Lots of promo shots from the Farscape mini-series have made it online of late, and so far the Peacekeeper War looks like quality vintage ‘Scape, right down to Einstein Harvey. I may have to break the Sci-Fi boycott for this.
Tag: Fanboy
On the Comeback Trail.
Booyah…We’re finally getting close to a release date for the RotK:EE: December.
Tricksy.
Time? What time do you think we have? While the world enjoys the RotK theatrical edition (released on DVD last Tuesday…or earlier, if you live in NYC), the Extended Edition runs into delays, and now might not see the light of day until 2005. For what it’s worth, Entertainment Weekly has at least confirmed some inclusions, although nothing we haven’t heard before. Ah well, I’m ok with waiting a few extra months if it’ll mean a difference in quality.
Self-Flagellation.
“WHO THE H*#&! ARE YOU AND WHAT GIVES YOU THE RIGHT TO MUCK AROUND WITH THIS TREASURED PIECE OF LITERATURE, YOU AMERICAN HOLLYWOOD HACK? Ah. Good one. Yes, I can see why a lot of people might be wondering this…” Screenwriter Karey Kirkpatrick talks about his contribution to the forthcoming Hitchhiker’s Guide film.
The Unsubtle Pie.
Will Chris Weitz of American Pie direct His Dark Materials? This sounds like a terrible idea at first…then again, I thought he and brother Paul Weitz did a solid job with About a Boy. Well, hopefully they won’t throw out the Tom Stoppard script too quickly…
From Greeks to Goblet.
With Prisoner of Azkhaban right around the corner, casting continues for Mike Newell’s Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. And for Year 4, the Defense against the Dark Arts teacher — Mad-Eye Moody — will be Brendan Gleeson, most recently seen as Menelaus in Troy. I like it.
Forthcoming Issues / Darth Awakens.
AICN reports some (somewhat dubious) rumors on a slew of comic book sequels, including Hellboy 2, Spiderman 3, and X3/X4. Also in the sequel department, Episode 3 — now apparently titled Rise of the Empire — gets the Latham Film treatment. (They previously made the Hobbit and RotK fan teasers, although this one, frankly, isn’t quite up to snuff.)
Prisoner’s Dilemma.
The ten minute preview of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkhaban, shown Sunday night on ABC, is now online. Not much to see here…all of the actual scenes shown look like a vast improvement over the Chris Columbus outings, but there’s a lot of filler to wade through first.
Tide Bandits.
Reports suggest Terry Gilliam’s next film (after The Brothers Grimm) will be Mitch Cullin’s Tideland. If the book blurb deeming it a “modern gothic version of Alice in Wonderland filled with ghosts, spirits, and magic” is correct, then it sounds like a great fit for Gilliam.
Dead on Arrival.
Writer-director Stephen Sommers had best lock his doors at night, ’cause I have a feeling a very angry and very dead Peter Cushing may just be thinking of paying him a visit. Some movies are bad-funny, others are bad-bad…However much it may seem like one of the former from the previews, Van Helsing emphatically falls in the latter category. This movie is so loud, dumb, and nonsensical that it makes Kate Beckinsale’s last vampire movie seem like The Shining. In short, I’m ashamed that my ten+ bucks helped this godawful piece of claptrap make $54.2 million over the weekend.
What else is there to say, really? One of the early AICN reviews summed Van Helsing up as a “big, gawdy, dumb disaster,” and I think that pretty well encapsulates it. Hugh Jackman, so promising as Wolverine, seems bored and distant. Kate Beckinsale and Richard Roxburgh duel it out for the lousiest accent this side of Don Cheadle in Ocean’s 11. David “Faramir” Wenham’s bookish friar sidekick might’ve worked in a different movie (John Hannah played the same part in The Mummy)…it doesn’t here. And the CGI throughout — particularly that of the Wolfman and Dracula’s demon incarnation — is cartoonish and terrible. We’re talking Hanna-Barbera .
But I guess you can’t fault the actors and FX guys too much for phoning in such a terrible script. After all, everyone’s forced to chew out extended passages of completely clunky exposition, except during the long, interminable bouts of rope-swinging. The amount of time CGI characters spend swinging, flying, or falling in this film (with the camera invariably positioned just behind their CGI shoulder, so as to complete the roller-coaster effect, I guess) is flat-out ridiculous, and particularly given that the laws of physics never seem to once apply. And the denouement — which takes forever and a day to finally happen after all the flying, swinging, and falling — makes no sense in a number of ways. (How long is midnight again?) Trust me, Van Helsing is as terrible as you’ve heard…Abandon all hope all ye who enter here.