Just saw Pineapple Express and I gotta admit it was a lot of fun. Normally not a fan of the stoner movie, largely due to a bad previous job at which it seemed half my co-workers rocked the ganj far too much, but the "Have you ever really LOOKED at your hand?"-type humour was kept to a minimum and it's always great to see the ever-gorgeous Nora Dunn onscreen, especially when she's cursing up a storm. Quite the lovely contempo ultraviolence as well; I remember the disparaging tone commentators used to take about action movies from the early eighties, especially the ones from the Joel Silver factory, but seriously? Commando is practically a children's movie compared to the flying viscera that seems to get flung around in the name of ironic yucks these days.
Okay, so I'm settling back with my kiddie combo (what? if I get a full bag of popcorn I'm going to eat the whole thing and nobody wants that) and the pre-show promo reel is unspooling and in "Casting Notes" it's mentioned that Eva Mendes and Nicolas Cage are going to be headlining a remake of Bad Lieutenant.
Go ahead, read that back to yourself, I'll pause for a moment to let it sink in.
Can you think, scouring your memories, for a film LESS needing a remake? The mind positively boggles. So I look it up on imdb as soon as I get home, and, get this, Werner Herzog is directing, it also stars Val Kilmer and Fairuza Balk (pause for a second while I swoon over knockout nutty goth girls....okay, I'm back) and the full title is Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans. The discussion boards seem to express some well-deserved confusion...is it a remake? re-imagining? sequel? Is it some in-name only franchise cash-in in the vein of Carlito's Way: Rise To Power or U.S. Marshals: Like The Fugitive Only It Blows? While I enjoy the synchronicity that Abel Ferrara did pursue Nicolas Cage to star in The Funeral (for the role Christopher Walken ultimately played), and the fact that Herzog is getting some Hollywood cred only forty-odd years into his directing career, I'm up-and-down, back-to-front flabberbaffled at this whole state of affairs. Seriously, I feel like I'm taking crazy pills here.
Saturday, August 9, 2008
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Say it ain't so...the dwindling state of the theatre-going experience in Toronto
It's one of several paragraph-long newsblips in the "Up Front" section of this week's Now magazine, rumblings that the Cumberland cinema may be the next movie theatre in this film-lovin' town to face the wrecking ball. Heartbreaking, but I suppose inevitable. I'd been meaning to write something on the first-run movie houses of Tee-Oh, and there's one more reminder that everything in this entry may well be rendered obsolete in a year or two. If you're a Toronto filmgoer reading this, there's probably nothing new here save my own personal reminiscences; if you're reading this from elsewhere, I suspect some nods of recognition are a'comin'.
Hogtown's suffered the fate of most other big North American cities, by which I mean the consolidation into plexes and the slow decimation of the standalone and independent arthouse theatres. Still, there are a handful of decent venues, many of which are taken over by the Festival Group in early September. The best, in my opinion, first-run theatre in the city closed almost four years ago. Any other Uptown fans here? Right, I thought so. The Uptown had the biggest, most cavernous main theatre in my Toronto experience, as well as two decent-sized basement rooms. Barely a bad seat in the house and the perfect spot to see genre work that calls for a big screen like the first two Matrix flicks, both of which I caught there opening day. The fate of the Uptown is well-known, and no doubt nationally common save for the fatal twist: the owners were unwilling or unable to pony up and cave to activist group pressure and retrofit the front entrance (an admittedly steep escalator) to make it wheelchair-accessible, and it was shuttered for good shortly after the cutain closed on TIFF 2003. The following summer, as the building was being demolished, a wall collapsed onto a nearby language school, killing (if memory serves) a South American exchange student.
As well, not long after I moved back to TO, the threeplex at the Hudson's Bay Centre was sealed up, and the Eaton Centre theatres closed; the latter wasn't exactly a palace, with its lousy projection and a labyrinthine hallway to get to the theatres, but it was the only remaining half-price second-run place downtown.
So what does this leave? The Paramount, which to me and everyone I've talked to about it, will always be the Paramount and not the freaking Scotiabank Theatre (sigh...) with its four huge front rooms, IMAX screen and nine back rooms, not a single one of which is a shoebox. It's right downtown and for a multiplex makes a surprisingly good location for fest screenings. There's also the Varsity for your slightly upscale flicks (Persepolis, inevitably the latest Coen brothers, In Bruges) as well as a decent cross section of the H'wood product of the day. Plus about half the Varsity rooms are turned over to the festival, and I'll always love the place for the proximity it allowed me to Lou Reed last year. I don't think the Beaches quite counts as downtown (no idea what the census calls the dividing line but I figure the Don River is the cutoff point) but I can't let this go without mentioning the Beach Cinemas because, as they're four blocks from my apartment, I'm there most weekends, especially during the summer. It's a multi, but it's part of the Alliance chain so the programming is a decent mix of slightly-left-of-centre and mainstream, the ticket prices are the cheapest in town with a membership, all the theatres are sizeable and have great sound and projection and the snack bar is above average.
The less said about the new AMC (Yonge & Dundas) the better; I think I need to see a movie with more than eight people in the auditorium to really form an opinion on the place. But that's my fault, I guess, for going there to see War Inc. and American Teen instead of the stellar studio product that clogs 90% of the AMC screens on a given weekend.
Which leaves us with the first-run arthouses. There's the possibly soon-to-be-gone Cumberland, which is sensibly totally taken over come festival time. Why not, since you can hit the Four Seasons with a rock from the snack bar, so the stars don't have far to walk for their premieres. And then (shudder) there's the Carlton. Whenever I see that a movie I've been looking forward to is opening there I can't help but wince and weigh just how much I really want to see it. Partly it's the atmosphere: I don't think I've ever seen a movie at the Carlton with more than twenty people in the auditorium (you can almost see the tumbleweeds rolling across the lobby), whether the movie was great (Tristram Shandy, Bee Season, Don't Come Knocking), middling (Angel A) or crap on toast (She Hate Me). Not that you can realistically squeeze all that many more people into screening halls that are about the size of my living room with tiny screens way up high that leave you with a crick in your neck the rest of the day.
However, the Carlton can at times seem like the Varsity compared to the most unpleasant theatre experience in town, the Canada Square. Up at Yonge & Eglinton, a block south of the Scotia's sister multi, is a bizarre little indoor mall with a ten-or-so-rooms theatre at the south end. Finding a gotta-see listed at the Square is worth two winces and a couple of out-loud curses. I mainly go to matinees on weekends and the mall, the kind of retail hallway built as an afterthought on the ground floor (or lower) of an office block, is 90% closed for business as I trek from the subway to the box office, so I can't help feeling like a trespasser, like I've missed the KEEP OUT sign on an abandoned building slated for renovation. Often there'll be one little boutique open for shits and giggles and the clerk at said salon or newsstand will sit there looking forlorn and depressed in the near-dark as what little foot traffic there is on a Sunday passes by. I've seen a few decent movies at the Canada Square, but for some reason virtually everything I catch there is a disappointment in some way, not to mention a downer as a movie, and I walk out pummeled by dreariness. I've got to be imagining this, but somehow almost every movie I see there had a myopic DP and a set dresser on Prozac; that's the only way to explain such mopey, murky offerings as the Strangers With Candy movie, the execrable Art School Confidential, and Walk All Over Me, the Canadian domme-com that begs the question "How can a movie featuring Tricia Helfer and Leelee Sobieski in fetish gear for most of the running time be so deathly dull to watch?" I'm convinced that the venue has tons to do with it.
Okay, this went on a lot longer than I'd planned it to. I did mean this to be a generally informative survey, but the imminent demise of the Cumberland drives home once again the sad fact...we're losing the great non-rep screens in town one at a time. If we're not careful, Toronto will turn into (ick) Ottawa, with its one arthouse, its one second-run house, its zero single-screen houses and its half dozen multiplexes being the only option for seeing any kind of flick that the distributors deign to drop on the capital.
Attica! Attica!
Hogtown's suffered the fate of most other big North American cities, by which I mean the consolidation into plexes and the slow decimation of the standalone and independent arthouse theatres. Still, there are a handful of decent venues, many of which are taken over by the Festival Group in early September. The best, in my opinion, first-run theatre in the city closed almost four years ago. Any other Uptown fans here? Right, I thought so. The Uptown had the biggest, most cavernous main theatre in my Toronto experience, as well as two decent-sized basement rooms. Barely a bad seat in the house and the perfect spot to see genre work that calls for a big screen like the first two Matrix flicks, both of which I caught there opening day. The fate of the Uptown is well-known, and no doubt nationally common save for the fatal twist: the owners were unwilling or unable to pony up and cave to activist group pressure and retrofit the front entrance (an admittedly steep escalator) to make it wheelchair-accessible, and it was shuttered for good shortly after the cutain closed on TIFF 2003. The following summer, as the building was being demolished, a wall collapsed onto a nearby language school, killing (if memory serves) a South American exchange student.
As well, not long after I moved back to TO, the threeplex at the Hudson's Bay Centre was sealed up, and the Eaton Centre theatres closed; the latter wasn't exactly a palace, with its lousy projection and a labyrinthine hallway to get to the theatres, but it was the only remaining half-price second-run place downtown.
So what does this leave? The Paramount, which to me and everyone I've talked to about it, will always be the Paramount and not the freaking Scotiabank Theatre (sigh...) with its four huge front rooms, IMAX screen and nine back rooms, not a single one of which is a shoebox. It's right downtown and for a multiplex makes a surprisingly good location for fest screenings. There's also the Varsity for your slightly upscale flicks (Persepolis, inevitably the latest Coen brothers, In Bruges) as well as a decent cross section of the H'wood product of the day. Plus about half the Varsity rooms are turned over to the festival, and I'll always love the place for the proximity it allowed me to Lou Reed last year. I don't think the Beaches quite counts as downtown (no idea what the census calls the dividing line but I figure the Don River is the cutoff point) but I can't let this go without mentioning the Beach Cinemas because, as they're four blocks from my apartment, I'm there most weekends, especially during the summer. It's a multi, but it's part of the Alliance chain so the programming is a decent mix of slightly-left-of-centre and mainstream, the ticket prices are the cheapest in town with a membership, all the theatres are sizeable and have great sound and projection and the snack bar is above average.
The less said about the new AMC (Yonge & Dundas) the better; I think I need to see a movie with more than eight people in the auditorium to really form an opinion on the place. But that's my fault, I guess, for going there to see War Inc. and American Teen instead of the stellar studio product that clogs 90% of the AMC screens on a given weekend.
Which leaves us with the first-run arthouses. There's the possibly soon-to-be-gone Cumberland, which is sensibly totally taken over come festival time. Why not, since you can hit the Four Seasons with a rock from the snack bar, so the stars don't have far to walk for their premieres. And then (shudder) there's the Carlton. Whenever I see that a movie I've been looking forward to is opening there I can't help but wince and weigh just how much I really want to see it. Partly it's the atmosphere: I don't think I've ever seen a movie at the Carlton with more than twenty people in the auditorium (you can almost see the tumbleweeds rolling across the lobby), whether the movie was great (Tristram Shandy, Bee Season, Don't Come Knocking), middling (Angel A) or crap on toast (She Hate Me). Not that you can realistically squeeze all that many more people into screening halls that are about the size of my living room with tiny screens way up high that leave you with a crick in your neck the rest of the day.
However, the Carlton can at times seem like the Varsity compared to the most unpleasant theatre experience in town, the Canada Square. Up at Yonge & Eglinton, a block south of the Scotia's sister multi, is a bizarre little indoor mall with a ten-or-so-rooms theatre at the south end. Finding a gotta-see listed at the Square is worth two winces and a couple of out-loud curses. I mainly go to matinees on weekends and the mall, the kind of retail hallway built as an afterthought on the ground floor (or lower) of an office block, is 90% closed for business as I trek from the subway to the box office, so I can't help feeling like a trespasser, like I've missed the KEEP OUT sign on an abandoned building slated for renovation. Often there'll be one little boutique open for shits and giggles and the clerk at said salon or newsstand will sit there looking forlorn and depressed in the near-dark as what little foot traffic there is on a Sunday passes by. I've seen a few decent movies at the Canada Square, but for some reason virtually everything I catch there is a disappointment in some way, not to mention a downer as a movie, and I walk out pummeled by dreariness. I've got to be imagining this, but somehow almost every movie I see there had a myopic DP and a set dresser on Prozac; that's the only way to explain such mopey, murky offerings as the Strangers With Candy movie, the execrable Art School Confidential, and Walk All Over Me, the Canadian domme-com that begs the question "How can a movie featuring Tricia Helfer and Leelee Sobieski in fetish gear for most of the running time be so deathly dull to watch?" I'm convinced that the venue has tons to do with it.
Okay, this went on a lot longer than I'd planned it to. I did mean this to be a generally informative survey, but the imminent demise of the Cumberland drives home once again the sad fact...we're losing the great non-rep screens in town one at a time. If we're not careful, Toronto will turn into (ick) Ottawa, with its one arthouse, its one second-run house, its zero single-screen houses and its half dozen multiplexes being the only option for seeing any kind of flick that the distributors deign to drop on the capital.
Attica! Attica!
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
29 days and counting; going live
The festival announced thirteen Asian titles today...that's a very odd sentence for some reason, reading it back. Hmmm. Plenty more good stuff, though. With twenty tickets I'm hoping to hit a few more countries cinematically this year; 2007 had me dipping my toes into Macedonia and Mongolia for the first time, albeit, reading back last year's blog entries, without thrilling success. I had really hoped to see The Voyeurs last year but couldn't work it into my schedule and in 2006 Never Say Goodbye was sold out by the time I tried to score tix, and that was probably my biggest missed-flick regret of the festival along with Grbavica. So this year, I have the goal of definitely seeing something from India, and Firaaq looks like the one. There's a new Takeshi Kitano as well, but the writeup on the TIFF site says it's the third part of a trilogy and I haven't seen the first two, nor am I even quite sure what they are. As well, I have to admit I may have passed through my Takeshi phase; Fireworks (Hana-Bi) blew me away when I was lucky enough to see it on the big screen in Ottawa, and I think Brother is a grossly underrated part of his oeuvre, but I find myself struggling with his other recent work. Maybe. I don't know. The Sky Crawlers sounds pretty sweet, and who knows, maybe I'll finally crack that anime mental block I've got with something by a master.
So the list is filling up. Thirteen days 'til the film list goes online and twenty days until that glorious day, what for me is like Christmas and...um...okay I guess that's the only holiday that comes with presents, so Christmas and mumblemumble rolled into one, the day the program book is released and I can freak out over a spreadsheet for three hours trying to figure out a program of first and second picks. Good times. And I really mean that without irony, that's one of my favorite nights of the year.
Also sent the link to this new journal into the TIFF site for hopeful inclusion in the "Your Blogs" section. The past couple of years I was working off my MySpace page but that's generally sort of falling into disrepair anyway, so a clean start seemed in order. Hopefully my Paul Gross snark of a couple of weeks back hasn't disqualified me from inclusion this year, but anyhow if you're reading this linked from the TIFF site, hi there, good to see you, and I'll be updating more and more frequently. It'll be mainly about the fest, but also the summer's-nearly-over blockbuster roundup is on deck, as are planned posts (in rough form currently) about the Toronto moviegoing experience in general, not to mention the other current countdown of the late summer, FanExpo, which is a mere sixteen days off.
Rain tomorrow, they say. I really hope so.
So the list is filling up. Thirteen days 'til the film list goes online and twenty days until that glorious day, what for me is like Christmas and...um...okay I guess that's the only holiday that comes with presents, so Christmas and mumblemumble rolled into one, the day the program book is released and I can freak out over a spreadsheet for three hours trying to figure out a program of first and second picks. Good times. And I really mean that without irony, that's one of my favorite nights of the year.
Also sent the link to this new journal into the TIFF site for hopeful inclusion in the "Your Blogs" section. The past couple of years I was working off my MySpace page but that's generally sort of falling into disrepair anyway, so a clean start seemed in order. Hopefully my Paul Gross snark of a couple of weeks back hasn't disqualified me from inclusion this year, but anyhow if you're reading this linked from the TIFF site, hi there, good to see you, and I'll be updating more and more frequently. It'll be mainly about the fest, but also the summer's-nearly-over blockbuster roundup is on deck, as are planned posts (in rough form currently) about the Toronto moviegoing experience in general, not to mention the other current countdown of the late summer, FanExpo, which is a mere sixteen days off.
Rain tomorrow, they say. I really hope so.
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Wishing and hoping
As I mentioned last time, bits and pieces are doled out teasingly by the TIFF exec as the summer plods along. The Midnight Madness program has been made public and while I was looking forward to Chocolate, I may be getting my hands on a boot later this week and thus I'll pass at the fest, tempting tho' it would be to see a flick about a female autistic savant Thai boxer while surrounded by genre junkies hopped up on Jolt Cola in the Ryerson auditorium at one AM even for a second time.
As I wait for more announcements, I can't help but make my mental wish lists. I already mentioned Palermo Shooting, but now let me add Genova to the list. I just watched 9 Songs, and was reminded just how much I dig Michael Winterbottom's work and I'm hoping his latest gets programmed, hopefully in the Masters program. With the change this year bumping Special Presentations up to the more or less status of Galas, there's cause for worry that my anticipated picks are going to be priced out of my range, or if I decide to splurge on one or two I'll be stuck with nosebleed seats like I was for Clean in 2004. Winterbottom's a TIFF regular, so the odds are good IMHO that he'll be bringing Genova here in September.
And I swear, if one more person asks me what I thought of The Dark Knight I'm going to freak. Once and for all: half an hour too long and a botched ending. Beautiful cinematography though, especially of the cityscapes. Now taking bets on who the villain will be in part three. I'm stumped, seeing as how the remaining name-brand Bat-villains all have a fantastical element that would brush up hard against the gritty realism established in the onscreen Chicago (let's call it what it is). The Romero and Nicholson portrayals of the Joker may have tipped into the surreal but Ledger showed the character could be embodied as a human loony with a few smears of greasepaint. Unless Wayne Industries has been tinkering with genetic engineering as far back as the sixties, the Penguin seems unlikely, and the Riddler, oy, don't get me started. My vote's for Rose McGowan as Catwoman, though.
As I wait for more announcements, I can't help but make my mental wish lists. I already mentioned Palermo Shooting, but now let me add Genova to the list. I just watched 9 Songs, and was reminded just how much I dig Michael Winterbottom's work and I'm hoping his latest gets programmed, hopefully in the Masters program. With the change this year bumping Special Presentations up to the more or less status of Galas, there's cause for worry that my anticipated picks are going to be priced out of my range, or if I decide to splurge on one or two I'll be stuck with nosebleed seats like I was for Clean in 2004. Winterbottom's a TIFF regular, so the odds are good IMHO that he'll be bringing Genova here in September.
And I swear, if one more person asks me what I thought of The Dark Knight I'm going to freak. Once and for all: half an hour too long and a botched ending. Beautiful cinematography though, especially of the cityscapes. Now taking bets on who the villain will be in part three. I'm stumped, seeing as how the remaining name-brand Bat-villains all have a fantastical element that would brush up hard against the gritty realism established in the onscreen Chicago (let's call it what it is). The Romero and Nicholson portrayals of the Joker may have tipped into the surreal but Ledger showed the character could be embodied as a human loony with a few smears of greasepaint. Unless Wayne Industries has been tinkering with genetic engineering as far back as the sixties, the Penguin seems unlikely, and the Riddler, oy, don't get me started. My vote's for Rose McGowan as Catwoman, though.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Midnight madness and counting down
Okay, so it took me more than a week to get around to the second entry of the new journal. Moot point, to be sure, as I'm sure nobody's reading this yet. Maybe if the TIFF does that link from their site this year some folks will scroll back but anyhoo.
With forty-three days to go 'til opening night, the steady stream of announcements and leaks have begun. Last week the Sun published its annual "we can all look forward to seeing Pitt, Clooney and Witherspoon on the red carpet this year" blurb, yadda yadda. I don't go to galas, so that niche of celebrity spotting is well out of my orbit of interest. That said, the Gala and Special presentations that have been announced so far are a pretty impressive lot this year. Oscar bait, sure, but still no complaints, and plenty I'll pay to see in regular release ultimately, especially the new Jonathan Demme flick and Fifty Dead Men Walking.
The fest is opening with Passchendaele, the trailer for which has been playing in Canadian theatres since late Spring (I saw it in front of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, of all places). And I know I may get my passport yanked for this, but I simply have no desire to see the movie whatsoever. The battle of Passchendaele is one I learned about several times throughout grade/high school (retention is another matter altogether) and yes, I know this movie is meant to be Canada's Saving Private Ryan, ie: a visceral representation of a wartime crucible that formed our national character. Maybe some Americans found the brilliant Ryan to be an insufferable history lesson, and perhaps those Americans will appreciate Paul Gross' tribute to our sacrificing forefathers much more than I can. Maybe it's just my general dislike of Paul Gross. You know, I suspect he's an absolutely awesome guy, a blast to hang with, real salt-of-the-earth. But I have a hard time seeing him onscreen without his precise Grierson-esque diction grating on my nerves. And fine, be a patriot. But his endless elevation of Canuck ephemera drives me batshit. Men With Brooms comes off as smug and insular as the "Darkest One" video, the one where the Hip hang with the Trailer Park Boys, Don Cherry delivers them fried chicken and they pay with red two-dollar bills and Canadian Tire money. Seeing Gross interviewed about Passchendaele, and I don't doubt his sincerity, he always seems to have that heavy-lidded, down-the-nose look that evokes the smug cliquishness you can see in photos of Woody Harrelson yammering about mediatation and biofuels, Tom Skerritt in Contact, and Soundgarden in any photo circa 1989.
But anyway, onto brighter topics. I've seen Midnight Madness movies at the TIFF before (Sukiyaki Western Django made my Top Ten of 2007 list) but never actually at the midnight screenings. Licking my wounds from missing last year's opener of The Mother Of Tears I booked Friday the fifth off as well so I'd be free to catch any MM screenings. Opening night is JCVD, in which Jean Claude Van Damme goes all meta on his celebrity, which is tempting, but...Sexykiller, Not Quite Hollywood and Chocolate are all must-sees for me, especially that last one, which I've been dying to see for a while now. C'mon, the folks who brought us Tony Jaa now spring an autistic Thai hitwoman on us? Dude!
More tidbits as they come up. My fingers are still crossed for a Palermo Shooting premiere, hopefully not as a Special Presentation so I can still squeeze it in on my ticket book. It's getting scathing reviews, but it's Wenders, so I'm there with bells on no matter the venue.
With forty-three days to go 'til opening night, the steady stream of announcements and leaks have begun. Last week the Sun published its annual "we can all look forward to seeing Pitt, Clooney and Witherspoon on the red carpet this year" blurb, yadda yadda. I don't go to galas, so that niche of celebrity spotting is well out of my orbit of interest. That said, the Gala and Special presentations that have been announced so far are a pretty impressive lot this year. Oscar bait, sure, but still no complaints, and plenty I'll pay to see in regular release ultimately, especially the new Jonathan Demme flick and Fifty Dead Men Walking.
The fest is opening with Passchendaele, the trailer for which has been playing in Canadian theatres since late Spring (I saw it in front of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, of all places). And I know I may get my passport yanked for this, but I simply have no desire to see the movie whatsoever. The battle of Passchendaele is one I learned about several times throughout grade/high school (retention is another matter altogether) and yes, I know this movie is meant to be Canada's Saving Private Ryan, ie: a visceral representation of a wartime crucible that formed our national character. Maybe some Americans found the brilliant Ryan to be an insufferable history lesson, and perhaps those Americans will appreciate Paul Gross' tribute to our sacrificing forefathers much more than I can. Maybe it's just my general dislike of Paul Gross. You know, I suspect he's an absolutely awesome guy, a blast to hang with, real salt-of-the-earth. But I have a hard time seeing him onscreen without his precise Grierson-esque diction grating on my nerves. And fine, be a patriot. But his endless elevation of Canuck ephemera drives me batshit. Men With Brooms comes off as smug and insular as the "Darkest One" video, the one where the Hip hang with the Trailer Park Boys, Don Cherry delivers them fried chicken and they pay with red two-dollar bills and Canadian Tire money. Seeing Gross interviewed about Passchendaele, and I don't doubt his sincerity, he always seems to have that heavy-lidded, down-the-nose look that evokes the smug cliquishness you can see in photos of Woody Harrelson yammering about mediatation and biofuels, Tom Skerritt in Contact, and Soundgarden in any photo circa 1989.
But anyway, onto brighter topics. I've seen Midnight Madness movies at the TIFF before (Sukiyaki Western Django made my Top Ten of 2007 list) but never actually at the midnight screenings. Licking my wounds from missing last year's opener of The Mother Of Tears I booked Friday the fifth off as well so I'd be free to catch any MM screenings. Opening night is JCVD, in which Jean Claude Van Damme goes all meta on his celebrity, which is tempting, but...Sexykiller, Not Quite Hollywood and Chocolate are all must-sees for me, especially that last one, which I've been dying to see for a while now. C'mon, the folks who brought us Tony Jaa now spring an autistic Thai hitwoman on us? Dude!
More tidbits as they come up. My fingers are still crossed for a Palermo Shooting premiere, hopefully not as a Special Presentation so I can still squeeze it in on my ticket book. It's getting scathing reviews, but it's Wenders, so I'm there with bells on no matter the venue.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Hellboy II: The Semi-unflattering Comparison
Saw Hellboy II: The Golden Army last night, which I suppose I was looking forward to as a summer popcorn muncher, and it certainly had its moments but ultimately left me kind of cold. I wonder if I'm just getting burned out on the whole "visual innovation for spectacle's sake" aesthetic, as I also thought Wanted was boring as crap a couple of weeks back. Don't get me wrong, Hellboy II is miles and away better than most generic summer movie junk. The performances are uniformly excellent and the makeup/effects work is well-nigh staggering. Plus I could watch two hours of Selma Blair and her cheekbones reading the phone book. Still, Guillermo del Toro is someone I'd categorize/lump in with Tim Burton in that he's a visual stylist who's a much more interesting director than, you know, a good director. If the Hellboy movies are del Toro's Batmans, then I guess Pan's Labyrinth is his Big Fish (and by the same token Devil's Backbone is his Corpse Bride? Blade II is his Mars Attacks? Probably best to leave this thread unpulled..).
Anyway, this is sort of a stopgap ramble to get my new blog up and running. More to come later today.
Anyway, this is sort of a stopgap ramble to get my new blog up and running. More to come later today.
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