For my first blog, I have decided to take a look into the next few months of movies and give my picks for what are the films I am most looking forward in the fall season.
10. Max Payne
My first choice is without a doubt my biggest guilty pleasure. I am both a fan of movies and video games, yet I will be the first to say that they don't always go well together. I mean, does anyone remember the Super Mario Bros. movie? Or Final Fantasy? But as a huge fan of both of the Max Payne games, I have to say that the games are some of the most cinematic games I have ever played and the story should work well in film. The trailer does look like a combination of Constantine and Punisher, and Mark Wahlberg really hasn't had a good film since The Departed, but I'm going to hope that it can be as good as it is in my mind.
9. Australia
OK, so I've seen the trailer for this movie a few times and read the description and honestly, I still can't recollect what this movie is about. From the poster I'm gonna guess that Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman are in love. And maybe it takes place in Australia. But besides that, no clue. But here is what I do know: Baz Luhrmann is directing this. Why does that make me interested even though I haven't the slightest clue what it's about? The man directed quite possibly the greatest musical of the past decade, (Not counting South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut, of course) Moulin Rouge. This is his first film since then and if this film can be close to as great, visually and emotionally, as that film was, this could be one of the best films this year.
8. Blindness
I saw the trailer for this before The Dark Knight, and I must say I was taken back by how great this looked, especially since I had never even heard of it until that point. Blindness, which is adapted from the Jose Saramago novel and directed by Fernando Meirelles of City of God and The Constant Gardner fame, tells the story of a worldwide epidemic where people seem to randomly go blind and the quarantine that is set up because of it. Julianne Moore and Mark Ruffalo play a couple who go to one of the quarantined sections, Ruffalo is blind, Moore isn't, no one in the section knows this. Plus, Gael Garcia Bernal from Babel and The Motorcycle Diaries plays the king of the ward that Moore and Ruffalo stay at, so just the fact that he's in this should make it a great film.
7. Milk
After taking a while to experiment with slow-moving films like Elephant, Gerry and Last Days, Gus Van Sant tells the story of Harvey Milk, the first ever man who was elected in California who was also openly gay. Sean Penn, James Franco, Emile Hirsch and Josh Brolin all star in this film, which could be Penn's ticket to his second Academy Award and hopefully Emile Hirsch will get nominated someway after being shafted last year for his extraordinary performance in Into the Wild.
6. Burn After Reading
After loving the last film from the Coen brothers, last year's No Country For Old Men, I decided to watch all the other films from the brothers that I hadn't seen this summer. From what I've seen, their films are split into two categories: mystery/thriller types (Miller's Crossing, The Man Who Wasn't There, No Country) and comedies (O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Intolerable Cruelty). Yet what makes their best films is when they combine the two genres (Raising Arizona, Fargo, The Big Lebowski). That being said, it looks like Burn After Reading should fit right along with those mystery/thriller/comedies and work right along with the style and approach of the Coens.
5. Synecdoche, New York
Once again, another pick because of who made it. Charlie Kaufman, who was written some
of my favorite films of all time including Being John Malkovich, Adaptation and his last masterpiece,
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, takes his first stab at directing with this film starring
Philip Seymour Hoffman. Hoffman plays a playwright who, for his new play, decides to make a
replica of New York inside of a warehouse. This may seem like a weird idea for a movie, but if
anyone can make weird work, it's definitely Kaufman.
4. Choke
Anyone who has read a book from Chuck Palahniuk know, the guy is seriously screwed up.
From his mom issues to his connection to self-help clinics, the man who wrote Fight Club, has
written about some seriously weird topics. Choke follows Victor Mancini, a sex-addicted,
historical-recreator, who pretends to choke in restaurants to earn money to keep his mentally
disturbed hospital mother in her nursing home. If that's not weird enough for you, then how
about the fact that Victor's mom's nurse thinks that he is the second coming of Christ? Yeah,
even Tyler Durden would think that was insane.
3. W.
Oliver Stone has never been shy to cover a controversial topic. From World Trade Center to
JFK to even Alexander, the man knows controversy. But making a biography of a president while
he's still in office? Well with that, this may be his most surprising film to date. From the poignant
topic to the incredible casting that includes Elizabeth Banks as Laura Bush, James Cromwell as
George HW Bush and the perfect casting of Thandie Newton and Richard Dreyfuss as Condoleeza
Rice and Dick Cheney, respectively, this film is sure to have Republicans in an uproar and
democrats laughing hysterically.
2. The Road
Entertainment Weekly named the Cormac McCarthy book the #1 New Classic book of the past
25 years. After reading this incredible book this summer, I think it goes even further than 25
years as one of the greatest books in that time period. Viggo Mortensen is simply known as
Father in this story about a man trying to protect his son in a post-apocalyptic world filled with
horrifying obstacles and even more horrifying people. The McCarthy book, who also wrote
No Country For Old Men, is shocking, disturbing and at the same time beautiful. If the few images
that have been released are any indication of how great this film will be, the film could be
equally as magnificent as the book.
1. Zack and Miri Make A Porno
The two greatest comedic worlds are about to combine this summer. Take the Apatow group,
mix them with the legendary Kevin Smith crew, have these two combine and make a movie called
Star Whores and you could have the best comedy this year. Kevin Smith's last film, Clerks 2, was
my favorite film of 2006, not to mention the original Clerks is my favorite comedy of all time makes
this an easy choice for my number one most anticipated film of 2008.
So leave me some comments! Let me know what your picks would be or if you think I've made
any mistakes on my list. Any criticism is welcome and hopefully I'll be blogging again soon.
No comments:
Post a Comment