Wednesday, April 26, 2006
Blade Runner: The Fine Print
As you probably know, Ridley Scott's visionary sci-fi classic Blade Runner was one of the first movies to produce a "director's cut," with a re-release of the film in 1992 presenting a new cut that was a little more faithful to Scott's original vision, deleting the voiceover hated by both Scott and star Harrison Ford, the happy ending, and a scene of a unicorn which gave a lot more creedence to the the controversial 'Deckard is a replicant' argument. However, while this "director's cut" (I say this in parenthesis because it's not Scott's real director's cut) was released in theaters and eventually made its way to video, there was another version that is still relatively unknown by moviegoers in large, which has just been summed up in a neat article at the fine site that is DavisDVD.In 1989, a workprint was uncovered that had previously only been seen in a couple of previews in 1982. It was a considerably different flick, with different titles, a different prologue, temp music, and also, no voiceover (perhaps it was the audience reaction to the preview that convinced Warners/Ladd to ask Ford to do a voiceover?). After the discovery, the print was shown in limited release in 1991, and sadly it has not been seen since. Luckily, Davis' run-through has actual screencaps, albeit from a shitty bootleg. But that's often the form old Hollywood artifacts take.
So why am I writing about this? I just thought it was a cool article about an element of film production that is never really seen aside from the afore-mentioned bootlegs. However, there may be a silver lining. Warners recently announced, if a little secretly, that Blade Runner will finally available be on DVD in a special edition. I remember when there were rumours a while back, and I saw an interview with Ridley Scott from Swedish TV when he said he was going to make a DVD with the workprint, the original cut and a brand new cut. I just hope Scott's plans haven't changed.
Source: DavisDVD
Continue reading Blade Runner: The Fine Print
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Last Score of Krypton
I'm a pretty big fan of Soundtrack.net. While they don't seem to update all that much, they always have good connections with the studios, and are good at providing first listens for a lot of big movies, for example, it was there that I first heard the music for the three Lord of the Rings movies. While this isn't a first listen - although I'll be piping in soon to report on their FL feature for Michael Giacchino's Mission: Impossible III - this is about their latest podcast, which just happens to be an interview with composer John Ottman, straight from the scoring stage on a little movie called Superman Returns.
As an unabashed fan of the first two Superman movies, and naturally the John Williams score from the first (Williams' music was reinterpreted by Ken Thorne in Superman II), I'm happy to report that when the curtain opens and the lights go down, the first thing we'll hear will be that classic theme. Ottman has confirmed that, while he'll be presenting a new arrangement to match the running time of the opening credits, the main title will be the same one that opened the original movie twenty-eight years ago.
Ottman said that he and director Bryan Singer felt 'it was like Star Wars,' and seeing a Superman movie without the theme would be like seeing a Star Wars movie without that famous opening score. Ottman also confirmed that he'll be including the original Lois Lane theme and the Krypton music, as well as writing a new theme for Kevin Spacey's Lex Luthor, who had no theme in the original movie. Hopefully come June, Soundtrack.net will have a first listen for the soundtrack, which itself is released in late June along with the film.Source: Soundtrack.Net Continue reading Last Score of Krypton
Ocean's Hoo-Hah!
Al Pacino is a great, great, great fucking actor. He's proved time and again that he can emote with the best of them - even in shithouse pictures like Gigli - and he's also one of the coolest motherfuckers around, which no doubt helped catch his latest tasty acting role, in Steven Soderbergh's Ocean's 13.
Pacino's role in the heist flick will be that of a Vegas casino owner, which I suppose given that Andy Garcia is in the movie as well, means that he'll maybe be playing a rival owner? Thankfully, Julia Roberts has mercilessly left the series, to be replaced by equally scary and previous Pacino co-star (in Sea of Love) Ellen Barkin, who was sexy once upon a time before she turned into a Skeksis.
On the topic, while I love Pacino, I'm not really that interested. I love Pacino, so I'd see it just for him, but while Ocean's 11 was entertaining fluff, it was never more than that, and I never felt compelled to watch it again, and ended up giving the DVD away. I guess it's cool that these are essentially Soderbergh's "safe" pictures, so he can keep making the more avant garde stuff he does, but I'm just not a fan. But hey, it's Al fuckin' Pacino.
Source: Variety Continue reading Ocean's Hoo-Hah!
Lou Gossett, Jr's Box-Office Bonanza - April 24th
If you want a guaranteed box office draw, at least on the opening weekend, you could do a lot worse than make a mainstream horror flick, as evidence by Silent Hill's $20.1m take on the weekend, showing ever more creedence to the argument that gross doesn't equal quality, at least judging from the reviews Christopher Gans' flick has had thus far.Scary Movie 4 dropped 58%, but still managed to take $16.8m, narrowly beating the second-highest new entry, Presidential assassination flick The Sentinel, which took $14.3m, 95% of which was probably due to horny males wanting to see Eva Longoria's ass on a twenty-foot screen.
Fox's Ice Age 2 is still going strong, taking in $13.2m and bringing its overall gross to $168m, making it the biggest hit of the year so far. Bad news goes to director Chris Weitz and Universal, whose American Dreamz entered the charts in ninth position, with a whopping gross of $3.6m, which I attribute to the fact that the trailer was absolute gash.
Comedy and drama are the order of the day for the last week in April, as the studios prepare for the summer onslaught. Opening on Friday are spelling drama Akeelah and the Bee, Robin Williams comedy RV, sports comedy Stick It and Paul Greengrass' 9/11 drama United 93. It'll be interesting to see how 93 fares with its subject material still very much in the hearts and minds of Americans, but I think whatever the gross, we can expect a fine movie. Also appearing in a limited release is Chan Wook-park's Lady Vengeance, the final part of his "Revenge" trilogy. It's probably only showing in NYC and LA, but if you live in those cities, you should check it out, as it's an amazing film.
1. Silent Hill (Sony) - $20.1m
2. Scary Movie 4 (Dimension) - $16.8m (Overall $67.4m)
3. The Sentinel (Fox) - $14.3m
4. Ice Age 2: The Meltdown (Fox) - $13.2m (Overall $168.3m)
5. The Wild (Disney) - $8.3m (Overall $22.2m)
6. The Benchwarmers (Sony) - $7.2m (Overall $47.1m)
7. Take The Lead (New Line) - $4.1m (Overall $29.4m)
8. Inside Man (Universal) - $3.7m (Overall $81.3m)
9. American Dreamz (Universal) - $3.6m
10. Friends With Money (Sony Classics) - $3.1m (Overall $4.9m)
Source: Box Office Mojo Continue reading Lou Gossett, Jr's Box-Office Bonanza - April 24th
Monday, April 24, 2006
DVD Cockfight: 04/25/2006 Edition
It’s another light week for the discriminating cineaste. Or the broke ass cineaste.
Match PointDirected by Woody Allen
Starring Jonathan Rhys Meyer, Scarlet Johansson, and…
!!!COX ALERT BRIAN COX COX ALERT!!!
Woody Allen is a national treasure. I’d certainly include him on very short list of filmmakers that have made such cultural impact to warrant such status (Martin Scorsese and Spike Lee would also figure towards the top of said list). Hopefully doing for model good-looking Londoners what he did for homely, bookish New Yorkers, Allen appears to be taking a different tack this time out. From the trailer alone this looks like quite a departure tonally (a dark thriller?) but still using male/female relations and marital infidelity as a launching pad. For the $15, it looks like a sound investment. Plus, Johansson and Cox…what more could you ask?
Guys and Dolls: Deluxe EditionDirected by Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Starring Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra
This will be the only thing in my shopping cart this week. That is provided it’s a noticeable improvement over the old MGM disc. The internets offer nothing on the wherewithal of this edition. I held off on the old MGM disc due to its non-anamorphic letterbox transfer. With a flick as vibrant as Guys and Dolls, you’d think they’d put a little extra spit and polish on the transfer. Let’s hope. If you’ve never seen it, it’s Brando and Sinatra in a musical about getting broads and gambling.
Aeon Flux: Special Collector's EditionDirected by Karyn Kusama
Starring Charlize Theron, Jonny Lee Miller, Frances McDormand (WTF?)
I hate to take a squirt on flicks I haven’t seen or not interested in seeing. I’m unzipping now…This wasn’t good as a short cartoon about a very spindly woman with fly-killing eyelashes. Who thought this would make a decent movie? Can we all agree on a moratorium on badass super assassins? AND sterile future environs?
Introducing a brand-spanking new feature to the Cockfight, a weekly award to the title that delves deepest into astounding depths of crapitude. Named in honor of one of our contributors, without further ado…
The Andrew Clarke DVD of the Week is…
The Nun
Directed by Luis De la Madrid
Starring Cristina Piaget, Tete Delgado
A smattering of IMDB user reviews:
“the worst 4 € i've ever spent”
“Huh?”
“very good special effects involving images of water” Continue reading DVD Cockfight: 04/25/2006 Edition
Hollywood Vs Movie Nerds
Ain't It Cool News has just posted Moriarty's script review for Alien Vs Predator 2. He doesn't like the script much. Reponse from the internet movie community has been predictably outraged. Plenty of people's childhoods are getting raped again. I wouldn't know, I didn't see Alien until I was 16 and I was pretty well violated by then anyway.
So who's the villain here? Fox exec Tom Rothman? Screenwriter Shane Salerno? Moriarty? Well Moriarty is a stuffed up pseud but no, it's not any of them. It's you. It's your fault. I hate you.
The only problem here is people getting disappointed by the quality of a film called Aliens vs Predator 2: Texas Hoe-Down. It is the sequel to the spin off to both the fourth entry in a franchise starting with a film which was a perfectly self-contained and complete story in its own right and a franchise that started with Arnold Schwarzenegger and replaced him with Danny Glover.
There was never any chance of it being good. None. It's Hollywood product. It's the new even tastier Big Mac now with improved cheese try it today!
So take a deep breath. Look at the title again - Aliens Vs Predator 2: Obviously Shit. If you feel even the slightest surge in interest, slap yourself. If you say something along the lines of 'look, if you just get a good director and a good writer and they do it really well, then it could be really good', slap yourself twice. Hard. If you say anything like 'OMGWTFROXXORZAVP2FUKKYEAH!', kill yourself. If you say it out loud, kill yourself twice. Hard.
Yes, the film is going to be shit. It was always going to be shit. My advice is to go anyway, but instead of buying popcorn and soda spend that money on half a dozen high class prostitutes to blow you on the back row. The change will get you the cab home.
Interestingly, the only way to make Freddy Vs Jason 2 watchable is to turn the prostitutes into a nice matching jacket and trousers afterwards.
Source: AICN Continue reading Hollywood Vs Movie Nerds
The Only Prequels That Matter Coming to DVD
Before all of you space nuts light your torches and grab your pitchforks, I'll quickly admit that I'm talking about a DVD set that many fans of the Naked Gun movies have been waiting years and years to spin on their DVD players. That show is Police Squad!, a television series that had a very short run of six episodes when it aired back in the early 80's. The show was created by Jim Abrahams and the Zucker Brothers (David and Jerry), they of the classic spoof movies Airplane! and Top Secret! (these guys just love their exclamation points).
Police Squad! introduced the character of Frank Drebin, the semi-bumbling detective who could corner a bad guy and punch an old lady before having his first cup of joe in the morning. If you hold any of the three Naked Gun movies close to your heart (each successive installment stepped a little further away from mine) and you haven't seen this show, you'll be amazed at how good these episodes are. I still hold the series up as one of the best examples of how a spoof comedy is supposed to work.
According to DavisDVD.com, David Zucker let slip in the most recent issue of Home Media Retailing Magazine that he will be recording commentary for the DVD set on some unspecified date. Other details about the eventual form the set will take are sketchy at this moment, including special fetures and date of release, but it's at least good to hear that I'll soon be able to replace my petrified VHS copies of these seminal episodes at some point in the near future.
Source: DavisDVD Continue reading The Only Prequels That Matter Coming to DVD
