Tag Archives: Nicholas Hoult

Podcast

MOV127: Wolverines!!

We’re baaaaack! After a few weeks of unexpected delays, Jeff and Steve are back with a variety of interesting films. In the past, it’s 1984’s “Red Dawn”, just in time for a remake coming out later this month. In theater’s it’s off to Silent Hill to find out if “Silent Hill Revelations” offers anything worth revealing. From there, it’s off to fairy tale land for a review of the trailer for “Jack the Giant Killer”. In movie news, we chat about a feature adaptation of “Animal Farm”, thoughts about trialer for the “Iron Man 3” trailer and we also cavort about the Disney/Lucasfilm deal. It’s the 127th reel of COL Movies… “Wolverines!!”

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News:

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The Past: Red Dawn (1984)
Rotten Tomatoes 53% Rotten; 65% Audience

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Director: John Milius

Starring: Patrick Swayze, C. Thomas Howell, Lea Thompson

Trivia:

  • The script for Red Dawn was written by John Milius and Kevin Reynolds from a story by Reynolds. The original story, called Ten Soldiers, was more akin to Lord of the Flies, the classic novel about the aggressive nature of man, than to the action film it eventually became. Some of the changes included a shift in focus from conflict within the group to conflict between the teens and their oppressors, and the acceleration of the ages of some of the characters from early teens to high school age and beyond.
  • The first motion picture released with an MPAA PG-13 rating. (The Flamingo Kid, the first film to *get* a PG-13 rating, sat on the shelves for 5 months before release.)
  • The film made the Guinness Book of Records for having the most acts of violence of any film up to that time. According to their calculations, 134 acts of violence occur per hour, 2.23 per minute.
  • The cast underwent an intensive 8-week military training course before filming started.
  • The illustration of Genghis Khan in the high school classroom at the beginning of the film is a caricature of director John Milius.
  • Charlie Sheen’s feature film debut.
  • The original trailer, on the laserdisc release, includes a scene with a tank rolling up to a McDonald’s where enemy soldiers are eating. The scene does not appear in the final cut, and was likely removed due to a mass murder at a McDonald’s in San Ysidro, CA, weeks before the film opened.
  • The film’s replica Soviet T-72 tank was so precise that when it was transported to the studio, two CIA agents followed and wanted to know where it had come from.
  • The plot, a Soviet/Cuban invasion from Mexico, was based on CIA and War College studies of US weaknesses at the time.
  • While filming the invasion scene at the high school, five parachutists dressed as Soviet soldiers were blown up to a mile off course.
  • In the movie, the Wolverines bomb the invaders’ regional headquarters. On August 3, 2006, heavy thunderstorms destroyed the 107-year-old Center Block Building in Las Vegas, NM, where the scene was filmed.
  • An old Safeway grocery store in Las Vegas, NM, was converted to a sound stage and used for several scenes.
  • The submachine gun Strelnikov uses near the end of the film is a Finnish-made Jati-matic GG-95 PDW. About 400 were manufactured in the mid-1980s.
  • “Red Dawn” was the given code name of the military operation in Iraq that captured Saddam Hussein on December 13, 2003. John Milius felt honored by that.
  • The original movie tagline said, “In our time, no foreign army has ever occupied American soil.” Some historians believe that is historically inaccurate. British troops occupied American territory during the War of 1812. They occupied an area outside of New Orleans, and occupied and burned large parts of Washington, DC, including the White House, in 1814. Japanese forces occupied several islands off the coast of Alaska during World War II. However, the statement “In our time” (within a viewer’s lifetime) is technically correct. No viewer was alive during the War of 1812, and Alaska was still a territory when Japan invaded; it become a state in 1959.
  • The original title of the script was “Ten Soldiers”.
  • Though the story takes place in Colorado, it was mostly filmed in Las Vegas, NM. In the short montage of destroyed Soviet vehicles that have been tagged with Wolverines graffiti, a highway sign in the background (with a large fish on it) advertises Storrie Lake, a New Mexico state park about 5 miles north of Las Vegas.
  • The classroom flag at the start of the movie is a 48 star flag. This was the flag of World War II, and a symbolic reference for a movie portraying the start of World War III.
  • When Erica finds the Lt. Col., she tries to ascertain his nationality by asking him to identify the capital of Texas. When he says Austin, Erica incorrectly says Houston. The incorrect answer is an in-joke; Powers Boothe is a Texas native, and Patrick Swayze was from Houston.
  • The sprocket wheel on all modern tanks is in the rear. The replica Soviet equipment was mostly American M-48 tanks. Driving the tanks backward and adding a fiberglass turret gave the replicas a more authentic look.
  • The Russian leader of the invaders is Strelnikov. In the 1965 movie Doctor Zhivago, schoolteacher Pasha Antipov (Tom Courtenay) assumes the name Strelnikov when he becomes a leader of the Red Partisans during the Russian Revolution.
  • When the kids listen to the radio, one message heard is “John has a large mustache”. During WWII, Radio Londres issued coded messages to the resistance in France, the most famous being “Jean has a long mustache”.
  • The Soviet Mi-24 Hind helicopters featured in this film are modified Sud-Aviation SA 330 Pumas fitted with bolt-on wings like the actual Hind helicopters. Similarly-modified Pumas also appeared as Soviet Hind helicopters in Rambo: First Blood Part II and Rambo III.
  • The upbeat epilogue of Partisan Rock, with the voice-over explaining that the Americans eventually won the war, was added at the studio’s insistence.

Talking Points:

  • Don’t really know what to say…

What We Learned:

  • Eating beans each day doesn’t make you tough
  • Never swallow the bug!
  • If you’re going to die, die standing up!
  • If you have the option of toilet paper or leaves, get the toilet paper
  • “Far better it is to dare mighty things, than to take rank with those poor, timid spirits who know neither victory nor defeat.” – Theodore Roosevelt

Trailer:

Recommendations:
Jeff: I’ve always liked this movie. It’s a war movie, a story about putting teenagers in to these type of situations. Very interesting experiment and well done I think. Not high on my list of favorite movies but definitely worth a watch.
Steve: I always loved this movie to the core. Since seeing it as a kid OVER and OVER, I wished I was with the Wolverines in the woods – although I may not have realized exactly why at the time – ah hem. Totally worth seeing before running out to the theater to see what they do with the remake version.

The Present: Silent Hill: Revelation
Rotten Tomatoes 5% Rotten; 49% Audience

Director: Michael J. Bassett

Starring: Adelaide Clemens, Kit Harington, Sean Bean

Trivia:

  • Production was delayed when a freak snowstorm hit the set in Cambridge, Ontario on 23 March 2011.
  • Roger Avary was originally set to write the film and had actually begun writing a draft when he was sent to jail for gross vehicular manslaughter and two felony counts of causing bodily injury while intoxicated. The film was then delayed until the studio hired Michael J. Bassett in Fall 2010 to write and direct.
  • In the school corridor in the trailer, just after Heather bumps into Vincent, on the wall behind them is a poster for a graphics class with a picture of a girl with a butterfly/moth over her face. Moths/butterflies are used often as imagery in the video games and represent Sharon’s “change” into Heather.
  • At Jack’s Inn, there is a red high-heel shoe on the headboard. In the game, Silent Hill 3, Heather uses such an object to solve a puzzle in the amusement park.
  • When it came time to work with Carrie-Anne Moss, an unexpected dynamic occurred on set between her and the lead Adelaide Clemens. At base camp, Moss was pleasant in her conversations with Clemens, but once they both arrived on set, Moss changed. As Adelaide Clemens describes, “She ceased any contact and kept a two meter distance from me. I did not fully realize this distancing until we started shooting; she came over and put her hand on my chin and I’ve never felt a more intense invasion of personal space. I just shuddered. It was fascinating and powerful.”
  • The last scene of the movie when Heather and Vincent are leaving Silent Hill, the truck driver who pick them up is Travis, who is the main character of Silent Hill: Origins, a prequel game. Also the bus with two police car escorting is tribute to another Silent Hill game, Silent Hill: Downpour.
  • In the ‘nurse attack’ scene, the x-rays on the wall clearly show a skull with blades in it, much like the “missionary” creature seen later on in the trailer/film.
  • In 2009, video game artist Masahiro Ito, who participated in the development of multiple installments of the Silent Hill series of video games, was asked to design the creatures and the look of the “Otherworld” dimension featured in the film, but declined the offer because of other obligations
  • Prior to the start of Silent Hill: Revelation 3D’s filming, Bassett expressed in his official blog his openness to fans’ suggestions of whom to cast as main protagonist Heather Mason, provided that the actress would provide a realistic portrayal of an eighteen-year-old and that she would be “known”, with the existence of a page on her on the website Internet Movie Database also cited as a requirement
  • IGN gave it a rating of 4.5/10, saying “Silent Hill Revelation 3D is an inferior sequel in every way, shape and form, a horror sequel that fails to either intrigue or scare, and one that just might have killed the franchise cold-dead.”
  • Metacritic’s aggregated score based on ten professional reviews is 16/100, with one critic saying “Silent Hill: Revelation fundamentally misunderstands the appeal of its source material.”

Talking Points:

  • The plot
  • The creatures
  • Do we care?

Critic Notes:

  • Positives: Not one positive review from Top Critics…and no positive comments
  • Negatives: Boring and baffling; Ends up being a 3-D spectacle of things being poked at the audience; The trailers ahead of the movie were better than the movie you paid to see; An ugly & assaultive collection of jump scares; Ultimately, don’t go to Silent Hill.

What We Learned:

  • Be very, very quiet around the nurses.
  • Never give the bad guy your part of the amulet.
  • Just don’t go to Silent Hill. No good can come of it.

Trailer:

Recommendations :
Jeff: Wow, this was one of the most boring “scary” films I’ve seen. No wonder why it’s a 5% rotten rating. It wasn’t bad but I kept looking at my watch. Claudia v Guardian was awesome though.
Steve: Plot and acting aside, it looked awesome. The new minions and battles between them looked very cool, but it’s really just a style over substance movie. Not being a huge Silent Hill fan (besides playing the original PlayStation version), I just may not have gotten it.

The Future: Jack The Giant Killer

Release: March 1, 2013

Director: Bryan Singer

Starring: Nicholas Hoult, Stanley Tucci, Ewan McGregor

Summary:

A modern day fairy tale in which the long-standing peace between men and giants is threatened, as a young farmer leads an expedition into the giants’ kingdom in hopes of rescuing a kidnapped princess.

Talking Points:

Trailer:

Excitement:
Jeff: Yey, another take on a fairy tale. I think this will probably go along the lines of Red Riding Hood. Okay, but wait for DVD. Hansel and Gretel, now that’s another story.
Steve: I can accept the tale as a big screen adaptation, but I’m just not sure that it grabs me like something more epic like “The Hobbit”. I’m wondering if this will actually grab the attention of American audiences because it seems to be coming out toward the end of the “fairy tale” boom in movies and TV.

The Past: Snatch

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The Present: The Man With The Iron Fists

The Future: Iron Man 3

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MOV091: “I Was Left For A Punctuation Mark.”

It’s the 91st reel of COL Movies, where the boys get their early Valentine’s Day on by reviewing “The Broken Hearts Club: A Romantic Comedy”. In theaters, they go out on limb to see if “Man On A Ledge” is worth your hard earned money. For the future, they check out – yet another – trailer for a film based on fairy tale as they climb the stalk to see if “Jack The Giant Killer” is worth beans. In news, there’s an update on the Blade Runner project and Filmumentary is Raiding the Lost Ark. All this and who knows what else we’ll talk about…it’s the 91st reel of COL Movies – “I was left for a punctuation mark“.

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Final Trailer – Raiding The Lost Ark, A Filmumentary from jambe davdar on Vimeo.

The Past: The Broken Hearts Club: A Romantic Comedy (2000)
Rotten Tomatoes: 63% Fresh, 69% Audience

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Director: Greg Berlanti

Starring: Timothy Olyphant, Dean Cain, Zach Braff

Trivia:

  • Director Greg Berlanti was allergic to the room used as Dennis’ bedroom and directed many of those scenes from outside.
  • This was the first movie filmed by director Greg Berlanti.
  • The Howie/Marshall storyline is semi-autobiographical to a relationship writer/director Greg Berlanti had.
  • As Greg Berlanti was a writer/producer of the series Dawson’s Creek, he showed the script for this movie to one of his favorite actors Kerr Smith who was part of the Dawson’s Creek cast. Kerr loved the script so much that he agreed to cameo any role Greg offered.
  • Many of the cast felt their characters needed to wear necklaces for their roles so several bought their own and wore them on-set. This became a joke among the crew.
  • In the final party scene, actor Justin Theroux wasn’t given a call time to show up on set but he surprisingly appeared 5 minutes before his scene was to be shot.
  • David Downs who played the unspoken therapist role was hired due to the fact that he was a cinema teacher to the director.
  • Filming took 20 days.
  • The scene involving Justin Theroux and Matt McGrath on the balcony took quite some time to shoot as loud cars would constantly drive by, thus ruining the scene.
  • When Timothy Olyphant and ‘Andrew Keegan’ were filming their scene on the park swings, a group of teenage girls noticed Andrew and waited until the scene was over to ask him for his autograph. When Timothy offered his autograph, the girls declined as they didn’t know who he was.
  • The hospital where Benji is taken was an abandoned hospital and the crew had to clean it before they could film.
  • The original title during the script phase was “8×10’s” a reference to Greg Berlanti’s sister’s term for the men he dated.
  • Greg Berlanti originally turned down the role of director, and he said in interviews that the studio offered the director position to him at least three times because they couldn’t find the right director. By the fourth or fifth time they’d asked him, he accepted.
  • The hardware store scene early in the film was shot at Laurel Hardware, which closed in 2009.

Talking Points:

  • Feel like a TV show to anyone else?
  • Realistic view of things? In comparison to other films?
  • Would you recommend to non-gay friends?
  • Jennifer Coolidge! 🙂

What We’ve Learned:

  • Sorry doesn’t feed the bulldog, sugar.
  • If your going to break up with someone you have to at least provide them with decent lighting
  • When your a newbie, every guy in the room is a possibility
  • All the gay men in LA are 10’s looking for an 11.
  • Birthday wishes are the only ones with any real validity
  • Some people are just gay and average

Trailer:

Recommendations:
Jeff: I truly think this is one of the best gay movies out there. While sex is a bit of the story, it focuses more on relationships. A must have for any gay library.
Ray: Once I got over the “straight” to video feel of this.. I really enjoyed it. I feel this was the movie that Bear City was trying SO HARD to be. I liked it so much I was able to look past Dean Cain being in it.
Steve: I definitely enjoy this film…if not just for the wacky relationship between the characters, but for the softball. LOL.

The Present: Man On A Ledge
Rotten Tomatoes: 32% Rotten; 61% Audience

Director: Asger Leth

Starring: Sam Worthington, Elizabeth Banks, Jamie Bell

Trivia:

  • Amy Adams was considered for the role of Lydia.
  • Det. Lydia Mercer (Elizabeth Banks) helps Nick (Sam Worthington), a wrongfully convicted man who escapes from prison to prove his innocence. In ‘The Next Three Days’, Banks played a character who is wrongfully convicted and escapes from prison.

Talking Points:

  • Acting?
  • Plot Holes?

What We Learned:

  • Everybody loves a good train wreck
  • You can tell a lot about a man by his eyes.
  • Women jump for love, men jump for money
  • People don’t go to work in Manhattan, they go to war.
  • It always ends in blood, snot, and tears.
  • There’s two types of people, those who do what it takes to get what they want, and everyone else.

Trailer:

Recommendations :
Jeff: I went in expecting a mediocre film, came out actually liking it. Still only above mediocre to me, but still think worth seeing in the theater.
Ray: Well.. that was a surprise. If you can get around the somewhat terrible acting and some big plot holes, it’s actually an entertaining movie, that offers more than just a guy on a ledge.
Steve: It was alright. I didn’t really have any major reactions. Decent acting.

The Future: Jack The Giant Killer

Release: March 22, 2013

Director: Bryan Singer

Starring: Nicholas Hoult, Stanley Tucci, Ewan McGregor

Summary:

An ancient war is reignited when a young farmhand unwittingly opens a gateway between our world and a fearsome race of giants. Unleashed on the Earth for the first time in centuries, the giants strive to reclaim the land they once lost, forcing the young man, Jack, into the battle of his life to stop them. Fighting for a kingdom, its people, and the love of a brave princess, he comes face to face with the unstoppable warriors he thought only existed in legend—and gets the chance to become a legend himself.

Trivia:

  • In May 2010 it was reported that production of the film would be delayed until February 2011. The report cited Singer’s interest in being able to pre-visualize scenes with the digital giants in-camera with the live-action actors (a la James Cameron’s Avatar) and the need for more time to work out the complex process as reasons for the delay.
  • In December 2010 Singer that, “I’m very much looking forward to using the EPIC Red for my next movie Jack the Giant Killer which will be shot in, what else, 3D. The camera’s incredibly compact size and extraordinary resolution are ideal for the 3D format. But more importantly Jack the Giant Killer is my first movie set in a time before electricity. The EPIC’s extraordinary exposure latitude will allow me to more effectively explore the use of natural light”.
  • Principal photography began on April 12, 2011 in the British countryside. In May 2011, production moved to Somerset, England for two weeks with filming scheduled in Wells, Cheddar and secret locations in the county including scenes filmed at Wells Cathedral. Also in May, scenes were shot at Puzzlewood in the Forest of Dean near Coleford, Gloucestershire. Puzzlewood, which features unusual tree and rock formations has previously been used for filming of the BBC TV series Doctor Who and Merlin. The same forest is said to have inspired J. R. R. Tolkien to write The Hobbit. Later in the same month, filming took place at Norwich Cathedral in Norwich, Norfolk.
  • In January 2012, Warner Bros. moved back the release date by nine months to March 22, 2013. It had been set to open June 15, 2012. The Hollywood Reporter stated “Warner can likely afford the move because of Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises, which opens in July. And pushing the film back gives the studio more time for special effects, as well as a chance to attach trailers for it to Peter Jackson’s Christmas tentpole The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey”.

Talking Points

  • Why this resurgence of fairy tales?

Trailer:

Excitement:
Jeff: Looks like a fun update to a fairytale. Seems to be happening alot lately. I have doubts on how the final product will be though.
Ray: Looks ok, I’m about as excited as I can be about a Jack and the beanstalk movie as I can be.
Steve: Eh…I like creepy fairytales. I may have to see another trailer to see if it will meet my “dark” demands.

Coming Attractions

The Past:

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The Present:

The Future:

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MOV052: “ZeroCool”

In this 52nd Reel, the boys go back in time to revisit “Hackers”. Does it still hold up today? As for what’s currently in the theater, they tackle “Thor” (and they like it! 😉 – haha!). Does it hold up to the plethora of comic book movies that are out there and coming up? Then, speaking of comic book movies, the boys check out the multitude of trailers for “X-men: First Class”. Do any of them actually excite the guys? All this and movie news including updates on the plot of “Expendables 2”, David Hasselhoff in he next “Piranha” movie, “Amityville Horror” goes 3-D, and “Dinosaurs vs. Aliens”? Pikachu…we choose you!!

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The Past: Hackers (1995)

Rotten Tomatoes: 32% Rotten; 66% Audience

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Director: Iain Softly

Starring: Jonny Lee Miller, Matthew Lillard,Lawrance Mason, Angelina Jolie, Fisher Stevens

Trivia:

  • The high school scenes were filmed at Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan, one of a few elite, exclusive high schools for students gifted in math, science and computers. Real school seniors were extras in many scenes. In the real school, the pool is on the first floor.
  • The computer they break into is a fictional mainframe computer called a “Gibson” – a homage to cyberpunk author William Gibson.
  • The character name “Emmanuel Goldstein” is taken from George Orwell’s novel “Nineteen Eighty-Four”. It is also used as a pseudonym by Emmanuel Goldstein aka Eric Corley, who publishes the magazine “2600, The Hacker Quarterly”. Corley was an uncredited consultant for this film.
  • The “Hacker Manifesto” read by Agent Bob was actually written by a hacker of great renown in the 1980s named Loyd Blankenship, who went by the name of The Mentor. It was published in PHRACK magazine, issue 07, file 03 in 1986.
  • Eugene Belford uses the pseudonym Babbage at the end of the film. Charles Babbage was the inventor of an early form of the computer.
  • Jonny Lee Miller and Angelina Jolie were married shortly after the making of the film, and then were divorced four years later.
  • Around the movie’s release, the official website was modified by its webmasters to appear that it had been “hacked into,” and digital graffiti and instructions to “see ‘The Net’ instead” was added to the site’s graphics.
  • All of the hacker handles proposed by the Joey were actual handles already used by real hackers.
  • The game being played in the arcade is a high-quality prototype of the Playstation game “Wipeout” by Psygnosis. It is done on a high-end SGI server and allowed the development team to try out tracks and gameplay, before porting it to the Playstation. As a result, there are features and graphics in the movie that do not exist in the actual game, including the “high score smashing” sequence.
  • The “hacking”-sequences – the scenes where you see the “inside” of a computer – are mostly motion-controlled models, because director Iain Softley thought that actual computer graphics would look too artificial.
  • The poster for this movie shows Acid Burn and Crash Override with various words and ASCII symbols transposed on their faces. Amongst the words are: – 1. Names of hackers in the movie, including Lord Nikon, Acid Burn, and Crash Override – 2. Some of the commonly-used passwords, according to Plague, such as God, Sex, Love, and Secret – 3. Phreak – a “phone freak” – a hacker who concentrates their knowledge on telephone systems. (Phantom Phreak was the main Phreaker in the hacker group)
  • Cyberdelia was built from scratch in an abandoned indoor swimming pool on the outskirts of London, with the center of the club in the depths of what was the pool. Producer Ralph Winter notes, “We never knew why, but the pool was designated an historic landmark, so great care had to be taken not to damage anything and to return it to its original state.”
  • The part of Kate “Acid Burn” Libby was originally offered to Katherine Heigl, but due to prior commitments to Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995) had to turn it down. The director auditioned Hilary Swank, Heather Graham and Liv Tyler for the role which ultimately went to Angelina Jolie.
  • At the beginning of the movie when Dade phones the security desk of the television station he is hacking in to he gives the name of Eddie Vedder, the singer of the rock band Pearl Jam.
  • The distinctive ring Kate Libby wears is the “Original Armour Ring” by jewelry designer Marche’ Noir.
  • The film’s writer, director, and some cast members attended the New York City 2600 meeting, a monthly hangout of the local hacker community, to observe and talk with real-life hackers.

Talking Points:

  • The competition

What We’ve Learned:

  • God gave men brains larger than dogs so they wouldn’t hump women’s legs at cocktail parties
  • Spandex is privilege not a right.
  • You wanna be elite you gotta pull a righteous hack
  • Hacking is more than a crime, its a survival trait
  • It’s in that place where I put that thing that time
  • There is no right and wrong, only fun and boring
  • Hackers used a lot of hard copy back in 1995.
  • HACK THE PLANET.

Trailer:

Recommendations:
Jeff: Totally unrealistic nerdy film. I adore it. Way dated though.
Ray: The Movie that made it “Cool” to be a computer nerd…. love it, although the tech aspect of this movie really dates it
Steve: Dated, but not as cool as other early computer-based movies like WarGames. To be honest, is early EMO to me. Not my fav, but others may like.

Intermission: Top 5 Computer Themed Films

  1. Tron
  2. WarGames
  3. The Matrix
  4. 2001: A Space Odessey
  5. Hackers

The Present: Thor
Rotten Tomatoes: 78% Fresh; 83% Audience

Director: Kenneth Branagh

Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Anthony Hopkins, Tom Hiddleston, Stellen Skarsgarrd

Trivia:

  • Comic writer Stan Lee who created Thor in 1962, appears as the truck driver who attempts to tow Mjolnir out of the crater it landed in… and fails miserably.
  • This is Anthony Hopkins’s first comic book film. He was previously offered the role of Alfred in Batman Begins (2005).
  • The Eye of Agamotto, a very powerful magical amulet, can be seen in Odin’s treasure room. This was a weapon wielded by a Marvel hero, Doctor Strange the Sorcerer Supreme.
  • According to producer Kevin Feige, the Bifrost bridge is the films’s most interesting set: “In the comics, it’s literally a rainbow that extends out from Asgard and pops down on Earth. We’re not necessarily doing that; we’re not having the big hard solid lines of colors. We’re saying it’s some sort of energy, almost a solid quartz bridge that as the light catches it and flows through it, you get some of that rainbow-esque quality to it.”
  • Anthony Hopkins signed on as Odin despite never reading a “Thor” comic or knowing anything about the Thor mythology. It was the concept of the father and son relationship that intrigued him about the role.
  • To prepare for his role as Loki, Tom Hiddleston trained in the Brazilian martial art of capoeira.
  • Thor holds a drawing of a crossroads with nine orbs in it. This is his perception and representation of Yggdrasil, in Norse mythology a great tree around which the nine worlds are tethered, making up the universe.
  • A model of the Infinity Gauntlet, an all powerful weapon capable of controlling aspects of reality (soul, time, space, power & mind) in the “Marvel Comics” universe, was constructed for this film. The model is made from bronze and copper (with jewels made from resin) and weighs 60 pounds. It was built to be operational so that animatronics could be built on it.

Talking Points:

  • There was very little exposition for a origin story film
  • Story – what you expected?
  • Natalie Portman…good or bad?
  • Loki looks like Johnny Weir
  • Chris Hemsworth..hottie or nottie?

What We Learned:

  • What you need is a rainbow bridge
  • I need sustenance!
  • A pet store is not the place to get a horse

Trailer:

Recommendations:
Jeff: I really liked it, not the best Marvel movie but not bad at all.
Ray: Tolerable, one of the weaker marvel movies as far as story goes. Don’t waste your money on 3D. Can we have the Avengers already?
Steve: Enjoyed it…was much more pleased than I thought I would be going in. Definitely worth a look…3D unnecessary.

The Future: X-Men: First Class

Director: Chris Miller

Starring: James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Rose Byrne, January Jones, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, Kevin Bacon, Lucas Till, Zoë Kravitz, Jason Flemyng, Edi Fathegi

Trivia:

  • Bryan Singer, who directed X-Men (2000) and X2 (2003), was approached to direct this film in October 2009, but in March 2010 declined due to his commitment to Jack the Giant Killer (2012) and was replaced with Matthew Vaughn in May 2010. Singer however stayed on as producer.
  • Taylor Lautner was considered to play Hank McCoy (aka Beast) but dropped out due to scheduling conflicts. Nicholas Hoult was later cast.
  • The uniforms the X-Men wear are colored blue and yellow, in homage to the original blue/yellow suits the X-Men wore in the comics from 1963 (their debut) to 2001 (when X-Men (2000) inspired a change to black leather).
  • Filming was originally to take place on Tybee Island, but a producer browsing on the online map program Google Earth found Jekyll Island to be a more suitable location.
  • Sirs Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen were considered to appear in the film as the elder Professor X and Magneto, but the idea was rejected as the filmmakers wanted to start a new X-Men trilogy, without any connection to the previous films.
  • A telepathic battle between Professor X and Emma Frost was going to be in the film, but upon the release of Inception (2010) the concept was scrapped.
  • This is the first X-Film without Wolverine or Cyclops.
  • Matthew Vaughn instructed the cast to do away with all accents in their performances. James McAvoy had planned to copy Patrick Stewart’s voice (since McAvoy was going to play a younger version of Stewart’s Xavier), but Vaughn quashed it; Vaughn also told Rose Byrne that Moira MacTaggart would not have her trademark Scottish accent in the film (to the Scottish McAvoy’s mild disappointment).

Talking Points:

  • How many versions of this trailer are there?
  • Trailer at least acknowledges the previous films, which I’m surprised at.

Summary:

Before Charles Xavier and Erik Lensherr took the names Professor X and Magneto, they were two young men discovering their powers for the first time. Before they were archenemies, they were closest of friends, working together, with other Mutants (some familiar, some new), to stop the greatest threat the world has ever known. In the process, a rift between them opened, which began the eternal war between Magneto’s Brotherhood and Professor X’s X-MEN.

Trailer:

TRAILER #1:

TRAILER #2:

TRAILER #3: International

Excitement:
Jeff: Stoked, but I’m easily stoked when it comes to comic book movies.
Ray: I am skeptical.. X3 really left a bad taste in mouth.. hopefully by going back to the past they can fix what they mucked up in the future.
Steve: Seems like it’s something I’ll like…origins of several characters versus a single movie on one. I’m down for it!

Coming Attractions

The Past
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The Present

The Future

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