Category: External Movies (Page 236 of 336)

Wrapping up Tarantino Tuesday

August 18, 2009 /

Quentin Tarantino has eaten my day! And there’s no guarantee it won’t also be Tarantino Wednesday-Sunday!

Nothing to do but share a few links you may have missed and I’ve failed to include here prior.

I tend to fight the temptation vigorously, but we film geeks love our lists, and Tarantino has participated in two this week. The first is his twenty favorite films that have come out since he began directing in 1992. It’s been on every blog on town, so I don’t see why we should be any different. (H/t Anne Thompson and every other blog in town.)

Do I agree with his choices? Nah, not very many. Some are downright baffling, including his favorite, “Battle Royale.” It’s an entertaining/disturbing little movie but, though it was a huge film for many, it wouldn’t come close for me to something like, say, the vastly less well known “A Dirty Carnival” — it might make my top twenty for the year it came out. On the other hand, agreeing is never the point of this film criticism game; that’s a mistake too many make. Also, my list covering the same period would have at least two, maybe three, but no more than four, Tarantino movies, so there’s that.

And that other list. In this case, Tarantino collaborated with the critics of England’s Time Out on a catalogue of what they see as the “The 50 Greatest World War II Movies.” It’s a genuinely interesting group of movies, and there isn’t a single film that I don’t think should be seen on it (including a few I need to get caught up on myself). Actually, there is one exception. I was essentially praying for death through of all “The Thin Red Line,” so bored was I with the intense beauty of Terence Malick’s imagery, so I can’t really recommend that one. Some people think it’s great. Also, thanks to my WWII movie-loving buddy, Randy Reynaldo, for sending me the link. And we both agree: Where’s “Stalag 17” Where???

The invaluable David Hudson has tons more, some of which may still end up here, too. More to come, for sure, in any case.

Action Movies, External Entertainment, External Movies, Horror Movies, Movie Comedies, Movie Dramas, Movies, News, Sci-Fi Movies

In which “Basterd” week gets going (updated)

August 18, 2009 /

It wouldn’t be the week of a new Quentin Tarantino movie without a little controversy. Now esteemed critic, film historian, and occasional hair-up-his-keister provocateur (not that there’s anything wrong with that!) Jonathan Rosenbaum helpfully supplies it in discussing a Newsweek piece, comparing good ol’ QT to both Holocaust deniers and Sarah Palin in one short blog post. (H/t David Hudson.)

Unlike Rosenbaum, I haven’t seen the movie yet so I’ll withhold comment. However, my bias is obviously pretty pro-Tarantino and pro- not seeing it as some kind of dangerous revisionism. What’s one boldly ahistoric movie against thousands made before it? It’s not like Tarantino’s deleting them from Netflix. I also fail to see how Rosenbaum can even begin to speak for the reaction to the film of real-life Holocaust victims. It’s putting an awful lot of power on the movie to imagine it’s causing any real distress to them without some evidence.

I’m a pretty proud secular Jew myself, so I take the Holocaust seriously. At the same time, I take the sort of ownership some Jewish thinkers take over the history of what happened at the time, and how filmmakers deal with it, with a huge lack of seriousness. Some years back, Roberto Benigni’s Holocaust tearjerker, “Life is Beautiful,” started a different sort of controversy and I felt many took excessive offense. I was moved by the movie, almost despite myself, but I could certainly understand why a lot of people disliked it. However, the level of vituperation still puzzles me. I once listened to two well known Jewish critics verbally bludgeon a well-known Los Angeles rabbi for daring to speak well of the film on a local public radio station. What gave them to right to decide how the rabbi was allowed to react?

Many years before that, Mel Brooks took some heat for daring to make fun of Hitler in the original film of “The Producers.” Even the deadly serious, extremely well received, riveting and thought provoking historical drama “Downfall” worried some because it presenting the monstrous dictator as a human being. That was, I thought, deeply wrong. It’s crucial that we remember, always, that Hitler was as human as any of us lest we start to act as if we are beyond evil, a popular belief among the actually evil.

Of course, adding comedy to anything touching on the Holocaust is really asking for trouble from some quarters. I haven’t been able to dig up a review of “Downfall” by Rosenbaum online, but I wonder what Rosenbaum thinks of the “Downfall” subtitle Internet meme? Would he agree with the take offered below?


UPDATE: Roger Ebert’s e-mail interview with Tarantino deals with “Basterd” history and actual film history.

Action Movies, External Entertainment, External Movies, Movie Comedies, Movie Dramas, Movies, News

More megabucks, more superheroes, and the opposite.

August 17, 2009 /

The news earlier in the day was just the start. It’s been a busy Monday in Hollywood.

* Different publications are offering a slightly different ways of putting it, but a new version of Dreamworks is being launched by Steven Spielberg, who is ending his relationship with Paramount, and executive Stacey Snider. They’re doing so with the help of $825 million in financing (that’s enough for 4.85 “G.I. Joe” movies) including a big chunk from India’s Reliance Entertainment. U.S. distribution of the new Dreamworks’ films will be handled by Disney, so we guess they’re no longer competitors. (Remember those pokes at Disney in “Shrek”?)

Everyone’s reporting on this but the most lucid version is being offered by Anne Thompson, even if I’d need a glossary to fully understand phrases like “J.P. Morgan’s syndication of approximately $325 million of senior debt”…something about a fancy way of retiring old debt? I’m going to have to work on that. Carl DiOrio also offers a fairly readable version.

* Speaking of Dreamworks, Brad Pitt is stepping in for a mysteriously departing Robert Downey, Jr. in the animated superhero/supervillian comedy “Oobermind.” I say mysterious because, as the Hitfix staff points out, the reason cited for Downey’s departure is a scheduling conflict, which is odd as it’s usually not very hard to reschedule someone for a solo taping session. It’s not like he would have had to spend six weeks on location in the Sahara dessert.

Brad Pitt’s comedic side has been seriously underutilized, but maybe not after what I take it is a fairly off-kilter and funny performance in “Inglourious Basterds.” (Lee Marvin was also kind of hilarious in “The Dirty Dozen,” come to think of it.) The cast of “Oobermind” will also include the suddenly-in-everything Jonah Hill and Tina Fey.

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External Entertainment, External Movies, Movie Comedies, Movies, News

Superheroes and megabucks

August 17, 2009 /

Just another day in movietown.

* Sony has signed James Vanderbilt, who wrote the first draft of “Spiderman 4” (now twice rewritten), to pen an additional two Spidey screenplays. Writer Michael Fleming speculates that the studio wants to speed up production as the S-man is their most reliable vehicle and a Julie Taymor’s Broadway musical with music by Bono and the Edge, is in fairly deep financial doo-doo long before opening night. (Of course, there is another way Sony could make money — come up with something new…nah.) Vanderbilt, by the way, is also the writer behind Brian Fincher’s cinephile favorite, “Zodiac.”

I personally wonder if Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, and Sam Raimi have much interest in doing any more films after the next one, which I suspect is a bit of a Mulligan for the sporadically entertaining and occasionally embarrassing mess that was the last Spiderman film. Also, Maguire is older than he looks (34 as of last June), and time is running out. A forty-something actor might work for Iron Man, but for Spidey, it’s kind of another story.

* Speaking of young superheroes, or in this case super anti-heroes, Variety tells us that Lionsgate has purchased the domestic rights to Matthew Vaughn’s comic-book adaptation “Kick-Ass,” with a cast that includes Nicolas Cage, Aaron Johnson, Chloe Moretz and Christopher Mintz-Plasse. Anne Thompson is very much on board and notes the strategy of indies using Comic-Con to get distribution. She also has a video from the con which doesn’t want to play properly on my computer. In addition, those who understand finances better than I might be able to draw something kind of line between and this Nikki Finke item having to do with the sale of some stock by Lionsgate Bigwig Joe Drake.

* Ignoring my fervent prayers, “G.I. Joe” is doing very well abroad. At least people who complain about the dumbing down of America will have to realize it’s not just us. Misery loves company.

Action Movies, Actors, Actresses, Comic-Con, External Entertainment, External Movies, News, Sci-Fi Movies

Alien nation movie moments #4

August 16, 2009 /

With “District 9” having made a pleasantly surprising $37 million, it seems fitting to wrap this theme up with a couple of trailers from the grand-daddy of all alien invasion stories with a political subtext. H.G. Wells’ “The War of the Worlds,” was pretty clearly intended as a metaphor about British colonialism. Certainly, any decent version of the story gives us an idea of what it must be like to have a vastly powerful nation suddenly invade for some reason of their own (not that that ever happens anymore).

We’re going to travel backwards in time with trailers for both the 2005 Steven Spielberg and the 1951 George Pal film versions.

“The Tasmanians, in spite of their human likeness, were entirely swept out of existence in a war of extermination waged by European immigrants, in the space of fifty years. Are we such apostles of mercy as to complain if the Martians warred in the same spirit?” — H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, 1898

Below the flip, I’ve got a special audio bonus.

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External Movies, Movies, Sci-Fi Movies

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