Tag Archives: Ryan Reynolds

Here Are The Nominations For The 22nd Annual Critics’ Choice Awards!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

manchester-by-the-sea-sundance-2016

The Broadcast Film Critics Association have announced their nominees for the 22nd Annual Critics’ Choice Awards and here they are!  Once again, in a pattern that will probably see repeated several times of this next month, the nominations were dominated by Moonlight, La La Land, and Manchester By The Sea.

FILM NOMINATIONS FOR THE 22ND ANNUAL CRITICS’ CHOICE AWARDS

BEST PICTURE

BEST ACTOR

BEST ACTRESS

  • Amy Adams – Arrival
  • Annette Bening – 20th Century Women
  • Isabelle Huppert – Elle
  • Ruth Negga – Loving
  • Natalie Portman – Jackie
  • Emma Stone – La La Land

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

  • Viola Davis – Fences
  • Greta Gerwig – 20th Century Women
  • Naomie Harris – Moonlight
  • Nicole Kidman – Lion
  • Janelle Monáe  – Hidden Figures
  • Michelle Williams – Manchester by the Sea

BEST YOUNG ACTOR/ACTRESS

  • Lucas Hedges – Manchester by the Sea
  • Alex R. Hibbert – Moonlight
  • Lewis MacDougall – A Monster Calls
  • Madina Nalwanga – Queen of Katwe
  • Sunny Pawar – Lion
  • Hailee Steinfeld – The Edge of Seventeen

BEST ACTING ENSEMBLE

BEST DIRECTOR

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

  • Damien Chazelle – La La Land
  • Barry Jenkins – Moonlight
  • Yorgos Lanthimos/Efthimis Filippou – The Lobster
  • Kenneth Lonergan – Manchester by the Sea
  • Jeff Nichols – Loving
  • Taylor Sheridan – Hell or High Water

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

  • Luke Davies – Lion
  • Tom Ford – Nocturnal Animals
  • Eric Heisserer – Arrival
  • Todd Komarnicki – Sully
  • Allison Schroeder/Theodore Melfi – Hidden Figures
  • August Wilson – Fences

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

  • Stéphane Fontaine – Jackie
  • James Laxton – Moonlight
  • Seamus McGarvey – Nocturnal Animals
  • Linus Sandgren – La La Land
  • Bradford Young – Arrival

BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN

  • Arrival – Patrice Vermette, Paul Hotte/André Valade
  • Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them – Stuart Craig/James Hambidge, Anna Pinnock
  • Jackie – Jean Rabasse, Véronique Melery
  • La La Land – David Wasco, Sandy Reynolds-Wasco
  • Live by Night – Jess Gonchor, Nancy Haigh

BEST EDITING

BEST COSTUME DESIGN

  • Colleen Atwood – Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
  • Consolata Boyle – Florence Foster Jenkins
  • Madeline Fontaine – Jackie
  • Joanna Johnston – Allied
  • Eimer Ni Mhaoldomhnaigh – Love & Friendship
  • Mary Zophres – La La Land

BEST HAIR & MAKEUP

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE

BEST ACTION MOVIE

BEST ACTOR IN AN ACTION MOVIE

BEST ACTRESS IN AN ACTION MOVIE

BEST COMEDY

BEST ACTOR IN A COMEDY

  • Ryan Gosling – The Nice Guys
  • Hugh Grant – Florence Foster Jenkins
  • Dwayne Johnson – Central Intelligence
  • Viggo Mortensen – Captain Fantastic
  • Ryan Reynolds – Deadpool

BEST ACTRESS IN A COMEDY

  • Kate Beckinsale – Love & Friendship
  • Sally Field – Hello, My Name Is Doris
  • Kate McKinnon – Ghostbusters
  • Hailee Steinfeld – The Edge of Seventeen
  • Meryl Streep – Florence Foster Jenkins

BEST SCI-FI/HORROR MOVIE

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM

  • Elle
  • The Handmaiden
  • Julieta
  • Neruda
  • The Salesman
  • Toni Erdmann

BEST SONG

  • Audition (The Fools Who Dream) – La La Land
  • Can’t Stop the Feeling – Trolls
  • City of Stars – La La Land
  • Drive It Like You Stole It – Sing Street
  • How Far I’ll Go – Moana
  • The Rules Don’t Apply – Rules Don’t Apply

BEST SCORE

  • Nicholas Britell – Moonlight
  • Jóhann Jóhannsson – Arrival
  • Justin Hurwitz – La La Land
  • Micachu – Jackie
  • Dustin O’Halloran, Hauschka – Lion

Deadpool

Film Review: Deadpool (2016, directed by Tim Miller)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Deadpool_posterWade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) is a mercenary with a sense of humor and a heart of not quite gold.  When he is diagnosed with terminal cancer, he leaves his girlfriend, Vanessa (Morena Baccarin), and agrees to allow a secret organization to experiment on him.  They will cure his cancer but, in return, they expect him to serve as a super powered slave for their own clients.  After being severely disfigured by the sadistic Ajax (Ed Skrein), Wilson develops a super human healing ability.  Eventually, Wilson escapes but now fears that he’s too twisted to return to Vanessa.  Taking on the identity of Deadpool, Wilson tries to track down and get his revenge on Ajax (real name: Francis).

From the moment I heard that 20th Century Fox was producing a Deadpool film, I had only one request: “Don’t fuck it up.”

After all, there is a reason why Deadpool is one of the most popular characters to come out of Marvel’s later period.  He’s certainly the best thing that Rob Liefeld has ever had a hand in creating.  First introduced in New Mutants and subsequently used in the various X-books before getting his own ground-breaking series, Deadpool has earned the right to be known as “the merc with a mouth.”  Deadpool was popular because, out of all the characters in the Marvel Universe, he alone understood that he was in a comic book.  He would frequently break the fourth wall and talk about how ridiculous life as a comic book antihero was.  At a time when almost all other super powered characters were presented as being grim and troubled, Deadpool was the often vulgar antidote to comic books that took themselves too seriously.

(My favorite Deadpool moment was when Deadpool had been once again incorrectly assumed dead.  When Blind Al told Weasel that Deadpool was dead, the footnote at the bottom of the panel read, “Guess the series is over!”)

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I saw Deadpool last weekend.

They did not fuck it up.

My biggest fear was that the Deadpool movie would present a neutered or toned down Deadpool but there was no need to worry.  Though the film’s plot may be a standard origin story with a revenge subplot tossed in, Deadpool distinguishes itself by staying true to the character’s anarchistic and self-referential humor.  This is not a case of Dolph Lundgren putting on a trenchcoat, driving a motorcycle, and calling himself the Punisher.  And it is certainly not a case of the strange character that Ryan Reynolds played in X-Men Origins who was supposed to be Deadpool but definitely was not.  Deadpool allows Deadpool to be Deadpool, right down to the red uniform, the broken fourth wall, and the R-rated humor and violence.  Deadpool earns its R rating and wears it as a badge of honor  This is not a movie for children.  Everything that most heroes do and say off-camera, Deadpool does and says for the entire audience to see and hear.

That's not Deadpool!

That’s not Deadpool!

That's Deadpool!

That’s Deadpool!

Deadpool ends with the promise of a sequel, perhaps one that will include Cable.  Since Cable is one of my least favorite Marvel characters, I hope that the sequel will at least see the return of Colossus (rendered by CGI and voiced by Stefan Kapicic) and Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Briana Hildebrand), both of whom make welcome appearances here.  Negasonic Teenage Warhead especially deserves her own spin-off film.  Let her blow up shit for two hours.  I’ll watch.

Also, if the sequel has to feature Cable, I hope it will also include Dr. Bong.  Deadpool needs all the help he can get!

1988445-doctor_bong_diagnosis_deadpool_26

A Very Red Band Deadpool Trailer for Christmas

Posted on by Arleigh

Deadpool

Twentieth Century Fox has had a stranglehold on the film rights to one of Marvel Comics’ biggest properties: the X-Men and every character associated with them. So far, the studio has only taken the core X-Men and Wolverine properties and adapted them onto the big-screen to mixed results. Some fans of the properties have even come to see the Fox vision for these mutant characters as tame and water-down version of the classic comic book characters.

One such mutant character which had languished in development hell within Fox was the character of Deadpool. The so-called “Merc with a Mouth” had an off and on development cycle throughout the years. The character finally appeared in the forgettable Wolverine stand-alone film, X-Men Origins: Wolverine. The character was played by Ryan Reynolds and just like another superhero film (this time for DC as the classic character of Green Lantern) he starred in, this one bombed and he was starting to be seen as a curse on superhero projects his named gets attached to.

If there was one major effect that Marvel Studios’ success with their Marvel Cinematic Universe has had with the rest of the Hollywood studios was to force them to treat their comic book property licenses seriously. They had to embrace the comic book nature of the properties they held the license to and work with it instead of against it.

It looks like Fox might be doing just that with their R-rated attempt at the Deadpool live-action adaptation starring the star who campained long and hard to produce and star as the title character: Ryan Reynolds. If the tone we’ve seen with the Comic-Con trailer and this latest red band trailer is any indication then the Ryan Reynolds superhero curse could be ending in early February of 2012.

Deadpool is set for a February 12, 2016 release date.

The (Official) Deadpool Red Band Trailer

Posted on by Leonard Wilson

Deadpool

Fox has released the trailer for Marvel’s Deadpool, which comes out next year. This is the same trailer that was shown at the San Diego Comic Con earlier this year, and is in crystal clear HD. For those who aren’t aware, Deadpool is the tale of Wade Wilson (no relation to me, mind you), who is dying of cancer and elects to join a program similar to the Weapon X one that created Wolverine. When he’s given the same healing factor as Wolverine, Wilson takes his new-found abilities and becomes Deadpool, the Merc With a Mouth, weapon-wielding extraordinaire. The movie has the potential to be great or maybe not, considering how hard they’re trying to appease their target audience. It hits just about every mark, with it’s breaking of the fourth wall and comic elements. It’s also great to not only see Ryan Reynolds reprising the mishandled role from X-Men Origins: Wolverine, but finally having it done in a way that at least comes close to the comic origins.

Why is this a Fox production and not a Disney/Marvel one? Well, for one, Fox already had the character. Two, I don’t think Deadpool fits into the wholesome do-gooder world that most of the Marvel Heroes and Heroines inhabit. He’s more like Stitch in comparison to the other Disney Characters.

Deadpool also stars Morena Baccarin, Gina Carano and T.J. Miller. Enjoy.

Shattered Politics #64: Dick (dir by Andrew Fleming)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Theatricalposterdick

I wouldn’t necessarily say that I love Dick but I still think it’s a pretty good film.  (Ha ha, see what I did there?)  Of course, to really appreciate this 1999 comedy, it helps to know a little something about political history.  For instance, it helps to know that the Dick of the title is President Richard Nixon (played here by a hilariously paranoid Dan Hedaya).  In 1973, as the result of his attempt to cover up White House involvement of a burglary at the Watergate Hotel, Nixon became the first President to resign from office.

A lot of the credit for Nixon’s downfall was given to two reporters for the Washington Post, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein (played, in this film, by Will Ferrell and Bruce McCulloch).  While Woodward and Bernstein investigated the Watergate break-in, they were reportedly fed information by a highly placed informant who was referred to as being Deep Throat.  For years, the identity of Deep Throat was a closely held secret.  Countless books were written that speculated as to who Deep Throat may have been.  (In the film All The President’s Men, he was played by Hal Holbrook.)  Finally, in 2005, it was revealed that Deep Throat was a FBI agent named Mark W. Felt, who was upset because he was passed over for a promotion.

And, quite frankly, that’s kind of a disappointing solution.  When you think about someone who brought down the government, you hope that he or she will turn out to be something more than just a disgruntled employee whose previous work consisted on running counter intelligence operations against domestic political activists.

In fact, it’s hard not to wish that, perhaps, Deep Throat could have been two 15 year-old girls who just happened to stumble across one of the biggest political scandals in American history.

Well, fortunately, this is the theory proposed in Dick.  Betsy (Kirsten Dunst) and Arlene (Michelle Williams) are two friends who, one night in 1972, sneak out of Arlene’s apartment so that they can mail a fan letter to singer Bobby Sherman.  While doing so, they happen to stumble across the Watergate burglars and get a good look at White House aide G. Gordon Liddy (Harry Shearer).

The next day, while on a field trip to the White House, the two girls are spotted by Liddy.  Liddy arranges for them to be pulled to the side and questioned by chief-of-staff H.R. Haldeman (Dave Foley), who determines that the girls barely know who Nixon is and that they don’t understand what they witnessed.  However, before Haldeman can send the girls on their way, Nixon himself enters the office and complains about how poorly planned the break-in was.

This leads to an unlikely relationship between Nixon and Betsy and Arlene.  Hoping to win their loyalty (and their silence), Nixon arranges for them to be his official dog walkers.  Betsy and Arlene, meanwhile, still don’t have the slightest idea of what’s going on.  They accidentally bring pot cookies to the White House (which Nixon particularly enjoys) and Arlene even develops a mad crush on Nixon.

But, of course, Nixon eventually shows his true colors and Betsy and Arlene take down the government….

In many ways Dick is a one-joke film, in which Betsy and Arlene regularly find themselves blissfully unaware while history literally unfolds around them.  But it’s actually a pretty clever joke and it’s also a very plausible one.  People are often unaware that anything important is happening when it’s actually happening.  Often times, it’s only in retrospect that historical moments are seen to be truly historical.  And, ultimately, Watergate itself is such a bizarre scandal that it’s the perfect moment in history to be reinterpreted as a comedy.

Dick is ridiculous enough to be funny but plausible enough to be memorable.

Trailer: Plan 9 and The Voices

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

PCAS

So the upcoming film Plan 9 is apparently meant to be a remake of Ed Wood’s Plan 9 From Outer Space.  That sounds like a terrible idea, doesn’t it?

Perhaps The Voices will be better.  This one features Ryan Reynolds, Anna Kendrick, and a talking cat!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fKu_NMbNKM

6 Trailers For 6 Films That 6 People Might Watch in 2015!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

So, I should start out by explaining that this is not the latest entry in my soon-to-be-revived series, Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation Film Trailers.  Instead, these are 6 trailers for 6 films that you will have a chance to see in 2015!

Seriously, it’s always good to start a new year with something to look forward to, right?

1) 71

This one look intense, no?  Jack O’Connell plays a British soldier who, during the British occupation of Northern Ireland, finds himself lost behind enemy lines in Belfast.  Jack O’Connell is a rising star and the film won best director at the British Independent Film Awards.

2) Veronika Decides to Die

This was actually filmed in 2008, premiered in Brazil in 2009, played in Germany in 2010, and, seven years later, it’s finally getting a U.S. release.  It’ll premiere in theaters and on VOD on January 20th and then, in March, it’ll be released on DVD.  That would seem to indicate that First Look International, the film’s distributor, doesn’t have much faith in it.  But you know what?  Some of the best films ever made were distributed by people who had no faith.  This could be a challenging, edgy film.  Or it could be crap.

We’ll find out!

3) A Little Chaos

This historical drama stars Kate Winslet and it was directed by Alan Rickman!  The trailer looks gorgeous.  I majored in art history so I have to admit that I will always have a weakness for films like this.

4) Woman in Gold

Will Ryan Reynolds ever star in another good film?  That’s a question that I often find myself pondering.  Reynolds is the type of talented actor who deserves more than co-starring in R.I.P.D. and showing up in a cameo in A Million Ways to Die In The West (BLEH!).

While Woman in Gold does not look to be the type of film that’s going to help re-establish Reynolds as being a rising star, it does look like a film that will give him a chance to remind people that he actually can act.  Undoubtedly, it’ll help that he will be co-starring with Helen Mirren.  Woman in Gold is scheduled to be released on April 3rd.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=geJeX6iIlO0

5) Wild Card

It’s not January unless Jason Statham is killing someone.  2015’s Jason Statham film will be Wild Card.  It’ll be released on January 30th.

6) Blackhat

And finally, we have Blackhat.  It’s scheduled to be released on January 16th.  It’s directed by Michael Mann and stars the official sexiest man alive, Chris Hemsworth.  Apparently, Hemsworth will be helping to capture whoever it was who hacked Sony.

What do you think, Trailer Kitty?

Driving Trailer Kitty

Lisa’s Homestate Reviews: New Mexico and A Million Ways To Die In The West

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

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My family lived in Carlsbad, New Mexico from January of 1991 to July of 1992.  I was only 5 years old when we arrived and 6 when we left so I really can’t say that I remember that much about Carlsbad, beyond the fact that my mom was always worried about rattlesnakes, I was excited about going to kindergarten and that, when my Dad announced that we were moving to Oklahoma, I cried and cried because, even at that age, I knew that meant I’d never get to see my friends again.

So yeah, some of my memories of New Mexico are a little traumatic.  But are they as traumatic as watching Seth McFarlane’s A Million Ways To Die In The West, a film that was shot in New Mexico and which is an early front-runner for claiming the title of worst of 2014?

Written by, produced by, directed by, and starring Seth McFarlane, A Million Ways To Die In The West tells the story of a sheep farmer named Albert (played by Seth McFarlane) who basically spends the entire movie whining about how much he hates living in the old west.  His girlfriend leaves him for … well, look, the plot is stupid.  You knew the plot was going to be stupid when you first saw the trailer earlier this year.  You probably even knew the film wasn’t going to be that good.  However, as bad as you might think the film is, it’s nothing compared to how bad the movie actually is.  And the blame pretty much rests with Seth McFarlane.

Seth McFarlane has got cold, dead eyes and a curiously unlined face that, when taken along with his ever-present smirk, tends to make him look like one of those horror movie mannequins that comes to life once the store closes and murders horny teenagers.  I understand that it’s always been a part of McFarlane’s act to present himself as being an asshole with a heart of gold but, for the most part, that works best when you only have to deal with his voice.  The minute that you see his smug face, which is as immobile as his voice is expressive, the heart of gold part disappears.  All your left with is an asshole who insists on telling the same joke over and over again.  As both a comedic writer and director, McFarlane’s technique is to basically beat the audience into submission, dragging jokes out to such an interminable length that you eventually laugh because you simply cannot believe that you’re wasting so much time watching this crap.  Some people have mistaken that technique for genius.  Those people should be forced to watch A Million Ways To Die In The West in much the same way that Malcolm McDowell was forced to watch violent movies in A Clockwork Orange.

(And I write all of that as perhaps the only woman in the world who was not offended by Seth McFarlane singing The Boob Song at the Academy Awards, if just because the joke was clearly meant to be at the expense of McFarlane and the overage frat boys who seem to make up his fan base.)

A Million Ways to Die In The West is full of familiar faces.  Liam Neeson goes totally overboard as the film’s villain.  Neil Patrick Harris, as usual, is fun to watch, or at least he is until he’s forced to take part in one of McFarlane’s trademark endless musical numbers.  Eventually, Harris’s character gets slipped a laxative and it’s just as disgusting as it sounds.  Giovanni Ribisi plays McFarlane’s best friend and his joke is that he’s a Christian (yes, Seth takes on Christianity — what a rebel!) and that his girlfriend (Sarah Silverman, who deserves better) is a prostitute who is willing to have sex with everyone but him.  Amanda Seyfried has the thankless task of playing McFarlane’s girlfriend while Charlize Theron plays the enigmatic woman who teaches Seth how to shoot a gun.  (Theron gives a far better performance than this movie deserves and it was hard not to wish that the entire film had just been about her character.)  There are also several celebrity cameos — Ryan Reynolds, Christopher Lloyd, and even Jamie Foxx show up.

But, ultimately, the entire film is about Seth McFarlane.  He wrote it, he directed it, and he stars in it.  Seth McFarlane dominates this film and that’s the problem.  What might be slightly amusing in a 22-minute cartoon is not going to be funny enough to sustain a nearly two-hour film.  For a rambling and often aimless film like A Million Way To Die In The West to succeed, it needs a star who is both skilled at comedy and likable enough that he’ll be able to anchor the mayhem.  (Seth Rogen, for instance.)  Instead, we’re given a smirking Seth McFarlane and the end result is a film that somehow manages to be both forgettable and a disaster.

Now, you may be wondering how I ended up watching this film.  Well, originally I wasn’t planning on ever seeing it but then I started to read reviews about how terrible it was and I was like, “This is a film that I definitely need to see for myself, so that I can see if the film is actually a misunderstood masterpiece or if it’s a film that I’m going to have to keep in mind when I’m compiling my annual list of the year’s worst films.”  (Plus, when I arrived at the theater, The Fault In Our Stars was sold out.)  But anyway, I sat through it and I forced my sister Erin to watch it with me and I think Erin may be on the verge of finally forgiving me.

Finally, what was more traumatic?  Leaving behind my friends or watching this movie?

Too close to call.

A-MILLION-WAYS-TO-DIE-WEST

A Quickie With Lisa Marie: Green Lantern (dir. by Martin Campbell)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

So, earlier tonight, I was sitting in a dark theater watching the latest super hero film, Green Lantern.  Now, Green Lantern is getting some terrible reviews right now and having seen it, I can understand why.  That said, Green Lantern is not an offensively terrible movie in the way that Priest, The Beaver, or The Conspirator were terrible films.  Instead, Green Lantern’s main problem is that it’s just so freaking forgettable.  To be honest, I found myself forgetting about it while I was watching it.  So, this isn’t going to be an easy review to write.

(This is also why this is a quickie review.  I mean, I’ll make some noise for a few minutes and I’ll try to come up with something halfway neat for the end of it but don’t ask me if I really felt anything.)

Since I realized I was forgetting about the movie even as I was watching it, I decided to use social media to help me out.  Blatantly ignoring the rules (but that’s why you love me, baby), I spent most of the film texting and tweeting.  I’m pretty sure I heard the people sitting behind me whining about it but who cares?  I did what I had to do.

Anyway, checking my texts, I find the following conversation:

Text from LMB (that’s me) to ENB (that’s my sister, Erin): Hey bitch where you at?

ENB to LMB: WTF, bitch?  I’m sitting next to you in the theater.

LMB to ENB: Hi, Erin!  lol. : )

Okay, so that’s not much help but it does tell you just how engaging this film is.  I had the choice of either watching Green Lantern or sending text messages to my sister who was sitting right next to me and I chose to send text messages.

I also resorted to posting a few cryptic messages to twitter, with the hope that they would serve to remind  me of what I was watching.  Here they are:

Tweet #1: About to see Green Lantern. : ) — See, I didn’t start this film out with a bad attitude.  I was looking forward to it.

Tweet #2: Old ppl always take forever buying tickets — What’s up with that?  I would think they would be in a hurry seeing as how they’ve got less time to see a movie than I do.  Just saying.

Tweet #3: We need a super hero named Red Herring — I sent this tweet just 15 minutes into the film but it shows that I had already picked up on the main problem with this film.  There’s a lot going on but it all feels like it’s just been spit out by some script-o-matic sitting hidden behind the Hollywood sign.  It just doesn’t ever really add up to anything beyond a sinking feeling of been there, done that. 

Ryan Reynolds is haunted by flashbacks of his father dying.  Why?  Because Scriptwriting 101 says that the hero has to have some sort of self-doubt to overcome. 

When we first see Ryan Reynolds, he’s lying in bed with a naked blonde.  Who is she?  What happens to her?  Why does Reynolds, at no other point in the film, seem to be the type who would have a one night stand with some anonymous blonde?

Reynolds joins the Green Lantern Corp. when he gets a glowing green ring.  All the other members of the Corp. doubt him because he’s human but then they say that the ring never makes a mistake.  Okay, so if the ring is incapable of making a mistake and the ring chose Reynolds than why is everyone so convinced that Reynolds can’t cut it as the Green Lantern?

Seriously, it’s as if someone just wrote out a list of plot points and some anonymous script doctor just went down the list, checking off everything as he tossed it into the mix.

Plus, I think Red Herring would be a cool super hero.  He could have the power of creating mass distraction and he could be the sidekick of my super heroine alter ego, Lady Verbose.

Tweet #4: Lol, cockpit is a funny word — I believe the exact line that inspired this tweet was something like: “And I still get into a cockpit occasionally.”  It just made me laugh because cockpit is a funny word, largely because it’s a combination of cock and pit.  Anyway, that is honestly the only line of dialogue that I actually remember from the film.  As action and comic book movies tend to live and die on the basis of the quotable one-liner, that’s not a good sign.

Tweet #5: Green Lantern kinda bleh but Ryan Reynolds is mancandy — And you know what?  He is.  Green Lantern may have been forgettable but Ryan Reynolds made a likable hero and he brought some much-needed humor to the role.  To be honest, as I look back at the various Green super hero movies, I can’t help but wonder how much better Green Hornet would have been if it had starred Ryan Reynolds as opposed to Seth Rogen.  (I love you, Seth, but the super hero thing just isn’t for you.)

Also, Peter Sarsgaard did a pretty good job playing a surprisingly sympathetic villain.  Both he and Reynolds deserved a better film. 

Other than Sarsgaard and Reynolds, the cast was pretty forgettable but then again, it’s not like they really had much to work with.  I have to be honest, though, that I am now officially bored with Tim Robbins.  He shows up here playing yet another insensitive rich white guy.  As usual, you don’t really buy him as the character because he’s just too obviously Tim Robbins.

Tweet 6: Lets not go to Camelot. Its a silly place. — I think this was inspired by all the scenes that were set on the home planet of the Green Lantern Corps.  (That’s the group that Reynolds becomes a member of.)  These scenes were obviously meant to inspire awe but they just felt silly.  In the film’s defense, some of the special effects — particularly the evil entity known as Parallax — are impressive but, for almost every impressive special effect, there was another that just fell flat (which is never a good thing for a 3-D film).

Tweet #7: Sinestro is a silly name. — Sinestro, played by Mark Strong, is the leader of the Green Lantern Corp.  And Sinestro is a really silly name.

Tweet #8: Why not just call him Eviltro? — Well, why not?

Trailer: Green Lantern (2nd Official Trailer)

Posted on by Arleigh

The WonderCon 2011 exclusive trailer and footage was a major step in creating major buzz and hype for Warner Brothers’ and DC Entertainment upcoming superhero film Green Lantern. With just a little over a month left before the film premieres the second (most likely the final trailer for the film) trailer has been released and whatever doubts early marketing and ads the film seemed to give rise to have gone away with this final release.

Green Lantern is sort of the Iron Man of the DC Comics pantheon in that he’s one of the more powerful characters in that universe, but he never got to the level of iconic status as Superman and Batman. There’s a reason why the only DC comic characters to have sustained any sort of film franchise have been Superman and Batman. The Green Lantern character was never about fighting evil on Earth. His fight was always on a much more cosmic-scale and this trailer shows that the danger in the Green Lantern is cosmic in scale even. The last superhero to attempt such a concept story-wise was the Fantastic Four sequel with Silver Surfer and Galactus. That didn’t turn out as well as many hoped it would. Here’s to hoping that Green Lantern will succeed where the Fantastic Four sequel failed.

Green Lantern is set for a June 17, 2011 release. It will come out in both 2D and 3D (RealD and IMAX 3D).