Posts tagged remake
“Get Him to the Greek” Self-Indulgent Knockoff
Jun 10th
Posted by Channel 1 Networks in Hotshots Movie Reviews
Self-Indulgent Knockoff
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
GET HIM TO THE GREEK starring Jonah Hill and Russell Brand is a major disappointment if you were expecting something original from the team that made the 2008 FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL.
On the other hand, as I have been saying for years, “Hollywood has run out of ideas,” and what can you expect when almost every other new movie is a sequel, a prequel, a remake, or even “based on the characters” from another movie as this one is?
This movie should have a title in the closing credits that says “Based on the premise of the 1982 My Favorite Year,” which starred Peter O’Toole and Mark Linn-Baker.
You be the judge: Leonard Maltin says in his MOVIE GUIDE that the earlier film is “about a young writer on TV’s top comedy show in 1954 who’s given the job of chaperoning that week’s guest star, screen swashbuckler and off-screen carouser Alan Swann.”
This film is about a record-company intern who’s given the job of chaperoning a British rock star from London to the Los Angeles Greek Theater in 72 hours, where he is scheduled to give a concert, and the rock star’s name is Aldous Snow. Same initials. Coincidence? Or intentional?
Anyway, the record-company executive is played by Sean “P. Diddy” Puff Daddy Do-wah Diddy Combs, and he tells his staff, “We got to thicken our revenue stream.”
Aaron Green suggests the idea of putting on a 10th anniversary concert at the Greek with Aldous Snow, and once that Snow agrees, Aaron is given the task of getting Snow from his home in London to Los Angeles in time for the concert.
And, of course, nothing goes as Aaron plans.
Snow believes that the concert is in two months and that Aaron chenged the date on him. So, Snow would rather party than catch a flight.
To keep Snow sober, Aaron drinks all of Snow’s booze in his flask and smokes all of Snow’s weed.
A stop in New York City for an appearance on the “Today” show doesn’t go well at all.
Snow asks Aaron to do something for him that is illegal as well as disgusting.
And then Snow changes their flight to go to Las Vegas so he can visit his father.
GET HIM TO THE GREEK is not much more than a self-indulgent knockoff.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”
Chloe – Movie Trailer
Mar 31st
Posted by Channel 1 Networks in Movie Trailers
An untrusting wife attempts to prove that her husband is cheating by hiring an escort to seduce him, inadvertently endangering her entire family in the process. Catherine (Julianne Moore) is a respected doctor, and her husband, David (Liam Neeson), is a dedicated music professor. They’ve been married for years and have a teenage son together, but lately the passion has faded from their romance. The morning after David misses his flight home — and the elaborate surprise birthday party Catherine had planned to celebrate his return — Catherine finds a text message on his phone that leads her to believe her husband is sleeping with a female student. Her suspicions grow over the following weeks, and when Catherine has a run-in with an escort named Chloe (Amanda Seyfried), she hires the ravishing blonde to test her husband’s fidelity. After each encounter with David, Chloe reports back to Catherine with all the sordid details. But the further the experiment goes, the less clear Chloe’s motivations for taking part in it become, and the more the untrusting wife begins to fear that the situation has spiraled out of control. Directed by Atom Egoyan (The Sweet Hereafter, Ararat), this erotic thriller is a remake of Anne Fontaine’s French film Nathalie…, and was adapted by Erin Cressida Wilson.
“Brothers” Ending All Wrong
Dec 9th
Posted by Channel 1 Networks in Hotshots Movie Reviews
Ending All Wrong
“Hotshots” looks at a movie!
BROTHERS is a remake of a 2004 Danish film, and you just might want to rent that earlier film than see this muddled mess.
Sure, this one stars Jake Gyllenhaal, Natalie Portman, Tobey Maguire, Sam Shepard, and Mare Winningham, but there are holes in the story, unresolved issues, and problems that continue up until the very ending.
Now, these problems might be the result of the version released in theaters, perhaps because of studio pressure, and a preferred “director’s cut” is waiting in the can for its DVD release and that bane of all writers: the “alternate ending.”
Until then, we are stuck with this one.
The time is 2007, and Gyllenhaal and Maguire play brothers Tommy and Sam Cahill, who are polar opposites. Tommy was always the family screwup, whereas Sam was a star football player in high school, married his high-school sweetheart, and followed in their father’s footsteps to become a captain in the U.S. Marines.
In fact, as the movie opens, Sam is getting ready to be deployed to Afghanistan for his fourth tour of duty, and Tommy has just been released from prison.
Sam tells Tommy, “Stay out of trouble.” And Tommy replies, “All right. You be safe over there, all right?”
Before he leaves, Sam writes a letter to his wife, Grace, that he hopes won’t have to be delivered. But shortly after his arrival in Afghanistan, Sam’s helicopter is shot down by Taliban rebels, and Sam is presumed dead.
Back home, Grace takes the news of Sam’s death hard, and Tommy steps into the surprising role of comforting her and her two young daughters.
However, in spite of what the publicity would have you believe, it isn’t what you think.
Meanwhile, Sam wasn’t killed, but was captured by the Taliban and held prisoner, during which time he does something horrible.
So, when Sam is rescued and comes home, he is carrying a terrible guilt, and his arrival disrupts the new, surprising arrangement at home.
Now, if you do see this theatrical release of the film, ask yourself these questions: Does Grace read the entire contents of Sam’s letter for the audience?
Are we told everything that happened between Tommy and Grace? And does Sam reveal the whole story of his imprisonment?
BROTHERS doesn’t answer these questions, and the ending is all wrong.
I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”