Movie Releases, 10/6
A pretty big weekend for movies as the industry gets out of the September dumping ground.
We begin with Martin Scorsese! And gangsters! The Departed is a remake of the Hong Kong flick Infernal Affairs. Starring everyone in Hollywood. Well, not everyone, but it's a big list of heavy hitters--Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Mark Wahlberg, and Jack Nicholson, not to mention Martin Sheen, Alec Baldwin, and Running Scared hottie Vera Farmiga. DiCaprio is an undercover cop trying to nail Nicholson, and Damon is a cop who is a secret informant for Nicholson. Conflict, ahoy! I can't friggin' wait. The trailer is one of the best of the year.
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning seems like a completely redundant title to me--we've had an original movie and a remake, now we have a prequel touting to be a story taking place before all that. I guess we see the origins of Leatherface. But really, what a gimmick. This will be the same ol' shit--dumbass teenagers will run out of gas in a small town and walk onto the ranch of redneck demon spawn (who must be the owners of a Dumbass Teenager Magnet), and be tortured, and several will die, and one woman will probably escape only to get caught by some other redneck that we originally didn't think was part of the clan. Michael Bay's third horror producing gig after the remake and The Amityville Horror remake; and there are many more horror remakes in the pipeline from my favorite director. Please recognize sarcasm.
Jessica Simpson falls in love with funny-ass comedian Dane Cook in Employee of the Month. They are the advertised appeal of this movie, but it looks like former "Punk'd" conspirator Dax Shepard is going to get most of the laughs. Cook is one of those comedians I wonder will ever translate well to the big screen--I'd like to see something he writes get filmed. Anyway, Cook and Shepard battle for the coveted (redundacy alert) titular title and for Simpson's affections.
Limited:
The number of films flying into New York theatres is getting overwhelming. There's a lot of limited stuff arriving this weekend:
Little Children, in which married Kate Winslet seduces married Patrick Wilson much to the ire of Wilson's wife Jennifer Connelly. The trailer is bizarre and wonderful at the same time--Winslet looks subtly evil in her ways. In the Bedroom director Todd Field returns.
Michael Apted's 49 Up, which is the 7th in the series of documentaries covering specific people since the age of 7 and catching up with them 7 years at a time.
And those who love John Cameron Mitchell of Hedwig and the Angry Inch fame will be glad that he returns with another film promising all sorts of various uncomfortable sex to watch if you are the poor bastard who takes your date to movies like his latest, Shortbus. I don't know how much buzz this has, but it seems like the kind of thing that will fill a much-needed alternative-movie niche. It's always fun to have some movies that make people squirm, and see if maybe there's a point to it all.
Anyhow--this is going to be a busy weekend for me. I still need to watch The Queen, The Last King of Scotland, and I have somewhat of an interest in A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints (not featured in my release post last week). Now there's all this. Damn!
posted by Chris @ 9/30/2006 08:58:00 PM
2 comments
2 Comments:
I've been waiting all year for Scorsese's take on Infernal Affairs .. It had better just rock! .. I can't see it beating out Jessica's ta ta's at the box office, but hopefully it can finish second, ahead of that thoroughly unnecessary chainsaw flick
I'm by no means a fan of the "Chainsaw" films. I put the remake on my "Worst of 2004" list, or was that 2003? Whichever. My point is this one is actually getting quite a bit of good word of mouth from the festivals it's played at already, and it's got an intriguing preview. Of course, so did the remake. I guess we'll see, but I have some decent hopes for it. Should be quite a bit better than our other horror offerings this October (Grudge 2 and Saw III).
"The Departed" is something I've been looking forward to, but I have to admit the previews make it look like an exact duplicate of the Japanese version, "Infernal Affairs." Which will be cool for most people, because I'm assuming your average movie goer has not seen the original. However, if you've seen the original, which I have, then I'm wondering if this is going to just come off kind of pointless; just another "Red Dragon" or "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory." I mean, Scorcese's other attempt at remaking a great film, 1991's "Cape Fear" was a flat out disaster in my opinion. Hopefully, he does a better job here. The most interesting week for films in quite awhile.
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