Here’s The Latest Trailer For The Suddenly Controversial The Hateful Eight

Posted on November 5, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

It’s amazing how quickly things can change.

Just one month ago, The Hateful Eight was a film that everyone was eagerly anticipating but which no one was expecting to be as controversial or as incendiary as Quentin Tarantino’s previous film, Django Unchained. I think a lot of us were expecting The Hateful Eight to be a bit like Kill Bill — i.e., a delirious homage to Tarantino’s favorite films and one that took place in a parallel universe. We were expecting The Hateful Eight to be an example of pure cinema, with little connection to the outside world.

But that was a month ago. Things have changed. As I sit here typing this, The Hateful Eight has suddenly become one of the most controversial films of 2015. Suddenly, deciding whether or not to see it has been transformed into a political decision. Following Tarantino’s public criticism of the police and his refusal to back down from his statements, there are suddenly calls to boycott Tarantino’s latest film.

Myself, I’m not a huge fan of boycotting anything. I may choose not to see something for whatever reason but that’s my choice and it certainly does not make me politically or morally superior to anyone who may choose differently. Ultimately, those who want to boycott Tarantino’s film because of his liberal politics need to realize that they’ll also be boycotting a film that stars Libertarian Kurt Russell and features Republican Bruce Dern. If you can’t stand Tarantino’s politics, don’t vote for him when he runs for President. Don’t vote for any candidate that he endorses. But leave his movies, and those of us who want to watch them, alone.

Add to that, The Hateful Eight looks really good! Check out the trailer below!

A Tease of Tarantino’s Eighth…The Hateful Eight.

Posted on August 12, 2015 by Arleigh

The Hateful Eight was never to be seen due to the unfortunate leak of the early draft of Tarantino’s screenplay for the film. It wasn’t meant to be seen outside of those he had trusted to become part of the film. Yet, the script still managed to leak and fanboys worldwide rushed to download and take a gander at what Tarantino had planned for his eight film.

After weeks and a couple months of cooling down from the betrayal of having his work leaked before it was time, Tarantino finally backed off from his promise that The Hateful Eight will never be filmed. With sighs of relief, fans, admirers and critics were glad to see Tarantino change his mind and put the script into production.

Months have gone by since that decision and the start of principal photography. Mini teasers were released and publicity shots were disseminated to the public, but a proper teaser trailer still hadn’t been released.

Now, the waiting has ended as The Weinstein Company has released the first official teaser trailer for Quentin Tarantino’s eight film, The Hateful Eight.

The Hateful Eight will be seen in limited release this Christmas 2015 and everywhere else on January 8, 2016.

Film Review: The Avengers: Age of Ultron (dir by Joss Whedon)

Posted on May 1, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In some ways, I think I may be both the worst and the best possible person to review the latest installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, largely because I’ve seen all the films but I don’t know much about the comics on which they are based. As a result, I can judge each film solely by what is on screen but, at the same time, I know that there are a lot of references that go straight over my head. For instance, when we saw Avengers: Age of Ultron earlier tonight, I had to get my boyfriend to explain to me why certain members of the audience got so excited when Iron Man mentioned an African country called Wakanda. But what’s important is that I would have still enjoyed Age of Ultron even if I had never known why Wakanda was important. The MCU has, so far, managed to maintain a balance between keeping the Marvel fans happy while also remaining accessible to viewers like me. The MCU has created its own separate reality, one that even someone like me can feel comfortable exploring and reviewing.

However, before I get around to giving you my feelings on Age of Ultron, let’s be honest about something.

There are a lot of critics out there who have been waiting for a chance to attack the latest installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Some of them have disliked the MCU since the very first Iron Man film. They have been lone voices in the wilderness, arguing that the entire franchise is overrated and, in some cases, creatively destructive. Much like the Old Testament prophets, they continue to warn of the future while other filmgoers ignore the pillar of fire forming over the nearest theater. And then there are other critics who have praised previous MCU efforts but have never really been comfortable about it. These are the critics who resent having to write positively about a mere genre film. These are the critics who still haven’t gotten over just how good Guardians of the Galaxy truly was. They have been waiting for an MCU misfire so that they can do their penance for suggesting that Robert Downey, Jr. deserved Oscar consideration for Iron Man 3.

These critics are going to watch The Avengers: Age of Ultron and they are going to pounce. They are going to point out that Age of Ultron puts too much emphasis on action over nuance and, as impressive as the CGI may be, it’s impossible to deny that Age of Ultron almost robotically follows the classic action movie formula. They’ll point out that none of The Avengers really develop as characters over the course of the film. Depending on how they’ve felt about the MCU up to this point, some of them will point out that Age of Ultron feels a bit like a step backwards. It doesn’t have the political subtext of Iron Man 3 or Captain America: The Winter Soldier. It lacks the satiric edge of Guardians of the Galaxy. And, ultimately, it’s just not as much fun as the first Avengers film.

And they won’t necessarily be wrong. I mean, let’s be honest. I write this as someone who has enjoyed (and, in some cases, loved) the previous MCU films. Avengers: Age of Ultron is not going to be remembered as one of the best of the MCU films. This is a flawed film that never reaches the heights of the original Avengers. All of the criticisms listed above are perfectly valid.

But, with all that in mind, I still enjoyed Avengers: Age of Ultron and I happily recommend it without a bit of hesitation.

Age of Ultron opens with the Avengers attacking a HYDRA base and we quickly discover that the Avengers are exactly the same as we remembered them. Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.) is cocky, self-destructive, and torn by guilt over his past as a weapons manufacturer. Captain America (Chris Evans) is earnest and idealistic. Thor (Chris Hemsworth) is … well, he’s a God. Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) is scared of what he becomes when he transforms into the Hulk. Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner) is still shooting arrows and feeling out-of-place. Natasha (Scarlett Johansson) is still flirty, enigmatic, and apparently in love with Bruce Banner.

One of the reoccurring themes of the MCU is that whenever Iron Man tries to make the world a better place, he instead ends up nearly destroying it. His latest attempt leads him to create Ultron (voiced quite chillingly by James Spader), a robot who has Tony’s personality and who has decided that the only way to bring about “peace in our time” is to destroy all of humanity. Ultron’s motives are as close as this film gets to any sort of thematic subtext. Ultron stands in for every ideology that would take away a person’s individual freedom in the name of the greater good. Age of Ultron doesn’t explore this subtext as much as I would have liked it to but, at the same time, I appreciated that it was at least there. That’s more than you can say for a film like Man of Steel.

Ultron is not the only new character to show up. Andy Serkis has a small role as a character that will undoubtedly be a villain in a future MCU film. After voicing JARVIS in several films, Paul Bettany finally gets to actually appear onscreen. I can’t talk too much about his character without spoiling the film but Bettany makes good use of his limited screen time.

And then there’s Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen. Previously, they played lovers in Godzilla. In Age of Ultron, they play siblings who just seem like lovers. Taylor-Johnson is Pietro, who can move at super speeds. Elizabeth Olsen is Wanda, whose powers are a bit less defined but mostly seem to consist of being able to do whatever the script needs her to do at the time. (As the film explains it, “He’s fast, she’s strange.”) In the past, I’ve had mixed feeling about Taylor-Johnson. I thought he was brilliant in Nowhere Boy and Anna Karenina but, in other films, I found him to be excessively mannered and a little dull. But, in the role of Pietro, Taylor-Johnson really shines, achieving a good balance of arrogance and vulnerability. As for Elizabeth Olsen, she is perfectly cast as the angry but sensitive Wanda. At the very least, Age of Ultron better serves both of them than they were served by Godzilla.

(Add to that, Wanda and I share similar tastes in fashion, which will make it easy for me to dress up as her for Halloween.)

Director Joss Whedon does a good job with the film’s many battle scenes, especially the final one. And, as someone who hated the mindless destruction of Man of Steel, I appreciated that, as characters, the Avengers spent as much time trying to protect innocent bystanders as they did battling Ultron and his henchrobots. At the same time, it was hard not to feel that the film’s emphasis on action did sacrifice some of the character moments that have made other MCU films so memorable. Early on in the film, there’s a great scene where the Avengers simply hang out at a party. They dance, they dink, they laugh, and eventually, they all take turns attempting to pick up Thor’s hammer. It’s a fun scene because it brings these heroes back down to Earth and, for a few minutes, we get to relate to them in the way that we would relate to our best friends. Age of Ultron could have used more scenes like that.

That said, the cast of Age of Ultron provides enough old fashioned movie star charisma that they overcome the script’s shallow characterization. In many ways, it’s like one of the old Frank Sinatra rat pack movies, where you forgive a lot because you enjoy hanging out with the cast. They’re just fun to watch. Robert Downey, Jr., Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, and Mark Ruffalo; at this point they are so identified with these characters that the actors and their roles might as well be interchangeable.

(And, at this point, if it were revealed the Robert Downey, Jr. owned a suit of armor, would you really be surprised?)

Ultimately, Age of Ultron feels a lot like one of the less acclaimed James Bond films. It’s flawed, it’s imperfect, but fans of the franchise will find a lot to enjoy. Much as you wouldn’t introduce someone to James Bond by showing him Moonraker, you probably wouldn’t want to introduce someone to the MCU by showing him or her Age of Ultron. If, somehow, you’ve managed to exist without ever seeing any other MCU films, then Age of Ultron will leave you confused and wondering what the big deal is. But, if you’re already a fan of the franchise, you’ll find a lot to enjoy here.

And, flaws and all, you’ll walk out of the theater looking forward to the next installment.

Quick Review: Kingsman – The Secret Service (dir. by Matthew Vaughn)

Posted on February 14, 2015 by Leonard Wilson

Kingsman: The Secret Service was a no brainer for me. I’ve been following Matthew Vaughn since Stardust, and a friend pointed me towards Layer Cake, which I love. Most audiences know Vaughn from his work on X-Men: First Class and Kick-Ass. That’s the main reason I ran towards this movie. I also found out writer Mark Millar (Wanted, Kick-Ass, Marvel’s Civil War) was involved and the story was originally a comic, so the flow of the film makes perfect sense. Overall, Kingsman is a triumph for everyone involved, easily a film I could see myself returning to see again, but it’s not without it’s quirks. If the movie were cut into four acts, the first three were great, but the last act comes close to falling into the clichés it tries so hard to avoid.

Short and Sweet:

If you liked Wanted’s and Kick-Ass’ action sequences and copious amounts of violence mixed with bloodletting, Kingsman has your name written all over it. Throats are cut, people are shot, and bones are broken. It doesn’t happen often throughout the film, but when it does, it can get messy. The movie may have you considering wanting to get yourself some good business attire. It isn’t for kids by a long shot, it’s rated R for a reason.

The Slightly Long Version:

Kingsman is the tale of Gary “Eggsy” Unwin (Taron Egerton), a young man who ends up being recruited for The Kingsman after a run in with the law. The Kingsman are a secret society of spies that at one time were tailors to great people. When a threat to the world rises in the form of a rich tech wiz named Valentine (Samuel L. Jackson), the Kingsmen must find a way to stop him.

Eggsy’s recruiter is Harry Hart, played by Colin Firth, who does the best job out of all of the actors involved (in my opinion). Being the one who has to explain what all this is about, Firth manages to play the mentor role well. When it comes to fighting, he shows everyone who’s boss. Who knew Mark Darcy could fight (well, other than Daniel Cleaver, I guess)?

The casting for Kingsman really couldn’t offer any more surprises than it did. You have Jack Davenport (Pirates of the Caribbean), Mark Hamill (channeling his inner Joker here), Michael Caine, Mark Strong (a Vaughn favorite), Sofia Boutella (whose dance techniques work well for her blade wielding character) and Sophie Cookson. There’s really no one out of place here, save for maybe Jackson, who’s villain hates violence yet sees when it needs to be done. I do like that the movie kept me guessing about the Valentine’s intentions.As for Egerton, though I’ve never seen Egerton in anything before this, he’s good enough to warrant seeing him in a sequel. I can see him becoming a Vaughn regular in another film – maybe as an X-Men member?

As if the crew spent some time watching John Wick, the action in Kingsman moves pretty fast and fierce at times, and there’ll undoubtedly be a few scenes that will have you abusing the slo-mo feature when it arrives on digital download. The film moves through scenes with few cuts involved. You’ll have someone staring into a monitor at a fight that travels to the fight itself, and then flow into another moment. It’s Vaughn at his best, and at times, it’s all beautiful. I guarantee you that at least one scene in particular will probably have people talking. By far, one of the most unique uses of a Lynyrd Skynyrd track since The Devil’s Rejects. On a side note, it’s wonderful to see every advertised gadget get some use.

So, with all that praise, what’s the problem? Well, the last part of the film felt a little flat for me. If you’ve ever watched Batman Begins and it’s repetitious “stop the train before it hits the Wayne Tower” sequence, Kingsman feels similar. What bothered me was how some of the events were kind of caught in a bubble. Given the stakes involved (especially near the end), you’re never really told or shown the outcome of the actions. It’s really hard to explain without giving anything away, but I could put it like this. If you fired a gun in the middle of a street in broad daylight, someone would react and call the cops, no? So, if you escalate that action, shouldn’t the reaction / after effects be big? Between this and an annoying bit of product placement, I suppose it couldn’t be avoided. Still, it may be something that stands out for some audiences. It’s by no means a deal breaker, though.

I’d happily see it again at the cinema.

For Your Consideration #8: Captain America: The Winter Solider (dir by Joe and Anthony Russo)

Posted on December 16, 2014 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I would estimate that, when it comes to the movies, Ryan the Trash Film Guru and I agree with each other perhaps 95% of the time. What’s interesting is that the 5% of the time that we have disagreed, it’s always been the result of an entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. As Ryan has documented many times on this site, he’s not a fan of the MCU. (The title of his review of the second Thor film is probably one of the best that’s ever appeared on this site.) As for me, I’m the exact opposite. In fact, I am such a fan of the MCU that I am about to suggest that Captain America: The Winter Soldier — along with being one of the best action films of the year — deserves serious Oscar consideration.

(Ryan’s opposite take on the film can be read here.)

Now, unlike some of the films that I’ve suggested deserve your consideration, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, along with receiving critical acclaim, was also a major commercial success. What made The Winter Soldier unique was that it deserved both the acclaim and the money. There was a lot that I liked about The Winter Soldier. In the role of Captain America, Chris Evans was both likable and, most importantly, believable as a hero out of time. And while I would have never guessed that her character was supposed to be Russian, Scarlett Johansson continued her streak of kicking serious ass in the role of the Black Widow. Samuel L. Jackson brought his customary style to the role of Nick Fury and Sebastian Stan was properly intimidating as the Winter Soldier. The action scenes were exciting, the dialogue was sharp and witty, and the film worked both as a stand alone film and as a part of the overall Marvel universe.

But, for me, what truly elevated Captain America: The Winter Soldier was the film’s subtext. (In that way, I would compare it to another surprisingly intelligent genre film, The Purge: Anarchy.) For those who may have forgotten, the villains of the Winter Soldier are all members and pawns of Hydra, a secret organization that has so infiltrated the American establishment that it has literally become something of a shadow government. Hydra has also infiltrated SHIELD and plans to use their intelligence capabilities to not only preemptively identify possible threats but to eliminate them as well. In fact, by taking control of the SHIELD helicarriers, Hydra can anonymously deliver death and destruction from above.

Does that sound familiar to anyone?

What truly makes this subtext come alive is that fact that the main villain — Hydra’s double agent in SHIELD — is played by none other than Robert Redford. Any student of American film knows what Robert Redford represents. Early in his career, Redford was the idealistic, ambitious, and frequently laconic protagonist, the perfect symbol of American exceptionalism. In the 1970s, Redford was the audience surrogate in classic paranoia films like Three Days of the Condor and All The President’s Men. Lately, as the man behind the Sundance Film Festival and a frequent director, Robert Redford has been the epitome of bourgeois, establishment liberalism.

Hence, when we hear Redford say, “Hail Hydra,” it’s more than just a catch phrase. It’s also the film’s way of saying that we’re all fucked. If even Robert Redford can be a villain, the film seems to be saying, then how foolish do we have to be to fully trust anyone or anything? If Robert Redford can order people killed and then justify it by claiming that he was acting for a greater good then why are we so shocked when governments do the exact same thing?

We live in paranoid times. In the future, historians will recognize that few films captured that paranoia as perfectly as Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

Trailer: Avengers: Age of Ultron (Extended)

Posted on November 12, 2014 by Arleigh

“I know you mean well. You want to protect the world, but you don’t want it to change. There’s only one path to peace…your extinction.” — Ultron

Marvel has released a new extended version of the teaser trailer they released a couple weeks ago. While it’s pretty much similar to the first teaser trailer this extended version has a new intro with Ultron in his initial form confronting the partying Avengers in Avengers Tower. The voice-over by James Spader as Ultron also sounds much different in this trailer than the first. We also get more lingering shots of all the Avengers from Iron Man all the way to Hawkeye rather than the rapid-fire cuts we saw in the first teaser.

May 2015 cannot come soon enough.

Avengers: Age of Ultron is set for a May 1, 2015 release date in North America.

Back to School #67: Coach Carter (dir by Thomas Carter)

Posted on September 20, 2014 by Lisa Marie Bowman

You all have got twitter to blame for this review. I vaguely remember Coach Carter playing in theaters back in 2005 but I didn’t see it. To be honest, the only thing that bores me more than high school football is high school basketball. I have to admit that I really can’t stand to watch basketball, largely because I hate the way the player’s shoes are always squeaking on the court. It just hurts my ears.

But, I’ve noticed that whenever Coach Carter shows up on television, everyone on my twitter timeline seems to get excited about it. Coach Carter is one of those films that is obviously popular with a lot of people so, when I saw that it was going to be playing on Showtime last week, I figured why not?

And you know what?

Coach Carter is actually a pretty good movie. If I don’t seem overly enthusiastic about it, that’s because I’m just not into sports. But I do love movies and Coach Carter is an effective film. That it’s predictable isn’t really that much of a surprise. Predictability is actually probably one of the main appeals of the sports genre. But Coach Carter is distinguished by a strong cast and it has a pretty good message to boot.

Plus, it’s based on a true story! How true I don’t know but I’d like to think that the movie stuck pretty close to the facts if just because the story is so appealing.

Anyway, the Coach Carter of the title is played by Samuel L. Jackson. At the start of the film, Carter takes over as basketball coach at the same inner city high school that he graduated from. When he first starts, his team is rude, disrespectful, and undisciplined. The majority of them have little direction in their lives and have basically pinned whatever hope they have for the future on eventually playing professional basketball.

(I will admit right now that I was really excited to discover that Channing Tatum played one of the players. The only thing that would have made me happier would have been for James Franco to suddenly show up.)

Carter informs his team that, in order to play for him, they have to be willing sign a contract that states that they will treat everyone respectfully, that they will wear a tie on game days, and that they will all maintain a C+ average. Some of the players refuse to sign (and are promptly kicked off the team) but those who do quickly discover that Carter expects them to honor the terms of the contract.

And, under Carter’s leadership, the team goes on to have a great season. They’ve got an undefeated record and appear to be heading for the play-offs when Carter discovers that several members of the team have failed to keep up their grades. To the shock of both the faculty and the community, Carter benches his entire team and announces that none of them will play until all of them have at least a 2.3 GPA.

Needless to say, it all leads to one of those emotional school board meetings that always seems to show up in films like this.

As I stated above, it’s all fairly predictable but the movie itself is well-made. And if anyone was born to play an outspoken basketball coach who isn’t going to let anyone tell him how to run his team, it’s Samuel L. Jackson. Jackson is one of those actors who is so good and so powerful that I think we sometimes tend to take him for granted. Perhaps the best thing about Coach Carter is that it gives Jackson a chance to show what he’s truly capable of doing as an actor.

Again, I really don’t know that much about basketball and I’m not a fan of the game. But, with all that in mind, I was still entertained by Coach Carter. If nothing else, it proved that a lot of the people on my twitter timeline aren’t crazy.

Trash Film Guru Vs. The Summer (?) Blockbusters : “Captain America : The Winter Soldier”

Posted on April 13, 2014 by Ryan C. (fourcolorapocalypse)

I’m firmly of the belief that nobody my age has any business whatsoever using the phrase “WTF,” but nevertheless — WTF? Captain America : The Winter Soldier has been playing for two weeks now, there are, what, either or ten people who write regularly (or semi-regularly) for this website, pretty much all of ’em are bigger fans of Marvel’s cinematic product than I am — and I’m the first person to review this flick here, even though more or less the entire country saw the thing before I did yesterday? Well, okay, but somebody had better get busy on writing a rebuttal to this, because what I’ve got to say is going to piss a lot of people off.

It’s not that DisMar’s latest blockbuster is “bad,” per se — it’s just that it’s exactly what you expect it to be, that’s all these things ever are, and sorry, but it’s not “the greatest super-hero flick ever made.” And that statement, in and of itself, is going to be enough to upset the die-hards out there because, to them, every Marvel movie is “the greatest super-hero flick ever made” — until the next one. Which is probably just as well because these things are entirely disposable and don’t hold up particularly well to multiple viewings. Be honest — once the initial “high” wore off, was The Avengers really all that great? Or Iron Man 3? Or Thor : The Dark World?

Of course they weren’t. Which doesn’t mean they weren’t fun, or that they didn’t hit all the right bullet points on whatever unofficial geek check-list you keep. It’s just that they do their job, get it over with, and move on — as you do, dear reader. Think about it : after watching your average Marvel movie (and if there’s one thing all of these films are, it’s aggressively average), you’re not necessarily pumped to see it again so much as you are pumped for the next one. And that’s kinda the point, isn’t it? The Marvel cinematic “universe” is a self-perpetuating organism at this point, whose primary function is to whet your appetite for the supposed “greatness” to come rather than give you time to reflect on the mediocrity of what’s already been/is going on. The hype surrounding the product is woven into the fabric of the product itself — in fact, it’s the largest part of it.

Don’t get me wrong — I had a reasonably fun time kicking back and watching Captain America : The Winter Soldier. Chris Evans does a reasonably good job portraying Cap/Steve Rogers as a guy who’s fundamentally decent, but not so holier than thou that you want to knock his teeth in. Robert Redford’s choice to play the treacherous Alexander Pierce as a believably nonchalant master manipulator is solid, and everything about him oozes “old movie vet” professionalism. Sebastian Stan cuts a strikingly mysterious pose as the (sub-) titular Winter Soldier. Anthony Mackie is likable in the extreme as sidekick Sam Wilson/The Falcon. And it’s cool to see Toby Jones “back” — after a fashion, at any rate — as Arnim Zola, this time in an iteration somewhat closer to how Jack Kirby originally envisioned him. The main thrust of the story is pretty engaging, too, revolving as it does around a massive web of Hydra “fifth columnists” within S.H.I.E.L.D. itself. It’s reasonably — though far from overwhelmingly — interesting, and keeps you guessing just enough.

But there are some pretty glaring flaws here, as well. Samuel L. Jackson seems tired and played-out as Nick Fury, and while it doesn’t help that his entire “character arc” in this film is lifted note-for-note from that of Jim Gordon in The Dark Knight, the fact of the matter is that Sam doesn’t seem to be putting any more effort into this gig than he does in his credit card commercials. Scarlett Johansson remains horribly miscast as Natasha Romanov/The Black Widow, and while that’s not such a huge problem in movies where she’s peripheral (at best) to the action, it stands out like a sore thumb here, where she’s called upon to be much more central to the proceedings. And for a supposed future love interest, Emily VanCamp is entirely forgettable in her brief time on screen.

Still, those are minor quibbles compared to the main problem here, which is how hopelessly generic, and indeed formulaic, this whole thing feels from start to finish. Joe Johnston’s Captain America : The First Avenger remains my personal favorite Marvel Studios film, but as with Kenneth Branagh and the Thor franchise, DisMar has opted here to show a veteran director with his own ideas and authorial stamp the door when it came time for a sequel and bring in “talent” from the world of television (in this case brothers Joe and Anthony Russo) to hammer things into the dry, predictable “house style” best exemplified by Joss Whedon’s Avengers and Jon Favreau’s first two Iron Man flicks. The end result is a multi-million-dollar, CGI-heavy, clinically-paced, personality-free zone.

About a half hour into things here, you start to get the distinct feeling that you’ve seen all this before, and there’s good reason for that — you have. The action sequences are progressively bigger, louder, and more destructive, but not much else. They don’t become progressively more thrilling or suspenseful, and while the stakes are nominally raised every time, their execution remains largely the same. You could probably run ’em all in reverse order with no real difference to the story. And while there does, in fact, seem to be a kind of major shake-up Marvel’s “universe” at the end of this film, the fact that the Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. TV series remains a going concern week in and week out is all you need to know to figure out that any “ramifications” from this story are apparently very short-lived indeed. In other words, Marvel’s doing on celluloid what they’ve always done in print — providing, in the words of Stan Lee (who it pains me to even quote, but in this case I must) “the illusion of change” — but no actual change at all.

In the end, in the eyes of this armchair critic at any rate, that’s what Marvel’s movies are all about at this point : the status quo. If you’re happy with that, then you’ll enjoy the heck out of Captain America : The Winter Soldier. But if you’d like to actually see something that takes a few risks, dares to break the mold a bit, and maybe even matters — well, you’ll have to look elsewhere. That’s not the point here. The point here is to get you all hot and bothered for Captain America 3, or The Avengers 2 — or whatever the hell else is in the pipeline — before this one’s even over. Viewed from that angle — the one that shows the goal of every Marvel movie is nothing more than ensuring that there will be a next Marvel movie — then yeah, this one’s gotta be viewed as an unqualified success. So what?

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (4 Minute Extended Clip & Trailer)

Posted on March 8, 2014 by Arleigh

It’s just less than a month away from one of 2014’s most-anticipated films. It’s the sequel to Captain America: The First Avenger and Marvel Studios has been kind enough to treat it’s fans to a 4-minute clip/trailer of the film.

This clip from Captain America: The Winter Soldier comes early in the film and helps in setting the tone of the film. This is not the gung-ho and patriotic first film. This follow-up shows the after-effects of the events from The Avengers and how it’s created a sense of paranoia and conspiracy surrounding the very group Captain America has now become a part of.

Where the first film had the nostalgic feel similar to Joe Johnston’s The Rocketeer, this sequel looks to tap the 70’s conspiracy and 80’s technothriller genres. It’s anyone’s guess whether the Russo Brothers succeeded, but just going by this extended scene and the previous teasers and trailers they may have just done that.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier arrives in North America on April 4, 2014.

Scenes I Love: Jackie Brown

Posted on February 23, 2014 by Arleigh

Latest “Scenes I Love” comes courtesy of Quentin Tarantino and Samuel L. Jackson.

There’s nothing else to say other than: “AK-47, the very best there is. When you absolutely, positively, got to kill every motherfucker in the room; accept no substitutes.”

Now, that is true since the venerable rifle designed by the late and great Mikhail Kalashnikov sprays all over the place like a freshman seeing a naked girl live for the very first time. Now, his comments about the .45 was a tad misleading. The .45 will jam once in awhile, but not more than any other firearm and the fact it’s still one of the most sought after and popular handguns in the world speaks to the creative genius that is John Browning.