Zack Snyder really has come a long way, from being at the helm of one of the more controversial horror remakes of recent years, as he burst onto the scene with his remake of the George Romero classic "Dawn of the Dead" (2004), which proved to be surprisingly good, with Romero himself admitting to have also been impressed by the film. Since that debut he has frequently proved himself to be one of the most exciting directors currently working today and certainly one of my favourite directors, as he quickly proved his debut was no fluke as he not only pulled off the War Porn epic "300" (2006) but then also pulled off the seemingly impossible by finally bringing "Watchmen" (2009) to the screen, after it had served a lifetime in development hell.
Now following up from his Nazi owl movie aka. "Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole" he is currently finishing off "Sucker Punch" which he is already teasing with, despite it's release date currently not due until March 2011, which sucks even more when it's safe to say the film looks absolutely stunning, as this latest trailer shows.
The plot follows a young girl called "Baby Doll" (Emily Browning), who is sent to a mental institution by her evil stepfather, she soon finds herself retreating into an alternative reality, as a way of coping with her situation, while envisioning a plan to escape.
This is the film I'm most excited about seeing at the moment, since first stumbling upon the trailer and amazing promo art, which you can enjoy below, but already this film has all the makings of a must see, especially as Snyder seems set to take us on a Tarantino style genre mash up, as he well and truly lets his creativity run wild, as I think is pretty well illustrated with the trailer and personally I can't wait.
For a while now I have been a big fan of Roller Derby, which you might want to write off as me just being interested in attractive punk chicks on skates, which it's true might be some of the appeal, along with the fact that it is one of the most brutal sports out there, with fights regularly breaking out especially with them being actively incouraged, so why are more people not getting behind making this a national sport, after all who really likes football (or Soccer for my American readers) anyway? So as you probely guessed, I'm glad that someone has decided to finally make a film which combines, two of my favourite things in life together, Ellen Page and Roller Derby which is exactly what has happened with "Whip it", which see's Page joining her local Roller Derby league in an attempt to find herself.
For those of you not to sure what Roller Derby, here is a quick introduction video
So no doubt after seeing that video your wondering, why we bother with all these other lesser sports right. Well "Whip it" was written by "Shawna Cross" who herself is a former Roller Derby skater, having skated under the name Maggie Mayhem for the Sirens and based alot of the characters and teams, based on these experiences on the Roller Derby Circuit.
Personally I've been a fan of Ellen Page pretty much since, I first saw "Hard Candy" (2005) in which she took I think everyone by surprise, with a performance that verged on darn right brutal, as the pedophile torturing Hayley, while also proving extremely well suited to the pop culture obsessed dialogue of Diablo Cody in "Juno" (2007), which makes it all the better that she is once again in similar territory it seems with this film, which also see's the directorial debut of Drew Barrymore.
Ok so it could turn out to be a horrible film, but personally it's Roller Derby and Ellen Page so what more of a reason would you want to go see it? I just hope that it doesn't turn my beloved Roller Derby into some over glamorised mainstream nightmare, with corporations who will no doubt try to cash in on any success this film has. Still I guess we will have to wait until October to see, whether Barrymore can make the transition from screen to Director chair.
Ok so while prowling the Internet, searching for more random cinematic delights and Horror shows, to write about here, when I stumbled across this trailer, which is a reimaginging of what Ghostbusters would have been like had, it been shot in the 50's instead of the 80's. Honestly though I thought that this was a real trailer, until it was pointed out, by one of my less gulible friends, that it infact a really great fake, created using random parts from 19 different films, though know idea which film the flying Michelin man is taken from?
Often regarded as the weakest entry of the franchise, especially seeing how by this point they'd given up on trying to disguse how fake the shark was, with one notable scene clearly showing the pole, which is moving the shark! Still for some reason it has not only one but three intresting choices for ending, two of which I knew about for ages and the third I only recently discovered, but they probely do rank as some of the most original and yet extremily random ways of dispatching of a giant beastie ever. So first up is the ending I originally remembered, the first time I saw it.
What is funnier about this ending is that this was actually how you killed "Jaws" in the original NES game, which like any game associated with the film is pretty much awful though not as bad as this film. Ok on to ending two which you can watch by clicking on the link, but seriously the shark explodes, like a balloon after being rammed with the front of the boat, which from what I can gather was the original US Theatrical ending. Still I suppose this is better than a version that I caught on TV last year, which just used the ending from the first film, so that Mike presses the button on the box and the shark explodes, only using the explosion from Jaws. Sadly I havn't been able to find this, to share with you all, so here instead is the trailer for "Up from the depths" (1979) which is yet another giant sea creature movie, but you know I'm just a sucker for these movies. Now if I could just find a version without so jackass Trader boosting the price of thier copy!
Ok so like most of the elitist horror fans out there, I have a tendencey to frown on most modern horror, pining for the days when everything wasn't CGI and effects were more hands on, with such cynical views coming mainly as the result of being forced to sit through far to many unwanted remakes of classic horror films and blood free (and usually scare free) slashers. Still one franchise has continued to entertain me from it's first entry and that is "Final Destination" which see's it's forth installment released in August and having just watching this newest trailer I really can't wait!
One thing, which I'm especially relived to see is that David R. Ellis, is returning once again to the directors chair, especially seeing how he did such a great job with "Final Destination 2" while also directing one of my (numerous) guilty pleasures "Snakes on a plane". True it is slightly disapointing that Glen Morgan and James Wong, have choosen not to continue the series, but by the looks of the trailer it seems that there are a whole new set of inventive death scenes to enjoy, so here's just hoping that the censors don't start demanding cuts in these scenes, which honestly like the traps in the "Saw" series have been one of the main selling points of what so far has been a great series, even if in the past they have been accused of being predictable, when it comes to the death scenes, but I'll trade predicatability anytime, especially if I'm going to get a decent payoff, which so far this series has yet to fail me on. My only slight grumble I guess is the use of 3D, which is currently once again, the film gimmick of the moment and hopfully won't mean just an excuse to throw stuff at the screen, especially as I will no doubt be having to watch it in 2D, as my local cinema's arn't overly big on getting behind such trends.
So all I ask now is that Ellis not screw up a franchise and just keep the same formula, which has made the first three films so special to me.
Gory deaths + Varied locations + Predictable yet Gooey endings = Good Times for all!
Basically this is my love letter to the cinema I adore, with the main focus being to look away from the mainstream and instead look more in the direction of Cult, Foreign and Obsure cinema and everything that comes in between. This blog is also about keeping movie going fun and embracing the randomness, that can often be found, while also uncovering the occastional hidden great, often in the most unlikely of places.
I try to add somthing new atleast once a week, but I'd rather keep this blog fun to write and so i'm not neglecting commitments outside of this blog.
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