Posted on Monday, April 29th, 2013 by Angie Han
Though David Gordon Green broke out with quiet indie dramas like All the Real Girls, since 2008′s Pineapple Express he’s stuck mostly with studio comedy projects. But now he seems ready to transition back, with the indie Prince Avalanche as the first step. Funny but sweet, the film strikes a pleasing balance of both Green’s serious and goofy sides.
A remake of the Icelandic film Either Way, the film centers on two very different men, pensive Alvin (Paul Rudd) and his girlfriend’s dim brother Lance (Emile Hirsch), as they spend the summer together painting road lines in remote areas of Texas. Magnolia scooped it up shortly after its Sundance premiere in January and has now released a first trailer. Watch it after the jump.
Read More »
.
Please Recommend /Film on Facebook
Posted on Monday, April 29th, 2013 by Angie Han
The gorgeously shot, effervescently soundtracked trailers for Sofia Coppola‘s The Bling Ring have done an excellent job of appealing to lots of different groups: arthouse aficionados, Harry Potter fans, even mainstream audiences who just love a good ripped-from-the-headlines drama. But there’s at least one person who was completely turned off by the latest version.
In a series of tweets, real-life Bling Ring member Alexis Neiers blasted the upcoming film as “trashy and inaccurate,” declaring that she has “no intention of seeing this film.” It’s a pretty dramatic change of heart from an earlier statement she wrote about the movie, in which she expressed her optimism that Coppola would “shed light to the truth.” So what is it about the new trailer that’s got her so riled up? Read her words after the jump.
Read More »
Did anyone watch Silver Linings Playbook and think, “I want that ending to wrap up even nicer?” It had a very sweet, very appropriate conclusion but that wasn’t always how it ended for director David O. Russell. The Oscar-winning film starring Jennifer Lawrence, Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro hits Blu-ray and DVD April 30, including a bunch of deleted scenes. One of them is an alternate ending that brought all the characters back together for one more time. Check it out below. Read More »
(Note: This is a reprint of our Mud review from Sundance 2013. The film opens in a limited run today.)
For his follow-up to Take Shelter, director Jeff Nichols smartly casts Matthew McConaughey as a violent drifter who slides into the lives of two young boys whose families eke out a bare existence on the Mississippi River. Using the gift for gab that any character played by McConaughey must automatically possess, this outlaw wraps the boys up in his plan to achieve true freedom.
While Take Shelter trafficked in heavy ambiguity, Mud does away with uncertainty, at least with respect to the story. This is a straightforward tale that rides on the shoulders of McConaughey and two excellent young actors, Tye Sheridan (The Tree of Life) and newcomer Jacob Lofland.
Mud is a riff on Mark Twain, and an exploration of the relationships between generations of men. It could be a Tom Waits song, perhaps a long-lost cut from Swordfishtrombones, revolving as it does around a man with a dark past who seeks to build an escape engine out of cast-off parts, with love as his fuel. The film casts a keen eye on people living a mostly bygone lifestyle, and wraps those observations in a rollicking little adventure that you might find in the yellowing pages of an old pulp novel.
Read More »
Posted on Thursday, April 25th, 2013 by Angie Han
If you were ever a young bookworm, the name “Judy Blume” likely meant a lot to you. The celebrated author has been behind some of the best loved YA novels since the ’70s, including Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret., Blubber, and the Fudge series. Over the past four decades, her books have sold over 80 million copies in 41 different countries.
It’s surprising, then, that it’s taken this long to get one of her books to the big screen. But hey, better late than never. Adapted by Blume and her son Lawrence Blume and directed by the latter, Tiger Eyes stars Willa Holland (Arrow) as a teenage girl dealing with the sudden death of her father. Watch it after the jump.
Read More »
Posted on Wednesday, April 24th, 2013 by Angie Han
Creators of brilliant-but-cancelled TV series aren’t the only ones who’ve been inspired by Veronica Mars‘ Kickstarter success. Zach Braff has taken note, and now he’s taking a similar route to fund his next movie.
Braff made quite a splash with his 2004 feature directing debut Garden State, but as he explains it, the difficulty of finding financing has kept him from making a follow-up. Until now, that is, with your help. Wish I Was Here is designed as “not a sequel in story, but a continuation of the tone” of Garden State, centering on a 30something struggling actor instead of a 20something one. Watch his pitch video, which features appearances from Donald Faison, Jim Parsons, and Chris Hardwick, after the jump.
Read More »
Even for fans of Sofia Coppola, the biggest interest in her new film, The Bling Ring, might be for the man behind the cinematography. The late Harris Savides shot the film, and though he was not able to see the project through to release, his touch is all over it. As anyone familiar with Savides’ work would expect, the film indeed looks gorgeous, with a restrained but perfectly composed color palette.
Granted, it doesn’t hurt that Savides and Coppola were able to train their lens on Emma Watson as the ringleader of a group of teen girls that robbed the homes of Los Angeles celebrities before the so-called “bling ring” was nabbed by cops. This first full trailer gives us a good look at the full span of the movie, from the kids’ initial flush of interest in the scheme, the rush of excitement in the robberies, and their total douchebaggery when caught.
Check out the trailer below. Read More »
Michael Bay has never attempted a movie as complex as Pain and Gain. He’s made plenty of films that flaunt action, crime and sex, but Pain and Gain isn’t one of them, at all. Below its glossy surface, Pain and Gain is a dark, terrifying true story of one man’s twisted view of the American dream and how he strives to achieve it. That means the film’s main characters — played by Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson and Anthony Mackie — are not good people. They have good traits, maybe even good hearts, but though they’re presented as muscle-bound super men, they’re not good people.
Making an entertaining and thought-provoking movie filled with despicable characters is not an easy task. It’s a tonal nightmare and Bay struggles with that balance from the very beginning of the film. Ultimately, he finds a groove and the film may win you over, but the journey to that point is as bumpy as a muscled arm. Read More »
