Spielberg delivers the T-Rex money shot in "Jurassic Park".

(Steven Spielberg, 1993)

November 26, 2009

by Joel Crary

For my money, no modern director is as consistently reliable as Steven Spielberg, who approaches a wide variety of genres with a seemingly tireless eagerness to make exemplars for each. The first three-quarters of “Jurassic Park” is superb adventure filmmaking of the highest order. One scene, in which a Tyrannosaurus Rex breaks free of its enclosure and attacks a group of tourists, remains among one of the most harrowing ever filmed. Before the 21st century Spielberg, who elected to go all George Lucas on a re-released “E.T.” that toned down its scarier material, his younger self had no qualms with putting children in harm’s way.

As a child, I loved him for it. Sixteen years after I saw the film in theatres, there is still a palpable sense of terror to the T-Rex scene as it nearly crushes the children under a sunroof before flipping the car and grinding it into the muddied road like a finished cigarette. In that scene and others in which dinosaurs are majestically portrayed as having returned to roam the earth after 65 million years, the boy in Spielberg is apparent, using all of the tools at his disposal to recreate the wonder he must have felt at a young age when flipping through illustrations in a grade school science textbook.

I had a first or second row seat for my first viewing of “Jurassic Park”. People crammed into theatres to see it , the result of a marketing campaign that spent a dollar for every year that dinosaurs had been extinct. It seemed less a film that a full-on cultural event, something completely unique in light of most of its competition in the summer of ‘93, which included “Super Mario Bros.” and “Last Action Hero”. Merchandise and ancillary products dominated store shelves. Toronto named their new basketball team after a dinosaur that no one had so much as heard of three years prior.

Most significantly, “Jurassic Park” was the film that changed the movie-making landscape with regard to CGI. Sequences such as the running of the gallimimus herd and the brachiosaurus encounter, animated by the effects creators at the still teenaged Industrial Light & Magic, opened up doors of possibility for animators still working within the limitations of stop motion on productions. After “Jurassic Park”, unreal creatures began to move more fluently, extending the possibilities of the corporeal onscreen.

The film’s strongest effects work, however, remains in the realm of animatronics, which have always trumped CGI. The T-Rex is actually there in the frame, screaming like something out of a nightmare as it tears an electric fence to pieces. The potency of “Jurassic Park’s” dinosaur scenes comes from the effort of the effects team to study the creatures’ behaviour and apply it to their movements. The filmmakers are aware that all most of us know about dinosaurs comes from what we have retained from lessons and theories learned in childhood – the T-Rex can’t see you if you don’t move; the brontosaurus eats leaves, not people – thereupon building our empathy for the hapless characters as they find themselves at the mercy of natural selection.

For the most part, Michael Crichton and David Koepp’s script is wisely fueled by the awe of their characters. These days, the movie starts to lose me around the time Dr. Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern) has to restore electrical power to the park. Spielberg gets a little too energetic with his camera movements, which try in vain to pump life into the film after the T-Rex scene has shattered the nerves. There are plot holes and conveniences galore, such as the scene where Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neill) throws a stick at an electric fence to see if it’s still working, or the fact that 13-year-old Lex (Ariana Richards) knows how to navigate a UNIX interface to restore the compound’s locking mechanisms.

“Jurassic Park” was my introduction to the brilliance of Jeff Goldblum. Viewing Ian Malcolm in the post-Brundlefly context puts a whole new weird spin on his oddly delivered observations regarding chaos theory in the evolutionary process, but he’s wasted in the film’s second half, where he is positioned in fetishistic shots that linger on his bare chest and placement akin to some kind of fallen Greek deity. Samuel L. Jackson also plays an understated role as one of the park’s technicians with an Andy Capp smoke perpetually dangling from his lips, and in his portlier days, Wayne Knight tangles with an acid-spitting dilophosaurus and loses in mucky fashion.

The character I’ve come to enjoy most is Robert Muldoon (Bob Peck), who lived in Crichton’s book but dies in the film. In spite of his fatal error in hunting velociraptors, he’s the one guy out of the lot I’d trust to escape the island with, as he’s the only one who seems to acknowledge exactly what the dinosaurs are capable of. Had he survived, I believe he could have single-handedly prevented the next two installments in the “Jurassic Park” series, or at least brought some much needed good sense to “The Lost World”.

John Hammond (Richard Attenborough), the showman, cares little for the science behind his attraction. I like his bit of dialogue about the flea circus, pregnant as it is with the idea of trading in things we can’t see for things that are too big to imagine, overwhelming ourselves with our own power simply to see if it can be done. “Jurassic Park” is about ambition and a desire for capital triumphing over good ideas, told with an excitement for the scientific method and what becomes possible for the adult who never fully grows out of his childhood fantasies. Spielberg clearly never has.

Kenneth Branagh’s adaption of Thor has a great cast already in place. Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Tom Hiddleston as Loki, Anthony Hopkins as Odin, Natalie Portman, Jaimie Alexander, Colm Feore, Samuel L. Jackson to name but a few.

MTV Splash Page recently spoke with Natalie Portman, who was promoting her new film Brothers, and she revealed that Kat Dennings (Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist) has a role in Thor as well.

“Well I’m really excited,” Portman told MTV News. “Kat Dennings is going to be in it with me and she’s a good friend and an amazing actress, so I’m looking forward to that.”

Variety has confirmed Dennings’ role in the film and is reporting that she will play Darcy, who works with Natalie Portman’s character, Jane Foster.

Thor is out on 20 May 2011.

I dare you. I double dare you motherf*cker!

Get the tshirt here

Poco material esta saliendo por ahora de esta esperadísima secuela, fotos, alguna que otra visita al set de rodaje, mas fotos, mas visitas al set, y mas fotos.

Hoy nos llega lo que será la próxima portada de la revista Empire, que tiene al Hombre de Hierro como principal reclamo.

Recupero un par de imágenes que tenia por aquí guardadas sin haber publicado, en la que podemos ver a Stark en una cafetería con la armadura de Iron Man y varios pics de lo que será una línea de juguetes del film para ir haciéndonos una ligera idea de cómo será, por ejemplo, Don Cheadle como Maquina de Guerra.

Os dejo también un video piratón del footage mostrado en la pasada Comic Con de San Diego, cuyos últimos minutos son para mear y no echar gota, cuando salga en buena calidad no quiero ni imaginármelo…Maquina de Guerra va a repartir de lo lindo.

Quentin Tarantino may be many things — perverted, profane, whipsmart, cocky, a little too enamored with his own cleverness — but subtle he is not. He’s not even in the ballpark. Matter of fact, if that ballpark blew up, he wouldn’t hear the sound for another three days. Nah, Tarantino’s a guts-glory-chicks-and-explosions kind of director, and that imagination of his? In the name of Le Royale with Cheese does it dream up some wild-n-twisted trips.

Mark ”Pulp Fiction” down as one of the wildest. Every nanosecond of this humdinger’s 154 minutes contains something warped/crazy/effortlessly cool to behold: philosophical discussions about foot massages, the nature of miracles and a gold watche that has been places no watch should go; murders both coolly calculated and comically accidental; a frightful drug overdose; kinky sex (think S&M with an Alabama drawl and a gimp); and, last but not least, a sinfully delicious $5 milkshake. Random as this catalogue seems, Tarantino’s film is far more scattershot. The action doesn’t adhere to a simple timeline; instead, there are three stories that run parallel, then smash together, then diverge only to reconnect in ways that boggle the mind upon repeat viewings. “Pulp Fiction” is a genius noir/gangster combo that keeps us guessing. Guess long enough, though, and patterns start to emerge from the madness.

Sort of. Since Tarantino makes it nearly impossible to understand how these stories pool into a cohesive ending, let’s tackle one beast at a time. First, there’s “Vincent Vega and Marcellus Wallace’s Wife,” the tale of L.A. hitmen Vince (John Travolta) and Jules (a perfeclty cast Samuel L. Jackson) heading to do a job ordered by their loose-cannon boss Marsellus (Ving Rhames). Since Marsellus recently threw a guy out a high-rise window for giving his wife Mia (Uma Thurman) a foot massage, Vince has the jitters about taking her out on the town. His plan is simple: “Chew my food with my mouth closed, laugh at her fucking jokes, and that’s it.” Of course, trouble has a tendency to follow Vince, so things don’t go that smoothly.

Smoothness doesn’t much like Butch (Bruce Willis) either, which we discover in ”The Gold Watch.” A talented boxer with a sweetly innocent girlfriend (Maria de Medeiros), Butch shovels some dirt on his own grave by winning the fight Marsellus paid him to throw. But his neat double-cross turns messy through a series of freak coincidences, the most interesting involving two pawn shop owners who plumb forgot to pack their manners (not to mention their morality) when they left the Deep South. ”The Gold Watch” leads into “The Bonnie Situation,” a conclusion of sorts where Tarantino himself shows up as Jimmie Dimmick, a pal of Jules who begrudgingly agrees to help him clean up an accidental hit (“my gun went off! I don’t know why!” insists the a brain matter-spattered Vance) with help from Winston Wolf (Harvey Keitel). What’s on Wolfe’s business card we can’t be sure, since the terse mystery man only offers “I solve problems” as his job description.

It’s offhand comments like these that demonstrate one of Tarantino’s greatest strengths: revealing character traits with one or two stray lines of dialogue. He’s a student of human nature, and he knows the ways people fill time by arguing over whether foot massages are sensual or wondering what cheeseburgers are called in France (see above). And yet everything these characters say tells us something about themselves or the story. Christopher Walken, in his lone scene, delivers a howling-good speech that seems like comic relief, but the subject — the gold watch — comes back into play. Jules spouts a nonsensical version of Ezekiel 25:17, but it reveals his own moral code. Thurman, who finds jumpy loneliness in Mia, parlays a terrible joke about tomatoes into a real connection with Vince. Haphazard though they seem, these lines are the threads that knit everything together.

What else dazzles about “Pulp Fiction”? There’s the abundance of lurid violence — much of it comical (including an uncomfortably funny rape scene), some of it truly shocking, none of it gratuitious. Jackson and Travolta are one hell of two-man team, while Willis registers a pulse and Eric Stoltz has wit to burn. Ultimately, though, it’s the manic, fearless force of Tarantino that makes “Pulp Fiction” a sweet, sweet joyride, indeed.

Grade: A

Numarul din ianuarie 2010 al revistei Emipire Magazine va avea pe coperta un nou poster pentru “Iron Man 2″.

De asemenea, in interiorul revistei, fanii filmului vor gasi si alte poze de promovare pentru Iron Man.

Filmul va aparea pe marile ecrane pe 7 mai, anul viitor, iar din distributie fac parte actorii: Robert Downey Jr, Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Jon Favreau, Mickey Rourke, Sam Rockwell, Samuel L. Jackson si Scarlett Johansson.

I’d like to write a review of Inglourious Basterds but it seems that so much effort has been spent keeping the real story out of the public eye that talking about it seems like I’m breaking some unwritten law, a law punishable by scalping and getting beat around by a baseball bat.  Instead, lets think back to the first time you heard about Inglourious Basterds and how annoyed you were that it was spelt so badly.

We were told that Inglourious Basterds was going to be like the Dirty Dozen, it was going to be about a group of Jewish soldiers going around France fucking up the Nazi’s and leaving there scalped bodies to spread fear to other Germans. Then we saw the trailers, Brad Pitt looking like a war hardy veteran stood before a lineup of afore mentioned Jewish Soilders talking about going around France and fucking up the Nazi’s, then we saw the official poster and there was a pretty girl on it… what the fuck is that about?

Well forget everything you thought you knew about Inglourious Basterds because as usual Quentin Tarantino has totally twisted our expectations of what a World War II movie has to look like or be about.  It’s not just the story line either – the use of modern music throughout is totally unexpected, as are the on screen written references with childlike hand drawn arrows that would seem to be more suited to an MTV show than a war epic.  Added to that are random cuts to obscure old documentaries about the burning temperature of nitroglycerine and character explaining cut sequences voiced by Samuel L Jackson, both random interjections are a constant source of amusement to me and probably a slice of hell to the nerdy film types who write film blogs with clever names that reference pre-war German cinema in their title.

Also, rather surprisingly, Inglourious Basterds isn’t even about those crazy basterds roaming about the country “killin’ Gnazi’s” either!   The plot line is, instead, another Tarantino trademarked tale of revenge set “once upon a time in war torn France”. and the first thing you’re going to have to come to grips with is that Brad Pitt and the rest of the Inglourious Basterds players are just bit parts in this epic story of revenge.   The real star of the show is Christoph Waltz who plays Hans Landa the SS’s finest detective, nicknamed “the Jew hunter” and, in my opinion, Hans Landa is the best character that Tarantino has ever created!  From the moment we are introduced to Landa early in the first act we are forced to hate him, he is clearly evil and arrogant like a comic book villain, and because of that, immensely enjoyable to watch, with Christoph Waltz playing the part perfectly and stealing every scene he is in.

I don’t know why the trailer was so misleading and didn’t make this obvious- maybe the Weinstiens didn’t think that the story of a Nazi Jew Hunter told mostly through subtitled French and German was going to move units in America (actually yeah I can understand why for the last 2 years we’ve been lead to believe Basterds was a movie about Brad Pitt and some guys causing trouble around the Champagne region now I think about it)…

I don’t want to give away any story details and I certainly don’t want to give away any of the quirky twists (I’ve even omitted a huge chunk of female character information from this already bare bones “review” so as to leave you with some surprises) and it’s killing me that so few people have seen this movie as I enjoyed it immensely! As always the fine line between comedy and violence is tread as if Tarantino was Phillipe Petit and “comedy” and “violence” were the names of the twin towers.  The quality of dialogue is consistent throughout and I’m happy to give Tarantino a little time to show off what he’s learned about the world (as long as he never makes us hear it from 4 girls in a car for an hour (with no boobs) again).

Watch it and enjoy, then we can all talk about it…

Por Antonio Golmar

Pocos actores cuentan con un currículum como el de Mark Wahlberg, quien hace unos meses contaba en un programa de la televisión británica que su primer coche le salió gratis porque lo había robado, aunque luego, desde la cárcel, lamentaba no haber seguido los pasos de sus hermanos, los New Kids on the Block.

Nadie que viese a Mark Walhberg por primera vez ahora, con su raya a un lado engominada, su cara de no haber roto un plato en su vida y sus maneras tranquilas y educadas, sólo perturbadas por alguna palabra malsonante, podría imaginar ese pasado propio de alguna canción de Lou Reed.

No es que sienta simpatía por los rufianes. Gracias a dios, dos meses en chirona bastaron para que Mark diera un giro de 180 grados a su vida y aprendiera a ganarse la vida sin fastidiar a los demás. Tras su paso por la música y la publicidad (junto a Kate Moss, muñeca rota de la moda internacional, fue la imagen de la ropa interior de Calvin Klein) Wahlberg comenzó a hacer cine. Un poeta entre reclutas, Diario de un rebelde y sobre todo Boogie Nights, esa descarnada visión de la noche neoyorquina de los años 70, lo consagraron como actor.

En 2007 fue nominado al Oscar como mejor actor secundario por su papel en Infiltrados y acaba de terminar The Lovely Bones, un thriller dirigido por Peter Jackson (El señor de los anillos, District 9) que promete. Además, ha producido varias series de televisión, entre ellas Entourage, y actualmente rueda The Other Guys junto a un reparto variopinto en el que figuran Will Ferrell, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Keaton y la mismísima Paris Hilton. Sin embargo, Mark no parece un hombre frívolo: el más joven de nueve hermanos, está casado, es padre de tres niños y es católico practicante.

A sus 38 años, Wahlberg  puede mirar a su pasado con una sensación de vértigo, pero seguro que también de satisfacción por lo conseguido. Y los aficionados al buen cine y a los papeles de verdad sólo podemos desear que siga proporcionándonos buenos ratos, y que el ángel de la guarda que lo salvó de morir en los atentados del 11-S (tenía reserva en el vuelo 93 de United Airlines, pero en el último momento cambió de planes y voló a Toronto) no le pierda de vista.

Filme do ano de 1993, do realizador Tony Scott , mesmo do Man on Fire e do The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 que referi no penultimo post. ; escrito por Quentin Tarantino.

Altera entre a descoberta do amor de Alabama Whitman (Patricia Arquette), uma prostituta e Clarence Worley  (Christian Slater), um rapaz normal que gosta de Elvis e de Kung Fu; e  um monte de sarilhos, mortes, enredo e algumas partes de boa disposíção e violência.

No fim, acaba tudo num quarto de hotel com matança quase geral. Antes de ver no IMDB não sabia por quem tinha sido escrito o filme, e quando estava a ver essa parte pensei: “mesmo Tarantino!“, o que depois se confirmou.

True Romance , está cheio de grandes actores e tem alguns “ingredientes” para um bom filme, pelo menos para o meu tipo de filme; apesar de ser estranho ver actores como Brad Pitt e Samuel L. Jackson com papeis tão “insignificantes” (devido ao ano em que o filme foi feito).

8.5/10

TORRENT

TRAILER

IMDB

Lee.

廿年前的作品，今日再看一樣看出味道，Spike Lee的獨立電影眼，廿年前就懂得關懷社區，看得出日常生活的隱藏危機，相比起《撞車》，早廿年頒一個金人給 Spike Lee更為實至名歸吧。

天才橫溢，光芒四射，唯一我估唔到的，是Spike Lee雖然早成荷里活注目導演，但至今的作品依然堅持己見，寧願拍自己深愛、言之有物的題材，也不似蘇德堡先生的早改走荷里活的金光糖衣大道，故此，Spike Lee其後大部分作品連在港公映機會都無，甚為可惜。

一個沒有「壞人」的社區，因何都會導致一場不可收拾的悲劇，Spike Lee放輕了種族、貧富的嚴肅討論，卻以一個非常炎熱的平常日子來道出一切，Spike Lee 親自飾演的薄餅仔 Mookie心如導演，游走社區了解社群卻依然無能為力，如此，那一個垃圾筒是注定要掟的，掟出對國家、對社會、對階層的種種不滿。

廿年了，階級問題越來越嚴重，舊社區的生活還是被人遺棄，假如真說改變了的，不是冰山不再融解，而是白宮主人換上一層黑皮膚，只是前路一樣茫茫。

伸延：
．社區記憶──《低清老翻王》
．城市意外──《撞車》

“Hamburguesas, la piedra angular de un desayuno nutritivo.”

Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) en Pulp Fiction

Esta semana los actores Idris Elba (The Wire, The Losers, en la fotografía), Ray Stevenson (Roma, Punisher War Zone), Stuart Townsend (Battle in Seattle) y Tadanobu Asano (Mongol) han pasado a formar parte del elenco de Thor, adaptación del cómic Marvel que dirige Kenneth Branagh. El cineasta no puede tener queja de un elenco en cuya elección ha participado de forma determinante. Anteriormente ya se había anunciado que contaría con Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Natalie Portman, Anthony Hopkins, Jaimie Alexander, Colm Feore y Samuel L. Jackson en su proyecto. El rodaje de la superproducción comenzará a mediados de Enero, teniendo la mente puesta en el 20 de Mayo de 2.011, día en el que se ha marcado su estreno.

VERDICT:
6/10 Highly Unlikely Situations

One of the deeper, more thought-provoking films of my generation. Truly profound on many a level.

Snakes on a Plane is about…well, it’s exactly what you think it’s about. A guy witnesses a notorious mob boss commit a murder, the said guy gets put on a plane with Samuel L. Jackson as his FBI bodyguard so that he can testify against the mobster, then it turns out that the mobster loaded up the whole effing cargo section of the plane with venomous snakes that are all really pissed off as a bizarro way to kill off the witness without having someone just shoot him.

I could probably just tell you to click this link and leave it at that – and considering I just clicked that link five times in the last minute and I’m still laughing my ass off, I’m pretty tempted to do so – but what the hell, I’ll just go ahead and keep this one short and sweet.

There’s probably two reactions you had when you first heard the title of this movie: ”Worst. Idea. Ever.” or “FUCK. YES.” I’m pretty sure this review would be going differently if I was in the former mindset, but come on, how could you not be at least a little interested with a title like that?

Yeah, it’s pretty stupid, but any movie whose overall function is to see how many ways people can die via snakes on crack, explore the many wonderful places people can get bitten (e.g.: penis and breast get addressed quite promptly, in case you’re wondering), and gives Samuel L. Jackson free reign to swear and yell his brains out like no other, that’s the kind of movie I’m going to see. The acting is whatever, the story is pretty much non-existent, but who cares, bring out the next batch of boobie-biting snakes!

One question though, how the hell did they smuggle the world’s largest anaconda onto that plane without anyone noticing? Ugh, never mind, stupid question for a movie like this.

Snakes on a Plane is a B-movie through and through, it’s not trying to be the next Die Hard, and you’re getting exactly what you pay for with this one. While it’s not necessarily a good movie, it’s still a good slice of ridiculous fun and who can resist Sam Jackson tazing snakes and dropping F-bombs for an hour and forty minutes? I sure can’t.

That Sam Jackson. What a badass.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW

Adapted from the legendary comic strip, THE SPIRIT is a classic action-adventure-romance told by genre-twister FRANK MILLER (creator of 300 and SIN CITY). It is the story of a former rookie cop… Adapted from the legendary comic strip, THE SPIRIT is a classic action-adventure-romance told by genre-twister FRANK MILLER (creator of 300 and SIN CITY). It is the story of a former rookie cop who returns mysteriously from the dead as the SPIRIT (Gabriel Macht) to fight crime from the shadows of Central City. His arch-enemy, the OCTOPUS (Samuel L. Jackson) has a different mission: he’s going to wipe out Spirit’s beloved city as he pursues his own version of immortality. The Spirit tracks this cold-hearted killer from Central City’s rundown warehouses, to the damp catacombs, to the windswept waterfront … all the while facing a bevy of beautiful women who either want to seduce, love or kill our masked crusader. Surrounding him at every turn are ELLEN DOLAN (Sarah Paulson), the whip-smart girl-next-door; SILKEN FLOSS (Scarlett Johansson), a punk secretary and frigid vixen; PLASTER OF PARIS (Paz Vega), a murderous French nightclub dancer; LORELEI (Jaime King), a phantom siren; and MORGENSTERN (Stana Katic), a sexy young cop. Then of course, there’s SAND SAREF (Eva Mendes), the jewel thief with dangerous curves. She’s the love of his life turned bad. Will he save her or will she kill him? In the vein of BATMAN BEGINS and SIN CITY, THE SPIRIT takes us on a sinister, gut-wrenching ride with a hero who is born, murdered and born again. –© Lionsgate Films

Ryan Seacrest and Simon Cowell should top this list, for playing ‘Hollywood guys’ who are ‘qualified’ to find America’s next top singing talent.

(Jokes) but Forbes Magazine has released their list of the ten most overpaid actors in the Hollywood film industry for 2009. The findings are based on what actors got paid by studios and what they returned per dollar back to the studio via the box office.

The findings weed out the older talent posturing themselves as big stars and make room for the newbies like the Efrons, Lautners, Pattinsons of Hollywood’s rising stars.

Here’s the list of most overpaid actors:

1. Will Ferrell ($3.29)
2. Ewan McGregor ($3.75)
3. Billy Bob Thornton ($4.00)
4. Eddie Murphy ($4.43)
5. Ice Cube ($4.77)
6. Tom Cruise ($7.18)
7. Drew Barrymore ($7.43)
8. Leonardo DiCaprio ($7.52)
9. Samuel L. Jackson ($8.59)
10. Jim Carrey ($8.62)

Ouch! Sucks to be Will Ferrell. In fairness to these blokes on this list, it was a recession so they can’t be held entirely to blame for low box office returns. For a woman to even appear in this list, like Drew Barrymore is an achievement, not an embarrassment when competing against the blokes. So go Drew Barrymore!

[image courtesy of TopNews]

~Posted by Horiwood.Com, Hollywood California USA. 11.19.09~

Hi. How are you? My name’s Elliot, and I’m with the Cub Scouts of America. We’re… we’re selling uncut cocaine to get to the jamboree.

– Elliot

Quentin Tarantino penned the script for True Romance for director Tony Scott. I heard about this movie, because when I saw the IMDb page of Inglourious Basterds. He made one of the characters “Bear Jew” Donowitz the grandfather of one of the character in this movie. I thought I might check it out. I think this was Tarantino’s attempt to have a bloodily romantic movie, but it fails.

Taking place in Detroit, a comic book store worker, Clarence Worley (Christian Slater) goes to a Sonny Chiba “Street Fighter” triple feature. A beautiful young woman, Alabama Whitman (Patricia Arquette) intentionally bumps into him there. They take a liking to each other and meet each other for pie. He tries to get to know her more, but she is coy.

They quickly fall in love and have sex. Afterwards, Alabama confesses to him that she is a call girl that was hired by his boss to get him laid on his birthday. They promise to be with each other always and get married the next day. She tells him about her fucked up life and how needed to get her stuff back from her pimp

When shit is about to go down the spirit of Elvis (Val Kilmer) gives Clarence a quick pep talk in the bathroom. Clarence wants to retrieve Alabama’s stuff from her former pimp, a Rasta man named Drexl (Gary Oldman). Going over there, things go wrong when he kills Drexl and takes a suitcase. It turns out that suitcase is filled with a million dollars worth of cocaine from a drug lord, Blue Lou Boyle.

The duo doesn’t know this. When Clarence comes back to the apartment bloody and bruised, Alabama is turned on by doing anything for her. They go over to a trailer house to meet his father, Clifford (Dennis Hooper), who is a police officer. They haven’t seen each other in three years. He wanted to know if the cops are after the twosome. Clifford tells them that they are in the clear.

They take a road trip Clarence’s best friend in Hollywood, Dick Ritchie (Michael Rappaport), an actor with his stoner roommate, Floyd (Brad Pitt). After the duo leaves, Vincenzo Coccotti (Chirstopher Walken), the local counsel for Boyle, pays Clifford a visit. The thugs interrogate him when Clarence dropped his license at the crime scene. They want to get their score back.

The movie is supposed to be a modern version of Bonnie and Clyde, but the movie felt false. You know you hear Tarantino dialogue when the characters ramble on about movies and minute trivia. The movie as whole laid flat. There was no oomph. I didn’t care if the characters lived or died. It was disappointing.

Judgment: Words cannot describe how terrible this movie is.

Rating: **1/2

I’m a NCIS fan. Because of that, I watched the NCIS and NCIS: Los Angles premieres. Anyway, when I watched the NCIS: Los Angles premiere, I immediately thought that the actress who plays Hetty Lange looked like Edna Mode, the character that created the uniforms for the Incredibles, in the movie The Incredibles. Personally, I just found it really freaky that they look so much alike. I would say that they based Edna Mode on Linda Hunt. Anyway, I just found it freaky.

First, please pardon this 11-day hiatus. If you think to yourself  “Oh, the Yankees won the World Series only 11 days ago,” then I share my unending celebratory joy with you as if that ticker-tape parade hasn’t even made past Battery Park yet. Wow, I’m pathetic. Nonetheless, there’s no reason why this blog could not exhibit the same fecund week of releases. I arrest myself from the hustle and bustle of mainstream sports media and declare a true end to the “controlled chaos” of the baseball season. Right here, right now.

Secondly, I cannot promise a total end, but I’ll tell you what I will not talk about: Mariano Rivera adding his own share of meaningful drama to the postseason by stating he was fighting a rib-cage injury through it all. That one’s got to beat Curt Schilling’s donning of a cranberry juice-stained sock in 2004! Gosh, these drama kings! Alright, move on; Mark Teixeira and Derek Jeter winning the Silver Sluggers, with Teixeira rationally more deserving of it with his whopping 39 homers. But Jeter broke Lou Gehrig and that’s enough of a reason for the world to love him way more than A-rod’s shortened yet way productive season; Tex and DJ winning Gold Gloves, where I’m just really debating the Jeter’s worthiness of the award; how pretty the Empire State Building looked in pinstripes; how I have a wonderful friend who’s a Phillies fan; Let’s end it here.

Thirdly, so it’s clear that the Yankees has been the center of post-season talk, as always. And their captain, being a broken record, as always. Can Derek Jeter ever shed a tear, wreck havoc, or admit something exclusive about himself, at least by the time he retires from an industry so embodied by him? I think he’s got it. You got to hand it to him that despite inhibitions, he is full of surprises. Surprising enough to make the first big splash of the off-season.

Derek Jeter, as a bum, filming a scene

Flabbergasted? So are Mark Walhberg and Will Ferrell in the background. Definitely stranger than fiction, but far more humorous than old school. This is Derek Jeter, the five-time WS champ, silver slugger, gold glover, all-star..etc; the same guy who wrote an inspirational autobiography, who plans to attend college in the future, who is near retirement age and..I guess.. the same guy who’s dated the best of gorgeous ladies, including Jessica Alba, Jessica Biel, Vanessa Minillo and Scarlett Johanssen. And yes, this is what he ends up doing in the off-season. He’s had a few acting experiences, but were they enough to garner him a role with renowned actors like Walhberg and Ferrell? Who cares. He’s Derek Jeter! He’s rich, good-looking, single, so he has every opportunity to have a role in a comedy film, let alone a role as a bum. Oh, eyes of the impoverished, feast on this honor your hero DJ has given with his role of address to your kind!

Oh this will be big. I am not very into comedies, but I do like Marky Markie and DJs. Directed and co-written by Adam McKay, starring in this upcoming 2010 action/comedy film, “The Other Guys,” are Samuel L. Jackson, Dwayne Johnson, Will Ferrell, Mark Wahlberg,….and Derek Jeter! Jackson and Johnson will act as two highly experienced officers; whereas Wahlberg and Ferrell as silly detectives, I hear, puts a bullet to “aging” Jeter’s leg! FYI, this scene was filmed in Coney Island of all places. Let me tell you what I know of Coney Island. I hear it is like a haven for those who are “different” or “normal but wishes a time of difference” to be themselves. Heck, you even got Andrew Lloyd Webber convincing his Phantom to restart his life at the Coney!(Ladies and gentlemen, coming to Broadway in the near future, The Phantom of Coney Island.) And now you got Derek Jeter, dressed in scrapcloth and a butt-wiping mop. Everybody, including the Arts and Entertainment industry, has gone nuts! Now you know Coney Island’s full of facades, or weirdos.

But this one is still a darling. He doesn’t look like a champ here, but neither does he look “aging”. That wig just doesn’t wipe out his endearing blue eyes, perfect smile and photogeniculars. Need some wrinkles here and there, and yellowish, corroding teeth for that to work. But he is Derek Jeter and this is comedy. Acting experience is not required of him for a role. He doesn’t even need to hit homers to win Silver Sluggers and Hank Aarons. Perhaps, he’ll be the first comedian to even win an Oscar before Will Ferrell! Expected to be released August 6, 2010 in theaters near you, keep yourselves tuned in.

Demorei o máximo que pude para ver esse filme. Para falar a verdade, eu nem queria ver esse filme. A razão? Medo. Meu maior medo era o hype imenso que esse filme carregava em cima dele. A fita nem tinha começado sua vida nos cinemas e todos já diziam que seria “o melhor filme de todos”. Confesso que sou um pouco (pouco é muito e muito é pouco) chato. Principalmente quando gosto de algo. E sempre gostei dos filmes do Tarantino. Não, eu não acho o cara um gênio. Acho um ótimo e divertido diretor. O maior triunfo do Tarantino é saber lidar bem com o clichê. Algo que todos tentam e a maioria fede ao fazer tentar fazer isso. Tarantino trabalhava numa locadora. Ou seja, estava rodeado pelo clichê o dia inteiro. Afinal, os filmes que costumam passar nas televisões das locadoras são, em sua maioria, algo que se tornou clichê com o tempo. Junte se a isso o seu talento e ironia referente à violência e você têm um ótimo diretor. Seu primeiro roteiro foi “Assassinos por Natureza”/ “Natural Born Killers” (com Juliette Lewis, Robert Downey Jr. e Tommy Lee Jones no elenco) o qual Oliver Stone dirigiu. Talvez seu maior roteiro, mesmo sendo bastante revisado pelo próprio Stone.

O primeiro roteiro de Tarantino já mostra o quanto ele é light.

Também não vi Burn After Reading/Queime Depois de Ler pelo mesmo motivo. Muito é falado antes de o filme ser lançado. E também é de um dos meus cineastas favoritos. O fato dos irmãos Cohen terem entrado no mainstream me assusta até hoje.

Assustado com os Irmão Cohen no mainstream!

Quem já acompanha as peripécias deste blog sabe que costumo mais descer o pau do que elogiar: tirando Y: The Last Man, Ren & Stimpy e Billy & Mandy eu fui só reclamações e maldições. Mas de qualquer forma, não fiz tantas resenhas assim…

Então já deve ter alguém pensando: lá vai esse chato descer o pau no filme. Mas…

…o filme é muito bom! É melhor que Pulp Fiction? Não! É melhor que Kill Bill? É igual e diferente do mesmo modo. Ver um filme do Tarantino tem sempre uma sensação parecida, mais ou menos como ver Kubrick pós-Lolita. A sensação é parecida e os filmes não. Tarantino já conseguiu deixar sua marca no seu modo de fazer filmes. Não sei como explicar, mas quem conhece o trabalho dele já sacou o que eu quis dizer. Assim como Kubrick tinha aquele modo de sempre valorizar aqueles sorrisos aterrorizantes, cenas no banheiro e outras coisas. Não me entendam mal. Não estou comparando um com o outro. Kubrick era um gênio. Um dos maiores da história do cinema. Tarantino ainda não o é. É ótimo e divertido. Mas não sei. Ainda falta algo e tive a impressão de que com Bastardos Inglórios ele deu mostras de que está à procura desse algo mais.

Bastardos Inglórios é o chamado Historical Fiction (ficção histórica). A fita se passa na Segunda Guerra Mundial (entendam que esse era mais um dos meus medos: Nazistas de novo?!). Mas Tarantino não esgotou ainda mais o assunto. O nazismo e a guerra podem passar apenas como coisas secundárias.

Agora, para não falar só de Tarantino, o elenco foi muito bem escolhido. Começando com Christoph Waltz (“Ordinary Decent Criminal” / “Um Criminoso Decente” – vejam esse filme também!) no papel de Hans Landa. Waltz é o melhor no filme. Sua atuação é bárbara e mereceu o Cannes de melhor ator. Michael Fassbender (“Bando of Brothers” e “300”) como Lt. Archie Hicox (o inglês que troca tiros na virilha no pub) muito bem também. Eli Roth (demorei a lembrar quem era esse doidão. Ele faz parte do grupo Splat Pack, que é um grupo de cineastas de filmes de terror que decidiram voltar a fazer filmes de terror mesmo – pesados, “Saw”/ “Jogos Mortais” é de um diretor desse grupo. Eli Roth é o diretor de “O Albergue” que, confesso, não sou fã) é Donny Donowitz / O Urso Judeu, impecável sua ultima aparição na qual ele atira em Hitler até o rosto dele virar pedaços de carne moída no liquidificador. Diane Kruger (a Helena em “Troy” / “Tróia” e Abigail Chase em “A Lenda do Tesouro Perdido”) interpreta Bridget von Hammersmark. Diane Kruger já foi uma modelo de sucesso na década de 90, se não estou enganado. Que bom que deixou de ser modelo, parece que sob a correta direção e em um filme bom (diferente dos citados na qual ele atuou) ela tem talento. Daniel Brühl (“Adeus Lênin” e “The Edukators”) é Fredrick Zoller, ou o herói de guerra alemão. O cara é realmente bom. É só ver os filmes que o cara fez. Til Schweiger (“Tomb Raider” e “Rei Arthur”) é  o alemão que muda de lado. O cara no filme é hilário. Não sabia que o cara era bom (afinal olha os filmes que eu citei que ele fez), mas ele o é. Mélanie Laurent faz Shoshana. Essa eu não conhecia, mas também é muito boa. Omar Doom é Omar Ulmer. Gedeon Burkhard é o tradutor dos Bastardos. B.J. Novak (“The Office”) é o Little Man (não lembro bem como ficou em português, se foi Pequenino ou algo do tipo). Mike Myers (o Austin Powers) é o general inglês que comanda a idéia do assassinato de Hitler. Rod Taylor (“A Máquina do Tempo” de 1960, baseado no livro de H.G. Wells) faz o Wiston Churchil. Denis Menochet (“Hannibal Rising”) faz o fazendeiro francês do inicio do filme. Christian Berkel (“Operação Valquíria”) é o barman do pub onde rola aqueles tiros na virilha. Jacky Ido (esse eu não conheço) faz Marcel. August Diehl (“The Counterfeiters” e “The Ninth Day”, ambos alemães) é o oficial da Gestapo, especialista em sotaques, que troca tiros na virilha. Alexander Fehling (“And Along Come Tourists”, também alemão) é o cara que está comemorando o nascimento do filho onde dão tiros na virilha. Sylvester Groth é Josef Goebbels, ministro da propaganda de Hitler. Groth também interpretou Goebbels na comédia My Leader – The Truly Truest Truth about Adolf Hitler (também alemã). Quem também interpretou Goebbels foi Martin Wuttke – que é Hitler no filme de Tarantino – no filme Rosenstrasse (alemão também, mas se tiverem tempo – e paciência para achar – vejam). Julie Dreyfus (Sofie Fatale em “Kill Bill”) é a interprete francesa de Goebbels. O curioso é que parte do elenco desse filme são também diretores. Um exemplo disso é Enzo G. Castellari que no filme é um general nazista. Castellari é um diretor italiano, conhecido pelos seus Spaghetti Western como Any Gun Can Play, Kill Them All and Come Back Alone, Seven Wichesters For a Massacre e,…, The Inglorious Bastards – Quel maledetto treno blindato. Os bastardos de Castellari e de Tarantino são parecidos. Com certeza o filme de Castellari inspirou Tarantino. Os Bastardos no filme de Castellari são soldados americanos que estão sendo levados para uma prisão militar quando um ataque aéreo alemão acaba os “soltando” ao matar todos os guardas. Os soldados decidem fugir e acabam fazendo parte de um plano que consiste em roubar o giroscópio de um foguete V-2 nazista que se encontra em um trem extremamente protegido por nazistas.

The Ingloriou Bastards de Castellari.

Ué, e o Brad Pitt? Bom, Brad Pitt é um grande ator. Quando ele não faz papéis de heróis entediados ou de galã supersexy (como Aquiles em “Tróia” ou Sr. e Sra. Smith) ele manda muito. É só ver filmes como Thelma & Louise, Across the Tracks, Kalifornia (acho que foi aí onde ele aprendeu esse sotaque que ele tem em Bastardos Inglórios), Interview with the Vampire, Lendas da Paixão, Seven (Sete Pecados Capitais), Os Doze Macacos, Fight Club (Clube da Luta), Snatch (mais uma vez ele faz um sotaque genial), Babel, …, deu para entender, né? Ou seja, quando o papel e o filme é bom, ele arrebenta. Por isso não vou ficar falando o quanto ele foi bem nos Bastardos. Tentei falar mais dos outros que, para a grande maioria, são desconhecidos.

Como não poderia deixar de ser…

Pausa para um lanchinho...

…em filme de tarantino nunca falta sangue e nem Samuel L. Jackson. Ele não atua, mas é o narrador. Poucas vezes narra, é verdade, mas ele está lá.

Minha conclusão é: se não viu, veja por você mesmo. Se já viu, sabe do que estou falando.

Freunde des subtilen Horrors aufgepasst! Es gibt einen Superschocker in der Videothek. Hinter dem Titel “Zimmer 1408″ vebirgt sich ein genialer Horrorstreifen.
In den Hauptrollen: John Cusack (brillant) und Samuel L. Jackson (weniger brillant).
Die Story: Aus der Feder des Altmeisters Stephan King.
Zitat: “Das Zimmer ist echt mies.”
Empfehlung: Angucken!

No tengo idea de los creditos de esta ilustracion pero soy fan… Si saben de quien es favor de comentar para darle credito.

yay!

No, not the musical.

Hair Chronicles Vol. 1:

Hair is interesting.  Hair comes in different colors, strands, textures and lengths.  Just about any adjective can be applied to it.  However, I’ve had a very limited range of options with my hair so about 1/16th of these descriptions apply to me.  Basically I’ve been getting the same haircut for the past 11 years.  A shape up, even and low.  This radical change occurred at 12 years old when a little nappy, matted haired hussy in science class told me that my fade was ugly.  Yeah I’m still bitter.  My parents chose not to cut my hair until I was about 2 or 3.  So there is a family picture of my parents and I where I am sporting a crooked fro; akin to Samuel L. Jackson’s performance as ‘Mr. Glass’ in M. Night Shamalan’s Unbreakable:

Hot.

So for Halloween I decided to go with a relatively extreme change and get a Mohawk, Frohawk, Fauxhawk, landing strip, whatever.  The original design was inspired by Noah Puckerman from Glee:

badass.

The immediately product got rave reviews. Unfortunately, the end result did not do Puck justice. Fast forward 2 weeks later and my head looks like the creative canvass of the Michelin Man.  I need to find a stylist in DC who can help me realize this dream of self expression through hair.  Mohawks originated as punk and rebellious and have emerged as chic and modern in 2009.

….Maybe this is just a sad and sorry attempt of me trying to hold onto whats left of my early twenties.  I guess it’s not as bad if I admit it.