December Movie Preview

Internet!! Hello and happy it’s not Thanksgiving anymore. That’s right, we made it. We battled that little baby Time for a whole 11 months, and now it stands before us old and decrepit and miserable for 1 more month. But don’t worry Time take some of yourself and look around you at this last month, this last somewhat wonderful month of movies!! In fact, let’s all do that, with a little number that goes something… like this.

December Movie Preview 2015

December 4th –

Krampus – A movie about evil Santa coming around at Christmas and killing a bunch of snot nosed jerks, that will somehow not be at all as good as a movie based on that idea should be. I mean I can think of individuals in my life who I would LOVE to see get a visit from the old Kramper Damper, but this movie will just be bad. Save yourself some ten dollars, and in no way watch it.

Macbeth – Michael Fassbender and Marion Cottilard play Macbeth and Mrs. Macbeth. What more could you possibly need to know about this movie?? It’s gonna be great. But it is also gonna be rated R… cause it’s Macbeth. So not for the kids all you snooty parents who want to take your kids to Shakespeare. Also (and brace yourself for this shocker) it’s not exactly playing in a lot of theaters so… good luck finding one near you. I traded four score and seven thistles to a guy and it STILL wasn’t enough to cover my gas expenses to get to the nearest Macbeth enabled theater. Course the thistle market has been down this year… Dang communists.

COMMUNISTS!!!!

 

December 11th

In the Heart of the Sea – I’m VERY excited for this movie. It’s got Chris Hemsworth, Tom Holland (Spiderman/boy/he better not screw this up), Cillian Murphy and Bendan Gleeson. AND Ben Whishaw (Q/the only mildly lighthearted parts of James Bond movies these days) as Herman Melville. I literally don’t know what else I could ask for in a movie except for maybe a giant whale.

“He had to say Giant Whale didn’t he?”

 

Nothing else of note comes out this week. Go watch In the Heart of the Sea. Or… I don’t know, hold your friends and loved ones close because sweet juniper buries and berries the weekend after this is —

December 18th

STAR WARS: THE FORCE FRIKKIN AWAKENS

And thus I am feed with what is probably the single greatest and most terrible decision I have ever faced. I HATE crowds… and I love Star Wars. How much does it cost to rent out a theater?? Oh wait, some crazy person already did that. For seriously though. Someone bought all of the tickets to a showing just so he could watch it in peace. And I consider that a VERY valid route to success.

On a more film related note, let’s be realistic. This will probably be a good movie. That’s what JJ Abrams does best. Good movies. He hasn’t really made a great movie yet (though I loved Star Trek Into Darkness, which Star Trek fans hated because… Picard??? Maybe???) He makes good movies, and he’s VERY good at making movies that appeal to your nostalgia factor. Even Super 8 (not that good a movie) was LOADED with weird 80’s kid movie nostalgia. So that’s what I’m expecting here: a good Star Wars movie that reminds me of my Han Solo action figure filled childhood. I’m not expecting a great movie that changes my life and threatens the Dark Knight on it’s ‘Ultimate Micah Movie’ pedestal. I will be very surprised if this is a bad movie because… well frankly there’s no way Harrison Ford would have even vaguely sort of agreed to do it if there wasn’t something there. I mean that dude hates Star Wars. So that’s it: it’ll be good. And Star Wars. And I am 1000 percent down with that.

Also out this week: Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip (AKA We Had to Release This Sometime, So Why Not Hope Some Drunk Star Wars Fans Accidentally By the Wrong Tickets.) Also: who keeps making these movies??? And how? Who is signing the giant check for Alvin and the Chipmunks 4??? And can we kill them?

Oh and also Sisters, a movie starring Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, two women who I think are hilarious, and wonderful, and Queens of modern comedy… and the movie does not look good. I’m sorry Tina and Amy… but it does not look good. Someone say I’m wrong here, I want this movie to be great but, have you seen the trailers?? At any point during the trailer did you do anything but moderately smirk to yourself?? Any comedy trailer is supposed to be 3 minutes long and should have at least two laugh out loud moments (saving your best moments for the movie, but as a comedy movie you should have some comedy to spare.) I got nothing from the Sisters trailer. And I hated myself just a little bit for not caring about this movie.

Could you PLEASE be good??

 

December 25th –

I spent longer then I should have on Star Wars (a sentence that could realistically be my epitaph) so let’s some up some of the incredibly depressing movies that are being released on Christmas shall we??

Concussion – Will Smith stars as a doctor who discovers the horrible, life ruining effects of the repeated concussions suffered by many NFL players.

Joy – Something something Jennifer Lawrence, something something, a woman fights for what’s hers in a world dominated by men and cattle… or something.

Point Break – Not really a depressing movie so much as a depressing reminder that someone looked at a movie starring Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze that came out in 1991 and thought we needed a remake.

The Hateful Eight – Quentin Tarentino gets a bunch of people together and murders them in a cabin. It’s basically the weird ADD child of Django Unchained and Agatha Christies’ And Then There Were None… but also real violent.

Revenant – Leonardo Decaprio stars as a man whose son is brutally murdered and who himself is brutally mostly murdered and he seeks revenge on said murderer and mostly murderer.

Merry Christmas everyone!

 

So to some up we have:  Child murder/revenge, Woman struggling to make it in mans world, crappy 90’s remake, Quentin Tarentino in the Woods, and NFL concussions.

Merry Christmas???

So there you go guys, December. And 16 days to Star Wars… just in case you were wondering.

Judging Covers 7-16-2015

Well hey internet, and welcome to the party. So about a week ago Comic-con was a thing and there has been a lot of hull and ballou made about some of the various trailers that came out that week so here is a famous, fabulous, and frivolous segment that we have called Judging Covers in which I go around and make snap judgements about things that I have done very little research on!!

Sisters –

Okay so this wasn’t a comic con trailer. But if you can’t stop and salute a Tina Fey and Amy Poehler movie what exactly are you doing with your life? Comedies are probably the toughest genre to do a trailer on because it’s pretty easy to make a hilarious comedy trailer just by dropping in your movies two best jokes. Sure those might be the only two good jokes actually in the movie but wasn’t that trailer hilarious??? It’s the movie equivalent of letting someone taste test a 4000 dollar bottle of wine, and then actually serving them a bottle of that wine with the wine removed and replaced by stagnant pond water in which resides a great white shark.

That said: Sisters looks great.

Basically the peanut butter and jelly of comedy.

Fantastic Four: 

Get ready to read this a lot: Still on the fence about this one. I liked this trailer, I like the cast, I like the fact that this movie seems to be taking itself more seriously, while at the same time having some fun characters and characterization. BUT, it’s still a fantastic four movie. The Fantastic four two of whom are less interesting copies of other heroes (Thing and the Invisible Woman) one of whom is an interesting character that we’ve seen A LOT of in other movies (the Human Torch) and the other of whom is a man with what is probably the worst super power in the recorded history of made up super-powers (being stretchy like a rubber band.) Couple that with the fact that the last two movies in this particular franchise were teeth numbingly bad and I have some MAJOR trust issues with this movie.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice 

Full honesty? I liked this trailer a lot. I think Ben Affleck makes a great Batman, I liked the fact that we may be exploring a little bit of the repercussions of Superman basically destroying an entire city in Man of Steel and then snapping that dudes neck like a kit kat bar. And I actually really liked our brief looks at Jesse Eissenbergs Lex Luther. It was a really solid trailer.

Do I think it’ll actually be a good movie??? Say it with me: Still on the fence about this one. I feel like it can be safely said that it will not be a great movie. Unless (and this isn’t gonna make a lot of sense) Lex Luther saves it. Cause we know who Batman and Superman will be in this universe. They will both be dark and growly and scowly and want to punch things. Not bad, but not entertaining people. I can’t relate at all to the fact that Superman is struggling with controlling his super powers… I have, in fact, the exact opposite problem. They will be there, their fights will be cool, but they will not take this movie from ‘meh’ (which it will probably be) to ‘good.’ The one guy who can do that is Lex Luthor. Cause Luthor can be very interesting as he struggles to find his place within a world that has suddenly completely changed the rules on him. He can also be a much needed injection of comic relief and (dare we say it) actual character energy. As weird as it is in this extremely dark and depressing world with incredibly gritty and depressed super heroes it could actually be the villain who brightens the world up for us some.

Though if you look at his hair too long, you will lose all will to live.

Anyway, I liked this trailer, I don’t think the movie will be great, but I also don’t think it will be a strawberry jelly filled train wreck. There’s even a chance (Jesse Eisenberg dependent) this movie could be pretty good.

 Suicide Squad – 

I’m actually 100 percent on bored with this movie. I like the idea of a team of super villains teaming up to save the ‘magical thing we’re saving today.’ Very on board with Will Smith as Deadshot who looks great and I’m sure will give the movie some heart, and the rest of the team around him seems like they’ll be a lot of fun to watch do their thing. Hopefully it’ll be a nice break from the norm for super hero movies and really DC comics have always had the best villains, so why not just let them out and let them do their thing. Could be a really good movie. But that’s not what you came here for I’m sure. You’re here for:

Micah’s Thoughts on the New Joker

Everyone knows I loved Heath Ledger’s joker. He was fantastic, perfect for the movie he was in, and it is a tragedy we didn’t get to see him do more. But, that particular time (sadly cut short though it was) has passed. We’ve got a new DC Universe, a new Batman, and it only stands to reason that we would get a new joker. So, how does Jared Leto do?? Well, first off let’s bear in mind that I’m pretty much working with roughly three lines of dialogue so I could be 100 percent wrong on this BUT assuming these three lines are actually how he does the whole thing: I’m on board.

I like the voice, I like that he didn’t just put on long green hair and try and be Heath Ledger and I like that he didn’t go straight comic book with it ether. What I was hoping was that we would get a brand new look at a character who their have been a ton of iterations of and that it would be more along Heath Ledger’s joker while at the same time not being a carbon copy and I think that’s what we’ve got. Though once again: three lines of dialogue.

So there you go guys!! I somehow managed to do four full trailer reviews and at some point in each of them fully admit that I have no idea what I was talking about!! Yup, it’s good to be back ladies and gentlemen. It’s good to be back.