Recently I had a discussion with a friend about movie marketing. It’s all the same. Every preview has basically the same structure and narration, every official film website has all the same stuff, etc. etc.

     Well, here is the website for Frank Miller’s film, “300.” It’s not the basic crap site with a trailer and some pictures and wallpaper downloads (although it does have that stuff too). This thing is set up as a blog with comments posted by the actual film makers. It just went live last week, so there’s only one post, but my hope is that it will have posts by crew members and maybe even actors from the film.

     I don’t know much about the film itself; I just read the synopsis at the site, but I loved “Sin City” and I can only hope this film is more of the same. I like what I see so far at least marketing wise. Hopefully they’ll keep it up to date and posts will be written by different people. I’ll keep you all up to speed when I find out more.

www.moviepatron.com

     Quentin Tarantino has lately started talk about an epic version of Kill Bill where he fuses both volumes together and releases it into the theater as one long film with an intermission; just like the old days.

     I have been screaming for something like this for years. Where have the epic films gone that give you a break, in between, to use the can, smoke a cigarette, refill your soda or whatever? I know the answer. They’re gone because studios and theaters lose money BIG time on longer films.

     John Campea over at themovieblog.com has been talking about this recently regarding King Kong. The studios did not originally want the film to be over 3 hours (in retrospect, they were right) because theaters would only have time to show the thing once per night. That’s half your audience gone. They’ll still see it eventually maybe, but after opening week or two, public interest in a film wanes quite a bit. People move on to something else. Finally, the studio let Jackson do what he wants because he’s….well, Peter Jackson. But they took a hit because of it. There’s a lot more to it that I won’t go into now regarding contractual obligations with theaters and screenings, etc. But John is right, KK will make less money because it is over 3 hours long. People use Titanic as an example of how a longer length film can still do excellent at the box office. But the problem is this: films today do not stay in the theaters as long to give people the opportunity for a repeat viewing. According to John, in 1997, when Titanic was released, there were 170 film released all year. In 2005, 526 films were released. This is the competition that movies have to face today. Crazy.

     So when Quentin mentions his 4 hour long epic Kill Bill, I get excited. Screw the studios and greedy corporate types. Make the movie how you want and if they don’t distribute it, they’re stupid, because they’re still gonna make money when it’s Peter Jackson, Quentin Tarantino, Ridley Scott or James Cameron or any other big-time director in charge of the project. So will I see Kill Bill re-cut and made into one movie as it should’ve been in the first place? Absolutely.

     I watched the first hour of the “Fantastic 4″ last night. I had to turn it off for two reasons. One, it is so bad that my head was starting to melt, and two, my neighbors apparently had had enough too because they started banging on the wall. I don’t blame them one bit.

     So, you won’t find this review on my site. I won’t take the time. My intelligence was insulted enough. Even Jessica Alba couldn’t carry this trash. One more super-hero movie to toss in the circular file.

BLLLEEeEeeech!

I have posted my year end “Favorites / Best of / Worst of” list of 2005 over at my site:

Moviepatron.com

Take a look-see and the tell me what I missed or what I’m wrong about it.

Here’s a few new trailers I came across today that you all should check out:

The DaVinci Code
Inside Man
Mission Impossible 3
Miami Vice
The Matador
Superman Returns
Cars

Thanks for the laughs Richard. See you on the flip side.

R.I.P.

     Another House of the Dead film!!? The first one is hands down the worst film I have ever seen! New reports from “The Movie Blog” indicate it is in the works and a trailer is already available on the internet. Stay as far away you can people. Seriously, run for your lives if you see anything resembling a House of the Dead poster, trailer, DVD or screening. You might as well take ten dollars, wipe your ass with it, then eat it.

I‘m not a huge fan of the X-Men series, but the previous two were pretty good. In fact the last one I really enjoyed. The trailer for the new X-Men (3) has just been released to the internet. Here it is:

X-MEN III trailer

     The first pictures of Rocky IV are online! Here is one of The Italian Stallion weighing in against, presumably, his opponent. Good to see the old guy back in action. I wonder if he’ll win this fight?

On Becoming a Better Movie Critic OR
How to Get More out of Moviegoing OR Why Untamed Heart is Pure Evil
- by Anthony Selbitschka (Movie Patron contributer)

     The credits are rolling so you get up from your seat, rub your sore bum, and walk down the sticky aisle towards the theater’s exit. Your companion turns to you and asks, “Did you like it?” How do you answer? Here are the typical knee-jerks:
- “It was alright.”
- “The first one was better.”
- “It sucked.”
- “Sigh… Chick Flick.”
     Hopefully this starts a discussion that lasts the entire car ride home. If not, shame on you! Granted, Bad News Bears won’t demand the same amount of attention as Vertigo, but go ahead and ask WHY the movie was sub par, or WHY it made you cry, or WHY you vowed to never see another Paulie Shore movie again. Ask your friend the same WHY’s and viola! A discussion is born! This is the best part of seeing movies—the ride home. Cripes, my pal Mike and I are still arguing over Forrest Gump—and that came out years ago.
     Unfortunately, most of us stop at “It was okay” and never ask the WHYs behind it. Even worse, most of us have failed to set up standards against which we can judge each movie—so the Armageddons of the industry are sadly lumped in with the Gattacas. I have compiled a few hints that can help us all think a bit more critically about the movies we see. Go ahead and try them out, but be warned—with higher standards, you seem to like fewer movies. BUT (and it’s a big but) the movies you love will seem oh-so-much better!

REMEMBER THAT ART INVOLVES CHOICE

     Here’s the best definition of art that I have found: “Art is the selective re-creation of reality according to an artist’s… value judgments.” (from Ayn Rand’s Romantic Manifesto, 1969) Let’s break this down. A piece of art cannot include all of reality, so the artist must choose which elements to include in the final product. Is it a dark and stormy night, or is it sunny? Are the subjects heroic or evil? Is it a one-shot of a bowl of fruit or is it a panoramic of New York City? In short, ART IS SELECTIVE so the recreation of reality that the artist presents reflects the artist’s psyche. While this applies to all art forms, let’s keep this in mind for our discussion of movies. If the movie ends poorly, don’t take it as a given—someone chose to write it that way!
     I often get furious at screenwriters for wrecking perfectly good movies during the final few minutes where the key decisions are made: do the good guys win or lose; does he get the girl or not? It’s getting so bad lately that I now watch movies with the paranoid supposition that if it’s good so far—they’ll find a way to ruin it in the end. Thankfully, I am often wrong and I end up being pleasantly surprised, but there were times that I’ve been burned so badly, I am left with these jaded scars.
     I now refer you to my personal standard of a horrible movie: Untamed Heart [SPOILER WARNING!!! Skip to second paragraph of next section if you haven’t seen “Untamed Heart” and care.] —the perfect set-you-up/knock-you-down movie I’ve been talking about. It’s a cute movie filmed in my ‘hood of Minneapolis starring Christian Slater and Marisa Tomei. We watch Slater struggle with shyness throughout the movie until finally accomplishing his goal to win the heart of the gal. We feel so happy when the introvert finally comes out of his shell and steals the heart of the lady. Nice so far, eh? Not so fast! In the last few minutes of the movie, it turns out that Slater’s baboon-friggin’ heart fails and he dies. The end. What does this say about the screenwriter? When given the choice to have his characters enjoy the relationship they worked so hard to establish, the writer decides to randomly kill off the hero rather than end his story happily. How can a person be so jaded that not only he kills off the hero and the relationship he created—he puts it on film to show us all that love is futile.
     Moral of the story: ask what the writers were thinking! All elements within the movie involved choice. These choices lead us to:

DETERMINE THE MOVIE’S THEME

     Guy meets girl, guy gets girl, guy suddenly dies from his failed baboon heart is the plot of Untamed Heart. Love is Futile is its theme. It is important to determine a movie’s theme as it forces us to sum up the parts into a concise philosophical statement. If I told you in conversation that love is futile, you should have an almost subconscious reaction—hopefully negative—to this statement as it bounces off your own philosophy. But, if you watched Untamed Heart and failed to determine the theme, you could get away with liking the movie—probably dismissing it as a cutesy, harmless chick flick—while I hold it up as the ultimate in evil.
     [spoiler detour ends here] Themes can be as simple as good wins over evil (Star Wars) or complex as the pains a loving parent can endure to protect his child from evil (Life is Beautiful) (this could be reduced to good wins over evil as well). In either case, we can hold these packaged philosophical statements up to our own views on life to determine if we agree with the theme or not. It will usually follow that you will dislike the movies that disagree with your views and vice versa for those at are in accordance.
     Tactful directors and writers may hide their themes behind their stories so their movies can be enjoyed on many levels. One of my favorites, Gattaca, can be enjoyed on one level as yet another futuristic sci-fi movie. On a deeper level, we see the struggle of an individual against an oppressive society. With even deeper examination, we discover the theme of free will vs. determinism: the rewards that come to those who make choices to change their lot in life—and the stagnation of those who wallow in what’s been handed to them.
     What if the theme is a bad one? What if the movie has great execution, but the theme seems to be against your own views? By determining and reflecting on a movie’s theme, we are better defended against being distracted by nifty special effects, witty dialogue, beautiful cinematography, or cunning direction while the underlying theme remains to be against our philosophic principals. This suggests that we must:

REMEMBER THE HEIRARCHY: theme rules over the other elements.

     This is why I can say in one breath, “Boy, Raging Bull had the best direction, cinematography, and acting I’ve seen in years—and I hate it!” I would then point to its theme of a man being destroyed by his own success and ask why would anyone want to watch that happen. Why not watch a man grow old and happy due to his success?
     Consider This Is Spinal Tap, one of the finest examples of comedic acting, characterization, and improvisation that I have ever seen. I can go on for days gushing about its subtleties and its dead-on caricature of 80’s heavy metal—but the movie still can’t crack my top-10 all-time favorites list. Why? What was it about? This movie lacks a strong theme with which I can connect. It exhibits the craft of comedic acting—but nothing more.
     Now consider the dreadful Judge Dread, a movie that has the same theme of some of my favorites: Indiana Jones, Star Wars, Batman Begins; but the plot, acting, continuity, and overall execution were so piss-poor in Judge Dread that we now have to learn that:

A CRAPPY MOVIE WITH A GREAT THEME IS STILL A CRAPPY MOVIE.

     Yes, a movie can sabotage its good intentions by its own ineptitude. As critics, we must be honest enough to throw in the towel and admit that yes—the movie sucked despite its nice message. This is where we hard-core critics meet up with the casual moviegoers. We must ask: did we enjoy the experience; did we get swept away by the film; were we bored, scared, torn, giddy, etc. This final lesson is as important as the first:

BE A MOVIEGOER FIRST, BE A CRITIC LATER.

     Don’t get caught up in the philosophic-mumbo-jumbo-high-horse-ridin’ stuff I’ve been carrying on about while watching a movie. Get caught up in the movie—not the criticism. Enjoy it. Have fun. Cry if you need to. Be a movie FAN. Pardon me while I offer a sports analogy: you can become an expert on basketball and learn the ins-and-outs of the triangle offense vs. the zone defense, but never—ever forget how fun it is to play. Same goes here. Learn how to break down a movie into its basic elements and assess its theme—but never forget how cool it is to watch ‘em!

     Normally - in fact almost always - I try to stray from the Hollywood gossip garbage. I don’t generally care about stars’ private lives. I have never understood why so many people find it fascinating to read about them; why Entertainment Tonight and shows of that ilk are so popular. I look at People magazine while in line a the grocery store, and I don’t understand how anyone can care about that junk. Blurry, distant shots of Mel Gibson buying soup are not interesting to me. I also think the Papparazzi over-steps it’s bounds most of the time. I think people, even stars, should have the right to bring their kids to the water park without a million cameras shoved in their faces.

     However, sometimes there are stories that I do find a little interesting or weird and feel the need to share them - like all of Tom Cruise’s antics over the summer. So because Mr. & Mrs. Smith has just been released this week on DVD and Brad Pitt and Angelina are two of the hottest actors in films right now, here is one such story being reported by the AP about Brad and Angelina:

     Brad Pitt is seeking to become the adoptive father of Angelina Jolie’s children, the actor’s publicist announced Friday.

Pitt and Jennifer Aniston announced their separation in January, and Aniston filed for divorce in March, citing irreconcilable differences. The divorce became final in October. Pitt, 41, has denied Jolie, 30, was the reason for the split.