The First Batch From '06

The Producers
It was a movie. Then it was a musical. Now it's a movie again, but not a movie about the movie - it's a movie about the musical. I suspect it will soon be a documentary about the movie of the musical or even a documentary about the transition from movie to movie with a brief musical interlude.
It's all so very greedy.

Really, my only problem with this film is Matthew Broderick. Nathan Lane makes Bialystock his own. It's clear they wanted Lane to look like Zero Mostel but he didn't *just* do Zero, he made it his own. Broderick, on the other hand, spent the entire movie doing Gene Wilder and failing miserably. There's a good reason Gene Wilder is 'the one and only' Gene Wilder.

Also, Broderick is stiff in this roll. Yes, I understand that he plays an uptight accountant and that Bloom will never be loosey-goosey, but Broderick looked like he had a metal rod for a spine during the dance numbers. Even at the end, once he's discovered fun and had sex with Uma Thurman (Ulla), he is still stiff as a board.

I give concession to the fact that he is dancing next to Nathan Lane and anyone would look bad next to Nathan Lane, but Broderick's brand of stiff doesn't even come off as anxious or petrified (a la Wilder's 1968 performance)... the man just can't dance with grace. You can almost see him moving his lips while he counts the steps.

If you REALLY wanted to see the Broadway show but couldn't finagle tickets... this, according to my mother, is a fine substitution. For the record: She also thinks Matthew Broderick did a "wonderful job."


The Ringer
I don't really know what I was expecting when I went to see this one. Part of me thought they would cop out and spend 90 min making fun of the disabled cast, but knowing that The Ringer has the blessing of the Special Olympics, part of me hoped they would turn it around and have Knoxville be the butt of most jokes.
That latter was the case.

This film does a fantastic job of making sure EVERYONE is portrayed as a person. In fact, the humor in this film doesn't linger on the differences between Knoxville and the Olympians. As soon as Knoxville is in the Olympic dorms it becomes an ensemble comedy. And, damnnit, this movie is funny.

It's not going to go down in history as one of the greats but, most will agree, it's funnier than Club Dread (albeit wit fewer titties).


Fun with Dick & Jane
It's a formulaic remake and an adultish vehicle for Jim Carrey.
He and Tea Leoni play well off of each other, but there isn't anything special in their chemistry (the robbery scene with the funny voices is pretty good).
This movie does make a solid jab at the recent Employee Pension Theft scandals. Although, they set the movie in the mid 90's so they could make lots of 'ironic' jokes about how the dirty crook from AmeriBank (the company in this movie) is going to go be a VP at Enron.
meh.


Wolf Creek
It takes WAY to long for stuff to go wrong. There is a romantic subplot that doesn't need to be and a bunch of character building that is wasted on a slasher flick.

I have to give credit to the three types of heroes/victims depicted in this movie. No one is embarrassingly stupid, though one girl can't stop panicking and it, of course, gets her killed.

Once she gets rolling, Wolf Creek does okay. There are some don't-run-upstairs moments but, overall, a reasonably solid horror flick.


Bloodrayne
I've said it before and I'll say it again...
Fuck Uwe Boll!
Ben Kingsley, Michael Madsen, and Michelle Rodriguez... who did you piss off that this is the only work you could get? If your agent told you to align yourself with Uwe Boll before he 'blew up'... stab your agent in the eye with a spent Sharpie, kick his son in the balls, fire his ass, and move back to Nebraska. You're not allowed to act anymore.

Guinevere Turner... how the hell were you involved in writting the screenplay for American Psycho!?! The only thing worse than Uwe Boll's directing was the writting. Be ashamed.

I leave you with a sign of the apocalypse... Uwe Boll's next film.
I know they aren't A-list, but, how the hell is Uwe Boll getting actors, of even this quality, to make his movies?!?

In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (pops)


Hostle
Another horror film that takes days to get to the horror.
The first act is over 45 minutes long.
This film isn't so much about people getting hacked up as it is about people getting tortured before they get hacked up.
Hostel isn't the great film that people are saying it is. This is the first horror flick that uses the world's hatred for Americans as a plotpoint. That, and Tarantino's name, are why people are shitting themselves over this movie.
It's good, but it's nothing to write home about.


Grandma's Boy
By all accounts, this movie should have sucked HARD.
It, as I'm sure you've inferred, doesn't.
I think this is the second crude-sex-comedy-for-adults (the first being The 40-Year Old Virgin). If you liked T40YOV, then you will probably dig G'sB. If you grew up with the Happy Madison stuff... you will also probably enjoy yourself.
This is pot jokes for the 30+ crowd.

Rumor Has It
I love the premise for this movie (a woman discovers that her family was the basis for The Graduate). It's too bad such a great premise only functions as a catalyst for a mediocre romantic comedy.

Some of the laughs are solid and the use of music for comedic effect is superb, but the romance stuff and the plot stuff are really lame.