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I’ve gotta get back to programming in a second, but first…
Let me save you some time and distill the 5-book series that encompasses The Chronicles of Narnia down to its two essential facts: Turkish Delight is a sticky dessert and the titular lion is a metaphor for Christ …for some reason. These would appear to be the only things going for this movie apart from a very long and silly title. But the real question for The Chronicles of Narnia is will it be a bigger success than last year’s The Chronicles of Riddick?
Rumors about a fourth installment to Peter Jackson’s incredibly popular Lord of the Rings trilogy reveal it to be a separate movie entirely. At last, stop-motion and claymation technology have reached a level of sophistication that Peter Jackson can finally make an enduring version of King Kong. The real advantage for Jackson is that computer graphics allow for a greater degree of lip sync and character animation that until now have limited the performance of the film’s pivotal star, Adrian Brody.
I’m a little worried about whether the popular Broadway musical The Producers could actually work as a feature film, but I’m glad that at least one popular Broadway musical has finally shown enough crossover appeal (thanks to the public’s enduring fascination with both Uma Thurman and the Nazis) to make it to the big screen. I can’t wait until 2008 for the inevitable musical based on the movie based on the musical based on the movie.
Brokeback Mountain, which looks like a cowboy fantasy taken out of Gus Van Sant’s secret diary, is the sort of movie that usually enjoys a limited release at the Tomkat Theater in West Hollywood. Starring the Casanova Heath Ledger and Jarhead Jake Gylyllennhaaaaall (sp?), this steamy cowboy romance simmers with an erotic ambience not seen since Unforgiven.
Finally there’s the Jim Carry comedy Fun with Dick and Jane, which is not to be confused with the Tomkat double-feature Fun with Dick and Dick.
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It’s November and music is in the air… and in theaters!
Money enthusiast and rap star 50 Cent stars in Get Rich or Die Tryin’. How about “Get Rich or Don’t Get Rich?” You don’t need to make everything into a life-and-death struggle, Fiddy. Now I don’t want to give away the ending of the movie, but since it’s a big-budget feature film starring 50 Cent in the story of his life, I’m guessing “dying tryin’ ” isn’t an outcome.
The Chumscrubber is a feature-length adaptation of Chumbawumba’s one hit song. It centers around a man who drinks a whisky drink, a vodka drink, a lager drink, then a cider drink. I assume this man is an alcoholic. The film chronicles his struggles, what gets him down and how he gets up again.
Zathursa. See: Jumanji
For songs that don’t rhyme and jokes about black people, check out comedian Sarah Silverman in Jesus is Magic and hear variations on the same six jokes that made her sorta-famous.
In the trailer for Walk the Line, Joaquin Phoenix states, “Hello, I’m Johnny Cash.” and the movie appears to say just about as much. Folsom Prison? Check. “Ring of Fire”? Check. Reese Witherspoon? The heck? What’s she doing here? At least her goofy southern-somewhere drawl finally seems appropriate.
Finally, Rent tells the inspirational story of several hip, young artists living in a run-down part of New York who are all trying to ‘make it’. No wait, that’s the movie Fame. Okay, but Rent is a musical. No wait, Fame was also a musical. But what Rent has that Fame doesn’t is more timely references to things like AIDS and Newt Gingrich. But with all the similarities, maybe this movie should be called Rent: I’m gonna live forever …or die tryin’.
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So many brand new movies to see!
In Flight Plan, asexual parent Jodie Foster loses her luggage on an airline flight. She spends the rest of the movie adamant about reclaiming her lost luggage even though nobody else believes she brought any in the first place. Did I say luggage? I meant daughter. I can’t say I look forward to seeing this one, after already seeing this same thing in The Forgotten (2004) and Hitchcock’s The Lady Vanishes (1938). Wait, it’s on an airplane you say? Well that’s totally different.
Also, from the writer of Emma and Sense & Sensibility and the producers of Bridget Jones’s Diary and Love Actually, comes a movie just like Emma, Sense & Sensibility, Bridget Jones’s Diary and Love Actually: Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice.
So what’s new with America’s sweetheart Emily Rose? This September something-or-other, she’s getting some exercise in The Exorcism of Emily Rose! It’s a story about a psychotic little girl whose demons cannot be cured by medical science and must be treated by a higher power. It chills the viewer with eerie sounds and images, leaping beds and a waif with a voice like an angry linebacker. Also, Emily Rose will be played by Linda Blair and the movie will be released in 1973 under the name The Exorcist.
Serenity, based on the low-rated sci-fi series “Firefly”, is about some people in a spaceship. Not terribly innovative yet, but wait’ll you find out what they’re carrying! The cargo is a Joss Whedon fantasy: a combat-capable super-chick. The real question of the movie though is which combat-capable super-chick??? Is it a squeaky blonde named Buffy who slays vampires? No wait, maybe her name is Lara and she raids tombs, guns a-blazin’! Or is it Dark Angel Jessica Alba come to kick future space butt? Or could it be Jennifer Garner from “Alias”?
Maybe it’s Jodie Foster’s missing daughter.
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