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Some interesting bits in this new trailer for G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.

Seeing Christopher Eccelson from Doctor Who as Destro is going to be kind of creepy.

But I still think it's going to be a train wreck.

The revelation that they're outfitting the Joes with what seems suspiciously close to Iron Man armor does not bode well.

I think G.I. Joe Resolute, the new webisode series by comics writer Warren Ellis, does a much better job revamping this property -- which, let's face it, is a little hard to revamp without hacking out massive chunks that make no sense or are just plain embarrassing when you're not eight years old.

I was never an X-Men fanatic but I did enjoy the first movie and think in the hands of good writers -- Grant Morrison, Warren Ellis and Joss Whedon most recently -- it's good stuff.

Fanboy or no, though, this commercial simply breaks my heart.

Incidentally - I got hold of one of the leaked X-Men Origins: Wolverine workprints that's floating around and have to admit -- it's better than the last two X-Men movies. The action and effects are mostly solid, the story (which sticks closely to the Origin comic from 2002) is more compelling than your average super-hero flick (certainly better than the last Spider-Man film, Daredevil or Ghost Rider).

The actors - Hugh Jackman in the lead, Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool, Liev Schreiber as Sabretooth -- were certainly worth watching.

I was prepared to hate it -- but I'm not a fundamentalist. Evidence has changed my mind on this one.

Here's what's so great about the new Paul Rudd/Jason Segel flick I Love You, Man: it may be the most honest movie about male friendships I've ever seen.

Yeah, it's a wacky comedy with gross-out elements like projectile vomiting and a scene where Segel fights The Incredible Hulk...er... Lou Ferrigno.

But the hilariously awkward heart of the film is that most men will recognize in Paul Rudd's own fumbling attempt to cultivate male friends something they themselves have struggled with at one point or another. Most American men have trouble making new friends. Not because we're cold, solitary cave-creatures but because the process of making friends as an adult male is uncomfortably close to dating and the society has simply not prepared us for that.

Paul Rudd and Jason Segel take this existential crisis and somehow make it so funny that I'm still cracking up, days later, thinking about throwaway scenes.

(Minor spoilers after the cut - nothing too big)

Two sad deaths this week - Tony Award winners Ron Silver and Natasha Richardson.

I loved Silver on The West Wing

Silver, who was 62, was buried Wednesday after a two year battle with esophageal cancer. Ed Rollins remembers him here.

Here's Richardson and husband Liam Neason talking about Eugene O'Neil.

She was just 45.

Along with a staggering number of the rest of you, I saw the Watchmen movie over the weekend.

I first read the Watchmen comics when I was 15 but, unlike some of my favorite comic nuts, was never really dying to see it on the screen. Not because I thought it would necessarily be a heartbreaking failure -- just because I don't think everything needs to cross genres.

And my assessment of the movie is basically that: What, exactly, was the point of this?

(No real spoilers you wouldn't have gotten from the trailer beyond this point)

Don't forget: Tonight is the first "Midnight Madness: Beer and a Bad Movie" night at The Carousel.

The show: The infamously, hilariously awful Troll 2.

The time: Midnight at the Carousel Luxury Cinemas at 1305 Battleground Ave., Greensboro.

The price: $5 (includes a ticket and three beers from local brewery Natty Greene's - or popcorn and soda for those under 21).

Our video interview with event planner Joe Scott here.

You can't make this stuff up.

Just in time for the reboot of the film series, the new collection from Genki Wear will begin with three scents:

Tiberius (Captain Kirk's middle name)

Red Shirt (from the uniforms of low-level, often doomed crew members in the original series).

And...well...Pon Farr, folks. Pon Farr.

Excited to see this trailer for the Johnny Depp/Christian Bale flick Public Enemies.

Much less excited about G.I. Joe.

Wait, wait, wait...

The Green Hornet movie, written by and starring Seth Rogan, is now going to be directed by Michel Gondry?

Somebody's punking me, right?

You may remember The Green Hornet from the 1960s TV show - straighter than its campy cousin Batman and featuring Bruce Lee as loyal chauffeur and sidekick Kato.

But the property's been around since the 1930s, when it was a hit on the radio.

I'm a little worried that like fellow radio heroes The Shadow and Doc Savage, this update's going fail. But with a script by Rogan directed by Gondry it may be so gloriously strange that I have to see it anyway.

Did an interview with local blogger, DJ and GoTriad contributor Joe Scott, one of the men behind The Mix Tape Film Series and the new Midnight Madness: Beer and a Bad Movie, which begins in March.

More info here.

For reference -- here's the trailer for Troll 2. You will need beer.

Update:

It seems there's an upcoming documentary about Troll 2 and its cult status as a "best worst movie." (Thanks to Ian McDowell for the tip)

Don't forget: Fast Times at Ridgemont High will be playing on the big screen at the Carousel tonight at 7:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. as part of the Mix-Tape Film Series.

Phoebe Cates' topless scene is itself worth the price of admission -- especially because I believe tickets are still $3, popcorn $1.25 and beer's $1.

Or, alternately -- marvel at a time when Sean Penn's had the ability to be intentionally funny!

Check out the essay on the film that will be included in tonight's program here.

I've missed too many of these. May have to make it out tonight.

In an upcoming interview with USA Weekend Stephen King talks good writers and bad writers -- and doesn't shy away from naming names.

On Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling and Twilight author Stephanie Meyer:

"Both Rowling and Meyer, they’re speaking directly to young people. ... The real difference is that Jo Rowling is a terrific writer and Stephenie Meyer can’t write worth a darn. She’s not very good."

King goes on to make a point about the Twilight books that, while I've only read enough excerpts to make me decide against the books, seems spot on:

"...it’s very clear that she’s writing to a whole generation of girls and opening up kind of a safe joining of love and sex in those books. It’s exciting and it’s thrilling and it's not particularly threatening because they’re not overtly sexual. A lot of the physical side of it is conveyed in things like the vampire will touch her forearm or run a hand over skin, and she just flushes all hot and cold. And for girls, that’s a shorthand for all the feelings that they’re not ready to deal with yet."

I'd feel less confident in agreeing with that statement if grown women I know hadn't read the books and told me they see it much the same way. One friend described the books as reading like "bad Internet fan fiction." But with poorly-fleshed out ORIGINAL characters.

King goes on to praise Jodi Picoult, say Dean Koontz can both write like hell and be awful and, maybe most satisfactorily to me, say that while James Patterson is very, very successful he's a terrible writer.

Patterson's stuff is so awful it makes me angry. It's so awful I finally sat down to begin writing a pop novel instead of just saying: "I could do better than this!"

I'm sort of agnostic on whether I think writers should savage each other in print. They shouldn't make a sport of it, certainly -- but when someone asks your opinion I don't see the harm in telling them what you honestly think.

King has himself written some terrific stuff and some terrible crap. Any writer who writes long enough is going to have to admit to that. But I think he's reached a stature as both a writer and a popular success as a writer that he can speak with some authority about talent, success and if and when one has anything to do with the other.

King's latest collection, Stephen King Goes to the Movies, includes works that have been adapted into popular films including The Shawshank Redemption, 1408, Children of the Corn and Hearts in Atlantis.

First, British actor Christian Bale (allegedly) punches his mum.

Now the Batman star is ranting at the crew and threatening people on the set of Terminator: Salvation.

The audio-tape of his rant is not work safe -- but it is worth listening to at home, if only for a laugh.

So in the trailer for the new Wolverine movie the X-Men's most badass (and most overly exposed) mutant meets Gambit, gets punched by a morbidly obese boxer (The Blob?) and fights Liev Shreiber as Sabretooth?

The new Bond movie came out this week and, of course, I was there to see it on opening night. Haven't missed one in the theater since Goldeneye.

On the whole I liked it, but there's good news and there's bad news...

If you're in Greensboro and not too exhausted from the elections:

Don't forget about Rushmore -- one of my favorite Wes Anderson movies, playing tonight at The Carousel.

Writer/director Michael Crichton, best known as the author of "Jurassic Park," has died of cancer at age 66.

Crichton wrote best-sellers that blended science, adventure and social commentary. Some of his best known novels became hit films, including "Jurassic Park," "Congo," "Rising Sun" and "Disclosure."

He was also the director of such movies as "The Great Train Robbery" and "Westworld" and the co-creator of the long-running hit TV drama "ER."

Everything about the man seemed to be outsized -- he stood 6'9'', was married 5 times, wrote his first best-seller ("The Andromeda Strain") while completing his studies at Harvard Medical School.

He was also a foe of the theory of global warming and a critic of the American media.

He was like a character from one of his own novels -- large, fascinating and somehow not quite believable.

Richard Dreyfuss, who plays Dick Cheney in Oliver Stone's "W." biopic, slammed the movie in an appearance on "The View."

He called it "6/8ths of a great film" and said he was disappointed Stone didn't come to some conclusion at the end -- a common criticism so far. He also compared working under Stone to working under Sean Hannity.

Which Stone's gotta love.

Entertainment Weekly calls Oliver Stone's biopic of the sitting president "unusual and inescapably interesting".

But reviewer Todd McCarthy also says the film "is unable to achieve more than a sort of engaging pop-history pageant and amateur, if not inapt, psychological evaluation, due to the unavoidable lack of perspective and a final act that has yet to be written."

Sounds about right -- but I still think I'm going to see it.

What about you guys?

A few musical questions this week:

- The AP reports that Bob Dylan's new bootleg series album, "Tell Tale Signs" will stream free on NPR's website for a week before its official release. Ain't Bobby so cool?

- Is there anything more anti-climatic than Clay Aiken coming out of the closet? Any fan who didn't realize he's gay either hasn't yet had the birds and bees talk or richly deserves to have her world shattered by this non-story.

- The Flaming Lips are finally releasing their weirdo outer-space/holiday movie Christmas on Mars. Follow the link for an exclusive trailer. It's getting a limited theatrical release -- closest theater to us is in Nashville -- and is coming to DVD Nov 11. How can you resist a film featuring modern psychedelic rock music in space AND Santa?

Seeing Burn After Reading last weekend got me thinking of my favorite Coen Brothers movies -- and why I've inexplicably been inserting an "h" into their name without realizing it.

Apparently I wasn't alone (at least in contemplating my favorites).

This list attempts to rank brothers' movies in terms of sheer greatness -- which means, of course, there will be many many disagreements.

I've gotta agree with putting The Ladykillers at the bottom, at least...

UPDATE: Slate also has an interesting piece on the politics of The Big Lebowski, which is celebrating its tenth birthday this year.

This weekend I saw the new Coen Brothers movie Burn After Reading -- the Coens' twisted version of a spy film.

The Coen brothers don't actually do spoofs - their films rarely directly reference or mock anything specific. But they do have a penchant for taking established film genres -- detective flicks, gangster pictures, caper movies, Capra-esque morality tales, romantic comedies -- and giving them their own bizarre twist.

In this sense, Burn After Reading is firmly in the tradition of The Big Lebowski (a bizarro Raymond Chandler-style detective movie) and Fargo (a murder mystery with the unlikeliest of heroes, villains and settings). Like those films Burn's plot is complicated, unlikely and whirls and circles itself like the hula-hoops in The Hudsucker Proxy. But it splits the difference between those films in terms of serious darkness.

What people will probably talk about most is Brad Pitt's performance as...well, a complete doofus. We've seen Pitt the romantic leading man, the dirtied-up terrifying villain (Kalifornia) and the spastic head case (12 Monkeys). But even in The Mexican I'm not sure we've ever seen him this broadly, proudly moronic.

But for my money some of the best scenes are the drier CIA-centric ones with John Malkovich as a disgraced, defeated analyst and JK Simmons (the dad in Juno, Garth Pancake from The Ladykillers) and David Rasche as his former bosses.

What did you guys think?

As a fan of the first two Ghostbusters movies, I hope I'm not the only one hoping they're not going to make a third.

Let's remember Ray, Winston, Egon and Peter as they were.

And let's honor them by creating new properties that are as good or better instead of trying to wring the last bit of funny out of them.

Just a reminder -- The Big Lebowski is playing on the big screen tonight as part of the Mix-Tape Film Series.

Shows will be as 7: 30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. at the Carousel Luxury Cinemas, 1305 Battleground Avenue. Sadly, White Russians will be unavailable but I'm told there's going to be cheap beer and popcorn.

See you there, dude.

Update: The movie isn't on the marquee, there's no sign announcing it at the ticket counter, it's not up on the movie-times signs above the registers, it isn't mentioned on the theater's website and you can't buy tickets for it online -- but it is happening. I just got tickets for it at the box office, so it can be done.

It may also be worth mentioning that the chants of "eight is enough" that we heard at the Obama acceptance speech last night were previously heard on The West Wing, hurled by a Republican presidential candidate at the Bartlet administration.

It was mentioned on another blog that there was a similarity between Obama's saying John McCain "didn't get it" and a line from Michael Douglas' President Shepherd in The American President, written by West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin.

That line, aimed at Richard Dreyfus' Republican candidate in the movie, is actually "Bob's problem isn't that he doesn't get it. Bob's problem is that he can't sell it."

Life imitates art imitating life.

In an interview in this month's GQ, Sorkin says he digs Obama.

From the Q&A:

"The first time I met Barack Obama—I should say the only time I’ve met Barack Obama—was a year ago, when he was doing fifty-person-cocktail-party fund-raisers. He flattered me by saying, “My intention is to steal a lot of your lines.” My prediction is he’s just going to blow the doors off the place in Denver. This is a man who—the Jeremiah Wright of it all aside—was clearly paying attention in church. I don’t need to tell you that I’m a big fan of oratory. A big part of leadership is the goose-bump experience. We’ve been missing that."

It's another Web Junkie Wednesday and this week we're looking at getting more bang for your DVD buck.

If you're like me your inability to keep track of series television (especially large, complicated serial stories like those on Lost, Heroes and 24) has led you to give up, wait for the DVD and watch it at your own pace.

This can be leisurely -- an episode or two a night -- or you could stay in your pajamas, get a giant punchbowl full of breakfast cereal and create your own Saturday catch-up marathon. But however you do it, it can get expensive.

That's where Just The Disc comes in. By ditching the packaging and selling you just the disc of movies, shows and music CDs they cut the price dramatically -- CDs are just $2.99 and DVDs $3.99. You can buy one disc at a time and if you buy five, you get free shipping. All discs are pre-owned but in excellent condition and fully guaranteed.

They don't have everything -- but they do have a lot of popular shows, movies and CDs.

Example: On Amazon.com the cheapest price for the First Season of The West Wing is $37. Even used, the best you can do is $21. You can buy all four discs of the same series at Just The Disc for $16 -- or just buy the first disc to see if you get addicted (you will).

I don't know about you, but I rarely keep DVD and jewel cases nowadays anyway. I slip them into a disc wallet to save space. From now on, when possible, I'll be buying them this way, saving money and cutting out the middle man.

Kevin Smith says: "I saw 'Watchmen.' It's f%&^ing astounding." (profanity redacted)

The Dude abides, indeed.

Rolling Stone has a great piece on the 10th anniversary of the Coen Brothers film The Big Lebowski -- which has only grown in cult stature since its initial, disappointing release.

The film will be on the big screen Sept. 3 as part of the Mix-Tape Film Series at the Carousel Luxury Cinemas in Greensboro. If you've never seen the movie, you've got a lot coming to you - and it's worth seeing on the big screen.

I plan on being there. You should, too.

UPDATE: Those doubting the endurance and growth of the Lebowski cult need only check out this shirt...

We all love Robert Downey Jr., and Jack Black is OK, too ...

There's a real reason why critics loved this movie. It pokes, prods, and makes laughs possible that otherwise would not be OK in the walking, living, thinking, sympathetic (and PC) real world. And it brings down the film industry, which many a critic, I bet, not-so-secretly wants to see.

And so, in those ha-ha Hollywood moments, the movie gets a little too inside baseball, if you're just looking for the good ol' haha.

Good news: one of my favorite comics of the last ten years may be coming to the big screen.

Bad news: it may star Tom Cruise.

I think I scared my deskmates this afternoon when I found out the next Harry Potter movie had been pushed back from November 2008 to July 2009. (There was pounding of the mouse and cursing involved. I'm a passionate HP fan.)

Basically, it sounds like the strike screwed them up for summer 2009, so they need a tentpole movie to make some money. What's more of a surefire moneymaker than The Boy Who Lived?

While it means more of a lag between Order of the Phoenix and Half-Blood Prince, it will mean a shorter wait between the next one and the last two movies (which will be based on book seven), which are due November 2010 and summer 2011.

"Horn said the later release of "Half-Blood Prince" will not affect the schedule for the final two movies."

I'm not entirely convinced of that, but I hope it's true.

"...so I can let them die in jail over a clerical error."

Remember when that movie Rendition came out, and people thought it was far-fetched and sensationalist?

Turns out there's far less international political intrigue and suspicion of espionage than that necessary for people to simply disappear. And die. In U.S. custody. Because of clerical errors.

Today's lesson: If you're a husband, father and law abiding cancer patient, pray that U.S. immigration doesn't screw up your address.

Local blogger, DJ and Go Triad contributor Joe Scott is helping to organize a film series at the Carousel Luxury Cinemas on Battleground Ave.

The Mix-Tape Film Series will give many of us a second (or in some cases a first) chance to see some great (and some...er...cult...) films on the big screen.

First up on September 3: a personal favorite -- The Big Lebowski.

In the coming months: everything from the high-brow perversity of Blue Velvet to the low brow juvenile nostalgia of The Monster Squad.

I'm not really a big-screen, 35 mm fetishist, so there are only a few of these I think will be really improved by seeing them in the theater (Edward Scissorhands chief among them) -- but tickets are $3, popcorn $1.25 and beer's $1 so I'll probably end up seeing quite a few of these.

You should too.

I think we can all agree that although Oliver Stone's political/historical movies (JFK, Nixon) are fascinating, they have to be viewed as a sort of historical fiction with a heavy bent toward speculative psychoanalysis and melodrama.

But you still do want to go see them.

Right now I'm reading First Son by Bill Minutaglio, a veteran Texas journalist who delves deep into the lives of the Bush clan.

Hopefully Stone's movie will do a little of what Minutaglio's book does -- help to humanize a man who has been both demonized and lionized beyond all logic at a turbulent period in American history.

After enjoying the new Seth Rogan weed action/comedy Pineapple Express (and, perhaps, a doobie of his own), Rolling Stone critic Peter Travers compiled a list of ten movies that belong in the Stoner Movie Hall of Fame.

Though the last one's a bit of a cop out, it's hard to argue with these selections.

Except to say...no Dude, Where's My Car?

On a related note: Cheech and Chong are apparently touring again.

After a long weekend of wowing Bat-fans and breaking box office records, Dark Knight star Christian Bale reportedly got into a hotel brawl with...well, his mom.

On the Mel Gibson scale, how bad is this PR?

I can only reason that he was sitting around his hotel asking himself:

"What do I have to do to eclipse Heath Ledger's epic, scary-as-hell performance as the Joker? Oh, wait a tick...mum, come here love..."

On his Twitter feed famed comics writer Warren Ellis (who has written his share of Batman stories and long theorized Gotham city would be a nicer place if The Bat tore off peoples' nipples) lost no time in kicking Bale for...you know, kicking his mom.

UPDATE: Ledger has issued a statement denying he assaulted his mother or sister, both of whom apparently reported being assaulted. Contacted by the media, the sister says it's a "family matter." The mother is not commenting.

If you haven't seen The Dark Knight yet, you've got a lot coming to you.

Including -- new Bat Gadgets!

Among the coolest -- Batman's new motorcycle, the Bat-Pod.

Popular Mechanics has gone inside the creation of the Bat-Pod.

From the piece:

Enter the Bat-Pod, a motorcycle-ATV hybrid that lands eye-popping stunts sans CGI, a hand-built bike that fires grappling hooks—while shape-shifting.

When he first laid eyes on the Bat-Pod mockup, special effects supervisor Chris Corbould wasn't sure if his director actually knew anything about motorcycles. But that's what makes The Dark Knight at once a throwback superhero movie and a green-screen-light breakthrough in digital Hollywood: It turns fantasy into reality. And building a concept vehicle without a team of automotive engineers was one of its biggest challenges. "The gauntlet had been thrown down," Corbould says.

Also: behind the scenes of the movie's IMAX sequences.

Watchmen trailer: I have no idea what this movie will be about (haven't read the graphic novel), but it looks amazing, and it's done by the director who did "300," which is enough for me.

24: Exile: The "24" movie. It looks like Jack Bauer does Rambo.

Terminator Salvation: Christian Bale as John Connor? I didn't even need to watch the trailer to know I'd see this. But it still looks pretty awesome.

Bonus: Not a trailer, but definitely a teaser: The series "Wizard's First Rule" (based on Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth series) is debuting the weekend of Nov. 1! And it's Sam Raimi! How exciting is that??? The hourlong series, starring Craig Horner and Bridget Regan, starts with a two-hour premiere. (If you haven't read this series, you have enough to time to finish it before Nov. 1. If you start now. And read fast.)

Went to the midnight showing of The Dark Knight last night and am dead on my feet today as a result.

The above picture? That's me today, minus the smile.

But it was worth it.

My brief assessment after the jump (minor spoilers ahead, nothing major).

As we all wait for The Dark Knight (I've already got my tickets for the midnight showing Thursday), Scientific American does an interview with E. Paul Zehr, who has just released a book called Becoming Batman: The Possibility of a Superhero.

Zehr, an associate professor of kinesiology and neuroscience at the University of Victoria in British Columbia and martial artist, says Batman could theoretically exist -- but not for long.

From the interview:

Wouldn't fighting Gotham's thugs every night take its toll?
The biggest unreal part of the way Batman's portrayed is the nature of his injuries. Most of the time, in the comics and in the movies, even when he wins, he usually winds up taking a pretty good beating. There's a real failure to show the cumulative effect of that. The next day he's shown out there doing the same thing again. He'd likely be quite tired and injured.

Is there any indication in the comics of how long Batman's career lasts?
The comics are really vague on this, of course. In Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns, he deliberately shows an aging Batman coming back after he's retired, and he highlights him being tired and weaker. Somewhere around age 50 to 55, he should probably retire. His performance is going down. He's always facing younger adversaries. That is well at the end of when he's going to be able to defend himself and be able to not have to deal that lethal force. This was actually shown in an animated series called Batman Beyond.

Oh right. It's the future; Batman is old and he trains a kid to replace him.
You're familiar with that one? What we learn is that Batman, when he was older but before he retired, actually picked up a gun against a thug because he had to. His skills had let him down so that he wasn't able to defend himself without harming another person. So that's when he decided to retire.

How would all those beat-downs have affected his longevity?
Keeping in mind that being Batman means never losing: If you look at consecutive events where professional fighters have to defend their titles—Muhammad Ali, George Foreman, Ultimate Fighters—the longest period you're going to find is about two to three years. That dovetails nicely with the average career for NFL running backs. It's about three years. (That's the statistic I got from the NFL Players Association Web site.) The point is, it's not very long. It's really hard to become Batman in the first place, and it's hard to maintain it when you get there.

So it's official: Wanted was pretty awful.

I think it's rare that the experience of watching a movie is so boring and frustrating that even some brief Angelina Jolie nudity (or that of a body double, I'm not sure) doesn't make up for it.

This was that experience.

But here's the thing: I didn't think the effects were bad or ridiculous. I just thought the script was crap, the original work was tweaked just enough for it not to be as interesting and it was carried out poorly. Also, the soundtrack was just awful.

Ech.

It's hard not to get excited about a new Bond flick even well in advance...but I've been doing pretty well.

That is all out the window now, though.

A few quick reports on movies in various stages of not-out-yet:

* If you just can't wait for the new X-Files movie, the opening scenes are now online at Yahoo! Movies.

* Rolling Stone movie reviewer Peter Travers has an early review of The Dark Knight. He digs it - especially Heath Ledger's performance, which he calls "mad-crazy-brilliant."
"If there's a movement to get him the first posthumous Oscar since Peter Finch won for 1976's Network, sign me up," he says.

* A fourth Spider-Man movie has been scheduled for a 2011 release. Neither leading man-boy Tobey McGuire nor director Sam Raimi have yet signed on for the sequel -- and after the trainwreck that was the last one, I can hardly blame them. Still, I'll probably end up seeing it and feeling dirty afterward. Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in!

In a recent interview with The Times of London, Jason Bateman confirms we'll see an Arrested Development movie in 2009.

Nice.

Michael Cera and Bateman (both of whom were in Juno) rocketed to film success after the show was canceled -- which Bateman attributes to the show missing with America at large but being beloved of people in L.A.

"..and those are the ones who hire us," Bateman says.

I've become addicted to those little Red Box DVD machines in the grocery store, so I'm paying more attention to DVD releases lately. A bunch of movies I dug in theaters are being released on DVD this week. If you missed them the first time around, you should check them out now.

Charlie Bartlett - A teen angst flick that's just a little Wes Anderson, a little John Hughes and a little Cameron Crowe. Plus, it has Robert Downey Jr. as a high school principal who is also (in a shocking case of casting against type) an unstable drunk!

In Bruges - Colin Farell, Brendan Gleeson and Ralph Fiennes star in this strange tale of two hitmen hiding out in a very strange little Belgian city. But there are some things you can't run away from, no matter how many drugs, women and midgets you hide behind.

Persepolis - The animated (not CGI -- animated) film adaptation of Marjane Satrapi's graphic novel about growing up in Iran during the Islamic revolution. Like Life is Beautiful, it's really a lot more fun than a plot synopsis makes it sound.

Definitely, Maybe - Just caught this one on DVD myself. You should too. Ryan Reynolds plays a recently divorced father who tells his little girl the story of how he met her mother -- but makes her figure out which woman she is in the story of his life, in which he's changed the names to protect the guilty. The concept actually works better than you might think -- and the funny retro-90s bits where Reynolds works on Bill Clinton's first campaign and discovers Nirvana's Nevermind may be the best bits of 90s comedy nostalgia yet committed to film.

Saw both The Incredible Hulk and Get Smart this weekend.

I have to say -- the Hulk movie was better than I expected.

The non-Hulk bits were terrific, with Ed Norton giving us some real quiet desperation. A good sci-fi government chase movie even before the Hulk shows up. The special effects didn't take me out of the film as much as I expected. Especially enjoyed Tim Roth as the villain and am looking forward to another one.

I had incredibly low expectations for Get Smart -- so it managed to exceed them.

Slow start, some good bits, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson shone, it was the sexiest I've ever seen Anne Hathaway and Steve Carrell did his thing. Not going to get an Oscar nomination and I'm not dying for a sequel, but it was a fine summer popcorn movie -- some laughs, some action, some nostalgia.

This shouldn't really be terrifying -- but for some reason it is.

Maybe it's just the memory of its probable inspiration...

Check out everyone's favorite industrialist/super-hero/summer action movie star guest-starring in the latest trailer for the Hulk film.

I'm interested to see the extent of Stark/Iron Man's role in the film -- looks like more than just an easter egg for those playing close attention, but you don't want to take the shine off of Ed Norton's Hulk by having Downey Jr. steal the spotlight.

The trailer for the new X-Files movie, I Want to Believe, is up at Yahoo now.

I didn't expect to be this excited about it.

Guess I missed it more than I realized.

The trailer for Gonzo, the new Hunter Thompson documentary out next month, is up now.

It's narrated by Johnny Depp and looks as though it has a deep bench of political figures (Jimmy Carter, Pat Buchanan, George McGovern), celebrities and writers (Tom Wolfe, Jann Wenner, Tim Crouse).

Some great historical footage I'd never seen, too. Looks good.

Apparently.

The director of Snatch and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels will be directing a new film version of the detective based on an upcoming comic by Lionel Wigram.

This is going to be interesting...

All right, so "controversy" may be a bit much. We're talking about a summer popcorn film.

But there's certainly a lot of Indy disagreement out there in the wake of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the fourth installment in the George Lucas-Steven Spielberg action/adventure franchise.

Roger Ebert loved it, giving it 3 1/2 stars and saying: "I can say that if you liked the other Indiana Jones movies, you will like this one, and that if you did not, there is no talking to you."

Rolling Stone's Peter Travers wasn't as impressed, giving it just 2 1/2 stars and saying:"By midpoint, the movie starts to play like National Treasure meets The X-Files, with a touch of The Goonies, and I don't mean any of these comparisons as a compliment.

Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly went with a B-, saying: "everything is new and nothing is new. The movie's legacy may simply be the melee that ensues when Spielberg cracks the whip and moviegoers scurry for tickets."

What did I think? Well, after seeing the film twice this weekend, I think I agree with everything these three reviewers say -- and loved the film anyway.

(More after the cut -- with a few spoilers)

I went to the midnight showing of 'Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull' last night. (This next part is not a spoiler.) There were a bunch of college kids, including a group of guys in front of us. At one point before the movie started I heard one of the guys say the word "spoiler," and then one of the kids says, "Yeah, Indy dies." I looked at my husband and said, "If he is right, I will shank him at the end of the movie." And I was serious. No worries, though, he was just being a jerk.

Now, here are spoilers (i.e. don't click if you haven't seen it!):

As I try to get myself excited over the latest Incredible Hulk film (it does star Ed Norton as scientist-turned-monster Bruce Banner, but the effects still look ridiculous), I looked up what Roger Ebert said about the last one, which Ang Lee directed in 2004.

The effects were the Achilles heel of that one, too -- but I also just feel as though the story got a little preachy and over-ambitious for its own good.

Bizarrely, Ebert opens his review thusly: "The Hulk is rare among Marvel superheroes in that his powers are a curse, not an advantage."

Since it's clear from this review and others that Ebert knows something about comic books, I was a little shocked that he wrote that. The thing about Marvel superheroes is they almost ALWAYS feel their powers are a curse.

Spider-Man struggles with the responsibility of being extraordinary and often wishes he could be a normal kid (then a normal man, later, a normal husband often).

Iron Man (eventually) feels that his technology and his brilliance must be used for peace and progress when it's easier, more profitable and less dangerous to be irresponsible, manufacture weapons and be a playboy rather than a superhero. He often calls his "powers" a curse.

The Fantastic Four have all cursed the accident that gave them their abilities from the beginning - from The Thing who became a hideous monster to the young Johnny Storm, who enjoys his powers but comes to understand they make him separate and different.

The X-Men -- that whole franchise is basically built on this concept.

The Hulk is maybe the most extreme example of this, because his powers are destructive and he has so little control over them that they're rarely any advantage at all.

Still, seems like a fairly obvious point.

But Ebert also gave the Hulk movie three stars. No accounting for taste.

As a comic geek and someone who's been lusting after both their movies, I love this comic parody of the "I'm a Mac" commercials starring what will almost certainly be the summer's two best comic book film stars.

...but as a comic book geek I have to point out that Tony Stark DID lost his parents at a young age as well.

A nice little surprise before the Iron Man movie this weekend: full length trailers for The Dark Knight and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

I think the Dark Knight trailer was better by far, the Jones one somehow not as good as the teaser we've already seen.

This one, though...

Artist on Artist: John Cusack and Diablo Cody

Seriously.

I beg of you.

Imagine how much more warmly we'd regard Hot Shots, The Naked Gun and Austin Powers if we hadn't had to endure the sequels?

Well, less so with Hot Shots, obviously...but you take my point.

Do the right thing. Leave well enough alone.

Stay Classy.

Some talk in the comments of my Iron Man Rapid Review about the stinger at the end of the credits and what it means for a sequel.

(Stop reading here if you're afraid of Spoilers. No, really. Stop reading.)

Just saw Iron Man.

I had high hopes, so I was a little scared of being let down.

But, long story short: one of the best super-hero movies I've ever seen, and the best one Marvel has produced in a long while.

Amazon is having a pretty sweet sale on boxed sets of classic films. Mother's day is coming up, so if your mom is a film buff, it's great timing.

Among the deals:
The Mel Brooks Collection for $45.00 (includes Blazing Saddles / Young Frankenstein / Silent Movie / Robin Hood: Men in Tights / To Be or Not to Be / History of the World, Part 1 / The Twelve Chairs / High Anxiety).

The Pink Panther Film Collection for $35.00 - includes The Pink Panther / A Shot in the Dark / Strikes Again / Revenge of / Trail of and puts that Steve Martin remake to absolute shame.

The Frankie and Annette Collection for $20.00. This is crazy 60s kitsch that is occasionally terrific and hilarious even when it's bad. Includes Beach Blanket Bingo / How to Stuff a Wild Bikini / Beach Party / Bikini Beach / Fireball 500 / Thunder Alley / Muscle Beach Party / and Ski Party. Man, was Annette the foxiest chick on the beach or what, Daddio?

The Marilyn Monroe Special Anniversary Collection for $25.00. Includes The Seven Year Itch / Gentlemen Prefer Blondes / Niagara / River of No Return / Let's Make Love and Marilyn - The Final Days Tragically omits Some Like It Hot.

The Woody Allen Collection, Set 1 for $50.00 .Includes some of my favorite Woody films, and a few I don't care for particularly. Annie Hall/Manhattan/Sleeper/Bananas/Interiors/Stardust Memories/Love and Death and Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex But Were Afraid to Ask.

The Kids in the Hall are doing a 30-city, two-month tour (don't call it a comeback - they've been here for years, rockin their peers and puttin' suckas in fear).

The Onion's A.V. Club has an interview with them.

They're apparently looking to do a new show and movie. To which I will immediately become addicted.

You know, the problem with the future is that it does keep becoming the present -- and that present does continue to be sort of underwhelming.

Here's a list of 10 movies whose vision of the future already seem dated.

It's sort of a mixed bag, really. I mean -- New York hasn't (officially) been turned into a giant, unregulated prison. But also, our everyday furniture isn't anywhere near as cool as the stuff in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Let me start by saying this: I'm an unapologetic Rolling Stones fan.

Yes, I know: they are elderly, rich and I was in elementary school when they put out their last really solid album.

I don't care.

The fact that they didn't break up at the height of their fame and only one of them managed to die does not make them any less a great rock and roll band -- they simply didn't cease production in the period when they were most creative and vital. I was in college before I began to really appreciate their back catalog, and on the strength of that I think they should be allowed to tour until they actually fall apart in front of us if they like.

With that said, you can see why I'd be excited to see Shine a Light, a Stones performance film directed by Martin Scorsese (who on top of being an Oscar winning director of terrific dramas is also no slouch in the rock doc department, having helped edit Woodstock, directed The Last Waltz and No Direction Home).

One of my favorite directors putting together a concert film of one of my favorite bands? Yes, please.

Unfortunately...it was not all it was cracked up to be.

To reward myself for having survived moving last weekend (and this week, and the unpacking that continues), this is what I'm going to be seeing this weekend:

Good stuff with Mick, Keith, Jack White and Martin Scorsese in the latest Rolling Stone.

I am disappointed to hear, however, that they wanted to get a PG-13 rating for this and so cut the use of the F-word down to two instances. Not just by playing songs that don't require it or watching their mouths but by actually taking it out of songs -- most egregiously in "Some Girls."

I can't really follow the logic -- does anyone think kids too young to get into an R movie are going to be trying to get into this without their parents anyway? The idea that Scorsese (for whom the F-word seems to have been artistically essential to this point) and the Stones (for whom the F-word is, in many ways, part of a way of life) could make a PG-13 movie leaves me scratching my head.

Reader Jim Vanner sent me a link to this Q&A with historian David McCullough from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

McCullough is the author of some of my favorite historical biographies, and in this Q&A he talks about the John Adams miniseries HBO has created around his bestselling biography.

McCullough has had really good experiences with HBO so far -- they produced the excellent Truman, based on his Pultizer-prize winning biography of Harry S. Truman. He has high praise for what they've done with John Adams as well.

The author says of the min-series' gritty realism:

"It's going to be the 18th century -- and particularly, of course, the 18th century in this country -- as Americans have never seen it before. It's not a costume pageant; it's the way life was. You are going to see people with bad teeth and dirt under their fingernails. You are going to see a man tarred and feathered and it's going to be hard to watch, it's so awful. It wasn't just a sort of high school prank. Tar-and-feathering was torture. People died from it. You are going to experience the horror of smallpox and of someone having a leg amputated without anesthetics. It's very real and entirely in keeping with the way it was."

I've been really enjoying HBO's mini-series event, John Adams.

Which sort of surprises me.

I'm not much for period pieces. I find that most films that take place during dramatic, world-changing events in human history are so scrubbed down and overblown that there's no way you could be fooled into thinking it might have happened even sort of this way.

But the John Adams mini-series...it's like seeing Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven after a steady diet of John Ford or Howard Hawkes westerns. There's something about seeing our founding fathers sweaty, smelly, dirty, petty and egotistical that seems so much more authentic.

At one point in the second installment a group of representatives sits around a table patting themselves on the back over the first continental congress -- which has to this point accomplished nothing. Adams -- whose directness we admire even if it does sometimes make him an insufferable prick -- says that all they've proved is that every man there thinks he's a great man and has to go out of his way letting everyone else know it.

Which is the kind of thing you never read in your grammar school history class.

Any of you enjoying it as much as I am?

When I was a kid, there were few things cooler than G.I. Joe.

It took the massive cultural tsunami that was the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to unseat Duke, Snake Eyes, Scarlett and Sgt. Slaughter as the coolest good guys (with the coolest bad guys).

Unfortunately, the cartoon doesn't hold up very well when adult fans revisit it.

But, like Transformers before them, the Joes are getting the big screen, live action treatment. And here's a shot of Snake Eyes, the silent-but-deadly ninja every guy my age wanted to be when he was barely old enough to hold anything as sharp as a steak knife.

Chris Evans, the guy who played The Human Torch in the two god-awful Fantastic Four movies, is telling MTV news that he doesn't think there will be another -- and that he's ready to be done with it.

I think we're all ready to be done with it.

I love The Fantastic Four. And I think they could, as Spider-Man proved in the first and second films, translate to the screen in a way that would thrill both adults and children. A solid concept always can. But they've screwed the pooch twice on this one and if there are going to be any others they need to do what Batman (and now The Hulk) are doing and just pull a full on reboot, as though the first two never happened.

Which is essentially what Evans is saying when he admits to MTV that, "I think that if [FF2] does okay and people respond with the appreciation of a more serious tone, hopefully [with] the third one we can inch closer to a legitimate cast and a legitimate film."

Saying that your first two movies failed to have a legitimate cast that made up a legitimate film does sound like straight shooting -- and has Clooney proved with his Batman film, sometimes you just have to admit something sucked to get past it and do better work. But it also sounds like a guy who knows this train ain't going back there.

File under "Revivals...sorta"...

- Queen is releasing their first album of new material in more than a decade -- and this time they're doing it with ex-Bad Company frontman Paul Rodgers, with whom they've been touring with a sort of "Tribute to Freddie Mercury" show.

Hardcore Mercury fans are losing their minds and saying they shouldn't call this new iteration of the band Queen. Which you had to sort of see coming. Their last album, 1995's Made in Heaven, was made with leftover Mercury vocals.

- Variety reports that director Sam Raimi (Spider-Man, A Simple Plan) is looking to revive Tom Clancy's superspy Jack Ryan, who has been played on screen by Alec Baldwin (The Hunt for Red October), Harrison Ford (Patriot Games, Clear and Present Danger) and Ben Affleck (Sum of All Fears).

Jack Ryan movies have, to date, raked in nearly $800 million at the box office -- so I guess you can see why they'd want to bring him back yet again. My dad's a Tom Clancy fan and these guys (and they're almost all guys) are rabid. Freddie Mercury fans may scream and cry if Queen replaces him with someone they don't like -- but Tom Clancy fans might shoot the poor guy who becomes the next Jack Ryan if he lets them down. I nominate Vin Diesel for this very reason.

- Yes (the band) are hitting the road for a 40th anniversary tour.

No, no you're right -- they did just do a 35th anniversary tour. Think that's a little too much Yes? Keyboardist Rick Wakeman agrees with you -- so he's sitting this one out. This is the fourth time he's quit the band. His son Oliver's going to be handling his duties while dad takes a principled stand over giving Yes fans more of what they inexplicably continue to want.

- It looks like Bob Odinkirk and David Cross of the late, brilliant Mr. Show are coming back to HBO for a new series. It won't be a Mr. Show revival, but I'm still looking forward to it.

- And last but by no means least, Elvis Costello is releasing his new album, Momofuku in only two formats -- digital and vinyl.

If you buy the vinyl album (which I will) you get a voucher for a digital download. Hardcore audiophiles continue to (probably rightly) extoll the virtues of vinyl and (certainly rightly) condemn the comparatively terrible sound of the MP3 format. Like Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails, Costello has built an audience that's loyal enough to roll with him and remain curious as he experiments with how to continue to deliver music to us in the way he likes.

Check out the trailer for the new Incredible Hulk movie, starring Ed Norton as Bruce Banner.

For those keeping count -- yes, this is the second Hulk movie in the last five years. I enjoyed 2003's Hulk, but I did think it was a little psycho-babbly and am looking forward to this reboot.

If you've seen Primal Fear, you know Ed Norton's perfect for this. And while the effects still look a little weird to me, it looks like the script's taking its cue from some of the Hulk comics of the last few years, which have seen the character return to his roots as a loner hunted by the government and unable to get close to anyone for fear of the monster that lives inside him.

Also, for the comic geek fanboys out there -- the other monster toward the end of the clip looks like it could be The Abomination, a fan favorite Hulk villain.

Well, the shoot for the film version of the classic graphic novel Watchmen has officially wrapped. The film is slated for release one year from today, March 6 2009.

Director Zack Snyder (300) has posted some cast photos which include costumed versions of The Comedian, Rorschach, Nite Owl, Ozymandias and the Silk Spectre.

I think Rorschach (the psychopathic character based on The Question) looks properly ominous.

This one of The Comedian seems a little Joel Schumacher-directing-Batman to me.

And this one of Ozymandias just totally jumps the shark.

I know I shouldn't expect subtlety and nuance from the guy who gave us 300 -- but Alan Moore is not exactly Frank Miller. Different writer, different stuff, different tone and sensibility needed.

Looks like Dave Gibbons, the artist who co-create the universe with Moore, is pleased with the production, though. I should really reserve judgment until I've seen the finished product.

For those coming in late: Watchmen, Alan Moore's epic deconstruction of the Superhero genre, has been stumbling its way to the screen for 20 years. The comic is consistently hailed as one of the best graphic stories ever told and helped give birth to a darker, more serious tone in superhero comics (which Moore later tried to dismantle with the "pop comics" of his America's Best Comics line). It also made Time magazine's list of All-Time Top 100 Novels alongside Catch-22 and To Kill a Mockingbird. Not too shabby.

Moore is famously critical of films of his work (and who could blame him the way it's been screwed up -- "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" and "From Hell"). He was happy to essentially stay quiet about the film version of V For Vendetta until the producers began telling people he approved of and liked it. He's gone back and forth for years between not really caring if they made films out of his stories and actively opposing it.

Too soon to tell if this one will tick him off.

8: 22 p.m.
We're coming right up on the telecast now - I'm tired and achy from the flu, speedy and loopy from the Sudafed and a little annoyed by the Red Carpet coverage.

I mean - I'm usually pretty disinterested in "So, who are you wearing?" over and over again -- but this year, it seems like it's particularly bad.

I'll be live blogging the Oscars tonight on Culture Shock. From a flu-medicine stupor. Should be entertaining.

Predictions now?

What could possibly go wrong?

Not content with being mocked for her acting in just about everything but Dick Tracy and Who's That Girl, Madonna is apparently directing now.

Here's a (not work safe) teaser clip of her upcoming film, Filth and Wisdom.

It appears to be about...British strippers? Makes a strange sort of sense, actually.

The only thing that could have made that trailer better would have been more Shia LeBeouf. I'm glad to see they're going to acknowledge Indy's age and how it wouldn't be as easy for him in this film.

Indiana Jones (and that kid from the Transformers movie) are on the cover of Vanity Fair this month.

A good story -- and some great photos by Annie Leibovitz. Some video from the shoot here too.

My favorite may be of Cate Blanchett as an evil, sexy Russian agent (the action has moved to the 1950s in this flick -- when the Ruskies were sinister and hot).

Here's the teaser poster for the new bond flick, Quantum of Solace.

The film's out in November, and I can't wait.

The title's a little clunky -- and is actually the name of a Bond short story by the character's creator, Ian Fleming. The story, which appears in the short story collection For Your Eyes Only, is good -- but it's really not about Bond. Bond visits a governor who tells him the story -- which is about a low level bureaucrat whose cheating wife humiliates him, and how he takes revenge on her.

There have been worse Bond titles (Tomorrow Never Dies, anybody?) -- and there are rumors Amy Winehouse will sing the title song, if she can get herself together and stay alive long enough. British pop star is the only profession more dangerous than British secret agent.

LucasFilms released the following photo from the set of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

How excited am I about the new Indiana Jones flick? This is me at a movie theater recently, when I caught sight of the new Indiana Jones poster for the first time...

Comedian Zach Galifianakis (The Comedians of Comedy) interviews Michael Cera (Arrested Development, Juno) in this clip from Cinematical.

Wizard!

Our new intern in the office today suggested there was "not enough Michael Cera" in Juno.

I agreed that he didn't get enough screen time, but given the size of those shorts, I think it's impossible to say there wasn't enough of him.

... and editors and other people to check behind them.

Joaquin Phoenix made a statement while accepting an award by using cards instead of speaking -- only problem is, he apparently doesn't know how to spell his own name.

Saw Sweeney Todd this weekend, and enjoyed it much more than I'd expected to.

Here's my thing about musicals: I don't hate them. I just hate it when they take themselves too seriously. When there's dancing and singing involved it's very easy to go of the tracks of drama and into melodrama. And, though I know this makes me awful and closed-minded, I have a really hard time not laughing when people burst into a song in a way that I'm supposed to find moving rather than mirthful.

So -- Guys and Dolls I like. Les Miserable, not so much.

I dug Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Dreamgirls was too much.

Like Chicago, I feel like Sweeney Todd split the difference pretty well. I never saw the stage show, so I have to assume that most of the credit for the movie's tone should go to director Tim Burton, who has spent decades mixing the dramatic and the hilarious to great effect (Beetlejuice, Batman, Ed Wood).

The plot seems tailor-made for Burton -- a strange alchemy of Dickensian morality play and morbid, surreal storytelling worthy of Edgar Allan Poe. Which is a perfect playground for Johnny Depp (who seems almost preternaturally attracted to the weird), Helena Bonham Carter (who seems to have made a career of playing kind of creepy goth chicks) and Sacha Baron Cohen (who, with Borat under the belt, took to the sliminess and ambiguous nationality of his character like a fish to water).

I won't ruin any major plot points for you, but I will say this: if you're hoping for a happy ending, you might be better off seeing PS. I Love You.

...and I have to say, I think it deserves the hype.

I read screenwriter Diablo Cody's book last year, and hoped Juno would be as funny, touching and cool. Done, done and done.

Cody and actress Ellen Page both richly deserve their Golden Globe nominations. I loved that quiet, almost zen-like hilarity Michael Cera brought to Arrested Development and it's back (along with Jason Bateman's on-the-edge placidity) in Juno. Also, The West Wing's Allison Janney and J. K. Simmons (a sociopathic white supremicist on Oz and J. Jonah Jameson in the Spider-Man films)?

Sold.

Also, I have almost the entire soundtrack stuck in my head. Sonic Youth, The Kinks, The Moldy Peaches, Belle & Sebastian, The Velvet Underground and Cat Power. Yeah -- I'm going to actually go out and buy this one.

Comedian David Cross (Arrested Development, Mr. Show) has been taking some flak for his appearance in the Alvin and the Chipmunks movie.

So, he decided to answer the "Why? God, Why?" question via this funny and brutally honest blog post.

Short answer: It's an effing kids movie, you're taking it too seriously and of course he did it for the money.

Next.

The trailer for the next Batman movie is intriguing, but they're being a bit stingy with shots of Heath Ledger's Joker.

I guess you don't show the whole shark doing it's thing in the Jaws trailer...

Hard to find good bootleg copies of the IMAX prologue that was shown with I Am Legend, but they're out there.

Rolling Stone's Peter Travers chooses the top ten DVD releases of the year in the latest Rolling Stone.

Coming in at #1: The Blade Runner: The Final Cut DVD

Go check out (and groan at, and whine about) the others here.

Great place for Christmas present ideas, at the very least.

The more I see of Heath Ledger as The Joker, the more I like it.

But the design of the Bat suit is worrying me a bit. Do you see how much extra crap seems to have turned up on his torso -- etchings and contrasting colors and articulation. The shape of the cowl seems to have changed and become more teched-out as well.

To my mind Batman should always look dark, simple and deadly. He's not effing Iron Man. It's not important for us to see how much gadgetry we can jam into the suit to sell variant versions of the action figure later on. That's how you get to the George Clooney era Bat Suit. That way lies doom.

We went three Indiana Jones movies without much noticeable change in Indy's get-up -- and people didn't find that boring, they found it iconic.

Slight spoilers if you know absolutely nothing about Sweeney Todd. I don't think there's anything here that isn't in the trailer.

Quick note: For those who don't know, Sweeney Todd, coming to theatres Dec. 21, is a movie version of Stephen Sondheim's award-winning Broadway musical. Sweeney is the Demon Barber of Fleet Street -- a man wronged who wants revenge on those who wronged him.

So I was playing around on the Sweeney Todd Web site. I've been waiting for the movie for a long time now, really looking forward to it. But it's also been tinged with nervous anticipation -- will they be able to pull it off? I love Johnny Depp, and I didn't want him to screw this up.

Well, thank goodness, he hasn't. At least not from what I've heard. If you go to this link and click "Enter site", another window will open. In the top right corner is something called Audio -- click on it, and you can listen to parts of some of the different songs. I'm pleasantly surprised with Depp -- he's not bad. It's a hard role to sing, and what little I've heard impresses me.

However. Helena Bonham-Carter.

It's unfortunate that her and Burton are a thing because she's going to be hearing a lot of director's couch comments. She's awful -- she can't sing -- it's more of a fast talking, and there's no power at all behind it. Not to mention she sounds like she is trying to hurry through the lyrics as fast as she can so she can stop singing -- she doesn't seem to believe she should be singing, either.

She just annoyed me in "Bit of Priest" and "Worst Pies in London". And I'm even trying to cut her a break -- Angela Lansbury defined that role, and she's who I hear in my head when I listen, but I was willing to give someone else a chance. When I first heard Carter's name, I thought it could be a bit of inspired casting -- provided she could sing. Yeah, well, I will now be going to the movie dreading her moments.

All I can hope is that she can bring something to the role besides her singing. Except that I really feel like Mrs. Lovett is almost a sweet woman who's a bit demented -- she clearly loves the boy and has a thing for Sweeney, and thinks they can all be a happy family of sorts, with a few murders thrown in here and there -- not a demented woman who's scary, which is how I think Carter will play it -- Bellatrix does Mrs. Lovett.

On the other hand, listening to Alan Rickman in "Pretty Woman" didn't upset me. Does he sound like an actor singing? Yes. But it doesn't annoy me. He sounds like Snape singing, which turns me into a giddy fan girl inside.

Of course, you can listen to "Green Finch" if you wish to torture yourself. I hated it in the production I saw, and I hate it here, too. And I have no idea who the girl is who sings it, only that she is slightly better than the soprano who sang it on my soundtrack.

So now I'll still see it opening weekend, but some of the air has been let out of the balloon for me. What do you guys think? Am I being too hard on her? Anyone agree with me?

Empire Magazine has an exclusive interview with Heath Ledger about playing The Joker.

According to the magazine the role involved Ledger "marinading himself in nothing but Joker before shooting."

Ewww...

So IESB has some blurry photos of Zachary Quinto as Spock in the new JJ Abrams flick. There's video, too.

Also, it's not been verified, but details of the plot are leaking, and it sounds pretty cool. Click here for spoilers if you want to know what may or may not be true.

Well, new Bond Daniel Craig has signed on for four more Bond movies. That would make him Bond for one more movie than his predecessor, Pierce Brosnan (who made four Bond flicks) but wouldn't equal Sean Connery (six) or Roger Moore (seven).

I'm a die-hard Bond fan, love the books and the movies. I was very skeptical about Craig -- but he won me over with the excellent Casino Royale.

If I'm forced to choose I have to go with Connery as the best Bond -- but because the first Brosnan was the first Bond I ever saw on the big screen I feel like he'll always be my generation's Bond. Timothy Dalton was the first Bond I ever saw (on video, in License to Kill) -- and I thought he was good, but he didn't have the scripts and his second (and last) Bond movie was no good.

Roger Moore -- I really consider his entire tenure a sort of embarrassment and find it hard to believe that anyone was ever coked up enough to buy him as Bond.

Went to see "Saw 4" with my little (18-year-old) sister this weekend.

And man did it make me feel old.

Let me start with some wild hyperbole: I'm not sure I've ever seen a better Western than The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.

And I've seen (and loved) a lot of Westerns. From John Wayne as Chisolm to Val Kilmer as Doc Holliday, from the grit of Sam Peckenpah's Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid and Eastwood's Unforgiven to the comic puckishness of Support Your Local Sheriff and Maverick.

But this one -- this one has it all. A strange, heartbreaking script that is at once timeless and topical. A knockout cast of some of my favorite actors (Brad Pitt, Sam Rockwell, a career-making turn for Casey Affleck). Great cameos (Nick Cave, James Carville). Beautiful, stunning cinematography. Brilliant, spooky direction.

And, beyond all that, it does not spare one of the greatest strengths of any authentic film of the genre: the ubiquitous weirdness of the Old West.

[SOME SPOILERS AFTER THE JUMP]

There seem to be some strange movies becoming television shows lately.

The movies themselves are of course successful -- it's just strange trying to imagine them on the small screen.

The premiere of the Terminator TV spin-off, The Sarah Connor Chronicles, is drawing near and the AP reports George Lucas is planning a live action Star Wars television show thirty years after the first film hit theaters.

A "Mr. & Mrs. Smith" television show is supposed to have been in the works for a while now. The pilot apparently didn't fly at ABC but is now being shopped around. I actually think this might work really well, as long as the camp is left in for that old-school Avengers vibe.

Also, talk of an Ocean's 11 TV miniseries

There have been far, far too many television shows going to the big screen in the last decade or so -- and I'm wondering if reversing the formula is a good idea.

Maybe I'm just nervous because of the old Robocop TV series.

Some movies that were arguably better once they became TV shows:

1) M*A*S*H

2) Buffy the Vampire Slayer

3) In The Heat of the Night

4) Stargate

5) La Femme Nikita (Fairly good TV show, though not as popular as "Alias." I actually liked the movie remake Point of No Return with Bridget Fonda -- for whom I have a thing spawned by this film and Single White Female.)

7) Highlander (the movies were sort of all over the place. The show, while a bit much, was at least consistently interesting.)

It's official: Eric Bana will play the main villain, Nero, in the new Star Trek film. Probably best known as Bruce Banner in Ang Lee's "Hulk," he was also the hottie Hector in "Troy" (about the only good reason to see that movie). I'm also looking forward to him as King Henry VIII in "The Other Boleyn Girl" and Henry in "The Time Traveler's Wife."

Runnin' Down a Dream, the David Bogdanovich documentary about Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, is being screened at select theaters next week.

The trailer -- featuring Eddie Vedder, Rick Rubin, Stevie Nicks, The Travelling Wilburys, Dave Grohl, Bob Dylan and Johnny Depp -- looks good.

If you live in Greensboro the closest showings are in DC and TN -- but the movie will be released Oct. 16 as part of a box set that includes three DVDs and one CD. Rare concert footage, interviews, all that good stuff. It's a Best Buy exclusive and, at $25.00 seems like a deal to me.

But here's the thing -- the film is apparently a butt-numbing FOUR HOURS LONG.

I love Tom Petty but come on, man -- don't do me like that.

I may have to watch it in installments, like a mini-series. But I can enjoy the coffee table book now.

So Britney's debacle has overshadowed the real news that came out of the VMAs: co-star Shia LaBeouf, who I bet is playing Indy's son, announced that the title of the new film is Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. It's set to premiere in May 2008.

Thoughts, comments?

In this week's posts you can:

* Read my musings on Britney Spears looking like a drag queen (and the possibility that she'll spend the rest of her life performing for them).

* Find out whether Disney Channel's High School Musical star Vanessa Hudgens (and new star of inadvertent teen amateur Internet pornography) is into the Brazilian wax!

* Check out pictures of Maggie Gyllenhaal in the new Agent Provocateur lingerie ad campaign!

* Consider "The N Word" with comedians Lenny Bruce, Richard Pryor, Chris Rock and Dave Chapelle -- all of whom used it to greater effect than Eddie Griffin, who was bounced from a Black Enterprise event for dropping it this weekend.

* Tell me whether you got screwed when Apple dropped the price of the iPhone just two months after its release (and whether the $100 store credit they're giving customers makes up for it).

* Check out clips from shows coming out on DVD -- including 30 Rock, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and, of course, Flight of the Conchords.

If you missed any of it, it's all archived. Enjoy.

Also -- talk back, you lurking bastards!

Joss Whedon fans take note:

Amazon's Gold Box Deal for today is Firefly: The Complete Series for $19.99 (!)

Firefly is the prematurely canceled cult sci-fi show that spawned the film Serenity and retains a fierce cult following. Part Western, part space opera, the show has great characters, terrific production and effects (by which I mean they look as though they could actually be happening -- a bit of gritty reality to the future and to space travel).

It's well worth looking into -- and for the price of the average DVD you can get the whole series plus DVD extras.

Well...not here, of course.

But the pictures are out there.

It seems Vanessa Hudgens, Zac Efron's brainy love interest in the popular High School Musical franchise (and demonstrably less brainy love interest in real life) took some nude photos of herself. And, of course, they leaked onto the Internet.

Where I found them in about three minutes.

Would get fired (and possibly sued) for linking to them from here but I will note a few things:

1) There are a series of photos of her in progressively less clothing, in provocative poses, until she's posing naked and smirking for what seems to be a camera with a self timer.

2) She's doing so in what is clearly a bedroom and not (as has been reported) a bathroom. The curtain behind her just looks like a shower curtain. There's a bed and dressers in plain view.

3) The sort of creepy part about this (I mean -- besides her being the star of Disney films) is that, though she's 18 years old, the bedroom looks very much like the bedroom of a very girly high school girl. Christmas lights are strung along the ceiling of the room. Stuffed animals are visible on the fluffy bed on which she poses on all fours in what appears to be her sports bra.

4) Though she's turned out the big lights, turned on the string of Christmas ones and lit a series of tea candles on the dresser to "set the mood" she's left a half-finished plastic bottle of Dannon water (exactly like the one I'm drinking out of right now, eerily) on the dresser right beside her. This sort of kills the teenage girl faux romanticism of the scene and gives it a creepy, "I'm going to need to stay hydrated" porno shoot vibe. While the photo is undeniably aesthetically pleasing (in the strictest anatomy-drawing class sense, of course) the room and the way she's set it up sort of torpedoes any potential sexiness and just sort of makes my skin crawl. Mostly.

5) Female friends of mine who are hostile to the idea that every woman needs a Brazilian wax to be sexy have a new hero in Vanessa Hudgens. She makes their argument forcefully.

The number of news stories on these photos this morning is sort of staggering -- and many suggest that this is going to ruin her career with Disney, maybe even take down the entire High School Musical franchise. But as I look at them I wonder -- can that be right? It's not like she's doing anything really awful in them. They don't even rise to the level of misbehavior of some recent beauty pageant contestants. She just did what some (maybe an increasing number, and we can talk about and be disturbed by that if we're so inclined) 18 year old girls do when they're young and beautiful -- she privately documented her nudity for her boyfriend. I don't think it was for mass consumption -- though with Paris and Lindsay as warnings along the path of young fame she probably should have known better.

Let's hope this mistake doesn't doom her.

A few strange and wonderful comic-booky things this week:

- The movie version of Alan Moore's seminal WATCHMEN now has an official Warner Brothers movie site, complete with production blog and cast list. It's happening...

- Edward Norton is not only playing The Incredible Hulk in the new movie (which is rebooting the character and hoping to wash the taste of the last one out of our mouths) -- he also pitched in on the script. Also, TV Hulk Lou Ferrigno, who is now a Los Angeles Reserve Deputy Sheriff, has apparently filmed a cameo for the film.

- Over at Blender, alt-country rocker Ryan Adams (whose new album is doing a lot better than I predicted) gives what should be some obvious advice about starting a comic book collection. Kids -- take it from me, a guy who, years into trying to purge his house of comics, still has boxes of them: if you're not hooked, don't start.

- Director John Singleton is attached to films about two of Marvel Comics' most prominent black characters - The Black Panther and Luke Cage. Singleton isn't talking about which will be produced first, but he does throw out some ideas about casting here. I'd personally be against model Tyrese Gibson as Luke Cage. I'm sure he has the physique but I'm not sure he has the chops. I'd go with Wesley Snipes -- no, I don't care that he already played Blade.

Joe posted some new Batman pics a couple weeks ago. Now Perez has some more up that I haven't seen before. I was skeptical of Heath Ledger at first, but I've slowly come to think that he might be pretty awesome as the Joker.

Couple more here.

This is, apparently, strange movie news week.

Behold:

* My fanboy dreams come true, as they're apparently making a Jonny Quest movie.

* My Will Farrell nightmares come true, as he's apparently made another goofy sports movie. That's three of them now, for anyone who's counting. Four, if you count Kicking and Screaming. Which I don't. Does some studio boss have dirty pictures of him with a sheep or something?

* SNL digital short genius Andy Samberg (of "Lazy Sunday" and "D*ck In a Box" fame) has made his first film, Hot Rod. And it is apparently just effing awful. Which is disappointing, but somehow not surprising. I like the guy and hope they paid him enough to do it his way next time.

* Tom Cruise may make a cameo in the new Star Trek movie, playing the Enterprise's original captain.

* Apparently emboldened by the new Sci-Fi Channel series, they've released a new DVD edition of the 1980 Flash Gordon film. Flash Gordon: Savior of the Universe Edition features enhanced picture quality, sound, that awesome-in-its-ridiculousness soundtrack by Queen and some never-before-seen footage from one of the most unintentionally hilarious films of all time.

Looks like Hunter S. Thompson's first novel, The Rum Diary, really is coming to the Big Screen.

The semi-autobiographical novel, published after Thompson became famous as a journalist and author of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, concerns his early days as a reporter in Puerto Rico.

Johnny Depp is reportedly playing Thompson, a role he lived with Thompson to perfect in Terry Gilliam's film version of Fear and Loathing.

Some of the still images of Heath Ledger asThe Joker that have been released (or leaked) ahead of the Batman sequel, The Dark Knight:

I'm relieved that Maggie Gyllenhaal will be taking over the Rachel Dawes role played by Katie Holmes-Cruise in the first film. Maybe she can make the character...you know...in any way interesting.

Now You can see (er...hear) a trailer that includes a horribly teasing little bit of the Joker's laugh near the end here.

It was finally confirmed at Comic-Con that Zachary Quinto, best known for his creepy clock-obsessed character on "Heroes", will play Spock in the upcoming Star Trek film, helmed by J.J. Abrams. Abrams did a fantastic job with Mission Impossible III, so I can't wait to see what he does with yet another stale franchise.

Even better, they've also confirmed that Leonard Nimoy himself will return to the film for a substantial cameo. "People have asked me why I'm doing this movie, and I think it's simple: It's logical," said the 76-year-old Nimoy, according to MTV.

Some of the other names that have been thrown around "Star Trek," which will turn back the clock on the franchise, include Matt Damon as Captain Kirk and Gary Sinise as Bones. Damon I'm not so keen on, as good as I think he is, but Sinise I would love to see as Bones. I think he has the acerbic wit down cold.

Who would you like to see cast in the classic roles? Is it sacrilegious to even make another movie?

Adrien Brody.

Jason Schwartzman.

Owen Wilson.

Oh, yes.

It's a new Wes Anderson movie.

The trailer is here.

What's your favorite Wes Anderson movie? That American Express commercial, while good, doesn't count.

I vote "The Royal Tennenbaums," though I know some are partial to "The Life Aquatic."

So DC Comics sent me a copy of Action Comics #851.

The issue, written by comics superstar Geoff Johns and Superman director Richard Donner, is the fourth part of the "Last Son" story arc in which a boy arrives on Earth who seems to be from Krypton.

It's also in 3-D.

You heard me. 3-D. Like with the glasses and everything.

The premise is that Superman heads into The Phantom Zone -- a place where, among other things, Kryptonian criminals like General ("Kneel Before...") Zod are imprisoned. In the Zone you have to wear special goggles to make reality comprehensible or you'll go mad.

I don't mind telling you, I was pretty excited about this issue. I carefully cut the 3-D glasses out of the special insert, put them on and...

Well, that was about it.

It was all pinky and a bit strange...but not that exciting, in the end. Even with the glasses the blurred images gave me a bit of a headache -- and nothing seemed to be jumping out at me or zooming past.

Someone from a generation in which 3-D was considered genuinely exciting help me out, here. Was it ever thus? Was it never exciting? Is that why the whole 3-D thing went by the wayside, except as kitsch?

I read a good review of U2's new 3-D concert film the other day.

Maybe that will make me a believer.

My favorite part of the last Harry Potter movie?

Seeing this Get Smart trailer beforehand.

The audience went nuts for it.

I discovered Get Smart on Nick-At-Nite when I was a kid -- back when their line-up included nothing from the 1980s.

I thought it was some of the strangest, funniest stuff I'd ever seen (particularly because I finally understood where much of one of my favorite cartoons, Inspector Gadget, was coming from).

And, the rarity among things from our childhoods, it just got better as I got older.

Now, it's going to be a major motion picture starring Steve Carell as Maxwell Smart.

All right...would you believe a minor motion picture?

A puppet show with very sophisticated lighting?

Those who never saw Get Smart -- or just haven't seen it in a while -- can brush up before the movie with these episodes on Google Video.

A clip from the upcoming Bob Dylan biopic I'm Not There has leaked (or was leaked) on YouTube.

It features Cate Blanchett playing a young Dylan (and she is, eerily, a ringer for the Dylan in one of my favorite rock docs, Don't Look Back) in a strange conversation with Allenn Ginsberg (played by one of my favorite comics, David Cross of Mr. Show and Arrested Development).

The guy who plays...that is supposed to be John Lennon, right?...is kinda crap. But otherwise it looks like it's very interesting.

UPDATE:

For comparison, here's Dylan being punk before it was cool from D.A. Pennebaker's 1967 documentary Don't Look Back. In the clip he suggests that Time Magazine doesn't print THE TRUTH -- because if they did they'd print just pictures of "a tramp vomiting into the sewer" next to "Mr. Rockefeller or Mr. C.W. Jones."

HEA-VY.

From The Sun:

PAGANS have pledged to perform “rain magic” to wash away cartoon character Homer Simpson who was painted next to their famous fertility symbol - the Cerne Abbas giant.

The 17th century chalk outline of the naked, sexually aroused, club-wielding giant is believed by many to be a symbol of ancient spirituality.

Many couples also believe the 180ft giant, which is carved in the hillside above Cerne Abbas, Dorset, is an aid to fertility.

A giant 180ft Homer Simpson brandishing a doughnut was painted next to the well-endowed figure today in a publicity stunt to promote The Simpsons Movie released later this month.

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Click here to see the actual painting.

Man, the publicity push for The SImpsons movie is really full-tilt.

I was excited enough about all of those 7-11's turning into Kwik-E-Marts.

Here's a list of where they are, in case you'd like to visit one. I've been trying to organize some friends for a weekend trip to Washington, D.C. to see the closest one to Greensboro, buy some Squishees, Buzz Cola and Krusty-O's.

Who needs the Kwik-E-Mart?

I....dooooooooo.......