Well, this is a pleasant early-morning, post-blizzard (for you North Easterners!) treat. I’m still not sold on a return trip to the Monsters, Inc. universe, but it’s hard for me to watch the full trailer for Pixar’s prequel to that picture, the inventively titled Monsters University, without cracking a partial smile. But don’t take my word for it– have a look yourself and see what you think of the animation giant’s latest: Unlike the promo material we’ve seen for the film in the last few months or so, this trailer introduces the vague outlines of plot to the project. Given that we already know how things turn out between Sully…
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G-S-T Review…A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III
There’s no good way to approach A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III (henceforth referred to as Charles Swan for brevity’s sake). In large part, that’s a byproduct of the film being a complete disaster, but an alluring, charming sort of disaster, and this is where Charles Swan becomes a complicated beast. I’m not sure what else could reasonably be expected about a Roman Coppola film starring Charlie Sheen that’s so firmly about Charlie Sheen; at best that’s a recipe for rampant weirdness, and at worst for catastrophic cinematic failure. Somehow Coppola’s aim lands Charles Swan squarely in between, and what we’re left with is a bizarre Sheen…
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G-S-T Review…The Taste of Money
Did you know about the corrupting influence money can have on a person, or several persons? Were you aware that the pleasures of the high life come at a dark price? The Taste of Money has both of these big, obvious questions on its mind among many others, and the film– the seventh to come from controversial South Korean filmmaker Sang-soo Im– tackles these ideas with melodramatic zeal, never once shooting for anything resembling graceful subtlety in its portrait of South Korea’s wealthy ruling class. Frankly, the film scarcely even seems interested in dealing with reality, instead engaging in brash, lurid mythmaking ripped straight from headlines chronicling the battle between…
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Sweet International Trailer…'Journey to the West'
AKA A Chinese Odyssey. AKA one of the Four Great Classical Novels. Full disclosure: I watched the trailer for Journey to the West at least a half a dozen times this morning and I’m still not totally sure what I saw with every repeat viewing. Somehow, Stephen Chow and timeless, massively influential Chinese literature seems like a really odd mix, but that’s exactly why I pay the price of admission to see his films in the first place. I’m sure this will make slightly more sense once I’ve actually seen the whole film, though I’m willing to pick up some supplemental reading if it’ll help me attain understanding of the…
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G-S-T Review…John Dies At the End
Soy sauce, TV psychics, magical Jamaicans, sentient organic computers, meat monsters, Paul Giamatti, and the constant threat of apocalypse: that’s John Dies at the End in a nutshell. Or maybe it’s Don Coscarelli in a nutshell. Of course, John Dies at the End isn’t pure Coscarelli– the cult film legend’s latest adapts the novel of the same name by one Jason Pargin, who initially had his book published back in 2007. But there’s a nagging sense of kismet that permeates the experience of watching the movie, as though Pargin wrote his story knowing that someday Coscarelli would end up translating it into cinema using his own brand of rampant comic-horror…
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Ohhh, Look…Watch Full 'Victory's Glory' Skit From 'Movie 43'
Take the headline as more of a suggestion than a command. Truthfully, this clip says a lot more about Movie 43— the everything-but-the-kitchen-sink ensemble sketch comedy film hitting theaters this Friday– as a whole than meets the eye, though it also gives away a significant spoiler: the ‘Victory’s Glory’ segment really isn’t all that funny. In fact, if you’ve seen any of the trailers for the film, then you’ve already seen this bit’s best moments. Meanwhile, rest of the scene just tries to recycle its most effective beats over and over again for five minutes. I grant that this is just one minuscule chunk of an hour and a half…
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First Photo of Benedict Cumberbatch in 'The Fifth Estate'
Permit me to take this opportunity to admit two things: that I’d totally forgotten about the existence of The Fifth Estate, and that I’m ill-acquainted with the work of Benedict Cumberbatch. I like the guy! Don’t get me wrong! But I’ve only made it through half of the first episode of Sherlock and Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy and Four Lions make for a really small sample size. Maybe, given that 2013 looks to be the year of the Cumberbatch, I should go back and watch The Other Boleyn Girl, re-watch Atonement, and catch up on Sherlock so I can join the legions of fans foaming at the mouth for the…
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G-S-T Review…LUV
Sheldon Candis’ greatest coup in directing LUV, his debut feature, could well be securing rapper-turned-all-around-entertainer Common as his leading man. Common only started making moves in the acting world in the early 2000s before landing roles in Smokin’ Aces and American Gangster in 2007, but he’s been writing rhymes about manhood and the value of family since 1992; combining that background with his natural, easy charisma, he feels like a natural fit for a story about a young boy learning life lessons from his uncle over the course of a single day in inner city Baltimore. When Common speaks, he speaks with authority. Were we in Michael Rainey Jr.’s place,…
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Cuarón to Strand Bullock, Clooney in Space This October
Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity, one of G-S-T’s most anticipated releases of the year, has been a long time coming after delays kept it from seeing release in the fall of 2012. I’ll admit that I held some fears about its chances of seeing the light of day this year in reserve– who holds onto a movie driven by two major Academy darlings for this long?– but those fears have been put to rest: the film now has officially been given an October 4th release date. We know precious few details about Gravity beyond Cuarón’s position at the steering wheel, Clooney’s and Bullock’s starring roles, and what the synopsis tells us, but I…
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Hugh Goes High-Res in 'Wolverine' Image
This is exactly what it sounds like: a high-resolution photograph of Hugh “Heard the People Sing” Jackman from Darren Aronofsky’s James Mangold’s upcoming The Wolverine, a sequel/reboot/rebootquel/one-off for the eponymous beloved superhero after 2008’s disastrous Wolverine: Origins. Naturally, there’s not a whole lot to say about the shot– Jackman looks like he’s ready to tear off some heads after serenading audiences in Les Misérables, and I suspect for many that seeing Jackman in fighting shape will represent a huge chunk of the picture’s fan allure. If anything, it should be refreshing to see Logan go toe-to-toe with samurai and ninjas instead of yet another super-mutant heavy designed to make us…
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Sweet Trailer…'Trance'
I have a feeling deep in my gut that Trance— Danny Boyle’s follow up to 2010’s 127 Hours— inevitably will draw a lot of comparisons to another trippy, mind-bending film about theft, reality, deception, and the nature of memory by a certain well-liked British filmmaker. But Boyle isn’t Christopher Nolan; he never has been and he never will be, and that’s a good thing. How will Boyle handle a film about a thief (James McAvoy), an art auctioneer (Vincent Cassell), a hypnotist (Rosario Dawson), and the search to recover a lost, stolen painting? In a word, artfully. Have a look for yourself and see what you think: More interesting than…
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First Glimpse at Katniss and Finnick in 'Catching Fire'
The folks over at Entertainment Weekly managed to score Lionsgate’s first two official images for the next installment in the Hunger Games trilogy (well, quadrilogy), Catching Fire. At this point you’ve probably seen the original film, which means you probably are well-acquainted with Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) by now– so let me introduce you to Finnick Odair (Sam Clafin, of Snow White and the Huntsman), a former victor of the titular games and, as the book emphasizes repeatedly, one handsome son of a gun. How does Finnick figure into a story where Katniss already has two potential love interests? Good question. Turns out he’s a past victor of the Games…