Figured I’d just look through my favorite sites and try and post some links to some interesting news.

the god’s have granted me movie immunity- turns out it’ll be a lot longer before I have to try and stomache a horrible, Americanized Oldboy Remake. This is seriously one of my top-10 movies of ALL TIME. It does NOT need to be translated- the actors in the original have voices that seep through your ears like silk, and with that, its sooooo easy to watch even in Korean. Yeah…subtitles…are a problem for some people. You know what, I have three words for you- HOOKED ON PHONICS.

And also, it’s [an] unfair comparison because Han Solo, we only got to see him three times. And David Addison, they did almost four years of that show, they never did twenty-two episodes of any season so they never reached their syndication number. So they did roughly sixty to seventy episodes so he had more time to be a pimp. But even in that first episode he was more pimp than Han Solo.

So over the last six days I was in Silver Spring, Maryland, filming a new movie with another group. This is a group I haven’t used that often. Mostly consisting of theatrical actors from AEHS- some of the best but overlooked, this group has spunk, creativity, and a lot of talent for their age.

The film was fantasy-meets-revenge, and although we didn’t get to record a lot of the scenes, we got enough that we can make a near-finished product, and possibly film other stories in the saga later in the year.

Here’s the current poster art, done by our artist and actress Simply Taboo.

I’ll have a single scene up later in the week hopefully. One of the earlier scenes.

Anyways, hope this one turns out well, back to Salisbury in 6 days!

The South By SouthWest Film Festival (SXSW) is holding a competition in association with Robert Rodriguez (Sin City, Desperado) to create a “fictional movie trailer” for the upcoming film Grindhouse , a partner work between Rodriguez and Tarantino.

Here are the details:

SXSW and Robert Rodriguez Want ‘Grindhouse Trailers’ for 2007

Austin, TX – January 15, 2007 – The South by Southwest (SXSW) Film Festival is putting out a call to filmmakers who would like to submit their best “grindhouse trailer,” in honor of the April release from Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino, Grindhouse. A sample of the best submissions will be judged by Rodriguez himself, and presented during SXSW, on March 11, 2007.

Filmmakers have a deadline of February 12 to submit their “grindhouse trailer” (no longer than two minutes in length) to SXSW. The trailer should be made for a fictional feature-film, just like those being made by celebrity directors Eli Roth and Rob Zombie for Grindhouse. From those submissions, Rodriguez will determine the best of the bunch, and it will screen during a special presentation entitled “Robert Rodriguez’s Grindhouse 101” on Sunday, March 11. During the presentation, Rodriguez will share stories and footage from the making of the upcoming Dimension Films release.

“We really want filmmakers to come up with something fun, scary, freaky, and out-of-this-world for the competition,” says SXSW Festival Producer Matt Dentler. “This competition, like Grindhouse itself, is in the true spirit of innovative and fast-paced filmmaking.”

Submissions must arrive no later than February 12, to: “SXSW Grindhouse Trailers,” P.O. Box 4999, Austin, TX 78765. There is no application fee, but the trailers must be under two minutes in length, and made within the last 12 months. Films that have already been submitted to SXSW for 2007 consideration, are not eligible. The 2007 SXSW Film Festival occurs March 9-17 throughout downtown Austin, TX. Grindhouse will open nationwide on April 6, 2007.

I’d really be into doing this, and I hope people back at Salisbury might want to try it too. Anyone interested?

I’m not much for the recent trend of Hollywood remakes, but I’m definitely up to reading about anything the original creators have to say about the trend. Aside from King Kong and a few others, I’ve rarely felt a movie really could benefit from a remake. Unless the theme is connected somehow to timelessness, its really hard to see a new era making an old statement with old ideas. I mean, would it ever make sense if anyone ever did an Easy Rider remake? God forbid I just inspired someone.

Well, over at Arrow in the Head, a GREAT site for anyone who is a horror/genre/action film fan with over 800 reviews brilliantly written by Arrow, there’s an interview with the original author of the 1986 genre classic The Hitcher. Now I’m not going to steal this guy’s interview- chances are if I did he’d hunt me down and break a bottle of JD over my head, so I’m just going to give my readers an excerpt with the link. This excerpt, by the way, is probably one of the best-written comments on the remake craze currently shaking (and possibly breaking) the industry. Here it is, from Eric Red:

The word that comes to mind about this horror remake trend is “cannibalistic.” It reminds me of the cannibalism Indians and serial killers practiced by eating the heart and flesh of an adversary to supposedly absorb and gain his strength. The remake guys think that by remaking a film, they somehow gain, through perception or box office, creative ownership of a brand name that was established by other people who took the risk to do something original and do it well.

and he follows up by saying:

But it’s cool getting a film remade. Any way you cut it, it means there’s something enduring in my original script that has stood the test of time to be redone for a new audience. Screenwriters never get the chance to have scripts made twice, and although compromised, the script to “THE HITCHER” has basically been made twice.

Is “THE HITCHER” remake going to be as good as the original? Hell no. Is the remake my script? Basically. Is the remake going to be a wild ride for the audience with some great scenes? Probably. The bottom line for me is it’s an undeniable thrill to see the billboards, bus ads, TV trailers of a film that started with me all those years ago as a kid in Texas. With “THE HITCHER” & John Ryder, I have created a horror icon that’s gone the distance, and I’m proud as hell of it.

Check out Arrow in the Head for more great horror-related news and reviews!

Comic book movies have been popping up like weeds in the last 10 years, ever since the Spider Man and X-Men craze. Those two Saturday-morning high profilers more than deserved the film treatment. Daredevil, Ghostrider, Elektra (even though my mom loved it), The Punisher, Hulk, and Iron Man are all movies that most people probably agree we could do without. Here’s a low-down on my opinions:

Spider-Man deserved to be a movie because its a superhero that can be about one major character and how his life is affected by his cursed power. It’s sorta in the modern day “emo” trend, but the fact is that’s what kids want, and adults love to see a guy in blue tights fighting monsterous villains in NYC. It just looks cool. Spider-Man is one of the most charasmatic characters ever created, and thusly deserves a movie. Sam Raimi brought in great characterization that Maguire complimented with a great performance. I more than approve, with Spider-Man 2 probably being one of my top 50 movies of all time.

X-Men deserved a series because of the popular collection of characters, would make for an awesome trilogy, and sadly was utterly decimated by studio politics. Don’t blame Ratner, kids. Blame Singer for leaving the project just as it was finally getting good. The first movie was decent popcorn, but the second was what REALLY nailed the oncoming “mutant apocalypse” feel that the series was known for, especially with scenes such as the raid on the Mansion which was mirrored by the raid on the Evil Secret Government Hideout. I still attribute inane fanservice to the fall of the trilogy, with that wonderful Juggernaut line killing my brain for the last twenty minutes of the film. And no, I won’t repeat it here.

Daredevil is a decent character, but if Spider-Man is already saving New York, why do we need this fluzy? I liked Affleck’s performance, the man has TALENT, but sadly the directing was so off base, and one of the more mature characters of the Marvel Universe was treated as a child’s plaything, with more cheesy taglines and quips than this more-Batman-less-Spidey needed. It was the start of a snowball towards REALLY BAD COMIC BOOK MOVIES which brings us to

Elektra which I’ll admit I haven’t seen, but my mom loves it, and some of the fight scenes look OK. Defintely looks more focused than Ultraviolet, but hey, that isn’t saying much. Jennifer Garner should be doing something more serious with her career instead of playing wtih Sais- she obviously has the talent. I’ll admit I saw 13 Going on 30 and felt slightly touched. If I don’t admit that, my mom will kill me, alas poor ego vs. survival.

Ghostrider deserves the Straight-to-DvD treatment for two reasons: 1) Nicolas Cage’s career in the action/suspense field is an absolute joke. Here’s a link to one of his other recent career moves which he took VERY SERIOUSLY
and 2) The special effects look absolute crap tastic. Find your own damned trailer I’m not going to provide links to absolute…well Nic Cage movies that don’t sully his career. And just to show I’m not a complete hater- I really want to see Lord of War.

In my opinion, The Punisher and The Hulk were two movies that had the guts to try something different, and succeeded with mixed results. They’re more open to a love-it-or-hate-it field of criticism though, as they aimed for marks and didn’t always miss them. There was some really cool stuff in both films that felt original and not tacked on for the sake of playing-up the character. However, other than the fantastic casting of Iron Man in which Robert Downey Jr is playing an alcoholic (nyuk nyuk nyuk) there really isn’t anything to look forward to from this Robo-Batman-Wannabe.

Now there’s two major Marvel Franchises I have yet to mention- Blade and The Fantastic Four . I don’t mention the former because the first movie, as I recall, actually came out before X-Men and Spider-Man. It was also a REALLY COOL vampire action flick. I have no beef with Snipes killing vampires. It’s damned awesome, even some parts of the much maligned Trinity.

So what’s the deal with FF? I thought it was a bad idea at first, but then I actually sat down and watched the film and realized that while the movie wasn’t very good, the heart was ALL THERE, and the franchise aimed more at families than most of the films that came out as of late. Most comic book films aim towards either “resetting” a franchise, or building up the nerd base for what I can assume is going to be a cosmic war of stupidity over forums for the next 30 years until something wipes them all out (I’m going to go with George Carlin’s theory of Autoerotic-asphyxiation). Fantastic Four aimed to be a family movie, with more of a fantasy-comic book setting, and in the end could please crowds at least for one viewing. Its the kind of shlock comic book films could be made out of if we lived in a less-cynical time, and I don’t mind it one bit. So here’s the trailer for the sequel, something of which I HIGHLY APPROVE OF.

My opinion might not matter for much at this point in my career, but what we all need to do is pay attention to trends- FF is one of the least destructive trends in comic-book movie making, and if they’re going to make a kids-movie craze out of it, I prefer that over CGI skulls that are supposed to be taken seriously any day.