Matt Damon is having a hell of a year, isn’t he? I thought he was pretty damn good in The Departed. And now he has two sure-things on the way with Ocean’s Thirteen and The Bourne Ultimatum. I think it’s pretty clear who’s winning the Ben Affleck versus Matt Damon best actor competition (not that there was ever any doubt).

Anyway, I just wanted to do a quick post for the teaser that just dropped. It doesn’t show much, but it still got me excited.

This week I’m going to start with the little guys first, because they need the love.

Peaceful Warrior is based on the book The Way of the Peaceful Warrior. Even though I’ve read the book, Peaceful Warrior isn’t easy to sum up without making it sound like hooey, so I’ll let the PR people do the talking. “In the film, Scott Mechlowicz plays Dan, a talented-yet-arrogant college gymnast with Olympic dreams and a golden future. The athlete thinks he has it all: bookcases of trophies, endless friends, fast rides and disposable relationships. But all that is about to change. One day, Dan’s world is turned upside down after a chance meeting with a mysterious stranger he comes to know as Socrates (Nick Nolte)—a man who holds the power to tap into new worlds of strength and understanding. After he suffers a debilitating injury, with the mystical help of Socrates and an elusive young woman named Joy (Amy Smart), Dan will grow to realize that strength of spirit is what leads a man to his true greatness.” I had pictured someone more peaceful than Nick Nolte (he of the scraggly mug shot) as Socrates, but he’ll do. The book was quite interesting and the trailer makes the movie look even better. RENT IT. (Official site)

Live Free Or Die (not to be confused with the next Die Hard sequel, Live Free or Die Hard) is the latest addition in the bumbling criminal genre. John “Rugged” Rudgate is a criminal legend in his own mind. When Rugged and his friends get the chance to commit a real crime, of course everything goes awry and hijinks ensue. Michael Rapaport and Zooey Deschanel co-star. The trailer is pretty funny, so I say RENT IT. (Official site)

After The Wedding was nominated for Best Foreign Film this year, with the tagline of “Champagne is poured, and secrets are spilled.” Based on the title, I was expecting a bit of a chick flick, but the trailer is all sex, lies, and intrigue. Mads Mikkelsen acts in his native language, proving he can be more than just Bond’s nemesis in Casino Royale. RENT IT. (Official site)

The Lookout was written and directed by Scott Frank, who also wrote Out of Sight. Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays an injured former athlete who gets conned into participating in a bank robbery. The Lookout could go one of two ways: forgettable heist movie or dark, twisting crime drama. Isla Fisher (Wedding Crashers) and Jeff Daniels co-star. RENT IT. (Official site)

Blades of Glory: Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve heard of Will Ferrell’s lampoon on the world of figure skating. Jon Heder, Craig T. Nelson, Jenna Fischer, William Fichtner, Amy Poehler, and Will Arnett co-star. SEE IT, not that you need prodding. (Official site)

I knew The Reaping was a SEE IT the very first time I saw this trailer a few months back. However, it’s taken me a while to figure out why exactly. After all, supernatural thrillers are usually not my thing, and this movie looks way too similar to about twenty other recent films that I had absolutely no interest in seeing (The Skeleton Key, for example).

At first, I assumed that my interest in The Reaping was purely based on the plot (I do love the idea of revisiting the ten plagues without the help of Charlton “from my cold dead hands” Heston). However, I’m wondering now if there isn’t more to it. More specifically, I’m wondering if Hilary Swank has maybe performed some sort of weird hypnosis thing on me.

For some reason, every time I see Hilary Swank’s name attached to a film, it’s like there’s this little alarm that goes off in my head, alerting me that I must go see it. And try as I may to ignore the alarm, I always seem to find myself inside a packed theater, staring up at her giant image, $11 missing from my wallet.

The thing that I don’t get is that I don’t actually like Hilary Swank. I think she’s kind of weird looking and kind of annoying. I think if I found myself on a blind date with her, I’d probably be looking for the exits (of course, I’d still brag to all my friends that I went out with an Academy Award winner).

But the fact is, the girl knows how to act. And more importantly, she can carry a film, even when her character is a quadriplegic. So I guess I should stop fighting it and just resign myself to a lifetime of watching Hilary Swank movies. It’s really not that bad of a fate.

The Reaping is rated R and opens April 5. (Official Site)

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In The Nanny Diaries, Scarlett Johansson plays Nanny, a character eager to begin her life as a nanny to a wealthy Manhattan family, the Xs, played by Laura Linney (who I’m not sure is mean enough for the role of Mrs. X) and Paul Giamatti (who is completely absent from the trailer). She gets all the luxuries of playing house on the Upper East Side, without the responsibility of having to pay for the lifestyle. It’s all very The Devil Wears Prada meets Mary Poppins (minus the singing chimneysweeps). What’s not to love?

Well, a lot, apparently. The parents of her young charge are never around, she is constantly humiliated in front of the could-he-be-any-cuter boy who lives in the same building, Mrs. X tells her to her face that she isn’t good enough for said boy, and she is being spied on through a nanny-cam installed in a teddy bear. What is Nanny to do? She can’t quit, or so she says, for she has grown to love the little boy she cares for and she won’t leave him with parents who seem to have forgotten he even exists.

The Nanny Diaries is based on the 2002 best-selling novel of the same name. I have read the novel, so it’s impossible for me to watch this trailer and not make comparisons to the book. The book was written as a comedy-drama that often focuses on how absentee parents can affect a child’s development. The film, on the other hand, is being billed as strictly a comedy. Oh, those wacky rich folks! They’re just so busy being fabulous that Nanny gets into all sorts of wacky hijinx while caring for their son. But wait…are neglectful parents something to laugh at? Is a twenty-something girl unwittingly thrust into the role of “mother” really that funny?

Since I love to see films based on books I’ve read and play the compare/contrast game, I’ll see this one, but I’ll wait to RENT IT with my boyfriend (you may know him as Netflix).

The Nanny Diaries is rated PG-13 and opens on April 20. (Official Site)

UPDATE: The new release date for The Nanny Diaries is September 7, 2007.

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I must admit, I’ve seen this trailer about a thousand times by now. I even caught a First Look press junket interview at a recent screening of Reign Over Me (which was pretty darn touching, by the way). In the interview, Kirsten Dunst and Tobey Maguire were obviously being fed lines about how many “twists and turns” were in Spider-Man 3 – boring diatribe that went in one ear and out the other. Um, hello guys! No one needs to be convinced! I mean really, it’s only one of the most anticipated movies of the last two years!

For me though, the excitement is a bit more personal. I remember last fall when I managed to get a few glimpses of Kirsten and Tobey (who both look amazing in person) filming down the street from my office. No, I wasn’t caught on camera – but I am looking forward to reminiscing about that beautiful, sunny day when I jumped up and down shrieking like a little girl, prompting some passersby to instruct me just exactly what I should do with my loud, skinny white ass…

But I digress, none of that matters. The truth is, this looks like it’ll be just as exciting as the first two. Harry and Peter finally get to duke it out, Mary Jane gets her ring (or maybe some lucky pedestrian does – the trailer doesn’t fully reveal that one), and we get our first glimpse of a Venom Symbiote as it bonds to Spider-Man!

All in all, it’s gonna be pretty freaking sweet. I’m definitely going to SEE IT.

Spider-Man 3 is not yet rated and opens May 4 (Official Site)

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It is impossible to talk about Waitress without discussing its sad backstory. Waitress was written and directed by Adrienne Shelly, an independent film actress who began making her own films in 1994. Last November, Shelly was found dead in her Manhattan apartment in what was presumed to be a suicide. A few days later, a housepainter that Shelly had hired confessed to the murder. When she died, Shelly had already finished Waitress and was waiting to hear whether the movie had been accepted into the Sundance Film Festival. The Sundance committee had already selected Waitress before Shelly died, and in January the film played to capacity crowds at Sundance and shortly sold to Fox Searchlight for $5 million.

After watching the trailer, I’m not surprised that Waitress was one of Sundance’s bigger sales. Although it is undoubtedly aimed at women, Waitress is not your typical chick flick and looks far superior to most films of that genre. (We’re talking about you, Georgia Rule.) Keri Russell plays a Jenna, Southern waitress who is pregnant, unhappily married, and feeling trapped by her own life. By day, Jenna works at a diner with waitresses played by Curb Your Enthusiasm’s Cheryl Hines and by Shelly herself, behind big black glasses. By night, she pours her heart into unique pies and writes letters to her unborn baby. Jeremy Sisto plays Jenna’s husband and the one and only Andy Griffith plays one of Jenna’s regular customers.

In short, Waitress looks to be a poignant comedy about what happens when life doesn’t turn out just as you’d hoped it would. I definitely want to SEE IT when Waitress opens in limited release on May 2. (Official Site)

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So I was just getting ready to write a post for Waitress, when I happened upon this trailer over at Mad About Movies. Sorry, Keri Russell, but you just got bumped.

Now, I hate Jamie Kennedy with a passion, so normally I wouldn’t think twice about seeing this film. But something about the trailer really rubbed me the right way.

Most of all, I’m just loving the ridiculous story-line: a prepubescent breakdancing phenom falls victim to a tragic break-related accident, which puts him in a coma for 20 years and when he wakes up, he decides to reunite his old crew to enter a breakdancing competition in the hopes of winning back his grade-school sweetheart.

One word: Brilliant! OK, maybe two words: Idiotic/Brilliant!

Marina over at Mad About Movies had a good point, which is that this movie will most likely flop, despite the fact that it holds more appeal than its most obvious competition, Blades of Glory, which will most certainly be a boxoffice smash. Personally, I’m more in the mood for a stupid-humor romp about breakdancing than figure skating, but that’s just me.

Unfortunately, this movie still stars Jamie Kennedy, which precludes me from ever possibly paying $11 to see it, but I will definitely RENT IT.

Kickin’ It Old Skool is rated PG-13 and opens April 27. (Official Site)

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The weekend box office will probably once again be dominated by 300, but there are some new entrants in the race.

Tops on my agenda is Reign Over Me, starring Adam Sandler as a man destroyed by the loss of his family on 9/11, and Don Cheadle as his former college roommate who helps him attempt to deal with the pain. Sandler blew me away in the trailer, and I daresay that he could generate some award buzz. According to IMDb, Reign Over Me was slated for a December 1 release, but Sony bumped it in favor of The Holiday, costing Sandler a potential Oscar nod. (Perhaps the studio thought Sandler’s Oscar chances would be better this year, without Forest Whitaker dominating the category.) Don Cheadle is always amazing, but I can’t wait to SEE IT for Adam Sandler’s performance. (Official Site)

Shooter is Mark Wahlberg’s first outing since his Oscar nominated performance in The Departed. Wahlberg plays a secret service agent who is framed for an assassination attempt and then (dum, dum, dum!) wants vengeance on his enemy. Shooter is directed by Antoine Fuqua, who has hasn’t had a hit since Training Day in 2001. I doubt that Shooter has as good as a script as Training Day, so I’m going to SKIP IT. (Official Site)

Pride has quite possibly the lamest movie poster that I’ve seen in quite some time. Seriously. I walk by the poster every morning on the way to the subway, and it just makes the movie look so horribly cheesy. Terrence Howard and Bernie Mac star in this story of an underdog, all-black swim team in the 1970s, though the poster made me think it was about boxers. Terrence Howard has had his pick of scripts since Crash and Hustle & Flow, but I can’t give him the benefit of the doubt on this one. SKIP IT. (Official Site)

Color Me Kubrick is the mildly intriguing story of a con man who poses as Stanley Kubrick during the filming of Eyes Wide Shut. John Malkovich plays “Mr. Kubrick” and the trailer may give away the film’s funniest moment. When starstruck fans ask who “Kubrick” has in mind for his next film, he answers “John Malkovich,” to which they all reply, “who?” If you’re a big Kubrick fan, you may want to RENT IT. (Official Site)

Also opening this weekend are TMNT, the animated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, and slasher sequel The Hills Have Eyes 2. SKIP IT and SKIP IT.

I’m just biased. I want Reign Over Me to reign at the box office.

As any twenty-something alive recalls, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were one of the biggest cultural icons of Generation Y. Too bad Harvey Weinstein and his gang of “creative” thugs had to go and butcher it for a quick buck. Sure it’s flashy, computer generated, and even a bit kitschy at times, but who wants to sit through an hour-and-a-half remake of something that we’ve all watched dozens of times?

I mean really, it looks like a droll hybrid of Independence Day, Ghostbusters, Armageddon, and any other summer blockbustery schlock we’ve all been fed consistently over the last ten years. As if that wasn’t enough, they add insult to injury by “hipping” the name up with an acronym and losing the live-action costumes! I don’t know about you, but I’m gonna miss Master Splinter in his rat suit.

My advice: SKIP IT, or else they’ll keep feeding us more.

TMNT is rated PG and opens March 23. (Official Site)

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Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate’s life for me. For the last time.

This Memorial Day weekend brings the conclusion to the ‘Pirates’ trilogy with Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World’s End. If you’ve seen (and enjoyed) the first two installments, it looks like you can expect some more of the same: campy good fun on the high seas with the usual suspects: Orlando Bloom, Keira Knightley, and the delightfully boozy antics of Johnny Depp’s Captain Jack Sparrow.

At the end of the second Pirates movie, we saw Captain Jack sail off to, presumably, his doom. At World’s End picks up where we left off, with the salty crew on a mission to find and save Jack, lead by the (dead? not dead? undead?) Captain Barbossa, played by Geoffrey Rush. The crew apparently sails to, literally, the world’s end, judging by the huge wall of water they approach in the trailer. Jack is found, but is reluctant to rejoin the band of men (I use ‘men’ in the all-inclusive sense, Miss Knightley) who turned on him in the last film. But rejoin them he must in order to have one final battle with their foes: the squid-like Davy Jones, the pompous pirate-hater Lord Beckett, and Captain Sao Feng, leader of a troupe of pirates from Singapore (a new character for this final film played by the always impressive Chow Yun Fat).

I admit I was a little underwhelmed by the second Pirates movie after loving the first one. This third installment seems to be more of the same, but I’ll still SEE IT for two reasons:
1. The final battle scene will be epically awesome to see on the big screen.
2. I can use this film as an excuse for why I’ll be talking like a pirate for the rest of the summer. Yarr.

Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World’s End is not yet rated and opens May 25. (Official Site)

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