Not much big news here, and I have to get some laundry done in preparation for tonight’s festivities, so here’s the gist: Inglorious Basterds is opening on August 21st of 2009. Weird date. Close to the Halloween release date for 2007. Hurm.

Anyway, here’s the text of the press release, for those of you who are looking to make careers in press releasing:

December 31, 2008 – The Weinstein Company (TWC) and Universal Pictures announced today that Academy Award-winning director Quentin Tarantino’s World War II epic, Inglourious Basterds, starring Brad Pitt, will open domestically August 21, 2009. The announcement was made by Harvey Weinstein, co-chairman of TWC and David Linde, co-chairman of Universal Pictures who are partners in the film.  TWC and Universal are co-financing and co-presenting the film with TWC handling domestic distribution and Universal handling international distribution. International release dates will be announced shortly.
 
 
About The Weinstein Company
The Weinstein Company (TWC) was created by Bob and Harvey Weinstein, the brothers who founded Miramax Films Corporation in 1979. TWC is a multi-media company that officially launched on October 1, 2005. Dimension Films, the genre label that was founded in 1993 by Bob Weinstein, is also included under the TWC banner.
 
During the Weinsteins’ tenure at Miramax Films the company released some of the most critically acclaimed and commercially successful independent feature films which received 249 Academy Award® nominations and won 60 Oscars®, have generated billions of dollars in worldwide box office receipts and billions more in home video sales.  In its history, Dimension Films has released some of the most successful franchises including Scream, Spy Kids, and Scary Movie.
 
About Universal Pictures
Universal Pictures is a division of Universal Studios (www.universalstudios.com).  Universal Studios is part of NBC Universal, one of the world’s leading media and entertainment companies in the development, production and marketing of entertainment, news and information to a global audience.  Formed in May 2004 through the combining of NBC and Vivendi Universal Entertainment, NBC Universal owns and operates a valuable portfolio of news and entertainment networks, a premier motion picture company, significant television production operations, a leading television stations group and world-renowned theme parks.  NBC Universal is 80% owned by General Electric, with 20% controlled by Vivendi.
 
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Even they couldn’t think of much bullshit with which to pad this out!

When I was in Austin for Butt-Numb-A-Thon I had a lively debate with a fellow critic about some of my practices. If you’re a long time reader of this site, you’ll be aware that every now and again I’ll get up on my soapbox and will speak out about the behavior of my fellow film critics and entertainment journalists. This guy thought this wasn’t my job; he was partially mad at a hyperbolic (and comedically violent) article I wrote about a friend of his this year, but he also simply didn’t believe that inter-critic sniping helped anybody.

EFilmCritic feels exactly the opposite. Every year the site has a rundown of the Whores of the Year, the critics who freely give blurbs and quotes to movie advertising campaigns, and often to the worst movies imaginable. This year’s list is pretty fascinating (even though I somehow escaped notice despite giving a foul-mouthed quote for Punisher: War Zone), as it shows that former heavyweights like Earl Dittman (minor pun intended) are dropping, while new folks – Bloody Disgusting’s Brad Miska, for instance! – are coming into the big time.

For me this annual year end list is a big deal. There’s nobody policing us out there. Especially in this post-newspaper world there are no editors and no second guessers. And as the value of film criticism diminishes, it’s important for those who actually care about this stuff to do what little they can to fight back against the rising tide of idiocy and corruption.

A side note to the Whores of the Year list – EFilmCritic also keeps a close watch on Ben Lyons, the louche douche who co-hosts the post-Ebert At The Movies. Lyons is essentially the face of the destruction of film criticism, the TV version of the internet’s Alex Billington. He’s an ignorant goofball whose taste in film would be considered suspect if it wasn’t simply non-existant. He likes whatever is thrown in front of him. You can read a pretty interesting article about how much everybody hates Ben Lyons right here.

The Lyons/Billington situation calls to our attention the modern day problem of criticism. Sure, you have whores like Shawn Edwards (who I once drunkenly followed around a party, asking if every piece of food he had was the best of the year or the best he had ever eaten. To his credit, Edwards ignored me), but he’s just there to get his name in print. The Lyons and Billingtons have the same goal in many ways, but they also have a shockingly small amount of film knowledge… and this is considered a plus. We’re at a place in criticism where knowing about what you’re critiquing might be considered a handicap. We want our critics to be ‘just like us.’ You see how well that went when we elected a president based on this concept. Every now and again, it’s nice to have actual experts in some positions.

You can read the Whores of the Year list at EFilmCritic by clicking right here.

Hey there!

Ever wonder why there aren’t more romantic comedies with Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson? Now you don’t need to, because Last Chance Harvey is here!

The film centers on a man down on his luck who finds an unlikely romance in the form of Emma Thompson as he deals with career and family strife.

No, he is not reprising his Mumbles character from Dick Tracy.

This looks like a nice little film that we’ve got passes for our Atlanta readers to enjoy, ones who simply need to click the link below to attempt to obtain a pass (good for two) for themselves to.

So give Harvey a chance!

Note: Send in your request ASAP, as the screening is on the 5th and our mail service is lame.

Note: This screening is not to be confused with Last Chance Lee Harvey, Oliver Stone’s upcoming romantic tragedy.

Some folks have linked to various places where the new potty-mouthed, sex-crazed, and violent as hell teaser trailer for Crank 2: High Voltage can be seen, many of which load slower than Jessica Tandy’s footspeed [band name!], so I’ll point you right here at FirstShowing.net where it loads crisp and clear and phenomenally.

The bottom line is that Crank is one of life’s sublime pleasures and this sequel looks to be upping the ante in every aspect except subtlety. It instantly gets me jazzed for 2009, because any year where Amy Smart is publicly manhammered onscreen is a good one. What an adorable elf she is!

The ‘ripped from the headlines’ story centers on our hero (Jason Statham) recovering from his helicopter plummet just fine thank you, who escapes from the operating table before just losing his penisflesh, and his quest to exact more justice, all the while having to keep his artificial heart supercharged with go-juice lest he perist. In other words, the best plot of all time. Just watch the damn trailer. Then comment here on our message boards and move on with your year-end festivities.

Crank 2: High Voltage also may answer one of humankind’s most pressing and controversial questions:

“Is Doc Miles gonna have to choke a bitch?”

Dwight Yoakam is so much better than us it isn’t even funny.

BUY IT AT AMAZON: CLICK HERE

STUDIO: First Look Pictures
MSRP: $28.98
RATED:  R
RUNNING TIME: 98 minutes
SPECIAL FEATURES:
Featurette
Deleted Scenes

The Pitch

Takashi Miike goes John Ford all over a motherfucker.

The Humans

Kaori Momoi, Koichi Sato, Quentin Tarantino, Takaaki Ishibashi and Teruyuki Kagawa

The Nutshell

Takashi Miike tries to continue on the tradition of Franco Nero’s Django.
Mixing bloodshed with carnal sexuality, Miike continues with his
patented panache. Playing off his friendship with auteur Quentin
Tarantino, Miike has stumbled upon something. An East meets West
tall-tale of a lone cowboy sharing in a legend that would make Leone
proud. Hideaki Ito offers a memorable turn as the unnamed gunman of
reknown.

The Lowdown

Sukiyaki Western Django
is another reason why Miike is King. Sure, his ideas don’t always gel
together everytime. But, he takes a fucking shot and goes for the
gusto. From the first reel, it’ll take the audience some time to get
used to the phonetic Western slang coming out of the Asian actors. It’s
a little hokey at first, but it’s no different than the stilted
dialogue in a Republic Western. Yet, Miike makes one fatal mistake in
the pursuit of pleasing aesthetic. He forgoes any reasonable structure.

Sukiyaki Western Django seems
to also show a kinder side of Miike. I want to say that Miike is
playing the sex and violence more gently, but others seem rather quick
to say that the man is losing his touch. The multiple rape scenes and
the quick jumps in action go back to my previous point. We’re seeing
Miike getting sloppy in exchange for a visual palette that would please
Western eyes. After the first hour, the experience is frustrating and
would push novice viewers away from more Miike experiments.

The
film isn’t easy to say the least. But, it’s not challenging. I’ve seen
a ton of Miike films and this has to be one of the weaker offerings.
What kills me is that the film feels dated for being a modern movie. I
wanted to see more action and more ka-pow. But, everything feels tame.
It’s a big build to something freaking major and then nothing. This
film fucking ebbs and flows so much, that it makes me sick.

Sukiyaki Western Django gets the Western tone in this fucked way. I’d put it on par with an immigrant only learning English from Sesame Street and
drunks on the street. There’s no rhyme or reason to the action, but
Miike doesn’t care. He’s here to make a visual experience that will
unfortunately leave the viewer minutes after turning off the DVD. I
hate to shit all over a talented filmmaker, but there are some things
that you can’t ignore. A film needs a fucking point. Sukiyaki Western Django only exists to keep your eyes focused on the screen. 

The
DVD
has a pretty strong transfer with no audio dropout. The hour long
making-of featurette shows off a great deal of what went into the film.
But, the deleted scenes are a joke. If you’re Region Free, I’d
recommend picking up one of the Asian discs floating around on the open
market. You’ll get more deleted scenes, a longer cut of the film and no
obscured shots in the first rape scene. I know how important rape
scenes are to you.

We’re still on the tail end of the holidays, otherwise known as the graveyard of news as Hollywood pretty much shuts down for the duration.  However, some guys are still out there working to bring us those movies and TV shows for which we’re clamoring…

…as well as a giant leech flick remake. 

Thanks to an e-mail deposited in the CHUD bin, we got word that Roger and Gene Corman’s 1959 Attack of the Giant Leeches is about to get an overhaul.  Bret Kelly, a guy who’s been fairly busy of late, both in front of and behind the camera according to his IMDB page, directed the suckfest (to be taken literally, you know, because of the leeches, not as a critique). 

The original was directed by Bernard L. Kowalski, who also lensed 1958’s Night of the Blood Beast and a crapload of TV including The Untouchables, Mission Impossible, Gunsmoke and The Rockford Files to name a few.  He also happened to be the uncle of a guy named Brian Grazer.  The original was also written by Leo Gordon (Tobruk, The Wasp Woman) and was produced by Gene Corman with Roger riding shotgun on the exec producer credit.  It also featured Yvette Vickers…yes that (NSFW) Yvette Vickers.

Having seen the trailer, I can’t tell if it’s a straight homage to the camp of the films of the period or if it is an earnest effort that will end up being be worthy of the aforementioned suckfest description.  I’m hoping for the former, otherwise expect the word “suck” to be overused in every review from here to Collider to Joblo and back.  The original had guys in rubber suits as the leeches, and at least this version seems to keep it real rather than going with shitty CGI, so we’ll just have to see how it works out.  

As the trailer’s of a page-busting size, click the link below.

Thanks to Avery for the tip.

Fuck This Face III: Fuck Face with a Vengeance

What better way to end 2008 than with one last “fuck you” to Twilight and its horrible, horrible fan base. Actually, this time the fuck you is on me.

Sort of. But first, this:

The
furor over the silly vampire movie has died down until home video
brings it back in front of our collective eyes, but I think it’s safe
to assume that this series doesn’t have the legs to remain on the
public’s consciousness for long enough for Stephanie Meyers’ boring
vision to run its course theatrically.

I mean, if the Narnia
series is facing serious threats, I can’t imagine gothic chick-lit
holding a candle. Especially since most of the idiots who read these
abominations will have reached the age of reason by the time any
subsequent adaptation hits screens. I mean, I liked Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing
at age eight but by age eleven I had evolved to where I was more
interested in Pennywise the Clown than Superfudge and I can’t imagine
too many Sucklings sticking around with the same blind loyalty down the
pike once they realize how to undulate properly and how to balance
chewing gum and other assorted mouth tasks.

Twilight is
toothless, so it’ll get harder and harder to push the buttons of the
lame little girls and bored secretaries and grounded tennis moms who
somehow made it a sensation as it’s replaced by some other flavor of
the month. Maybe something that apes some other already ripened
subgenre. With wizards, vampires, and werewolves run into the ground
maybe it’s time for someone to steal from Frank Herbert or Pierre
Boulle or Mary Shelley for the next dumbed-down teen sensation.

Bottom line is that there won’t be a theatrical Twilight
franchise in five years and that has little to do with the 2012 Mayan
prophecy, Obama’s presidency, or the price of an inner tube at Stone
Mountain Park. It has to do with the fumes of originality the product
bears and the fact that (aside from a mystifying group of adults) the
core audience of the series is going to reach adulthood and realize the
error of their ways. Add to that the fact that the people too young for
Twilight
now will surely have something better to pick from in the next few
years (I dunno, perhaps the majority of everything printed from
Gutenberg to this morning) and you have what I hope is something close
to the truth.

Plus, vampires are so boring and dumb. So are moussed, pale assholes.

Here’s where my face gets fucked though, the tragic ending to this trilogy (until Live Free or Fuck This Face) of terrors…

My
mother-in-law is a media specialist at an elementary school. She read
Twilight… and didn’t hate it. So much so that she has given it to her
daughter to read. For those bad at math, that means there is a person
UNDER MY ROOF reading this book. Sometimes at night I can feel its
presence on the nightstand across the way from my resting form.
Beckoning not to me, for I am a garlic mirrored wooden stake of awesome
and impervious to its wiles, but to the person it is beholden to not by
logic but some arcane twist of hate.

My
wife has never read a book that featured conflict, preferring the
simplicity of Jan Karon or fucking Thomas Kinkaide’s religious fiction
[because there’s such a thing as non-fiction religion… ahem], yet she is reading Twilight.

And she hasn’t died from it. Yet.

But if she likes it too much and too vocally she just might.

Today, the latest Lucky Nightsticks song, DISINFORMATION.