March 12 2008
Guess Who’s Coming To Nam and Other Lounge Links
posted by Steven Shaw at 2:22 pm
Vantage Point, in cinemas Thursday
Opening this week: Vantage Point tells the story of an assassination attempt on the US President (William Hurt) and then retells it from eight different perspectives, including that of a news producer (Sigourney Weaver), Secret Service agents (Dennis Quaid, Matthew Fox) and an American tourist (Forest Whitaker). It’s doing okay at the Internet Movie Database with a current user rating of 6.7 out of 10, but poorly at the more critic-heavy Rotten Tomatoes, where its T-Meter ranking is at 36% with the consensus “Premise is undermined by fractured storytelling and wooden performances”. See the trailer here…
Video: A slighty weary or maybe just toasted Justin Timberlake welcomed Madonna into the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame yesterday. Go here to see The Stooges pay tribute, performing her song “Burning Up”…
Sea Lion, the new album from local legends The Ruby Suns get the thumbs up from Pitchfork Media (we liked it too)
Movie studios often have the last say with the final cut of a film and “safe” endings can dramatically change the end result. Think Bladerunner or any number of director’s cuts. Here’s the original ending to I Am Legend, starring Will Smith as the almost-last-guy-on-Earth.
Guess Who’s Coming To Nam: Robert Downey Jr. (left) goes black face for the Ben Stiller’s Tropic Thunder, a satire on Hollywood. “If I didn’t feel it was morally sound, or that it would be easily misinterpreted that I’m just C. Thomas Howell in (“Soul Man”), I would’ve stayed home,” said Downey Jr. The Daily Mail predicts a “Race Row”. Read more here…
Warm Up with Wilco: Chicago’s darlings of intelligent rock Wilco are visiting NZ this Easter weekend, playing Bluesfest at Whitianga on March 22, as well as shows in Auckland and Wellington. Click here to see a live performance of “Impossible Germany”, courtesy of Wilco’s well-honed podcast service at Wilcoworld.net…
Stoner cinema: Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay gets a good reception at Variety … and Super High Me, a doco inspired by Morgan Spurlock’s Super Size Me which follows comedian Doug Benson’s planned excessive marijuana usage, went down well with the audience at South by Southwest. When someone asked if Spurlock was okay with the title, a panellist said, “He liked the film!” Benson’s reply: “Well, then next I’m doing Where the Hell Is Osama With My Weed!” Here’s the trailer for Super High Me: