Anne Hathaway Catwoman

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--- Super Grouper - Of all the things in the world for me not to go nuts about and rush to watch it seems insane that the teaser for The Avengers, which is online now, would fall amongst them. Yet I haven't watched it yet. I am losing my mind! Oh well. I lose a little more every day. Have you watched it yet? or perhaps you saw it attached to Captain America? My screening didn't have it, the bastards. Anyway yadda yadda it is there to view if you're so inclined. io9 also took some screencaps, saving me the effort. Obviously I'm just a big fat ball of sloth today. But look at Hemsworth's bicep there - is he even bigger? He looks enormous, good grief.

--- Live Longer Than Prosper - It is straight up ridiculous that they haven't even finished a script for a second Star Trek movie, ain't it? There's taking your time to come up with a good idea and then there's just being lazy. LAZY! I know lazy, after all. AICN has a little word on where things are right now and it's not gonna be until at least Summer of 2013 they're guessing. Quinto needs the work, JJ!

--- Baby Mice - If you've noted the Donnie Darko banner this week with a smile - it brings me one every time I load the page - then you'll want to note this as well - there's gonna be a Richard Kelly blogathon! Hosted by Jaime at Exodus 8:2 it'll go from August 15th through the 21st! I was just thinking about Kelly the other day and wondering when we'd get more news on what he's up to - he's supposedly working on a "more straight-forward" thriller called Corpus Christi (yeah, The Box was supposed to be more straight-forward) but I haven't heard anything for awhile. Anyway there's loads to cull from his filmography for a post for this blogathon so it should be good stuff!

--- Call Him Tarry - Terry Gilliam is working on an adaptation of Paul Auster's book Mr. Vertigo. I have never read this book, but I like to hear that Terry Gilliam is working on something. Maybe he'll even get to turn his ideas into a movie for once! Imagine that.

--- Man On Milo - Via BD comes that delightfully homoerotic shot of Milo Ventimiglia hovering at the backside of another attractive looking dude in Xavier Gens' next horror flick called The Divide. Gens made his name off of Frontier(s), which rode the French horror bloodbath wave a couple years back. Anyway sweat and tank-tops and evil thoughts in close proximity, I'm there.

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For someone who looks like this without his clothes on, Chris Evans can be a real dork sometimes, can't he? I suppose it's terribly old-fashioned of me to think dorks can't look like that without their clothes on, but it still feels unexpected coming from Mr. Evans. He was all swagger as Johnny Storm! But then a camera will catch him in a shot like the one above and you almost can hear the whisper of pocket protector against polyester-blend cardigan. It's a dichotomy that works well for him in Captain America anyway, even if I sorta chewed apart that movie and spat it out in my review. It does have good things to like about it! Quite a bit!

If you wanna hear a little more from me on Captain America, plus this weekend's other releases - Friends With Benefits, Another Earth (my review), Sarah's Key, and The Myth of the American Sleepover - then head over to Celebrity Beehive.


One movie I didn't mention there but is playing in NYC starting today is Rainer Werner Fassbinder's epically weird sci-fi flick World on a Wire, which I posted at length about here. Go see this if you're in this city! You will be amazed.

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First things first: the best thing about Captain America: The First Avenger - well the best thing that's not a topless Chris Evans getting pawed at by Dominic Cooper - is Hugo Weaving's hilariously spot-on Werner Herzog accent. Your mileage may vary here but since I've got a Herzog fetish it got me through the rougher patches of movie. Indeed I realized at one point that all I was paying attention to were the accents - the subtle Teutonic variations depending upon their varying levels of evil between Weaving and Toby Jones and Stanley Tucci - the latter's is so silly he could only be a lovable good guy; the standard issue American dude of Chris Evans versus the showier Dominic Cooper's "I've got a mustache and I like the ladies!" slippery good-time Yankee Doodle fella; Tommy Lee Jones' wonderful Tommy Lee Jones impersonation; Hayley Atwell's clipped Brit coming from between two lips coated with the most hypnotizing lipstick I've ever seen... this movie is a mouth lover's dream!

Those sideshows aside it's not to say it's really such a bad movie that I just had to wander off mentally in order to survive. It's a perfectly serviceable movie. Once Evans gets juiced up to his usual fantastical muscle-man proportions he's a special effect unto himself, and he puts a lot of heart into the earlier scenes as the skinnied-down Steve Rogers. (But that skinnying down special-effect often wanders into the uncanny valley and Evans' head looks freakishly big for that body. It's a bit of a relief when he bulks up and we can stop being distracted by it.)


And the middle section centering on the jingoistic propaganda campaign Cappy finds himself the sudden star of is the movie's stand-out - not only is Evans' costume the snuggest (obviously a concern when judging this film), but it exudes a playfulness and a visual snappiness that's much needed.

But wander your brain does anyway, even if your life doesn't necessarily depend on it. See my biggest problem with the film, which I hinted at earlier today, is its lack of pop. There's not really much here that feels new, like we haven't seen it before. I knew once the bad guy revealed his weapon to be some kind of laser-gun person-evaporator early on that the film-makers weren't pushing their imaginations too far outside of the comfort zones. There are moments, like the aforementioned propaganda set-piece, where the style of the film overcomes that, and at least they never try to explain their silly laser-guns (It's magic! Magic is science for stupid people! The end!) And the actors are having some fun. (I could easily watch two hours of Dominic Cooper zipping around purposefully in high-waisted trousers. More of that please!) But mostly you do find your mind wandering. You think about Joe Johnston's The Rocketeer for awhile, and then Indiana Jones, and then Werner Herzog tears his own face off so you're paying attention again for a minute, and then maybe some Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow flits by and you're all, "Oh god Sky Captain, I haven't thought of that movie in forever.  Wasn't Gwyneth Paltrow in that? That was weird."
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The A/C has returned! My brain is starting to function again, hooray! Just in time for the day to be over, of course. From what I hear it is decidedly not air conditioned outside. Good grief.

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If you're really really fast (and my crafting of this post might even take too long before it disappears) you can click over here and see a really really terrible quality bootleg version of the teaser trailer for Joss Whedon's Avengers movie before it's inevitably taken down by the studio. (This seems to be the same one we mentioned this morning that'll be playing at the end of Captain America's credits.) You get to see Chris Evans boxing, along with glimpses of Jeremy Renner as Hawkeye, I think there's a quick second of Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner, plus Chris Hemsworth as Thor and ScarJo as Black Widow and RDJ as RDJ in a metal suit. Honestly it's hard to tell, the quality is so bad. Still - Thrills! Chills! Spandex!
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--- Post Cappy - Supposedly there an an Avengers preview of sorts at the very end, post-credits, of Captain America. That link has a couple spoilers for the movie so click with caution. I usually don't bothering sticking through the credits of these movies for Samuel L. Jackson's annual appearance but I might have to for Joss.

--- Carnage Quartet - The Playlist has a couple of new pictures from Roman Polanski's Carnage with Jodie Foster and Kate Winslet and Hans Landa and that pudgy guy who could never marry any of them not even Hans Landa.
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--- Sam Noir - Sam Rockwell is replacing Jeremy Renner in Better Living Through Chemistry. It's about a pill-popping pharmacist who has an affair with Jennifer Garner and plots to kill her husband. Sounds very Body Heat On Vicodin.

--- Getting Gangsta - Slash has got word on what director David Yates is looking at doing now that he's finished with Harry Potter (he directed the last four films) - perhaps an Al Capone bio-pic with Tom Hardy, for one! I like it. The thought of Tom is loose suit pants over boxers and wife-beaters and suspenders fill my head and I like it. Also a possibility is a trilogy based off of Stephen King's The Stand.

--- Slave People - The director of Smart People - that movie that should've just starred Thomas Haden Church and Ellen Page and forsaken all the rest which was bullshit - is who they've picked to direct the 300 sequel? Okay. Slightly random. I guess he almost directed The Ring Two but bailed, which shows wisdom.

--- The Trance Dance - Seems like Danny Boyle is turning to Michael Fassbender's co-star in A Dangerous Method now that Fassy can't be in his new film - no, not Viggo, but Vincent. Cassel that is. Fassy was going to star in Trance opposite James McAvoy and reignite their hot sexual chemistry again, but it wasn't meant to be. Not that I don't want to see McAvoy and Cassel make out. Not that they will. Not that that's stop me from imagining it.

--- Balls Deep Herself, Ari Graynor, has got another role lined up - she's co-starring in For A Good Time, Call... opposite Lauren Miller, actress and more importantly Seth Rogen fiance. It's a "raunchy comedy" co-written by Miller about two broads, said broads being Miller and Graynor, who start a phone sex telephone line. Do those things even exist anymore?

--- Two Weeks - Meant to link this up last week but there's the first official shot of Colin Farrell in the Total Recall remake. (via)

--- White King - The King dies in Snow White, doesn't he? That's how the Evil Queen takes power over the kingdom? Or is he just too weak to upstage her? I can't remember. Anyway Sean Bean has just landed the part of the King in Tarsem's movie version (with Julia Roberts as his Evil Queen) so we can assume he'll die, him being Sean Bean and all.

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ComingSoon's got a huge bunch of new Captain America pictures to check out, of which the above was quickest to grab my eye, naturally. We're pretty much seen this shot before in the trailer but this is tré HQ - click on it and it's like you're licking the veins of Chris Evans' arms. Just like that. And here's another good one with Cappy in his costume with an especially bunched-up-crotch and his bunk-buddy Sebastian Stan:

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--- Hey Look - Channing Tatum shaved his head. I have no idea what it's for, if it's for a role or whatever, but I want to rub my hands (or you know, my whatever) all over it, I know that much.

--- Three Peeks - DH has descriptions of a few trailers we'll be seeing soon - namely The Dark Knight Rises (which is already leaked online in a crappy pirated version, I watched it this morning but the copy I saw's already gone so search around maybe you can still find it), The Amazing Spider-Man (which'll be shown at ComiCon, and excuse me while I groan at the apparent extensive inclusion of origin story in it - is there anyone on Earth who needs to see him get bitten by the spider at this point?), and the first trailer for John Carter Sans Mars (I think that's what I'm calling it from now on), which is supposedly showing up "with select copies" of Harry Potter this weekend. I better be seeing a "select" fucking copy then.

--- Future Man - There aren't any shots of Colin Farrell or any of the other actors in the Total Recall remake in these pictures from the film's now-shooting set, but there are some amusing looks at the costumes the police extras have to wear. Very TRON meets storm-trooper.

--- Latest Final - BD has a rather extensive (that's code for "I only skimmed it") set report from the latest Final Destination movie, which I am officially so excited for I could barf. As I say every time this franchise comes up, I hope I'm seeing new films from this series every other year for the rest of my life.

--- Suicide Laughs - I must've heard about this project earlier but forgotten - Kristen Wiig is teaming up with the filmmakers behind American Splendor to make a dark comedy about a girl who pretends to try to kill herself to win a dude back, a scheme which backfires and gets her sent to live with her estranged mother. This sounds like exactly what she should be doing, so I am there. It's also kind of reminiscent of the darker edges of Bridesmaids - that character was forced by sad circumstances to move home and deal with her mother too. I sense a theme! Kristen Wiig hates her mother.

--- Hero Boobs - This is my sort of literature! io9 gathered up all the examples of Marvel movie superhero men taking off their clothes that they could think of in one hot spot destination post. Chris Evans as Johnny Storm and Captain America, Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, they got them all oh wait they forgot a couple which I will now bitch about, that's right. Just off the top of my head they left off Thomas Jane as The Punisher, they left off Eric Bana in the first Hulk movie (although they do give love to Ed Norton in the last film), and they left off Daniel Cudmore as Colossus in X2.

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When I saw the above picture of Chris Evans in the new issue of Men's Health there on the left I immediately thought of Reese Witherspoon reacting to her 50s era bra in Pleasantville:

Chris Evans could like kill a guy with those things.

(And yes, that would be the sweetest death ever.)

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And yes, with the lovely and voluptuous Varla from Faster Pussycat Kill Kill (RIP Tura Santana) headlining today's banner today's all about the giant breasts, apparently. I've been infected with RussMeyeritis. Aaaaoooooga!

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Can't wait for the scene where Bucky gets his chance to check out all of Chris Evans' super-soldier improvements back at the barracks after lights out in Captain America! 

(You can see a bunch more of Stan here)

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Hey you guys remember how in the first Captain America trailer there was an edit that made it look like Dominic Cooper was totally checking out Chris Evans new buff body, with the whole slo-mo sunglasses-lowering? Well in the brand new trailer they took it even further! We now have Dominic Cooper pawing at Chris Evans abs.

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I mean... what do I say to that? It might be foggy and wet outside today weather-wise but inside my head this is one of the most beautiful days I've ever seen.

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For the most part his new photo-shoot for GQ involves way too much clothing, but the above picture almost makes up for the rest of it. See all of them over at KI212.

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Because obviously those are the only two options,
and they're entirely mutually exclusive too.

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Today is Chris Evans' 30th birthday. There are 39 days until Captain America comes out. Now I'm no mathematician, but 30 + 39 = 69. I figured out your secret message, Chris! Do I win?

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This is a time where it seems fit to invoke that ol' Rosemary's Baby chestnut, "This is no dream - this is really happening!" By this I mean that Joss Whedon's The Avengers is really actually filming right now, which just seems too insane to be true. But it is! And MTV got some info out of Chris Evans behind the scenes of their Movie Awards show the other night. (via)

So we know that somewhere in Albuquerque Chris Evans, Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo and Jeremy Renner are hanging out together getting drunk, and yet we all haven't stampeded the town? We're slipping.

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--- Terminate This - Caught the last ten minutes of the first Terminator on TV last night - I say this with total affection in my heart, but what a cheese-fest! I'd forgotten. When Linda Hamilton - man I miss Linda Hamilton; I guess it's hard to roll out of bed when your bed is made out of billion dollar bills from Jim Cameron's stash - says, "You're terminated!" to the robot as she crushes him I watched my eyes roll right across the room. Anyway more blather about the upcoming reboot over here; apparently it'll be some sort of time-fracture plot a la JJ Abrams Star Trek, which does make sense. They want pretty pretty block of wood Paul Walker for the Michael Biehn role.

--- Song Bird - James Franco is releasing an album. I'd thought he learned his lesson from the Oscars. I guess not.

--- This Bites - Sharks are the new Truman Capotes! Stale Popcorn offers up the trailers for the similarly plotted (or should I say "plotted") Bait 3D and Shark Night 3D, the latter which is so abysmal a trailer I've refrained from commenting upon it yet. It's from the director of Final Destination 2 and has murderous sharks in three-dee - I should be commenting upon it!

--- Frosty Reception - Joe offers up ten thoughts on X-Men: Muppet Babies, all of which sound sound to my ears if I might be ever so slightly less enthusiastic. But I wholeheartedly agree with his endorsement of January Jones take on Emma Frost, as well as the striking resemblance between Banshee and Ron Weasley, which kept freaking me out.

--- Jonze-ing - Spike Jonze's new animated short film will be playing before every movie for the next two weeks at the IFC Center here in NY. Shame that this is what it takes to maybe force me to see the new Godard movie, but there it is.

--- Two By Two - Darren Aronofsky really wants to make his Noah and the Ark movie next, apparently. I will take whatever he wants to give me, so okay. Robes and sandals and two of every animal it is.

--- Re Up - Chris O'Dowd, who won our hearts and therefore our loins with his adorable accented police officer in Bridesmaids, has joined the cast of Judd Apatow's Knocked Up spin-off movie. But then, so has Charlene Yi.

--- Slave Wrangler - It's looking more and more like Leonardo Dicaprio will take the role of the lead villain in Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained, while it's looking less and less like WIll SMith will take the lead role of Django.

--- Space Jockeys - For a good long while Jake Gyllenhaal was attached to Doug Liman's Moon movie - he disassociated himself from the project awhile ago since the film was taking forever to get off the ground, and went and made his sci-fi movie Source Code instead. But Liman's movie has now gotten a green-light says DH, it's now called Luna, and the names rumored for Jake's one-time role are Bradley Cooper, Chris Evans, Andrew Garfield, Emile Hirsch and Chris Pine. Cast them all and then just eliminate all wardrobe budget!

--- Not So Shy Shia - Shia Labeouf is taking the Transformers 3 press rounds as an opportunity to tell us that a fifth Indiana Jones movie is very close to happening. He's also taking the moment to get photographed with his shirt off as you see there, which I appreciate slightly more. I mean I'm not a Case of Crystal Pepsi hater like most folks; I just have my own specially arranged priorities.

--- Pride Kills - As blessedly happens every June, Billy Loves Stu's going all out for Gay Pride Month and posting delights every day, like several recent interviews with gay horror folk - go forth and read, yo. One covered in gore is my kinda Pride.

--- The Bed That Eats - Hooray new reviews at Final Girl! Stacie's reviewed Death Bed and Castle Freak! There's a pair of titles.

--- Bust A Ghost - I am going to take this rare opportunity to encourage a remake of a film I love... probably just because it's early and I'm not quite myself yet. No, this is positive. Vulture's reporting that MGM wants to have David Lindsay-Abaire, the playwright behind Rabbit Hole, write a script for their long-rumored Poltergeist remake. Better still, they're not imposing any story limitations on him, meaning he could come up with a story all his own and they'd just lazily slap the name Poltergeist on it, I guess. Whatever, he hasn't even taken the job yet, so who knows. But in the same article they mention they're also working on a Carrie remake and that's so offensive I can't even.

--- Shield V Skull - io9's got a new TV commercial for Captain America, which apparently hasn't come out yet? I really feel like I already saw it. Huh.

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Back at the tail-end of April when the trailer for What's Your Number? first showed up it was in cruddy lo-fi YouTube quality, and I promised I'd re-cap the couple of moments that matter therein once I set my eyes upon a higher-quality version. Well the trailer's at Apple now, so I have now kept my promise. I am a decent and honest person. Click on any of these to embiggen.