Well, twitter finally comes up trumps, actually no twitter finally came up trumps when i saw someone put "old macdonald had tourettes, e, i, e, i, cunt, but twitter today made me happy as the empire feed from comic-con (i really really really want to go to one of those) related the news that the arrested development movie is in the works and cound begin shooting in 6 months! or 18 months, either way good stuff! So with a bit of research i found out a little more and found this video
yep, he has a interview in a magazine called details where he talks about the prospects of a AD film. You know i actually saw this magazine on the stands when i was in a book shop last week and thought that would be an interesting read becuase Bateman usually is, i never bought it cos i am tight.
Granted I haven't seen him act, so I'm just judging his acting ability on his music. If it's anything like that halfway through the film he'll just start doing a very bad Sean Connery impersonation.
The news that Fox had ordered more Futurama was, like, the bestest news ever. So trust those numpty bastards at Fox to royally fuck up what should have been the easiest thing ever. Let the people who made Futurama the best thing on telly do what they do.
But no.
If this report's to be believed Fox want to recast the voice talent, the finest ensemble on telly. Let's hope they don't because if they go ahead the show just won't be the same.
Antichrist, the new horror from Lars Von Trier, has been passed uncut by the British Board Of Film Classification (BBFC) and British "newspaper" The Sun doesn't like this one bit.
Now "The Sneak" may have some genuine beefs with the film, and from descriptions he/she may be correct. I can't say that it sounds like my cup of tea. It certainly sounds like it would be the worst date movie since Schindler's List, although there will be someone out there who takes someone thinking "a bit of horror, should get her horny", only to face a situation a bit like when Travis Bickle takes Cybil Shephard to a porno theatre.
But there's one paragraph that reveals the real reason this piece appeared in the paper at all:
"The most talked-about film of the moment is SACHA BARON COHEN’s latest offering, Bruno.
But while the antics of the OTT fashionista can be eye-wateringly shocking, it is ridiculous that the film has the same 18 rating as Antichrist. All the sex in Bruno is slapstick."
Bruno certainly is the most talked about film of the moment...by The Sun. Everyday for the past couple of months Bruno has gotten some sort of bumming up in the Sun's pages, including a review about a month before the film was even released, a puff piece about Sacha Baron Cohen being Britain's funniest comedian and the very day I write this (6/7/09) Bruno "guest edits" the Bizarre segment of the paper.
So is it really just that The Sun's a tad pissed off that Bruno getting an '18' certificate means that much of the audience for a film full of gay jokes, teenage boys, now can't legally see the film, hurting potential profits? I'm not exactly sure of The Sun's interest in Bruno doing well, but the amount of space given over to it, tenuously linking to any of Cohen's characters at any given chance, means that this announcement from the BBFC is a stinger. There is definitely an argument here about what the BBFC's role is in film censorship and whether Antichrist goes too far, but reading between the lines this piece has been written under false pretences.
Just a quick post to say that both myself and Ruud are a pair of lazy bums. We've both seen The Hangover but neglected to review it. Now I could try and write some bullshit about how comedy is hard to review because its one goal is to make you laugh so no matter how much of a mess the film is if you're guffawing like a trumpet it's a success. As I said, I won't. What I will say is that The Hangover is not only a very good film, it's bloody hilarious as well, with Ed Helms and Zack Galifianakis stealing the show. If you haven't seen it, do so. And then you too can guffaw like a trumpet.
We'll probably do a more expansive review when it gets released on DVD and that other new fangled one that I can't afford, Blu Vein I think it's called. Anyway we can then do in depth analysis on whether it holds up to a second viewing and if this film features the smallest visible penis on a grown man in the history of the artform. Keep your eyes peeled (for the review, not the penis. Although you'll probably need to do it for that as well.)!
What with the buggered economy, the nation's youngsters attempting to kill each other either through knife related stabbings or by passing on STDs to as many people as possible, politicians trying to spend all of our money on such necessities as porn and inflatable houses for ducks and global warming meaning more rain in Scotland, times are bleak. And when times are bleak we must look for an escape, some form of entertainment that takes us away from all this shit. Well what better an escape than a trip to the cinema? In that darkened room there's that magic window showing us fantastical pictures that match our dreams, as long as those dreams include giant robots kicking each others titanium posteriors while millions of innocent bystanders are killed. It brings a sense of joy to a heart weighed down by the fact that within those two hours that you're there you've probably lost your job, your house and those bastards who used to be your neighbours have shot your cat's eye out with an air rifle. Cinemas are indeed great at insulating you from the nastiness out with.
Or at least that's what you thought! You see there's a window of time that allows you to ignore all that is cracked about life and it opens when the trailers begin.But if you arrive earlier something sinister is afoot, something that can ruin your enjoyment of the entire experience. Forget the film, these events will overrule any giddiness it may bring. Forget a happy ending, like when the Cloverfield monster killed all those annoying fucktards, because fear will have clamped its considerably muscular arms around the throat that in this metaphor is your brain and has started squeezing for dear life.
It all starts pleasantly enough. Enter the theatre early enough and you'll find an atmosphere that's pretty relaxed. Some music will be playing, the best-of Curiosity Killed The Cat or a mixtape of all those mid-90's pop reggae songs by acts like Big Mountain and Pato Banton. It's music from a more innocent, care-free time when singing "girl I want to make you sweat" didn't trigger some feminist retort about chauvinistic attitudes in popular music. And anyway, what's wrong with a song where the guy is inviting her to go jogging? Sorry, I digress. On the screen are movie related place holders containing trivia, Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes didn't use real tomatoes, or word games, guess the popular star: DRAB TTIP. It's all very nice.
Then the adverts start.
Not the trailers, but the adverts. The trailers are for movies about people dieing after using a haunted social networking site or the latest "serious" film from Euroland about relationships and stuff." FUCK OFF EUROLAND! I WANT A FILM INVOLVING CATS TURNING EVIL AND RISING UP LIKE A NEW FELINE NAZI PARTY TO DESTROY EARTH. GIVE US THAT MOVIE HOLLYWOOD! Sorry, I digress yet again. It's the adverts, the sort of pre-trailers trailers. At first it seems okay as it usually starts off with a Jack Daniels ad. You know, the ones filled with locals clearly ripped to the tits on the beverage they produce, and they're all happy and backwards and they live in the mountains and there's no women so you suspect that they may be cosying up to one another and it looks nice. Drinking makes you happy and able to enjoy the company of your fellow man, or at least it makes you forget. "Maybe I'll have a drink after the film," you say, "keep the fuzziness the film instills in me continue for a while." Drinking's great ain't it?
WRONG MOTHERFUCKER!!!!!
No, it's not fucking great. If you drink you'll end up murderising a kid whilst driving your 4x4 death machine under the influence of fake happy juice. And even worse, the kid's corpse will then stalk you, but not in a way that makes you feel like a celebrity. No, it'll make you feel like a murderiser!
HOW DARE YOU EVEN THINK ABOUT BEING HAPPY AGAIN! Especially not whilst there are children lying dead under computer desks the world over. What I want to know is why the dead kid is ginger? This is a shocking display of casual racism on the ad makers, or Doom Merchants, part here as it suggests that gingers can't cross the road without noticing without noticing a hulking great Honda Civic baring down upon them. If that kid had hazel eyes or was from the island of Tonga the uproar would be incredible. As it stands the silence from the Anti-Sun campaigners is deafening. In fact it makes me bloody angry! So angry I'm now going to have to take some "chill pills". It happens I've just purchased some from the internet. Nothing can go wrong taking pills from the net, can it?
What the fuck? I mean WHAT THE FUCK? Is this like an urban update of that old wife's tale about swallowing an apple seed and a full blown tree blasts through your skull a few years later? It's just so wrong. Like really, really, really, really wrong. Do these ads play before kids films as well because Care Bears and the Magical Adventure in Happy Fluffy Town just got ruined for poor little Timmy. In fact his whole life's now ruined. In fact mines has been by it too, but little Timmy has more years of torment ahead of him. Unless he's ginger and lives near a main road with a ton of pubs on it. The only way you could make that video worse is if the bloke looked up from the sink to see a couple of kids standing in the doorway, faces aghast as they stare in disbelief at the rat. Then the little girl, through a tidal wave of tears scream, "Fluffy! You've killed Fluffy!" Then to top it off the little boy chips in, "Thanks a lot Dad, this is the worst Christmas morning EVER!"
Thankfully these grim examples of why everything ever is horrible are usually followed by an ad for the latest must-have mobile phone. This thing has a camera, a music player, an Atari Lynx emulator, and a function that makes chips the way your mum used to before chip pans were banned as the lethal weapons that they are. Hell, it can even make phone calls to other telephones, mobile or non-mobile. The ad's bright, it's colourful, it's loud and it's filled with happy, good looking people who are clearly living the good life thanks to this wonder machine that fits in their pocket. They're clearly people who have said "no thanks, I'll get all my entertainment from my phone" because watching stuff on a really small screen with tinny sound is clearly the way forward. Of course they want you to join them, and after seeing dead ginger kids, rats being vomited up and listening to Big Mountain, fuck, you want to join them. You want to be one of those beautiful people, happy because having spent so much time focusing on a 5" screen they've went blind and can't see the atrocious world crumbling around their beautiful, well-trainered feet.
You just want to be happy, like them.
WELL YOU CAN'T BE BECAUSE YOU LOST YOUR JOB AND CAN'T AFFORD A NEW PHONE! You're stuck with your Phillips brick you've had for fourteen miserable, predictive text-less years. Even the happy ads now are punishing you, showing you what you should be, what you should have when you can't adhere because of matters outwith your control. It's basically saying "get it right up you, you shit phone owning knob you".
Hey, now a car ad's on with a soundtrack by Keane. Time to end it all. You may as well just stuff your face with popcorn until you choke. Ah well at least you'll get a sugar rush before you go, eh?
Only you won't because you accidentally lifted a bucket of salted on the way in. See you're so crap you can't even die happily. And now the film's starting and you just can't bring yourself to care. The world's caught up to you and not even the opening mantra "Directed by Michael Bay" could see you plunge lower.
And that's my account of the last time I went to the cinema to cheer myself up.
Indiana Jones and the Cradle of Filth Indiana Jones and the Something of Somewhere (see cause he's old and forgot) Indiana Jones and the Knackered Knees of Athritica Indiana Jones and the Last Big Payday (unless they do a sixth (they'll definitely do a sixth)) Indiana Jones and the Mortgage of Doom The Jones Identity (they're really looking to change up the series with this one) Indiana Jones 5: Jones Harder Indiana Jones and the Trip to the Doctor Indiana Jones and the Confusing Supermarket Layout Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of Chicken Soup
Michael Bay's remit for this sequel appears to have been "the first one, just more so" and that's exactly what it is. More explosions, more masturbating over the Yank army, more "plot" padding out the time between giant robots battering each other. It certainly is more so.
And yet somehow it feels less.
Don't get me wrong, the first Transformers is by no means a great film, but it is enjoyable, explodey summer fluff. And that bludgeoning direction of Bay's even kind of works in the context. Plus the robot effects are bloody excellent. All that's present and correct here as well but it doesn't feel as impressive. There are some bloody amazing sequences, all shot through with Bay's own patented Confuso-vision, but at no point does the film knock you sideways the way the original did. It lacks the crucial "wow factor". Plus the main problems with the first one are also back, and like everything else they're also "more so". The plot is pure crap. Now, I'm not expecting something to rival the classics here, but it could at least rival the first film's story about, er... finding some spectacles on eBay or something. It seriously is a bit rubbish, even for a whammo, blammo movie. That sense of confusion as to what's actually going on and which character is which is also present, thanks to Bay's aforementioned habit of having so much go on it's actually impossible for the human eye to comprehend it all. Too often it feels like the camera is sitting too close to the big robot fights, possibly done to show off how flawless the admittedly fantastic effects work is, but you may as well be watching the ones and zeros that constitute the fighters for the good it does. Also making an unwelcome return is the strangely childish sense of humour that led to a joke in the first one involving an Autobot pissing on John Turturro. How do you top that? Here's a Decepticon's testicles swinging in your face, will that do?
Then there are the "comic relief" characters. Sam's parents return and manage to grate, especially the whole Mum getting stoned because even though she's clearly the right age to have been around in the 60's she doesn't know what hash is, but they are not the worst. Not by a long shot. Added to them we get a couple of Autobot twins, sorry I didn't catch their names and I'm not a Transformers geek, who are a stereotypical redneck and some faux-hip-hop speech spewing arse respectively. But that's not all as there's also Sam's college room mate, a conspiracy theorist sure about the existence of the Transformers who's only function appears to be to scream, cry and get hit in the nuts. Be thankful then for Turturro's double turn as the returning Simmons and as the voice of the decrepit Jetfire. The worst character though is Tyrese Gibson's Epps who's only functions appear to be a) spouting dialogue that "comments" on what's happening, but not in a clever, fourth-wall cracking sort of way, rather in a "hey isn't that politician a bit of a dick" style, and b) to be the token black character in an otherwise all-white film. In fact when other non-American nationalities appear they only do through a "this is how Americans imagine you to be" filter. If a Scottish character was in it he'd probably be a real-life Groundskeeper Willy.
In fact the biggest bugbear is how "pro-American" the whole thing is. As much as it supposedly is a film that is designed to in no way illicit a single thought from the viewer that's not strictly the case. It's very clear Iraq and the "War on Terror" loom large over this. There's just a bit too much "look at how fucking great all this big army shit is, look at how efficiently we can kill people who don't agree with us". At times it feels like the film's a recruitment video for the army, making dieing in a sandy sweatbox look kind of fun.
Maybe I'm looking for too much. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is a two and a half hour mess, with a storyline that doesn't so much unravel as just explode in your face at intermittent intervals. The effects are indeed amazing, maybe the best you'll see to date, but having them shoved at you constantly deadens their impact until it's just a big jumble of colour and sound dancing about in front of you. So pretty much just like the first one then, but, you know, more so.
