Well, if you’ve ever said to yourself: “Self, if I ever become a superhero, my vehicle isn’t going to be a flashy, flimsy yuppy style slick-mobile, I’m gonna have a ‘rupture your corn-hole just by driving by type vehicle, one that’d punch through your house like butter’”, then you’ll really like these.

- Apparently, once upon a time the design producers for Batman Begins thought the very same thing.

Here’s the Batmobile - right on the warner brothers’ homepage. Click This and be Mighty:
http://batmanbegins.warnerbros.com/page.html

Sigh. Shoulda seen nonsense like this coming. First off, I must accept that these very well could be turned into good things, but I doubt it. So far.

For those of you just joining us, Infernal Affairs is a fantastic cop/triad drama out of Hong Kong. It pits an undercover cop who’s working deep within a triad gang against a bad cop working high in the ranks of the police department. Both characters have one connection to their real identity, being the bosses of both “groups”. It’s a loyalty twisting mess as one side scrambles for power meanwhile the moles try desperately to expose the “opposite mole” while keeping themselves incognito at the same time.

Brad Pitt reportedly went ape over the movie and demanded it get remade for North America. Martin Scorsese sits in the director’s chair for it, and as I’ve just learned, the significant altering of the script has started. Who’s at fault I don’t know. The only good thing I read about the remake script so far is that they are reportedly consulting the original directors. I don’t really know how MUCH consulting is going on because……

The characters of the two bosses have been REMOVED. REMOVED!! What the Hell?? I don’t know who was watching the DVD in the studio, but those characters are sort of …. y’know… KEY! What about the elevator scene and subsequent “descent” near the end of the film?? Who the Hell’s in charge?? Half the film was about those guys. Not saying it’s impossible, but that’s one huge porker of a “modification” to the script. And What about Infernal Affairs 2?? Oh geez, I’m frustrated. Furthur, (this one is acceptable though) the gangs in question is between the Irish Police and — a gang of sorts? — the article is a little unclear. I’ll assume it’s an IRA thing. - But this is how rumours start. Let’s move along .. the Article (at kfccinema.com) goes on to say the the plot has been made simpler. ..[pause].. *…ahem…* … WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?! SiMpLeR?!?!?! THat’s the beauty of the damn film!!.. You don’t see me scribbling all over the Mona Lisa because “the whore isn’t smiling enough” do you?!?! .. Didn’t think so. Just freakin LEAVE IT ALONE!! MOTHER FASNVL:JQWEOQS!!! BAH!!!!

Oh, this’ll be really quick… but in case you’re getting ansy in yer pantsy waiting for the full Trailer of Spiderman 2 to be released, Sony has been kind enough to post some flashy-dashy clips from the movie on their website.. FOLLOW THIS LINK to watch it.

— There’s a bunch of behind the scenes stuff there too that you may wanna check out.. Fun Fun.

Ah yes…..The words “Orlando Bloom Topless…” I can see the quivering fingers of horny teenaged girls sending the web hits into the stratosphere already.

I actually have no idea if this movie will be released in North America - I imagine it will be eventually, but it seems likely that the current release is slated for, what DVD junkies would refer to as “region 2″. Or UK & Europe for the lay person. Here is the Trailer for it anyway.

What looks like a rather well done comedy action flick, Orlando Bloom plays a small, stringy little boxer who’s about to take on the undefeated champion of the sport. His only advantage is his lifetime milk consumption, which has given him bones that are tougher than chaos math. That’s about all there is to draw from the trailer so far. And I’m sure the overanxious lady fans haven’t even read this far anyway.

Well colour me stinky. If this film isn’t gettin’ funner and funner. Jack Black has currently snagged the part of Carl Denham, a reporter in the mighty Peter Jackson’s casting of KING KONG - which will be shot (no shock here) in New Zealand…..

Now, I might be crazy here, but this very well could be a Jack Black milestone flick… I mean sure, between his indie stuff and his Tenacious D stuff, (hilarious) he’s already doing GREAT, but how often to you get the most popular director in the world of the moment, saying things about you like:
“I’ve been wanting to work with Jack Black ever since I saw him in High Fidelity… He’s a smart and versatile actor blessed with an abundance of energy and charm and I’m absolutely thrilled that he is joining us.”? Not often, lemme tell ya… (Read the Article) And look at that, they kinda even look the same.

No one’s ever said that about me and I’m broke. They’re probably co-related. You go Jack, take over the world while you’re at it won’t you? Excellent.

Did you ever see Freaky Friday? Either one of them? Or any other “take on someone else’s responsibility” type movies? You know the routine: the person with the big ego, who really has no idea what they’re doing, assumes they can do the other person’s job much better than the original person because.. “How hard can it be, right?” Today, the shoes of this annoying, ignorant, hard-headed person are being worn by my favourite love-to-hate-them company: Disney.

Reuters tells us that Disney revealed that they will tackle, write, direct, animate, produce and release “Toy Story 3″ all by themselves. (Article Here) Hehehehehehehe. This’ll be neat. Disney distributed the first 2 Toy Stories, that’s it. Okay, yeah yeah, they have a Producing credit for them as well, but folks, this is essentially the MailMan standing up and saying he can do the CEO’s job. Oh sure, this mailman happens to know how to make movies, but in this modern time, movies that aren’t any good.

I mean sure, I can’t sit here and say “it won’t make money”, because it will: 1) From people who don’t follow this stuff and think it’s being made by the same company 2) From little kids who just want to see their favourite characters again and 3) From people like me who wanna sit and pick the daylights out of it. So, yeah, a few bucks are to be had but, look at things this way: Disney has billions. Disney now has lots of elbow room now that they’ve laid off, fired and sent their hand draw-ers packin. Obviously they have some new, secret, fantastically wonderful new plans for the company right? A whole new leaf right? A new company! a new 3D model direction! infinite possibilities, right? Nope, Toy Story 3. - A story based on someone else’s movies, but it’s a shoo-in for us, so we’ll do it. Cuz we don’t have anything else constructive at the moment.

My Heroes.

Visit the Save Disney website.

It is a sad day for any serious fan of film. One of the truly great actors of our time has passed away. Sir Peter Ustinov died Sunday night of heart failure.

There are FAR too many great roles that he played to go through, but I personally will always remember him as Lentulus Batiatus in Sparticus. Ustinov had a presence about him on the screen that few actors in history ever have. His voice was also one of the most distinctive in history. All you had to hear was one syllable, and you knew it was him. His passing leaves the world a less interesting place.

Well kids, it only took Miramax a few years and more release dates than I care to count but it looks like Steven Chow’s hilarious kung fu action comedy Shaolin Soccer is finally hitting North American shores, albeit in very limited fashion. Coming Soon shows the film getting a three city US release - those cities being New York, LA and San Francisco - on April 2nd and considering ads have been spotted in the New York Times this time it looks like Miramax is actually going to follow through on the release. Apparently the ads also say clearly that the film is being released subtitled in the original Cantonese, which is happy news for purists. Like me. It does, however, look as though we’re going to have to wait a bit longer here in Canada. Tribute has the Canadian release listed on April 23rd with no city information listed, though Toronto and Vancouver seem like the obvious choices.

Check out the trailer here. And then go see the movie. You’ll laugh. Hard. And often. Honest.

Oh Look. You can pre-order Matrix: Revolutions on DVD. .. Who Cares.

Can someone please expain to me how exactly Stephen King keeps landing scriptwriting jobs? I just checked the IMDB and according to them he’s got eighty one writing credits to his name. Eighty one! And of those eighty one I can count maybe a handful that are actually good films, virtually all of which were originally written under different names and adapted by other writers. Everything I’ve ever seen by this man that was written directly for the screen has been just horrible. And yet he keeps getting hired. Hence the five King written projects currently in development. Sure, the guy sells books but he can’t write a good screenplay to save his life - and lest you think I’m being cruel to poor Stevey the same can be said for a lot of other novelists, notably William Gibson whose novels are amazing and screenplays are similarly wretched.

But on to specifics. I’m a big fan of Lars Von Trier. I like all of his stuff, but I have a particularly weak spot for a little mini-series he did in Denmark called the Kingdom. It currently exists in two runs, each run being 4 episodes with the third and closing run likely never to happen thanks to a little over half of his principle cast up and dying on him. True story. Thus, I cringed when I heard that ABC had bought the rights to the show and hired Stephen King to rewrite it for American audiences. I’ve been avoiding it on tv but thanks to the wonders of the internet I’ve just skimmed through the first three episodes and this thing is truly, wretchedly bad. I feel dirty. Yes, it suffers from bad casting and pacing but the root problem goes back to the writing which is so heavy handed and clumsy that it makes Von Trier - Lord of the Melodrama and Whacking of People Over the Head To Make His Point - appear subtle. And yet despite the heavy handedness it takes King THREE HOURS to get to a point in the narrative that Von Trier reaches in the first episode of the original. Good Lord, man! Make it stop! MAKE IT STOP!!!

I’m feeling very grateful for my delete key right now.

Hot diggity. Just in case all the incredible anime feature films due to hit screens this year wasn’t enough to slake your appetite for large-eyed animated goodness here’s some more ridiculously good news …

A fine young man over on the KFC Message boards (which you should all check out from time to time if you’re at all interested in Asian film) just came across the trailer for Samurai Champloo - a new anime television series from Shinichiro Watanabe. The fanatical among you will know that Watanabe is the man responsible for the incredible Cowboy Bebop while the less anime fixated are probably aware of him as the man behind what are, in my mind anyway, the two best shorts on the Animatrix DVD - namely Kid’s Story and A Detective Story.

How happy am I about this? Well, I just went and installed Real Player - Satan’s preferred choice for viewing streaming media - so that I could avail myself of the trailer. Check out the Champloo website here.

Okay, so this news bubbled over a few days ago, but I’ve been sick and visiting New York City, so screw all y’all. File this in the “With a Grain of Salt” drawer, but here it is.

In line with other silly attempts at flashy titles, like Episode 1 and 2, Episode 3 seems to be right on pace with the Uber-silly Title, “The Creeping Fear”. I’m still not totally convinced this is real, simply because the title is too darn ridiculous. I mean, after ‘Phantom Meanace’, I don’t think it’s beyond possible, but I have very strong doubts - that and it’s fun to report anyway. The rumour goes on to say it was originally to be titled “Rise of the Empire”. Which, in my humble opinion, is JUST FINE!!! In fact, I LIKE that title!.. It has an “Empire strikes…” and “Return of..” quality to it. ‘The Creeping Fear’ sounds like something you’d find in a fat guy’s pants.

Here’s a few other joke titles I’ve found from ticked off Star Wars fans that made me chuckle - Feel free to add your own: How ’bout:

- The Creeping Fear Eye for the Star Wars Guy?
- Creeping with the Enemy
- The Passion of the Jedi
- The Coconut Pete Fear
- Episode III: Havana Nights
- Dude, Where’s my lightsaber?
- Episode III: The Jeeping Creeping Fear
- Episode III: - Jabba Takes a Dump and Eats Another Frog…..
- Star Wars Episode 3 “The Return of Short Round!”
- Creeper by the Dozen
- Episode III: Crapping Far

Okay, Apparently, the REAL title is to be released very shortly anyway. Again, we shall see.

Hey Kids!! You like Spider-Man??? You better!! Why? Because USA Today is telling us that the Charity Loving, Third-World advocates over at Sony Corporation just very well may bring you SIX Spider-Man films. That’s a lot.

Granted, it’s obviously way too early to assume that they will be good or bad, but 6? Jeepers. the Article is Here, but you may have to go to USA Today’s “Life Page” First, and click on the article from there, because USA Today asks you how old you are before you can read it. Why? I dunno. It’s not my stupid page.

And of course, there’s a truck load of stuff about the movie coming out in the article as well… Badder Bad Guys, More New York stuff.. — the only thing I find “interesting” is the whole “we’re gonna get deeper into the characters” stuff. Don’t get too deep there Sammy, as long as you leave room for some punching - and Bruce Campbell - I could care less either way.

Okay here it is again, Shaolin Soccer Returns. Actually the Original Returns. Because we never got it in the first place. What movie is this you ask — Well, you can watch The New Trailer right here.

It’s not a sequel, just another chapter in what is already a practically inexcusable series of bumpings and delays. Actually, take away “practically”, it IS inexcusable.

You see, Shoalin Soccer is a truly funny film. That, we can also say, was made years ago. Well, 2001 was years ago. Since it was such a smash hit in Asia, Miramax decided to release it here. Then they didn’t. Then they did. Then they didn’t. What they ENDED up doing was purchasing Distributing rights and then doing nothing with them. However, it looks like Shaolin Soccer might ACTUALLY make it to the screen this time around.. Although I won’t believe it until I see it up there… Back in October I made this Shaolin Soccer Timeline: - here it is Updated:

In Yahoo Movies, I found this summary of release dates… Ready for this?
July 19th, 2002
- - This was originally scheduled to open on April 5th, 2002, then, August 30th, 2002, and now sometime in the 1st quarter of 2003.
August 16th, 2002
- - This has been pushed back a little bit again, now to April 11th, 2003.
January 31, 2003
- - Miramax has bumped this back another four months to August 8th, 2003. That’s 16 months after its first target date.
June 23, 2003
- - Miramax has adjusted this movie a week, from August 8th to August 15th.
August 8, 2003
- - Miramax has dumped their plans on giving this film a wide release, going with a platform release starting on September 5th instead. As KungFuCinema.com reports, this decision comes with the news that Miramax has decided to go with the original dialogue (with subtitles) rather than doing an English dub.
September 2, 2003
- - Miramax has decided not to release this film this week after all, with no word now on when they might release it to the U.S. public. Might they now be considering sending it direct-to-video?
September 4,2003
- - Miramax is currently looking for a new release date in the 4th quarter of 2003.
October 8,2003
- - It appears that Miramax is now aiming for sometime in 2004 instead.

This trailer seems to have removed the overdubbed lines, so it seems that all of these whispers may actually be true. However, www.movie-list.com has it listed for a March 26 release and the official site says “April 2nd”, so apparently there’s still some confusion somewhere. We shall see.

I actually like dogs. Just not usually in my movies. Normally everything putters along just fine until Fifi shows up and tilts the script on its ass.

However, nothing infuriates me more than the “Invincible Dog” syndrome. You know what I’m talking about. And you hate it too. If you don’t, you should. In fact, you should be shot, and then you should. In that order.

Let me generalize this syndrome for you. Take a barely survivable situation. Guns fights are popular, settings of massive Act-of-God type destruction are even better. Take only a handful of people who are barely surviving themselves. Allow Hell to bubble over in an Industrial Light and Magic Orgasm of chaos, whatever it may be. Kill every cast member that only has a first name and a couple more in the ethnic minority. Cover everyone else with blood or soot or dirt. Cue barking. Barking…. Barking of the stupid animal, that SOMEHOW, through explanations you’ll never receive, looked at life, death and Satan right in the face, and wiggled out untouched - without the benefit of an opposable thumb even. This drives me batty. I can’t stand it. A dramatic device so obvious and so overdone, I can’t believe it isn’t outlawed. Its Hollywood’s version of the Hip-Hop singer that still rhymes “…hands in the air” with “…like ya just don’t care”.

Folks, please help me here, because I know there’s a LOT more, but I’m sick right now and can’t think of anymore. But these films are the worst films of Invincible Dog Syndrome I could think of…

-Independence Day - Granted, we all need our little time out to make sure that Rover is out-running the 50 storey wall of fire that’s careening down a tunnel at alien technology speeds. Oh look! - The doggy dodged the tower of white-hot, car-melting gases by half an inch! He’s FINE!!!!. Kill me.
- Dante’s Peak - Okay, It gets worse. And do me favour, if we’re ever fleeing a river of molten lava, fresh out of the gusher, and I BACK UP, to rescue a puppy - g’head and punch me in the balls. No please. I deserve it. I mean granted, in this case, their jeep was using 2000 degree resistant gasoline, and tires unphased by a river of hell, but who cares? Wel’ll just let the plausible world remain on hold while we gently beckon for the stupid dog, to heroically leap into the jeep, so we can then safely drive off into the sunset where we can dwell in bedtime stories laced in bullsh-t all night long.
- Speed 2 - By the end of this sentence, I will have already donated too much time to this movie than it deserves but- YOWZA. Take a boat. Increase the size of this boat to about a football field. Make this football field drift on water at top speed. Now send it crashing into shore so hard, that’d it would probably give James Cameron a stiffy. Now, all of this destruction does some mighty good damage (especially to the cardboard buildings that are too painfully obvious.) Squash an uncountable amount of cars, maybe a few slow old people,and take out an entire city block. But what’s this? that white car… is that? is that? Yes it is!! Fifi’s Okay!!! that 25,000 ton boat’s a bloody feather for Fifi!! Way to go Fifi, you stupid, ugly lame excuse for a character!! Get a thumb.
- Daylight - Nothing touches this one. Never have I been so infuriated by a dog’s survival than this. You’re guided through hours of treacherous underground holes that are barely maneuverable by humans and just as they’re about to make it…….., the dog they left behind HOURS ago, must’ve been watching the film, took notes, and caught up to them, all by his masterless self. People had to MAKE me not shut the movie off at this point.

Look at how long this is! I’m shutting up!

So, I just went and watched the trailer for Casshern a few more times and, yep, still absolutely mind blowingly incredible. Go watch it now whilst repeating these two phrases over and over: “first time director” and “six million dollars“. Every major film studio in the world should be lining up at Kaz Kiriya’s door begging him to work for them.

This may not be technically news, but it merits saying aloud in as public a place as possible. Go see Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I caught an early matinee today and came away much impressed … Charlie Kaufman continues to grow as a writer and this is very likely the best ’serious’ performance that Jim Carrey will ever give and considering how highly I hold his work in Man on the Moon that’s a pretty serious compliment. Kaufman built his name with the extended mind games of Being John Malkovich and Adaptation but his work on Confessions of a Dangerous Mind showed me that he’s got a firm grasp on humanity as well and Sunshine pushes that even further. Yes, the trademark Kaufman ticks are there - the fractured timeline and questioning of basic reality are the most obvious - but he has fused them here with incredibly rich characters to create what, in my mind, is clearly his finest work to date. Michel Gondry is an impeccable choice as director, effortlessly fusing the trickery and mind games that make Kaufman so much fun with the realism and true human heart that give this film it’s kick. And the cast, from top to bottom, is absolutely stellar with Carey in particular giving a fearless portrayal of a deeply insecure and damaged man. It’s early yet, but this is the best film of the year so far.

Okay, I realize fully that I’m about to simultaneously excite and anger an awful lot of teenage girls and just how dangerous that can be, but onwards into the breach!

Whilst perusing the very bad sequel (?) to Battlestar Galactica on Canada’s Space Channel tonight I witnessed what, to me, was a very disturbing news segment. Apparently the folks who control the James Bond franchise are hot in pursuit of Orlando Bloom to take over the role after Brosnan finishes out his contract. These people are, quite clearly, out of their minds. First there were the ‘Americanization’ rumors and now their looking to cast somebody completely and utterly wrong for the character in the name of chasing a younger demographic. Hello people: you’ll destroy the character in the process, and considering that the most recent Bond film was the highest grossing ever I hardly see why you feel such a pressing need to mess with the character.

Don’t get me wrong, I think Bloom is a very talented actor and I’ve liked him a lot in what I’ve seen him in so far but he is horribly, horribly wrong for the role. First, he is at least a decade too young. Second, I don’t buy him as a cold blooded killer at all. Bond needs to have an edge of menace to be effective and Bloom just doesn’t.

You had it right with your first post-Brosnan choice people: Clive Owen. He was born to play this part. Stop messing around with something that wasn’t broken in the first place.

I’m not much of a Tom Cruise fan, although he has done some nice work. The best I’ve ever seen him do was “Minority Report” which was just fantastic and Cruise carried the film well. Now Spielberg and Cruise are teaming up again to do the classic H.G. Wells alien-invasion story “War of the Worlds“.

Personally I think this is great. War of the Worlds is a great story that most other alien invasion movies are pure rips offs of. Cruise and Spielberg have already shown they are a formidable team, and with the technology available today the visuals will finally be able to do the imagination of the story justice. If any of you play the Hollywood Stock Exchange I would highly suggest buying LOTS of this stock‚Ķ you know the MINIMUM this fill will take in will be $250 million at the box office. I’ll see it.

Okay, you can make a pretty good case that John Woo - once the unchallenged master of the bullet ballet thanks to films like The Killer, Hard Boiled and even Face/Off - has been on the slippery slope to film oblivion, and deservedly so, since he did Mission Impossible 2, but I’ve got to say this has got me intrigued … Word is Woo is after Hugh ‘The Wolverine’ Jackman to star in an upcoming gangster musical. That’s right, Woo’s going to stop just editing all that gun play to music, he’s actually gonna put the music in the film and have his actors dance along. No question Jackman’s the right guy to combine manly swagger and Broadway showtunes - he’s finishing a very successful run on Broadway right now - but does Woo have enough left in the tank? If so he just may pull off one very peculiar flick …

Read the whole story here.

I would LOVE to see this documentary film.

MSN.ca reports:

Film Dissects ‘Bush’s Brain,’ Karl Rove

“Bush’s Brain” has been cracked open and exposed for the world to see. The documentary, based on the book of the same name about presidential adviser Karl Rove, had been kept tightly under wraps before making its world premiere to a packed theater at the South by Southwest film festival.

Both the book and the film depict Rove as the true brains behind the Bush administration, and practically a co-president.

The film, which screened Saturday night, begins with the image of Bush confidently descending the stairs of Air Force One with “Hail to the Chief” signaling his arrival.

Then comes the punch line.
(more…)

So, you’re Miramax and you own the rights to an absolute masterwork of Asian cinema that goes by the title of Hero. This thing’s so good that it netted itself a best foreign film Oscar nomination over the film that your company sunk all of its marketing money into. So what do you do? Do you ride that bit of awards news into a strong marketing campaign? Nope. Do you put out a trailer that shows people just how incredible the visuals in this film are? Nope. Do you ride the hell out of the star power of Jet Li and Zhang Ziyi - two of the most recognizable Asian stars in the Western world? Nope. How ’bout working the reputation of acclaimed art house director Zhang Yimou? Nope. Any sane company would have done all of these things, but not Miramax. Here’s what they did: pledge 20 mil towards the production costs to secure the rights to the film, never bother to actually pay out their share, then sit on the film for ALMOST TWO YEARS and threaten lawsuits against anybody who imports the official Chinese DVDs which, by the way, released well over a year ago.

So what does it take to get Miramax to finally release a universally acclaimed film like this? A phone call from Quentin Tarantino, the only really bankable director in Miramax’s stable and evidently the only one who even remotely understands or cares about Asian film in the whole damn place. If this was a European film it would’ve hit theaters in months regardless of quality - see Benigni’s crapfest Pinocchio and the treatment (ie original cut and language perfectly well preserved on DVD there but never - ABSOLUTELY NEVER - on their Asian product) it received for proof - but because Hero’s stars are all slanty eyed it sits on the shelf bloody well forever until the white knight rides in to save the day.

Good on Quentin. Bad on Weinstein. The film’s now supposed to release in June. Read the article in Fangoria here.

Everyone knows that I am a huge comic book/superhero movie fan. Comicbook: The Movie

Here is the movie that gets into the pants of what us comic collectors and true fans feel when a movie comes out that distorts the original works it is based on. League of Extrodinary Gentlemen had very LITTLE to do with the graphic novel it was based on. This peaved a LOT of LXG fans.

Here we have Mark Hamill playing a highschool history teacher Don Swan who also owns a comic book shop, and due to his fanzine “Once upon a Dime” he is considered the undisputed ultimate fan of a golden age comic book called Captain Courage.

As the ultimate fan, the studio recruits him to make a documentary about Captain Courage in hopes of promoting the new remake of the book Codename Courage, and the big budget Superhero Movie based on the ultra violent remake. The whole movie was filmed in and around the Sandiego ComicCon with a pile of cameos from the likes of Stan Lee and Kevin Smith. This was not a set, it was the ACTUAL Convention.

Comic book fans will love this movie. If you don’t collect comics, or you don’t understand why people do. Don’t rent this film. If you do collect comics, you are not a real collector until you have seen this.

On a side note, Comic Book Villians is another phenominal film about comic collecting that is a must see.

This sounds campy in a Batman Returns and Batman Forever sort of way. This new Batman movie is trying very hard to distance itself from the previous four Batman Films made popular by Tim Burton and then eviscerated by Joel Schumacher. Even the first teaser image we get to see, seems to imply that the costume will be a woven bodysuit with hand stitched details unlike the foam latex nipple suits.

The title Batman: Intimdation Game was received by the fanbase as being an acceptable title considering Ras Al Ghul was the enemy. That role was originally rumoured to be given to Liam Neeson and is now confirmed to be given to Ken Watanabe

These rumours seemed to be an evil ploy to throw off the fans so they didn’t have any idea what was to come. At this point I am not taking any Batman news at face value. I half expect them to change the title once more. Perhaps Batman: Nah Nah na na Nah Nah.

Either way I predict that I will LOVE this movie.

Meet the Parents was the film that made me take notice of Ben Stiller. Since then I’ve become a huge fan of “most” of his work. Now the sequel “Meet the Fockers” is set to start filming next month and be release around Christmas time.

This time around it looks like Dustin Hoffman and Barbra Streisand are going to be playing Stiller’s parents. Apparently the movie will focus on the dynamic between the two sets of parents. I’m really looking forward to this one!

Okay, the large majority of you have never seen it so you’ll just have to trust us when we say that Ong Bak is absolutely the best straight martial arts film to be made in the past ten years or so (I put Hero and Crouching Tiger into another category altogether) and you’ll just need to smile and nod when I tell you that the follow up is due to start filming this month and that this is a big deal. Tom Yum Goong will reunite the lead actor and director of Ong Bak with a plot line revolving around the young Thai fighter’s clashes with Vietnamese gangs in Australia. The film has already been sold to distributors in the UK and Japan with more international types lining up as I type which means it should hit our shores fairly soon while Luc Besson’s version of Ong Bak is due to hit sometime this year.

Okay, so if you read the site at all regularly you should have picked up by now that a) I really like Japanese films and b) I really like Sam Raimi. Thus it should come as no surprise that I’m doing little excited dances waiting for the Sam Raimi produced remake of Japanese horror flick Juon, which is coming to these shores as The Grudge. And thus I was very very happy to come across this: eight minutes of behind the scenes footage from the shoot of the remake featuring Sarah Michelle Gellar and Bill Pullman talking at some length about their involvement and also including a couple of sweet clip montages from the original flick that still freak me out despite my having seen it several times and knowing exactly what’s coming. Curse you, Toshio, curse you! Oh wait … that’s pretty much the problem in the first place, isn’t it …

It’s in Windows Media format …

If you’ve never had the “pleasure” of seeing ‘The Eye’ - a downright spooky Chinese/Thai flick, than you’re missing out on some solid “Please Someone Just Kill Me Now” type moments of tension.

I’ll Keep this one short - but kfccinema.com posted today the link to the Full Trailer for The Eye’s Sequel, aptly titled, The Eye 2. Snappy, huh? Folks, seriously, turn up your volumes and check this trailer out — Just make sure you watch the whole thing.

Full Trailer for Eye 2: http://www.eye2themovie.com/video/eye2_trailer.wmv

Eye 2’s Official Website (and it’s heavy, HEAVY Flash content to the point it’s almost not worth navigating): http://www.eye2themovie.com

Okay, this news is a couple weeks along now, but I love the irony and I’ve noticed today that not everybody knows about it.

Remember the fable of the chicken on the farm that bakes bread? She runs around collecting wheat saying: “Who’ll help me gather the grain?” - And the other Farm Animals don’t. “Who’ll help me grind flour?” Nobody. “Who’ll help me Bake it?” Nary a hoof or paw lends a hand… or paw. Ah, but when she says: “Who’ll Help Me EAT IT??” - Everyone goes: “GOLLY! - Hit Me Up That Sweet Bready Goodness!!!”
Our Farm Animals in this Case is 20th Century Fox, the Working Chicken: Mel Gibson.

- Date: Thursday, July 24th, 2003: Mel Gibson is debating on even releasing ‘Passion’ with subtitles. Fox News states 20th Century Fox has inked a deal for distribution of “The Passion”. (Article)
- Date: August 2003: 20th Century Fox says “Never Mind” amid doubts of money and whispered controversy. (Article)
- Mel says “Who’ll help me Distribute it?” Nobody…
- Mel says “Who’ll help me Market it?” Nobody… Zip Forward to…..
- Date: Present Day. Passion has had the largest 5 day opening (Article), the largest February opening (Article) and has raked in nearly a quarter of a Billion dollars in 2 weeks.
- Mel says: “We’ve gotta quarter Billion Dollars! Who wants to help sell DVDs?”
- 20th Century Fox says: “WE DO!!!!!” (Article)

Oh, How quickly they forget. Hesitation? What hesitation? Gimme the fricking MONEY.
There’s a life proverb that says “The world’s best eraser is a good night’s sleep…” I hereby add to that wise reflection: “…and a quarter billion dollars.”

I credit Bubba with giving me this story - he let me in on it, but that was a wee bit more than a day ago.. He’s a busy man. So in his stead, I bring you some sad, sad news. Well, for the movie going audience anyway.

Granted, a slight grain of salt is in attendance with this news as it scratches its way down my throat.. However - word on the street is, that on his 41st birthday, April 26, Jet Li will announce his intent to quit making films to study/follow Buddhism. Oh sure, some will say how wonderful it is when people experience some enlightment.. Oh Yap Yap, enlightenment schmightenment…. I’m talking about my MOVIES here, let’s keep things in perspective.

A Chinese news ticker “Xinhuanet.com” and chinaview.cn carried the story. Click here to read the article.

At the same time, if you’ve only ever met Jet Li in the movies he’s made in America, this departure may be a song not worthy of even a sigh. Which is also understandable, but which also begs the case that you desperately need to expand your Jet Li movie library. Like, to include far away ones. Like ones not in… y’know… English. They’d be very good stuffs. Which makes this news very bad stuffs.

I guess April 26th or 27th will provide some future movie enlightenment of our own. We will see…

Somebody give the folks over at Dreamworks a big slice of pie and pat on the bum. Y’know, just to say ‘good job’ because everybody enjoys pie and bums. Variety is reporting that Dreamworks is currently in negotiations with Hideo Nakata to helm the upcoming sequel to The Ring which, of course, was based on Nakata’s Ringu. First Raimi gets Shimizu to remake his own film with The Grudge, now Nakata’s remaking one of his own - who knows? Maybe the studios are finally realizing that the original directors just might have a clue what made the films so good in the first place.

For those who haven’t seen any of his films go out and rent the original Ringu. Nakata is an absolute master of slow burning atmosphere. He builds his stuff slow relying heavily on mood and texture and compares quite favorably to M. Night Shyamalan. Once you’re done with Ringu, track down Nakata’s original Japanese sequel then move on to Dark Water. You won’t be disappointed.

Over the last couple of years Johnny Depp and gained a lot of my respect (whewww, I’m sure he’ll sleep better at nights now). I only really took notice of his amazing talent when i watched “Blow” for the first time. After that, I watched some of his older films and I remember thinking to myself “how did I not notice before how talented this guy is?!?”. Now Secret Window is here, and while I’m sure that it will be the film to take “The Passion of the Christ” out of the #1 spot at the box office this week, the reviews are not looking good. The general flavor of all the reviews that I’ve read is that the film starts out pretty well, but then at a certain point decisively falls apart and is unable to put itself back together again. The trailers have had an almost “Misery” kind of feel to them, which caught my interest. Oh well, just the fact taht Depp is in it will force me to give the film a chance even if the pundits are warning me to spend my money on more important things… like the “The Culture Club: Reunion Tour DVD”

Like I mentioned a couple of days ago, I’m a big Val Kilmer fan. So it’s nice for me to whip around the web and see that his new movie “Spartan” is getting some pretty decent reviews, not fantastic, but pretty decent. The Internet Movie Database sums up the film this way: “A “lone wolf” U.S. government secret agent, Scott(Kilmer), is assigned the task of rescuing the kidnapped daughter(Bell) of the president, only to discover along the way a larger, more sinister plot with origins within the White House itself”. Sounds good to me. Here are what some others are saying about via RottenTomatoes:

“Spartan plays out like a classic mind game, and an awfully good one at that.”
- Christopher Null, FILMCRITIC.COM

“Spartan is Tom Clancy without the pop-literature pretense. It’s 24 for those who like more of a cerebral challenge.”
- Rob Blackwelder, SPLICEDWIRE

Hello, can anyone say “Spy Kids 4″. I (and many film pundits) said basically the same thing when the first Agent Cody Banks film came out. Now Agent Cody Banks 2 is here and so far everything… and I mean EVERYTHING I’ve read so far has been quite negative about this film. Don’t get me wrong, no one is saying this is the worst movie of all time or anything, but there seems to be a universal agreement amongst movie reviewers: “This is a poor movie”. And really this shouldn’t surprise any of us. The first big clue to me was the fact that it has Anthony Anderson in it. I don’t want to sound too critical, but how this man keeps getting roles in movies is totally beyond me. He can’t act, and he’s not funny. He’s just annoying. Perhaps that says more about the directors he’s worked with than it does about his talent (or lack thereof), or maybe he just really is that bad. Here are a few things some critics are saying:

“This uninspired, maladroit entry should insure that ‘Cody’ won’t be bankable for long, and that his days as a cinematic ‘Agent’ are numbered.”
- Frank Swietek, ONE GUY’S OPINION

“Agent Cody Banks 2: Destination London unleashes itself upon us like an unchained Cerberus, lasciviously devouring all basic notions of intelligence and sophistication in its destructive, rampaging wake.”
- Keith Uhlich, SLANT MAGAZINE

“I called Cody Banks 2 “horrible,” and I used the word deliberately. Another good one would be “shoddy”; I doubt if there’s ever been a worse-made movie sporting the MGM logo.”
- Jim Lane, SACRAMENTO NEWS & REVIEW

Wow, I was doing my usual surfing around this morning and I came across THIS PICTURE. Apparently it’s of Anakin Skywalker after Todd Bertuzzi hit him from behind with his fist and a bucket of lava. I’ll say right now that I’m not 100% sure this picture is real, but it looks awfully good, and I’m pretty sure that is indeed Hayden Christensen. For those of you who are not familiar with common Star Wars folk lore, it is said that Anakin Skywalker became the ultimate man in black following a battle between Anakin and his master Obi Wan Kenobi leaving Anakin so badly wounded that he had to adopt the famous black life support suit to even live. I’m guessing this picture would be from “after” the fight. Someone grab that man some moisturizer. To see a much larger version of the picture click here.

Okay, so I just noticed that Aintitcool had a link to the Internet Exclusive Trailer for Alien vs. Predator due out this summer.

Now besides the fact that the Predator will take everything to the bank, and besides the fact that everyone loves debating this, the trailer isn’t giving us much to look at for longer than maybe a half second - which gets annoying after the first 30.

However, there’s not much sticking out in so far as “spoiler” clues with the exception of that shot to the left there. Any ideas what that is? Is is just a “badder” looking mask? I hope not. Is it supposed to be “badder” looking teeth? I hope not also. I mean, it might be cool - but the last time the “mean creature” was “Bigger and Badder” was Jurassic Park 3. And since I’ve never heard the sentence: “Jurassic Park 3 Rocked my Hoop!”, it makes me a wee bit iffy on the whole “Badder” image.

Whatever. He’ll win anyway.

When you see the trailer for 13 Going on 30 you can’t help but think only about hottie-and-a-half Jennifer Garner. Here’s my dilemna…

Is this a movie for teens to laugh at an adult who’s really a kid on the inside, is hot as hell, adored by the masses, and hitting on the 13-year-old boy that everyone wants to be? OR

Is this movie for adults who wish they could somehow go back and be the innocent 13-year-old in their adult bodies and hope for the best?

I will without a doubt go see this movie, if for nothing else than to see Jennifer Garner in what seems like a very funny role. Not to mention that it’s obviously a chick flick to the Nth degree. And how I adore chick flicks!!

Not much has been written about this movie just yet, but I’m sure as we get closer to release date (April 23) we’ll hear some more.

Visit the official site here

I’m going to have to excuse myself after this post to go punch myself flush in the crotch for at least an hour.

I just saw this news bit on television so I simply had to research it, and lo and behold, Countingdown.com has caught the news and so has Yahoo!…

Fresh off the assembly line at ‘The Plant for Flaccid Ideas’, a subsidiary company of ‘Guys Addicted to Pot Who Lie About Their Penis Size’, comes the new, fresh and horribly lame idea: Fast and the Furious Part 3. Sick.

Countingdown.com’s Article. and Yahoo’s Article.

2 Fast 2 Furious had my Razzie vote for “Poorest Excuse For An Actual Movie” in 2003. (That’s a real category folks, click here) And now this. I’m very curious what on earth they’re going to call this, I mean, since their use of the number 2 in the last title was so clever, of course. I suggest ‘The Fast and the Furious: Kill Yourself’ or maybe ‘2 Fast 2 Furious Too’ or ‘So Lame my Ass Hurts’ or ‘I Have Lights Under my Car and I’m a Date Rapist.’. I don’t know, they can use those titles if they want.

So Vin Diesel is currently tugging on the bait line for being in this one. Which is the only hope for getting the dullards who haven’t figured out they’ve been shown the same movie twice already, in the door for a third one. 2005 Razzie Noms start today in my book.

The first 2 Lord of the Rings films were released on DVD in August, but it seems that with the trilogy finished, the powers that be no longer see a need to hold off the release of the third installment. Return of the King is coming to DVD on May 25th, which is good news… sort of. You see, the extended version (the one that most people really want to buy) still won’t be coming out until the Christmas holidays sometime. Why torture us like this? The reason is simple: They know that stupid suckers like me can’t wait until November or December to buy this movie, therefore I’ll buy the versions that gets released in May AND later buy the extended version, thus increasing their sales and profits. It’s a low down disgusting game they’re playing… but brilliant at the same time. I hope I can’t hold out and just wait for the extended version… but… I… am… soooo…. weaaakkkk.

It’s a dark day for John. I’m am one of the few people who actually really liked Daredevil. I thought it was fun. It was a great cast, good action, and anything with Jennifer Garner in it will have me in line to see it as fast as I can. But more than that I just thought it was a solid overall film that didn’t get the credit it deserved, probably because Ben Affleck was in it (and by the way, I thought he did a very respectable job as Daredevil). I was sure that there would be a sequel, when a franchise movie makes over $100 million at the box office you can usually bank on it. But I guess with Ben Affleck making statements like these, the chances are slim to none:

Ben Affleck badmouthed Daredevil and any eventual sequel at a recent press conference. “I don’t know about Daredevil II. That may be too much work for me,” Affleck said while promoting the release of Paycheck. “I suppose that if Kevin Smith wrote it and was going to be involved, I would do it. … I’m not banging down the door trying to get Daredevil II made. You’ll know when my career is really on the slide when I start resurrecting the franchise.”

No Ben, we’ll know you’re career is really on the slide when you start winning Razie awards and no one wants to see any of your movies anymore. Oh wait… maybe you WILL be making Daredevil 2 soon after all!