Yearly Archives: 2018

Trailer Round-Up: First Man, The Predator, How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World, Bad Times At The El Royale, The Old Man & The Gun, Operation Finale, A Star is Born, and The Girl In The Spider’s Web

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

There were a lot of interesting trailers released this week.  Among those that I’ve already looked at: Suspiria, Widows, White Boy Rick, Wreck-It Ralph 2, Bumblebee, The Lego Movie Part Two, Halloween, Billionaire Boys Club, 14 Cameras, and Siberia.

Here’s the best of the rest!

First Man is Damien Chazelle’s follow-up to La La Land.  In this one, Ryan Gosling plays the first man to ever step on the moon.  Many critics, including me, expect this will be a definite Oscar contender.  (Chazelle may even find himself competing once again with Barry Jenkins, whose If Beale Street Could Talk is also considered to be a possible contender.)

Here’s the second trailer for The Predator, which emphasizes action above all else.  (Check out the first trailer here.)

Here’s the trailer for the third installment in the beloved How To Train Your Dragon franchise, The Hidden World!

Here’s the trailer for Bad Times At The El Royale, which is either going to be brilliant or totally suck.  I don’t really see any middle ground here.

Normally, I would be tempted to roll my eyes at something like The Old Man & The Gun.  I mean, didn’t Robert Redford say that he wasn’t going to make another movie until climate change was defeated or something like that?  However, this film was directed by David Lowery, who was also responsible for the best film of 2017, A Ghost Story!  So, I will definitely give this one a chance.  Here’s the trailer:

Here’s the trailer for Operation Finale, a dramatization of the 1960 intelligence operation that led to the capture of Nazi war criminal Adolph Eichmann.  Why do we need this movie?  Go to YouTube and read some of the comments left under this trailer.  With anti-Semitism on the rise and more and more people buying into the despicable BDS movement, this is a story that needs to be told.  Hopefully, Operation Finale will do it justice.

Damn, Bradley Cooper’s got a pretty good singing voice!  Check out the trailer for A Star is Born if you need proof.

And lastly, here’s the trailer for The Girl In The Spider’s Web.

Hilariously, there’s a lot of people bitching about the fact that Rooney Mara will not be playing Libseth in The Girl In The Spider’s Web.  Folks, there’s only one Lisbeth Salander and it’s not Rooney Fucking Mara.  Noomi Rapace was, is, and always will be the only Libseth Salander who really matters!

Forgotten Horror: THIRTEEN WOMEN (RKO 1932)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

I pride myself on having seem almost every horror film made during the 1930’s, though once in a while an obscure title comes along whose attention has escaped me. But how on Earth did I miss THIRTEEN WOMEN, especially with a cast headlined by Irene Dunne (of all people!) and Myrna Loy ? This fast-paced thriller involving hypnosis, astrology, and serial murder is downright nasty, and has been cited as a precursor to the “slasher” genre… not to mention a whole lot of fun!

We begin with circus performer June Raskob receiving a letter from the mysterious Swami Yogadashi with her horoscope attached, predicting impending doom in the stars for her. But it’s her sister who dies, plunging to her death during their trapeze act (shown in gruesome detail), and poor June goes hopelessly insane. The scene shifts to exotic half-caste Ursula Georgi, who has the Swami under her hypnotic…

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Song of the Day: Comeback Kid by Sleigh Bells (2012, dir by Derek Miller and Gregory Kohn)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

I like Sleigh Bells.  Originally, I was going to use their video for I Can Only Stare for today’s music video of the day but the video’s suicide heme didn’t feel appropriate for this weekend.

So, I went with Comeback Kid, instead.  I tend to think of this video as being a trailer for some extremely over the top television show about life in small town Texas.  (Having lived in small town Texas, I’m allowed to say that.  If someone from up north said the same thing, I’d have to claw their eyes out.)  I know that some people are probably saying, “So, you wouldn’t share one video because of all the suicidal imagery but you’re willing to share a video that opens with a woman jumping around with a gun!?  What the Hell, Bowman!?”

Well, you might have a point but I’ve made peace with myself.  When I was fourteen, one of my friends told me that her father had just purchased a new gun and I spent an entire afternoon holding the gun and pointing the gun and jumping around with the gun.  I never pulled the trigger, which is a good thing because I later discovered that, despite what my friend had told me, the gun was loaded the entire time.  But it’s odd.  Guns are scary and yet strangely seductive at the same time.  Denying that fact doesn’t do anyone any good.

(For the record, I’m the only person in my family who doesn’t own a gun.  Recently, a new gun store opened a few blocks away from our house.  As Erin put it, we now know where to go “when the shit finally goes down.”  She was joking and I quote her with her permission but still, that shop is probably the first place that the majority of my neighborhood would head if a revolution ever did break out or if our country was invaded Red Dawn-style.  I’d probably be right there with them.)

(By the way, there’s another store in my town that specializes in selling both guns and antique dolls.  It’s a fun place, to be honest.)

Anyway, enjoy!

Here’s The Trailer for Keanu Reeves in Siberia!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

The action film career of Keanu Reeves continues this July with Siberia!

In this one, Keanu’s a diamond trader whose partner disappears in Russia.  Keanu hops on an airplane so he can investigate.  I’m going to guess that it will all somehow involve the Russian mafia because almost everything does nowadays.

Personally, I think they missed an opportunity when they didn’t call this one, “John Wick in Siberia.”

I also think that someone needs to team Keanu and Liam Neeson up for an action film.  Speaking of Liam, did you remember to see The Commuter earlier this year?  It was surprisingly good.

Anyway, here’s the trailer for Siberia!

Here’s The Rather Awkward Trailer For Billionaire Boys Club!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Billionaire Boys Club is an upcoming film that’s based on a true life murder.  In the 1980s, two wealthy young men murdered a con artist named Ron Levin.  The film was first expected to be released in 2017 but then it got pushed back by a few months.  That’s rarely a good sign but I still plan on seeing the film because I enjoy true crime reenactments and, at the very least, I would imagine there would be a lot of fun 80s music on the film’s soundtrack.

That said, the trailer is totally awkward because of the presence of Kevin Spacey in the role of Ron Levin.  I saw one comment on YouTube from someone declaring, “It’s cool to see Kevin on screen again.”  Of course, what needs to be remembered is that this film was shot in December of 2015, long before Anthony Rapp and several others came forward with stories of decades of sexual harassment and abuse at Spacey’s hands.  In fact, this film was completed long before Spacey started work on All The Money In The World.  While Christopher Plummer was busy reshooting Spacey’s scenes in that film, Billionaire Boys Club was sitting on the shelf.

Anyway, this film is finally going to be released in August.  Interestingly enough, Levin’s murderer will be played by Ansel Elgort, who previously co-starred with Spacey in Baby Driver.  I’ll probably see the film, though perhaps not in theaters.

Here’s the trailer:

Here’s The Trailer for David Gordon Green’s Halloween!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Somewhat under the radar, Texas’s David Gordon Green has had one of the most interesting and varied film careers of any modern filmmaker.  How many other directors would be capable of directing both Your Highness and Joe?

Green’s latest film is a sequel/remake/reboot of the horror classic, Halloween.  The trailer picks up decades after the end of John Carpenter’s film, with Michael Myers again coming for his sister (Jamie Lee Curtis) and, this time, his niece (Judy Greer).  However, Laurie isn’t just passively waiting for the next night that he comes home.  Laurie’s got a gun and she’s not shy about using it.

So, judging from this trailer, all of the original Halloween sequels never happened.  Needless to say, the two Rob Zombie films have been pushed to the side as well.  Whether that’s a good thing or not will depend on how you feel about those films.  I’ll be sorry to lose Halloween II but the one with Busta Rhymes?  Who cares?  Rob Zombie’s first Halloween was good but his second one can ride out of town on a mysterious white horse for all I care.

As for this latest film, the trailer looks good.  I have faith in David Gordon Green.

One Hit Wonders #15: “Smell of Incense” by Southwest FOB (HIP Records 1968)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

The obscure Southwest FOB climbed to #56 on the pop charts with their psychedelic hit “Smell of Incense”:

This cover of the West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band tune by five high school pals from Dallas, Texas gained national exposure, and the kids released one album. They even opened some shows for a group that soon became much bigger – Led Zeppelin! But the band broke up, and Southwest FOB (which stood for ‘Free On Board’, don’t ask me why) was relegated to the Bargain Bins of rock history… almost. Two of the group’s members later became prominent in the 1970’s as one of that decade’s most boring soft-rock duos, England Dan and John Ford Coley:

Yes, the pair behind such snoozers as “Nights Are Forever Without You”, “We’ll Never Have to Say Goodbye Again”, and “Love Is the Answer” first hit it big with Southwest FOB. Should’ve stuck to…

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