I told you about the first. And the second. Here’s the third, starring recent event winner Lefty Phil himself!

The Osterman Weekend is quite the strange little movie. It’s adapted from a Robert Ludlum novel, it was Peckinpah’s final film, and it’s entire plot plays out even stranger. It’s about a tv news anchor who’s told that his friends are in fact Communists and that his house needs to be wired in order to sweat it out of them. Needless to say this is all a ruse, and it turns into a good old fashioned home invasion film, as only Peckinpah can make, with tons of slow motion, Rutger Hauer, the lovely Meg Foster, and Craig T. Nelson sporting a hilariously fake mustache. Suffice to say, I love the movie.

It’s now being remade by a fellow named Brian Kirk. I’m vaguely familiar with Game of Thrones (still weighing on whether I should blind buy the Blu-ray set, leaning towards picking it up.) but from what I’ve heard it’s got a lot of action, and he sounds like the best choice to remake the movie. It will probably be also closer to the original Ludlum novel, which I’ve heard isn’t the most coherent thing either. Either way the original movie isn’t some highly touted classic, so this remake shouldn’t get a lot of people up in arms over it.

The source article mentions that this film is a ways off, but it may be fast tracked if The Bourne Legacy is a hit, and judging from that amazing trailer featuring the amazing Renner, it should be a hit.

Here’s the trailer for the original film in case you’re curious about it.

Source: cinemablend

I had a blast the one time I spent (and may likely ever spend) watching the unrepentant silliness of Piranha 3D, which to me is the perfect modern exploitation movie… just slick enough and well-crafted to not be DTV, but just winkingly retarded enough to get away with all the dumb shit it wants to do.

The trailer for the extensively delayed sequel appears to promise more of the same, with an extra helping of insanity in the form of piranha’s that can break through steel and squeeze through house pipes. Looks like this will let the film to recapture the same silly mayhem of the first film, while also going after the smaller Slither-ish moments in bathtubs and teenage sex scenes. Take a look.

I do like “Hoffwatch.”

They brought back Chris Lloyd and Ving Rhames, and don’t seem to have skimped on the scale of the exploitation… what else could one ask from a sequel like this?

The film hits 3D theaters sometime this year but still appears to be in the “coming soon” zone.

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via /Film

It exists!

I’m certainly in. I like the scale of it, still seems like a ton of fun, but I’m wondering how boosted Michael Bay’s ego is feeling right now, because damn if this doesn’t look like a reskin of Dark of the Moon with comic book characters. Like, damn.

You can see the trailer on Apple Trailers

…or any of the YouTube embeds that will get pulled every five minutes today while Apple enjoys their debut.

A quick Hero Shot gif I tossed together for you guys..

Now dump your thoughts (you’ve got ’em) in the comments below!

My one question: As undoubtedly sexy as this trailer is… do you detect any sense of Avengerformers: Dark Side Of The Loki from this?

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"Shit, so much wood I've got to find..."

It’s not necessarily a great time to be anything less than a sure-thing blockbuster in Hollywood right now, and certainly an iffy time to be an expensive Biblical epic. That said, Darren Aronofsky’s Noah seems to have steadily progressed along in the last year without much doubt or major threats of plug-pulling that have plagued even his tiny films in the past. So while Paradise Lost is put on indefinite hiatus, Aronofsky might be rolling cameras on the story of Noah as soon as July.

The production hasn’t been entirely smooth though, as the lead-casting process has hit some snags with Christian Bale stepping away and (admittedly informal) talks with Mike Fassbender not going anywhere. But it turns out some rumors of negotiations with Russell Crowe have turned out to be true, and it looks as though contract signing will soon happen and put Russell Crowe on the biggest poop deck in history.

While Crowe cracked a joke about the rumors on twitter without substantively indicating how true they were at the time, Variety suggests that both parties are now “actively working on a deal” at this point. There’s no word about Liam Neeson working on a deal (his name was also tossed around in the earlier rumors).

It’s not hard to conceive of Crowe fitting into an Aronofsky film large or small, but I’ll wait till it’s 100% before I opine too much. Frankly, at this point, I just want this to roll cameras… I trust Aronofsky will get what he needs from whoever ends up donning the beard and collaborating with him.

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via JoBlo

The Coen Brothers are knee deep in production on their beatnik follow-up to True Grit, the fictionalized story of Dave van Ronk called Inside Llewyn Davis. The film stars Oscar Isaac (Drive) and it will feature a great supporting cast including Carey Mulligan, John Goodman, Justin Timberlake, and Garrett Hedlund. They’ll all be a part of the Coen Bro’s attempt to capture the folk trend in the 1960s New York music scene, which revolved around a few key figures and places that ended up playing big roles in the creation of the Gay Rights movement. To what degree any of that will play into the story I do not know, but our first pictures from the set suggest the Coens will have an authentic looking backdrop for whatever tale they’ve chosen.

First are a few pictures of some production street dressing.

Those are followed by some pictures of Isaac, Mulligan, and Timberlake in their outfits and facial hair scenarios. They look a little too put-together to be legit beatniks to me (I’m not suggesting they should be grungy, just a little less sparkly), but I can’t wait to find out why Isaac is frustratedly carrying that cat.

What’s your first impression?

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Source | JJ & Gothamist (via JoBlo)

“It’s a surety that Bill Murray will not do the movie…”

It feels like a long time coming, but hopefully this Dan Aykroyd interview with The Telegraph can finally put to bed speculation that’s been raging on since Viggo the Immortal took his final sliming. Murray’s out of Ghostbusters 3, and it’s hard to imagine he was ever in in the first place. Aykroyd also drops a few hints that this development might be a contributing factor in the demise of the project altogether. Quotes like “it’s in suspended animation” and “there is still interest from the studio” aren’t exactly ringing endorsements for a go picture.

My thoughts? Good. Great, in fact. At this point it feels like Dan Akroyd is the only person holding a torch for this film. And I include the fans in that as well. Outside of an animated film or a videogame, I have no interest in the continued adventures of these characters. Ghostbusters is an all-timer, and the sequel isn’t nearly as awful as some make it out to be. But the thought of seeing the Ghostbusters in old age is depressing. Worse is the rumor that this is intended to be a “passing of the torch” film. Ugh.

Here’s a recap of the spec script I sent to Sony years ago:

Scene 1: Torch
Scene 2: Passed
Scene 3: Boobs?

Your move, Sony.

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What is this? Every single day of the week at 11 EST, a new Graboid, a single moment grabbed from a random movie, appears on this site for you to guess the name of the film, share with your officemates, or discuss on our message boards. Sometimes the Graboid will be very easy and sometimes it’ll be as obscure as obscure gets. So read the news, read the reviews, and enjoy a screencap each and every day for your guessing pleasure.

Instead of just bumping the one article for the CHUD Podcast, I’m going to give each installment their own so that we can build this thing up a little better and keep it fresh. Of course fresh isn’t exactly on the menu with these shows due to the meandering craziness of them, but you get my drift.

WARNING: FOUL LANGUAGE & OFFENSIVE MATERIAL

#80 – The CHUD Show – If This One Doesn’t Kill Us

This episode has the notoriety of being dogshit. We recorded it the middle of the afternoon wedged between Steve’s work shift and mine and we were hauling ass to get it done. It shows. But, in the spirit of not giving a shit here it is. I hope you find things to enjoy.

BUY FROM AMAZON: CLICK HERE!
STUDIO: Anchor Bay Home Video
MSRP: $20.57
RATING: R
RUNNING TIME: 111 minutes
SPECIAL FEATURES

• Deleted Scenes
• Commentary w/ director and cast
• Alternate Opening
• Alternate Ending
• Featurettes
• Gag Reel
• DVD and digital copy included

The Pitch

Let’s make some money!

The Humans

Directed by Wes Craven.  Screenplay by Kevin Williamson.  Acted by Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Emma Roberts, Hayden Panettiere, Marley Shelton, Mary McDonnell, Erik Knudsen, and one of the creepier-looking Culkin siblings.

The Lowdown

It’s been a decade since the last trivia-themed killing spree. Dewey is now the sheriff of Woodsboro, Gale seems to have gone into retirement and become a housewife (very progressive of her), and Sydney has embraced the role of professional victim wholeheartedly, using her notoriety as the American serial killer community’s favorite muse to peddle an inspirational memoir. But when Sydney returns home to do a book signing, local teenage girls start getting creepy phone calls again, and before you know it the trio find themselves in the middle of a real-life ‘reboot.’

The Nutshell

Let me start by saying that I’m an unapologetic fan of the Scream series. I don’t think they work terribly well as mysteries or as horror films, but I like the characters, I enjoy the self-referential humor, and I appreciate the geeky film-school commentary on slasher flicks, sequels, trilogies and the like. So I’m not exactly what you’d call a tough sell when it comes to this type of film.

That being said, as a fourth entry in the series made ten years after the fact, a sort of “what the hell, let’s make one more Scream movie” lark, Scre4m is… decent. It just doesn’t bring anything new to the table, something each of the previous sequels managed to do, despite their many flaws. Scream 2 killed Randy.  Scream 3 sidelined Sydney (who’d been the driving force of the series up to that point), put Gale and Dewey center stage, and delved into the back story of Sydney’s mother, which at least brought an element of genuine mystery to the proceedings for the first time. Scre4m doesn’t manage anything remotely similar.

Emma Roberts is cute, though.

Worse yet… as a springboard for a new trilogy, Scre4m is abysmal. Given that the film was released theatrically several months ago, and since I don’t feel I can explore my thoughts on it fully without discussing certain key plot points, I’m going to venture into the realm of SPOILERS for a moment.

First off: almost none of the new characters introduced in the film survive. So any illusion that a new trilogy would feature Sydney, Dewey and Gale passing the reins to a new generation of slasher fodder is just that, an illusion.

Second: without getting too specific about the circumstances involved, there’s a moment near the end of Scre4m where it appears as though the killer might escape justice. Think of what a great set-up that would be for at least one more film: a scenario where the audience knows who the killer is all along (which is actually a staple of virtually every major slasher franchise except this one, as it happens), while the characters remain in the dark. I know I’m basically writing fan fiction at this point, but I think this could have taken the series in an interesting new direction. As it stands, though… none of it happens.

On the bright side, however, Hayden Panettiere is also quite fetching.

I also loved Sidney’s character arc over the course of the previous three films. In the first one, she’s struggling to accept the truth about her mother; in the second, she’s dealing with trust issues (owing to the fact that her boyfriend and another close friend turned out to be the killers the first time around); and in the third she’s become a recluse, shutting herself away to avoid being targeted by a seemingly endless parade of psychos. When she walks away from that open door at the end of Scream 3, it says something about the journey she’s been on, and the obstacles she’s overcome.

In Scre4m, Sydney is haunted by survivor’s guilt, prompted by the fact that she keeps walking away in film after film, while those she loves inevitably perish. This is an interesting notion, but sadly it’s barely touched on in the film, and is more or less dropped well before the credits roll. The previous films all featured a pivotal scene, at or near the end, where Sydney confronted whatever it was she was struggling with and either overcame, or found herself hoist upon it. There’s nothing like that here.

Do I need to keep making justifying statements at this point?

And a word about that lovely screen grab posted above: now, I’m a red-blooded American male and I enjoy a good cheesecake shot as much as the next guy.  But the thing is, this young lady spends the last several minutes leading up to her (actually quite gruesome) demise prancing around the bedroom in her skivvies.  This is exactly the sort of goofy B-movie nonsense the Scream flicks used to satirize.  (The opening few minutes of Stab, anyone?)  Now they’ve flown full-force into wallowing in those very same clichés.

Finally, we have the theme.  Scream explored slasher films, Scream 2 waxed poetic about sequels, and Scream 3 pontificated about the tropes and what have you of the great American trilogy. In tried and true fashion, the latest entry takes aim at the horror genre’s current red-headed stepchild: reboots.

Now one problem with this is that, while the previous films at least arguably had something to say about the things they targeted, Scre4m has only the most superficial observations to make about reboots. There’s a deeper issue, however, which is only this: while the first entry in the series was a slasher film, the second was undeniably a sequel, and the third, at least from the perspective of those involved in making it, was intended to be the concluding chapter of a trilogy, Scre4m is in no way, shape, or form a reboot!

‘Reboot’ is a term that gets thrown around a lot lately, but what exactly does it mean? Is a remake a reboot? Does a reboot have to be a remake? I would argue that the absolute, bare-bottom definition of a reboot is that it has to ignore previous continuity; not necessarily all continuity, mind you, but a reboot has to disregard the events of at least some previous entries in a series or franchise. Halloween: H20 ignored the previous three films in that series, Highlander: The Final Dimension ignored the (only slightly less bloody) train wreck that was Highlander 2,  and so on. Scre4m doesn’t ignore anything, therefore nothing is being rebooted.  Just my two cents.

Is Scre4m a bad film? Not really. It’s just frustratingly unremarkable. Casual viewers will probably be entertained, but as a long-time fan of the series, I wanted more. If you’re going to resurrect a defunct franchise ten years after its presumed demise, you ought to have something new to say; Scre4m doesn’t.

The Package

The film looks great (unlike the recent Blu-Ray release of the original trilogy – and yes, I fully expect to be stoned for using that terminology in reference to the Scream films – which looked and sounded like @#$%).  Plenty of deleted scenes, all with commentary.  All in all a decent presentation.  Now if only the movie was a little better…

Rating:

Out of a Possible 5 Stars