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Glenn here looking at the trailer to the long-awaited sequel to Oscar-winner Finding Neverland!
Tom Hanks as Disney and Emma Thompson as P.L.Travers in "Saving Mr Banks"
Okay, so Saving Mr. Banks isn't a sequel, but it's certainly a kin to Marc Forster's Peter Pan origin story from 2004. I wasn't a fan of that movie, but given we've recently been discussing Johnny Depp's descent into fulltime caricature, maybe we should relish Finding Neverland as one of his few roles of the last decade that didn't rely on kooky make-up and broad physical comedy. For whatever reason I'm surprised Disney didn't try and get Depp on board to play a bumbling Dick Van Dyke in this behind the Hollywood scenes feelgood drama. Instead they went with relative unknown Kris Kyer who actually has a history as a Dick Van Dyke impersonator. Whatta world! [more...]
It's not every month, hell, it's not every year when we get the trailer to a new Michelle Pfeiffer movie so naturally we have to talk about Malavita again. Or, I guess, The Family as it's been rechristened before release. It's always a pity when a movie ditches a really specific title for one that could work for thousands of movies and thus stakes no claim on personality whatsoever.
Perhaps the trailer itself has personality. Let's watch and discuss.
[watches]
Okay. Only watch that if you're the kind of person who doesn't care about spoilers. IF you are this kind of person i envy you because the movie studios don't care about them either - they love shovin' them into trailers. I get the sense you're basically seeing the whole movie here. But we gotta break it down anyway as we do because...
LA PFEIFFER IS BACK
YES
Michelle Pfeiffer saying "merci"
This might be funny. It's kinda tough to tell in the trailer because so much of comedy depends on good editing and trailers never have a sense of that since they're cutting entirely different scenes and dialogue together for their specific 2 minute effect
The return of Michelle Pfeiffer's Married to the Mob accent "we're not in Brooklyn anymore"
Michelle Pfeiffer driving that car with those sunglasses
Tommy Lee Jones has been on a real roll lately. Does this end the party or continue it?
and Michelle Pfeiffer as fire starter. Bring it bitch.
NO
After Silver Linings Playbook, I'd like to believe that Robert DeNiro is back to acting rather than cashing in but a mob comedy is probably not the place to believe that.
Whenever trailers show this much of the wink-wink laughs and action, I worry about "those are all the best parts" and there's a lot of ways in which this might be super offensive (xenophobia, "hurting people is hilarious!" immaturity and so on) rather than funny.
MAYBE SO
Luc Besson, in the director's seat, isn't totally reliable.
The casting of the kids looks great visually but Dianna Agron coasts a lot on her looks and when you're playing Pfeiffer's daughter... well, she better take it up a notch. Pfeiffer never did that and good lord she could have coasted for decades with the ones she got.
Also: Can you believe my restraint that I only used one photo of Pfeiffer to illustrate this?
Oscar-teasing trailers are just like Oscar bait movies: they all come out at the same time. Can't there be a little breathing room? After Captain Phillips warned us that Tom Hanks (and Paul Greengrass) are ready to come roaring back... After Gravity teased us with visual effects so terrifying that the prospect of Sandra Bullock acting out existential despair (not something she's known for you must admit) already seems like The Must Event of the Year... After The Butler threw a Handful of Presidents & First Ladies , Oscar Winners, Ten History Lessons, and OpPRRRrraaAAHHHh in one trailer pot and stirred itself into an Oscar Bait Frenzy (or Parody)... came The Weinstein Co's major player: AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY.
The film stars 3 Oscar winners (Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts, Chris Cooper), 3 nominees (Juliette Lewis, Sam Shepard, Abigail Breslin), 1 underappreciated awesome fellow (Ewan McGregor), 1 recent Emmy winner (Martindale), 1 rising star Benedict Cumberbatch, 1 curiously resurgent Dermot Mulroney and 1 Misty Upham from Frozen River... so you know FYC ads will have to be five page spreads. The Hollywood Reporter's already counting the ad dollars because that's a lot of names to push. [more after the jump]
abstew here with another edition of "Yes, No, Maybe So". Tonight's trailer of choice Lee Daniels's latest, The Butler. Oh, and please be gentle–it's my first time...
When last we caught up with the Oscar nominated director, he was dishing up a heapin' helpin of some southern fried, kitschy, camp in The Paperboy. I think people were a little surprised to see that the follow-up to the Oscar-winning Precious involved an Academy Award winning actress peeing on the star of the High School Musical movies. And, well, surprisingly the Academy didn't feel the need to shower that film with any gold of its own. So, just how will the decades-spanning Butler fair? Will it be more Precious (Oscar noms for all!) or more Paperboy (um, the Razzies are next door...) Let's take a look!
YES
One word: OOOOOooooPPPPPPppppPPPRrrrAAAAaaaAAAAaaAaHHhhh!!! [more]
The trailers have been flying at us so quickly these days that it could only mean one thing: summer movie season approacheth. All the late summer would be blockbusters and early fall Oscar contenders are waiting to spring from their respective buzz gates.
Left to Right: Brühl in "Rush", Damon in "Elysium", McAvoy in "Filth", Booth in "Romeo and Juliet"
So with so many newbies we'll just get them all out of the way after the jump with a look at the new Romeo and Juliet, the sports bio Rush, the depraved Filth with James McAvoy, and Neil Blomkamp's Elysium, his eagerly awaited sophomore effort post stunner-debut District 9. Ready. Set. Go...
Friday, July 12, 2013 at 8:53AM 
Tom Hanks as Disney and Emma Thompson as P.L.Travers in "Saving Mr Banks"
