Movie Marketing Monday

Movie Marketing Monday

Limitless

The highs and lows of drug use have been the subject of many films. However, I like the sci-fi spin that this film takes.




Hanna

Saoirse Ronan going all Salt-like to the music of The Chemical Brothers...yep, I am interested.

Movie Marketing Monday

Machete

In honor of Jeff Fahey’s recent work on Lost, I thought that I would highlight another soon-to-be-cult classic he will be featured in. Machete has quickly become one of my most eagerly anticipated films of the year.




Megamind

Dreamworks answer to The Incredibles? Seems like it. Instead of The Fantastic Four, Megamind looks to add a comedic spin on the classic Superman tale. As long as it is better than Superman Returns I will be happy.

Top Five Friday: Russell Crowe

The Best

L.A. Confidential:

There was not a single bad performance in this entire film. This is the film where Crowe perfected his tough guy with a heart of gold routine that he used in numerous films afterwards.

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

I really liked the chemistry Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany have in this film. Peter Weir’s film did not grab me upon first viewing, but I have really grown to appreciate this film immensely over the years. I think I was just not in the right mood for Master and Commander upon my first viewing.

Gladiator

Many have tried to recapture the scope and fun of films like Spartacus and Ben Hur but few have succeeded like Gladiator. While I think Joaquin Phoenix is the weak link in this film, a lot of my reaction towards Phoenix may be due to the fact that Crowe’s Maximus is such a dominating character.

Romper Stomper

I actually prefer The Quick and the Dead over Romper Stomper on the whole, but Crowe’s performance in Romper Stomper is too sizzling to ignore.  Really, he is the only reason to even watch this film.

The Insider

In my opinion 1999 is one of those defining years in cinema history. The sheer number of good, and sometimes groundbreaking, films was outstanding. The Insider was one of those great 1999 films that worked well on so many levels.


The Worst

Virtuosity

I can still smell the cheese off of this flick. Luckily Washington and Crowe reteamed again for American Gangster, and proved that they could work well together given the proper project.

Body of Lies

Ridley Scott and Crowe have a Scorsese/De Niro style working relationship. This is their second weakest film together to date. Their worst film can be found at the bottom of this list

Mystery, Alaska
As a hockey fan (Go Habs Go!), this movie should have appealed to me on several levels. I was not expecting something as captivating as say The Rocket, but at least something better than The Mighty Ducks. Sadly this ranks just above Slap Shots 2…yes, I really disliked this movie.

Proof of Life
Crowe’s tough, but sometimes sensitive, routine did nothing to help this film. Meg Ryan’s career was never the same after this movie.

A Good Year
Easily the worst Crowe/Scott film to date, not to mention the most boring. I am all for actors trying to show their softer side. Unfortunately I think Crowe got softer and dull mixed up somewhere in the process.

The 5 Best & Worst Scorsese Films

I had planned to write an editorial piece on Martin Scorsese for the LAMBs in the Director's Chair series but time was not on my side this month. Still here are my picks for the best and worst Scorsese films:

The Best

The King of Comedy

I am not sure why this film does not get more love from the general public. In my opinion this is a hidden gem in Martin Scorsese's large canon of work.

Raging Bull

Still one of the best sports related films ever made. I remember first seeing this on the big screen at age 13 or so. The film was playing at one of the old historic theatres downtown as part of a Scorsese double bill. Even at a young age this film blew me away.

Taxi Driver

I came close to placing either After Hours or The Last Waltz here, but ultimately went with Driver. The film has been quoted to death so it does not have the same replay value as some of the other ones on the list. Still every once and a while it is good to revisit the dark mind of Travis Bickle.

Goodfellas

You knew this would appear on the list somewhere. With the exception of The Godfather series, ever other gangster film gets compared to this cinematic classic.

The Departed

I was tempted to put Mean Street in this spot but figured I needed a break from the Scorsese/De Niro pairing. I loved Infernal Affairs and I really like how Scorsese remade the film. Since I have not seen Shutter Island yet, hope to catch it in the next week or so, I would say this is the best film of his films with Leonardo Dicaprio.

The Worst

Gangs of New York

The beginning of the Scorsese/DiCaprio era also coincided with the tail end of Scorsese’s decade long “Give Me an Oscar” push. Daniel Day-Lewis’ Bill the Butcher is the only reason to watch this bloated mess.

The Age of Innocence

Love the casting, found the film to be rather dull on the whole. It also did not help that this came out when Ismail Merchant and  James Ivory were still at the top of their game.  There are far better period piece romances out there.

Kundun

The cinematography is fantastic but the film just did not live up to my expectation.

The Aviator

See Gangs of New York comments minus Daniel Day-Lewis. DiCaprio gives a good performance in the film but I walked away learning nothing new, or interesting, about Howard Hughes. To see a biopic done right go back up to Raging Bull.

Casino

I like it better when it was called Goodfellas...

Lenny’s A Riot Without Carl Carlson

Lenny

The one thing I love about Academy Award season is the large amount of classic, and award nominated, movies that show on television. It is a chance to re-watch old favourites, and to discover previously unseen gems. It also allows us to reflect upon actors/actress whose have spent the majority of their careers delivering outstanding, and often defining, performances. Dustin Hoffman is the perfect example of this.

I had forgotten how great of an actor Dustin Hoffman was back in the sixties and seventies. This is not to say Hoffman is not a good actor today. On the contrary, he can still turn it on at a drop of a hat. Yet, when you review some of the films he starred in between 1967 to 1979, his work in that era is simply jaw dropping: The Graduate, Midnight Cowboy, Straw Dogs, Lenny, All the President's Men, Marathon Man, and Kramer vs. Kramer. The interesting thing is that Hoffman is often overlooked when discussing great actors. Although widely respected, he does not get the same amount love as other actors, like say Robert De Niro or Al Pacino, of that era. I wonder if this is because Hoffman often opts for playing the everyman instead of the more macho roles that De Niro and Pacino tend to take. I was thinking about this fact while watching Lenny for the first time last week.

Lenny, directed by Bob Fosse, is a biopic that looks at the life of Lenny Bruce (Dustin Hoffman), the most controversial comic of the 1960s. The film follows Lenny's as he goes from struggling stand-up comic to underground sensation. We see the ups and downs of his marriage to Honey (Valerie Perrine), a stripper, including their battle with addiction. Yet his marriage to Honey was the least of Bruce’s problems. As Lenny became more popular, the vulgarity he used in his shows became more scrutinized. This resulted in Lenny constantly being arrested on indecency charges. The numerous arrests not only started to damage Lenny’s professional career, but his mental state as well.

Dustin Hoffman is brilliant as Lenny Bruce, he brings a rogue-like charm to the role while never losing site of Bruce's humanity. Several of the best scenes in the movie are not Lenny's stand-up routines, which are great, but his interactions with his wife Honey. As Honey spirals out of control, we are constantly aware of the confliction growing inside Lenny. Bruce knows that she is bad news for both of them, yet he is responsible for making her the way she is. The fact that Hoffman and Perrine have great chemistry together only heightens the turbulent marriage on screen.

If the relationship between Lenny and Honey was not gripping enough, Fosse nicely juxtaposes Lenny’s stand-up routine with many key moments in Bruce’s life. Fosse slowly shows how the many court battles started to alter Lenny. Not only did Bruce’s jokes, and observations, become increasingly political; but the stress of the legal woes impacts his overall mental state as well. One of the most gut-wrenching moments comes when Lenny, who can no longer find work to pay his legal fees, is begging to be thrown in jail but the judge refuses.

It is fascinating watching Lenny in this day and age. Many of the things that Lenny Bruce got arrested for saying are considered tame by today's standards. The film is not just a reminder of how far society has changed in the last fifty years; but also, how much we take freedom of speech for granted. Through his tribulations Lenny Bruce inadvertently became one of the important pioneers of the free speech movement in the sixties. It was a burden that he did not want, but ultimately ended up carrying all the way to his grave. Without Lenny Bruce there would not be the likes of Richard Pryor, George Carlin, Jerry Seinfeld, Judd Apatow, etc. Heck, we probably would not even have Youtube or blogs. If you are looking for a movie to get you ready for Sunday’s Academy Award show, Lenny might be the film for you.