Posters: "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button"

It’s another slow news day, so I’m putting up more posters.

These have been circling the net for a while, but Awards Daily has our first official, high-res glimpse of the posters for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

And I don’t really like them. They’re strangely plain and unattractive. What say you?

 

Poster: "The Wrestler"

Via Ropes of Silicon.

In Contention says it’s not the official artwork for the film but a leaked comp. Still, it looks pretty good.

 

Trailer: "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince"

 

Some Thoughts on "Quantum of Solace"

I’ll be writing a full review for The Dispatch soon, but I want to get my opinion out there just for the record.

I loved Quantum of Solace.

And I say this as someone who liked but never loved Casino Royale the way some people did. But this one bowled me over. Marc Forster’s more lyrical sensibilities bring a fresh beauty the the action sequences (which are stunning), and at times breathtaking. It’s non-stop action, but Forster makes it count. This isn’t a mindless blow-em-up thriller, this is an intelligently crafted, superbly edited, lean, mean piece of work.

 

Trailer: "Watchmen"

Am I the only one that feels nothing but total ambivalence about this? It just doesn’t do anything for me at all.

 

Ebert Thrashes Lyons

Not by name of course, but check out Ebert’s list of rules for film critics, which comes after the uproar over his reviewing a film that he only saw eight minutes of (a controversy I have somehow managed to not hear about until now).

Ebert has several zingers aimed directly at Ben Lyons, who took over his spot on At the Movies, like this one:

Keep track of your praise. If you call a movie “one of the greatest movies ever made,” you are honor-bound to include it in your annual Top Ten list. Likewise, for example, if you describe a film as “the most unique movie-going experience of a generation,” and “one of the best films of 2007, and of the last 25 years,” it’s your duty to put it in the Top Ten of 2007. This is doubly true if you have published two separate lists naming 14 of the year’s top 10 films.

and

 

Some Thoughts on the New "Star Trek" Trailer

I’ll admit, one of the things I was most excited about going into Quantum of Solace was the premier of the new trailer for J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek. I’ve gotten into Star Trek quite a bit in the last year or so, and I’ve been looking forward to seeing the first real glimpse into what Abrams has come up with for his prequel of sorts.

And I came away completely underwhelmed.

I say this not as a lifelong megafan or a drooling fanboy, but as someone who appreciates the vision of Gene Roddenberry and the world he created. And by the looks of this trailer, this is not it.

 

This. Movie. Kicks. Ass.

I’ll hammer out some thoughts tomorrow. I’m going to bed.

 

Six Degrees of Separation

Did anyone else find it interesting to see Tom Noonan, who played the original Frances Dolarhyde in Michael Mann’s 1986 Manhunter, playing opposite Philip Seymour Hoffman, who played Dolarhyde victim (and recipient of the famous “do you see?” speech) Freddie Lounds in Brett Ratner’s 2002 remake, Red Dragon, in Synecdoche, New York?

I don’t know, it just struck me as interesting, seeing as how Noonan isn’t seen on screen very often, and I just watched Red Dragon again this week.

“Do you see?”

 

On "Role Models"

From The Dispatch:

The interesting thing about the film is that while it begins as just another painfully unfunny comedy, the presence of the children, played by “Superbad’s” McLovin’ Christopher Mintz-Plasse as nerdy teenager Augie and the endearing Bobb’e J. Thompson as the streetwise 10-year-old Ronnie, injects the film with some much-needed energy. Indeed, the two of them are the highlight of the film and make the climactic “World of Warcraft”-esque battle of the nerds a surprisingly touching and funny scene. The problem is it only manages to bring the film up from “D” level to “C” level. There just isn’t enough here to warrant spending two hours on, especially when it’s all been done before, and better, somewhere else

Click here to read my full review.