Will Ferrell is not for everyone I can admit that, and his films have been diminishing returns since ‘Anchor Man’ and the glory of lines like “I’m going to punch you right in the ovaries!” which is a shame, and i’m hoping that ‘Semi-pro’ might take him back to that. The thing is with Ferrell though he’s decent when he’s playing it a bit straighter too; he was great in ‘Stranger than Fiction’ and I really liked him in the Woody Allen film he did a couple of years back called ‘Melinda & Melinda’. Actually some of the short films he’s been doing on his website ‘Funny or Die’(where this trailer is hosted incidentally) are funnier than the hollywood stuff he’s been in

It’s expected the film will be released in February 2008

(trailer via cinemablend)

Man what the fuck would we do without wikipedia? I’ve been keeping an eye on the new Stephen Chow (Shaolin Soccer, Kung-fu Hustle) film for a while, and in that time it seems to have changed titles several times. At first I thought Chow was working on more than one production at the same time, but wikipedia is there to clean it all up for me:

In August 2007 the film was given the title ‘CJ7′, a play on China’s successful Shenzhou manned space missions – Shenzhou 5 and Shenzhou 6. It was previously been known by a series of working titles – ‘Alien’, ‘Yangtze River VII’, ‘Long River 7′ and most notably, ‘A Hope’.

Also there seems to be no clear plot synopsis for the film anywhere either (this is turning into a wacky version of cloverfield), Wikipedia give me this:

Chow plays a man who lives in a partly demolished house. He takes in a homeless boy (who is actually played by a girl, Xu Jiao). Whether the semi-demolished house and the homeless boy are on Earth, or on the alien planet is not clear. As Chow’s character can’t afford to buy a toy for the child, he finds a makeshift toy in the garbage and brings it back to his “son”. The “toy” is actually a powerful alien device and the aliens are desperate to get it back.[4] Some rumours state that it is a “pet” rather than a “toy”

You can check some stills from the film at a russian site here and at a chinese site here

I loved Kung-fu hustle it was one of my favourite films of the last couple of years, mainly because it was such a surprise to me. I enjoyed Shaolin Soccer but Kung-fu hustle was such a step-up it really blew me away. Understandably the looney-tunes elements weren’t for everyone, but for me just added to the fun I was already having….

i’m looking forward to ‘CJ7′ .. it’s on my ‘balls out’ list. that’s a good thing

Javier Bardem is the reason i’m not sleeping very well at night. The guy gives me the fucking creeps, and the bit when he falls onto his back and pulls that crazy straining face as he’s strangling the life out of that guy…. **shudder**.. I don’t like it. Shark eyes acting

I had to stop reading the Cormac McCarthy book the film is based on halfway through (which was really difficult as it’s pretty damn good) to save ruining the film for myself….

Check the new trailer (apple quicktime encodes) here: small medium large 480 720 1080

I really liked Night Watch when we eventually got it over this side of the pond (2 years after it was out in Russia I think?) and Day Watch is just as good but if anything just ramps it all up a gear. Some of the action sequences are truly epic and need to be seen to be believed, but plot wise if you haven’t seen the first film you might be a little (read: a LOT) lost. Dusk Watch, the third film in the trilogy (the films are based on a series of books) is out in Russia some time next year I hear, so i’ll keep my eyes peeled for any developments as they make themselves known.

So to celebrate the release of the film in the UK next Friday (October the 15th) fox has given me a bunch of Day Watch stuff to give away…. . So as I understand it there’s 5 sets of ‘goodie bags’ to give away, in said bags there’s:

- A Day Watch t-shirt (which looks pretty cool, if it’s too big you can give it to your girlfriend to sleep in, girls look hot in Day Watch gear… FACT)

- A ‘baseball’ cap (i’m pretty certain this’ll make you look like you just got off the special bus.. but what do I know)

- A set of four metal Day Watch shot glasses. (for drinking blood out of…. or Baileys…. whichever you prefer)

The comps open only to UK residents… sorry my foreign chums

all you need to do to enter is drop me an email to competition@solaceincinema.com, and please remember to put ‘day watch’ in the subject line. The winners will be announced next thursday.

Here’s a picture of a set.. in case you were wondering:

So they’ve started to test screen nail Marshall’s new film ‘Doomsday’.. in the states apparently (What the fuck Marshall??) and the first couple of reviews are starting to show up on US sites…. some positive… some not..

The First review I read was over at at Aintitcool, who’s reviews I tend to not trust… at all…

I knew I was going into this movie knowing that I would love it, or at least like it. What I got was something else. What I watched was this silly, far fetched, horribly paced apocalyptic disaster. Now I know this was only a test screening and not a completed picture. We all filled out the surveys at the end of the film and asked about what we thought etc.. but Neil Marshall people! C’mon! I like Neil Marshall’s movies because of the lack of bullshit in them. So why in hell, is there more bullshit in this movie to last a lifetime? I have no answer.

You can read the full review here

Naturally i’m pulling for this movie to be good, so fingers crossed i’ll agree with ionCinema more:

Though the film appears to be Marshall’s break from the horror genre, this is one of the bloodiest films I’ve seen all year. The Reaper virus effects are appropriately disgusting, heads are blown apart, limbs hacked off, a man is roasted alive and eaten, and blood spurts by the gallon. Battle is carried out with everything from futuristic automatic weapons, to crude clubs fashioned from table legs and metal spikes, to medieval weaponry, and martial arts. The action is extraordinarily well directed, and Marshall’s ability to create increasingly intense, eye-popping action sequences rivals what Jameson Cameron did in Aliens and Terminator 2. The film’s twisted sense of gallows humor is also a welcome element.

Check out their review here

I saw the trailer for the film at this years Frightfest, and it looked great (despite being in black and white… due to technical issues) like a great mix between ‘Escape from New York’ and ‘Mad Max 2′, some of the action and road chases looked insane, and Rhona Mitra looked hot. I’m dealing in facts people.

I’ve got all my fingers and toes crossed.

I it and it’s tagline “you must admit, you brought this on yourself”. but other than this poster so far nothing has really peaked my interest. The remake is shot-for-shot and I don’t really understand why… the original is barely 10 years old. **deep exhalation of breath** Well I won’t go on about it again. It’s playing at the London Film Festival this year (press screenings of which start today) so I’ll see it for curiosities sake… and becuase I like Naomi Watts and Tim Roth. Expect a full report.

I posted when the trailer came out, and I still think it looks pretty good. I’ve never read the book but It stars Tom Jane, and William Sadler and is being directed by Frank Darabont

I had no idea these films were in production until first showing posted these sweet posters. Imagi are the guys behind the CGI turtles movie that came out earlier this year. I haven’t seen it but the word was that it was better than people expected. I’m not sure what to make of that. Astroboy i’m honestly indifferent too, I didn’t watch it as a child and i’ve read maybe small pieces of one book, but Gatchaman is a different kettle of fish. It was known as ‘Battle of the Planets’ in the west, and I used to watch it really early on a saturday morning next to ‘Ulysses 31′ and ‘Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors’. I can’t wait. There’s also some production artwork for the Gatchaman film here

Funny Games/The Mist posters via impawards, Gatchaman and Astroboy via Firstshowing

Wow.. this a little to much for my weak heart first thing in the morning. The full ‘Hotel Chevalier’ short is online, it’s a prelude to Wes Anderson’s ‘The Darjeeling Limited’ incase you didn’t know. Sweet Natalie Portman flesh… I like to imagine she tastes like fruit polos.. or perhaps Tizer. You’ll need a stinking iTunes account to view it here, or you can download it from rapidshare here

What better way to follow fluffy art school spank material like ‘Hotel Chevalier’ than with a trailer for a film called ‘Midnight Meat Train’. No fucking around. It stars Vinnie Jones and a guy who I recognise but can’t be bothered to look up his name. The thing I’m really interested in is it’s directed by Ryu Kitamura, the guy responisble for crazy Japanese weapon fetish movie like ‘Versus’ and ‘Azumi’. Looks like some gorey fun.

You can check the trailer here, and the (russian) poster on filmz.ru here

In a similar vein to ‘MMT’ (as we will now refer to it) there’s a trailer for ‘Pathology’, but If i was going to lay money on which film would be better, i’d throw it down on this one. It’s from the guys that directed ‘Crank’ so at the very least we know it’ll be fast paced and fun.

Check it out here 480 720 1080

You can catch Zack Snyder chatting about ‘Watchmen’ here

Apparently it’s been recut, and had a lot of CGI added to it since it was slated at Cannes, the new trailer for Richard ‘Donnie Darko’ Kelly’s ‘Southland Tails’ has hit the web. It still looks like a mess to me, interesting.. but a mess. I want to be proven wrong but I don’t think I will. Watch the trailer and see if you can figure out what the fuck is going on..

Check it here 480 720 1080