Good news for those affected by the documentary The Cove, actually: Entertainment Weekly is reporting that the annual September slaughter of dolphins just off the coast of Taiji, Japan appears to have been averted this year.
Daily Archives: September 3, 2009
The Boondock Saints II Actually Exists, It Seems
I still halfway think that this is some sort of fever-dream hallucination, and I’m going to wake up in bed next to Suzanne Pleshette, but the red-band trailer for The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, the sequel to boorish writer-director Troy Duffy‘s blustery fraternal shoot-’em-up, and an orgiastic assemblage of genre clichés seen hundreds of times before, is up and online, and now comes word that the film will even receive an October 30 theatrical release through Apparition, Bob Berney’s new distribution company. Nothing much new here (slow-mo gun discharges, squib-happy stuntwork and the like) to indicate this will play outside of the hand-clapping, beer-swilling, already converted small cult audience, and I don’t know that a Peter Fonda cameo is the key to unlocking commercial relevance, but to-scale props for the musical cue use of The Skids’ “The Saints Are Coming.” Totally obvious, sure, but it works.
The Suite Life on Deck: Anchors Away!
Tween-targeted adventure, fun and excitement arrives on DVD in the form
of The Suite Life on Deck: Anchors Away!, a sort of fleshed-out, thematically grouped spin-off offering of the hit Disney Channel
original series The Suite Life of Zack & Cody, starring Dylan and Cole Sprouse.
Reprising their roles from the show, the twins Zack and Cody Martin hit
the high seas with hotel heiress London Tiptoe (Brenda Song, above center), enrolling in a semester-at-sea program aboard the S.S. Tipton. Much to his chagrin, dutiful hotel manager Mr. Moseby (Phill Lewis, above right) also gets sucked along on the outing, assuming responsibility for all three youngsters. Hijinx ensue, don’tcha know, as well as romance; the boys try to woo some young ladies, to the extent that “action” involves holding hands and a peck on the cheek. Ashley Tisdale, of the High School Musical flicks, even reprises her role as Maddie from the original series.
Some of the outfitting is all wrong (hipster and vintage videogame T-shirts?), but the shaggy-haired Sprouse twins serve as harmlessly charming anchors for this slice of diverting adolescent entertainment. The direction is pretty flat and straightforward, and the writing makes sure to carefully underscore each set-up, but it’s all performed with cheery enough aplomb, and thankfully doesn’t feel the need to “dual-pitch,” with coded double entendres or other jokes for adults.
Housed in a white plastic Amaray case with snap-shut hinges, The Suite Life on Deck comes presented in 1.33:1 full screen, with a Dolby digital surround sound audio track, and optional French and Spanish language tracks and subtitles as well. The disc’s supplemental features include “Much Ado About Nothing” and “International Dateline,” two bonus episodes which offer up further sea-set adventures. The latter, in which the crew enters a time warp and is forced to repeat the same day over and over, is no Groundhog Day, but probably ranks as the best offering of the bunch. There’s also a 10-minute segment, “Debby on Deck,” in which the Sprouse twins goof around with and interview Debby Ryan (above left), the newest member of the cast, as well as an additional 10 minutes of glad-handing incidental footage from the on-deck premiere event for the show. Yes, parents, this is a suitably wholesome distraction. To purchase the DVD via Amazon, click here. B- (Show) B- (Disc)
A Few Words Regarding the LACMA Popcorn Summit Meeting
Much more on this soon, but Tuesday’s meeting with LACMA director and CEO Michael Govan shed a bit of light on the state of the museum’s film program moving forward. The most heartening thing from my perspective, and likely for those who have a vested interest in the sort of current classical programming that underscores cinema’s position as a primary art form, was Govan’s unequivocal statement of belief that film was and is an art on par with the other collected and curated works of the museum, and that there was no inter-organizational opposition toward establishing a separate curatorial department for film.
Attending on behalf of the Save Film at LACMA grassroots campaign were site/petition organizers Debra Levine and Doug Cummings (far right), along with, from left, former Los Angeles Film Critics Association president Lael Loewenstein; Oscar-winning costume designer James Acheson; American Cinematheque Director of Publicity and Promotions Margot Gerber; Sony repertory executive Jared Sapolin; Shannon Kelley (kneeling), Head of Public Programs at the UCLA Film & Television Archive; yours truly, current president of LAFCA; DocFilms Programming Chair emeritus Kyle Westphal, and Michael Schlesinger (in sunglasses), a veteran film distribution and repertory programming executive.
For Govan’s perspective, and more on the museum’s announced “CineClub” endeavor, a $50 LACMA membership add-on that would give members priority ticketing and help them support a program they value deeply, click here. There’s also an op-ed in today’s Los Angeles Times which ably sketches out many of the particulars of the situation, but perhaps misstates things when it concludes: “Looking at Govan’s original decision, it’s clear the program wasn’t being canceled because elitists at LACMA don’t take film seriously; the bigger problem was that attendance had fallen by 50 percent. Ultimately, if the program is to succeed, it must attract patrons.” Knowing the numbers, that figure is a bit of an overstatement. And yes, money is key. But this isn’t a fight over patrons; big donor money is what it’s about. Underline that.
Jennifer’s Body Hitches Prospects to Megan Fox’s Body
Jennifer’s Body, penned by Diablo Cody, has already started screening in Los Angeles in advance of its Toronto premiere and September 18 bow, and the advance word from three sources I’ve spoken to pegs it anywhere from the sort of bad that induces shrugs of dispirited disinterest to flat-out, aggressively terrible. Nevertheless, one can expect another surge of interest in star Megan Fox, and certainly a spike in internet searches for these sorts of photos. But will e-sex appeal translate to box office punch, when not paired with marauding robots? Hard to say, though Movieline’s Kyle Buchanan delivers a relative defense of Fox’s skills.
Earth (Blu-ray)
Nature documentaries are dime-a-dozen-type things, as any bored elementary schooler can attest. But advances in film technology have possibly impacted no other sub-genre quite like they have our pursuits of chronicling the animal kingdom, rendering laughably obsolete the 16mm Ciba Geigy filmstrips of yesteryear. Earth, which debuted Disney’s nature programming arm when it bowed theatrically this spring, is the latest documentary offering to offer up a snapshot of our changing planet, and animals’ place in it, and it’s a beautiful, engaging film, full of footage the likes of which may never be seen again.
Earth positions itself as somewhat of a macro docu-snapshot, but also smartly hones in on several storylines that help anchor and root the movie for younger viewers. In the Arctic, a mother polar bear trailed by her two cubs awakens from hibernation and searches for food as their icy hunting grounds melt away, and the father polar bear (above) swims further out to sea in search of food. A herd of African elephants slowly traverses the arid Kalahari Desert toward the water-rich Okavango Delta. A humpback whale and her calf, meanwhile, take part in a 4,000-mile, epic migration that takes them from tropical waters all the way to Antarctica. Remarkable high-definition footage captures these creatures in places that human beings rarely see, providing an enthralling glimpse of unique worlds.
A big part of this success must be credited to award-winning filmmakers Alastair Fothergill (The Blue Planet) and Mark Linfield, the latter of whom was also involved with the superlative Planet Earth miniseries, which was commissioned by the BBC and subsequently broadcast Stateside by the Discovery Channel. They obviously have a grasp of arresting natural visuals, but also figure out a way to weave together story strands in a manner that gives Earth a bit of an artificial narrative pull. Earth does toss in a few facts for narrator James Earl Jones to dole out, too, but the movie is chiefly driven by its stunning imagery, and in fact some of its writing (“This creature is the essence of wilderness” is the description of a lynx) comes across as silly and a bit indistinct. The only other big strike against the movie is its overly Disney-fied score, from composer George Fenton. The noise, only occasionally grating, can’t cancel out the power of the visuals, though.
Available in a two-disc Blu-ray/DVD combo pack, Earth includes a small slate of bonus features that offer viewers an in-depth look at the making of the movie as well as an opportunity to learn more about our planet and its myriad fascinating inhabitants. Earth Diaries is a 45-minute making-of special that chronicles in exhaustive detail the five-year production of the film, which touched all seven continents, 62 countries, over 200 locations and spanned over 2,000 days in the field. This footage is often just as fascinating as the footage in the finished product, as is the case with watching the filmmakers deal with the challenges of navigating a low-flying hot air balloon around clusters of tree branches. Richard Burton, the movie’s aerial director of photography, speaks interestingly about the Cineflex camera used in the film, and co-director Linfield aptly points out regarding the production, “Things don’t go right all the time. And if they do, then you’re not trying things difficult enough.”
Given the stunning vistas on display, Blu-ray is definitely the way to go for this title, which maximizes the 1080p high definition and 1.78:1 widescreen presentation. (A single-disc version of Earth is also available, mostly targeted for rental.) Optional English SDH, French and Spanish subtitles are included; exclusive Blu-ray bonus features, meanwhile, consist of a set of filmmakers’ annotations that appear as pop-up facts, VH-1-style, during a viewing of the movie. Animated chapter stops and an array of trailers are also included, which slows down the disc’s tracking just a bit. To purchase the combo DVD-Blu-ray release via Amazon, click here. A- (Movie) B+ (Disc)