Movie Scum

How many times can this dejected comic book series be adapted? I do not read comic books but I can dig comic book films, provided they don’t look like complete failures. So far, the Marvel comic series Fantastic Four has produced three films and not a single one has even hinted at something I’d be interested in seeing. But after last summer’s shit-show of Fant4stic , which not only managed to piss a bunch of fans off even more but also lose the studio a lot of movie, producer Simon Kinberg wants another bite at this festering apple of a series. Telling Den of Geek! that the much maligned property is still in play at Fox, Kinberg offers a bit of a mea culpa and a desire to continue with the present cast: “I think we made many mistakes when we made that movie - mistakes that we learned from and we wouldn’t repeat. I think we tried to make a darker Fantastic Four movie, which seemed like a radical idea but we were kind of messing with the DNA of the actual comic instead o...

Christopher Nolan goes back to Europe with his new film, Dunkirk . Set during the Battle of Dunkirk in 1940, Nolan’s original screenplay will center around the evacuation of the titular French city of Allied soldiers and citizens. And I now know more about this WWII event than I did before. According to Variety , Dunkirk will feature unknowns as the lead players but with backup by Nolan stalwart Tom Hardy and Kenneth Branagh. It will be produced by long-time partner and wife Emma Thomas and distributed by Warner Brothers in July 2017 and will be shot in IMAX. Could this be Nolan’s Saving Private Ryan? Let’s hope so come early 2018.

Well, it seems that rather than making a new Halloween film , Dimension Films, the guardians of Michael Myers for the past twenty years, have been stripped of their power. The Wrap reports that Dimension Films is no longer in the Michael Myers business and that Marcus Dunston and Patrick Melton are no longer involved in the production of the presumably dead-in-the-water Halloween Returns . Returns would have reportedly either taken place following Halloween II (not Rob Zombie’s) or found Myers on death row. Or both! But now neither. I can’t say I’m too broken up about it. Under Dimension’s reins, the Halloween films were very hit-or-miss, with the hits meaning not completely terrible and the misses being Halloween: Resurrection . Perhaps, it’s for the best now that little Mikey Myers finds a new home to play in.

Much like when Guardians of the Galaxy was announced, I was entirely disinterested in Marvel’s announcement of Ant-Man . Granted, Marvel has a stellar record with their in-house films and the impossibly cheesy sounding Guardians turned out to be among their top tier. But still. A superhero who controls insects and whose main superpower is shrinking. Boo! Give me more Captain America.

In all honesty, up until the first teaser trailer for The Force Awakens dropped last winter, I was more or less ambivalent towards it.

You might be mistaken for thinking the Mission: Impossible series to be nothing more than Tom Cruise’s daily exercise excuse and to a certain point, that may be true. But this Americanized version of James Bond, with the requisite femme fatales, gimmicky gadgets, and exotic locations, still offers an exciting ride through the world of espionage and double-crossing.

Films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe are quite fun and generally well-regarded. And then there’s the duo of Thor movies which, while not bad, are nowhere near as endearing or entertaining as the original Iron Man or Captain America: The Winter Soldier . But the Hulk may be just the perfect plan to give Thor his own breakout movie. News that Mark Ruffalo would be joining Thor’s third solo adventure, Thor: Ragnorak was greeting with cheers amongst the internet as the duo’s playful bantering, and hitting, was among the high points of The Avengers films. Ruffalo sums up the new film as such: “I don’t really know that much about it, but I think it’s going to be a buddy picture with Thor and Bruce Banner,” Ruffalo said. “I think they’ll probably fight. There’s no doubt, everyone wants us to fight at one point.” As drab and ultimately forgettable as the previous Thor films were, this seems like a sure-fire way to make this one stand out. Everyone loves a fight between a god ...

An Angry Birds movie may have made sense a few years ago. Is this an attempt to reinvigorate the franchise or merely sell more games and plush animals? The new trailer for The Angry Birds Movie , due out next summer, a good four years or so since Angry Birds were relevant in pop culture, doesn’t show much action or plot but merely introduces the characters we’ve all grown to love and loathe through our pig-destroying levels. The fact that this trailer light on jokes and heavy on name placement doesn’t bode well for this adaptation but we are still a few seasons away from a release. Although, this cast, including Jason Sudekis as ‘Red’, could enliven the scorned birds sufficiently, this seems more of a late cash grab than any animated kids movie that has any merit. Perhaps I’ll be wrong.

With M. Night Shyamalan back in the news recently for relatively positive reviews for his newest film, let us not forget that he has made some shitty movies. One of those movies is The Happening .

According to Deadline , the powers that be are planning The Mist to be a weekly endeavor. It’s funny that I just watched the film with my son this weekend, to which he threw the remote in anger due to the ending. The overall gist sounds the same with a strange mist rolling into a small town filled with god-knows-what and presumably the plucky cast of characters who have to face it all. While I’m not sure that The Mist would be a suitable candidate for TV adaptation, it certainly sounds intriguing enough. Hopefully for some, there won’t be such a downer ending.

There was much complaining in the wake of last week’s finale that the pace was too slow with too little to justify its bloated runtime. While I can see the argument, I disagreed with that assessment. This, the second episode, should more closely match fan’s expectations: more zombies, more carnage, more collapse of society. As is stated in the episode: “it all goes quickly.” Madison, Travis, and Nick are mostly in shock at the start following the close of the pilot with Nick’s dealer, having been shot and twice run down with a truck, still giving them the glance-over with that glazed, zombified look in his eyes. Madison’s daughter, on the other hand, is concerned with her boyfriend who flaked on their last meetup and decides to go to his house. There she finds a house torn to pieces and Matt with a high fever and an unknownst to her bite on his shoulder. After finally prying Alicia away from Matt without any damn good explanation of why, the group heads back to their house only ...

According to Hollywood Reporter , Wes Craven has died at the age of 76. Likely only in stature to John Carpenter, Craven and his work has had a remarkable impact on not only my movie-going experience but life in general. Beginning with his first feature Last House on the Left , Craven has had the remarkable ability to inspire and horrify viewers for over 40 years. He dreamt our nightmare with A Nightmare on Elm Street . He made slasher films relevant again in his Scream series. He brought to life so many various stories of despair and trouble through voodoo, incarceration, and even robotics. While admittedly his output has been very hit-or-miss (more miss in his later years), Craven was always held up as a professor of the genre that he helped create. He, and his works, will be sorely missed. Wes Craven 1939-2016