AWN Blogs

There's not a great deal of new buzz this week, but certainly the debut of the full TOY STORY 3 trailer has fans excited about 2010. In one small 2009 awards season news, there will be one less Oscar contender in the mix. Indie distributor Apparition has pushed Terrence Malick's THE TREE OF LIFE to 2010 so it can focus its support on the wonderful BRIGHT STAR and the upcoming THE YOUNG VICTORIA.

Getting Buzzed
7) Dear John
Trailer
Only two things have me slightly interested in this weeper from sap master Nicolas Sparks — Amanda Seyfried and Lasse Hallstrom. Seyfried plays a young girl who falls for a soldier played by Channing Tatum as he's about to be shipped back to war. So for seven years their relationship exists through letters. Oh this sounds like movie-of-the-week material to me, but Seyfried is emerging as one of the best 20-something actresses around and I have always respected director Hallstrom, who made two of my all time favorites — MY LIFE AS A DOG and WHAT'S EATING GILBERT GRAPE? I'm hoping this is as engaging as THE NOTEBOOK, but that's hoping for a lot, because Tatum is no Ryan Gosling.

Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck's SUGAR is one of the best baseball movies and baseball isn't its main focus. Miguel "Sugar" Santos, a Dominican ballplayer, is the focus. Through his story one sees the difficult odds any player must face in trying to make the major leagues, especially players from foreign countries. In the personal story of one player you get the scope of all players that follow their dreams of the big time.

Sugar (Algenis Perez Soto, film debut) is a promising pitcher in a Dominican farm league for the Kansas City, Knights. When a recruiter from the States teaches him a new curveball, he begins to attract the eyes of the Minors and is called up to a single A club in the Midwest. His friend Jorge Ramirez (Rayniel Rufino, LIBERTY KID) joins him, but he is soon cut from the team. Sugar has a hard time communicating with anyone because he only speaks a few words of English and few people speak Spanish. He stays with an older couple, who are diehard fans of the team. His coaches struggle to give him basic instructions. The only thing he knows how to order for breakfast is French Toast and he doesn't even like it that much.

In the promotion for this film, Maurice Sendak, the author of the book in which the film is based, said the only thing he wanted director Spike Jonze to do with the film was to respect children by not talking down to them. Jonze has done this with this sad, scary and sensational adaptation. Some younger kids might be too frightened to attend, but many will be thrilled by the adventure and relate to the mixed-up feelings of its characters. Like what Carol the Wild Thing says to Max the boy when they first meet, this guy gets it. The same can be said of Jonze.

Max (Max Record, THE BROTHERS BLOOM) is a rambunctious young boy who is confused and scared about all the changes happening around him. His mother (Catherine Keener, BEING JOHN MALKOVICH) is having trouble with her job and she's dating a new guy (Mark Ruffalo, YOU CAN COUNT ON ME), who doesn't seem to get kids. His sister Claire (Pepita Emmerichs) is now into her friends and when Max ambushes them in a snowball fight, the older kids take it too far and destroy his igloo. Max begins acting out leading to him biting his mom and running away.

HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER (1990) Review

HENRY, one of the best serial killer horror films ever made, has arrived in high-definition. This low-budget scarefest isn't the kind of Blu-ray disc you pop in to impress the friends — it's grainy and worn looking at times. But that represents the low-budget origins of the film. This isn't the kind of film one would even want gussied up in 1080p. This release is about as good as the film has ever looked or might ever look. The imperfections, especially in the amount of grain during night scenes, really pop in HD. It is what it is. The colors are balanced nicely, but again the grain does mute the blacks. The look of the film certainly mirrors the subject matter. As for the sound, the film does its best from the original source. Imperfections in mixing and editing are present, but that is not the fault of the Blu-ray makers. Like the picture, the Linear PCM 2.0 stereo mix is gritty, but it fits this film perfectly.

After a week hiatus, the Getting Buzzed column is back. Award season is heating up and we have some family films in this week's countdown that are getting Oscar buzz. We also have George Clooney and Freddy Krueger and God.

Sinking Slowly
Pirate Radio (Nov. 13, 2009)
Trailer
Richard Curtis' comedy about a pirate radio station run on a boat during the 1960s has been delayed over and over again in the U.S. Previously it was known as THE BOAT THAT ROCKED; now it's PIRATE RADIO. Rumors of recuts aren't supporting a positive case for this once promising release.

Getting Buzzed
9) Red Cliff (Nov. 20, 2009)
Trailer
The domestic trailer for John Woo's Chinese war epic is out. I've already seen it and it's a good John Woo flick. When it's acting more like BRAVEHEART it's great.

In recent years, Asia has become a land for innovative cult cinema. From Japan, we have a provocative satire of unruly youth and a drama of the loneliness of the workplace. From Korea, there is a trilogy of revenge films that take the subgenre to new depths of emotional resonance. Get a dose of cool for your weekend.

Kinji Fukasaku's BATTLE ROYALE is set in a near future Japan where the government selects one ninth grade class each year to participate in a tournament to the death. As I said in my original review, "When mainstream American cinema tries to take moral stand, it deals with a moral that is impossible for anyone to disagree with like 'life should be lived to its fullest.' I only wish more films in America would have the guts to take a chance like this one does." Fukasaku skillfully melds pitch black humor with cutting social satire, as well as moving moral dilemmas. If your life counted on it, could you kill your friends? Pushing human emotions to the extremes, this film tackles some disturbing issues such as youth violence, trust and the world's obsession with the humiliation of others on reality TV. This provocative film only gains relevance as it gets older.

Disney's Folly is what they called SNOW WHITE before it arrived in theaters. Moving into feature animated films was a huge gamble, but Walt Disney saw it as the only way to sustain the studio; shorts were getting less profitable. With this film, Disney was a perfectionist and as the production took longer and longer the more expensive it became. If the film was not a success the studio would go under. Upon its release it was hailed as a classic and that status has endured till today.

The story is a simple tale of good versus evil, but on a grand scale. Snow White (Adriana Caselotti, THE WIZARD OF OZ) is the epitome of goodness. The princess toils as a slave to her evil stepmother the Queen (Lucille La Verne, ORPHANS OF THE STORM), but she still finds the happiness in the simple things in life like the flowers and the birds. To contrast her innocence, the Queen is vain and vindictive. When her Magic Mirror (Moroni Olsen, 1950's FATHER OF THE BRIDE) declares that Snow White is now the fairest in the land, she commands her huntsman (Stuart Buchanan) to take the princess out into the woods, murder her and cut out her heart as proof of the heinous deed.