Don't Forget The Comedies

Just finished reading a couple of articles/blogs/whathaveyou about people's top picks for the summer.  95% (made up figure) of the lists were comprised entirely of the same big budget special effects extravaganzas everyone has been talking about for months.  A few of them listed one of the most anticipated comedies of the summer The Hangover Part 2.  Hopefully, there are others out there that dare to say they enjoy a good comedy now and then, there are some potentially great ones in the mix.

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'What Goes Up' Poster and Trailer

OK, granted - Hilary Duff. But the other things around her in the movie formerly known as Safety Glass have piqued my interest. That coming-of-age comedy is now called What Goes Up, and it reunites The Wackness stars Josh Peck and Olivia Thirlby, and throws in Steve Coogan for good measure.

We've got the new poster and trailer for What Goes Up, which is the feature debut for writer-director Jonathan Glatzer. The movie's been in the can for about 18 months, but will open in limited release here in a few weeks. The trailer presents this as a pretty quirky movie, and maybe one that's not as funny as it should be. There are no big laughs, but then again, it doesn't appear that it's really going for big laughs. Independent films need something to set themselves apart because they don't have the massive marketing, particularly as we roll into summer. And based on this batch of goodies, I'm not sure we're seeing what really makes this one special unless you're really into the cast. But I've been wrong before. Three times, actually.

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What's New In Theaters - August 22, 2008

In Death Race, a remake of the 1970s camp classic produced by Roger Corman, convict Jensen Ames (Jason Statham) is forced by his hard-as-nails warden (Joan Allen) to compete in our world's most popular sport: The Tour de France! Not really. Although there's so much criminal behavior in that race they might as well hold it in a prison. Shelley Darlington (Anna Faris) has lived at the Playboy Mansion for years. Too many years, apparently. Booted out because she's (gasp) 27, Shelley must find a new place to call home. She winds up being the house mother for the most unpopular sorority on campus, hence the title The House Bunny. More than likely, she'll teach them to put out. Fish (Rainn Wilson from The Office) gave up his drums and gave up on his dream of being a rock god when his old band, Vesuvius, kicked him out on their way to the top. The band has remained on top for 20 years, and their old drummer has never put it behind him. He'll get his chance to exact a little revenge in The Rocker, by backing up a high school band that rivals even The Jonas Brothers.

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Movie Review - 'Hamlet 2'

Hamlet 2

Starring Steve Coogan, Catherine Keener, and Elisabeth Shue
Directed by Andrew Fleming
Rated R

When you see that a comedy is called Hamlet 2, your expectations either go up or down. The title tells you something, and you have to have some reaction to it. Odds are you have a fair understanding of The Danish Play even if you’ve never read Hamlet. And if you think making it this far without having to proves something, then the something you've proven is that you like depriving yourself life’s perfections. So, before you see a frame of Hamlet 2, you’re aware that this film in some manner endeavors to make a follow-up to a story that simply can’t have one. I made the same mistake myself, for I had not yet met Dana Marschz (Steve Coogan). Marschz (it’s pronounced “marshht-s,” I think) is a failed actor, and categorizing him as a failure in that pursuit may actually be giving him too much credit. So Marschz and his lush of a wife (Catherine Keener) leave the genital herpes commercials behind them and move to Tucson, where an unenthusiastic drama class will learn from the best. Or at least the best available at that moment. Or at least the best available at that moment in that town who will also work for gas money. When Marschz learns the high school will cancel the drama program, which to that point had only embarked on productions of Hollywood films like Erin Brockovich, the teacher swings into action, writing a sequel to the greatest piece of drama in the English language. This time, though, Marschz promises it will have a happier ending.

If I had to compare Hamlet 2 to something, it would be Christopher Guest’s Waiting for Guffman, which I believe is his most complete mockumentary. Hamlet 2 may not be strange and consistently funny in my book, but it is a lot more accessible. There are more universal jokes in this film, and when the time comes to stage the play, a very familiar formula takes over. Formulas are not bad things for movies, incidentally.

Hamlet 2 gets a lot of mileage out of Marschz’s unbelievably daffy storyline (it involves Einstein and a musical number called “Rock Me, Sexy Jesus”), and miles pure gold with Coogan, an occasionally abrasive English comedian who is also unbelievably good in 24 Hour Party People and the incredibly bizarre Tristram Shandy. He shows something here he hasn’t before, however: Dana Marschz is likable and, sadly, believable. Since you had some reaction to the title Hamlet 2, let me reassure you that if your expectations were raised, it was with good reason. In addition to being unexpectedly funny in expected situations, the performance by Coogan is worth the price of admission all on its own.

I first saw this at \film, and I'm inclined to agree that it's better in concept than execution, if only because the concept is almost unbeatable. We already know quite a bit about Tropic Thunder - a war movie turns real, Robert Downey becomes a black guy - and now there's a very cool twist. Spoofing Apocalypse Now and the documentary about its filming, Heart of Darkness, Tropic Thunder has come up with Rain of Madness, a phony documentary about the events in the film, and the unraveling of the most expensive war movie of all time. It's Red Band, so there's some R-rated dialogue, although the best line is from the narrator: "After only five days of shooting, the film was two months behind schedule..." I would love for an actual mockumentary to pop up on the DVD, but the fake trailer is good enough for now. Please, check out Rain of Madness - with more Steve Coogan than we've seen in the Tropic Thunder trailers - from "acclaimed documentary filmmaker" Jan Jurgen.