Today's News: Aquaman won't settle for a Razzie

The slow week continues with only minor bits of news, in anticipation of the big Oscar bang no doubt:

Catan gaat bioscopen koloniseren

I've heard worse ideas for adaptations of games, board or video. Though most of either still fail to deliver decent movies, it's hard to deny. But at least Settlers of Catan seems to have more cinematic ingredients from which a proper movie can be distilled than the likes of Ouija or Tetris. You've got an enticing historical look, the potential of a sweeping plot of heroism and rivalry against insurmountable odds and the force of nature, plus dramatic elements like knights and bandits to spice things up a little. And of course, there's somewhat of a franchise potential, too. If the movie does become a success, there's the likes of expansion sets (Seafarers) or variations on the theme (Prehistory, or even more outlandish takes like Starfarers) to explore. And these days, every studio is aching to find franchises. Settlers of Catan might prove to become a solid movie. I just hope they don't throw in a silly random element that might alienate audiences from the original premise of the beloved game itself. Remember the response when Battleship felt the need to include aliens in the plot? I'd say Settlers of Catan has enough material going for it to do without such extra obstacles.

Jason Momoa's Aquaman onthuld

Now that shows like The Big Bang Theory have made a little too much fun of DC's King of the Seven Seas usual appearance and abilities, it comes as no surprise Aquaman needed a different, tougher look to overcome such popcultural bias. Casting Jason Momoa was a right choice in that regard, since you wouldn't want to get into a conflict with him about his style of dressing, it might be bad for your health. So no orange shirt, no green pants, and no riding sea beasts as a mode of transportation. You get a darker, grittier Aquaman, a regal appearance that screams 'don't screw with me!'. Basically it ends up looking like Khal Drogo with a Poseidonic motif, trident and fishy scales and all. It works I suppose, though it's not particularly coulourful or inspired. As for the meaning of the mysterious tagline 'Unite the Seven', beats me. I'm not into DC's comics enough to care to unravel its intentions. I'm a Marvel guy. I'll wait and see what exactly Momoa's Aquaman will be up to when he does his thing in theaters.

Winnaars Razzies bekendgemaakt

It appears the Razzies have found a new filmmaker to victimize. Though Michael Bay still won his fair share of awards, as is usual, it was Kirk Cameron that took most of the beating for his apparently dismal Saving Christmas, which was fortunately spared a Dutch release. I've never heard of the movie or the actor behind it, but when I see this flick on IMDb's Bottom Top 100 on the number 1 spot with a rating of 1.5, I get the picture. Okay, so there might be some hating hype surrounding the project that I don't know the details of. I'm not into Christmas themed films anyway, so I'll refrain from checking this one out. I've seen enough of these Razzie nominated movies for one year. I had to sit through both TMNT and the latest Trannies flick, which was quite enough of a borefest for me. Other than that, there's no real surprises among the winners here. Obviously Ben Affleck redeemed himself in the eyes of the Golden Raspberry Award Foundation, as he has already done so in the eyes of everybody else. Who knows, maybe Kirk Cameron will do the same some day, as the Razzies find somebody new to pick on.

Today's News: bunch of trailers & bunch of Razzies

So far I have succeeded in my goal to post at least one bit of news on MS every day. Here are the most recent results of that:

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/158620/nieuwe_trailer_avengers_age_of_ultron

Age of Ultron definitely promises to be a darker movie than the much more lighthearted and cheerful first Marvel ensemble movie that preceded it. Makes sense, in this universe of ramifications and consequences. The general audience probably hasn't kept close track of events as much as the legions of fans have (myself included), but the current state of affairs in the MCU is no cause for more playful superhero shenanigans. Serious stuff has gone down, you know. S.H.I.E.L.D. is in shambles, HYDRA has its tentacles firmly in place wherever there are power bases of mankind to be found, Loki secretly rules Asgard and Iron Man has lost most of his fortune, respect and technology. And then there's those various Avengers we haven't heard from for the least three years, not to mention several new names in their roster to shake things up. Obviously, these people have a lot on their plate and Joss Whedon has no intention of making things too easy for them. The shit is going to hit the fan and previously mounted tensions will erupt. From the look of things, Iron Man will have to take the blow of most of it, after his plan of creating artificial peacekeepers goes horribly awry and the rest of the team has to clean up his mess. However, as per the comic book lore, it seems the team will have to worry about their unpredictable and uncontrollable comrade the Hulk the most. Whatever the outcome, the team will be shaken up severely and it's conceivable that for every new member introduced, a veteran will step down. And we wouldn't have it any other way, since such dramatic results make the MCU the ever interesting place that is.

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/158629/remake_escape_from_new_york_van_start

This project has been in the works for many years, though it can't be said a lot of actual work was done on it. I'm not surprised it still will happen one day though. This movie has a definite high concept but is obscure enough for the general audience not to be aware of its status as a remake. And it has some clear franchise potential, allowing the main character to escape from other places once he's out of New York in any number of follow-ups. I'm glad originator John Carpenter is involved to some extent, though I know full well 'executive producer' and 'creative influence' can mean any number of things, many of which are not as involving as they sound. I'm pretty sure this remake isn't going to be anywhere near as gritty and grimy as its predecessor. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the studio notched the rating down from R to PG-13, so as to reach a wider audience for that franchise they're aiming for. Too bad, but I can live with it. I'm more interested in how this new dystopian future of theirs is going to play out. The bleak future from the original's 1997 has come and gone and it happily proved not to be as bad as advertized. Nevertheless, there's ample social anxieties in the present to capitalize on and I hope Carpenter will utilize his 'creative influence' steadily enough to ensure this new future is gonna be dirty and rotten but still a heck of a lot of over-the-top fun, as it proved in 1981.

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/158596/trailers_nieuwe_series_the_messengers_en_izombie

Ignoring the trailer for The Messengers, which looks like typically ludicrous Christian Apocalyptic drivel, I have to ask what's up with the current trend of making the naturally abject notion of a walking cannibal corpse a thing to be romanced and sexualized? I can understand how that works for those other undead in popular fiction, the vampires, since they're normally not in a state of decomposition and generally use their powers of hypnotism to sexually lure their victims in for their blood, which can result in a lot of sultry sex. But a rotting body hellbent on devouring brains simply ought not to be sexy, which clearly doesn't stop folks from fantasizing about it and making TV shows out of it. I gotta say, with the right blend of relative humour the concept can work, as was evidenced in the fairly hilarious Warm Bodies. Can it work over a prolonged period of time rather than a two hour movie though? iZombie will have to prove it can. I gotta say, the female protagonist sure does look cute despite being dead. The zombies in this show clearly aren't as far gone physically as the majority of their cinematic brethren. Then again, the trailer suggests the main zombie is a bit of an anomaly, as she also has kept her ability to reason. That makes the whole zombie element of the show seem a lot less alarming. Her ongoing drive for consuming human flesh apparently isn't as strongly developed, as a job at the coroner suffices to keep that necessary flow of brains coming. Or there are much more people killed in town than ought to be usual, perhaps. I hope the struggle for humanity in the deteriorating zombie brain is gonna be handled as consistently and convincingly as the skeptic would demand, rather than the show quickly devolving into a buddy cop routine or an all-out romantic comedy, as the trailer also indicates could very well be the case.

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/158630/michael_bay_films_grote_kanshebber_razzies

Few surprises here. It seems ripping on Michael Bay's movies - though often justified - is simply the socially expected and obligatory rather than the objective thing to do. As usual, the GRAF makes little secret of her disdain for the movies and actors she disses (though most of them deservedly so). When you list a title as 'Age of Ex-stink-tion', you can't be said to refrain from any emotional bias. I guess that just comes with an Award foundation that doesn't treat the movies it nominates, or itself for that matter, any serious. Maybe a more objective and refined sort of Worst Movies award foundation is in order to properly serve as a balance for the Oscar circus. Not that the likes of Michael Bay would care much: this particular object of movie mockery doesn't worry in the least about any damage to his reputation the Razzies may cause, considering his ongoing success at the boxoffice still has made him filthy rich and powerful in Tinsel Town. However, I would like to see some Razzie nominations that don't include Bay, Adam Sandler or Jennifer Aniston for a change. I guess the new category of Razzie Redeemers at least is a step in the right direction of the GRAF preventing making too strongly a mockery of itself.

And I'll also take a shot at predicting the winners:

Worst Movie: Transformers 4: Age of Extinction

Worst Actor: Adam Sandler / Blended

Worst Actress:  Cameron Diaz / The Other Woman en Sex Tape

Worst Supporting Actress: Nicola Peltz / Transformers: Age of Extinction

Worst Supporting Actor:  Kelsey Grammer / Expendables 3, Legends of Oz, Think Like a Man Too en Transformers: Age of Extinction

Worst Director: Michael Bay / Transformers: Age of Extinction

Worst Screen Combo: Transformers: Age of Extinction

Worst Script: Transformers: Age of Extinction / Ehren Kruger

Worst Remake, Rip-Off or Sequel: Annie

RAZZIE REDEEMER AWARD: Ben Affleck (from GIGLI to ARGO and GONE GIRL)

Today's Double News: this year's Razzies and some potential future candidates

Again, two bits of older news I didn't have time to post until today. You can blame the Oscars for that, just intervening with my regular routine like they own this blog.

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/154145/movie_43_en_after_earth_grote_winnaars_razzies

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/154137/_wachowskis_maken_mogelijk_nieuwe_matrix

You may not have been aware of it with all the Oscar festivities going on, as is the case every year, but there were some other movies around this weekend that got to win some awards. Not the ones they hoped for no doubt, but in both major winners' cases, I really like to think the makers of these films were self-aware enough to realize they would never win Oscars with these crappy products they were unleashing on an unsuspecting audience. If not, the Razzies should have unwarped their sense of reality. The only movie I felt won undeservedly was The Lone Ranger: it was far from perfect, but definitely not in the same league of shittiness as Grown Ups 2. No wins for Adam Sandler this time though, but let's face it, both After Earth and Movie 43 proved at least as abysmal as anything Mr. Sandler ever did, if not more so. Plus, maybe there was a little too much Sandler ripping going on at the Razzies and it was simply time for a change. Sandler must make do with the various nominations this time, and I'm sure that'll agree with him. I was unlucky enough to see After Earth and witness the devastating effect it had on appreciating humanity first hand. Since I too voted it my worst film of 2013 (so did the rest of the gang at MovieScene, and most everybody else), I wholeheartedly agree with these wins, and I hope those sequel plans will now go down the drain for good. On the other hand, I am fortunate enough not to have seen all of Movie 43: a friend of mine semi-forced me to watch a single scene - he had to share his trauma with others to beter cope with it, and who am I to turn down a pal in need? Though afterwards I decided to strongly reconsider my eagerness to help out needful buddies to spare myself future grief - and it was so painfully, embarrassingly and grotesquely unfunny I have yet to mentally get over it. It wasn't even so much the pure non-existence of humour, it was the fact that top actors like Kate Winslet and Hugh Jackman would debase themselves like this for all the world to behold. I don't buy for a moment the consideration that these folks thought they were shooting a scene of singular hilarity for a second. I know that actors who often star in heavy dramatic presentations feel the need to occasionally indulge in more lighthearted fare to stay sane, but there must definitely be limits. This excuse for a movie should be the type of film that breaks careers, and in Movie 43's film, there's a lot of excellent careers to shatter. I guess humanity just collectively decided to ignore the matter as best it could in the hope this film would vanish from memory, but that one single scene unfortunately has not exited mine. Thankfully there's other terribly lousy films to try and unremember too, hopefully rendering Movie 43 the stuff of grey memory matter, and there will definitely be more bad flicks in the future.

Like new Matrix sequels/prequels. Like anybody is actually wanting those. The Matrix trilogy ended over ten years ago and mankind has let it go since then. As it should, considering it was an exercise in how not to follow-up an instant classic, groundbreaking film. Okay, so Reloaded and Revolutions get bashed harder than they deserve on their own merits, but they're still not exactly good movies and showed there's little more worthwile novel stuff to mine from that fantastic first film. Of course, as this is a major franchise - or was, back then - there's always the opportunity for more cash to be milked out of its recognizable name, which is what the big Hollywood studios especialize in nowadays. And the prospect of precious money is undoubtedly the only reason the Wachoskis are on board this project. You can't tell me they honestly think more Matrix movies is a good idea themselves. Just look at that story proposal alone. It offers little new stuff. The emergence of the Matrix has already been explored in some detail in The Animatrix, while the rest of the concept is just a blatant rehash of the events of the first trilogy. Then again, maybe these rumours are indeed just that, and the story will focus on something else entirely. Nevertheless, you'll understand if I remain extremely skeptical about all of this.

Today's Column: why I like the Razzies better than the Oscars

Here's another column I wrote for MovieScene this weekend:

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/153493/column_de_rustgevende_razzies

I must admit inspiration came to me rather late in the game for this one. As a result it's certainly not my best piece, though when I did find a subject it was penned a lot faster than most other columns so far. I firmly believe in the Razzies as a rather stable, quiet ritual that is a welcome diversion from all the other Award fests plaguing the early months of each new year. Because it is solely about bad movies - the definition of which admittedly leaves a little to be desired occasionally, as in the case of The Lone Ranger this year - nobody cares so vigorously as when good movies are concerned. Amidst all the politics, anger and frustration surrounding the Academy Awards and the general discord which ensues when their winners are revealed, there's no such conflict over the Razzies. There's no need to account for bad taste after all: truly bad movies (though often still enjoyable on purpose) are generally considered just that, while defending or debunking the good qualities of a film, especially compared to other good films, causes much more consternation and lack of consensus. Few people will claim they thought Gravity was a bad film, but the level of its 'goodness' is open to questioning when comparing it with other movies that are considered good. Is Her a better movie than 12 Years a Slave? Who's to tell? Is Grown Ups 2 a horrendous picture? Yes, definitely! You have none of the tiresome hype you witness for two months around the Oscars at the Razzies. Plus, the Razzies don't take themselves seriously, while the Oscars do too strongly and not always deservedly so. The Razzies simply are a much more honest ritual, without agressively demanding as much attention from a movie lover as the Oscars sometimes so irritatingly do. So I'm all for Adam Sandler making more movies, just to keep the Razzies going. As long as I don't have to watch them.