loonyblog.

Quote of the evening?

In between promoting designers and raving about the competition, celebrities had to listen to some very odd -- and even insulting -- questions.

"Before you were a movie star, you were a serious actor," said ABC's Chris Connelly to Orlando Bloom.

A loss, but a good one.

See, in 1996, I lost because in several categories, I went with what I thought should win, rather than what would win. It's a mistake I've never repeated. This year, while I lost, I managed to get every single major category correct. The only ones I missed were score, song, costume design and cinematography. Unfortunately for me, my father got three of those right (he managed to miss only one this year, a feat to which I tip my hat).

So I graciously accept this defeat. Next year I hopefully won't be as distracted, and will be able to spend more time on research.

So beautiful...should have sent...a poet.

Both movies were simply stunning. Hero, with its bright, bright colors and sweeping camera movements was just jaw-dropping (particularly the fight among the leaves). And Days of Heaven (in my opinion, the best looking film ever made) just popped off the screen. And because DoH was shot in a 16:9 aspect ratio, it ran totally full-screen (like most recent films, Hero was shot in a larger aspect ratio, so it's shown anamorphic, with slight bars on the top and bottom of the screen). The scene with the locusts and fire in Days of Heaven should be seen on every HDTV ever made.

I went with the Sony KD-34XS955 for a few reasons. One, that I only have room in my wall unit for a 34 - 42 inch screen. And secondly, because of the image quality on all sources. This thing makes regular television look great (except for things taped off the WB, as that comes in really dark for some really annoying reason), Xbox games look amazing, and DVDs naturally look great as well. Plus it was relatively cheap for an HDTV. LCDs, rear-projection televisions and plasmas may get all the press, but believe me, if you can support the obscene weight (this thing weighs 200 pounds!) it's worth it.

The one thing I haven't tried on here yet is a pure HD signal. Time Warner's being their usual pain in the neck, and it looks like I won't be able to get a Cable Card until Friday. This year's Oscars will have to be in SD instead. I'll live.

Song of the South.

Still, if handled with the utmost care, this could be an interesting DVD release. But even if this is seen as a positive thing, I don't think we'll be seeing any of the more controversial Looney Toons cartoons released any time soon, like "Angel Puss" (featuring Li'l Sambo) or probably the most offensive one ever made, "Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips".

My 2005 Oscar predictions.

Continue reading "My 2005 Oscar predictions."

Oscar 2005.

As I haven't been following the craziness over the past few weeks with my usual fervor, I'm not as confident this year as I usually am...still, a bet is a bet, and I don't intend to lose (and the last few years have been painfully close, too). Stay tuned.

Movie review quote of the year.

"Saying Uwe Boll’s Alone in the Dark is better than his 2003 American debut House of the Dead is akin to praising syphilis for not being HIV."

"Alone in the Dark co-stars perpetual party-girl Tara Reid as an archeologist. That alone should give you some clue as to how bad this movie is."

At long last, Dune!

The Dune: Extended Edition will be released in a metal snap case (SRP $27.98). 2 versions of the film will be included... a 137-minute theatrical version, and the 177-minute extended edition. BOTH will be available in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen (which would mark the first time the extended edition was available in widescreen). The theatrical edition will feature both Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 audio, while the extended edition will be Dolby Digital 5.1 only. Extras will include never before seen "behind-the-scenes" footage, documentaries on the special effects, visual design and costumes, deleted scenes, original photographs and artwork from the set (newly resurrected from personal collections) and more.

Ma Kent is cast.

Meet Jimmy Olsen (no, really this time).

Believe it or not, this was the best picture I could find of the guy (c/o Yahoo Movies). In everything else, he was either dressed up like a Jungle native, or decked out for a KISS concert.

Also cast, according to Entertainment Weekly, is James Marsden, who will be playing Richard White, son of Perry, and love interest for Lois Lane. Whiney (and occasionally weepy) Cyclops aside, I like Marsden, so this is an okay choice with me.

Oscar nominations.

Let's start with the actor categories: I was pleasantly surprised to see Jamie Foxx nominated for both Ray and Collateral. I haven't actually seen Ray (I try to see as few Oscar movies prior to the awards as possible...it throws off my predictions), but I did see Collateral, and thought the acting was top notch. It was nice to see Thomas Haden Church and especially Virginia Madsen nominated for Sideways (which is probably my favorite film of the year, although I've seen so few that I'm really not qualified to make that call), although the snubbing of Paul Giamatti is a real shame here. I was a little disappointed to see Annette Bening nominated for Being Julia, not because I dislike Bening by any means, it's just that particular role seemed a little over-dramatic to be a serious contender. Having said all that, the actress category is really interesting this year, with Bening's old rival Hilary Swank back for a second round, Catalina Sandino Moreno and Imelda Staunton both being serious contenders, and then there's the wild card that is Kate Winslet.

For the screenplay awards, I found myself scratching my head over the nomination of Before Sunset for adapted screenplay. Since when did having a separate story credit qualify as adaptation? It's not like this is an adaptation from a printed story...it's a story written specifically for the movie! Oh well, whatever. At least Sideways was nominated for adapted and The Incredibles for original screenplay.

The documentary category shows itself to be forward-thinking for the third year in a row. The days of the World War II documentary being the easy win seem to be behind us, with Tupac: Resurrection and Super Size Me among the nominees. I was actually surprised that Joe Berlinger's Metalica: Some Kind of Monster was overlooked here.

The others: the music categories are downright sad this year, particularly among the nominees for original song...if either Shrek 2 or Shark Tale wins for animated feature I'll lose faith in humanity...hallelujah for the nominations A Very Long Engagement received...visual effects is unusually tough to call this year, as is the makeup category and the costume category is pretty weak as well, with only one real period piece among the lot (and not a very good one at that).

All in all, not a bad list of nominees. Stay tuned for my full picks as we get closer to Oscar night.

Bizarre.

Oh wait, no. Ewwwww...spam.

Say hello to Perry White.

Laurie seems like a fine, non-offensive casting choice, although naturally we'll still have to wait and see if they decide to go in some kind of weird direction with the character, such as the weird Elvis obsession in the Perry White on Lois & Clark ("great shades of Elvis!" indeed).

Regardless, Laurie joins Brandon Routh as Clark/Superman, Kate Bosworth as Lois Lane, Shawn Ashmore as Jimmy Olsen and Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor. Not a bad cast at all. Here's a look at the Perry White-to-be (photo courtesy of the Hugh Laurie FAQ):

So who's left to cast? Unless they decide to skip the origin entirely there's still Jonathan and Martha Kent (even if they don't skip it, these two will probably be in there somewhere), there's still the possibility of an appearance by Kal-El and Lara (although let's hope to god it's not as excruciating as Marlon Brando's zillion dollar atrocity in Superman: The Movie), and beyond that, it could be any character from the Superman stable. Lana Lang? Pete Ross? Emil Hamilton? Brainiac? Metallo? Lobo? Supergirl? Darkseid? (Just for the record, if Darkseid is ever in a live action movie and not played by Michael Ironside, I will start an organized revolt). Filming is supposedly starting soon, so any casting should be leaking out in the next month or so.

Lex locked, let loose the loons.

The question of course, is which one Bryan Singer & Co. are going with...will this be Lex the business man, as has been the case in the comics and animated series for the last decade or so? (Not to mention Smallville). Or will we see a return to the wisecracking evil genius Lex, as was depicted in the Gene Hackman-era films? Personally, I'd like to see a mix of the two. I've grown to like the more serious Lex, but there's always going to be a place in my heart for the classic version. I'm also going to be curious to see if they go with bald Lex, or opt for a revisionist look at the character (IE with hair), similar to the one John Shea depicted on Lois & Clark (although let's hope they leave out the cornball role played by the otherwise great Tony Jay).

In any event, Spacey's in, and that's good news indeed. Here's a pretty Lex-esque photo of the man (picture courtesy of Criminal Grace):

V for vindication.

Beyond that however, I find the tag line pretty cool as well: "Remember, remember the 5th of November." That's probably the film's release date (11/05/05), but it's also Guy Fawkes Day, and a line from the poem written about that day:

Remember remember the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason and plot.
I see no reason why gunpowder, treason
Should ever be forgot.

P for Portman.

In any event, I really, really, really hope they pick the right voice to play V (and since you never actually see the man behind the mask, it really is primarily a voice they're casting). I always pictured someone with a very theatrical voice in the role...V is, after all, a vaudeville-esque character (he says so himself). My first choice would probably be Avery Brooks, good ol' Captain Sisko from Deep Space Nine. This isn't just me being a DS9 fanboi (which I most certainly am) -- Brooks is a classically trained actor with just the right amount of theatricality. Also, the comic never actually says why V was in that internment camp. In the comic that's a perfectly acceptable literary device, but whoever is cast in the role will inevitably give off some kind of suggestion as to the background of the character. Putting an african american in the role gives a reason without coming right out and saying why (for those who haven't read it, in the book, minorities, homosexuals and other "deviants" are rounded up by an oppressive English government and put into camps).

But of course, I doubt they'll cast a relatively unknown actor like Brooks. My more mainstream picks would be people like Laurence Fishburne (again, a classically trained african american actor), Patrick Stewart (again with the Star Trek reference, but he's certainly got the theatrical background) or even Wesley Snipes.

Needless to say, I'm on the edge of my seat with curiosity. While Superman is the adaptation I'm following the closest (well, duh), this is a near-second. I think the Watchowski brothers can handle this well (even if they are only producing) and the material is ripe for adaptation. I think a stage adaptation would have been great, but short of that, this could be worthy of its source material.

I hope.

Is this Lois Lane?

The only thing I've seen her in so far is The Rules of Attraction, and that wasn't the most in-depth of roles (although I do remember her looking good), and she's definitely a bit on the young side at just 22. Still, while she's not my first choice, I won't be offended if this turns out to be true. It's still much better casting than Kirsten Dunst as Mary Jane, or Kristin Kreuk as Lana Lang (sorry, but although I've come to live with it, even after all this time, I still think she was miscast).

Also mentioned on Superman-V is that Shawn Ashmore (that's Iceman in X-Men/X2), has been cast as Jimmy Olsen. Again, not bad at all, although it would be odd to see a Jimmy Olsen who's actually older than Lois Lane (I would assume the actors would be playing younger and older respectively).

WTF?

OSCAR winner Steven Spielberg will bring one of the toy phenomenons of the 1980s to the big screen - generating a booming adult collectors market for the robots known as Transformers.

The director has announced he will follow next year's The War of the Worlds with a live-action tale of the mechanical heroes who disguise themselves as cars, trucks and jets.

My guess is that in the coming months we'll hear about John Woo's new Go-Bots movie, Michael Mann's Voltron, Sam Raimi's Bionic Six and of course, Quentin Tarantino's Mr. T and the T-Force.

Back that up a second.

Citing Chow's wife, Jasmin Chan Wui-nin, Chinese-language newspaper Apple Daily said Chow will play the famous 15th century Chinese pirate Cheung Po Tsai for the second and third installments of the film.

Chow will team up with members of the original cast including Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Geoffrey Rush and Keira Knightley along with newly joining Keith Richards as the father of Depp's character.

Oh dear god, no!

Superman cast.

At only 25 he's a bit younger than I'd like, although Christopher Reeve was only 26 when he made the first Superman, so Routh can certainly grow into the role. The age thing will have one strange side effect -- the actor playing Superman as an adult in the movie will be younger than the actor playing Superman as a teenager on television (Tom Welling is 27). Still, I'm pleased with this casting. Now comes the all-important casting of Lois Lane and Lex Luthor. I don't think it's going to happen, but I'm still holding out for Selma Blair as Lois Lane. Although I must say, as absurd as her presence on the show has been, I'm sort of liking Erica Durance as Lois on Smallville. The role is silly as can be, but she plays it well.

Forever Superman.

Needless to say, Reeve was my childhood hero. He made us all believe a man could fly, but he also embodied the role with an effortless charm that you can't fake. What I really liked about Christopher Reeve as I grew older is that unlike many actors who were type-cast and grew bitter about the role that made them famous, Reeve seemed to actually understand and respect what it meant to be Superman on the silver screen. He was a larger-than-life hero to so many people around the world and didn't just brush it off as so many other actors did.

In his later years, Reeve gained a new level of respect and admiration for putting a public face on disability. Despite his near-fatal accident that left him paralyzed, he never wavered, and never stopped fighting for new forms of research to help not just himself, but all victims of spinal cord injuries. He also became an outspoken crusader for stem cell research, and fought for widespread health and disability coverage in this country.

On a personal level, I'm sad because we'll never see Christopher Reeve walk again. I never doubted that I'd see that happen some day, and far more importantly, he never did either. As I said on this site in one of my earliest posts, I believe in the idea of Superman, and that will outlive us all. Christopher Reeve the man has passed away, but his image will live forever and his work lives on with the Chrstopher Reeve foundation. I think he'd be proud of both of those.

I heart Criterion.

That's not grime on my scanner...the art is done that way intentionally to look aged. It's a great effect.

God bless those people at Criterion. Sniff. As an added plus, over the weekend I sold my original Videodrome DVD back to GameStop to get credit towards my pre-order of Fable. Life, she is good.

Strange things I learned from audio commentaries.

Despite the fact that it's since become a first person shooter staple (going back as far as the original Wolf 3D), the chaingun wielded by Jesse Ventura in the original Predator was hardly practical. For one thing, it weighed so much that there were safety lines holding it upright when it was in use. But that's just one of many problems. Another is that it turned so fast, they had to crank it down just so it would show up on film!

But probably the nicest factoid, is that it only held enough bullets for five seconds of fire. The chaingun was intended to be mounted on a jeep, not carried, as it is in the film. Because of this, it was impossible to have any serious amount of ammo. There were two guys behind Ventura with bullets for the weapon at all times. Thanks to that stupid-fast firing rate, at the end of each take, the actor was buried up to his ankles in shells.

So cool. Yet so impractical

Whoever wins, fans lose.

Continue reading "Whoever wins, fans lose."

Attention anyone in Seattle...

Strange things I learned from audio commentaries.

According to the commentary by Terrys Jones & Gilliam, in the original draft of the screenplay that eventually became Monty Python and the Holy Grail, the Holy Grail was found in Harrod's in the Holy Grail section. And there was much rejoicing.

When you think about it, that makes total sense. Or at least, it makes about as much sense as anything in that movie, perhaps a bit more. I mean, where else would it be?

DVD overkill.

For the last six months or so (seriously, it's that big) I've been making my way through all the extras in Fox's absolutely brilliant Alien Quadrilogy set, which despite the name, is without a doubt the best DVD set ever made. But what's important about the Quadrilogy isn't that it's got nine discs for four films, it's that everything in here is super high-quality.

Each of the four Alien movies has both the original and a separate, special-edition (not director's cut) version, which contains extra and/or alternate footage. Every movie has a great multi-person commentary track, and each movie has its own disc of extras, containing a slew of documentaries, artwork, screenplays and archival material. On top of all of that, there's a ninth disc containing the extras from the old Alien and Aliens laserdisc sets, plus miscellaneous documentaries about the whole series.

As a long-time DVD owner/collector, I've seen tons of special edition releases, and I've come to appreciate a really nicely put together set of extras. The Quadrilogy screams quality, and it's not just a case where Fox gathered everything they could find and shoved them onto a bunch of DVDs. As much as I love the Lord of the Rings DVDs, the four disc SE for The Two Towers was already scraping the barrel, as the first set filled one of its discs with tons of general stuff about the entire series. What's left for the last movie? Got me. (Maybe that's why they haven't announced it yet).

I find it highly unlikely that there's really enough decent content to fill up ten discs for The Matrix films. The movies aren't long enough to be spread across two discs each, which means every movie will need to take up 3.3 discs on its own, and let's face it, even the most die-hard Matrix fan won't be that interested in all that junk. WB should concentrate on creating higher-quality content on less discs instead of competing for the largest box on the shelf.

But then again, I couldn't care either way. I didn't like the first movie enough to bother with any of its special edition releases (of which there were several), and certainly won't bother with this.

Awesome.

It's a mock-trailer, of course, and not a real film. And it probably wouldn't work as a real film, so it's just as well. But it's such a fanboi's wet dream, that it has to be seen to be believed. The film depicted in the trailer is an amalgam of various plotlines from both universes, but it's basically a mix of the President Lex storyline mushed together with various scenes from various animated series and the Superman and Batman movies.

Much like Batman: Dead End, the production's top-notch, or at least, it is for a fan film. Heck, for a fan film, it's downright amazing, even more so than Dead End because of all the different stuff involved here. Go check it out. I still think a Batman vs. Superman movie is a bad idea, but this? This is different. I'd go see this movie in a heartbeat.

SuperSinger

The spectacular Spider-Man (2).

Continue reading "The spectacular Spider-Man (2)."

SuperBay?

While I'm not the biggest fan of Michael Bay's work in general, I do think that The Rock is one of the best pure action movies I've ever seen (and I've seen a whole lot of 'em). Michael Bay is an exciting director, and really, the reason why movies like Armageddon are so painfully dull isn't his fault, it's the screenplay. The Rock had a great screenplay, which Bay played to perfectly. I can't say I've seen anything else from him that lived up to that potential, but with the right script, he could do a hell of a Superman movie. For the record, by "right script" I mean anything but JJ Abrams' script that was trashed so thoroughly at Aint' it Cool back in '02.

One other interesting thing about Michael Bay: his movies always have this sort of super-patriotic, gung ho military feel to them. While it'd be really easy to screw up, I think a Superman movie that focused on truth, justice and the American way wouldn't be half bad, if handled properly.

Christopher Walken's Superman?

On a slightly more depressing note, this list doesn't hold a whole lot of promise. Looking over the list, there are a couple of actors I'd find acceptable to play Superman: Brendan Fraser, for all his goofiness and George of the Jungle-ness, would actually be a somewhat decent choice, as would Jude Law. The problem with most of the people on this list however is that while they may make a somewhat decent Superman, they'd make an absolutely horrible Clark Kent. That was the key to Michael Keaton's Batman performance, and why I think he was such a good choice. Yes, his cleft chin looked a little strange in that Batsuit, but he was a really likable Bruce Wayne.

Can you imagine David Boreanaz as Clark Kent? Or Josh Hartnett? Or Ashton Kutcher? Ugh. I think Jude Law could do both roles, and Fraser could probably do it reasonably well, but they're the only two on that list capable of it. Actually, I think Rupert Everett would do a great job in both roles, but somehow I don't think that will ever happen.

Four discs of love.

Please don't suck...

Criterion, I could kiss you.

Here are some of the extras on the disc (a full list is up at Criterion's site):

• New high-definition digital transfer, with restored image and sound and enhanced for widescreen televisions
• Audio commentaries by director David Cronenberg, actors James Woods and Deborah Harry, and director of photography Mark Irwin
• Camera, a short film starring Videodrome’s Les Carlson, written and directed by David Cronenberg in 2000 as part of the 25th anniversary celebration of the Toronto Film Festival
• Forging the New Flesh, a new half-hour documentary featurette by video effects artist Michael Lennick about the creation of Videodrome’s landmark video and prosthetic makeup effects, featuring new interviews with Rick Baker and others
• Samurai Dreams, the complete and unedited faux Japanese AV feature seen in the film
• Fear on Film, a 26-minute roundtable discussion from 1982 between filmmakers David Cronenberg, John Carpenter, John Landis, and Mick Garris about censorship, special effects makeup, and horror cinema

How to rip DVD audio commentaries.

Anyway, until this week, ripping was a fairly convoluted procedure. Using a PC (as opposed to my desktop Mac), I would extract the audio tracks in question to AC3 format using DVD Decrypter, convert them to WAV using Ciler's AC3 Tool, and then convert them to DVD using Musicmatch, which I would also use to add in proper ID3 tags and rename the files to a more acceptable format. This system, although a bit clunky, worked fine. But thankfully, I've finally stumbled upon an easy-to-use alternative that's native to OS X (yes, I know I could have used OSex all along, but that was an even worse procedure).

This method's not free, but it works great, and I've even got some fancy touches thrown in for good measure, so read on for complete directions.

Continue reading "How to rip DVD audio commentaries."

Say what!?

I've been meaning to write a piece about the jumbled mess that Smallville's mythology has become (and the sudden sorta-but-not-quite-entirely appearance of Kara Zor-El in the season finale just added to that), but this just takes the cake. For what it's worth, the fact that a quote attributed to producer Alfred Gough misuses the word "it's" suggests to me that this is less-than-trustworthy news.

Let's hope so, because personally, I'd like to see a Superman movie that wasn't tied to some of the sillier plot twists in Smallville. I like the show, but that would be such a burden on any movie.

Update: Well that didn't take long...The Superman Homepage contacted Gough directly, and it turns out that those quotes are indeed a whole lot of bunk. Typoed bunk, at that.

Merchandising run amok.

But then, I guess I shouldn't talk...I was totally drooling all over these super deformed Alien figures recently. But then, that's different. Those are really, really cool. Ditto for the Predator and Army of Darkness figures. Those rock. It's totally different.

Yeesh.

Here's an excerpt from Eurogamer's article that explains why the game has this title:

The idea apparently is that Goldfinger is locked in a war with Dr. No for control of a massive criminal organisation (we can guess which), and that your aspiring henchman gets to rise through the ranks, customising and upgrading his villainous abilities along the way, and fighting alongside or battling against various Bond characters including the aforementioned Ms. Onatopp, bowler-hat-chucking Oddjob, Scaramanga (he of the Golden Gun fame), Pussy Galore, and of course Goldfinger himself.

So then, you might be wondering, why is it called GoldenEye? Because, it says here, your nameless henchman lost an eye in an encounter with Dr. No, and Goldfinger's technicians replaced it with... a... golden... eye... Nice one, EA.

The funny thing is that it sounds like a good idea for a game, so why on earth did EA bother swiping the title like that?

Trailer report: 4/04.

Continue reading "Trailer report: 4/04."

Drool.

But the promise of dual layer burning is too hard to ignore. As I've said here before, I've taken to archiving shows from my TiVo onto DVD, but because I can only burn to single-layer discs, there's a two-hour limit per disc. While I recently picked up some dual-sided single layer DVD-R discs, it still means that for maximum quality, I'm forced to burn a two hour movie as a flippy-disc, and nobody wants that.

I'm guessing that Apple's next version of iDVD will support dual-layer burning (for up to four hours on a single disc!) and their next superdrive will support dual layer DVD-Rs. And that for me, is the holy grail of DVD burning.