Craig's MovieBlog

Ellen Page and Ethan Hawke - Separated at Birth?

I happened to catch Reality Bites over the Thanksgiving Holiday (gosh I wish Winona didn't screw up her career...) so I guess the flick was fresh in my mind.

Then just now, I was watching the international trailer for Juno, and there's this one shot of Ellen Page (pictured below) where my screwed up brain said, "Whoa... she, she... she looks like Ethan Hawke from Reality Bites!"  So, I've been digging around the interwebs, and while I can't find a great picture to match where my head was, I found some that might be close.  Thoughts?  Am I completely nuts?!?

Take Ethan's hair from the first picture, and put it on the second picture where he's doing the eyebrows thing, and I think we've got ourselves another Ellen Page.  Maybe.  With facial hair.

Please note that I don't mean this as an insult to Ellen (or Ethan) in the slightest, and I cannot wait for Juno to come out.  Maybe it was even her tone of "Go Carol," that sounded like Ethan being a smart ass to Ben Stiller's character that triggered it for me.  Still, I think I'm onto something here... no idea what though.

The Oscar Movie

Over on The Lost Boy, I discovered a brilliant clip that you need to watch now.  It comes courtesy of The Soup, which I don't watch, but I have fallen deeply in love with its host Joel McHale after listening to him ad lib with Adam Corolla on the latter's morning radio show.

If you want to know how to get nominated for an Oscar, just watch:

More Indiana Jones Pictures

Yeah... I wasn't going to post about this either, and I never link to AICN, but my geek reflex is just taking over.  How can you not be just way too excited after seeing these pictures from Indiana Jones and the Magical Kleimheinen of Blargabar?!?!!?!  Or whatever it's called... not sure I got the name right.

Check out the spider webs on Indy's fedora in the last picture.  I am so in... 

Independent Spirit Award Nominations

...and Award Season is here!

If you've got a budget under $20 million, then you too can be an Independent Spirit Nominee.  I've cut-and-paste a few of the categories below, and you can read David Poland's analysis here.  By the way, look at all the amazing films that were first-time screenwriters (Juno, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, etc.)

Best feature
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
I'm Not There
Juno
A Mighty Heart
Paranoid Park

Best director
Todd Haynes, I'm Not There
Tamara Jenkins, The Savages
Jason Reitman, Juno
Julian Schnabel, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Gus Van Sant, Paranoid Park

Best screenplay
Ronald Harwood, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Tamara Jenkins, The Savages
Fred Parnes & Andrew Wagner, Starting Out in the Evening
Adrienne Shelly, Waitress
Mike White, Year of the Dog

Best first screenplay
Jeffrey Blitz, Rocket Science
Zoe Cassavetes, Broken English
Diablo Cody, Juno
Kelly Masterson, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
John Orloff, A Mighty Heart

Best female lead
Angelina Jolie, A Mighty Heart
Sienna Miller, Interview
Ellen Page, Juno
Parker Posey, Broken English
Tang Wei, Lust, Caution

Best male lead
Pedro Castaneda, August Evening
Don Cheadle, Talk to Me
Philip Seymour Hoffman, The Savages
Frank Langella, Starting Out in the Evening
Tony Leung, Lust, Caution

Best supporting female
Cate Blanchett, I'm Not There
Anna Kendrick, Rocket Science
Jennifer Jason Leigh, Margot at the Wedding
Tamara Podemski, Four Sheets to the Wind
Marisa Tomei, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead

Best supporting male
Chiwetel Ejiofor, Talk to Me
Marcus Carl Franklin, I'm Not There
Kene Holliday, Great World of Sound
Irrfan Khan, The Namesake
Steve Zahn, Rescue Dawn

No Country For Old Men Debates

I mentioned a few days ago (twice) how much I loved No Country For Old Men, until the ending just kind of took me out of the whole fantasy, leaving me with a big, "huh?"

Well, I don't want to go so far as to say that the film blogosphere elite has labeled me a "dullard" for not understanding what the Coen brothers were trying to do (well, they wouldn't be the first), but there is a spirited debate about the ending of the film going on at a variety of sites.  You can find people arguing over on Glenn Kenny's blog (from Premiere Magazine), David Poland's site, and Jeff Wells' Hollywood Elsewhere

If you saw No Country and were completely fulfilled by the ending, or if you were left wanting, there's definitely something to be learned from these conversations happening as we speak.

Oh, and if you haven't seen the film yet, don't you dare read these pages, as they are chock full of spoilerific goodness.

Charlie Wilson's War Finally Previewed

Universal finally showed Charlie Wilson's War to the press last night, and you can read what Jeff Wells, David Poland, and Kris Tapley thought of it.  The words "abridged," "cut and re-cut, "good but not great," "likeable," "terrific," and "Phillip Seymour Hoffman is a God... can do no wrong" keep coming up.  Sounds like a mixed bag but net-positive in the end.  I'm just wondering, when was the last time we had Oscar bait that was only 97 minutes long?

The Dark Knight Viral Campaign - Worth The Effort?

For months now, Warner Bros. has been working on getting the word about about The Dark Knight in a number of unbelievably super creative ways, and the fanboy-esque blogosphere has followed every step relentlessly.  Just this week, they've released some more work, from a mocked up Gotham Times, to a subway map for the Gotham City Rail, to the Gotham National Bank, to political sites for character Harvey Dent, among many other things... just today there's some new game that may reveal a picture of The Joker.

I want to be clear about my view on this:  I think this campaign is very clever, brilliantly executed, and just plain cool.

HOWEVER

Do you really think that anyone in the mainstream media is watching this?  Is there going to be a single person who buys a ticket to see The Dark Knight this summer, that wouldn't have done so if it weren't for this campaign?  Furthermore, this is freakin' Batman!  Is there a single person covering this stuff among online movie sites that wasn't going to see this movie anyway?  Shouldn't this effort go towards a franchise or property that doesn't have the name recognition that Batman already has?

Chris over at MMM says:

"This continues one of the best online campaigns - yes, I’m going to say it - ever. This campaign is obviously being thought out by someone or a group of someones who are creating a powerful cohesive experience. I don’t think for a minute that these sites are being created haphazardly or without thought as to how they’re going to lead into the story of the movie, adding a bit to the story for those who are playing along."

I agree with him completely.  BUT... is it worth it in the end?  Will this movie make any more money with this campaign than it would have without it?  This campaign had to be somewhat expensive to produce, but where is the ROI?  How is Warner Bros. going to measure whether this campaign was successful or not in the end? 

I'm a fan of things like this... to a point.  I'd even like to think that this is where the future of advertising is headed (so that we don't feel like it's advertising at all).  I just get nervous when I see massive amounts of work and energy wasted for no return.

Homemade Trailers: Be Kind Rewind

Man, I wish these were funnier.  This idea seems to have all kinds of potential, but something is just off.  Mainly, I'm not laughing, even though I really want to.

In Be Kind Rewind, Jack Black accidentally erases all the video tapes in his friend's store, so they recreate classic films themselves.  These are the trailers for two of those fake films: Ghostbusters and Robocop.

Should be super funny, right?  Yeah, I thought so too...

Ask A Ninja Covers the WGA Strike

Movie Marketing Madness points to this amazing video from Ask A Ninja.  His perspective on this ongoing battle is quite refreshing:

"Plus Writer's Guild does not sound like a very intimidating foe!  The only other guilds I know, are the Lollipop Guild and World of Warcraft guild, and I don't think either one of those are gonna help you out in this situation."

Bill Simmons Agrees With Me

Thank goodness... I thought it was just me:

"By the way, if somebody has a good explanation for the last 25 minutes of [No Country for Old Men], I'd love to hear it. Everyone at my theater applauded when it was over, like something special had just happened. Meanwhile, I was sitting there going, "Wait, it's over? What the hell just happened?" Without spoiling it, from the moment we see a hotel pool for the first time, the wheels come off so fast that it's like Norv Turner took over for the Coen Brothers. So frustrating. If you see one movie this year, go see Michael Clayton, George Clooney's movie about a second-year NFL receiver who kills more than 200,000 fantasy teams. Just kidding. It's fantastic."

No Country For Old Men... and Rambling About Funny Games Again

Tonight I ran out to see No Country For Old Men, which had me hooked for two-thirds of the movie, and then the Coens decided to just throw any convention to the wind and go all philosophical on us.  I know I'm supposed to just go with their flow and not expect an ending all tied up nicely in a bow, but perhaps any package at all would have been nice.  It's beautifully lit, incredibly suspenseful at times, and Tommy Lee Jones' character has a wonderful way with words.  But for me, it fell apart as soon as they got to Vegas.

Completely digressing, however, the theater I attended showed the trailer for Funny Games, and I just get angrier than ever watching that thing.  Last week their PR agency sent me an email pointing to a clip from the film, which I reluctantly watched.  I'm going to be a jerk, not link to it, and spoil it for you, because it involved the killers murdering the family's dog.  Don't read the next paragraph if you don't want to have the part about the family's dead dog ruined for you.  Consider that my spoiler alert.

One of the killers is playing the "Warmer, Colder" game that we used to play as children.  Naomi Watts wanders around her yard based on the young man's warmer or colder commands, until she gets to the back of her car.  She opens it up, and her dead dog sickeningly spills out onto the ground.  Oh, and in other parts of the film, everyone in this innocent family is tortured and murdered, including their young boy... maybe 7 years old?  And the killers get away. The End.

Nice.  Spoilers are all finished.

I love the first amendment, and Michael Haneke can make (and remake) this film if he wants, but I reserve the right to have the opinion that the content is despicable.  Maybe the ends don't justify the means this time.  I don't say this lightly; I'm never the one saying Tarantino is evil, or rap music and internet porn will ruin our children, and I can't believe I'm saying these things without even having seen the film.  (I’ve read enough reviews of the original film to know what happens, I know the big twist, and I do know what Haneke is trying to comment upon.)

Look, I'm as liberal, jaded, and cynical as you get, and maybe Haneke is trying to snap me out of it.  Something about just the basic construct of this movie has crossed a line with me though, and this probably has more to do with me than the film… but it still turns my stomach.

Michael Clayton - My Favorite of 2007 So Far

I can't emphasize enough how much I loved Michael Clayton.  When I make a movie, I want Clooney and Sydney Pollack involved... and probably Tony Gilroy.  Three-dimensional characters, terrific dialog, amazing visual and sound editing (watch the layers of almost any scene, as you're seeing one thing but hearing another). 

My favorite moment?  Clooney and Tom Wilkinson are arguing in a Milwaukee jail, verbally jabbing back and forth at each other, getting more and more heated, until Wilkinson finally pronounces, "I am Shiva, the God of Death."  There's a pregnant pause, and this seems to be the dramatic moment that everyone remembers.

Me though?  I remember the next line.  Michael Clayton, ever the pragmatist, responds almost sarcastically:

"Let's get out of Milwaukee first, and then we'll talk about it."

Loved it.

New Reading

If you read these posts through an RSS reader like Google Reader or Bloglines, you probably didn't realize that I have a list of "Must Reads" on the left column over here on the real site.  Okay, even those of you that visit the actual site probably didn't realize that either.  However, having said all that, I added two new blogs this week to my list, so I thought I'd introduce them to you.

First, while I'm a religious listener to Rob Long's podcast called Martini Shot on KCRW, I guess the writer's strike has given him an excuse to start a blog.  I'm a big fan of his recent "Comments, Enhanced" post. 

The second recent addition is My New Plaid Pants, which immediately blew me away with their multi-post breakdown of one of the most underrated films of my formative movie viewing years, Dead Calm.  Possibly still the best work Nicole Kidman has ever done (okay, To Die For was better) but it's got to be Billy Zane's career highlight.

Enjoy.

New Cloverfield Trailer

Okay... they got me.  I'm officially intrigued by the new trailer for Cloverfield.  It's as if J.J. Abrams said, "Let's make Independence Day, but we're gonna film it like The Blair Witch Project."

They even copied my favorite shot from the end of Blair Witch, when the cameraman falls over dead:

Prepare to get very, very carsick...  ;)

21 Trailer

I loved the book (when it was called Bringing Down the House) about some M.I.T. kids that had a plan to take on Vegas, and I had heard that Kevin Spacey had gotten involved in the production of the film, but the first trailer for the adaptation, now called 21, is here.

It will probably translate to the screen pretty cleanly, since it was a very short read so not much will need to be cut.  I am interested, however, in how Kevin Spacey can be married to Kate Bosworth in Under the Sea, but her professor in this film.  :)