February 7th
THE LEGO MOVIE (ANIMATED/FAMILY-COMEDY)Directed by Phil Lord & Chris Miller; Featuring the Voices of Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks, Morgan Freeman, Will Arnett, Will Ferrell
Rated PG for mild action and rude humor.
This could be right up there with PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN for best movies based on really bad ideas ever. Based on the LEGO-brand building bricks, which are usually based on previously-established film brands anyway, this film takes place within the "LEGO Universe", where an unassuming ordinary minifigure named Emmet (voiced by Parks and Rec's Chris Pratt) is mistaken as the "Special", the last Master Builder who can save their world from the sinister Lord Business (voiced by Will Ferrell) (quick, somebody call Fox & Friends; it's like family movies are intentionally pissing them off now). Bringing their trademark brand of easygoing, wacky cartoon wit are directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller, the talents behind CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS and 21 JUMP STREET, this is as likely to entertain adults as it will the child target audience.
February 7th
THE MONUMENTS MEN (WAR/COMEDY-DRAMA)
Directed by George Clooney; Starring George Clooney, Matt Damon, Bill Murray, Cate Blanchett, Bill Murray, John Goodman, Bob Balaban, Jean DujardinRated PG-13 for some images of war violence and historical smoking.
This was actually due for release last December, in time for the current awards season, but due to some reported indecisiveness by director George Clooney on the film's tone during editing, it was postponed to about two months later. Based on the book based on a true story, the film follows the exploits of a team of Allied forces responsible for recovering the valuable artistic artifacts confiscated by the Third Reich, before they're destroyed in war action or out of spite. The concept is an interesting and worthwhile one, and makes for a refreshing twist on the war movie genre, but hopefully they've gotten those tone issues ironed out. Unfortunately, the early reviews have not been very reassuring.
February 14thABOUT LAST NIGHT (ROMANTIC COMEDY)
Directed by Steve Pink; Starring Kevin Hart, Michael Ealy, Regina Hall, Joy Bryant, Paula Patton
Rated R for sexual content, language and brief drug use.
With an unexpectedly successful stand-up comedy theatrical release last summer in KEVIN HART: LET ME EXPLAIN and the current huge success of RIDE ALONG, Kevin Hart is rapidly becoming the hottest comic of the hour. In this remake of the 1986 Ed Zwick romantic comedy, which was based on the David Mamet play Sexual Perversity in Chicago, Hart plays one half of a quirky relationship with Regina Hall, juxtaposed with the budding relationship between each others best friend, which results from a would-be one-night stand. Director Steve Pink has a steady but unremarkable track record, but either way, there's probably a well-sized audience for this sort of thing.
February 14thENDLESS LOVE (ROMANCE/DRAMA)
Directed by Shana Feste; Starring Gabriella Wilde, Alex Pettyfer, Bruce Greenwood
Rated PG-13 for sexual content, brief partial nudity, some language and teen partying.
"Let's be young and dumb just for tonight," says the main character in the trailer for ENDLESS LOVE. Indeed. A remake of the infamous 1981 romantic melodrama, this aspiring least-original love story is about a rich girl who longs for something else, who falls in love with a charismatic young man from the wrong side of the tracks. It's looks as nauseating as it sounds, but you'll never convince the tween-teen girl demographic it's aiming for of that. Those who want to love it, will in all likelihood do so, but I don't envy the man in that relationship.
February 14th
ROBOCOP (ACTION/SCI-FI)Directed by Jose Padilha; Starring Joel Kinnaman, Gary Oldman, Michael Keaton, Abbie Cornish, Jackie Earl Haley, Samuel L. Jackson
Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of action including frenetic gun violence throughout, brief strong language, sensuality and some drug material.
I probably wouldn't be that interested anyway, but after Len Wiseman's PG-13-rated 2012 remake of TOTAL RECALL, I'm really put off to the idea of watered-down remakes of Paul Verhoeven films. Gone is the fun and goofy (though oddly thoughtful) concept for 10-year olds but with X-rated gore that everyone's favorite Dutch director and exploitation filmmaker brought to the screen in 1987. Instead, with pumped-up, glossy action and visuals from an unknown Brazilian director, Jose Padilha, the most promising thing about this movie is that Samuel L. Jackson uses the word "robophobic" in the film's trailer. Unless the reviews prove my suspicions to be significantly wrong, I don't plan on running out to see this.
February 14th
Directed by Mark Waters; Starring Zoey Deutch, Lucy Fry, Danila Kozlovsky
Rated PG-13 for violence, bloody images, sexual content and language.
It's based on a best-selling book series, because "Teen Paranormal Romance" is popular enough these days that Barnes & Noble even has a whole section designated for it, but unless the film itself does a better job of introducing the uninitiated to its world, then audiences may be lost, because I can't understand the story or plot elements as described in the marketing. It has something to do with a couple of vampire teenage girls, one's a half-vampire charged with guardianship of the other full but "peaceful" vampire, and they deal with typical high school hierarchy whilst also contending with malicious vampires. It's made by a pair of brothers, Mark Waters (MEAN GIRLS) directing and Daniel Waters (HEATHERS) writing, which could be an interesting mix, but credit for MEAN GIRLS goes more to Tina Fey, and HEATHERS may not be as good as you remembered it. Either way, most audiences will probably write it off as a Harry Potter-Twilight hybrid, and the Weinstein Company won't get their hoped-for franchise.
February 14th
Directed by Akiva Goldsman, Starring Colin Farrell, Jessica Brown Findlay, Russell Crowe, Jennifer Connelly, William Hurt, Will Smith, Kevin Durand, Kevin Corrigan
Rated PG-13 for violence and some sensuality.
Schlock-meister Akiva Goldsman (writer of a lot of bad movies; BATMAN & ROBIN, THE DA VINCI CODE, LOST IN SPACE; and a couple of really good ones; A BEAUTIFUL MIND and CINDERELLA MAN) makes his directorial debut with this incredibly strange and, in all likelihood, schmaltzy story that I can't understand from the advertising or press releases, but is based on a 1983 novel. It has something to do with a charming thief named Peter Lake (Colin Farrell), who falls in love with Beverly Penn (Jennifer Brown Findlay), a young woman dying of tuberculosis. Lake decides to go straight, but he still owes something to a psychotic gangster (Russell Crowe), who tries to have him killed, but a magical horse/guardian angel rescues Peter. Then, for some reason, the story shifts from the year 1916 to the present day, where all this stuff is still going on with the same characters, who apparently haven't aged. I don't know. I kind of feel bad for the boyfriends who'll get dragged to it on Valentine's Day, but if you're dating that kind of girl, then maybe you have it coming.
February 21st
Directed by McG; Starring Kevin Costner, Amber Heard, Hailee Steinfeld, Scott Burn
Not Yet Rated
Kevin Costner's recent resurgence has so far been comprised of supporting roles, but in this action-thriller-comedy he takes the lead with gruff voice and a role that could have been written with Liam Neeson in mind. As a veteran secret agent, Costner tries to reconnect with his estranged daughter (Hailee Steinfeld, from TRUE GRIT) while carrying on one last assignment that will hopefully provide him with the serum to cure his ailing health and earn him his retirement. What really turns me off to this one is the talent behind the camera; McG and Luc Besson. Besson, who wrote the script, also wrote the dreadfully overrated TAKEN, but even if you liked that, his most recent work was last year's bomb, THE FAMILY, which almost nobody liked. He's not known for reason or good taste. Director McG, whose last film, THIS MEANS WAR, was positively abhorrent, is characterized by bombastic yet bland, generic action and is dreadful at comedy, which the trailer seems to emphasize.
February 21st
Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson; Starring Kit Harington, Carrie-Anne Moss, Emily Browning, Jessica Lucas, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Jared Harris, Kiefer Sutherland
Rated PG-13 for intense battle sequences, disaster-related action and brief sexual content.
I hear that filmmaker Paul W.S. Anderson is a very agreeable person in real life, which is how gets people to let him keep making big movies even after regularly rotten reviews and unimpressive box office receipts. His newest film is this would-be romantic epic which its distributor would undoubtedly like to evoke the idea of TITANIC with. It has themes of a doomed romance, combined with a swords-and-sandals cliche-ridden plot and set against the backdrop of an erupting Mount Vesuvius. No doubt, it's tagline, "No Warning, No Escape" will be the source of some easy potshots, but Anderson's name should count as a warning.
February 28th
NON-STOP (ACTION/THRILLER)
Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of action and violence, some language, sensuality and drug references.
Yet another post-TAKEN Liam Neeson action vehicle, this action-thriller stars Neeson as an air marshal who finds himself subjected to a frame-job as an unknown passenger threatens to kill a person every twenty minutes until he's wired a large sum of money, in an account listed under the marshal's name. The Spanish-born director, Jaume Collet-Serra, has most of his experience in horror, such as ORPHAN, and the much-maligned HOUSE OF WAX remake, but was also responsible for one of the more disappointing post-TAKEN Neeson action-thrillers, UNKNOWN. NON-STOP looks like it has more action, but in all probability will be even more improbable and derivative, so I'm not expecting a surprise success like THE GREY. Neeson deserves better.
February 28th
SON OF GOD (SPIRITUAL DRAMA)
Rated PG-13 for intense and bloody depiction of The Crucifixion, and for some sequences of violence.
Partly a textbook cash-grab and partly mass evangelizing (although most of it will undoubtedly be a case of preaching to the choir), Roma Downey and Mark Burnett have found a way to squeeze something extra out of their already-successful HBO miniseries The Bible, by editing selections of the miniseries into a film about the life of Jesus. If you've already seen The Bible though, fear not, there's also some deleted footage from the series in the film. Whoo-hoo. There are more interesting, genuinely epic biblical films coming out this year, but even the religiously unaffiliated will get a lot more from the Bible itself.
February 28thWELCOME TO YESTERDAY (SCI-FI/THRILLER)
Directed by Dean Israelite; Starring Sir Maejor, Ginny Gardner, Sofia Black-D'Elia
Not Yet Rated
In this found-footage after-school special for teenagers, a group of teens discover plans for a time machine prototype and after building the machine, use it to make their lives more awesome. At first, things are going great, but inevitably, things take a disastrous turn as their actions interfere with the course of history. It's nice that a time-travel movie is approaching the little-dealt with aspects of minute changes creating disastrous consequences (it sometimes bugs me a little that Marty McFly only has to solve problems directly involving a small group of people), but maybe I'm expecting too much that a Michael Bay production will have any subtlety. I don't know, but I'm not all that interested in this.
