Category: Movies

Latest trailer for “Man of Steel” is a very, very good trailer

“Man of Steel” opens in just under a month. It’s funny to think about how some of us (me, specifically) were not sure how to feel about this movie because, you know, Superman as a character is kind of dull and Zack Snyder is Zack Snyder. We (and by “we” I mean “me,” because whatever, I already wrote it, let’s just move on and never mention it again) weren’t against this movie, because it had potential, but it wasn’t atop our summer must-see list, you know? (You know.)

Now I can’t wait to see this thing. The last few trailers really won me over. The last one was great, sure, and this latest (and last) one is even better. It focuses a lot on Michael Shannon’s General Zod, the villain of the movie, which is wise because you can’t go wrong focusing on Michael Shannon playing a crazy person. And the new ad spotlights the action, which — based just on the trailers so far — looks nifty but also doesn’t seem like it will be the sole focus of the movie. (Each trailer does a great job selling different aspects of the movie. I realize I’m just complimenting the marketing here, which is odd, but the marketing has been very good!)

The point here is that “Man of Steel” looks great and I’m very excited, just in case you were wondering:

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Vin Diesel takes credit for Facebook’s success, compares himself to Elvis and Brando

Vin Diesel chatted with Entertainment Weekly about the “Fast and the Furious” movies and “Riddick” and other things, and because he’s Vin Diesel he said some amazingly modest stuff about how Facebook became FACEBOOk because Vin Diesel used the site to talk to his fans. (I’m going to excerpt this at length, but again, you can read more over at Entertainment Weekly.)

So! Vin Diesel is the star of the “Fast and Furious” movies. He also has a lot of Facebook fans. Let’s dive in:

You’ve developed a big following on Facebook. What do you attribute that to?
Did you ever see the movie Social Network? Do you remember what they said the reason was to make Facebook?

To meet girls?
YOU GOT IT!

Let’s pause and appreciate Vin Diesel shouting “YOU GOT IT!” at the interviewer while discussing “The Social Network.”  Continue reading →

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New trailer for “Man of Steel”

As I’ve written before, “Man of Steel” has potential. The initial trailers and information made it look perfectly fine, but there are some aspects (namely, Zack Snyder and Superman as a big-screen character) that have kept me from being too excited.

This trailer, which arrived on Tuesday, moves me firmly into the excited camp. It’s a really good trailer! And at the very least, it looks like they found a different way to tackle Superman. (Having Amy Adams and Michael Shannon in the cast, in addition to Christopher Nolan’s involvement, does inspire confidence.) I still feel like we have no idea how the actual movie will work if it’s a two-hour exegesis of Superman’s tortured psyche, but I am curious to see how they mix that with a superhero origin story.

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Trailer for “Elysium”

Neill Blomkamp’s last film was “District 9,” a wonderful movie and probably the best sci-fi film to land over the last several years. So quite a few of us are eagerly, hungrily anticipating his follow-up, “Elysium,” which arrives this summer. We know he has assembled quite a cast — Matt Damon, Jodie Foster, Sharlto Copley, William Fichtner and Diego Luna, among others — but today we got our first look at the movie:

Well, that definitely looks terrific. I like how the scenes on Earth evoke the similarly lived-in feeling of “District 9,” that sense he created of a world with its own texture and history, rather than another cold, polished CGI construct. Remember how Blomkamp almost directed the “Halo” movie, but that fell apart, so he went ahead and wrote and directed two sci-fi movies instead? I’m sure his “Halo” would have been interesting to see, but instead we got a pair of original films: a phenomenal one in “District 9″ and, now, a very promising one “Elysium.” I can’t wait.

[Yahoo! Movies]

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Roger Ebert, 1942-2013

Ebert, 70, who reviewed movies for the Chicago Sun-Times for 46 years and on TV for 31 years, and who was without question the nation’s most prominent and influential film critic, died Thursday in Chicago. …

His colleagues admired him as a workhorse. Ebert reviewed as many as 285 movies a year, after he grew ill scheduling his cancer surgeries around the release of important pictures. He eagerly contributed to other sections of the papers — interviews with and obituaries of movie stars, even political columns on issues he cared strongly about on the editorial pages.

The Chicago Sun-Times announced Thursday afternoon that Roger Ebert, the paper’s legendary film critic, had died.

You should without a doubt read “A Leave of Presence,” his final blog post, published less than two days before he died. I will excerpt only the final line, which I admit is completely cheap (and you should still read the entire thing), because it is one hell of a final line:

So on this day of reflection I say again, thank you for going on this journey with me. I’ll see you at the movies.

Longform has put together a few key Ebert stories, and additional collections, reflections and reminiscences are sure to come. [UPDATE: Here's the Longreads page with additional stories.]

* * *

Ebert truly was one of the all-time greats. He remains an inspiration for countless people, myself included, who cannot begin to express how much we learned from him and enjoyed what he did and how he did it. Many of us who never met him, and who only knew him through his words, cannot help but feel like we lost someone we knew.

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Connie Britton Is Great

The headline of this post is almost too obvious, because of course Connie Britton is great. I mean, is there a person out there who is both (a) aware of Conne Britton’s existence and (b) not a huge fan of hers? Of course not. Of course there is no such person. (The best part about this argument is that it’s so steeped in data and research that it is clearly bulletproof.) Anyway, the New York Times Magazine profiled Connie Britton, so feel free to read that if you would like to read about how she was probably too tall for the Renee Zellweger role in “Jerry Maguire.”

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First trailer for “Inside Llewyn Davis”

We all woke up to a lovely surprise today: The first look at “Inside Llewyn Davis,” the latest film from the Coen Brothers. The highly-anticipated movie, in the way that all of their films are eagerly awaited (but also in a way that their movies since “No Country for Old Men” have been particularly hoped for), is about a 1960s folk musician in New York City.

Oscar Isaac (“Drive,” “The Bourne Legacy”) stars as the titular Davis, while the film also includes Carey Mulligan, Garrett Hedlund, Justin Timberlake (sigh), John Goodman (in his first Coen Brothers movie since “O Brother, Where Art Thou” in 2000) and F. Murray Abraham.

This is a terrific trailer:

Last year, New York took a peek at the set, demonstrating how the Coens transformed modern-day New York into the Village of the 1960s.

[ildatthegaslight.com]

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