The Equalizer is one of the handful of shows, along with The Sandbaggers and The Rockford Files amongst others, that had a huge influence on me growing up, and that still leak into my work in both large and small ways.
I knew when this was announced that it would bear little to no resemblance to the original Edward Woodward series, but seeing this first trailer, I’m tentatively optimistic that they seem to have captured at least some of the feel of the original series, and there’s at least two callbacks to the show that I spotted. Loved the appearance of McCall’s weapon room, for instance (and its existence gives some measure of lie to his monologue at the end of the trailer).
Also, if Melissa Leo is playing Control, I will be in heaven.
I have fond memories of watching The Rockford Files, in re-runs, with my grandfather. I came to The Equalizer late in the series, but really enjoyed it.
This looks like it’s got some potential.
Reblog if you want a Black Widow Movie
tj:
My guy friend says “No one wants to see some chick do back flips around bad guys.”
I want to prove him wrong.Not to be rude, but your friend seems like a stupid doodoo head.
“chick doing back flips around bad guys” sounds like 50% of the movies I watch.
I’m in.
H.R. Giger on the set of Alien, creating the props, set-pieces and costumes, 1979.
via Reddit
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2zMwtolhmY?feature=oembed&enablejsapi=1&origin=https://safe.txmblr.com&wmode=opaque&w=250&h=141]
[gallery]
Captain America: The Winter Soldier poster by Paolo Rivera
There is nothing I do not like about this.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1pX97_0rxU?feature=oembed&enablejsapi=1&origin=https://safe.txmblr.com&wmode=opaque&w=250&h=141]
New Trailer for ‘Godzilla’ Reboot Strongly Suggests There Might Be Something Else Lurking Out There
HELL. YEAH.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1FNL_iIp5c?feature=oembed&enablejsapi=1&origin=https://safe.txmblr.com&wmode=opaque&w=250&h=141]
‘Peanuts’, A Feature-Length CG-Animated 3D Film Based on the Comic Strip by Charles M. Schulz
I confess to having mixed feelings about this. But, being the father of three, and a long-time Peanuts fan, I’ll most likely see it.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6acRHWnfZAE?feature=oembed&enablejsapi=1&origin=https://safe.txmblr.com&wmode=opaque&w=250&h=141]
New ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’ Trailer Asks Whether the Future Can Be Changed
This cannot come out soon enough.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLWsK1ZFunA?feature=oembed&enablejsapi=1&origin=https://safe.txmblr.com&wmode=opaque&w=250&h=141]
Captain America: The Winter Soldier trailer.
Can. Not. Wait.
[gallery]
“It ain’t the years honey… it’s the mileage.”
RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK
Still one of my all time favorite movies.
And one that I can over-analyze for days.
It clocks in at #3 on my personal all-time list.
[gallery]
The sights of Sherwood forest by Linda Pesudovs by Shannon Ocean on Flickr.
“We’re men, MANLY MEN!, we’re men in tights….YES! We roam around the forest looking for fights…”
Rock of Ages: The Retrophisch Review
In the interests of full disclosure: the soundtrack for this film was the soundtrack of my life in the 1980s. I was a closet metalhead–closet only in the sense that I didn’t have long hair and wasn’t allowed to go to the rock shows by my Southern Baptist-raised mother. These songs are the songs of my formative teenage years, and I was already biased toward liking this movie before I sat down in the theater to view it. So fellow ‘80s rockers whose iPods and iPhones hold Poison, Journey, Bon Jovi, Twisted Sister, The Scorpions, Guns N'Roses, and the like, you’re going to love this movie, despite its myriad shortcomings.
Oh, and shortcomings it has. For one: how do you leave out Motley Crüe from the soundtrack? Talk about your quintessential 1980s L.A. rock band. There’s not even a cut from the Crüe in the original musical. Granted, Rock of Ages is, despite its full-on '80s rock ensemble, a love story. And Motley Crüe didn’t make their bones belting out power ballads. Now it wouldn’t surprise me to learn, given Motley Crüe’s years-ago split-up, then later reformation, that there may have been some legal wrangling that proved too costly. Or maybe, being the quintessential 1980s L.A. rock band, the Crüe simply didn’t want their tracks being associated with a Broadway musical and its film spinoff.
One shortcoming which will come as no surprise: the plot’s really thin. The entire reason there’s even a plot is to give us reasons to have these songs performed. I’m sure if you took the original music videos for these songs, or video of their best live performances, strung them together one after another, and released that to theaters, we '80s rockers would be just as apt to shell out our ten bucks each to sit down and enjoy that hour and a half. One will note that Rock of Ages’s running time is just a hair over two hours, which tells you there’s about 30 minutes of nearly useless, music-less filler to slog through.
Casting: whew, we could be here awhile in this regard. But I’ll try to keep it brief. Alec Baldwin is amusing in his role as Bourbon Room owner Dennis Dupree, but you could easily interchange him with any number of actors. Malin Akerman is pure eye candy as a reporter from Rolling Stone. Really? A swimsuit cover model type cast as a reporter from Rolling Stone? The other supporting roles are as equally interchangeable among the Hollywood glitterati as Baldwin’s.
Julianne Hough is endearing as Sherrie, and we all know she can sing. (All the actors did their own singing, painfully obvious in a line of one song where Baldwin chimes in.) Mary J. Blige as Justice, the owner of The Venus Club, is a treat, and you want to hear more of her covering Pat Benatar and Quarterflash than to put up with another round of anything from Diego Boneta. My feelings regarding the lead casting of Boneta as Drew are best summed up by this line from Tom Santilli in his Examiner review (read after I saw the film):
He seems more suited for musical theater, which I guess this is, but he just seems like the kind of guy Stacee Jaxx would have beaten up in high school.
And speaking of Stacee Jaxx, this leads us to Tom Cruise. Like many, when I saw Cruise was taking the role of the fictional rock legend, I had serious doubts he could pull it off. And while I don’t think his singing voice is quite right for certain numbers (“Paradise City”, most notably), he sings well enough to indeed pull it off. I’ll also give Cruise points for giving an appropriately dark performace as a rock god who’s having trouble accepting his place in music history, and not knowing where to go next. I got the feeling he was channeling Axl Rose as the latter dealt with his own issues following Guns N'Roses’ ascendance from overnight success to rock institution.
There’s a lot to ding Rock of Ages for, but all in all, it’s a fun movie. And if the soundtrack of your life was like mine during that time period, you may find yourself wanting to go see it again.
James Cameron, secret conservative?
And about the Na'Vi. Like most fifth graders, Cameron endows them with a nobility and honor that he thinks the Native Americans possessed. Fine, whatever. What is important is that he presents an "idealized" society. A society based on respect for the planet and the creatures that inhabit it. In one scene, Neytiri kills some freaky Doberman looking thing and then cries about it later. She had to kill it because it was attacking Jake. To save one life, that she deemed more important, she took another.
The entire Na'Vi society is based on a code of honor and achievement. The members must "prove" themselves to the tribe by accomplishing things like riding dragons. When Jake tames the big mofo dragon, a great accomplishment, he is rewarded by being made the leader of the tribe despite the fact that Tsu'tey was next in line to be chief.
Cameron's idealized society is one based on individual achievement. When individuals take great risks, they are often rewarded over people who have seniority. Fairness is determined by accomplishments, not by rules. There are winners and there are losers amongst the Na'Vi and they manage to be a happy society. Oh, and when they are forced, they kill to protect themselves and their loved ones, an action that they don't take lightly. They have honor and nobility. They have strong traditions.
Sounds good to me. In fact, it sounds a lot like the conservative view of what America stands for. I'm in. Hey, Cameron, beers at my house, I TiVo'ed Glenn Beck for you.
Brothers at War
This looks good.
"Brothers at War is an intimate portrait of an American family during a turbulent time. Jake Rademacher sets out to understand the experience, sacrifice, and motivation of his two brothers serving in Iraq. The film follows Jake's exploits as he risks everything--including his life--to tell his brothers' story. "Often humorous, but sometimes downright lethal, Brothers at War is a remarkable journey where Jake embeds with four combat units in Iraq. Unprecedented access to US and Iraqi combat units take him behind the camouflage curtain with secret reconnaissance troops on the Syrian border, into sniper 'hide sites' in the Sunni Triangle, through raging machine gun battles with the Iraqi Army. "Ultimately, the film follows his brothers home where separations and life-threatening work ripple through their parents, siblings, wives, and children. Brothers at War is a rare look at the bonds and service of our soldiers on the frontlines and the profound effects their service has on the loved ones they leave behind. For more information please visit - www.brothersatwarmovie.com." The film is executive produced by Gary Sinise (CSI: New York, "Lt. Dan" in Forrest Gump), who said, "The media took the 15 people of Abu Ghraib and made them the face of the military. This [movie] is a true portrait of our military and their families."
Movies 2008
Last year set a new record in terms of movie-viewing. I saw 28 movies in the theater, with 10 more viewed on DVD. Theater:
- The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything
- The Bucket List
- Juno
- Rambo
- Fool's Gold
- Semi-Pro
- Jumper
- Horton Hears A Who
- Smart People
- Forgetting Sarah Marshall
- Baby Mama
- Iron Man
- Speed Racer
- The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
- Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
- Wanted
- Kung Fu Panda
- Wall•E (x 2)*
- Hellboy II: The Golden Army
- Batman: The Dark Knight (x 3)*
- War Games (25th anniversary, one night-only showing)
- Step Brothers
- Star Wars: The Clone Wars (x 2)*
- Space Chimps
- Death Race
- Quantum of Solace
- Punisher: War Zone
- Yes Man
* additional viewings not noted in total count If you observed the multiple viewings, you may have already surmised what my favorite film of 2008 was: Batman: The Dark Knight. Utterly fabulous film. It really captured the grittiness, the criminal ugliness, of the original comic storyline. Batman may be a superhero, but it is his detective skills which serve him just as well against the criminal underworld he fights as anything else. Batman has always been the non-superhero superhero; by that I mean he doesn't possess any super powers. He's simply a man who has trained his body to such a degree that his physical prowess is superior to nearly every opponent he matches up with. His mental prowess is equally strong, and it doesn't hurt that he's got his family's millions to back him up with tools that no one else has. Batman is the superhero that nearly anyone could be, millions of dollars in backing notwithstanding. That's what makes the character so great, and so relatable. Like my friend Jeff, I really hope they don't make a third movie (with Batman Begins being the first). The Dark Knight is such a quintessential Batman film, it would be incredibly difficult to top. DVD:
- The Departed
- Hot Rod
- Bottle Rocket
- Heart of Geauxld: The Story of the 2007 LSU Fighting Tigers
- American Gangster
- Raiders of the Lost Ark*
- Eastern Promises
- 27 Dresses
- Hellboy
- Hot Fuzz
- Casino Royale*
- Blade Runner: The Final Cut
I didn't count Raiders and Casino Royale in my DVD total, as they were re-watched in preparation for seeing movies in the theater. I did count Blade Runner as a new selection. The Final Cut is Ridley Scott's ultimate vision of the film, and I treated it as such, going in with a fresh and open attitude about one of my favorite films.
As for my favorite film viewed on DVD, that's a tough one. The Departed didn't live up to any of the hype in my opinion, though I'm looking forward to seeing the Hong Kong original, Infernal Affairs. Likewise, I wasn't blown away by American Gangster, either. I did enjoy it, but I didn't think Washington's or Crowe's performances were any grander than their previous work.
Hot Rod and Bottle Rocket are among Brent's favorite movies, and were taken in as an attempt to get to know my friend a little better. I thoroughly enjoyed both. I'm thinking not too many people are going to get Bottle Rocket, but it has an underlying whackiness that may not elicit out-loud laughs, but is very humorous nonetheless.
In the end, I think the DVD favorite goes to Hot Rod. It doesn't get much better than:
"My safe word will be 'whiskey'."
"Why are you saying it like that?"