I don’t know about you, but the Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part 1 teaser trailer released shortly before the MTV Awards only left me frustrated. Beautiful scene! Gorgeous hair clip! Hey, Edward all gussied up! But just when I was settled in…the end. Well, they don’t call ‘em teasers for nothin’.

Now the entire trailer is available, and I’ve gotta say I’m even more excited. That’s a pretty neat trick, considering I’ve no love of the books. The movies have been done well, however.

But enough rambling. Check out the new Breaking Dawn — Part 1 trailer!

This is a Summer for wrapping things up.  First up, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2.  But this Fall, the Twilight saga also begins it’s end game, with Breaking Dawn – Part 1.

By now just about everyone knows the story; Bella must choose between Edward, the sparkly vampire of her dreams, and Jacob, the hunky, often shirtless werewolf best friend that adores her.

The big question is how this film will tackle a storyline that caused discord even among the most die-hard Twilight fans.  All I can say is though I’m not a fan of the books (love the mythology, hate the writing) I’ve really enjoyed the movies.

So, without further ado, a very brief sneak-peek at the beginning of the end of Bella’s trials and tribulations, and the start of her new life/unlife/whatevs.  It’s got me dying to see more, though I could do without the Damien: Omen II soundtrack. Behold Breaking Dawn!

 


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Academy Award winner Bill Condon has been confirmed by Summit Entertainment as the director of The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn, based on the fourth novel in Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight series. Melissa Rosenberg, who adapted the three previous books for the screen, is currently writing the screenplay.

Summit plans to break the fourth novel’s story into two movies, the first including Bella’s wedding, pregnancy, and delivery, and the second covers her transformation into a vampire and her child’s growth. Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, and Taylor Lautner are set to return. Filming will likely begin this November.

Condon wrote and directed the films Dreamgirls, Kinsey, and Gods and Monsters, which won him an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. He was also nominated for another Academy Award for his screenplay for the movie Chicago. Condon’s current project, the indie movie Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, written by Slumdog Millionaire‘s Simon Beaufoy, has been put on hold until he is finished with Breaking Dawn. His planned Richard Prior bio-pic has also been put on hold indefinitely.

The upcoming third film in the Twilight series, Eclipse, comes out on June 30, 2010.

The final trailer for the third installment in the Twilight saga premiered on Oprah on Friday, and now it’s available online. Check it out below the official plot synopsis for the movie:

“In The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, Bella once again finds herself surrounded by danger as Seattle is ravaged by a string of mysterious killings and a malicious vampire continues her quest for revenge. In the midst of it all, she is forced to choose between Edward and Jacob knowing that her decision has the potential to ignite the struggle between vampire and werewolf. With her graduation quickly approaching, Bella is confronted with the most important decision of her life.”

Well, I’m not anticipating this very much. I’ve seen the first two, and did not enjoy either, although New Moon was slightly more watchable. Anyway, I hope all of you Twilight fans enjoyed this sneak peek.

The third film in the “Twilight” series was helmed by director David Slade (30 Days of Night) and opens in theaters and IMAX on June 30, 2010.

Rock-and-roll punk spectacle has rarely looked more spiffy or energetic than it does in Flori Sigmundi’s The Runaways, an entertaining and authentic biopic of the 1970’s all-girl band. Sigmundi shows an incredible flair for realism within the rock scene, employing a fly-on-the-wall perspective to the troubles and triumphs that come with being young, famous and surrounded by too many drugs and choices.

The Runaways never downplays the serious consequences its young protagonists face but it also steers clear of turgid melodrama by delivering spectacular performance pieces. If there is a flaw to the picture overall, it is one I’m not used to writing in print; the movie needs more Kristen Stewart.

Stewart, the usually bland but stalwart star of the Twilight pictures, proves her that her talent is indeed being wasted on that series. In fact, if she can harness half the restless energy and internal spirit that she summons as Joan Jett and filter it into Bella Swan, then I might be interested in tuning in for the rest of that milquetoast vampire saga. Of course, she’s got something here that she was never given in Twilight; a strong script and a living breathing person to inhabit.

Does it help that Joan Jett is both very real and very lively, and served as a consultant to Stewart on the film? Perhaps, but those are only the tools used. Stewart takes those resources and proves a vital point that Sigmundi might have missed; the film should have focused on Joan and filtered all of its gritty details and organic atmosphere through her perspective.

Of course, this is where reality gets in the way. Cherrie Currie, the quite young leader singer of The Runaways, wrote the book that the film is based on and Dakota Fanning portrays her in the movie. Jett was the one who approached Kim Fowley, the sometimes addled, sometimes creepy, preeminent  rock manager of the time, and asked him to handle the band. It is also Jett that managed to rise up from the ashes of the Runaways and have a quite successful 80’s career. She seems to come packaged with less dramatic issues than the unfortunate Currie, but she’s also more interesting as an artist. When Stewart nails the beating ambition and the punky spunky charm of Jett, the movie detaches from its imposed focus and gravitates towards Jett.

I liked Fanning fine as Cherie, and she really shines in those moments when the band is up on stage and performing. The work that more than likely drew her to the role–the dramatic bits that deal with her fractured family life and her dalliances with all manner of sex and drugs, including a superficial (or was it?) fling with Jett—is never quite as convincing. I felt like I was watching Fanning mimicking Currie’s habits and style in those moments, but when she’s rocking out, she appears to be completely at home within the skin of someone who never seemed all that comfortable in hers.

Part of this no doubt has to do with the fact that the trajectory of the band, including the usual rise and fall, lacks a lot of intense drama that might have come with a different group. There are the usual issues and tragedies that arise from being cast into a life you have little preparation to deal with. Sigmundi wisely focuses on the music and the snarly allure of these gal pal rockers, and in doing so, the movie occasionally feels at odds with itself. I found myself wondering afterwards if The Runaways might not have been more compelling as a fictional concert film of sorts, possibly condensing events down to an evening or two, or perhaps a focus on the tour circuit.

However, it does dawn on me that we might have a bit less development of Michael Shannon’s Kim Fowley if that were the case, and that would have been a shame. By far the most seasoned performer in the cast, Shannon came ready to work for The Runaways. He nails the portrayal of Fowley as a man both talented and diseased, opportunistic and caring; a borderline predator curiously contrasted with a warped surrogate daddy.

Shannon can deliver the unsettling, as was demonstrated in 2006’s Bug, where he played a crazed ex-military man who wanted desperately to search Ashley Judd’s skin for crawling microbes. What he can also do is perfectly encapsulate the external perception of a character while drawing inside a totally different landscape, and then using all of his acting skill to slowly and surely integrate the two disparate pieces into an intriguing whole. In a different film, Fowley might have been a background player despite being front and center for Currie’s book. With Shannon, he’s right there in the foreground sharing glorious interaction with the female leads.

The Runaways may have a few issues when it comes to focus, but it’s as strong as they come in terms of delivery. Sigmundi and her production team have given us a 70’s rock microcosm that feels as authentic as any captured. She pushes her stars to great heights and gets for her troubles, characters that fit snuggly into that world, all the while striving for it and straining against it all at the same time. The Runaways is an anthem for punk chick angst, and the surprising thing is that it never feels flimsy or adolescent.

Rating: ★★★★☆ 

Remember Me is a tragedy.  

I’m not talking about the film’s plot or themes, or even the idea that it’s a dead-on-arrival romance. In fact, it isn’t. Surprisingly, Rob Pattinson and Emile De Ravin make a believable and interesting couple and the film actually delves into some effectively dramatic family relationships.

What’s tragic about the movie is that after finding its legs and delivering several wonderful and on-point moments, Remember Me destroys every single thing that came before with an ill conceived, nearly flabbergasting ending that doesn’t just cheapen the film and its characters, but renders them all inconsequential.

Imagine going to the house of a casual friend who often irritates you, sitting down and then being treated to some wonderful cooking and great conversation. Just as you are thinking what a great idea it was to get together, said friend sneaks behind you and brains you with a shovel, and then immediately bolts out the door. It’s exactly like that and it hobbles what was working as a good, poignant romantic drama.

But let me digress from the ending and its obvious troubles and focus on something else. Rob Pattinson is acting here, and on top of that, it’s good acting. Lost’s Emile De Ravin (she’s Claire) shares much of the film’s screen-time with him, and they take this slight, New York-centric indie chick flic and give it honest, emotional gravity. This is particularly an amazing feat given how contrived and heavy the general premise feels.

Pattinson plays Tyler, another angsty twenty-something (as opposed to Ed Cullen’s  angsty 220-something), who’s a heavy drinking, rebellious mess of daddy issues and deep grief. The daddy issues come for distant businessman, Pierce Brosnan, who spent his life financially providing for his family, and saw that as pretty much the end of the responsibility. The grief is from the death of Tyler’s brother, who killed himself 6 years prior and shattered the family even further as a result.

 One night, Tyler drunkenly shoves Sgt. Craig (Chris Cooper) and gets a face full of windshield for his troubles. Craig himself is a brooding type, and with good reason; his wife was murdered on the subway in front of his young daughter. Now that daughter, Ally, is grown-up and played by Ravin. Tyler’s sleazoid roommate, Aiden, identifies her at school and pushes Tyler to date and dump her, as revenge for the officer’s brutal handling of him.

Of course, as is the case of things in a movie like this, they fall for each other and Tyler abandons his plans of vengeance in favor of cuddling, sharing sob stories, and eventually, doing things with Ally that will no doubt make any Twilighters  in the audience pass out and choke on their gummi bears. This plot is old, old news, and I’m not so sure I liked it the first 400 times they walked it out of the gate. But, when you have the right people and the right pieces in the right places, any formula can work (except for torture films and anything with Stephen Baldwin). This one does, I’m almost loathe to admit, largely because of Pattinson.

What the Twilight saga has so thoroughly obscured is Pattinson is a gifted actor with his own sort of charm. Yes, that charm is based off of an aloof, sulking kind of persona, but if you can build a character that exists under that, then there’s something that an actor and an audience can unwrap; you aren’t left with just a pale, pasty straw man eyeing up your neck. Pattinson really pulls up some emotional baggage in Tyler and then he gets to show the young man in the process of throwing that baggage away, and it’s largely due to Ally’s influence on him.

The most welcome surprise of the film is that Pattinson’s best scenes aren’t just reserved for his time with Emile, and he gets some stellar interaction with Brosnan, who’s making a new career out of very juicy bit parts. Tyler also has a kid sister, played by Ruby Jerins, and they have this very warm, sweet relationship that could have generated a different and likely better film all on its own. 

Ravin began as a pretty face on Lost, but she built Claire out of strong stuff and pushed the character through several emotionally tricky circumstances. She’s got a very disarming way of playing notes of distress or sadness, and it helps that she manages to soften and radiate during moments like that. It makes Ally not just credible, but her attraction to Tyler credible too. This isn’t a pairing based off of long moody stares, but shared pain and struggles with family, and the movie has the courage to let the characters work through both factors; the pain and the family.

Unfortunately, we’ve reached that point of the review, where it becomes necessary for me to bring up the film’s end and issue a disclaimer for what has been a positive review. I’m not going into a single spoiler, but quite frankly, there’s no single good reason why the choice was made to shoot this ending. Understand, it’s not just bad, or dishonest, or even inherently divisive to the rest of the film. It’s worse than that; it’s completely overwhelming, the kind of broad, shocking statement that is trying to create context and give us something we can socially connect to.

So, take that into account. If you leave the moment Rob Patt walks out of his dad’s office, you will have still seen a good movie and can go home with the integrity of your 10 dollars intact. If you stay, well I warned you. Some may suggest I should be harder on the film, but the truth is that most of it works and it will serve as a good reminder to fans of Pattinson’s vampire stuff that not every love story is based around pouty looks.

Rating: ★★½☆☆ 

Twilight fans, be warned. This isn’t the trailer, or even the teaser trailer (which debuts tomorrow evening at6:00 a.m. PST), but rather ten seconds from the opening of it. I’m not guessing that’s going to matter for most hardcore fans though.

You will get ten seconds of Kristen Stewart, Rob Patt, and Taylor Lautner bringing those heart-warming glares to bear in a misty wilderness setting, and if you watch the teaser roughly 20 times, you will have more or less watched enough of it to count as the trailer.

I’ve not liked any of these movies so far, but I’m willing to be optimistic about this, at least a little. David Slade, the director of 30 Days of Night, is helming this one and I can only hope for a crossover where those vamps fight these.

Let the mania begin! Here’s ten seconds of Twilight Saga: Eclipse!

Stay tuned tomorrow morning when we bring you the full trailer!

Recently I asked you who your favorite big screen werewolf was and that got me thinkin’ about some other popular characters portrayed by multiple leading men in the movies. This discussion must always start with the character of agent 007 James Bond, best played by Sean Connery. Other popular Bonds were Pierce Brosnan and Roger Moore while Timothy Dalton and George Lazenby aren’t

remembered so fondly for their portrayal of the famous secret agent. Currently carrying the torch and ordering shaken martinis is Daniel Craig who seems to make a lot of people happy; I prefer him on the other side of the law as he was in Layer Cake and Road to Perdition.

Then there’s Dracula, or vampires in general. The list of actors who have played a vampire on film is a long one. So here are a few that come to mind, please remind me of any as I’ll most definitely leave some out – Leslie Nielsen (Dracula: Dead and Loving It), Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise (Interview with the Vampire), Willem Dafoe (Shadow of the Vampire),  Robert Pattinson (Twilight), Bela Lugosi (Dracula), Gary Oldman (1992′s Dracula), Frank Langella (1979′s Dracula), Christopher Lee (1970′s Count Dracula), and Kiefer Sutherland (The Lost Boys). Needless to say, all of these guys suck, but who is your favorite?

Second in big-screen adaptation popularity to Dracula is  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes who, along with Dracula, has been in the movies since the very beginning. Personally I’ve got a John Barrymore’s Sherlock Holmes (1922) waiting for me on my DVR, which I recorded after seeing Robert Downey Jr. play the part this past Christmas. I also watched a slew of Sherlock films from the late 1930s into the 40s starring Basil Rathbone, the man most of us think of when we imagine Holmes. Robert Stephens played the part of Holmes in what I consider to be one of the worst Holmes films The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes. Probably the most popular Holmes story The Hound of the Baskervilles has seen many leading men including Peter Cushing (1959) and Peter Cook (1978) in the role of Holmes. My favorite Holmes adaptation is Disney’s The Great Mouse Detective (1986) starring Barrie Ingham’s Basil of Baker Street as a Holmes-like mouse.

Another Hollywood mainstay that’s been around almost as long as Sherlock and Dracula is Robin Hood. Russell Crowe will be slinging arrows this May in theaters as Robin Hood. My favorite Hood is a tie between Kevin Costner’s Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and Disney’s foxy 1973 adaptation voiced by Brian Bedford. Douglas Fairbanks first wore the tights and feathered cap in 1922′s Robin Hood followed by Errol Flynn in 1938′s Robin Hood. Mel Brooks didn’t play the part but he did direct Cary Elwes as he had fun with the part in Robin Hood: Men in Tights. One Hood adaptation that I’ve not seen and as a native Texan am dying to see is Gene Autry’s 1947 Robin Hood of Texas! I can only imagine…

Honorable mention goes to Batman and Superman, both qualify for this discussion but I really don’t think either are very interesting as the best/worst in each case are pretty black and white. Don’t agree with me? Say so!