactly blown away by the trailers, but I’m holding out hope — I don’t want to live in a world where a movie that teams up Jack Black, Ben Stiller, and Robert Downey, Jr. (who, after Charlie Bartlett and Iron Man, might just be my new favorite actor) isn’t amazingly great.
Recommended if you always thought Apocalypse Now just wasn’t funny enough
Star Wars: The Clone Wars
There was a time that George Lucas talked about making nine, or even twelve, Star Wars movies. Then he ran out of gas after six (some would say before), and decided to pay the bills with royalties from action figures and trading card games instead. That doesn’t mean other people can’t make more of them, though! I guess this computer-animated film qualifies as another addition to the so-called “Expanded Universe”…and if you don’t know what that phrase means, it’s probably not for you. As I understand it, this is the kick-off for a planned TV series of the same name. No word on how it relates to the previous animated series Star Wars: Clone Wars (but I assume it’s something like the relationship between Ghostbusters and The Real Ghostbusters).
Recommended if you know who Zorba the Hutt is
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
First Match Point, then Cassandra’s Dream…and now yet another critically acclaimed Woody Allen film? Is it possible that we’re experiencing a Woody Allen Renaissance? “Woody Allen Movies” is a genre (yes, genre) that refuses to go away, so I sure hope so. As I understand it, this one stars Penelope Cruz and Scarlett Johansson as a couple of Americans named Vicky and Cristina, who fight with Spaniard Rebecca Hall over her boyfriend Javier Bardem, in Barcelona. Now if only I could figure out where he got the title…
Recommended if you actually saw Scoop
These things just keep coming…hit the jump for more.
Mirrors
The latest unnecessary horror remake that you won’t see, brought to you by the latest flavor-of-the-month director that you don’t care about, who also directed some other unnecessary horror remake that you didn’t see, and don’t remember!
Recommended if you liked The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (the remake) or Shutter (the remake), or are looking forward to The Thing (the remake of the remake)
Fly Me to the Moon
I’d like to dismiss this as yet another pointless computer-generated-talking-animal movie (and I will in a second), but there are a handful of things that make it somewhat notable. First, it was produced in Belgium, not the U.S.; second, it’s in full 3D (and I’m a sucker for that stuff — I even sat through Beowulf without compaining much); third, it’s based around the 1969 Apollo moon mission (which kids should know about); and fourth, it’s named after a song popularized by Frank Sinatra and Count Basie — and who doesn’t love those guys? But if you’re looking for an excuse to stay away, here’s all you need to know: one of the characters is a nerd named “I.Q.” That’s the level of creativity we’re dealing with here.
Recommended if you just can’t wait for the sequel to Space Chimps
Henry Poole is Here
This is one of those indie-esque dramas where the press gives you almost no hints as to what the plot is supposed to be. I think Luke Wilson stars as some sort of terminally ill dude, and then Jesus appears in his stucco? And then maybe it’s not Jesus? And a bunch of really moving stuff happens? And the audience stands up and claps? Something like that. It does have Radha Mitchell and George Lopez in it. So there is that.
Recommended if you liked The Fighting Temptations or Saved!…maybe
on Aug 13 2008 @ 3:14 pm 1. scary film reviewer said …
wow, that synopsis and commentary on Mirrors is really lame. Come on now, is that really how you feel? That was just a low blow, cheap shot to any fan of horror. Alex Aja did one remake outside of this one. Two very gripping thrillers/horror films, and while Mirrors might not be movie gold, I’m not 100% sure it deserved such a slap in the face. Now I feel really dumb for wanting/going to see it this weekend.
on Aug 13 2008 @ 3:29 pm 2. Fox said …
Yo, I went and saw that dope ass movie Scoop! So what of it buddy!??? Huh, Huh!!!??? Yeeeah… wassup now… you scared or su’in?
And Alex Aja doesn’t just deserve a slap in the face, he deserves a kick in the poop hole. I wanna fight him. >[
on Aug 13 2008 @ 3:33 pm 3. Evan Derrick said …
On the one hand I agree with scary film reviewer – Aja is one of the better horror talents working today. On the other hand it is yet another remake of an Asian horror film, which says nothing positive in the slightest about the state of American horror. I realize he’s French, but since his import into the states, he’s fallen sadly into line with Hollywood’s way of churning out lame horror remakes. Why is it that all of the good horror films are foreign these days?
on Aug 13 2008 @ 3:34 pm 4. Luke Harrington said …
It looks like I’m stirring up some strong emotions here…seriously, SFR, if I had known there was someone out there who was taking my writing that seriously, I wouldn’t have said half the things I have. I’m more annoyed with the general trend of horror remakes than I am with Mirrors in particular. :\
And Fox…you don’t wanna mess with this.
on Aug 13 2008 @ 3:35 pm 5. Evan Derrick said …
Oh, and Rebecca Hall is the ‘Vicky,’ not Penelope Cruz (who plays Bardem’s ex-wife, not his girlfriend). I realize that is confusing since Hall is conspicuously not on the poster and Cruz is.
on Aug 13 2008 @ 3:36 pm 6. G said …
I liked Scoop way more than Match Point. Woody really, really wants to be a director of dramas, not comedies (I’ve read his book of interviews, and he is obsessed with it) but he’s just not. He can do comedy and “dramedy” but drama is not his thing. Even Interiors is only a partial success.
Obviously, you and I were looking at different metacritic pages for Cassandra’s dream.
Metacritic: 49/100
Rotten Tomatoes: 51/100
RT Top Critics: 43/100
That’s not acclaim, I don’t think.
on Aug 13 2008 @ 3:38 pm 7. Luke Harrington said …
Hmmm…I guess you’re right. I didn’t check Metacritic (or its ilk), but I remembered hearing generally good things about it. Perhaps I remembered wrong.
on Aug 13 2008 @ 4:00 pm 8. Fox said …
Dang… look at Evan scooping in to correct the error on the VCB preview. You guys are hardcore around here!
But on VCB trailer, I really love the way it ends with Penelope Cruz shooting the gun and the screen goes to black.
I’m an admitted Woody Allen devotee, so I am very biased when it comes to his stuff, and probably blind to his lesser works. I agree with G on liking Scoop better than Match Point, and I halfway like Cassandra’s Dream. But I like Woody’s “murder” movies better when they have have an undercurrent of comedy to them like Crimes and Misdemeanors and Manhattan Murder Mystery.
on Aug 13 2008 @ 4:01 pm 9. Evan Derrick said …
I haven’t seen Scoop, G, but I found Match Point absolutely riveting. One of the most intense, searing dramas I have ever seen. Just one man’s opinion, of course (and, as you pointed out, Cassandra’s Dream did not fare well in any sense), but any director that can pull off a film like Match Point has knack for drama plain and simple.
on Aug 13 2008 @ 4:56 pm 10. Joseph said …
“Recommended if you know who Zorba the Hutt is”
Guilty as charged.
on Aug 13 2008 @ 4:58 pm 11. Alexander Coleman said …
Match Point, I fear, plays best the first time you view it, and then it gradually loses more and more with each revisiting. In that sense, it’s a pretty shallow thriller, and also a recycling of Crimes and Misdemeanors.
Manhattan Murder Mystery–now that’s an underrated Allen film. Having recently seen it again, I must commend the way in which Allen mixes some unsettling Hitchcockian tension with laugh-out-loud moments.
Scoop is pretty awful in the sense that, you immediately accept that it’s Allen working in a minor key, but it’s just not even successful on that modest score card. So, it’s a thoroughly lightweight comedy–fine. But it didn’t provoke a single laugh.
I found Cassandra’s Dream to be perhaps Allen indulging in his worst instincts. It’s the one movie he’s made that was in its own way depressing–because it’s an achingly somber story told clumsily and lethargically… It was like attempting to surf on molasses.
I’m hoping Vicky Christina Barcelona is Allen’s true comeback. I have a good feeling about it. Of course, that might just be from looking at Penelope Cruz in the ads and trailer.
on Aug 13 2008 @ 5:15 pm 12. Fox said …
Wait…. “Zorba the Hutt” is a real character in Star Wars!?!? I thought Luke was just making a bizarre Nikos Kazantzakis joke!
Alexander -
I agree with your analysis of Cassandra’s Dream, but what made it watchable for me was the performance of Colin Farrell.
Similarily in Scoop, I thought – surprisingly – that Scarlett Johannson did a great job as the surrogate “Woody” character… especially after that excruciating performance by Jason Biggs in Anything Else (Woody’s worst film, in my opinion…)
on Aug 13 2008 @ 6:04 pm 13. G said …
I could not be more excited about the love for Manhattan Murder Mystery. An utterly charming film, one where his use of the great directors is productive rather than mere mimicry (see A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy, Interiors). Although I love both Diane Keaton and Mia Farrow, Anjelica Huston may be the greatest female Allen player of them all. After not getting her fair share in Crimes and Misdemeanors (an even better film), she dominates this one even when she’s not onscreen, intimidating the three other major characters with her intelligence and her sexuality. Basically, she rules. As does the movie.
Match Point just felt like an empty and shallow exercise to me, and the “which way will the ring fall” seen (which Allen described as his inspiration for the entire film) seemed trite and deflating. But nowhere near as trite and deflating as the film’s latter third degeneration into keystone kops routine( “But what if someone planned the first murder, and then the second murder was an accident.” “Nah.”)
New topic: How bitter am I that I now seem to hate dramatic irony in all of its forms? Anyone with me on this? anyone?
on Aug 13 2008 @ 8:00 pm 14. Luke Harrington said …
Yeah Fox…I wish I was that literate.
on Aug 14 2008 @ 10:02 pm 15. Phillip Johnston said …
Robert Downey Jr. is gut-bustingly hilarious in Tropic Thunder. I was in stitches every time he was on screen.
The rest of the movie was a different story.
on Aug 15 2008 @ 12:24 am 16. Sam Juliano said …
“The rest of the movie was a different story”
I haven’t seen it yet, and I won’t make any conclusions, but I would place even money on that turning out to be a fact!”