I’ll give you a completely honest answer. I wasn’t present. I was a guy who had a tremendous amount of ability, but my head was always in the world of wanting to be an actor. I majored in theater at San Diego State. My one eye was on football, and my other eye was on Hollywood. -Apollo Creed, Carl Weathers.
Okay, so I can accept a lot, but Bradley Cooper starring in the autobiography of SEAL Chris Kyle? Of course, Steven Spielberg has his sticky fingers in the mess that will be American Sniper:
Bradley Cooper, Chris Kyle in American Sniper?
DreamWorks and Warner Bros will team on Steven Spielberg‘s next film American Sniper, with Bradley Cooperaboard to star in the autobiography of Navy SEAL Chris Kyle. Cooper optioned the book himself, along with Andrew Lazar’s Mad Chance, and it has turned out to be quite a coup for the actor. Jason Hall (Paranoia) wrote the script and will executive produce, with Spielberg, Cooper, Lazar, and Peter Morgan producing.
Kyle, an expert marksman who spread his love for weapons by teaching others how to shoot, was recently and tragically gunned down along with a pal by a fellow discharged vet they had taken to a Texas shooting range to deal with his post-traumatic stress disorder.
Love Chris Kyle and all, but I don’t see myself watching this one.
Courtesy of the Motion Pictures Association of America (MPAA), you may soon be reading this: An intense scene of war violence, some images of carnage, brief strong violence more prominently in the near future.
The problem with H’wood is not the ratings, it is the garbage they put out. I can’t remember the last time I went to the movie theater. And I used to see 20-30 films a year!
James Secretan was the assumed name of a famous spy according to Kate Grimond, the famous writer’s niece. It does not have quite the same ring to it, does it?
Buzz Jacobs and Doug Brown directed BENGHAZI 9.11, about the events before, on, and after September 11, 2012, documenting the true story of Benghazi 9.11. . .
Apparently, folks have a hard time pronouncing Saoirse Ronan’s name. (The actress had roles in Atonement, The Lovely Bones, Hanna, and The Host.) According to the Irish thespian: her first name has been butchered as “Sowers,” “Source-say,” “Sorsha,” “Sar-say,” “Soo-see,” “Say-ice,” and “Soyers.”
Inspired by the true story of a suspicious 1968 sinking of a Russian sub, Phantom stars Ed Harris as Soviet captain Demi “Don’t Call me Moore.” Who has epilepsy:
Submarine thrillers such as “Run Silent, Run Deep,” ”The Hunt for Red October,” ”Crimson Tide” and the classic “Das Boot” have long been a cinematic staple. “Phantom,” the latest entry in this venerable genre, doesn’t exactly rise to the level of its predecessors. Inspired by the true story of the mysterious 1968 sinking of a Russian sub, it’s even more claustrophobic than its setting would suggest.
Phantom starring Ed Harris, about a junky Russian Submarine
The tense Cold War-era storyline concerns a final voyage undertaken by veteran Soviet captain Demi (Ed Harris), still physically and emotionally scarred by a previous mission that went awry. Although he’s previously commanded nuclear subs, he’s now put in charge of a dilapidated vessel that’s about to be sold to the Chinese navy.
In addition to Demi’s regular crew, who include his loyal right-hand man Alex (William Fichtner), several “technicians,” led by the mysterious Bruni (David Duchovny), are also aboard.
Sub guys are among our best trained. Whenever I see Dolphins, I respect ‘em.
For 30,000 rials (about a buck) you can buy bootleg DVDs of Argo in downtown Tehran. And Ataollah Salmanian, a Persian director, plans The General Staff, a cinematic response to our movie. Correction, a cinematic response to Ben Aflac’s movie.
Movie trends come in waves with other directors following the initial hit. Think Westerns or 80s teen angst. And Park Chan-wook, Kim Ji-woon and Bong Joon-ho belong to a new wave, this time of Korean directors directing movies in English. Their American movie masterpieces: Stoker, Last Stand, and Snowpiercer. . .
How many names can you drop in a couple of sentences? Read this snippet (oddly about the movie Zero Dark Thirty): There were few more minute observers of fact than George Orwell. As Timothy Garton Ash has written, if Orwell had a God it was Kipling’s “God of Things as They are.” Yet, as Garton Ash says of Orwell: “One of his most powerful early essays describes witnessing a hanging in Burma.” Only in the NY Times.
Aliens: Colonial Marines (ACM) is being marketed as an official 20th Century Fox sequel to Aliens and Alien 3. But be warned, ACM is a video game:
In the first few minutes, we’re thrust into the aftermath of the 1986 movie (and the beginning of Alien 3.). As Corporal Winter, our mission to rescue the rescuers of Hadley’s Hope colony on planet LV-426 rapidly devolves, and it’s up to us to determine what happened.
We also get an intro by Corporal Hicks (Michael Biehn) and some interaction with the “whole” new Bishop (Lance Henriksen). For fans of the films and comic books, that alone is worth the price of admission to this shooting party.
Marines and aliens. Together again. . .
Inigo Montoya
So Wynand Mullins of New Zealand was wearing a t-shirt on an airplane flight that read: Hello! My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die. It is, of course, Mandy Patinkin’s line from the movie, The Princess Bride.
But the stewardess was alerted by another passenger and she was not amused. So she asked him to change it.
Comment of the day goes to the Yahoo girl who said: Who was the Captain? The Dread Pilot Roberts?
The Chinese government has censored James Bond and Skyfall, tinkered with certain pivotal scenes to fit its view of the world. Without ruining the plot too much:
The missing scene was set in Shanghai, when a French hitman (played by Ola Rapace) is shown shooting a Chinese security guard in the elevator lobby of a skyscraper before preparing for an assassination.
Berenice Marlohe and Daniel Craig in Skyfall
Later in the film, in a casino in Macau, Daniel Craig’s Bond questions the story’s femme fatale, Severine (Berenice Marlohe), about whether her tattoo is the result of her being forced into a local prostitution ring at an early age. While the lines remain intact on the soundtrack, the Chinese subtitles suggest the spy is asking her quarry about being coerced into the mob instead.
The film’s Chinese subtitles also fudged the exposition of the back story of the film’s villain, Raoul Silva (Javier Bardem), who tells Bond how he was handed over to the Chinese authorities while working for the MI6 in Hong Kong. He adds that he suffered immense torture at the hands of his interrogators before attempting to kill himself.
Chinese censors? I wonder what Jackie Chan has to say about this.
In looking at the movies this weekend, I was considering (maybe, possibly) suggesting Matru ki Bijlee ka Mandola (starring Pankaj Kapur, Imran Khan, Anushka Sharma, and Arya Babbar) to my friends here. The movie was only playing at Reading Cinemas, as per this ad. And just today, there was a shooting at the theater:
Matru ki Bijlee ka Mandola
Police shot and critically wounded a man Saturday suspected of chasing his girlfriend with a handgun across a shopping mall parking lot before ducking into a movie theater where officers confronted him.
The shooting occurred inside the Reading Cinemas theater in northern San Diego around 3:50 p.m., and no moviegoers or officers were hurt, officer David Stafford said.
He said officers went to an outdoor shopping center, where the theater is located, in response to a domestic violence call. Police did not immediately release other details.
A San Diego Fire-Rescue Department dispatcher said the suspect was taken to a hospital with life-threatening injuries.
Imran Khan, Anushka Sharma
The owner of a business next to the theater said officers told him the armed man chased his girlfriend across a parking lot. Steve Krongard, the owner of the Nickel City arcade, said police shut down the lot, checked every car leaving the mall and went from businesses to business to look for the suspect until they found him in the theater.
“There were 20 police cars blocking the entrance, then the fire truck and the ambulance rushed in,” Krongard said.
“Then we saw seven cops with what looked like rifles, then paramedics went into the theater.”
The theater’s manager told Krongard the shooting occurred during a screening of “Les Miserables.”
Imran Khan, Pankaj Kapur, Anushka Sharma
Adrian Amante, the owner of the Home Trends store, told U-T San Diego people started running out of the theater and hiding behind cars.
A moviegoer told KGTV the lights suddenly went on during the film and two officers came into the theater with their guns. Another witness told the station that everyone got on the floor and started heading for the exit doors.
Please please please, people: get ahold of yourself. Take up long-distance running, get a blog, meditate, join the Navy. I hear this is a good way to keep things chilled out in your life.
John Krasinski
I’m willing to have any conversation with anyone after they’ve seen it, because I think that they’ll be very surprised as to what the movie is really about, John Krasinski said. I don’t think either of us were interested in telling a very one-sided, uber-liberal anti-fracking movie because that would just be boring. The truth lies so much closer to the middle than either end of the extreme.
Very smart marketing, John. Tell people they have to watch the movie before they decide whether it is for them. Love the Office. Jim Halpert’s the man. But I am not going to see this piece of trash. Yes, the fact that it was financed in part by the government of Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) — a region that stands to profit from the failure of the fracking industry, does not surprise me. Viewers can sniff your bias from a mile away. This is not the 1960s where information was a tight commodity. The internet has opened up the game to all of us.
The quote: People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people, is credited to the movie V for Vendetta. I must confess, despite the anarchistic leanings of the film, I understand the thought behind the saying. Curiously China, of all places, just aired the film for the first time. . .
