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GTBP CONNECT
Tuesday, August 24, 2010 at 2:04AM Lionsgate is reportedly over the moon about RED, the comic adaptation about a group of graybeard government assassins who suddenly find themselves in the middle of big mess as targets of the intelligence community (Retired Extremely Dangerous).
Thursday, July 22, 2010 at 6:40PM Comic-Con = Christmas. More stuff than any other event of the year, and we'll see plenty over the next few days. Summit has jumped all over its fall spy comedy, RED, by releasing a better and more involved trailer. Here's the key: Oodles of new footage.
Thursday, June 24, 2010 at 7:43AM You will have a blast with this. And might I say, Helen Mirren is the star attraction. Red is an ensemble spy comedy, based on the DC Comics series, and starring Mirren, Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich, and Mary-Louise Parker.
Friday, June 18, 2010 at 3:01AM | Jonah Hex
Starring Josh Brolin, John Malkovich, and Megan Fox  |
A man gruesomely marked by the brand of the butcher who murdered his family believes his quest for revenge will come up empty when he learns his
nemesis has died in a hotel fire. So what is left for this man? Where does he go?
Jonah Hex is a comic book adaptation that, in a longer format, could actually dig deeper and try to answer some of those questions. Of course,
the concern isn't about the frayed emotions of a man who has lost everything and is reminded by his half-paralyzed and grotesque face. Jonah
Hex is about 'splosions. At least we get that much.
For a movie this size - a large budget, big stars, and a big studio - Hex is criminally short. It runs less than 80 minutes, credits to
credits, so that's not worth the ticket price. But why is it so short? It appears that director Jimmy Hayward has tried very hard to cut down the film
to under an hour-and-a-half, and some of those experiments work.
He flies through the early stages of the story with narration supplied by Hex (Josh Brolin), and that's always a sure sign that someone somewhere
thought the movie needed to be shorter. Tipping its cap to the film's roots, Hayward, who also directed the very different Horton Hears a Who,
bakes in an animated sequence to explain how Hex went from wearing the brand of Quentin Turnbull (John Malkovich) to learning about Turnbull's death
years later. It's another device that seems out of place, although it might have been the most memorable sequence in the entire film.
There's also the more subtle approach Hayward uses: Outside of fights, the scenes here are very short, the dialogue very direct and brief. Stylistic
choice? There doesn't seem to be much style at all in the way the story unfolds, so this is probably just an incomplete script. Feels like it. Again,
there's zero emotional turmoil once Hex gets branded. Even when he finds out Turnbull is really alive, which we know will lead to him exacting revenge
at the end, it's an incredibly short change of color on the mood ring.
The real curse of Jonah Hex is that well over half the film feels nondescript. Even though it's kind of a western on steroids set in the years
immediately following the Civil War, only rarely does it evoke its period. It lacks an authenticity, which could be because it lacks so much of
everything else. Some of the set pieces are nice enough, but there's not even any consistency between them. The Washington D.C. created for the end of
the film smacks of rushed CGI, which is fine if the rest of the movie does, too. Otherwise, it sticks out like a sore thumb.
Saturday, May 15, 2010 at 1:57PM Four new character posters for Jonah Hex, hitting theaters a month from now. Go!
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