Magnolia has dropped the first official (red band) trailer for the indie comedy we told you about last week, Bobcat Goldthwait’s God Bless America. Those who saw it at TIFF last year called it hilarious, even if it is dark and violent.

Loveless, jobless and possibly terminally ill, Frank (Joel Murray) has had enough of the downward spiral of America. With nothing left to lose, Frank takes his gun and decides to off the stupidest, cruellest and most repellent members of society with an unusual accomplice: 16-year-old Roxy (Tara Lynne Barr), who shares his sense of rage and disenfranchisement. From stand-up comedian and director Bobcat Goldthwait comes a scathing and hilarious attack on all that is sacred in the United States.

I know I’m a sick twist, but this may be the funniest thing I’ve seen in a very long time. I actually clapped and whooped during this trailer. Joel Murray gets to live out every fantasy I’ve had in the last fifteen years. (Oh my God, the scene in the movie theater alone…) As Frank says, “Why have a civilization if we're no longer interested in being civilized?"

God Bless America will be available on VOD April 6 and in theaters May 11.

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Source Hulu via TheFilmStage

Universal Pictures has released new photos, film clips and more now available for new release Big Miracle, starring John Krasinski and Drew Barrymore.   Find out why everybody loves whales by checking out the new Infographic and don’t forget head over to Pinterest.com to see the BIG MIRACLE boards and find out how you can Pin to Win!

Check out the boards at Pinterest  where you can enter the Big Miracle "Pin To Win" Sweepstakes for a chance to win FUN prizes. Find out more details at their Facebook page.  Brush up on your whale facts by visiting the Big Miracle infographic, plus check out the Twitter Sweepstakes 100 randomly selected Twitterers who follow @UniversalPics and include the hashtag #everybodyloveswhales will win a Big Miracle t-shirt.

Local newsman Adam Carlson (Krasinski) can’t wait to escape the northern tip of Alaska for a bigger market. But just when the story of his career breaks, the world comes chasing it, too. With an oil tycoon, heads of state and hungry journalists descending upon the frigid outpost, the one who worries Adam the most is Rachel Kramer (Barrymore). Not only is she an outspoken environmentalist, she’s also his ex-girlfriend.

With time running out, Rachel and Adam must rally an unlikely coalition of Inuit natives, oil companies and Russian and American military to set aside their differences and free the whales. As the world’s attention turns to the top of the globe, saving these endangered animals becomes a shared cause for nations entrenched against one another and leads to a momentary thaw in the Cold War.

  Big Miracle is in theaters on February 3.

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We have some new information, pics and posters for another film we first mentioned when it screened at TIFF. Daniel Nettheim’s The Hunter, based on the novel by Julia Leigh. It stars the always good Willem Dafoe as a mercenary sent from Europe by a mysterious biotech company to the Tasmanian wilderness on a hunt for the last Tasmanian tiger.

The Hunter is the story of Martin (Dafoe), a skilled and ruthless mercenary sent into the Tasmanian wilderness on a hunt for a tiger believed to be extinct. Hired by an anonymous company that wants the tiger’s genetic material, Martin arrives in Tasmania posing as a scientist. He proceeds to set up base camp at a broken-down farmhouse, where he stays with a family whose father has gone missing. Usually a loner, Martin becomes increasingly close to the family; however, as his attachment to the family grows, Martin is led down a path of unforeseen dangers, complicating his deadly mission.

Both of the posters (the one above comes courtesy of JoBlo) emphasize the lush yet extreme Tasmanian setting. If nothing else, the movie should be visually stunning. But you don’t hire an actor of Dafoe’s caliber and then put him in a travelogue, so expect a compelling story set against a dramatic natural backdrop. The trailer below is from the film's Australian release last fall.

The Hunter by moviestune

I want to know more, don't you? Magnolia Pictures purchased the film in Toronto and plans a 2012 release, although nothing definite as of this writing. We’ll keep  you posted.  The Hunter also stars Sam Neill, Frances O’Connor, Sullivan Stapleton and Dan Wyllie (the last two you may remember from Animal Kingdom).

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I have no words. Well…almost. Seriously, after the trailer for Kirk Jones’ What to Expect When You’re Expecting that we showed you last month, I didn’t think it could get worse. Then I saw these posters. Are they photographs or are they cartoons? And as if the current trend toward airbrushing any character or distinction out of the faces of already beautiful people wasn’t bad enough, they’re all clutching their fake baby bumps with beatific smiles on their bland faces. All except JLo, who probably refused to look “fat”. (I'm kidding, her character adopts)

And the captions! I can only assume these are actual lines that these characters are forced to say in the context of the movie. Frankly I’m stunned. I said I stared at the trailer in “slack-jawed wonder”, I have no words for what my expression must have been as I clicked on these posters one by one.

The film is based on the popular non-fiction self-help book by Heidi Murkoff, that has this innocuous plot summary: “A look at the lives of five couples as they prepare to become parents.” Now let’s see what the official synopsis is for this He’s Just Not that Into You/Valentine’s Day/New Year’s Eve celebrity mashup. (It’s like The Loveboat set in a maternity ward.)

Over the moon about starting a family, TV fitness guru Jules (Cameron Diaz) and dance show star Evan (Matthew Morrison) find that their high-octane celebrity lives don't stand a chance against the surprise demands of pregnancy. Baby-crazy author and advocate Wendy (Elizabeth Banks) gets a taste of her own militant mommy advice when pregnancy hormones ravage her body; while Wendy's husband, Gary (Ben Falcone), struggles not to be outdone by his competitive alpha-Dad (Dennis Quaid), who's expecting twins with his much younger trophy wife, Skyler (Brooklyn Decker). {Wait a second…didn’t Quaid just have twins with his trophy wife??} Photographer Holly (Jennifer Lopez) is prepared to travel the globe to adopt a child, but her husband Nate (Rodrigo Santoro) isn't so sure, and tries to quiet his panic by attending a "dudes" support group, where new fathers get to tell it like it really is. {Holly and Nate? JLo and Rodrigo are "Holly" & "Nate"?} And rival food truck chefs Rosie (Anna Kendrick) and Marco's (Chace Crawford) surprise hook-up results in an unexpected quandary: what to do when your first child comes before your first date?

What to Expect When You’re Expecting was written by Shauna Cross (Whip It), Heather Hach (Freaky Friday) and opens May 11 in the US and 18th May in the UK.

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Source

The last time we talked about the Nicolas Cage/January Jones revenge thriller it was called Justice for the UK release back in November  (after having started out as The Hungry Rabbit Jumps).  Now it’s called Seeking Justice. With elements of Stangers on a Train and Star Chamber, Roger Donaldson’s Seeking Justice stars Nicolas Cage as Will Gerard, a happily married family man whose quiet life is turned upside-down when his wife, Laura (January Jones), is brutally attacked one night while leaving work.

At the hospital, waiting for news about his wife’s condition, Will is approached by Simon (Guy Pearce), who proposes an intriguing offer: Simon will arrange to have a complete stranger exact vengeance on Laura’s attacker, in exchange for a favor from Will in the near future. Distraught and grief-stricken, Will consents to the deal, unwittingly pulling himself into a dangerous underground vigilante operation. While continuing to protect his wife from the truth, he quickly discovers that his quest for justice could lead to frightening and deadly consequences.

A new trailer debuted today on iTunes and thanks to Comingsoon, we have an embeddable version:

Seeking Justice, which looks a cut above the usual Nic Cage fare and miles above that Joel Schumacher opus, Trespass (I’d love to know how he convinced TIFF to give that a berth), also stars Jennifer Carpenter, Xander Berkeley and Harold Perrineau. It opens in the US on March 16.

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Here’s a new international poster for John Carter, plus a new image of Mark Strong as Matai Shang and Dominic West as Sab Than. The Japanese have airbrushed all of the character out of Taylor Kitsch’s face and I don’t recall seeing anything in the trailers were he’s dressed like a WWII flying ace, but okay.

I have to admit, my interest in John Carter started with the inclusion of Mark Strong, so I’ve been especially curious about Matai Shang. According to JohnCarterUK, “Matai Shang is the Holy Hekkador (King) of the Therns. Using their advanced technology, the mysterious Therns represent themselves as the messengers of Issus, the Barsoomian Goddess, in order to further their own plans.”  Holy Hekkador Batman! (sorry…couldn’t resist. Expect to see it again.)

Sab Than is “the Jeddak (King) of Zodanga. He is impulsive, arrogant and aggressive; promoting war and conquest as the Zodangan way of life. With his dangerously calculated charm, Sab Than will even try to make a deal with the devil to destroy Helium and rule all of Barsoom.” Ooo…sounds dangerous. We like DW and I am loving the face tatt.

While my interest may have started with Strong, the more I’ve read and seen, the more I’m looking forward to the movie. Given director Andrew Stanton’s background in animation and that they’ve taken two years to get the CGI right, I expect the effects to be spectacular. And I’m not the only one. Not only does Disney/Pixar have a lot riding on their massive gamble, but apparently other studios are starting to think there’s actually something to this John Carter business. At least two movies have backed off the, admittedly full, release date of March 9.

I wouldn’t have thought that Playing the Field would be a threat, but it’s already moved to December 25. Today Relativity announced that their Edgar Allan Poe murder mystery, The Raven, was moving back to April 27. (I’m still mad at Relativity anyway. I don’t want to care what they do and I’d like it if I didn’t have to give them any of my money, but I generally try not to cut off my nose to spite my face.) Anyway, it looks like John Carter, which along with Kitsch, Strong and West, stars  Lynn Collins, Willem Dafoe, Bryan Cranston, James Purefoy, Thomas Haden Church and Ciarán Hinds, will be BMOP (Big Man on the Planet) when it opens in on March 9, all over the known world.

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The new UK version of the poster for This Means War is no better than the domestic version. It’s still the same bland overly airbrushed, photoshopped, big headed mess, with the only difference being that it’s been colorized.  *shakes fist* Why the hell would anyone want to make Tom Hardy look bland? Oops, I’m wrong. The other difference is that this one includes one of those ubiquitous scan code square thingies (that’s a technical term) for your mobile device. OOOOOOO….

To soften the blow (which unlike the edges on those faces, does need to be softened), Fox has also released a UK tv spot for your viewing pleasure.

Directed by McG (whose last outing was Terminator Salvation), This Means War is the story of two of the world’s top secret agents (Hardy and Pine)who  are also best friends.  They’ve never let anything come between them — until they inadvertently fall for the same woman.  It’s all-out war, as the two spies battle each other with high-tech surveillance, advanced tactics, and an arsenal capable of bringing down a small country.

“…a full rap and tap, boys” Yeah…Tom Hardy can give me a….sorry…where was I?

Oh yeah, the movie. This Means War also stars Chelsea Handler, Til Schweiger, Abigail Spencer and Angela Bassett. It will be out Valentine’s Day, February 14 here in the US. (In the UK they’re still saying February 17 with sneak peeks on February 14.)

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Some pretty things to look at without thinking too much. Good for a Monday morning…A little high-brow, a little low brow and something in between… 

Well, to start with, we have a poster for Dennis Quaid in Beneath the Darkness, which was supposed to come out in theaters this months. Evidently, Imagine Entertainment pulled it and it’s now going to straight to dvd and blu-ray.  Quaid’s been enjoying a bit of a resurgence lately, with Footloose and Soul Surfer in 2011 and Playing the Field and The Words in ’12 alone, so I’m surprised they aren’t taking the gamble with this. Not even in January. It must be realllllly bad…

The rural bliss of small town life has been celebrated as part of the American dream, but sometimes a small town is the perfect place to hide one’s secrets, one’s mistakes, one’s sins. And once discovered, it doesn’t take long for the American dream to become the American nightmare. On February 28th, Image Entertainment unleashes the small-town shocker Beaneath the Darkness on Blu-ray™ and DVD. Starring Golden Globe™ nominee Dennis Quaid in a rare villainous turn and coming off a recent national theatrical release, this gripping psychological thriller entwines cold-blooded murder, sinister secrets and modern hauntings on Maple Street. .

 Directed by Martin Guigui (My X-Girlfriend’s Wedding Reception, National Lampoon’s Cattle Call) and written by the late Bruce Wilkinson, Beneath the Darkness is a taut thriller pitting high school kids against a psychotic killer in a community where adults blindly refuse to see the ominous dangers right before their eyes.

If nothing else, Yimou Zhang's The Flowers of War has had some really beautiful, suitable-for-framing posters. (Given the current trend in movie advertising art, or the lack thereof, making most of them bland photo-shopped messes,  that's an achievement.) This latest, the official US version, is no exception.  

The Flowers of War stars Christian Bale in China's official Academy Award entry, as a Westerner who finds refuge with a group of women in a church during Japan's rape of Nanking in 1937. Posing as a priest, he attempts to lead the women to safety. Grossing $83 in just 17 days, making it China's sixth top earner of all time, The Flowers of War will also screen, out of competition, at next month's Berlinale.

The new French poster for Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance features a perturbed looking Nicholas Cage, which I suppose is only appropriate given that he’s…dead? A Ghost? The 2^nd Ghost Rider movie, which Idris Elba (that’s Golden Globe winner, Idris Elba – see how I did that?  They’re only relevant when people I want to win actually do) insists is not a sequel, sees Johnny Blaze (Cage) hiding out in Eastern Europe, where he is called upon to stop the devil (Ciaran Hinds), who is trying to take human form.

Idris plays Moreau and all I really know about him is that he rides a motorcycle, wears black leather and looks badass. Does anything else matter? No, it doesn’t. The movie also stars Christopher Lambert, Anthony Head, Johnny Whitworth and Violante Placido. It opens February 17 in the US, Canada and the UK.

Finally (for this post), we have a poster for a new movie. God Bless America was written and directed by Bobcat Goldthwait,  who believe it or not actually directed  a couple more films (no, I didn’t see them either) after 1991’s almost universally hated Shakes the Clown.  

God Bless America, which premiered as a Midnight Madness selection at last fall's Toronto International Film Festival , stars Joel Murray and Tara Lynn Barr as two citizens who, one day, decide that the reality TV culture could be cured with some violence. As with Shakes the Clown, there’s a lot of anger and humor being mixed here. This time I’ve heard that it pays off. (That’s certainly a concept I can get behind.) Murray and Barr allegedly have more of a father/daughter thing going than a May/December Bonnie and Clyde, even if this poster almost makes GBA look like an action film, but I’m sure the producers are doing whatever it takes to generate some interest. The movie will premiere on VOD on April 6, then open in limited release on May 11.

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