solace in cinema : A vast wasteland of movies

So the 79th Oscars have wrapped, and it was a REALLY LONG show, especially if you live somewhere like the UK, and they get around to ‘Best Picture’ at about 5am. Despite the insane length, the nominations where everyone was saying “well X should win, it’s their year” actually seemed to pan out for a change. Just when I was close to thinking there really is no justice in the world (Ghostrider is number 1 film in the world right now), the Oscars picks me up from my low ebb, as I now live in a world where a Martin Scorsese has won a ‘Best Director’ oscar and a ‘Best Picture’ oscar. Hah in your FACE Babel!

Quote of the night goes to Ryan Gosling who turned up on the red carpet with a woman on both arms (looked like his Mum, and his perhaps… his sister) and was asked by an ABC presenter “so you brought 2 ladies with you?” to which he replied “Yeah, i’m rocking it like Snoop”.

I think the 79th Oscars will be remembered as the renumerations year, where the academy made up for past Oscar-crimes and awarded someone a bunch of statues that should have had them 20 years ago. Anyway, here’s the full rundown, with my comments thrown in where I can be bothered:

Best picture
Babel
The Departed
Letters From Iwo Jima
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen

He was owed, ‘The Departed’ is a lesser scorsese film in my opinion, but.. like I said… he was owed.

Best director
Clint Eastwood, Letters From Iwo Jima
Stephen Frears, The Queen
Paul Greengrass, United 93
Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu, Babel
Martin Scorsese, The Departed

I’m not sure I mentioned it, he was owed.

Best actor
Leonardo DiCaprio, Blood Diamond
Ryan Gosling, Half Nelson
Peter O’Toole, Venus
Will Smith, The Pursuit of Happyness
Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland

Ryan Gosling will win one eventually that’s for sure. It’s a shame Peter O’Toole couldn’t win one after he rejected the ‘we’re sorry you’re going to die soon’ honorary Oscar in 2003, I guess it’s possible he could still get one, but I would say it’s unlikely. A difficult category to be in when you’re up against the powerhouse performance from Forrest Whitaker in ‘Last King of Scotland’.

Rob Zombie is in the middle of filming his remake of ‘Halloween’, and while many people are worried that he’s going to screw it up I’m excited to see what he’s going to turn out. The remake is happening no matter what, so i’m happy to see at least someone with a bit of potential directing it rather than giving it to some fresh out of the gates music video director. I didn’t like ‘House of 1000 Corpses’ but ‘The Devils Rejects’ had a nasty 70’s grindhouse vibe that i enjoyed (I overlooked the obvious references to the Manson Family cult)

Zombie’s doing a good job of keeping the official Haloween myspace page up to date with any new developments, and that’s where the picture of the new/old Michael Myers appeared. He’s exactly the same, but just a bit grimier. Still using the William Shatner mask and everything. I can hear fanboys around the world sigh with relief.

‘Halloween’ or ‘Halloween 9′ or ‘Halloween: Retribution’ or whatever they decide to call it is arriving in cinemas usurprisingly… halloween 2007.

(via bloody-disgusting)

I’ll apologise for that post title right now, I couldn’t help myself. This weekend it’s the New York Comicon, and while it’s nowhere near as big as the west-coast convention of the same title it’s still a big deal in the world of comics, and of course movies. I know a lot of horror fanboys like Eli Roth, but so far I haven’t liked any of his films, Cabin Fever was a mess and Hostel had bits that I really liked but on the whole was very ‘meh’. Also I think the guy has been riding under the ‘Tarantino presents…’ mantle for too long. I actually met someone the other day that thought Tarantino directed ‘Hostel’…

So AICN have got a great snap of Bijou Phillips, headless and naked on the new poster for ‘Hostel II’. If there’s one thing you can say about ‘Eli Roth’ it’s that he’s a marketing mans dream, his films are old school 80’s horror, tits, violence and gore… there’s no deeper meaning, there’s no subtext and there’s no irony. I’m not looking forward to the movie, but I can’t say I won’t be watching it.

Click the poster to the left to see a bigger version, or check it out at aintitcool here

You’d remember if you’d heard about a director called Nimród, It’s not a name you forget in a hurry. Nimród Antal directed a great Hungarian film called ‘Kontroll’ that followed the lives of a group of tube ticket inspectors and their odd lives spent largely underground (there’s even a great disclaimer at the beginning from the Hungarian transport minister, something along the lines of “this film is fiction, Hungary is awesome, please come!”). It’s much better than i’m making it sound trust me.

I’ve been following Nimród’s first foray into American movie-making ‘Vacancy’ for a while, and a trailer has finally arrived online, here’s the summary:

When David (Luke Wilson) and Amy Fox’s (Kate Beckinsale) car breaks down in the middle of nowhere, they are forced to spend the night at the only motel around, with only the TV to entertain them… until they discover that the low-budget slasher movies they’re watching were all filmed in the very room they’re sitting in. With hidden cameras now aimed at them… trapping them in rooms, crawlspaces, underground tunnels… and filming their every move, David and Amy must struggle to get out alive before whomever is watching them can finish their latest masterpiece.

This kind of horror-conspiracy is a bit played out with films like ‘Hostel’, ‘ils’ and ‘My Little Eye’ having already covered the same ground, but i’m hoping Antal can bring something new to the table.

Check out the trailer on Yahoo here

‘No Country for Old Men’ is a screen adaptation of the Cormac McCarthy novel by the Coen Brothers. Personally I think the Coens have been off track for a while, ‘The Lady Killers’ was really disapointing, and ‘Intolerable Cruelty’ was sub-par. I’ve been hoping they would return to the darker material they’ve touched on with films like ‘Blood Simple’ and ‘The Man Who Wasn’t There’. Although the outline of the plot of ‘No Country For Old Men’ sounds similar to ‘Fargo’ it’s actually much darker:

Set in West Texas in 1980, the story is about a young Vietnam vet who stumbles over the remnants of a drug deal gone bad. He’s hunted by two extremely vicious assassins who want the money back.

As has become standard with newer Coen films, there’s a nice array of talent on offer: Josh Brolin, Tommy Lee Jones and Woody Harrelson are cast in lead roles, with Javier Bardem, Kelly McDonald and James Brolin helping them out as supporting cast. The film has wrapped and is currently in pre-production with rumours it will premier at this years Cannes film festival.

A good place to keep you eye on for new news is Coen-Alumni Carter Burwell’s site; so far he’s posted 2 images (including the one above) and 2 clips from his score for the film…

Check out Carter Burwell’s NCFOM page here

His beautiful pieces from the score (in Mp3 format) are here:

A Jackpot

Blood Trail (End Titles)

I remember reading about ‘Fido’ a while ago, then came some clips, and I realised the guy playing Fido the zombie looked vaguely familiar, I’ve only just got round to looking on imdb and realised it’s Billy Connolly. Billy Connolly playing a zombie!!! there’s no way this can be anything less than fantastic.

Here’s the synopsis for Fido:

Timmy Robinson’s best friend in the whole wide world is a six-foot tall rotting zombie named Fido. But when FIDO eats the next-door neighbor, Mom and Dad hit the roof, and Timmy has to go to the ends of the earth to keep Fido a part of the family. A boy-and-his-dog movie for grown ups, “FIDO” will rip your heart out.

Did I mention Billy Connolly is the zombie?

The full trailer for ‘Fido’ has arrived on the films official website and it looks really funny, and a nice twist on the white-picket fence happy-days style 50’s american movie…

Check it out here (via)

Really? another time travelling/seeing the future film? really? another terrible looking Nic Cage film… somebody kill me. The trailer for Nic Cage’s new film ‘NEXT’ has arrived online.

I don’t hate Nic Cage, the guy is just a bit twitchy and seems to be a bit delusional about what makes a good film. I love the roles where he’s been reigned in like ‘Raising Arizona’ and ‘Adaptation’ and actually turns in a great performance. Then there’s films like ‘Face Off’ and ‘The Rock’ that are guilty pleasures, and I like the films despite his twitchy acting… then there’s films like ‘NEXT’, ‘Ghost Rider’ and ‘The Wicker Man’ aka…’AHHHH I’M COVERED IN BEEEEESS’ that just look horrible, and I have literally no desire to see them. The thing is if it was someone else in the lead like say Christian Bale I’d probably be quite excited to see it, but you insert twitchmaster Cage, some hammy acting, his blank WTF?!?!?! look he always does and another terrible looking hair piece and there’s no way i’m paying to see this.

What I think obviously doesn’t seem to have any reflection on what the general public think as ‘Ghost Rider’ made $51 million in it’s opening weekend in the US. Once again the marketing dollar rules supreme, and I wouldn’t be surprised if this film makes the same ammount of money opening weekend.

Here’s the plot:

Las Vegas showroom magician Cris Johnson has a secret which torments him: he can see a few minutes into the future. Sick of the examinations he underwent as a child and the interest of the government and medical establishment in his power, he lies low under an assumed name in Vegas, performing cheap tricks and living off small-time gambling “winnings.” But when a terrorist group threatens to detonate a nuclear device in Los Angeles, government agent Callie Ferris must use all her wiles to capture Cris and convince him to help her stop the cataclysm.

If for nothing else I would say watch the trailer because of Jessica ‘too hot to live’ Biel and the scene where she’s in bed. I think I just found my happy place.

Check out the trailer on apple here (normal and in HD)

and incase you didn’t see it… the best of the Wicker Man (Man in bear suit punches girl in face, it’s genius))

I’ve mentioned this film briefly before when talking about Pegg’s upcoming projects. The trailer for ‘Run Fatboy Run’ has been playing before ‘Hot Fuzz’ here in the UK, and has cropped up on youtube. ‘Big Nothing’ wasn’t very good, but it’s problems lay in it’s contrived plot rather than anything Pegg did on screen. ‘Fatboy’ already looks funnier than ‘Big Nothing’ just from the amount of chuckles in the trailer alone (mostly involving Pegg hurting himself). Here’s the synopsis for ‘Fatboy’:

A chunky, clueless guy leaves his fiancée on their wedding day only to discover — some 10 years later — that she is his one true love. But in order to win back her heart, he looks to finish his first marathon while making her realize her new man is the wrong guy for her.

via Aintitcool

First couple of pics of Udo Kier (evil looking german guy, from everything) and Bill Moseley (The Devil’s Rejects, Army of Darkness) from Rob Zombies Grindhouse contribution ‘Werewolf Women of the SS’

Check out bigger versions at bloody-disgusting and here