The Screengrab : hugh jackman

Morning Deal Report: Hugh Jackman Unbound

Scott Von Doviak — Wed, 13 May 2009 14:30:00 GMT

Madeleine Stowe makes her writing and directing debut with Unbound Captives, a western set to star Hugh Jackman, Rachel Weisz and Robert Pattinson. “Though Stowe's a newcomer behind the camera, getting the job and landing that cast is a payoff for her risky decision to turn down millions of dollars for the script in 1993…She would have played a woman (now to be played by Weisz) whose husband is killed and her two children kidnapped by a Comanche war party in 1859. She is rescued by a frontiersman, to be played by Jackman. Pattinson will play the son,” Variety reports.

Does the phrase “Scent of a Woman with a finance-y twist” make you shiver with anticipation? Please seek medical attention immediately. Al Pacino is in talks to star in Blink, an adaptation of Malcolm Gladwell’s nonfiction bestseller. Stephen Gaghan’s script “will center on the relationship between an older man (Pacino) and the twentysomething son he was never close to. The two reconnect early on in the pic, and the boy, an idealistic drifter who's teaching in a downtown New York school, and the father, a finance type living in Connecticut, must navigate their new relationship,” per The Hollywood Reporter.

Kevin Spacey will try to win back our hearts as Jack Abramoff in Casino Jack, to be directed by George Hickenlooper. “Film, formerly titled Bagman, stars Spacey as the once high-powered lobbyist whose bribery schemes and fraudulent dealings with Indian casinos ultimately landed him in prison.”

Morning Deal Report: Haunted by Hugh Jackman

Scott Von Doviak — Mon, 04 May 2009 14:30:00 GMT

Wolverine clawed its way to the top of the box office chart, taking in $87 million over the weekend. That means it’s officially summer, whatever the weather may be where you are. Ghosts of Girlfriends Past took the second spot with $15.3 million, while last week’s topper Obsessed fell to number three with $12.2 million. 17 Again and Monsters vs. Aliens rounded out the top five.

Wolverine star Hugh Jackman is moving to Ghostopolis. Jackman will produce and star in the film based on an upcoming graphic novel, which “centers on a man who works for the government's Supernatural Immigration Task Force. His job is to send ghosts who have escaped into our world back to Ghostopolis. When a living boy accidentally is sent to the other side, the agent must team with a female ghost (and former flame) to bring him back,” per The Hollywood Reporter.

Won’t you help Ben Stiller spread goodness? Stiller will direct Help Me Spread Goodness, a drama with comic overtones. Script, about a Chicago banker who gets swindled in a Nigerian Internet scam, was written by Mark Friedman and developed by Participant Media exec veep Jonathan King and prexy Ricky Strauss before they took it to Stiller,” Variety reports.

Screengrab Predicts: The Top 5 Bombs of Summer 2009 (Part Three)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 22:00:00 GMT

And now, the bombs...though, to be honest, with no Love Guru or Speed Racer in the running, this category (with one consensus exception) is a lot more of an open race for Summer 2009, with ties in the 4th and 5th place spots pretty much decided by coin-toss...well, it was a little more scientific than that, but not by much...

5. YEAR ONE (June 19)

Nick:
Barring The Flintstones suddenly becoming fashionable again, Harold Ramis’ caveman comedy starring Jack Black and Michael Cera will sink like a stone.

Scott:
Maybe this has one good weekend in it, but I’m not seeing a lot of staying power here. If you check your list of successful cavemen comedies, I think you’ll find it’s a bit shorter than you remember.

Andrew:
Oh, I dunno...I remember at least one really good gag in Ringo Starr’s Caveman, and I expect Year One to at least double that batting average...which might be just enough to get me into an air-conditioned theater on some muggy June afternoon. Not exactly a ringing endorsement, true...

4. IMAGINE THAT (June 12)

Scott:
Imagine what? Another toothless “family-friendly” Eddie Murphy comedy larded with sugary sweet life lessons? All too easy to imagine.

Paul:
Dear Eddie Murphy,

It’s been a decade since Bowfinger. Ever since then you’ve made lousy action comedies, lousy family comedies, and computer-animated comedies in which you provide the voice of a talking donkey. Pleasepleaseplease be funny again, both for your own sake and the sake of those who remember when you could still make people laugh. Thank you.

Sincerely,
The Screengrab

Andrew:
Okay, you guys convinced me...I kinda wish I’d put this on my own list of “bombs” now...but I put Transformers in its place on my list instead out of sheer malice.

3. X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE (May 1)

Nick:
Each X-Men film has made more than its predecessor, and this prequel cost more to make than any prior series entry. The Internet leak won’t affect its business, but Star Trek – opening one week after it – will, causing Wolverine to make less than X-Men: The Last Stand and thus be viewed as a modest failure.

Andrew:
For what it’s worth, I’ve seen and dug all the other X-Men flicks, and for some reason I could give a wet fart about this one, which looks to me like the bad Halle Berry Catwoman of the series. Now maybe if there were some musical numbers...

2. THE TAKING OF PELHAM 123 (June 12)

Nick:
With little action-thriller opposition around its June 12th release date, Tony Scott’s remake may open reasonably well. Yet given how blah it looks and how little buzz it’s attracting, it should quickly disappear from the nation’s overcrowded multiplexes.

Scott:
Speaking of ruining the ’70s (see below)...a gritty, grimy little New Yawk thriller with Walter Matthau at his hangdog finest is given the Tony Scott treatment. It looks as though puffy John Travolta and his wacky facial hair have already chewed some of the scenery, but expect him to devour the rest of it when this one hits theaters in June.

1. LAND OF THE LOST (June 5)

Scott:
I have an idea. Let’s completely ruin the ’70s for those of us who spent our childhoods there! Oh wait, we’ve already done that, haven’t we? Then what the hell, we might as well turn a quirky, beloved Saturday morning staple into another crappy Will Ferrell comedy with plenty of dopey sight gags and gobs of CGI effects.

Nick:
Will Ferrell and Danny McBride are inspired comedians, but Brad Silberling’s update of the 1970s TV show seems like the latest action-comedy hybrid destined to be neither exciting nor amusing. Expect a big-time bomb.

Paul:
Who is this movie for, exactly? Will Ferrell isn’t the box-office juggernaut he once was, and the ticket buyers who yearn for him to deliver Ron Burgundy-style laughs probably won’t go for the second-rate Jurassic Park-style dinosaur storyline. Meanwhile, the kids will probably be too busy watching Up and Night at the Museum 2 to care about this one. Does the original series have that many fans clamoring for a big-budget version of the story? I highly doubt it.

Andrew:
I have to say I actually feel bad about Land of the Lost winding up as our runaway number one consensus pick for top bomb of the summer, since I’m a fan of the original TV series and I have every intention of going to see the Will Ferrell version...and yet, my colleagues all make excellent points, plus the promotional stuff has a distinctly low-rent, Brendan Fraseresque feel to it...on the other hand, I wouldn’t be completely surprised if this one bites us on the ass, prediction-wise, and turns into a surprise hit...oh, wait, the budget was $100 million? Uh...never mind.

Click Here For The Hits (Parts One & Two), The Toss-Ups (Part Four) and The Honorable Mentions (Parts Five & Six)

Contributors: Andrew Osborne, Nick Schager, Scott Von Doviak, Paul Clark

Screengrab Salutes The Best & Worst Comic Book Movies Of All Time! (Part One)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 21:00:00 GMT

It’s Watchmen Week here at The Screengrab as the greater Geek-iverse (and the studio executives who love it) await the opening of Zack Snyder’s much-anticipated, much low-expectations-generating adaptation of Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons’ beloved, game-changing graphic novel about a bunch of asshole “super” “heroes” fighting crime, mental illness and erectile dysfunction in a scary alternate reality where Richard Nixon never went away. (And by the way, does everyone out there already know Silk Spectre II: Electric Boogaloo is portrayed by the same actress who played Valerie Cherish’s little blonde protégé on The Comeback? I just found that out, like, yesterday and was momentarily confused because I thought all the Watchmen were supposed to be kinda middle-aged -- but then I checked the Internet Movie Database and, much to my surprise, Malin Akerman’s actually 31, which is somewhat middle-aged, I suppose)...

Anyway, our own Scott Von Doviak and Paul Clark have already weighed in with their reviews of Hollywood’s latest attempt to wring a little KA-CHING! out of the POW! ZAP! BAM! of the funny book aisle, a strategy that’s been serving the Suits pretty well in recent years. I could pontificate here on the way America’s fascination with caped crusaders panders to infantile, imperialist empowerment fantasies, crowding more intelligent, adult material from the multiplex...but not only would that be annoying, it would also be hypocritical, since (A) I like a good funny book movie as much the next geek, (B) another movie about masked superheroes battling supervillains is a helluva lot better than another movie about masked sadists chopping up teenagers and (C) I keep hoping they’ll someday finally make that Wonder Woman movie I’ve been waiting for since I was 12. Mmm...magic lasso...

In the meantime, though, please enjoy the following list from Nerve.com’s very own Legion of Doom as we salute truth, justice, the American way and THE BEST AND WORST COMIC BOOK MOVIES OF ALL TIME!

The Best:

IRON MAN (2008)

True, it’s only been a few weeks since I wrote about Jon Favreau’s rock ‘em sock ‘em revival of the venerable Marvel Comics rust magnet for my Best of 2008 list...but (unlike certain awards-distributing Academies I could mention), I wanted to make sure this excellent film was recognized among the best of the best!

V FOR VENDETTA (2006)

Don't tell Alan Moore, who has never seen it but took the trouble to bad-mouth it anyway, but this adaptation of his Thatcher-era anarchists' fable, directed by Wachowski brothers proxy James McTeigue, does better than pretty good by its source material. The most important changes the filmmakers made from the original text, notably the transformation of Eve's (Natalie Portman) blokey boyfriend into a sardonic gay TV host played by Stephen Fry, actually work well: Fry's performance gives the film some heart, and film is clearly better suited than the printed page when it comes to paying gratuitous tribute to Benny Hill. The movie even inspired David Denby to apoplexy by seeming to present a terrorist as a political hero. Annoying David Denby is always a public service.

HULK (2003)

Remember how last year’s Edward Norton re-boot of The Incredible Hulk was going to prove that the relatively disappointing box office take of the 2003 Hulk was all Ang Lee’s fault? That audiences would embrace a louder, faster, dumber Hulk movie in a way they never did Lee’s artsy-fartsy one? How’s that working out for ya? The 2008 edition racked up almost exactly the same box office total as the 2003, so maybe it’s just that nobody likes poor ol’ Hulk. Or maybe the 2003 version wasn’t so bad after all, which is what I’ve been saying all along. Yes, it has its flaws; Eric Bana doesn’t exactly light up the screen, the CGI star isn’t quite up to snuff in some scenes, and things do take a little longer to get percolating than was perhaps necessary. But Lee brings a lyrical, haunting tone to the picture that may seem at odds with the whole “HULK SMASH!” ethos, but actually taps into a vein of melancholy the character has always possessed. The innovative editing scheme, with its cascade of digital wipes and split screens, is a far more clever and entertaining cinematic analog to reading a comic than anything Zack Snyder does in Watchmen, and the CGI effects do mesmerize at times. Hell, I could have watched this Hulk bouncing his way across the desert for hours.

X-MEN 2 (2003)

Ushering in the modern age of Marvel superhero films, Bryan Singer’s X-Men helped prove that the sight of men in tights – or, in this case, men and women in leather body suits – didn’t have to doom a comic adaptation to cartoonishness. It was Singer’s 2003 sequel, however, that truly elevated the genre by cannily marrying romantic drama, vigorous action and social-intolerance subtexts (here reconfigured from the source material to address sexuality more than race). Aside from Halle Berry’s still-awful wig and Alan Cumming’s grating Nightcrawler, X2 is sharper, smarter and more exhilarating than its predecessor, remaining true to the spirit of its heroes, villains and Dark Phoenix-ish storyline, buoyed by Brian Cox’s superbly villainous William Stryker, and smartly placing as high a premium on character as on spectacle. Which isn’t, however, to say that the spectacle itself isn’t reason enough to check out Singer’s sequel, since an early Stryker-led attack on Professor Xavier’s school, as well as Wolverine’s climactic throwdown with Lady Deathstrike, more than ably deliver the super-skirmish goods.

BATMAN (1989)

A genuine pop culture behemoth in the summer of '89, Tim Burton's blockbuster comic book movie probably did more than any other to make comics adaptations an accepted Hollywood genre, if only for proving that the success of the first couple of Superman movies hadn't been a fluke. This is not one of those accomplishments that nobody can see a downside to, and despite its hellacious popularity, the movie has always had enough attackers to count as controversial, including those who think it's a clumsy piece of storytelling to comics geeks (including Kevin Smith) who think it blasphemed its source material in any number of ways. But Burton's graphic sense and gothic sense of humor always made it a striking, strikingly funny piece of work, and facts are facts: no actor has ever been more compelling or convincingly haunted in a superhero role than Michael Keaton. The passage of twenty years and umpteen sequels and reboots (including Burton and Keaton's deeply flawed but often lovely Batman Returns) has thrown its defects and pluses into sharp relief: it's hard to remember that, in 1989, when Christopher Nolan was all of nineteen years old, many critics were appalled because they thought this picture was too dark.

SUPERMAN II (1980)

The 1978 Christopher Reeve Superman was an outlier, and probably the earliest example of filmmakers at least trying to make a genuinely good superhero movie. But it wasn’t entirely successful, and one sticking point for a lot of fans was the performance as Lex Luthor by Gene Hackman. The role has as many passionate defenders as detractors, but many thought that it was overly campy and unserious, and a superhero movie is generally only as good as its villain. The 1980 sequel would change all that. Introducing three Kryptonian supervillains escaped from the Phantom Zone – the hulking Non, the ice-cold Ursa, and best of all, the fantastic Terence Stamp as the megalomaniacal General Zod – Superman II gave us villains for the ages, and culminated in one of the most exciting fight scenes we’d seen to date. But it still wasn’t a great movie, and longstanding rumor placed the blame on the firing, when production was nearly complete, of Superman director Richard Donner and his replacement with Richard Lester. Lester, while a talented director, didn’t much care about the job and had little affection for the material, and the results are right there on screen. A few years ago, however, the Richard Donner cut was released commercially, and it finally became clear how good Superman II could have been if its original director had been allowed to pursue his vision all along.

Click Here For Part Two, Three, Four, Five & Six

Contributors: Andrew Osborne, Phil Nugent, Scott Von Doviak, Nick Schager, Leonard Pierce

Thursday Poll for January 15, 2009

Paul Clark — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 00:00:00 GMT

With the Oscar ceremony little more than a month away and nominations being announced next week, I used last week’s Thursday Poll to ask you about your tastes in Oscar hosts. And you responded rather decisively that when it comes to recent Oscar emcees, your preference was for Jon Stewart, erstwhile host of The Daily Show and star of such cinematic gems as Death to Smoochy, Big Daddy and Playing By Heart, who brought in 57% of the votes. By some not-all-that-odd coincidence, Stewart also shared the screen with your second-favorite recent host, Steve Martin (24%), in Stewart’s big-screen debut, 1994’s Mixed Nuts (yeah, we’ve expelled it from our memory banks too). In third place was one-timer Ellen DeGeneres, with former Oscar mainstay Billy Crystal and the hugely divisive Chris Rock in a dead heat for last. How will Hugh Jackman compare? Well, he couldn’t be any worse than Rock, could he?

This week, on the tail of Clint Eastwood’s latest directing effort Gran Torino, we look at the iconic actor/director’s most celebrated films. A perennial Oscar favorite, Eastwood’s films have been nominated for Best Picture four times to date, winning twice. Which Eastwood-directed Best Picture nominee is your favorite?

Which is your favorite? | BuzzDash polls

As always, the comments section is open. See you next week!

Screengrab Predicts The Oscars: Nominations (Part One)

Andrew Osborne — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 21:00:00 GMT

In the wee hours of January 22nd (my birthday by the way – Target gift cards are always appreciated!), the nominations for the 81st Academy Awards will be announced by whichever two actors lost the coin-toss at the 80th Academy Awards ceremony last February. (Apparently the nominations were originally supposed to be announced on January 20th, but apparently there’s some big parade or whatever going on that day.)

Anyway, next to making year-end lists and posting cleavagey shots of Scarlett Johannson, there’s nothing your friends at the Screengrab enjoy more than Oscar predictions.

This year, we’re keeping score...and you (yes, YOU!) can play along at home by posting your predictions (down yonder in the Comments section) for the five nominees in each of the following major categories (along with your long-range guess for the winners of each award): Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor & Best Supporting Actress.

After the actual nominees are announced, we’ll tally up the points and see which Screengrabber (or Commenter!) had the most accurate predictions, thus earning the top-seed spot going into the full-scale Oscar prediction play-offs.

For the Screengrab’s individual and collective picks, we'll see you after the jump!

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Scott Von Doviak Predicts:

NOMINEES
Penelope Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona)
Viola Davis (Doubt)
Marisa Tomei (The Wrestler)
Debra Winger (Rachel Getting Married)
Kate Winslet (The Reader)

Penelope Cruz is the thinking man's choice for Vicky Cristina Barcelona. Kate Winslet will pull double duty for taking it all off in The Reader. Speaking of taking it all off, how about Marisa Tomei in The Wrestler? Viola Davis stole the show with five minutes in Doubt. And how about trying to lure Debra Winger back to full-time work with a nomination for Rachel Getting Married?

WINNER
Cruz, resurrecting the Woody Allen lock on this category from a decade ago.

Sarah Clyne Sundberg Predicts:

NOMINEES
Amy Adams (Doubt)
Penelope Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona)
Beyoncé Knowles (Cadillac Records)
Samantha Morton (Synecdoche, New York)
Marisa Tomei (The Wrestler)

There are surprisingly few obvious choices for this one. Penelope Cruz will get nominated for Vicky Cristina Barcelona because it's the first good Woody Allen pic in years and nobody else is going to get any recognition for it. Marisa Tomei is here for playing a stripper, which is the type of thing that leads to nomination, unless of course you are Elizabeth Berkley. Amy Adams seems like another likely contender and Samantha Morton and Beyoncé Knowles, well they don't seem likely at all… I just like the thought of it really.

Paul Clark Predicts:

NOMINEES
Penelope Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona)
Viola Davis (Doubt)
Taraji P. Henson (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button)
Marisa Tomei (The Wrestler)
Kate Winslet (The Reader)

Anyone who is familiar with Doubt knows that the character of Mrs. Miller is prime awards bait, and Davis most definitely brought her game to the role. And Cruz’s memorably over-the-top turn as Vicky Cristina Barcelona’s unhinged Maria Elena promises to be the first acting nomination from a Woody Allen film in nearly a decade (while you’re at it, pencil Allen in for his 15th Best Original Screenplay nomination). Winslet looks like she’s on track to rack up nomination #6 and perhaps even #7 this year, and I’m guessing that this’ll be her year to win one. Another name that keeps popping up in the precursor awards is Amy Adams, but do you think that the voters will nominate all four principle actors from a movie they didn’t love enough to nominate for Best Picture? I doubt it. Looking much more likely are one-time Oscar winner Marisa Tomei in The Wrestler, and Taraji P. Henson, whose adorable performance as Benjamin Button’s adoptive mother Queenie is a highlight of a movie that ought to get plenty of Academy attention.

WINNER
Kate Winslet

Andrew Osborne Predicts:

NOMINEES
Amy Adams (Doubt)
Penelope Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona)
Viola Davis (Doubt)
Marisa Tomei (The Wrestler)
Debra Winger (Rachel Getting Married)

Why no love for Debra Winger’s blistering mama in Rachel Getting Married? Nobody’s talking up her Academy Award chances and as far as I know, only the Spirit awards have given a nod to one of last year's most memorable performances...but voting emotionally rather than strategically is always a sure way to hemorrhage points in your office Oscar pool (see my prediction snub of Sally Hawkins under Best Actress), so I’ll go with a safe bet for my first choice instead: Penelope Cruz, who’s also going to win (okay, to be honest, this pick is strategic and emotional, since she gave another one of my favorite performances of 2008, raising all surrounding boats on her raging, hormonal tide in Vicky Cristina Barcelona). But if it’s not Cruz, then it’s hard to imagine anyone beating Viola Davis, who was flat-out fantastic in Doubt. (Actually, now that I think about it...scratch Cruz and put me down for Davis: in such a tight race, a single vote could easily tip the balance, and for all I know, that swing vote could be Mia Farrow.) Aside from those two sure things, though, Supporting Actress is always the trickiest of the major categories to predict. Nobody expected Marisa Tomei to win for My Cousin Vinny way back in ‘92, for instance (though nobody was too surprised to see her fall victim to the Best Supporting Actress curse shortly thereafter); still, despite rumors that she’s, um, a bit of a handful to work with, she’s still a Made Guy in the Academy family, and it seems about time for Oscar to welcome her back. As for Amy Adams...well, she's America’s (and Hollywood’s) latest sweetheart, she looks good in red carpet couture and she did nice work in Doubt, so I expect she’ll snag the fourth spot. And finally...ah, what the hell: Winger.

WINNER
Viola Davis

Leonard Pierce Predicts:

Although 2008 got widely (and, I think, somewhat unfairly) smeared as an off year for movies, it was definitely a good year for the kinds of flicks that Oscar voters go for. With plenty of historical epics, ‘message’ pictures, and the kinds of ripe, fruity performances that always rack up AMPAS gold, the year may not have been a great one for the art house crowds, but it should provide the kind of entertainment at the Oscar ceremonies that Hugh Jackman won’t. Forthwith, my predictions for what’ll show up on the ballots in six major categories (the sure-fire lock: that I’ll make a total ass of myself with these picks).

NOMINATIONS
Amy Adams (Doubt)
Penelope Cruz (Vicky Cristina Barcelona)
Viola Davis (Doubt)
Amy Ryan (The Changeling)
Kate Winslet (The Reader)

The Academy will nominate a Woody Allen movie, as they do every few years just to get on his nerves, and movie fans will grind their teeth trying to figure out which Amy is which, distracting them from their usual annual confusion over why two actresses from the same movie got the nod. But in the end, Winslet will take home the statue for The Reader, a movie that’s going to get stiffed everywhere but in the acting categories. BIGGEST SCREWJOB: Debra Winger’s wonderful turn in Rachel Getting Married will be ignored, because the Academy can only handle so many comeback stories at a time.

WINNER
Kate Winslet

SCREENGRAB CONSENSUS: NOMINEES
AMY ADAMS, PENELOPE CRUZ, VIOLA DAVIS, MARISA TOMEI, KATE WINSLET

SCREENGRAB CONSENSUS: WINNER
KATE WINSLET

Click Here For Part Two, Three, Four, Five & Six

Contributors: Paul Clark, Andrew Osborne, Leonard Pierce, Sarah Clyne Sundberg, Scott Von Doviak

Ladies Only at Slate Movie Club

Scott Von Doviak — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 18:00:00 GMT

The previous movie year can never truly be put to bed until the Slate Movie Club has convened. In the past we’ve seen fireworks fly, particularly when Armond White was a participant, but recent years have seen a more collegial atmosphere prevail. This year it’s more of a sorority vibe, actually; Slate critic Dana Stevens has invited four female critics to participate in the roundtable. No boys allowed! Since, despite our best efforts, the Screengrab remains largely a boy’s club, we’re all in favor of this development, especially since the self-proclaimed “Vagina Movie Monologues” group is more than willing to dish on such topics as the unusually smooth face of Nicole Kidman.

“We needn't discuss anything prototypically ‘feminine’—though the mere question of what that might mean could make for a great conversation,” Stevens writes. “I'll raise another topic that we've all discussed, freely and hilariously, over drinks but tend to approach gingerly in print: What is the state of plastic surgery on-screen in 2008? And why is this topic so hard to broach without descending (or seeming to descend) into the ‘what has she had done?’ realm of celebrity gossip? Are we entitled to ask what's become of the once expressively mobile faces we come to the movies to see?”

"You know, I was talking to a (male) colleague about how we, the Sisterhood of the Traveling Movie Club, were all cautiously excited about talking about Worked Over Faces (to put it succinctly)—I mean, from a cinematic point of view—and he observed that women are much harder on other women than men are,” Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly responds. “I briefly felt shallow. (He's a great friend.) But then I thought, really, it's that we women look at faces (and boobs, and butts, and the kitchens, gardens, and sunsets) on screen in a different way than men do. It's like—I don't know, it's like we do an instantaneous translation: "Oh, hmmm, Nicole Kidman's forehead and Hugh Jackman's teeth, not real, OK, and now back to Australia.”

In all fairness, we’ve been known to mention the topic of Kidman’s peculiar visage – to say nothing of Mickey Rourke’s Dick Tracy villain-esque face – here at the Screengrab, too. And it should be noted that the ladies of Slate do go on to actually discuss, you know, the movies of the year. You can read the ongoing discussion starting here.

Related:
Slate Movie Club Still Swinging
Nicole Kidman Marries Charlize Theron

Trailer Review: X-Men Origins: Wolverine

Paul Clark — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 17:00:00 GMT

For non-comic fans who only know the X-Men from the movies, one of the bigger mysteries of the franchise has been the origins of its breakout character, Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine. Now, it appears that instead of actually coming out and addressing this in the original X-Men films, they were holding out for a possible spinoff focused solely on the character. And while the enterprise has a whiff of creative desperation coming from the last X-Men movie painting the filmmakers into a narrative corner, it’s not like character spinoffs are unheard of in the world of comic books, and this is merely the same thing in movie form. And as spinoffs go, this one doesn’t look bad. Jackman is back and badder than ever, and the story features a few characters returning from the original series- although both Stryker and Sabretooth are played by very different actors this time around, with Danny Huston and Liev Schreiber assuming the roles. In addition, there are some new fan favorites who have yet to turn up in the ensemble, although it’s hard to say whether Gambit’s appearance here is a good thing or a bad thing. All in all, this should be fairly watchable, and if nothing else it should be at least as good as X-Men United. Right? RIGHT???

Oscar Host Announced

Scott Von Doviak — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 19:30:00 GMT

The speculation has been mounting. (Somewhere, I guess. Not really here, but we’ll report it anyway.) For a while, the hot rumor was Ricky Gervais as host of the 81st Annual Academy Awards, but didn’t you know deep down that was too good to be true? So who would it be? Surely not Whoopi. Please merciful Academy, not Robin Williams. How about Jon Stewart? We like the Jon Stewart. That sounds good, let’s go with…no? No Jon Stewart? Stephen Colbert, perhaps? No, the host of the 2009 Oscar ceremony will be…

Huh. Hugh Jackman. Well, that’s…really? Hugh Jackman? I know he can sing and dance, but can he deliver a comedic monologue? React quickly to televised faux pas? “With new producers, a new set director and even a new music director, the Academy has been hinting at an all new look and feel for this year's Oscars telecast on Feb. 22,” the AP reports. OK, fine. Just saying: Stewart would have been fine by us.

Thursday Poll for December 4, 2008

Paul Clark — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 15:00:00 GMT

Last week saw the release of Baz Luhrmann’s Australia, a surprisingly sedate epic starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman. In conjunction with the film’s release, we polled our readership about Luhrmann’s short but attention-grabbing career thusfar. However, it appears that a great many of you aren’t fans of his work. When asked their favorite Luhrmann film, 46% of our readers chose “Make It Stop Already!” rather than going to bat for one of his movies. As expected, the highest-placing of his films was 2001’s Oscar nominee Moulin Rouge!, which garnered 31% of the vote, followed by Strictly Ballroom and William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet. In keeping with the overall critical reception so far, Australia received no votes whatsoever.

This week, we look at the recent films of Gus Van Sant. Since his latest Hollywood release, 2000’s Finding Forrester, Van Sant has reinvented himself as an art filmmaker, making five consecutive films that in some way or another explore the subject of death. So, to commemorate the recent release of Milk, we ask you- what is your favorite of Gus Van Sant’s recent films?

What is your favorite of Gus Van Sant's recent films? | BuzzDash polls

As always, the comments section is open. Good luck!

DVD Digest for September 23, 2008

Paul Clark — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 14:00:00 GMT

This week, a number of classic crime stories hit DVD, plus the big summer movie whose blockbuster gross surprised almost everyone with a Y chromosome.

DVD of the Week: Okay, so maybe there are more high-profile titles in the mix this week, movies that are both more popular and more critically acclaimed (see the next paragraph). But to my eyes, the big DVD news this week is the arrival of Eclipse Series 12: Aki Kaurismaki’s Proletariat Trilogy. For years, Kaurismaki’s work has been woefully underrepresented on Region 1 DVD, with only his recent films The Man Without a Past and Lights in the Dusk currently in print. So Eclipse’s release of three of his best early works is cause for celebration among his fans, in whose company I count myself. In evidence in each of the set’s three films- Shadows in Paradise, Ariel and The Match Factory Girl- is Kaurismaki’s patented deadpan humor, although in Match Factory Girl, the best of the three, the comedy can be a little difficult to spot at times amid the pathos generated by the film’s title character. If you already know Kaurismaki’s work, you’ve already reserved a copy of this, no doubt hoping that Eclipse will continue their commitment to Kaurismaki with eventual releases of Drifting Clouds and Take Care of Your Scarf, Tatjana. But if you’re looking to get into Kaurismaki, this is as good a place as any to start.

Additionally, as most of you know this week also brings the release of Paramount’s The Godfather: Coppola Restoration Collection (also Blu-Ray), which includes newly remastered versions of the first two films, commentary tracks by the director, and special features both old and new. There’s also the L.A. Confidential Two-Disc Special Edition (Warner, also Blu-Ray) that includes a new commentary track featuring the cast and crew, plenty of new special features, and even the music-only feature that was a highlight of the original pressing. Finally, two new collections of note: Sony’s new line of “Martini Movies” (whatever that means), which includes Dollars, The Garment Jungle, Affair in Trinidad, The Anderson Tapes, and The New Centurions; and the Warner Brothers Pictures Gangsters Collection Vol. 4- includes The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse, The Little Giant, Larceny, Inc., Invisible Stripes, and Kid Galahad.

This week’s new releases coming to DVD include: Sex and the City: The Movie (Warner, also Blu-Ray); George Clooney’s Leatherheads (Universal, also Blu-Ray); Ewan McGregor and Hugh Jackman in the Skinemax-ready Deception (Fox, also Blu-Ray); Dario Argento’s final installment in the “Three Mothers” trilogy The Mother of Tears (Dimension); the Flatliners-style thriller Pathology (MGM); and Simon Pegg in Run Fatboy Run (Warner).

This week has plenty to offer in TV on DVD, including: Boston Legal Season 4 (Fox); Brothers and Sisters Season 2 (Disney); Cashmere Mafia: The Complete Series (Sony); CSI: New York Season 4 (Paramount); Friday the 13th The Series: The First Season (Paramount); and Samantha Who? Season 1 (Disney).

Finally, this week’s relatively small slate of Blu-Ray only releases includes: Blow (Warner), and Cirque de Soleil: Corteo (Sony).

Trailer Review: Australia

Paul Clark — Tue, 27 May 2008 16:00:00 GMT

In retrospect, watching the trailer for Baz Luhrmann’s latest eye-popping opus on YouTube probably wasn’t the ideal way to experience it for the first time. Which would probably explain why I wasn’t as bowled over by this trailer as I probably should have been. But them’s the breaks, as they say. Still, there’s enough here to get excited about, even on the small screen. Since the rise to prominence of Australian cinema back in the 1970s, Aussie actors and filmmakers have made their mark on Hollywood, and if nothing else Australia is notable as that nation’s grandest, most ambitious cinematic vision to date. To say nothing of the cavalcade of homegrown stars on display, beginning with Hugh Jackman and naturalized Oz resident Nicole Kidman, who’s rarely better than when she’s working with Luhrmann. The only thing I’m worried about is that Luhrmann’s images will be swallowed up in his hyperkinetic editing like they were in Moulin Rouge! But even if the trailer refuses to let our eyes drink in the gorgeousness for as long as they’d like to, this still looks like a must-see.

Screengrab Movie Poster Preview

Scott Von Doviak — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 18:00:00 GMT

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we’ve been known to review the occasional movie trailer here at the Screengrab. Some people feel this is unfair – that we are making snap judgments based solely on some marketing executive’s dumbed-down notion of how to sell the product. To which I say: fie! (And I rarely say fie.) You know what would be really unfair? Previewing upcoming movies I know absolutely nothing about based solely on their posters! So let’s do it!

DEAL

Burt Reynolds is the aging gambling legend banned from all the casinos in Vegas and forced to undergo radical reconstructive surgery on his face in order to gain entry. When this duplicity fails due to sophisticated facial recognition technology, Reynolds recruits cocky but raw up-and-coming poker star Bret Harrison, offering to share his tricks of the trade in exchange for a cut of the profits. The two men butt heads, especially when Shannon Elizabeth enters the picture as the naïve cocktail waitress. But surprise! She’s actually conning them both.

DECEPTION

Ewan McGregor thinks he has it all – great job, new house, gorgeous wife Michelle Williams. That is, until mysterious stranger Hugh Jackman shows up. Williams claims he’s her uncle and that he’ll only be staying with them for a few days while he’s in town for a grooming seminar. McGregor begins to grow suspicious when he discovers Jackman’s boxer shorts in his bed. He snaps when he catches Williams and Jackman in the hot tub together, and kills both of them…but Jackman was never really there at all!

FRONTIER(S)

It seemed like such a quaint small town, the perfect place to spend the night while driving cross-country. Little did they know this town was actually populated by CANNIBALISTIC DEVIL WORSHIPPERS!!!

THEN SHE FOUND ME

Helen Hunt is a successful lawyer in New York, falling in love with neighbor Matthew Broderick, the advertising exec she met at Starbucks when he spilled his mochacinno in her lap on the morning of her big trial. All is going well until her estranged mother Bette Midler shows up to beg forgiveness for accidentally killing Hunt’s father with a waffle iron. The healing begins, and Hunt is finally able to get over her lifelong fear of waffles.

THE FALL

OK, this one is a challenge, but I’m gonna say it somehow involves a gay pirate, a time machine and an awful lot of peyote.

Trailer Review: Deception

Paul Clark — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 16:00:00 GMT

Most thrillers today feel curiously neutered, with studios' demands for PG-13 entertainment making it difficult for directors to inject too much sex into their films. Deception feels like a throwback to the early-90s heyday of the erotic thriller subgenre, when it almost certainly would have been penned by Joe Eszterhas and starred Michael Douglas. As bad as most of those movies where, they had a trashy yet glossy allure to them, which makes it all the more disappointing that Deception comes across as fairly bland by comparison, with the role that would've been played by Sharon Stone or Demi Moore now falling to... Michelle Williams? Even with its female-friendly leading men Hugh Jackman and Ewan McGregor, I can't imagine this really scoring with audiences (especially with that generic-sounding title). On the other hand, I imagine it'll have a solid second life on late-night pay cable. Who knows, I may even catch it there. If I hear there's T&A, that is.

Comic to Screen (In Reverse): Hugh Jackman

John Constantine — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 21:29:00 GMT

Typically, we here at Das Screengrab bring you all the latest news about all two billion ninety-three comics being adapted for the silver screen. Today, however, we’re mixing things up! Hugh Jackman, the Aussie thespian who became an inexorable part of 21st century pop culture after his portrayal of Wolverine in Fox’s X-Men flicks, announced that he’ll be creating his very own funny book, Nowhere Man. Co-authored by screen and comics writer Marc Guggenheim and published by Virgin Comics, Nowhere Man is a “Sci Fi odyssey set in a groundbreaking vision of the future in which mankind has traded privacy for safety.” Well. Sounds, um, groundbreaking. Sheesh…

You can check out a press release for the new book over at Newsarama.

Marvel Comics Is Ready for Its Close-Up

Phil Nugent — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 16:00:00 GMT

A long time ago when the world made sense, there were two kinds of comic books: DC comics and Marvel comics. And while Marvel reigned supreme at the comics shop, the company dearly wanted to break into the lucrative and ego-stroking business of licensing it characters for major motion pictures, and it was there that DC pantsed Marvel and took its lunch money. While DC was the home of Superman and Batman, Marvel was the home base of Howard the Duck. For years, Marvel's role in the Hollywood fod chain was epitomized by the 1994 Fantastic Four movie, a cheesy, cheap-looking affair that Marvel put into production without bothering to inform the people who worked on it that they had no intention of releasing it to theaters or even home video but were contractually obliged to make something if they wanted to hang onto the film rights to their own characters. All that started to change in 2000 with Bryan Singer's X-Men, whose success the director was unable to duplicate with his later stab at rebooting Superman. A couple of years later, Sam Raimi's take on the Marvel flagship hero Spider-Man launched a major franchise and proved that Marvel could sire a blockbuster movie without Singer or Hugh Jackman modeling a haircut that could open bottles and cans. Since then, Marvel has had varying degrees of commercial success with a for-real Fantastic Four movie and its sequel, as well as Ghost Rider, Daredevil, and Elektra, a bust in theaters but more of an earner as a DVD release that allowed film connoisseurs to conduct a close study of Jennifer Garner's moist eyes and washboard abs in the tranquil setting of their own fortress of solitude. Even The Punisher managed to make it into theaters with John Travolta on the poster, which helps to set it apart from the 1989 straight-to-video version, with Dolph Lundgren grunting his lines as if his tight skull-face T-shirt were cutting off his circulation.

Stage two in Marvel's renewed campaign to take over the film industry goes into effect on May 2 when Iron Man, the first official production of Marvel Studios, is released to theaters. As reporter Geoff Boucher puts it, this marks "the first step in the company's quest to go from intellectual-property fount to a stand-alone Hollywood player that can greenlight big-time popcorn movies." Studio chairman David Maisel crows that "We're the first since DreamWorks started 14 years ago that can greenlight its own $100 million movies. It doesn't happen very often." In some ways, Marvel might still look pretty small to the big guys: the "studio" is modestly staffed and will rely mostly on Paramount to distribute their finished films. What they do have is the backlist of established characters, many of them created back in the golden days when the legendary Stan Lee and the uber-legendary Jack Kirby were striking sparks together, despite Marvel founder-publisher Martin Goodman's attempts to rein in his brainstorming boys by reminding them that their reading base consisted of "children and a few illiterate adults." (Boy, the more things change, the more things stay the same, huh?) As Maisel puts it, "We're not in the movie business, we're in the Iron Man business right now. Marvel owns the intellectual property. We have an Iron Man video game coming, the toys, the comics, we have an animated television show coming, a direct-to-DVD animated Iron Man movie last year. We're going to have an Iron Man ride at an amusement park in Dubai in a few years." They're also in the Ant-Man business--Edgar Wright, the director of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, is said to be ready to direct a film about the wee fellow--and of course, they're still in the Spider-Man business, with plans by Julie Taymor (Across the Universe) to launch a Spider-Man musical on Broadway. What may be most impressive is that they're in the Hulk business, too. Ang Lee's 2003 The Hulk movie was perhaps the highest-profile misstep of the new Marvel movie era, an ambitious, poker-faced effort that confused critics and disappointed audiences, though it did have the dignity of being a flop of the misguided-art-house variety instead of the underfunded direct-to-video sort. Now, just five years later, Marvel is going to reboot The Hulk with Ed Norton in the lead. The fact that Marvel is taking a second crack at the "property" so soon after the release of a film whose reception might have encouraged lesser mortals to sweep the Hulk under the rug for a generation or three shows an impressive degree of faith in their own product. Can another run at Howard the Duck be far behind? Has anybody run any tests to see how Hugh Jackman would look with an orange beak?

Morning Deal Report: Snikt.

Peter Smith — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 15:00:00 GMT

The Wolverine movie has a full title (X-Men Origins: Wolverine) and a villain — Liev Schreiber, in a younger version of the role Brian Cox played in X-Men 2. Call me a naysayer, but I think the fun of the X-Men movies (well, X-Men 2 anyway — the other two weren't much fun anyway) was the ensemble. Sure, Hugh Jackman was good, but, well, we'll see.

Looks like the long-rumored Untouchables prequel will be Brian De Palma's next movie.

Uh, they're remaking Timecop. Well, there's room for improvement. (No disrespect, of course, to the Muscles from Brussels. . .)

— Peter Smith