Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.
I just got woken up, so I guess I’ll put up the updates I meant to get to before I fell asleep. It’s strange... I used to be nocturnal. Anyway, it’s been a few years since I’ve been to ShoWest, but Irish-Man definitely sounds like he had a blast and saw some great stuff. This is his final report on the week-long Las Vegas event, so dig right in:
Hello everyone, top o’ the morning to you. Irish-Man here with Part Three (finally) of my ShoWest report. I’m glad to be wrapping it up. This part will deal with the Universal promotional reel, the “Dreamcatcher” screening, and a couple of notes from the press interviews.
Plus a little surprise bonus at the end. Here’s Part Three.
Well, thanks to a generous invitation from a contact at Universal, I was able to get in to see their promotional reel, highlighting the upcoming year’s movies. Let’s jump right in, with a list of what was shown and my thoughts on each:
Bruce Almighty: A longer preview than we’ve seen so far, it shows some of Bruce’s pre-deity life (things never go his way) and some more of the gags after he gains God’s powers. This was a really funny preview, and I’m more interested now than I was before. Looks like a big hit.
2Fast 2 Furious: The same theatrical preview that we’ve already seen. In my opinion, there are two fantastic shots... the helicopter shot of dozens of cars pouring out of the garages, and the sports car getting run over by the semi truck. Other than that, nothing particularly sticks out. But since I liked the first one, I’ll be giving this a shot when it comes out.
Hulk: Another longer preview than we’ve see so far. This one had a significant portion of new material. There were more shots of Hulk throwing insanely heavy objects through walls, and some new shots of General Ross (I think that’s his name). Sam Elliott looks great for the part. Probably the coolest new parts were several shots from the desert, including one of Hulk standing on a cliff while two or three helicopters surround him, and at least two shots of Hulk doing his “super-leap” or whatever you want to call it, where he simply jumps hundreds of yards at a time because his leg muscles are so strong. Very nice isolation/desert imagery, and I’m glad that this part of the comics is in the movie, along with the more modern setting of San Francisco. One final note that can help everyone breathe a little easier. At one point, someone says to Dr. Banner something like, “That amount of gamma radiation should have killed you. But you’re doing fine.” Or something like that. The good news being that gamma radiation is still involved somehow, even if there are rumors that the Hulking out is genetic. Anyway, I really wanted to see Hulk before, and I still really want to see Hulk. It looks awesome and I don’t think this will break the Marvel streak at all.
American Wedding (American Pie 3): This was one of those previews that shows you a short scene from the movie, instead of a bunch of clips. The scene is hilarious; without ruining too much, Michelle (Alyson Hannigan) and Jim (Jason Biggs) are out having dinner. Jim is all set to propose. Michelle, not knowing this, gets a little “rambunctious.” Then Jim’s dad (Eugene Levy) shows up. Hilarity ensues. Really. After that scene they toss in a few other shots of various cast members, including Stifler of course. This preview smartly focused almost all on Jim, Michelle, and Jim’s dad. It looks like a really good, almost classy, way to take the series out. I’m glad it looks like it’s ending on a high note.
Seabiscuit: A very long preview for a movie with an awful title. And yes, I know that really was the horse’s name. But still. Before I saw this, there was no way I was going to go to a movie about horse racing during the Depression. Now my stance has upgraded to “maybe.” The preview made it look very much like one of those heartwarming true story types of things, much like Remember the Titans or Men of Honor. You know, the good guy with bad luck has to overcome obstacles to prove himself to all the people who said he couldn’t do it. While cliché, this particular plot never seems to go out of favor with the public, and the cast, including Jeff Bridges and Tobey Maguire, is appealing. High production values and strong drama are sure to abound. The best thing this has going for it might be the fact that it’s not another generic summer action movie. Like I said, this preview upgraded my opinion from “no way” to “maybe.” We’ll see.
Honey: Looks like “Save the Last Dance” meets “Glitter,” except with the lovely Jessica Alba instead of the ridiculous Mariah Carey. A young girl dreams of being a hip-hop dancer even though the odds are against her... ugh. There’s no way I’ll see this, and I doubt many of you will either. Still, it’s not exactly a movie made for geeks like us anyway. Let’s move on.
Johnny English: Oh goody. Another Bond spoof. This one stars Rowan Atkinson, of Bean fame, as the titular character. It didn’t look very original to me; Bond parodies have been done quite a lot, and this didn’t seem to have anything unique about it, unless you count the fact that the main actor is actually British. Which I don’t. Still, there were a couple of good gags in the preview. Maybe a rental.
love, actually: A bizarre preview, with almost the entire first half in silence except a group of people chanting/singing the word “love” in the background. Weird and annoying. As soon as that stopped, however, it looked moderately interesting. A romantic comedy from the makers of “4 Weddings and a Funeral” is how they were selling it, and the cast includes Hugh Grant (of course) Alan Rickman, in what looks like a very outlandish role. There was absolutely zero plot discussion, just scattered scenes and character shots. Very little dialogue even, mostly background music. An odd choice for a movie preview, and I’m left undecided by it. I’ll need to find out more before I know if I’m interested or not.
Welcome to the Jungle (formerly Helldorado): I liked the first title, but I guess they had some trouble with the censors. Who knows? Anyway, this movie features the Rock as a kind of urban bounty hunter sent to the jungle to bring somebody (Seann William Scott) back for atonement. When he finds him, however, he can’t leave because they are held hostage by some kind of big-shot criminal (Christopher Walken in yet another grungy role). So Stifler has to lead the criminals to some kind of money or treasure, while the Rock is in tow to make sure he doesn’t escape before he brings him back to America. It looks like a very light-hearted buddy movie/action-comedy. The casting is goofy enough that it looks like fun, and there are some good action scenes, like a jeep crash over a cliff into a river, and a bar fight where the Rock uses a guy as a human shield. This movie has no pretensions, and the result looks entertaining. I could see myself going to this when it eventually comes out. So sue me.
Intolerable Cruelty: It’s the Coen Brothers and George Clooney. I’m there already. But if that wasn’t enough, the preview looks pretty funny, with Clooney being the ultimate slimy yet charming lawyer, and Catherine Zeta-Jones looking really tempting and eventually proving irresistible to Clooney’s lawyer character, despite the fact that he’s trying to destroy her in court. The preview was funny in that quirky, Coen style, not in a slapstick, wacky-comedy style. Also, and I don’t know if this was intentional or just my imagination, but some of the settings and camera angles looked almost identical to ones used in Ocean’s 11, when Clooney has some of his scenes with Julia Roberts in the restaurant. Maybe I’m wrong, but it sure looked like it. This doesn’t open till fall, and I’ll definitely be there.
The Cat in the Hat: This looked good... except the Cat. The house, the neighborhood, Things 1 and 2, the Cat’s car, the crazy machines... all looked good. But the Cat? No. It just looked like an expensive, weird Halloween costume. And it sounded EXACTLY like Mike Myers. It was like he didn’t even try to change his voice to fit the character. He didn’t change his voice at all. It’s Mike Myers’ voice, and Mike Myers’ humor, so if you don’t like Mike Myers, beware. Alec Baldwin looks interesting as the neighbor, and the kids certainly look the part. This movie was expensive, no doubt about it. However, the preview wasn’t that funny. I have no clue what is in the script, but the jokes I saw didn’t bode well. I’m still skeptical about this one, but there is lots of time for new commercials to change my mind. In any case, it LOOKS great. Except that darn Cat...
Peter Pan: Peter Pan, on the other hand, looks perfect. Gone are the green, Robin Hood tights. Peter now looks like a young wild child from the jungle. Captain Hook (Jason Isaacs?) still has the red coat, the gold trim, the feathered hat, but he looks menacing. The hook is angular and sharp. Wendy Darling is the only kid really featured in the preview; I’m not even sure how much John and Michael are in it at all. The scene with Peter’s shadow escaping from the dog looks marvelous. There is another scene where the Darling children are chained to a rock in the water, then Hook chains one of their teddy bears to the rock and throws it in the water too. There is a lot of sword fighting with Peter and Hook. Some of you might go nuts at this, but I think I saw some wirework involved. One shot had Peter doing an incredibly fast, spinning jump, grabbing the sword and facing Hook. It doesn’t look like Kung Fu though; it just looks like Peter is flying with his own style. This was definitely one of the reel’s highlights, and I can’t wait to see more from it. But it doesn’t come out till Christmas Day.
Van Helsing: This wasn’t a preview, but Stephen Sommers introducing a lot of production art and test footage for the movie. The test footage included a CGI animatic of a woman being lifted off the ground by vampire bats and stunt actors flying 20 feet into the air on wires. Most of the preview was the art though, which looks really cool. There were designs for Van Helsing’s circular blade weapon that has all the silver and holy water and stuff. It looked pretty unique. Sommers also talked about how Van Helsing would have multiple weapons for any situation. He mentioned briefly how Frankenstein would be updated to look cooler and more dangerous. They kept the flat head and the bolts on the neck, and he said there is a part where Frankenstein’s head flops open and he has to slam it shut again. The art for Castle Dracula was enormous; we were showed the exterior of the castle, with these little tiny figures representing humans. Then the camera pans up and we saw a drawing of the top of the castle, which is huge and craggy and sits on top of a mountain. Not much concrete information, but a lot of cool suggestions of what we’ll see. I didn’t get a good idea of the tone, except I know Sommers wants the monsters to be tough. Don’t know if it’ll be humorous like the Mummy though. What I do know is that if they can turn the art into real images, it’ll definitely be a visual treat. It’s over a year away, though, so don’t get too worked up yet.
Overall, it looked like Universal has some definite winners and some that could go either way. It’ll be an exciting year to see if their releases can live up to expectations.
Following the promo reel was Universal’s lunch, which didn’t have any new information but did have some props from a couple of movies. After the lunch was the Warner Bros. screening of...
Dreamcatcher
First and foremost, I have NOT read the book, so I am not approaching this from any kind of purist/literary standpoint. Second, I don’t want to give anything away, so this will try to be short and not plot-focused.
The movie builds suspense well, but quickly. We meet the characters, they go into the woods, we see a flashback (a rather corny one) to their youth, and boom, we’re into the suspense. This movie establishes a creepy atmosphere early on and it works. When the “shit weasels” first reveal themselves, it’s still freaky. These creatures were way more frightening than anything I could have thought up, so the scary mood is intact. The alien itself is kind of a letdown, but it quickly vanishes and takes over the body of “Jonesy,” who starts speaking with a British accent. Apparently, the aliens know English, but only proper English. Anyway, Morgan Freeman shows up as a military commander bent on destroying everyone who may have had contact with the aliens, whether they’re infected or not. I’m glad he wasn’t playing his typical “wise old man” role, but he didn’t seem to fit in this movie. So the aliens want to take over Earth and they have a plan, but the remainder of the four friends try to stop them while avoiding Morgan Freeman’s psycho commander at the same time. Oh, and there is a mentally challenged childhood friend who holds the key to everything. Naturally.
This movie got off to a strong start (cheesy childhood dialogue aside), and built quickly until there was almost nowhere left to go. It kind of loses focus at the end and leaves some questions unanswered. It can’t decide what kind of movie to be... action movie, horror movie, suspenseful drama, etc. As a result, the last third is anticlimactic. It ends with a whimper instead of a bang. The bang came in the middle of the movie, and then got lost for most of the rest of the time. Was it a waste of the actors? Well, no, there are some good performances by the four friends. Was it a waste of my time? No, it was free and the first scene with the “shit weasel” was freaky as hell. Do I need to see it again? No. It was fine for free, and I might even recommend seeing it at the theater if you really like this genre. But I also recommend not having your hopes too high. It was disappointing considering the caliber of talent involved, but not disappointing if you’re just looking for a creepy time at the movies. So if you think you’d like it, then go see it. Personally, I just thought it was ok.
Some short press interviews were held that evening. There wasn’t much of note, but I’ll tell you what little there was.
Gary Oldman: Didn’t seem too excited about playing Sirius Black. Maybe he was, but it didn’t come across well. Also, David Thewlis will be playing Professor Lupin. I hadn’t heard this casting news before.
Christopher Walken: Funny guy in person. Said he did the trick shot in “Poolhall Junkies” on the first take, then couldn’t do it again after that. Not sure if I believe him, but he was so cool that I didn’t care.
Diane Lane: Hot. Wow.
Brian Grazer: Next movies will be “The Missing” (I think with Ron Howard) and “Cinderalla Man” (I think with Russell Crowe). He described “The Missing” as a suspense movie like “The Others” or “The Sixth Sense” and “Cinderella Man” is a true story of a boxer during the depression (or something). Neither sounded particularly interesting, but Grazer was much more likeable in person than I thought he would be.
And that was my ShoWest experience. I had a great time, and I certainly hope I can go back next year. Thanks to everyone reading this who helped me in any way, and I hope to talk to you soon.
And now for the little bonus. At the “Dreamcatcher” screening, I was irritated to find that “Final Flight of the Osiris,” one of the Animatrix shorts, was NOT attached to it. As luck would have it, I got to see a screening of it this week instead. The animation is spectacular. The humans are “Final Fantasy” level, and the exteriors of the ship and Earth’s surface and the Sentinels are marvelous. The action is exciting, with a real sense of desperation and overwhelming fear as the thousands of Sentinels converge on the one ship. The story is so short and is such a crucial part of a larger story that I wish it could have continued. I wonder if this plot will be mentioned at all in the next movie? The sword fight/stripping scene was fun, and world of the Matrix looked bigger than ever. This was a definite treat that should be seen if at all possible.
So there’s my final report. Hopefully I’ll have some more reviews coming in the future, but I am getting busier these days. I’ll be sure to write in next time I have something of interest.
Until next time,
Irish-Man
Nice work, man, and I agree with you based on what I’ve seen. The CAT IN THE HAT footage I’ve seen is creeeeeepy. That new BRUCE ALMIGHTY trailer was in theaters this weekend, and it’s pretty good. Looks like a monster hit. Best image was Jim Carrey parting his tomato soup like the Red Sea. I’d love to see that PETER PAN trailer, and have no clue when it’s even going to be in theaters. And the HULK almost sounds like too much at this point. Just bring on the movie... enough with previews.
"Moriarty" out.
