Posts Tagged ‘Coming Soon’

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes – Trailer Review

Posted: July 3, 2014 by whipkitty in All, Movies, Trailers
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While I have come to realize that Charlton Heston and I are pretty far apart on the political spectrum I still love the first two Planet of the Apes movies. The franchise took a sharp nose dive after that, so the modern reboot was a great chance to reintroduce the idea with post-millennium special effects. Also, I love it when the world ends and the existing “social contract” gets thrown out the window.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes looks like the sequel I was waiting for, and the wide shots of an abandoned city crawling with damn dirty apes is making my brain pulsate. Looks like the apes have learned to sneer effectively while riding horses! Cut to the remnants of humanity, led by Gary Oldman and some other dude who is not Gary Oldman. You know who I like less now? Gary Oldman, who clearly needs to work some stuff out (or at least needs a handler to remind him that defending anti-Semitic remarks never has positive consequences.
So, Caesar explains that apes do not want war in a funny croaky voice while Gary Oldman looks on like a slack-jawed yokel. Cut to shots of apes doing cool things like wrestling bears while people discuss the basic shortcomings of humanity and the superior adaptability of the ape. Hey! Now there’s a cute baby ape! What a shame I do not see that baby ape living through the end of the movie. There’s an outside chance it will just be kidnapped and used a pawn in the inevitable clash of species that will appear in the climax of the film, but I’m betting that is one dead ape baby.
Keri Russell is in this? She has been kicking ass and taking names over on The Americans; why did it take so long for her to show up in the promo? Stupid sexist Hollywood. I guess she’s married to the guy who is not Gary Oldman. Since Gary Oldman is yelling some very species-ist things I guess that guy who is not Gary Oldman is our human hero.
At the one minute 26 second mark the awesome things happens. A militant ape comes upon to human sentries who do not take it seriously. The ape clowns for them, they lower their guard, and then a slaughter ensues. A hilarious slaughter. Stupid humans.
More apes doing cool stuff, somebody gave Gary Oldman an automatic weapon, people running, the Navy gets involved, Gary Oldman yelling some more. Fire, hugging, interspecies bromance, more guns. This. Looks. AMAZING.

Deliver Us From Evil – Trailer Review

Posted: June 25, 2014 by whipkitty in All, Movies, Trailers
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Eric Bana plays a New York cop who has seen some horrible things, which he makes sure to tell us about in a hard to source accent.  Is the terrible accent the result of something horrible you saw, Eric Bana?  Can you just take your shirt off now please?  I find it must easier to ignore your stupid voice when you look pretty.  Also, it is apparently raining for most of the movie and I am sure you will increase the box office receipts if you sell the movie as  “half-naked and dripping wet Eric Bana keeps his mouth shut while fighting evil.”

So, Eric Bana has a daughter who is both annoying and cute, in the way of child actors.  He also has a wife.  Apparently, her job is to be his wife, dress is sexy nighties, and raise their daughter, so it’s one of those movies.  Anyway, he gets called out to the Bronx Zoo at night, and now it sounds like a Boston accent?  Maybe he watched Good Will Hunting before showing up to work?  Anyway, there are strange goings-on at the Bronx Zoo in the middle of the night.

Cut to a scene from Penny Dreadful (wolves looking shifty at the zoo!  Probably werewolves because…evil).  The cops wander aimlessly, and find a woman doing some frankly unsettling shit.  I am sure that giving crazy eyes while on your knees scraping at the unforgiving ground is bad enough, but the trailer editors amp up the disturbing factor through the use of nails on the chalkboard music.

Then, a priest with a hard to source accent appears.  Spanish?  I think it might be Spanish.  Anyway, blah blah evilcakes, but Eric Bana is like, blah blah spiritual void, blah blah I dare this movie to change my mind about God and the Devil.  Screaming, scared lady with scary husband, more rain, bodies fall from the sky.  Third mention of scratching as a plot point HOLY CRAP THERE IS A CREEPY DEMON GUY HOVERING OVER HIS DAUGHTER, oh, wait, that was just in the mirror, guess it’s safe to walk away and leave his daughter in the clearly haunted room.

At what point did Eric Bana see that demon guy in the mirror?  Because she is in bed during a lot of scenes in the trailer, and while I’m on the fence about the scare value of the rolling hooting owl head, if I see something weird in my son’s room, like, I don’t know, a demon guy, for example, we’re all going to sleep in the car that night.

Spiders, more screaming, that dude is tied to a chair, that other dude is popping out of a dumpster, more rain.  Apparently Eric Bana’s daughter is named Christina, because that’s the name he keeps repeating,  He doesn’t sound that worried though.  More like he found out that she drew on wall in permanent marker and needs a time out. Definitely looks decent, but every time I see the trailer I notice that Joel McHale (The Soup, Community) has a role, and I am dying to know where he could possibly fit in.  Maybe the wisecracking Chief of Police?

Earth to Echo – Trailer Review

Posted: June 17, 2014 by whipkitty in All, Movies, Trailers
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Dear whoever made Earth to Echo…Awesome ET rip-off!  It’s like the studio threw found footage, cute kids, robots, Super 8 and The Iron Giant into a blender and this emotionally void slop is what got spewed out.  In case you were wondering, I take schmaltzy, poorly done science fiction as a personal insult.  We ‘re talking, My Name is Inigo Montoya, You Killed My Father, Prepare to Die levels of personal insult.

The trailer opens with the Sweet Music of Whimsy and a voiceover.  Cut back and forth (may your intestines rot while still in your body, person who thought shaky cam was good idea) between various Lil’ Rascal-inspired kids showing off their phones.  Which, by the way, are much nicer than I can afford and should not be given to children, ever.

Then the unsupervised and dangerously neglected gang of future delinquents rides their bikes into the desert while more whimsical music plays.  Then they are poking at what appears to be a dusty bit of something or other, but is actually a robot alien of some kind.  Then, the children shriek in fear and probably wet their pants.  Just kidding.  But you know that would be the way more realistic reaction.

Ok, cute kid asking where the alien robot comes from, which is weird, because other than I come from space you dumb kids, what more specific answer will have meaning for them?  Are these kids astronomers?  Do they know advanced math?  Then having the alien robot show them a star chart is sort of pointless, isn’t it?  Why would the alien robot hang out with these kids anyway?  Is it an early version of WALL-E?  I read on the internet that the reason WALL-E was abandoned on the planet was that the robot model flipped out soon after its creation and “cleaned” the planet of humanity.  Please, please, alien robot—cleanse the Earth in radioactive fire starting with the precocious children that surround you!

Then one of the children says “those dudes.” And I really have to wonder if anybody under the age of 25 uses that word anymore.  Children running, blonde girl not having anything to do but conform to adolescent gender norms locating her as appropriately female while still able to serve as the token girl in the gang of boys, metal floating.  Truck Disassembly!  Truck Reassembly!  Boy bragging about he and his gang of outsiders did something, possibly, but not necessarily, relating to the truck disassembly-reassembly.

Transformer: Age of Extinction – Trailer Review

Posted: June 11, 2014 by whipkitty in All, Movies, Trailers
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How many people do you think MIchael Bay has killed?  I’m not including the number of people he killed with bad movies, or the people who dropped dead from Transformers: Dark of the Moon related rage embolisms, or even the few hundred or so who saw the original Transformers movie and lost the will to live after seeing Optimus Prime share a screen with Shia LaBeouf.  I mean that I really believe Michael Bay has his people find him the most dangerous game (like in that movie Surviving the Game starring Ice-T) and then lets them run naked through a labyrinth while popping away at them with a rocket launcher.

When he’s not doing that, he’s making terrible movies and rolling around in the big pile of money they earn for him.  For example, Transformers: Age of Extinction.  At least Shia LaBeouf doesn’t appear in this one.  Instead, Marky Mark is the star, presumably because Director Bay remembers how he good he sang “You’ve Got the Touch” the theme song from The Transformers: The Movie (1986) that one time.

The trailer opens with the ominous music that typically highlights something bad about to happen.  A scientist tells us about science in a British accent, so you know he’s smart and knows science stuff.  A Decepticon (?) is tied to a medical bed, and then Stanley Tucci is there radiating smarminess.

Shift to a junked up truck being towed to the Midwest.  Farmer Marky Mark and his daughter (the hot farmer’s daughter archetype replacing the hot gearhead with Daddy issues archetype from the first two films) have a sophisticated array of stuff designed to repair junked up trucks, for some reason?  Maybe he’s a disgraced scientist of some kind?  Anyway, I though the Midwest was constantly being flooded or tornado-ed, so I hope he has good insurance for all the equipment.

So, obviously the junked up truck is Optimus Prime.  Make up your own story for how he ended up in the hands of Marky Mark, because explaining that will probably not be a huge priority in the movie.  They are going to spend more time on the shady government types in the caravan of black cars being mean to Marky Mark and the hot farmer’s daughter.

Then things explode!  Because, of  course they do, because it’s a Michael Bay film.  The explosion kicks us to an Optimus Prime voiceover, and he sounds serious.  Apparently, humans like Stanley Tucci are hunting the Transformers, but something worse than Transformers are coming to hunt the humans AND the Transformers.  I wonder if they will come together and learn to work as a team to fend off a world-threatening alien species?  Hm.  That one Transformer has a gun for a head.  If I were a Transformer I wouldn’t waste my time turning my head into a gun just to look cool.  I would turn my head into a flamethrower and roast the planet, thus rendering it human free.

Anyway, alien ships that closely resemble super-sized snail shells are attacking the planet.  Only one thing left to do!  Bust out some Dinobots.  Wait, what?  Yes, you read that right.  The Dinobots, the spoiled bratty children/pets made by Transformers finally appear, presumably to fight against the super-sized snail ships.

Bumblebee is back and there is also some weird looking Transformers with a manly beard made of thick beaded cables.  More explosions, Marky Mark somehow maintaining a straight face while talking life and death with a giant children’s toy, transformer sound effect.  More explosions, hot farmer’s daughter, Marky Mark gets a gun, a Transformer who could find work as an obesity poster child, and OH MY LORD THAT DINOBOT IS BREATHING FIRE.

Then, Optimus Prime rides the fire-breathing Dinobot through cite streets while carrying what appears to be a red-hot glowing claymore.  Well, there’s something you don’t see everyday.  it might be worth my while to peek into the theater just for that scene alone.

 

22 Jump Street – Trailer Review

Posted: June 3, 2014 by whipkitty in All, Movies, Trailers
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Oh Boy!  Jonah Hill (who has lost all credibility) and Channing Tatum (who never had any credibility to begin with) are starring in a sequel to a movie I really didn’t like based on a show I never watched!  Based on the trailer, apparently their bro-mance from 21 Jump Street has progressed to couples counseling.

Ice Cube returns and he calls Hill and Tatum “dumb cops.”  He is not wrong.  Then, for some reason, there is an immediate fadecut to Hill and Tatum firing their pistols into the air while grabbing their other pistols.  So I’ll leave it to your imagination to decide which pistol is the latter.  Incidentally, after only 30 seconds I am convinced that actually sitting through this scurf on the head of the film industry will cause my ovaries to jump from my body and run away screaming.

Anyway, the boys are going undercover at a local Ivy League college to search out a new drug.  Hmm.  Given what I know about the average police department budget, I’m going to call shenanigans–there is no way in hell that a police department could afford to outfit two idiots with college gear.  I mean, I’ve been to college and the campus most people can afford looks nothing like that campus always shown in college movies.  In real life the other students are sleep-deprived and caffeine-shocked, and live in shoeboxes, not the spacious palaces typically depicted in film.

Anyway, after setting up any high school senior who sees the movie for a very disappointing first year in college, the action shifts to Spring Break.  That hip music the young people like plays over shots of bikini-clad nymphets jumping and drinking.  Wow.  A male-oriented film that glorifies violence, promotes racial stereotypes for the purpose of cheap giggles, mocks the emotions of the male characters, and objectifies young attractive women.  Way to go out on a limb, Hollywood!

Then Hill and that blonde woman from Workaholics fight each other, but it’s okay to hit her because she’s saying hit me and then she hit Jonah, so he has to hit her because otherwise he would need to calmly walk away instead of punching her in the face and then she’s going to kiss him, which is why he gets flustered and hits her…wait, why is it okay that Jonah Hill is hitting the blonde chick?  Seriously not cool, movie.

End the trailer with a penis joke, although, in many ways, the trailer has already been one, long, penis joke.  See what I did there?  I ended my review on a penis joke, too.

 

 

Jupiter Ascending – Trailer Review

Posted: May 28, 2014 by whipkitty in All, Movies, Trailers
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What have the Wachowski’s been up to lately, you ask?  Well, apparently it involves a crapload of mescaline.    According to IMDb, Jupiter Ascending involves “a young destitute human woman…targeted for assassination by the Queen of the Universe.”  Funny they should put it that way, because I happen to be the Queen of the Universe and I certainly wouldn’t  target a homeless person for assassination, I would just TCB all by myself.  

You wouldn’t be able to tell from the poster, but it stars Mila Kunis, apparently aging in reverse ala Benjamin Button, though that might be the result of excessive photoshopping.  Hey!  I wonder if her costume will involve tight black pleather like in Max Payne?

We open with a panoramic shot of a brightly lit city.  Then, Sean Bean is talking to some other guy who is looking for Mila Kunis, and then Mila Kunis is in a hosptial ward and some guys are trying to kill her.

Dear trailer: make more sense.

The trailer ignores me, and makes even less sense.  Because Channing Tatum appears, with the scruffiest facial hair and stupidest expression this side of an Amsterdam coffee house (the kind where they don’t serve coffee).  Also, he is wearing a ton of eyeliner and now I just want to punch him in the face.  To be fair, that is my default reaction to Channing Tatum.

Anyway, why does Mila Kunis need him to save her?  Can’t she save herself?  She’s an independent woman!  Oh dear, I begin to fear that they are  the movie’s supercouple.   Let’s all join hands and concentrate on making that not happen.   While we’re at it, let’s concentrate on pretending that Tatum isn’t speaking in that stupid, affected, voice.  Although, it might not actually be him talking.  I heard they had to put peanut butter under his lip to make him move his mouth while someone else read his lines.  Because he is dumb, is what I am getting at.

Ok, Space, Planets, more Sean Bean, more eyeliner, pretty dresses, music I don’t like..  Naked ladies, cyborgs of some kind, spaceship transformers, falling off tall buildings, lots and lots of guns…the Wachowski’s may be overselling here.  It might be to make up for the fact that around the 90 second mark Tatum swallows the face of Kunis.  Seriously, watch it.  It’s like he is one of those boa constrictors that can unhinge his jaw to swallow a small child.  I bet he tastes like oiled up stripper and Aspercreme, too.  I hope she got paid extra!

Well, it looks like spoiled milk, but I’ll check out a science fiction movie for giggles.  Maybe I’ll even decide to like that parts of the movie that do not involve Channing Tatum.

Knights of Badassdom – Trailer Review

Posted: May 22, 2014 by whipkitty in All, Movies, Trailers
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Rated R.  I’m going to feel free to consider that a good sign.  One question.  If, as reported by several online sources, filming began back in 2010, how on Earth did this cult classic waiting to happen slip past my hypersensitive radar?  My fake Vulcan ears are glued to ground on movies about geeky stuff like LARPing and role-playing!  I mean, I am a genre whore–I kept track of  Trick R Treat, Fanboys, and All the Boys Love Mandy Lane from rumors of their production to their tragic shelving and, finally, their triumphant release (except Mandy Lane.  Not bad, but hardly a triumph).  In this case, movie purgatory kept a movie down so far that I had never even heard of it until a trailer popped up on IMDb a few months ago.  Yes, it is released now.  And Peter DInklage is there!  And Summer Glau!  And Why can’t I find a copy!  WHY!  Sorry, I went to my sad place.  You know what might cheer me up?  The trailer!

Please note, before I even started watching the trailer, the promo posters had me frothing at the mouth to watch this bad boy…

Movie voiceover guy starts us off right by hitting the movie’s key demographic where it lives…a parking lot Renaissance Faire style set-up.  I used to work at at a Ren Faire, and while we did have twenty pounds of bosom lacked into ten pound corsets, we did not have Ryan Kwanten (True Blood) packed into plate armor.  Nor did we have Peter Dinklage camping it up, and hey!  It’s that guy from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia who plays that sweaty milk drinking guy!

Hm.  So far, three or four main guys–there’s the hot chick!  Oh Summer Glau, I missed you.  Can you do me a favor and contribute a cameo to all the shows I love over the next year?  I can picture you in Mad Men playing, um, yeah, can’t do it.  Maybe you can just run a round in that pseudo-medieval boiled leather miniskirt and kick things?  Cool, thanks.

Anyway, then Danny Pudi (Community) shows up and does his Danny Pudi thing, but slightly toned down, which reminds me that I’m going to miss Community next year because it is canceled.  That’s when things get a little…left of center?  It’s like, watching From Dusk til Dawn and having no idea about the vampire subplot that takes over halfway through.  Because suddenly, the geeky gang calls up a real live succubus.  And maybe, just maybe, that’s where the movie loses it way.  From this point on it’s mostly yelling and running and it’s dark, so I guess this is a comedy horror?  But not the good kind, like Shaun of the Dead.  Because they are taking it to a sort of misogynistic place, at least based on the trailer, and I’m not down with that.

But you know what?  It still looks pretty awesome and I want to see it.

 

 

 

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