Movie Releases, 8/25

All right, the 25th is full of notable movies; I'll start with the wide releases.

Broken Lizard, who gave us the cult classic comedies Super Troopers (I liked it OK) and Club Dread (didn't like), and were partially responsible for The Dukes of Hazzard (yeah, that downright sucked) return to the slapstick world with a movie I'm actually amped to see, Beerfest. This looks like complete zany fun, as teams from around the world participate in drinking games during Oktoberfest. It looks like it has all the drunken frat boy humor, complete with girls who don't mind showing skin.

If trailers could earn movies $200 million by themselves, then Idlewild would benefit from such a relationship. Outkast members Andre Benjamin (Andre 3000) and Antwan Patton (Big Boi), play in a big gangsters-and-babes musical, all set in a club during the Prohibition era in the pre-dirty South. Tons of performers like Macy Gray and Patti Labelle show up, stand-up comedian Bruce Bruce, and a whole slew of respected talent like Terrence Howard, Ving Rhames, Ben Vereen, and Cicely Tyson all fill out the cast. The trailer is filled with cool imagery and new beats from the mega-Grammy-winning Outkast, but the movie's release date has been pushed back a couple of times, so we'll see.

Mark Wahlberg goes Disney as he plays Vince Papale, an average joe who went to an experimental tryout with the Philadelphia Eagles in the seventies and made the team, in Invincible. Greg Kinnear plays Dick Vermeil, and burning hot Elizabeth Banks plays supportive eye candy. The first of three (inspirational, what else?) football movies coming out--the next is Gridiron Gang, followed by We Are Marshall.

Some classic books shouldn't ever be filmed, and one of them is How to Eat Fried Worms. Well, I guess in the age of "Fear Factor" what could gross us out anymore, huh? Anyway, I'll find myself cringing, a lot, during the story of a boy who, without trying, challenges a bully at school and ends up taking a bet to eat 10 worms in one day. Through dressings worthy of inclusion into a Wolfgang Puck cookbook, the kid makes eating worms more palatable. Vomit bags not included.

The next few movies coming out are limited releases, I believe. "Check local listings" if you're interested.

Tony Jaa, the burgeoning martial arts favorite, returns in The Protector (or: Tom Yum Goong). Here, he plays a guy who just wants to get his stolen elephant back. Snakes on a Plane, take that! Anyway, those who stole said elephant are hesitant to do so, and lots of impossibly wicked kicking, punching, jumping, and contorting takes place because of it, until Jaa gets Stampy back. Jaa is one of those "next martial arts stars" which means he sells himself and his unseen catalog every time he has a new movie out--you can simply say, "If you liked Ong-bak, then you will love The Protector." And then the next one comes out and you can say the same sort of thing. (The IMDb lists this at September 8, but they often don't update new release dates)

Also, Camilla Belle and Elisha Cuthbert play unwilling sisters in The Quiet. Cuthbert's parents, Martin Donovan (of Saved!) and Edie Falco (who, of course, is best known for...Freedomland. It's Freedomland, right?) adopt goddaughter Belle after her parents die (probably in a car crash, that's how they all go). It's all about family secrets and deadly sibling rivalry--with the promise of disturbing sexual content and brief nudity--and who would be getting nude? Is it Belle? Cuthbert? No, no...it's Falco. This supposedly has a wider release September 1.

One more--Edward Burns (remember him?) returns to the director's chair, well not for long because he's the star too, in Looking For Kitty. My hopes of the title being a euphemism for a wild sex comedy were dashed when I found out that Burns teams up with "Numbers" star David Krumholtz to find Burns's cheating wife. Burns started out with a promising career--The Brothers McMullen was decent, and She's the One showed promise, even though both had lots of detractors, Burns with time seemed like he was on the way to becoming a sort of Woody Allen. But then, most people wanted that handsome mug in front of the camera more, and he hasn't had a real high profile directorial movie since. And this clearly isn't one either, but anyone out there who still thinks Burns can work some magic...this might interest you.

I'm looking for Beerfest to be the surprise #1 this weekend; this has all the stuff people wanted to see in Accepted.