April 2008 News Archive (Page 12)

It's a basic, time-tested movie equation:

Beautiful girl + Screaming + Torn apart clothing = Ch-ching!

With Brittany Snow and the film Prom Night fitting that description perfectly, we expect the horror flick to do well at the box office this week. But does that mean it's actually any good? Let's see what a few critics have to say about that...

- The new Prom Night is insistently lifeless, which I think is worse than simply being awful. At least awful has some personality to it...the defanged slasher movement once again lays a rotten egg. -- Brian Orndorf

- A snappy teen movie that's short and as sharp as the blade bloodied by its distinctively featured psychopathic killer. It's formulaic and there's nothing new, mind you, but it's well done and it is our imaginations that are encouraged to create the horror. -- Urban Cinefile

- Outside of a brief clip from Can't Hardly Wait, there is absolutely nothing in Prom Night that is even remotely scary. - eFilmCritic

- It's tough to be terrified by [Schaech's] absurdly methodical pursuit of Donna's friends, who he has no reason to kill besides maybe coveting their seats at the lunch table. -- Metromix.com

The details of Sex and the City: The Movie have been guarded closely. All we can say for certain about the film is that it's due in theaters on May 30.

However, director Michael Patrick King has told Entertainment Weekly that Fergie just recorded the film's opening sing.

"It's called ‘Labels & Love,'" he said. "It's an entirely new song with lyrics, but it has the Sex and the City theme as the DNA â€" on steroids."

Moreover, since this is a film about mouthy divas, Jennifer Hudson (who plays Carrie's assistant), will lend her pipes to the ballad "All Dressed Up in Love." It was written by MC Jack Splash and Gnarls Barkley's Cee-Lo; it plays during the end credits.

"She sings it like nobody's business," said King.

Cinema Blend has published an interesting rumor regarding The Dark Knight.

According to that movie site, a scene has been deleted from the next Batman installment because it too closely reflects the unfortunate passing of star Heath Ledger.

Reportedly, the scene involves The Joker pretending to be dead, photographed in a body bag.

If this rumor is true, we think it's a mistake by producers. The Joker was Ledger's final performance. The best way to honor the actor is to showcase the role in its entirety. Don't panic and cater to overly sensitive, misguided, politically correct-minded people who can't differentiate between reality and fiction.

What do you think? Should The Dark Knight be edited down due to Ledger's death?

On May 16, the follow-up to The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe hits theaters. But what can fans expect from The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian?

The good folks at Moviefone have actually come up with an in-depth Character Guide to help viewers get to know the film and the plot before it comes out. Before you head over to check it out, look over the following description of Glenstorm:

An honorable Centaur (is there any other kind?), Glenstorm is also an astronomer charged with watching the skies for portents. And he's good at his job.

Glenstorm knows what Caspian will try to achieve before he even attempts it. At the Narnian Council, the centaur encourages the old Narnians to trust in Caspian's commitment to bring freedom to all.

James Cameron's upcoming Avatar ranks as one of the most anticipated film projects in recent memory. The film will mark the Oscar winner's first narrative movie since Titanic, while also representing Cameron's long-held dream of melding digital 3-D stereo with epic big screen storytelling.

Below, the director discusses the project with Variety. You can read the full interview here.

We're seeing that audiences like 3-D and it's becoming a main driver for adoption of digital cinema systems in movie theaters. But speaking strictly as a storyteller and director, what does 3-D add to the creative side of a project?
I believe that Godard got it exactly backwards. Cinema is not truth 24 times a second, it is lies 24 times a second. Actors are pretending to be people they're not, in situations and settings which are completely illusory. Day for night, dry for wet, Vancouver for New York, potato shavings for snow.

The building is a thin-walled set, the sunlight is a xenon, and the traffic noise is supplied by the sound designers. It's all illusion, but the prize goes to those who make the fantasy the most real, the most visceral, the most involving. This sensation of truthfulness is vastly enhanced by the stereoscopic illusion. Especially in the types of films which have been my specialty to date, the fantasy experience is served best by a sense of detail and textural reality supporting the narrative moment by moment.

The characters, the dialogue, the production design, photography and visual effects must all strive to give the illusion that what you're seeing is really happening, no matter how improbable the situation might be if you stopped to think about it -- a time-traveling cyborg out to change history by killing a waitress, for example. When you see a scene in 3-D, that sense of reality is supercharged. The visual cortex is being cued, at a subliminal but pervasive level, that what is being seen is real.

All the films I've done previously could absolutely have benefited from 3-D. So creatively, I see 3-D as a natural extension of my cinematic craft.

A 3-D film immerses you in the scene, with a greatly enhanced sense of physical presence and participation. I believe that a functional-MRI study of brain activity would show that more neurons are actively engaged in processing a 3-D movie than the same film seen in 2-D. When most people think of 3-D films, they think first of the gimmick shots -- objects or characters flying, floating or poking out into the audience.

In fact, in a good stereo movie, these shots should be the exception rather than the rule. Watching a stereo movie is looking into an alternate reality through a window. It is intuitive to the film industry that this immersive quality is perfect for action, fantasy, and animation. What's less obvious is that the enhanced sense of presence and realism works in all types of scenes, even intimate dramatic moments.

Continue Reading...

Somehow, we doubt movie reviews for Forgetting Sarah Marshall will even make a difference as far as the box office haul for this comedy goes.

Considering its pedigree and advanced hype, expect huge numbers.

Still, for those interested, the reviews have been mostly positive. Here's a look at a few for the film that opens on April 18...

- Personally, I can't remember the last time I laughed this hard at the movies... Without revealing the scene (because that would spoil the fun), this one has a shock value moment that is on par with Ben Stiller's classic "Franks and Beans" scene from [Something About Mary]. -- Reelz Channel

- One of those can't-miss romantic comedies in that there's some sweet, sensitive, insightful stuff for the ladies -- but there's also plenty of raunchy comedy for the boys. -- Cinematical

- Producer Judd Apatow looks to have scored another long-legged hit with Forgetting Sarah Marshall. -- Variety

- Writing and starring in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Jason Segel gets emotionally naked. He bares his soul. Also, he lets us see his schlong. As Steve Martin said, comedy is not pretty. -- Kyle Smith

Robert Downey Jr. has a busy summer ahead. He'll be portraying Iron Man... and a black man.

We wonder which was the biggest challenge for this actor.

As previously reported, Downey stars in the Ben Stiller-directed comedy, Tropic Thunder. But it may be difficult to recognize. The following poster for the movie should give you an idea why:

Mark Neveldine is the producer on the upcoming thriller, Pathology. He recently discussed the film - about medical students that plan the perfect murder - with Movie Web:

We've heard about the research that went on for this film...
Mark Neveldine: Yes, Brian Taylor (Pathology co-writer and producer) and I love hanging out at the morgue. We thought for this movie, it's about Pathologists, why not bring the whole cast and crew down and... anybody that really wanted to go to the morgue for a tour, so we did four or five times. Basically, what we did with the actors is we made them watch the full autopsy.

Through the Y-cut, removing the rib plates and taking out all the organs, weighing the organs and reflecting the skin away and taking the brain out; then sewing them back up. We even showed them some... tests and x-rays and how they photograph the body when they come in. We thought it would be really important for them to know.

The funny thing is, on days like today, when we're ripping a body open and we're trying to do this all in f*cking 10 minutes, it's good that all the actors know what's going on because some of them will say, "Well, wait a second, that colon is not in the right place!"

Or, "That chest plate is not on properly." It's great. So everyone is sort of helping out and collaborating with this. It's sick little world we're creating but the fact is people are doing this every day by the millions; they're doing autopsies on people. One out of every three of us will end up in a morgue because of an accidental or unnatural death.

We just kind of want to get the story out there and show some of this in a cool way. Which is, a game between really cool, awesome, intelligent pathologists; young residents.

Read the full interview now.

In this day and age of Internet buzz and gossip, it's difficult to keep any movie cameo a secret. So the makes of The Love Guru have found out.

The June 20th comedy features Mike Myers as the character of meditative self-help guru Pitka. He's hired by the Toronto Maple Leafs to settle the romantic difficulties of the hockey team's star player.

One surprise costar in the movie has now revealed to MTV the appearance of another: Jessica Simpson.

"When she needs help she comes to the love guru, Mike," said Verne Troyer, who plays a diminutive, mean-spirited hockey coach in the flick. "I don't want to tell you every one of [the cameos], but you're going to be surprised."

Although the actor formerly known as "Mini Me" in the Austin Powers franchise was eager to reunite with Myers, Troyer said that the day of Simpsons' cameo may have been the most difficult one he's ever spent on a set.

"That one day we had Jessica Simpson there, it was difficult for me and every other guy," he said, not needing to elaborate on why.

British actor Scott Adkins landed a bit role as "Weapon 11" in the spin-off X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

Reportedly, the character will be featured in an fighting sequence with Wolverine near the end of the film. Anyone care to wager with us on who will win that battle?

In other casting news, Daniel Henney (pictured) told The Daily News that he's landed the role of "Agent Zero" in the movie, which will mark his American feature film debut.

"We sat down and she explained the basic premise of the film to me. I had no idea at this point that the director, producers, including Hugh Jackman, and executives at Fox had already made a decision on me," Henney said of meeting with Fox's head of casting about the project. "They had somehow seen some of my past films and thought I'd be right for the role."

"I then rushed back to my hotel, tore through the script, made a few phone calls to rearrange my schedule and called them back and happily accepted the role," the actor added.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is slated for a May 1, 2009 release.