When it was all said and done the New Orleans Saints were Super Bowl Champs and Hollywood had a bunch o’ movies that wanted to advertise during the big game. We already talked about Alice in Wonderland and Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time; joining those two were M. Night Shyamalan’s Avatar The Last Airbender

Martin Scorsese’s Shutter Island starring Leonardo DiCaprio (looks like he’s gone back to The Aviator color scheme)

Joe Johnston’s The Wolfman remake starring Benicio Del Toro

and Ridley Scott’s Robin Hood remake starring Russell Crowe (reuniting the duo for the umpeenth time- Body of Lies, American Gangster, A Good Year, Gladiator)

What do you think of the ads? How did the movie ads compare to the beer, bank and chip commercials?

I’m gonna get Biblical and quote Solomon “there is nothing new under the sun” and there isn’t but why does Hollywood feel they have to give their take on everything? I see film as an art form and as an artist I think that sometimes someone else got it right, their representation of a thought or idea says it best. Hollywood on the other hand sees someone elses work turn popular and decides they need to get in on the action. There are two remakes due out very soon and not long after their originals were rolling in cinemas.

Just three short years ago Frank Oz (the capable director of such recent classics as The Muppets Take Manhattan, Little Shop of Horrors, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, What About Bob? and Bowfinger) released Death at a Funeral a British dark comedy starring some recognizable names- Peter Dinklage and Alan Tudyk alongside a mostly British cast. Death turned out to be a hit, well maybe not a hit but they made money on what was a small indie film in limited release. I suspect that most of the film’s success came from the fact that for the price of admission you got to enjoy a pitch perfect British dark comedy directed by a Hollywood veteran that introduced you to a few new faces on the screen.

Now three years later Hollywood has Easy-Baked you a remake starring a Who’s Who cast including Chris Rock, Danny Glover, Tracy Morgan, Martin Lawrence, Luke Wilson and Peter Dinklage. Yes the same Peter Dinklage in the same role he played three years ago. Directing this time around you’ve got Neil LaBute, who? You know he directed Lakeview Terrace starring Samuel L. Jackson and The Wicker Man (2006 remake) starring Nicolas Cage that Neil LaBute. Honestly I’m not sure who should be more offended, the cast of the original Death or Tyler Perry, one look at the trailer of the new Death at a Funeral and you’ll be left asking where Madea is (I think she’s still in jail). Hollywood is trying to squeeze every dollar it can out of your movie going pockets- don’t let them!

The second remake I’d like to question is that of the 2008′s Swedish vampire suspense thriller Let The Right One In with the Hollywood remake titled Let Me In. Easily the best vampire movie of the decade Let The Right One In needs no remake, sure it was subtitled in English but who’s complaining? In fact I think the lack of spoken English and the success of the film are evidence of just how well made the movie really was. The images told the whole story, isn’t that what all movie makers should strive for? I think so.

Whatever you do, whether you see the remakes or not, watch these two wonderful original foreign films and share your experience, hopefully your appreciation for them with us!

Hollywood is where I’ve had most of my werewolf encounters but enough about Robin Williams. Let’s explore this particular pack of Tinseltown werewolf as I wanna hear your pick for the alpha male to lead the pack.

Benicio Del Toro has his The Wolfman set for a very romantic Valentine’s Day weekend theatrical release (February 12, 2010) while you’ll have to wait a little longer to see Taylor Lautner’s abs and werewolf if you didn’t see the Twilight Saga’s New Moon in theater as the DVD and Blu-ray are due out late this March.

If you’re really hurtin’ for some lycanthrope cinema I’m sure you can find one of the Underworld films on cable television (if you’re an HBO subscriber then you’re probably watching Michael J. Fox in Teen Wolf as I type) or Hugh Jackman’s Van Helsing in Walmart’s $5 DVD bin. John Landis the very same director of such classic comedies as Animal House, The Blues Brothers, Spies Like Us and ¡Three Amigos! also had a soft spot for the hairy and scary when he first gave us An American Werewolf in London followed by An American Werewolf in Paris (flag his passport already!).

Maybe the most famous actor to howl at the moon was Jack Nicholson in 1994′s Wolf but it was Lon Chaney Jr. that introduced most of us to the werewolf in 1941′s The Wolf Man. Now I know I haven’t mentioned every barking big screen portrayal and personally I’m more of a Cat People type of guy myself (I carry a dog whistle for protection) but who is your favorite big screen werewolf?

Do the Oscar's Matter?

Hollywood continued to shine (on a slightly smaller budget) at the Kodak Theatre for the 81rst Academy Awards. Hosted by the multi-talented Hugh Jackman, this star studded event went underway on Sunday evening while producers crossed their fingers, hoping that the minor changes in the show would draw in bigger numbers unlike last year’s broadcast.

Starting off with a simple yet effective opener by Jackman (with the help from Anne Hathaway), the follow up with announcing

the nominees/winner of Best Supporting Actress came off as if the five presenters were at a eulogy. A fair portion of the evening continued the same, going completely bi-polar with the overall tone of the prestigious awards ceremony.

Performances: The musical numbers that fluttered on throughout the evening tried to reach out to a broader audience. The opening number was the most impressive, and even though they appeared to made a make shift background for each film, it was still terribly creative with very witty lyrics. Yes, I wish I had a cardboard Batpod just like Jackman did. For another number, there’s a performance by Jackman and Beyonce who seemed to sing popular songs from the 1930s to 1940s. Despite the growing cast of actors/singers from High School Musical 3 and Mamma Mia, left most people including myself scratching our heads wondering what they all are singing and why it was turning into a fancier version of the MTV Movie Awards. I’ll tap onto the performances and such during the Best Song category later in this article.

Presenters: A majority of the presenters were great, despite a couple others. One of the more awkward presenting came with the stiff Jennifer Aniston and the Pixar envious Jack Black (even though it was a joke, me smells envy). Another strange moment was between comedic actor Ben Stiller trying to pose as Joaquin Phoenix standing next to a slightly aggravated Natalie Portman. Even though they, for myself, were uncomfortable moments, the remainder of the presenters were statuesque and mainly got right down to the point.
Categories: One of the biggest things for many of us is trying to figure out through our own Oscar pools who will win which category. For this year, if you had your ballots in hand while watching the ceremony, it would have been painfully obvious. One example was prolonging the Best Supporting Actor category to futher on into the broadcast than where it normally is (Ledger did deserve that Oscar). Now they have done this kind of thing in previous years with other categories, for instance Diablo Cody winning Best Original Screenplay last year, but it came to the point of ridiculousness as the broadcast continued.

Best Song: Excuse me for a moment while I go on and gripe about this category and how it was handled last night. Out of the three songs that were nominated, two of them were from the Oscar picture favorite, Slumdog Millionaire. The other nominee was from Pixar’s Wall-E, which was supposed to be performed by the original singer (Peter Gabriel) but unfortunately stepped away from it a week before the Oscars. His reason? Not enough time to sing the song, meaning that each one of the three songs is lumped together into a 3 minute mesh, giving Gabriel only 60 seconds to sing a smidgen of the song. Now, I think that might not have been the real reasoning.
When the performance went underway, it started with the song ‘O Saya’, full of glamour and dancing, singing and all sorts of merriment. Then came ‘Down To Earth’, sung by a stiff John Legend while the dancers retire to the corner, all sorts of flashiness that was given to Slumdog Millionaire tucked away for a mediocre backdrop and performance. Then ‘Jai Ho’ started up, the attention quickly peeling away from Legend as it turns into a tribute for Slumdog. Obviously Peter Gabriel’s song did not win, but if the song from a great film was shoved aside for the Oscars to whore out Slumdog, I wouldn’t attend either.
Winners: Aside from the shoe-in win for Danny Boyle and company with Slumdog Millionaire walking away with 8 Oscars, there were some yays and nays over who was chosen. Beside the mumurs that Slumdog should not have won a couple of the technical awards (while I’m just pissed with the Best Song section), one of the outrages has been for Sean Penn winning over Mickey Rourke. Although Penn is a fine actor, to this columnist Rourke appeared more deserving of this award. Wall-E winning Best Animated Feature was something that made many really happy (surprised though it didn’t win Original Screenplay). Visual Effects rightfully went to The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which was phenominal effects wise. Did it bother anyone else about how they were cutting to so many people during the acceptance speech for Ledger’s Oscar instead of trying to stay focused on his family? For myself it was detracting away from the moment that everyone in the audience was tearing up over.

In the end this year’s Oscars seemed to take a step in the wrong direction, despite its supposed efforts to be different than before. Trying desperately to rekindle some form of an audience it used to have to form better ratings than its dismal previous year, they still continue to be even more overly political and uninteresting. If they continue to be as overly obvious of who will win what for next year, I’ll just tune onto my web browser after the show to see who won.

Here listed below are the winners for each respected Oscar Category.

2009 Oscar Winners
Best Picture
Slumdog Millionaire

Best Actor
Sean Penn (Milk)

Best Actress
Kate Winslet (The Reader)

Best Director
Danny Boyle (Slumdog Millionaire)

Best Supporting Actor
Heath Ledger (The Dark Knight)

Best Supporting Actress
Peneople Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona)

Best Foreign Language Film
Departures

Best Soundtrack
Slumdog Millionaire

Best Song
‘Jai Ho’ from Slumdog Millionaire

Best Animated Feature Film
Wall-E

Best Cinematography
Slumdog Millionaire

Best Art Direction
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Best Original Screenplay
Milk

Best Adapted Screenplay
Slumdog Millionaire

Best Documentary (Feature)
Man On Wire

Best Film Editing
Slumdog Millionaire

Best Sound Mixing
Slumdog Millionaire

Best Sound Editing
The Dark Knight

Best Visual Effects
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Best Short Documentary
Smile Pinki

Best Short Film (Live Action)
Spielzeugland (Toyland)

Best Short Film (Animated)
La Maison En Petits Cubes

Best Hair & Make-Up
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Best Costume Design
The Duchess

No movie in recent years has poked fun at, mocked and downright dragged the good name of Hollywood through the mud, laughing all the way quite like “Tropic Thunder”.  In a time when theaters are overpopulated by comedies that somehow have Judd Apatow’s name attached to them, “Tropic Thunder” is Apatow-free, but it still retains that gleeful sense of vulgarity that audiences seem to now love so much.  Not only does “Tropic Thunder” work with that vulgarity, it soars with it, easily making this the funniest movie I’ve seen so far this year.

In this laugh-a-second action comedy directed by its star, Ben Stiller, the very idea of Hollywood is taken for a ride.  “Tropic Thunder” also happens to be the title of a war movie being shot in the film, its cast a hodgepodge of movie stars.  There’s the action guy, Tugg Speedman (Stiller), the star of countless special effects-driven films that have gradually lost steam and the star of “Simple Jack”, a box-office dud centered around a retarded farmer.  Next is Jeff Portnoy (Jack Black), a comedian famous only for his film flatulence but yearns for more respect for his name.  Then comes the five-time Oscar winner Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey Jr.), an intense method actor who undergoes a controversial skin pigment alteration procedure in order to play the film’s main black character.  This really ticks off the cast’s real black actor, a rapper who goes by Alpa Chino (say that name out loud).  Anyway, the fed-up director (Steve Coogan) gets the idea from  the writer of the film’s source material (Nick Nolte) to take his actors out into the real “battle zone”, a jungle rigged with hidden cameras and shoot the entire film “guerrilla style”.  The only problem?  Well, the actors are mistaken for D.E.A. operatives and get caught up in a war against Korean drug runners, with good humor all the way.

Well, the real gem of “Tropic Thunder” is Robert Downey Jr., who shines as Kirk Lazarus.  In the hands of any other actor, I think the role could have easily gone off the rails as a result of stereotyping, but thankfully, Downey Jr leaves stereotypes of any kind at the door.  He’s black, but in a tasteful manner as he spews profanity, talks about collard greens and takes offense when Speedman says “you people”.  Downey Jr never overplays it, and his many arguments with Alpa Chino and the other cast members are sure to have everybody in the audience gasping for breath while laughing hard; the audience I saw the film with certainly behaved that way.  Downey Jr has always been one of my personal favorites, despite his personal problems, and I’m happy to see him back on his game.  He’s on a roll this year with “Iron Man” and now this.

However, that’s not to say that everybody else is just mediocre, because they’re not.  “Tropic Thunder” has a lot of funny performances, in addition to great cameos which are really supporting roles.  Matthew McConaughey has a good one as Tugg Speedman’s spaced-out agent, whose primary concern seems to be getting his star a Tivo.  And the other one that I just have to talk about is Tom Cruise as a vulgar, mean-spirited studio executive with no hair and quite a bit of paunch.  Cruise gets great laughs, both from his profane demeanor and his weirdly funny dance moves.  And suffice it to say that this role is one of the highlights of Cruise’s career.

Stiller both acts and directs perfectly for this material, as he amazingly makes us forget that he helmed the god-awful “Zoolander” back in 2001.  Stiller is clearly mocking Hollywood as best he can, and having fun with it.  The way the actors, agents and studio executives are portrayed in this movie will have film buffs such as myself cracking up continuously.  The film opens with clever fake trailers that introduce each actor to us, and they are hilarious.  Ben Stiller really does have a sense of what notes to hit for this movie, and it all winds up being a comedy experience for those interested in the film.

So, would I see “Tropic Thunder” again?  Definitely, because even though you can pretty much catch every joke about the movie industry the first time through, I think there’s still some subtlety underneath the surface of these jokes that cannot be picked up in the first viewing.  What Stiller has done is essentially created a biting commentary on Hollywood itself, one that always has something funny and interesting to say about how the studios operate and how actors can be taken as something they don’t want to be.  But the trick is that Stiller, who also co-wrote the screenplay, does so in a very fast-paced manner, hitting us with jokes left and right as he makes his point.

In the end, I would gladly take “Tropic Thunder” over other crude comedies like “Knocked Up”.  The movie is a laugh-riot with a LOT of F-bombs and other four-letter words, but that works here…somehow.  I know, crudeness and profanity actually working for me is something that rarely happens.  But I guess you could say “Tropic Thunder” is that rare type of comedy that I can say with all confidence that I loved.

Rating: ★★★★☆ 

Let me clear the air by saying that I was unwillingly dragged to see “Mamma Mia!”, the latest Hollywood interpretation of a stage musical.

Clearly, I’m not the type of person the people behind the film adaptation of “Mamma Mia!” were trying to please.  People like me, who are generally against musicals can and should find a better way to spend their time at the movies and leave the people who are actually interested in this film to see it.  However, I truly feel bad for anybody dragged to this incessantly corny and nearly insufferable movie musical that is so bad, even the presence of Meryl Streep can’t save it.

So, if I normally resist big, lavish movie musicals such as this, am I really the right person to review “Mamma Mia!”?  Well, I’d say no, but I’ll let you be the judge of that.  I’m not reviewing this movie for the fans of the musical, because I know that they’ll be pleased with what they get; I’m reviewing it for everyone else.  Now, that’s not to say that I automatically give every single musical I see a negative review.  I really enjoyed 2005′s “The Producers” as well as “Chicago” from 2002, and last year’s “Sweeney Todd” was my pick for the second-best film of 2007.  What ultimately made me not like “Mamma Mia!”, I guess you could say, was the simple fact that the film seriously missed every single mark it was trying to hit.  This movie is meant to be a fun, breezy hour and forty-eight minutes at the theater, but I thought there wasn’t any fun to be had and due to its dragged-out songs, there was nothing breezy about it.  Whereas “Sweeney Todd” played like a smooth flowing and hauntingly beautiful opera, and rather successfully at that, “Mamma Mia!” instead plays out like karaoke night in Greece.

Well, let’s face it.  Musicals aren’t meant to have elaborate or intricately crafted plots and that’s the case here (which invites another comparison to “Sweeney Todd” that I’ll make later).  The plot for “Mamma Mia!” is paper-thin and it always comes to a complete halt whenever the next musical number starts up.  So, the light and bright Sophie Sheridan (Amanda Seyfried) is about to get married to stud muffin Sky (Dominic Cooper), who incidentally has cloudy eyes.  Sophia’s one wish, though, is to have her father attend her wedding and give her away to her McDreamy.  The only problem is that her catamite of a mother named Donna (Meryl Streep) slept with three different men around the time Sophia would have been conceived.  That means that there are three possible candidates for the title of ‘Dear Old Dad’: Bill (Stellan Skarsgard), Sam (Pierce Brosnan) and Harry (Colin Firth).  And yet another problem is that Donna doesn’t want any of them at the wedding.  But as we all know, they’ll inevitably stay and that will cause serious romantic decisions to be made in one weekend that would normally take more than a weekend to decide to be made in, well, one weekend.

The plot’s only true purpose is to act as an engine to get us from one musical to the next, and that’s one of the biggest problems I’ve always had with musicals.  I can understand the necessity for an uncomplicated plot, but still, why can’t the writers at least try to bring more to the storyline so that the movie doesn’t feel like it can simply end at any given moment if one of the three men just came up and revealed that they are the father of Sophie?  Plus, I think it’s safe to say that you can pretty much guess who the father is by the way the camera lingers on each individual bachelor.  Now, I will admit that “Sweeney Todd”  does have a similarly thin plot, but the difference there is that the songs of that movie essentially were part of the plot.  It avoided that choppy style because the songs actually moved everything forward.  Here, the songs seem to be there just for the heck of it and while they may be mildly enjoyable, the choreography that accompanies them just makes everything feel like an overdone production of Riverdance.  And I’ll say this: if I had to sit through one more musical number where men and/or teenage boys tried to imitate professional dancers on a pier, I’d have been ready to throw my bag of popcorn at the screen.

For a musical meant to have purposefully bland performances made even more bland by professional actors such as Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan, then there’s something wrong in the acting department.  Meryl Streep has always been a terrific actress, but she’s given virtually nothing to work with here.  Oh, she can sing just fine and is definitely capable of holding her own whenever she bursts  into song, but it’s the in-between stuff that had me scratching my head in wonderment, trying to discern how Streep couldn’t be up to her own standards.  Also, her two shallow, giggly girlfriends portrayed by Julie Walters and Christine Baranski are the character equivalents of nails on a chalkboard.  And the serious overacting of Amanda Seyfried as Sophie doesn’t help much, either.

I think the best thing about “Mamma Mia!”, though, is the scenery of Greece.  Every outside scene carries vibrant sunshine, aqua-blue ocean and lime-green trees that at least give the movie points for eye candy.  And if I had to say something good about the cast, it would be that Colin Firth and Stellan Skarsgard do pretty decent work and are the most interesting to watch.

However, when a musical is iffy on the music and very noticeably at that in addition to being a challenge to sit through, then something went wrong somewhere.  I think it’s safe to say that the people who want to see “Mamma Mia!” will probably end up liking it, but me personally, I prefer my musicals to lay off the annoying choreography and make the songs pieces of the plot, rather than roadblocks to it.

Rating: ★½☆☆☆ 

After such a monumental weekend for Chris Nolan, Heath Ledger, Christian Bale and crew..what did you think about the film?

The rest of the United States thought it deserved the top spot in 3 different record breaking categories. Did you?

18.5 million on Thursday night alone brought The Dark Knight into 1st place for highest grossing midnight showings record. Second place goes to “Revenge of the Sith”.

66.4 million on Friday put “The Dark Knight” into 1st place for highest grossing opening day. “Spiderman 3″, which was a terrible movie, is now second with a 59.7 million record last year.

155.3 million for the weekend also brought down the mess that was “Spiderman 3″, and put atop the list a deserving film. “The Dark Knight” is a classic movie in its 5th day at the box office!

Last but not least “The Dark Knight” broke another record, do we care? Not really, but the 4,366 theaters it was shown is was a new record also in Hollywood.

With all of this said, do you really care? Do you want to see it again (I saw it twice already)? Did you even see it?

Let us know what you thought. “The Dark Knight” review is here if you haven’t read it yet. Some great responses in those comments also.

I just thought with a small lapse in news on the site, I could update you all with a few tidbits from around the world of Hollywood.

• Heroes now have their own toys. Toys R Us is selling a line of action figures based on our beloved characters from the show.
• Yahoo has brought us some new Hellyboy 2 photos.
• “Smallville” creators and executive producers Alfred Gough and Miles Millar have announced they are not staying on for the eighth season of the show. Do we really care though?
• “I am Legend” is still soaring on the DVD charts.

Now I do know that there are leaked Dark Knight photos out there but since they are not properly published I will refrain from posting them here. If you want them, Google is your friend.