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Saturday Night Drive-In: The Thaw

You may ask yourself, as I often do this time of year, “Self, why are there so many great Christmas movies, but so few good Thanksgiving-themed films?” Sure, there’s Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, Home for the Holidays, The Ice Storm, and Squanto. And one of my favorites, The House of Yes, starring Parker Posey—after all, how often do you get to say “I just saw a really sharp movie that featured Tori Spelling and was from the director of Ghosts of Girlfriends Past”?!?

But still, I want more as I wait for Eli Roth to actually get around to making his Thanksgiving horror film, as previewed in Grindhouse. (You’ll have to YouTube the trailer yourself—no way I can link to it from a “family” blog.) Well thank goodness when I went searching this year for a DVD tutorial on how to prepare the T-day bird, I found The Thaw. Much to my surprise, it was not about how best to defrost a turkey, but instead was a heart-felt, soul-enriching tale about truly giving thanks for all that is  right in your life.

For instance, are you living in an Arctic research station, spending your days dissecting polar bears and wholly mammoth carcasses? No? Well see, be thankful!

And have you been infected by crawly little crusty critters that make you vomit a lot before turning you into a big pile of bloody goo that ends up providing sustenance for more crawly crustly critter eggs? No? There again, thankful!

And are you Val Kilmer, having gone from Tombstone, Heat, and Batman Forever in the mid-‘90s to, in just the past year appearing in direct-to-video gems such as Hardwired, Streets of Blood, The Chaos Experiment, and now, The Thaw? Are you in Delgo? Or Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans? Are you in the MacGruber movie? THANKFUL!!!

Now before we get into The Thaw, let’s stop a moment and talk about Val Kilmer. Maybe to Mr. Kilmer, if he’s out there, reading. Val, buddy, you are a very good actor. No one doubts that. Even in the past few years you’ve turned in impressive supporting work in films like Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, Spartan, Wonderland, and even Oliver Stone’s trippy Alexander. You were good last year in the TV miniseries Comanche Moon.

So Val, please, just stop. Sit down. Think for a moment. You don’t need to be in Renny Harlin’s Mindhunters. No one does. You don’t need to take every DTV horror mis-flick that comes across your agent’s desk. Val, we love you. Whatever happened to you on The Island of Dr. Moreau, out there with Crazy Dave Thewlis, and Fat Brando, and Pedro’s Little Friend, we can work through it. We forgive you. Come back to us.

Okay, thus endeth the career intervention. Back to The Thaw!

The Hatter Gets Some "Mad" Competition

Bear with me, dear redbloggers as I spend the next week clearing out a huge pile of movie production news. Some of it, like this update on the fourth Mad Max movie won't be sparkling new news, but I hope you find it interesting.

As you may have heard, production is moving ahead on Mad Max: Fury Road, the fourth film in the Australian, post-apocalyptic action series. The original three films were created by director George Miller and made Mel Gibson a world-wide star.

(I grew up with The Road Warrior on cable in the early '80s, though for me Beyond Thunderdome played more as an overly slick, silly romp than a gritty action kick--I just never really got past Tina's wig.)

So when it was announced Miller was finally getting a fourth Max off the ground, the first question on everyone's mind was "Will Mad Mel be back?" After all, it's not unheard of these days for aging '80s action stars to dust off the walker and take another run at the characters and franchises that made them rich and famous: Harrison Ford in Indy 4, Bruce Willis in Die Hard 4, Sly Stallone in both Rocky 6 and Rambo 4, and even Ah-nold made a cameo appearance in Terminator 4, albeit via a computer-generated stand-in for the Governator.

Well it appears unlikely that Gibson will be back as Max Rockatansky, although there are still some cameo possibilities kicking around. What we maybe sorta kinda know is this: The new Max film, directed by Miller, will take place shortly after Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. So unless we're to believe that the harsh wasteland weather has really accelerated the aging process, we can count out Gibson as Max. However, in a recent interview with the Australian Herald Sun, Mel did not rule out the possibility of appearing in the film in a different role, maybe a cameo, maybe something more.

So who is the new leather-clad Madman in town? It'll be Tom Hardy, starring opposite Charlize Theron who is, quite frankly, tough enough to be the film's bad-ass heroine all by her lonesome. (Aeon Flux may not have been a great film, but Theron was plenty action-y in it.) Still, the casting of Hardy, presumably to play Max, fills me with glee. For a while this summer there were rumors that Jeremy Renner from The Hurt Locker might take the part, and I was fine with that. But Hardy kicks the project up to another level of cool. (Despite complaints from some folks Down Under that the role is going to--gasp!--a dreaded Englishman.)

You see, I finally caught up with Bronson a few weeks ago and boy oh boy does it present some fine credentials for Mr. Hardy. Hardy was in Black Hawk Down and his highest-profile role was as the Picard-clone villain in the awful Star Trek: Nemesis, the movie that shut down the old Star Trek feature-film franchise. You may also have caught him doing supporting work in Brit gangster films like Layer Cake and Rocknrolla.

Bronson is certainly in that vein: It tells--with great stylized, theatrical flair--the true story of Michael "Charles Bronson" Petersen, hyped as "the most violent prisoner in Britain." And Hardy, as Bronson, is utterly magnetic with his shaved head, handlebar mustache, and wild, glaring eyes. The role and the film's heightened aesthetic doesn't allow for much nuance in Hardy's performance, but as the film follows Bronson through 20 years of beatin' the puddin' out of people in and out of prison, it's safe to say if you're looking to put the "mad" in Mad Max, this is your man. After 25 years, I can't say I had much initial enthusiasm for a new Mad Max movie, but Hardy's casting has me seriously interested, bordering on excited.

How about you? Are you ready for more Max? Okay with Hardy and Theron's casting?

The Blind Side

Of all the horror movies I watch, all the CG and rubber gore I rarely blink at, I felt an inescapable sense of dread at the start of The Blind Side and instinctively moved to cover my eyes. The film opens with Sandra Bullock’s Southern syrup-drenched voice over, but on screen we’re seeing an old NFL film. Look, it’s the Redskins and there’s John Riggins, so it must be from the ‘80s. Yep, there’s Joe Theismann… and it’s a night game… which means a Monday night game… and… oh my god no… they’re playing the Giants… and there's L.T….

Every football fan over 30 remembers what comes next, and as Bullock’s character explains in her narration, it changed professional football and Michael Oher’s life. Thanks to that oh-god-cover-your-eyes moment live on Monday Night Football--when Joe Theismann’s shin suddenly went 90 degrees the wrong way (a moment that in the days before YouTube was still seen over and over again on television)--the left tackle’s need to protect the quarterback’s blind side became much more important and hence much more valuable and financially lucrative.

And because of that, the real-life Michael Oher, a hulking, surprisingly quick mountain of a man, went from living on the streets at age 16 to avoid daily life in the projects to becoming a first-round draft pick for the Baltimore Ravens last spring. In fact, in one of those nifty little art-and-life serendipities, this past Monday evening I got home from a screening of The Blind Side—the wonderfully moving dramatization of Oher’s story—just in time to catch Oher himself live on TV, helping the Ravens crush the hapless Browns on Monday Night Football.

The Blind Side tells the true tale of young Michael Oher (Quentin Aaron), a looming giant growing up in a solemn, silent self-protective cocoon. Big Mike, as he’s called by others, goes anywhere in the Memphis night to escape his mother’s broken home, but he’s not getting anywhere.

Then Oher is given a couch to sleep on for a night by Leigh Anne Touhy (Bullock), an interior designer, Taco-Bell-franchise socialite, and a bona fide bull-headed, Ol’ Miss-loving, Southern belle. Michael’s night on the expensive Touhy Family couch turns into two, then a week, then a month, as all the Touhys end up helping the behemoth of a boy find his place first in the classroom and only later on the gridiron. (Football is barely mentioned during the film’s first half.)

Based on the book The Blind Side: The Evolution of a Game by Michael Lewis, the film is written and directed by John Lee Hancock (The Rookie) with a sure hand for negotiating obvious sports-movie clichés past the dopey. The Blind Side may draw its inspiration from how Oher’s quiet, mammoth gentleness hides deep, protective strength, but its tone comes at you like Lawrence Taylor himself, bearing down with every heavy pound of crushing, inescapable power.

Thursday Threes: The Answer

When I asked what actor was in Men Don't Leave, Titanic, and Primary Colors, I got enough "Leonardo DiCaprio" guesses I worried for a second maybe he was in all three and I'd finally committed the dreaded "Double Threes Answer" foul-up I've been fearing. But a quick double check confirmed that while of course Leo was in Titanic, no he was not in Men Don't Leave (perhaps confusion with This Boy's Life?) or Primary Colors. Whew.

Most of you did get it correct, but the most correct fastest was faithful redblogger and reader who rocks Matthew S.! Matthew gets the construction-paper medal while in second was steady Threes placer Jim and in third was Arianaa. Congrats, all!

So who was in all three of those films? Light up the Inviso-Text for the answer!

It was indeed Kathy Bates, appearing this weekend in the terrific The Blind Side as a Memphis-based tutor--not much of a geographic stretch for Bates, who was born there. Before her big break-out role in 1990's Misery, Bates was working as an actor on stage and in film and television for two decades--she had bit parts in Two of a Kind and Arthur 2, and did guest spots on TV shows such as St. Elsewhere, L.A. Law, and China Beach.

In 1990, Bates also appeared in the under-rated, under-seen family drama Men Don't Leave, starring Jessica Lange, Joan Cusack, Arliss Howard and young Charlie Korsmo and Chris O'Donnell. Men Don't Leave was the second film from Risky Business director Paul Brickman, one of the great "lost" directors of the past 20 years. The very talented Brickman hasn't made a film since then.

Of course in 1997's Titanic Bates played the "unsinkable" Molly Brown, and in the following year's thinly veiled Clinton roman a clef Primary Colors, she was Libby Holden, the campaign adviser and old friend of the "Stantons." Holden was very loosely based on the real-life Betsey Wright, Governor Bill Clinton's chief of staff in Arkansas.

Bates recieved a supporting-actress Oscar nomination for Primary Colors--she was also nominated in 2002 for About Schmidt and won the best-actress Oscar for playing super-fan Annie Wilkes in Misery.

Your Thursday Threes

You know how it works!

I give you three films, you tell me what single actor was in all three of them.

Enter your guess in the comments section directly below this post, and if you are the first with the correct answer you'll find yourself with the homemade construction-paper medal! (You do all the making. And provide all the materials. But it's really an honor. Trust us.)

I won't publish any guesses until tomorrow when I put the correct answer up.

What actor was in:

Men Don't Leave

Titanic

Primary Colors

The Close-Up Poster Answer

Aw, here I thought I was being tricky, but most of you had no problem. Almost everyone nailed it, though there was one guess of Encino Man. Um, no.

Jessica was first with the right answer, followed by Paul N. in second (Paul's closing in on a win one of these days!) and Christopher Welch in third.

Here, take another look at the close-up view of this movie poster:

Hang on, I'm about to make it way too easy for you:

Follow me over the jump for the full poster and some fun, informative facts!

Enjoy Yourself Some Close-Up Poster Contest!

Let's make it a little trickier for a change, eh?

All you have to do is study the image below, a close-up bit of the original poster for a famous movie. Then just enter the correct title of the film in the comments section below this post.

I won't post any of your guesses until I put the answer up and announce the winners tomorrow.

Take a look and take your best shot:

 

Tuesday Threes: The Answer

So, I asked you what film featured Dwayne Johnson (voicing the lead human in this weekend's Planet 51), Peter Facinelli (reprising his role as a vamp-pa in Twilight: New Moon), and Roger Rees (you might remember him as Rebecca's boyfriend Robin Colcord on Cheers, or Lord John Marbury on West Wing, or the Sheriff of Rottingham from Robin Hood: Men in Tights, or the owner of the Titanic).

Quite a few of you got it right, some of you got close, but only Nichol was right and first! (I believe this is your second win in recent weeks, isn't it, Nichol?) Nichol gets the homemade construction-paper medal, while Paul N. and Jim came in second and third. Congrats, all!

Still not sure what the film was? Embrace your destiny! And the Inviso-Text!

Yes, it was 2002's The Scorpion King, starring the actor formerly known as The Rock as Mathayus,  the um king of the scorpions or sumthin'. Johnson's character was introduced at the end of 2001's The Mummy Returns--his first non-wrasslin' movie role. The idea was to then spin the anthropodian warrior off into a new Mummy-related franchise, a la Conan the Barbarian. Alas, the spin-off spun out at the box office.

Smarty pants historical trivia: There really were a couple Egyptian "scorpion kings"--not pumped-up beefcake warriors with mystical blood, but rather pre-dynastic pharaohs who used the scorpion as their ruling symbol.)

Facinelli was the fratricidal Prince Takmet, while Rees was the wise King Pheron  who got himself fratricided. Also appearing in The Scorpion King as the Rock's sidekick thief was Grant Heslov, the actor-turned-writer-director who helmed this fall's The Men Who Stare at Goats.

Star Trek

THE FOLLOWING IS A REPRINT OF THE REDBLOG REVIEW OF STAR TREK ON ITS THEATRICAL RELEASE. STAR TREK IS NOW AVAILABLE ON DVD THROUGH REDBOX.

Other redblog Trek pieces:

Erika Olson's Non-Trekkie Review of Star Trek

What We Talk About When We Talk About Star Trek -- Locke reminiscences on what Trek has meant to him since childhood.

UPDATE: When I wrote this review last May, I was still somewhat tentatively circling J.J. Abrams' Star Trek reboot, soaking it all in, processing the new shininess. Since then I've come to flat-out, unequivocally love the new Trek film--it'll no doubt make it on my top 10 list for 2009.

If can you get past young Jimmy Kirk taking a '66 ‘Vette for a 23rd-century thrill ride while jamming to The Beastie Boys’ “Sabotage,” then you should be okay with the rest of J.J. Abrams’ hyperactive, pop explosion refit of the Star Trek franchise.

Sure, there’s a lot of energy-drink-fueled teen giddiness and slapstick to the proceedings—at times you’d think it was Stardate 90210. And while it’s true Old Trek sometimes spent too much time sitting around talking, this new version feels a like a kid on a sugar rush, running circles around the room until you want to scream “Just STOP for a moment! Stand still and take a breath!”

But hey, I love me some Beasties, and overall, this is one helluva fun Trek--Star or otherwise. Maybe it’s a little too obsessed with hooking in younger, non-Trekkie viewers (product placement in a Trek film feels a lot like billboards at Wrigley Field), but considering all the hoops it has to jump through to get its origin story off the ground… while pleasing both newbies and devotees… and while introducing a very young, fresh-faced cast playing pop-cultural icons… well, this is a fine, fine start. One that not only leaves you breathlessly entertained, but giddy with anticipation for where Abrams and his co-creators can go next now that they have the hard part out of the way.

There is a plot—it involves Nero, a Romulan miner (Eric Bana) on an avenge-the-dead-wife mission (not the last shade of Khan the new film offers up) that involves going back in time almost two centuries and putting a serious hurt on the core systems in the budding United Federation of Planets. (An entity I’m not sure is ever mentioned in the film.)  Nero's first pounce comes just as Baby Kirk is being born (in space, not Riverside, Iowa—although he'll grow up there and the town still gets a nice shout out).

In what is a surprisingly touching moment amid the chaos, baby Jimmy Kirk is named and then left a fatherless rebel-to-be. (One critic noted that as the shuttle carrying Momma Kirk and her newborn waif retreats from Nero’s attack, it is literally the last time in his life James T. Kirk will back away from anything.) The Romulan with the Tyson face tattoo then pops back up 25 years later to continue his rampage, rushing the newly commissioned Starfleet flagship Enterprise into action with a crew comprised almost solely of cadets. (More Khan echoes.)

All of this, however, is pretense. Star Trek’s true goal is two-sided: Get young James T. Kirk (Christopher Pine) into the captain’s chair of the Enterprise and get his friendship with his Academy rival, Spock, started.

The ship, its captain, and its first officer will become legendary in time, but Abrams’ Star Trek wields a double-edged sword. The new film benefits from most of us already knowing—directly or indirectly—who these characters are. But that advantage cuts the other way as well, as comparisons to the original actors and their hard-earned dynamic are inevitable.

To everyone’s credit, they all hold their own nicely. Unlike the woe-begotten Hayden Christensen, Pine hits the ground running on his way to Movie Stardom—his lack of intimidation by the boots he needs to fill perfectly echoes Kirk’s own reckless confidence. There are plenty of times when Pine’s New Kirk comes off as an annoying jerk (the infamous Kobayashi Maru test is sadly tossed off as a smug, cocky joke) and his spastic womanizing feels more Van Wilder than Virile Leader.

But then you realize that’s the point. This is young Kirk, all impulse and swagger—he has 30 to 40 more years to season into the Kirk we last saw. Though it is unfortunate the film almost completely skips over his years at Starfleet Academy—Kirk appears to come out of the experience utterly unchanged from the unfocused horndog he went in as. (And yep, he beds a green-skinned Orion lass.)

Your Tuesday Threes

Oooh, this counts as bright and early for the Threes!

How it works: I give you three actors, you tell me what one film all three were in together.

Enter your guess in the comments section directly below this post, and if you are first with the correct answer you win the homemade construction-paper medal! And the admiration of your friends, family, and co-workers.

I won't publish any guesses until tomorrow when I put the correct answer up.

What film featured:

Dwayne Johnson

Peter Facinelli

Roger Rees