Tag: Will Ferrell (Page 3 of 6)

This Tuesday in TV-DVD – Nov. 3, 2009

November 3, 2009 /

* The Rockford Files: Movie Collection, Vol. 1: It’s like I said in my review: if these movies aren’t necessarily up to the standards of the original series – and let’s face it: they often aren’t – it’s so good to see James Garner, Stuart Margolin, and Joe Santos back in their familiar roles that it hardly matters.

* The Shield: The Complete Series Collection: Similarly, I’ll let Jason’s review speak for this set. “From its great ensemble cast and the memorable group of characters they portrayed, to the writing team’s ability to consistently hammer out quality and controversial storylines, ‘The Shield’ is by far one of the best cop dramas ever produced. Nay, one of the best dramas, period. It may not have gotten the attention it deserved during its seven years on the air, but its release on DVD will ensure that the legacy lives on for many years to come. If nothing else, you can expect it to be heavily referenced when the next great cop drama arrives on television, because while ‘The Shield’ may not have invented the wheel, it definitely burned the rubber off the tires enough times for people to take notice.” I have no doubt that he’s right. And one of these days, maybe I’ll even get a chance to sit down and watch it myself.

* Will Ferrell: You’re Welcome, America – A Final Night with George W. Bush: Adam McKay described Ferrell’s one-man Broadway show as “one of those great projects where you really walk in not at all caring about what the critics are going to say.” That’s probably a good thing, given what Jeff Giles, has to say about it. (To be fair, though, even McKay admitted that, although “the director of our special, Marty Callner, did an amazing job, nothing ever matches the live experience. The people who saw it live had a totally different reaction to it.”)

* Mission: Impossible – The Final TV Season: By the time this, the show’s seventh season, rolled around, you needed a formal checklist to cite all of the people whose departure left fans saying that it “hasn’t been the same since.” There’s no Martin Landau, no Barbara Bain…even Leonard Nimoy was gone by this point. But, hey, the big three – Peter Graves, Greg Morris, and Peter Lupus – are still around, with Lynda Day George serving as the season’s predominant femme fatale. Now that the whole series is available, when are we going to get the 1988 revival released on DVD?

* Spin City: Season Three: Shout Factory must’ve blown its whole bonus-material budget for the show on the Season 1 set, because we haven’t seen a single special feature since, but at least the comedy keeps on coming.

* Star Wars: The Clone Wars – The Complete Season One: Your mileage on this show varies by how much you can stand of George Lucas’s prequels, but at the very least, it looks and sounds good.

* Walt Disney Treasures: Zorro – The Complete First Season / Walt Disney Treasures: Zorro – The Complete Second Season: Once upon a time, when Antonio Banderas was merely a twinkle in his father’s eye, Guy Williams was dressed in black and bringing a whole new meaning to the phrase “cutting Z’s.” As usual, you can count on Disney to hook you up with a plethora of classic bonus material.

* Doctor Who: The War Games / Doctor Who: The Black Guardian Trilogy: What the…? Our man Ross has written full-length reviews for both sets? I am shocked. Shocked. Sounds like “The Black Guardian Trilogy” might be pretty good if you just skipped over the middle part of the trilogy. As for “The War Games,” while Ross says it’s “difficult to recommend…to people unfamiliar with it,” it’s a fantastic set for fans, and “the transfer and restoration work are just freaking gorgeous.”

* Fraggle Rock: The Complete Series Collection: Dance your cares away, worries for another day, and let the music play down in Fraggle Rock for as long as you can stand to watch. But given that it’s a Jim Henson production, you can probably stand to watch for a very long time, indeed. Actually, this isn’t the first time we’ve been offered a complete-series set for this show, but as someone who owns the notebook-styled version that came out last year, where the DVDs fall out way too easily, I can assure you that you’ll be a lot better off if you pick up this one instead.

* G.I. Joe: Resolute: I haven’t seen this Cartoon Network series, nor have I seen the new movie, but I don’t think I’m going too far out on a limb to suggest that this might be better than the movie. Or, at least, that’s the buzz, anyway.

Other releases this week:

* Ruby-Spears Superman:
* Here’s Lucy: Season 2:
* The Donna Reed Show: Season 3
* Art 21: Season 5
* Edge of Darkness: The Complete BBC Series

And – ho, ho, ho! – a trio of holiday releases for the kiddies:

* Dora the Explorer: Dora’s Christmas Carol Adventure
* Thomas & Friends: Holiday Express
* Merry Sitcom! Christmas Classics from TV’s Golden Age

Doctor Who, External Entertainment, External TV, News, The Shield, TV, TV Action, TV Comedies, TV Dramas, TV DVDs, TV Sci-Fi

You’re Welcome America: A Final Night with George W. Bush

November 3, 2009 /

Given how brutally Will Ferrell skewered George W. Bush during the 2000 election, you’d think a one-man show in which Ferrell celebrates the end of Bush’s two terms with 90 minutes of proudly partisan buffoonery would be a can’t-miss prospect — and during the limited live run of “You’re Welcome America: A Final Night with George W. Bush,” that may have been true. On DVD, however, Ferrell’s salute to the former Commander-in-Chief provokes more chuckles than guffaws, due at least in part to the fact that, despite his many contributions to late night comics’ monologues, Bush’s presidency really wasn’t all that funny. Taped shortly after Bush yielded office to Barack Obama (or, as Ferrell’s version of W. calls him, “the Tiger Woods guy”), this performance initially had the power of pent-up catharsis to get it across; now, however, it’s mostly just a faintly humorous, somewhat painful look back at a period of American history pockmarked with war, terrorism, economic turmoil, and a horrific natural disaster. Ferrell’s squints, frat-boy chuckles, and screams of idiotic rage just can’t keep up with it all, although the show’s more brazenly surreal moments (including a dance with Condoleezza Rice, played here by the fearless Pia Glenn) offer pleasant reminders of just how far he’s willing to go for his comedy. If you really loathed Bush, you’ll probably want to own it — or at least watch it — just to have one last laugh at his expense, but otherwise, this is a pretty lukewarm roast.

Click to buy “You’re Welcome America: A Final Night with George W. Bush”

Humor, TV, TV Comedies, TV DVD Quicktakes, TV DVDs

Friday movie news dump

October 16, 2009 /

It’s that time of the week when we offload the week’s last few stories.

Will Ferrell in * In the wake of his “Land of the Lost” debacle, Will Ferrell is going back to “Stranger than Fiction” territory with a more low-key form of comedy, writes Mike Fleming. “Everything Must Go” will be from first-time feature director Dan Rush and is based on a story by Raymond Carver — not an author frequently connected with hilarity though the script is apparently primarily a comedy and the premise (a newly unemployed guy’s wife locks him out and deposits his stuff on the lawn…and the guy responds by trying to sell all of it) sounds potentially pretty funny.

It’s important to remember that, once upon a time, not all comedies were expected to be laugh-riot farces and, ironically enough, they were often funnier anyhow. (The classical definition of comedy, by the way, is less about being funny and more about having a happy ending. By that definition, many black comedies are not comedies at all.)

* More from Fleming: Robert Redford’s new Lincoln conspiracy film started shooting on Monday and he has quite a cast assembled. This one could be good.

* American liberals like me complain a lot, and for very good reason, about the actions of media mega mogul Rupert Murdoch, particularly in regards to how his TV news network is essentially an arm of the Republican Party. But, it could be a lot worse. Italy’s scandal-ridden, far-right movie and TV mogul Murdoch-equivalent actually runs the freaking country and I bet Italian rightwingers cry about the “liberal media” and the evils of the Rome film-making establishment too. But, hey, at least they have health care,.

* Speaking of media moguls, Nikki Finke believes that GE may ultimately divest itself of NBC Universal, which may please ecologically minded and antiwar folks while depriving “30 Rock” of one of its best running gags. Still, Finke says it may be seven years before it’s complete, so Tina Fey & company should be able to milk it sufficiently. Also, Finke wonders about Ted Turner’s mental health in regard to Time-Warner.

* It may be last summer’s news here in the U.S., but “Up” continues to land on top of the global box office.

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

Today in casting news

September 23, 2009 /

There are times when I really think I shouldn’t mention another single casting related story. There are so many, and the news so often changes several times before the first day of shooting, that it seems kind of pointless. Nevertheless, today brings us a few such items that sort of demand a little attention.

* I don’t think I’ve mentioned the word that’s been floating around for a while now that Brad Pitt will apparently be opposite Robert Downey, Jr. playing the role of Sherlock Holmes’ archnemisis, Prof. James Moriarity, aka “the Napoleon of Crime.” Though it appears he’ll only be in a cameo role, if at all, in the upcoming “Sherlock Holmes” film directed by Guy Ritchie, he’ll apparently be handling head villain duties in the already-planned for sequel — assuming, of course, that the first film is reasonably profitable.

If you can’t get enough of excessively early speculation, Spout’s Christopher Campbell was way ahead of me and rounded that all up as of yesterday. Pitt seems an unusual choice, but he’s always seemed to do better in character roles than leading man parts, and Downey is a genius at bringing a bit of character to leading man roles, so there’s a nice bit of symmetry here.

* If one or even two well known leads can’t guarantee box office success, why not try four and add a cult-comedy kicker? That seems to be thinking behind the latest collaboration of comedy writer-director Adam McKay and post “Land of the Lost“-still-megastar Will Ferrell.

As described by MTV’s Mike Wigler and THR‘s Mike Fleming, “The Other Guys” is a post “Hot Fuzz” spin on the buddy-cop genre in which Samuel L. Jackson and Dwayne “No Longer the Rock” Johnson will attempt to allow a day in the sun for presumably bumbling, non-supercop ne’er do wells Ferrell and Mark “It’s been Decades Since I’ve Been ‘Marky Mark!” Wahlberg.  Only time will tell if this funky bunch — which also includes English comic Steve Coogan of “Tropic Thunder” and “24 Hour Party People” — delivers at the box office, but all five of these guys have proven they can be varying degrees of funny.

For some reason Jackson  hasn’t had much luck with out-and-out comedies. (He once remarked wryly that, “They were all funny while we were making them.”) Personally, I’d like to see him break that particular curse. I’m sure he would too.

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

Adam McKay has “The Goods”

August 27, 2009 /

You may not know Adam McKay by name, but you’ve almost certainly seen his work: the former “Saturday Night Live” writer has been virtually inseperable from Will Ferrell since the latter ankled “SNL” for a future in feature films, directing such comedy classics as “Anchorman,” “Talladega Nights,” and “Step Brothers.” And that isn’t all — McKay and Ferrell’s production company, Gary Sanchez Productions, is responsible for a long list of films and television shows, including “Eastbound and Down,” “The Foot Fist Way,” and, most recently, “The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard.” It’s that last project that has McKay making the publicity rounds these days, discussing the Sanchez-produced, Jeremy Piven-led comedy about a legendary car salesman.

Of course, with a resume — and list of upcoming projects — as intriguing as McKay’s, “The Goods” isn’t the only thing worth talking about, and during his recent chat with McKay, Bullz-Eye’s Will Harris made sure to pick his brain about a variety of topics, from how he and Ferrell met to the second season of “Eastbound and Down” to that oft-rumored “Anchorman” sequel. Which, McKay tells us, will happen…eventually:

We have a very clear idea for it, we want to do it, and we’ve talked to everyone, and everyone has said that they’re in, but everyone has schedules. Sadly, the second part after I say, ‘We’ll do it,’ is that it could be two or three years away.

With eight more episodes of “Eastbound and Down” on the way, it’s only natural to wonder how much McKay can spill about where the next season will take us — and just as natural for McKay to play it close to the vest:

Let’s see if I can give a clue without wrecking anything. I’d say the question for this season is, “Will Kenny return?” I don’t know, I don’t want to say anything. I don’t want to wreck it, because they have some cool ideas.

And that’s just scratching the surface of the interview. To read about McKay’s thoughts on the “SNL” years, his feelings about the impending DVD release of “You’re Welcome America: A Final Night with George W. Bush,” what to expect from Jon Heder’s upcoming sitcom, and more, click on the image above or follow this link!

External Entertainment, Interviews, Movies, TV

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