"Spider-Man 3" is opening soon. Some of you are excited. Some of you are wary (too many villains? Third is not a charm?). And some of you don't even remember what happened in the first two pictures.

 

If you've suffered memory lapse, refresh yourself with my MSN photo gallery. 

 

And I wonder. Can the third picture live up to the first two (especially the second)? So far Rotten Tomatoes nods a rather half hearted yes but it's still too early to tell. It could be at this point, "running on fumes" as Variety's Todd McCarthy claims. 

 

I'm eagerly anticipating the movie (and that black suit) so I will simply wait and see...

 

Sacrificing itself for the betterment of movie-reviewing mankind, Nicolas Cage's "Next" is the one big release movie that was screened for critics. The result? Mixed.

 

Basically, if you like mindless popcorn movies with flashy action set pieces, you will not be disapointed. If you want to actually make sense of plot and characterization, skip it. Or check out one of the review-less movies opening this weekend. Perhaps you could "represent" yourself at a "fly" showing of "Kickin' It Old Skool." Or you could see "Hot Fuzz." According to Film School Rejects, there are ten good reasons why you should. 

 

And read "Next" reviews at MetaCritic. 

 

I interviewed comic book filmmaker extraordinaire David Goyer (his picture "The Invisible," which he directed opens tomorrow and he recently scripted "The Dark Knight").

 

From my piece at Fandango:

 

From "Blade" to "Batman Begins" to "Ghost Rider" to "The Dark Knight," David Goyer is something of a king in the world of comic book cinema. Changing hats as producer, writer and director (and sometimes wearing them all at once, as he did with "Blade Trinity"), the multi-talented filmmaker is a veritable force in Hollywood, and a man largely responsible for comic books and graphic novels being finally taken seriously on screen.

 

His newest movie, "The Invisible," is a slight departure from his big-budget blockbusters, though it does reflect his interests. Remade from a Swedish movie, the thriller concerns a teenager who, after a vicious beating, returns as an invisible spirit. It’s a touching look at the aftermath of death, showing how slow the police are in solving his case and meeting up with the troubled young woman who is partially responsible for his death. For Goyer, "The Invisible" appears to be a more intimate and personal film than his other work.

 

 

Q: Again, many critics see comic books films as kids’ fare. But there are often much deeper issues brought up in them.

 

Goyer: Yes. Here’s a comparison. "Children of Men" is a science fiction film and so is "Independence Day," but I don’t think you could find two films on the different end of the spectrum in the maturity of storytelling. "Children of Men" is a very political film, it’s almost a manifesto, but it’s a sci-fi film. And "Independence Day," and I’m not taking anything away from it, is pure popcorn. You put them up against each other, one is from Venus, one is from Mars.

 

Q: Do you also think these films reflect what’s going on in our world?

 

Goyer: It’s certainly cyclical, but you can draft a correlation in the ’50s during the Cold War, the atom bomb, with the huge uptake in science-fiction and horror films. There is a lot of anxiety going on right now, the morass in Iraq, and so it’s not so crazy to me that there’s an uptake in genre films - because people want escapism.

 

I’ll give you another example. I’m working on an update of David Cronenberg’s [cult movie] "Scanners" right now and I think Cronenberg is a perfect filmmaker. In "Scanners," he was wonderfully sociological in what he was saying about corporate America [so] to look at what he’s trying to say with his original film and what would happen to "Scanners," post 9/11 and in the environment of prisons like Abu Ghraib, or the so called Black Sites… if "Scanners" existed, you could be damn sure they would be involved in that, so that’s the fun of this….what kind of political allegory or commentary can we slide into with this [new film].

 

Read my entire interview with Goyer at Fandango.

 

This year's Munich Film Festival will celebrate its 25th anniversary with Werner Herzog and Richard Linklater.

 

The two filmmakers who have close ties with Munich (Herzog was born there, Linklater held the international debut of "Slacker" at the festival) will show retrospectives of their work. That means 52 films for Herzog, which includes shorts and documentaries.

 

I love Werner Herzog but can you imagine taking in 52 Herzog pictures in less than a month? Including the movie where he hypnotized his cast, "Heart of Glass"? You might emerge from the theater like this.

 

Actually, this is great. I wish they'd hold that retrospective here. A Herzog a day...

 

 

Yet another celebrity vs. the paparazzi incident:

 

"Actor Hugh Grant has been arrested over an allegation he attacked a photographer in London, before throwing a tub of food at him.
Photographer Ian Whittaker told the Daily Star newspaper he was kicked before the tub was hurled at him.

The Metropolitan Police confirmed a 46-year-old had been arrested on suspicion of assault and has since been released on bail.

Mr Grant's lawyers confirmed an incident was now under investigation."

 

Why is Hugh always getting caught doing things that every celebrity does? I feel sorry for him (in this case, not the other one). I know celebs sign an unwritten contract that they must endure the paparazzi but they are human. They snap.  And, FYI, that "tub of food" was a can of baked beans. He was probably really hungry.

 

Okaaaay. So will Larry the Cable Guy's "blue collar" fan base be for or against his heelarious looking war comedy "Delta Farce"?

 

Watch the trailer. Decide for yourself.

 

And I'm gonna ruin something for you here. He does utter the line, "Get 'Er Done."

 

Larry claims to have coined that phrase but I know better. John Travolta said it in "Carrie"--no joke! John Travolta has more of a right to that particular witticism than Larry the Cable Guy. Or rather, Dan Whitney.

 

 

It was inevitable. Zany "Zoo" puns!

 

According to ScreenGrab's Leonard Pierce, the situation is getting out of control:

 

"As we noted before in an entry about Robinson Devor's 'Zoo', the controversial documentary on bestiality, the subject is so immediately explosive and alienating that it's hard to even talk about it without the whole thing going off the rails. Luckily, a lot of our nation's movie critics have spared us the trouble of figuring out whether or not it's something we want to have a serious conversation about by cramming all their reviews full of hilarious horse puns! 'A horse is a horse, of course', wheezes Variety's Scott Foundas; 'A horse of a very different color', yucks David Ansen in Newsweek. This is 'the year of the horse', says IndieWire's Anthony Kaufman, and Eric Snider goes with '…and the horse you rode in on!' Very funny, guys. What, no one thought of a 'New Zoo Revue' reference?"

 

 

--Rainn Wilson makes it possible for one young, hungry actress to play a prostitute, become beloved in the process.

 

--Previous beloved prostitute character's brother, Eric Roberts (aka the troubled, talented one) will play a mafia kingpin in Christopher Nolan's "The Dark Knight."

 

--Julia Stiles headlines "The Bell Jar" based on Sylvia Plath's famous, autobiographical novel. This will be the second adaptation since 1979 and I can't believe it took this freaking long. Shouldn't there be something like ten "Bell Jar's" out there? And, no, "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden" doesn't count.

 

David Bowie vs. Robert DeNiro. The Goo Goo Dolls vs. The Polyphonic Spree. Ricky Gervais? Daniel Johnston? Laurie Anderson? It's the Tribeca Film Festival vs. the newer, hipper, younger High Line Festival curated by the Thin White Duke himself.

 

According to New York Magazine (via Cinematical) it's the "rich, powerful father and his silky hipster son."

 

Read the rest here.

 

The things you learn from Wikipedia. And the ways you get there.

 

Here's my Wiki journey, a journey that began with substantive intentions and ended with...Daryl Hannah's board game:

 

Curious about the slaying of playwright and poet Federico Garcia Lorca led to his past friend and filmmaker Luis Bunuel who had a huge falling out with Salvador Dali an artist who later entertained Sonny and Cher who starred in "Moonstruck" with Olympia Dukakis an actress who has been politically outspoken, much like her co-star in "Steel Magnolias" (yes I clicked on "Steel Magnolias" and I have no idea why) Daryl Hannah (I was wondering if she'd been climbing any more trees lately) only to learn Ms. Hannah invented a board game called Liebrary.

 

So now I know Hannah creates literary board games. Great. Though I really should backtrack and read more concerning Lorca's "Bodas de Sangre."

 

 

 

 

More "Titanic" casting injected into the Sam Mendes picture "Revolutionary Road." After re-teaming Leonardo DiCaprio with Kate Winslet, the movie now has "Titanic" alum Kathy Bates who played the "unsinkable" Molly Brown in James Cameron's popular romance on (yes) board. 

 

Guess they can't spin the story (adapted from a critically acclaimed 1961 novel by Richard Yates) of a young couple living in a 1950's suburb with any other pizazz other than, "it's like 'Titanic,' only it's not on a ship and has nothing to do with any of those characters and Billy Zane does not appear. Well, not yet. Maybe he could play the rich, evil, handsome neighbor. Does that happen in the novel? Is there a rich, evil, handsome neighbor? You don't know? Well I didn't read the book."

 

Anyway, it's movie news. Maybe they'll think outside the box and next cast James Caan as Bates' husband to create a super fantastic "Titanic/Misery" merging. Or maybe they'll just cast Shia LeBeouf. That sounds about right.

 

Over at Screengrab, DK Holm offers many compelling reasons to watch Jack Cardiff's 1968 actioner "Dark of the Sun," a movie that also claims Quentin Tarantino as a fan.

 

Relaying his excitement Holm wrote:

 

"Recently the old mercenary thriller 'Dark of the Sun' became readily available, and I was delighted. I can throw away the old pan-and-scan dub-of-a-dub VHS tape I've been watching for years and trying to get others to watch. Now I can immerse myself in its widescreen glories (with photography by Edward Scaife, while the film was directed by DP-turned-occasional helmer Jack Cardiff), the sweaty bodies in the Congo, in the horrifying hoards, in Rod Taylor and Jim Brown's relaxed, quiet masculinity (both are underrated screen presences), in Yvette Mimieux's exotic, loyal fragility.

 

"Why 'Dark of the Sun?' I'm not sure, except that it is perhaps the greatest Saturday matinee movie ever made. Many of its components will be familiar to viewers with a memory that goes back to Stagecoach. There is the mission deep into enemy territory, but with a time limit. There is the noble warrior, the vulnerable love interest, the caustic villain in their midst, ready to betray. There is even the drunk doctor (Kenneth Moore) who has to deliver a baby. It may be derivative, but it may also be the text from which all subsequent action films were derived. Most of all, it is a train movie."

 

As a fan of Jim Brown, Rod Taylor and the train movie, this all sounds good to me. Read the rest of Holm's spirited take here.

 

"Thank You For Smoking" and "SherryBaby" both won Prism awards today. The Prism awards are handed out every year by the Entertainment Industries Council for accurate depictions of drug, alcohol and tobacco use, addiction and mental health issues.

 

They're also the only place Joan and Melissa Rivers will take home awards as they earned the Heritage Award for their telefilm "Starting Again" and "excellence in portraying substance abuse before the advent of the Prism Awards."

 

They are also the only place where a work of enterainment can earn a "Bipolar Disorder Award." And no, I'm not joking (that wouldn't be funny anyway). "Jellysmoke" nabbed that particular honor.

 

Read the rest of the story and the winners at The Hollywood Reporter.

 

One of our greatest living actors, Jack Nicholson turned 70 yesterday. 70. Though in real life (or, rather, award show real life) Jack's played the grinning, impish elder statesman for some time now, it's hard for me to wrap my mind around the concept of senior citizen Jack. Even with his terrific performance as retired widower in "About Schmidt."

 

And he's still going strong. I don't care how many critics think him stuck in Jack-isms (and I happen to love Jack-isms) he proved, not long ago, with Sean Penn's underrated "The Pledge," that he can give an understated, inscrutable and poignant performance that's weird without being showy about it. But again, I like showy Jack. I like Jack any way I can get him.

 

Here's a wonderful write-up celebrating Nicholson's years in film via The Guardian:

 

"There are numerous performers who might lay claim to being the ultimate American screen star (I admit to still holding a candle to Brando). But I don't think any of them has enjoyed the sustained run of great performances in significant films that Nicholson boasted in that golden period between 1968 and 1976. This was an astonishing spell, kicking off with Easy Rider and running through Five Easy Pieces, Carnal Knowledge, Marvin Gardens, The Last Detail, The Passenger and Chinatown before wrapping up with his Oscar-winning turn in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

 

"Along the way he defined himself as a new breed of American icon. He was not the matinee idol of old, nor was he the loveable kid next door. And while he boasted elements of Bogart's rumpled cool and Brando's Method angst, he was not quite like either of them either. He was an actor in keeping with the tenor of the times in 1970s America - at once vital and vulnerable; powerful and weak; inspirational and not entirely to be trusted."

 

Read the rest here. And, Happy Birthday Mr. Nicholson!

 

--posted by Kim 

 

So it's a "smaller" movie. And it's British. And it doesn't star Shia LeBeouf. I don't give a rat's rear quarters. It should have been number one! Number ONE!

 

But alas and alack, "Hot Fuzz" got a 6 at the box office. Which, OK, isn't bad. And Ryan Gosling (AKA the original and better LaBeouf) scored a number 2 picture with "Fracture" (those Anthony Hopkins "I Shot My Wife" posters probably helped)...but still.

 

Here's the top six movies over the weekend:

 

1. "Disturbia"--$13 million

2. "Fracture"--$11 million

3. "Blades of Glory"--$7 million

4. "Vacancy"--$7.6 million

5. "Meet the Robinsons"--$7 million

6. "Hot Fuzz"--$5.8 million

 

"I am so sick and tired of all these young Hollywood women and their problems that, well, I just feel silly about it. Silly that I know about Britney's latest freak-out, silly that I have an idea concerning Nicole's current poundage and silly for knowing the contents of Paris Hilton's seized storage locker.

 

"We can discuss what these women represent in our internet tabloid society, how they've seriously deviated from the path of my hero, Camille Paglia, and her revolutionary, pro-sex stance of the 1990s. But I'm sick of even discussing what's wrong with them. I just want an older starlet, a gal who really lived hard to take one of these young ladies aside and shake them. Shake them good. And who would I like to push Britney against a wall, sit her ass down and tell her what's what? Barbara Payton. "

 

Read the rest of my piece at The Huffington Post.

The buzz on "Hot Fuzz?" 

 

It's the must-see movie of the weekend. And yeah, I just wrote "must-see" (my eyes promptly rolled involuntarily at myself.) 

 

Nevertheless, Check out the rave reviews across the board at MetaCritic.

 

And go see it. Please don't pull a "Grindhouse" on Simon Pegg, Nick Frost and Edgar Wright. In addition to being massively talented and funny, they are apparently, really nice guys.

 

The Cannes Film Festival lineup is finally coming together. Well, almost. There are still a lot of maybes according to this report from The Hollywood Reporter:

 

"Months of conjecture surrounding the Festival de Cannes lineup will come to an end Thursday as organizers unveil the festival's 2007 lineup.

Wong Kar Wai's 'My Blueberry Nights,' which the Weinstein Co. will release in the U.S., looks as if it will be completed in time to fill the high-profile opening-night slot May 16, while David Fincher's 'Zodiac,' a Paramount Pictures/Warner Bros. Pictures co-production, is rumored as the festival closer on May 27.

 

"Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's 'Grindhouse,' Steven Soderbergh's 'Ocean's Thirteen,'  James Gray's 'We Own the Night' and the Coen brothers' 'No Country for Old Men' are locked, and Michael Winterbottom's 'A Mighty Heart' is set to premiere May 21 in Cannes.

The U.S.-heavy lineup awaits final confirmation on front-runner 'Paranoid Park' by fest veteran Gus Van Sant.

 

"Michael Moore will most likely be making it back to the Croisette with his health care documentary 'Sicko...' Paulo Morelli's 'City of Men' (the sequel to Fernando Meirelles' 'City of God') and Harmony Korine's 'Mister Lonely' also are anticipated. 

"As usual, the French are taking their time to secure festival slots, but it looks as if the black-and-white animated film 'Persepolis' will be a contender. Claude Miller's "Un Secret" and Alain Corneau's 'Le deuxieme souffle' are still in the running, and U.S. director Julian Schnabel's French production 'The Diving Bell and the Butterfly' is poised to ring on the Croisette.

 

"Catherine Breillat may be back in Cannes with her latest, 'Une Vieille Maitresse...' 'La Graine et le mullet,' Abdel Kechiche's follow-up to the 2006 Cesar Award-winning 'L'Esquive,' also is a likely contender."

 

Read the rest including the possibility of Ermanno Olmi's 'Cento Chiodi,' Korean director Kim Ki-duk's 'Breath,' Takeshi Kitano's 'Kantoku Banzai'  and 'Triangle,' a three-part action movie directed by Hong Kong filmmakers Tsui Hark, Johnnie To and Ringo Lam.

 

This is rounding out to be one hell of a festival. I hope.

 

 

Check out MSN Movies new page. It's brighter, bigger and easier to navigate.

 

And in the process, enjoy the great Kathleen Murphy's take on May-December romances in movies. Sean Axmaker's The Cinema of Scam. And Anthony Kaufman's ten movies that might make you green (that's environmentally conscious, not, Kermit the Frog. Oops, dating myself. Not Shrek).

 

Since I revere The Runaways (notably, their first album and their live in Japan record) I am both thrilled and just a little bit worried about this.

 

 

"The '70s teenage band the Runaways has a new gig. Producers Art and John Linson will be bringing their rough and tumble coming-of-age story to the bigscreen in 'Neon Angels.' Floria Sigismondi, who directed videos for David Bowie, the White Stripes and Marilyn Manson, will write and direct the drama about girls brought together by Kim Fowley, creating a band that would set the stage for girl groups like the Go-Go's and the Bangles. The Linsons secured music rights and deals that allow them to tell the stories of members Joan Jett, Cherie Currie and the late Sandy West. An unpublished memoir written by lead singer Curie will be used as a resource for a drama that intends to bare all the drugs, sex and heartache experienced by girls who struggled to be viewed as musicians, not sex kittens with guitars.

 

"'We certainly utilized to our advantage our image as teenage girls who wore titillating clothes,' Jett told Daily Variety. 'But we also became an excellent band and made it OK for girls to play rock 'n' roll. It got hard once people focused more on what we were wearing than what we were playing.'

 

"The group fared better in countries like England, Japan and Scandinavia, and broke up in 1979. Jett went on to solo success. 'Looking back, I loved that period of my life,' she said. 'Growing up, my fantasy was to play in a rock band, become famous and make a hit record.'

 

"Art Linson said the film will be financed independently... That will allow 'Neon Angel' to be R-rated and edgy, factors that were important to Jett and Curie. Jett will be exec producer, along with her longtime manager-producer Kenny Laguna and Brian Young."

 

Finally Joan Jett approves! She wasn't so keen on the Runaways' documentary "Edgeplay" (which was disapointing) so this should be interesting. And, dear god, they better not cast Avril as Cherie Currie. Meanwhile, enjoy girls who really, actually and really rocked.

 

Thanks to Final Girl's ever cool Stacie Ponder (and naturally, fellow Runaways fan) for the tip.