Not to sound morbid, but it occurred to me recently (whilst contemplating my own mortality) that someday – hopefully some far distant day -- I’ll read an Entertainment Weekly Spring/Summer/Fall/Holiday preview issue and/or watch a flock of coming attractions trailers for a whole bunch of movies I won’t, in fact, live long enough to see.
In Zelig, Woody Allen’s chameleon character dies with just one regret: that he never got to finish reading Moby Dick. Imagine Zelig’s disappointment if he’d been a Harry Potter fan in November, forever denied the opportunity to see the cinematic adaptation of Half-Blood Prince (let alone the Deathly Hallows)? And Lord knows at this point whether any of us will live long enough to see Zack Snyder’s much-litigated version of Watchmen. (Ironically, another movie that most of us seem destined never to see is Fanboys, about a cancer-stricken geek in 1998 determined, in yet another layer of sad irony, to see the as-yet-unreleased Phantom Menace before he dies...but I digress.)
Anyhow, with my wife and I both fighting various wintry ailments (and going on a solid week of sleep deprivation thanks to the itchy throats and sinus pressure of the damned), it’s hard to look forward to anything at this point beyond still yet more mucus...but if I should manage somehow to survive this relentlessly cold, snowy New England winter (good Lord...it’s only JANUARY?), then here are the five upcoming 2009 releases I’m most looking forward to:
5. HARRY POTTER & THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE
I originally posted this in my 2008 Fall Preview before Warner Bros. saw fit to switch the release date of the sixth J.K. Rowling adaptation to 2009, but the following still holds true: I haven’t read a single word of Ms. Rowling’s fantastically popular and beloved series of novels, but I’ve followed the relatively unprecedented blockbuster cinematic serialization religiously. I’ll go on record here as a big fan of Christopher Columbus’ unfairly maligned adaptation of Sorcerer’s Stone, and I thought Alfonso Cuarón’s Prisoner of Azkaban was bizarrely overpraised, but in general, the series just keeps getting better and better, and I can’t wait for the next episode.
4. STAR TREK
Yes, I’ve heard the Star Trek 90210 jokes, and no, the last few Star Trek movies have not exactly instilled fans with a lot of confidence in the franchise -- but as with J.J. Abrams’ day job, the increasingly ludicrous and exasperating Lost, I simply have no choice in the matter: I’m still going to watch. My Dad recently reminded me of the time he drove my geeky pubescent ass to a Star Trek convention through a full-scale Perfect Storm blizzard just so I could buy myself a Tribble and hang out with bosomy fangirls dressed like Yeoman Rand. So yes, good or bad, I’ll definitely be seeing this one – (alone, notes my wife).
3. WHIP IT!
I couldn’t find any clips of Drew Barrymore’s upcoming directorial debut about a misfit teen (Ellen Page) who joins an Austin, Texas roller-derby team. Instead, the trailer above is for Hell On Wheels, an astonishing documentary about the girl-powered rockabilly roller derby revival that sparked in Austin and spread across the nation. In the film, director Bob Ray captures the birth and hilarious, harrowing growing pains of the Lonestar Rollergirls, an all-female, D.I.Y. enterprise that transforms from weekend lark to serious business when big money and crippling injuries raise the stakes of a burgeoning start-up, leading to shattered friendships (and fibulas) and a fiery schism between two factions of fiercely independepent entrepeneurs. Short skirts + third wave feminism + breathtaking banked track action + Marxist/capitalist tensions + a fascinating cast of real-life characters & a kick-ass soundtrack = one of the best movies of 2007. I doubt Whip It! will be as good, but with Barrymore, Page, Kristin Wiig and Juliette Lewis strapping on the skates and kneepads, I’m more than willing to give this one the benefit of the doubt.
2. INGLORIOUS BASTERDS
When I saw John Waters interview Quentin Tarantino on a panel at the Provincetown Film Festival last year, the erstwhile Mr. Brown said he’d set himself the goal of finishing his “guys on a mission” World War II spaghetti Western lollapalooza (starring Brad Pitt, Maggie Cheung, The Office’s B.J. Novak, Freaks & Geeks’ Samm Levine and...really? Mike Myers?) in time for this year’s Cannes Film Festival. With the exception of roughly 42 percent of Death Proof, Tarantino has never yet steered me entirely wrong (I didn’t even mind his segment of the disastrous Four Rooms), and when he’s on his game (as he could easily be with this project) he is, like the wallet says, a Bad Motherfucker. It’s possible, of course, he won’t finish the film in time for a 2009 release...in which case, be looking for Basterds at the top of my 2010 movie preview list.
1. THE MEAT CITY BEATNIKS
As I mentioned on Thanksgiving Day in the 2008 Screengrab Holiday Special, I began shooting this ultra-low budget guerilla indie musical about screenwriters on the make and a drug deal gone bad (co-scripted by my esteemed Screengrab colleague Scott Von Doviak, based on a short story by Jim Dryden, with music by Eric Jacobson) way back in January 2008 (or possibly the late fall of 2007...it’s all a bit hazy at this point). Of all the releases I hope to see in 2009, this tops the list if only because it will mean (A) I’ve finally finished post-production and (B) it actually got released. Like Basterds, though, I’m not betting the farm on this one actually seeing the light of day before 2010...but if ever there was a year for hope, it’s this one!
HAPPY YEAR OF THE OX!
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