For E! Online, a few new items. First, the top 5 worst movies made by 2010 Oscar nominees. Here’s one:
4. Gun Shy, starring and produced by Sandra Bullock (nominated for Best Actress, The Blind Side). Liam Neeson plays an undercover DEA agent with diarrhea. Sandra Bullock falls for him anyway. That is all you need to know.
Next, a review of the new Roman Polanski film:
Yep, Roman Polanski’s still got it. With dry humor and expertly timed suspense, the director throws Ewan McGregor into a conspiracy theory plot involving a Tony Blair-like politician (Pierce Brosnan) whose memoirs provide the focal point of an investigation into serious war crimes. Similarly plotted recent movies, like, say, Edge of Darkness, can only dream of being this good.
As well as the new Kevin Smith:
Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that Cop Out is a tribute to cop-buddy comedy sequels of the ’80s, since, when the movie opens, our bickering partners have been together nine years, and there’s no obligatory recap of how they first met, hated each other initially, and later turned out to be the perfect mismatch. This does lead one to wonder how a screeching, paranoid dork like Paul Hodges (Morgan) ever became a detective, let alone one paired with the more standard action-hero-y Jimmy Monroe (Willis), but skipping the origin story at least allows us to cut directly to the chase (literally).
Meanwhile, over at Geekweek, I reviewed SHUTTER ISLAND:
Unfortunately for the director, and the audience, SHUTTER ISLAND is a disaster. I haven’t read the Dennis Lehane novel it’s based on, but I suspect the fault does not lie with the source material, as every other scene made me think to myself that David Fincher could have directed the script better. Hell, I’m not sure but that Kevin Smith or even Uwe Boll couldn’t have directed it better – they would certainly not have wasted as much money on needless gaudiness, plus Boll would still have cast Ben Kingsley. This doesn’t feel like Scorsese…it feels like Baz Luhrmann with a bad hangover (the fact that DiCaprio spends much of the movie either puking or having headaches and hallucinations similarly suggests a kind of morning-after vibe).
I also reviewed some McDonald’s Food:
McDonald’s may not have invented the chicken nugget, but they damn sure made it famous; the McNugget is an all-time classic that belongs in any hypothetical fast food Hall of Fame alongside the French fry and nachos. Kids today often grow up eating little besides chicken nuggets (I have two younger brothers who prove the rule), so it seems a little unfair in hindsight that, when I was a wee one, they did not exist! And I didn’t like McDonald’s burgers as a kid either, so when other children would have group outings to McDonald’s, there was very little I could eat. Here, the McNugget swooped in to save the day around 1980, but I grew up in Ireland, and it wasn’t until the late ‘80s that they made it across the Atlantic and became a weekly addiction for young LYT (one of many reasons Ireland sucked).
And finally, a column about actors and directors who work together too often:
Burton, in particular, is becoming so formulaic that one can play Mad Libs with the inevitable trades announcement. Behold:
HOLLYWOOD – Johnny Depp has officially signed on for the lead role of _______ in Tim Burton’s __________, a twisted new retelling of the classic __________ story, which will take advantage of the director’s unique vision. “I’m going to approach this character as if a ________ actually existed in the real world,” said Depp. “I think it will put a really unique spin on his ________.”
Opposing Depp’s character will be Helena Bonham-Carter as _________, who becomes a formidable opponent. “My take on her is that she’s slightly misunderstood,” said Bonham-Carter. “She’s been caricatured for all these years as a __________, and it’s made her a bit crazy.”
“Growing up, _________ was my favorite thing ever,” said Burton. “I’ve always wanted to re-imagine it in my quirky style, only with a less coherent story.”
Joining Bonham-Carter and Depp in the cast will be Christopher Lee, in a menacing cameo as the intimidating _________.
So you see, I am writing…just not here as often.
Oh, and the soundtrack to Tim Burton’s new movie will be scored by Danny Elfman.