Trailer Trash: The Amazing Spider-Man (2012)

The trailer begins with the establishment the disappearance of Peter’s parents , which may be another reason why we have a younger May and Ben.  Why May gets her hair done by Helena Bonham Carter I'll never know.

There are also and many scenes that show Peter as an awkward loner, which would be more characterization than he received in the original trilogy with Tobey Maguire just playing him as “Nice Guy”… with no money. Again we’re seeking alternatives.

Gwen Stacy shows up many times in the trailer even though she isn’t named. Based on this plus the pictures in Entertainment Weekly I’m thinking she’ll be a close friend who gradually becomes the love interest rather than Mary Jane, the seemingly unobtainable girl who later becomes the love interest. The writers are likely putting this Gwen in the role MJ had in Ultimate Spider-Man comics. Again, different in a good way.

It looks like Pete steps into a reactor at a lab and is bitten by the spider, it makes me wonder if Peter will show off some science skills this time.

The Lizard is the Big Bad of this film even though we don’t see him in the trailer. Given that this is Spidey’s origin story too, I wonder if they will have parallel themes of transformation, or perhaps draw their powers from the same source.

The trailer closes with a POV shot of swinging across the city, which looks fantastic. The swining scene in the original was easily the weakest portion of that film (effects wise) so this new offering is refreshing and dynamic. It  offers a satisfying big reveal for the costume reflected in the skyscraper. If they do this right, it will look amazing in 3D, and I never thought I’d say that.

Eagerly anticipating this Marvel movie moreso than the Avengers, who can get back to me when they've shot scenes of then the team in something other than a small room.

Trailer Trash: Fright Night (2011)

Some of my readers may recall my review of the 1985 horror film "Fright Night", and how I bad mouthed most of it. For as much as I didn't like the original, I do understand what the film makers were trying to do with it. It was a love letter to the Hammer Horror movies of the late 1950s with Roddy McDowell's character of Peter Vincent based heavily on Peter Cushing's Van Helsing Vampire Hunter. It was also an attempt to break away from the formulaic set up of the new and extraordinarily popular slasher films. Peter Vincent becomes the mouthpiece of the creators and makes no effort to disguise the disgust at this particular horror sub-genre that had over-saturated the market of the time. Hollywood is known as a land of copycats, so trying something fresh like this is something that I both commend and encourage, its just the execution, plus time, that I think is what prevented me from enjoying it more.

So now, like everything else, the film is being remade. I'm sure theres an executive somewhere in a Hollywood office with a catalog of properties that are already owned by his studio, biding time, waiting for the right moment to spring a remake on unsuspecting audiences. Likely this one was picked up in an attempt to ride the coattails of the sudden surge in vampires on screen over the past few years before the trend fades away completely. I'm not going to hold that against the new movie, I'm just pointing it out. It probably also helps that the film has a rhyming name, making easy for potential audiences to remember it during the fickle month of August when expectations for summer blockbusters have been severely diminished after all the razzle dazzle effects and explosions of the July releases. I can only hope that the makers of the new film don't see this as chance to rest on their laurels, but to put the same degree of passion on the screen that helped the original in order to break from the doldrums of tradition and expectation.

I'd like to touch briefly on the poster for the new movie before moving on the trailer because I saw the poster before the trailer and it helped form some of my attitudes towards this upcoming film.

This isn't a great movie poster. It reminds me a little too much of the poster for "No Country for Old Men". But there is at least one thing I like about it, and that is surprisingly, Anton Yelchin. The protagonist stands defiantly at a profile, facing left rather than facing straight on or looking to the right, this helps guide our eye past the angle of the supporting background houses, down the text which lets us know the all important what and when. The distinct axe also breaks the silhouette and sticks out in our minds. We don't need to see his face, we just need to know that our hero is a small person stands guard in front of a small pass, facing up against overwhelming odds, but that he is prepared for action!

The biggest problem is the biggest thing in the poster; Colin Ferrell's floating head. Sure he's got red tinted eyes, but that really isn't scary. If his nose is going to take up this much space, at least make that facial feature somewhat frightening! What I'd like to know is why we don't see fangs on Ferrell in the poster. Two pointed fangs are a classic feature of vampires and excellent for use in graphic design, hence why they're being used in the title's text. So why not show us a hint of any in the part of his mouth that we do see?

Then there's the tagline. "You can't run from evil when it lives next door." Wordy, but it does tell you the film's plot.

Quick comparison to the original poster:

The tagline: "There are good reasons to be afraid of the dark" is a bit generic, but the with image beneath, it works. A wide eyed pale face strikes boldly against a dark atmosphere bearing an inhumanly wide mouth full of cruel, sharp teeth and cackles menacingly while commanding the clouds, harnessing the forces of nature itself to assume the shapes of demons to assault a dwarfed house with no neighbors to allies to be seen, just two pine trees, both easily victimized by the blitzing breeze. There is but one light on in the house outlining a human silhouette, and whoever this lone person might be, they are residing in the last outpost against a devastating devil.

Okay, let's start the show

* Establish Anton Yelchin's Charlie as a typical teen with the good life in what we later see in the big city of Las Vegas.

* Charlie's peers, rather than nameless periphery females are the victims. This makes the disappearances distinct, even if we never see them because there are in the same peer group as the intended audience. Though one could argue that the fanservice victims of the original are more memorable because they were just there for gratuitous breast shots then be killed to drive the plot forward. I'm sure its no coincidence that the one victim we do see in this trailer is a pretty blonde, scantly clad woman.

* Speaking of which, theres a scene were Mom introduces us to Jerry, also provides Charlie's name, but only addresses his girlfriend as "His girlfriend". I guess that really is all we need to know about her, since the only things we see her do in the trailer is be threatened by Jerry and show off black lace bra , the latter being the official Hollywood code for "Let's Fuck". I'm going to go out on a limb a say she's going to be more of an archetype than an actual character.

* "Evil" Ed resumes his role as Mr. Exposition, but here he's the one to explain the connection in disappearances and go to Charlie about it rather than having Charlie be the one to figure everything out. He also looks more like a simple high school nerd archetype, rather than the original's big haired goofy spaz. This makes his role in the film more recognizable in the trailer and it looks like this version will be far less annoying.

* The shots in the last half focus on Charlie and Jerry going on the offensive, preparing for war and promising a greater level of violence and destruction than the original's "cry wolf" build up story.

* Sadly, there are no shots of David Tennant as Peter Vincent. The only reason I'm at all interested in this movie at all is to see The Doctor fight monsters on the big screen. If this is not delivered in a following trailer than I'm ready to write this off as a failure already.

It hits all the right notes for an action horror film, showcasing excitement and suspense, and catered to a young audience with a disposable income. Will it be any good? Well, we'll see soon enough.

The Blob (1988)

Starring Kevin Dillon, Shawnee Smith
Directed by Chuck Russell
Horror
Rated R

The movie opens with a decent from space to shots of a small, empty town in Anywhere, USA. There is foreboding music in the background to help establish the dark tone.

Aside of a few details, the story is the same as the original 1958 “The Blob”, with a Blob monster falling from outer space, consuming unsuspecting victims and its up to two teenagers to try and stop it from destroying the town.

The best thing about this film is how efficiently it uses the first act to establish its characters. Each person has a little bit of dimension and development so that they all seem important to a certain degree and results in all the more surprise and shock when a character becomes a victim of the Blob. It really helps the audience to care about trying to stop the situation and really invests us in the story more so than your average monster run amok type of movie.

Instead of just being regular teenagers, our lead characters are Brian is a juvenile delinquent with authority issues and Meg, a goody-good cheerleader from a wealthy family. They have decent chemistry but nowhere near as much charisma as Steve McQueen and company in the original.

The Blob effects in this version are decent. It should really go without saying that this is a bloodier and gorier Blob, so we get to see it tear apart and digest its victims, getting redder as it eats more, colored by the blood. While this Blob has more onscreen kills than the original, the actual deaths we do see are so brief that the shock sticks to our subconscious and comes across as more terrifying in our minds.

The problem is that the menace of the Blob is undermined by the introduction of a human antagonist, the corrupt government scientist Dr. Meaddows. While it first he comes across as an eleventh hour savior to stop the monster, his wooden and exposition heavy dialogue really give him away. He brings the story to a halt as he explains that the Blob is a biological weapon that he has designed and how he’d rather let the entire town be destroyed that have his experiment be lost. He’s just relishes in what a two dimensional bad guy he is and it really upstages the motiveless Blob. He death by the creature he created is far more satisfactory to the viewer than the destruction of the Blob in the end.

Speaking of which, the climax occurs when a “Jaws”-style tank explosion. Meg suddenly starts acting like Sigourney Weaver from “Aliens” and spewing typical monster killing dialogue firing multiple shots from an assault rifle trying to hit the Liquid Nitrogen tank that will freeze the Blob.

That would be the end of it, but right before the end we see a demented priest go on and on about how the Blob is a sign of the end of the world in a manner that’s beyond cliché.

A very well written script up until the third act, were we are sidelined by clichés. The Blob effects are good, but are starting to show their age. It is well made, but nowhere near as fun or as memorable as the original.

Final Score:

3 out of 5. Effective Horror.

Dawn of the Dead (2004)

Starring Sarah Polley, Ving Rhames, Jake Weber, Mekhi Phifer
Directed by Zack Snyder
Horror/Zombie Apocalypse
Rated R: Violence, Gore, Language, Some Sensuality

Summary:

The film begins as we slowly begin to see the zombie apocalypse develop and get a first person reaction from Ann (Sarah Polley) and well as a montage to let us know this is a worldwide event. Our entourage of characters are able find shelter at the local shopping mall. There are some hostilities with the people already at the mall, but this is smoothed over rather quickly for the sake of narrative convenience. They wait around, do some things, and then before you know it, they escape from the mall and make their way out into a very bleak world.

Analysis:

We don’t get so much of a protagonist or lead characters so much as we see some people who spend more time onscreen than others. In the original film had only four lead characters and got to know them and see them change with the situations, and because we knew them, there was some considerable tension as to whether or not they would live or die. In the remake we have at the height of the head count, seventeen characters, none of which we get to know beyond which of them is good with a gun, which one of them can stitch up injuries and which one of them is the jerk that’ll most likely abandon the group and get eaten by karma zombies. By the end I couldn’t even remember half of their character’s names.

With that being said there are some interesting ideas that are tossed around during the course of this movie. One subplot involves Ving Rhames using signboards to communicate with “Andy”, a guy who has secured himself on the roof of a gun store across the street. “He may as well be on the moon.” Ving says. It’s a rather chilling line at that, knowing that because of the undead army between them, he cannot help this man in need. The two men develop a friendship through the exchange of information and display emotional reactions to relaying of bad news. In my opinion, it’s the best part of the movie. There is also a rather gruesome scene involving a pregnant woman giving birth to a zombie baby that ranks as shocking on the emotional scale.

Despite the fact that the movie starts by focusing on Ann and reaction to the surrounding chaos she isn’t a leader or a real protagonist. As a nurse she just slaps on Band-Aids, while the other women are either elderly, in labor, or putting out so that we can see some truly pointless sex scenes. The duty of “group leader” shifts between Ving Rhames’ police officer character and “Michael” (Jack of all trades, master of none!) to handle all the dangerous situations, as that is the duty of men. I can’t help but remember “Night of the Living Dead” and the original “Dawn of the Dead” and how revolutionary it was that the black guy was in charge and could help get the survivors organized. In the very beginning we see Ann looked down upon by a doctor concerned only with his tee time because of her position as a nurse. This film could have been about Ann using her field experience as a medic to step up and lead, to show that theres more to her than what people give her credit for or what people see and feels like a missed moment of opportunity.

There are a handful of montage sequences, but none of them capture the feelings that the montages of the original did of the escapist fantasy of a shopping spree or of the futility and boredom of living in such an isolated and comfortable existence. There really isn’t any social commentary or message in this movie like there was in the original. So much of the film is just waiting around for something exciting to happen.

The zombies in this movie (curiously enough they are never called “zombies” at any point in the remake) are fast and furious, raging and raving as they crave for human flesh, much like those infected by the Rage virus in “28 Days Later”. These zombies look and feel more like wild animals than people with the way they ran, growled and were covered in blood. It really didn’t register in my mind that they were once people and it diminished both the threat of attack and the fear of what they represented.

While I respect the remake for trying out some new ideas rather than trying to carbon copy the original, ultimately it doesn’t go far enough to establish itself as something unique or different. The characters just hang around the mall waiting for something exciting to happen and I felt very much the same way watching the film itself.

Final Score:

3 out of 5. Typical. Falls short of what it could have been.

(Embedded trailer unavailable)

The Fly (1986)

Starring Jeff Goldblum, Geena Davis, John Getz
Directed by David Cronenberg
Science Fiction/ Horror
Rated R: Violence, Gore, Frightening Images

I remember when I first saw the original “The Fly”. I was visiting my parents around New Year’s and I had just finished the movie when my mom came in the room and looked at the box for the DVD and said to me; “I don’t know how you can stand to watch that creepy stuff.” Well if she thinks a guy in a rubber fly mask is creepy than I hope by all that I hold holy that she never sees this remake.

The film introduces us to a reclusive scientist Dr. Seth Brundle (Jeff Goldblum) talking to journalist Veronica Quaife (Geena Davis) about his latest invention, Telepods, which are capable to teleporting, an object from one pod to another and offers her the opportunity to follow his progress exclusively, which she excepts, as the two slowly begin to fall in love. Conflict arises when Veronica’s editor, Stathis Borans (John Getz) threatens to reveal the telepods prematurely, leading Seth to jump the gun and test it on himself, not knowing that a common housefly got into the telepod with him, and together the two were merged and Seth and Vernoica slowly realize that Seth is morphing into a monster.

It is interesting to note how much like the remake of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” (which also starred Jeff Goldblum) there is a shift in tone. The original “The Fly” was more focused on suspense, with the mystery sequence and the narrative told through voice over and flashbacks. Here the focus is more on horror, specifically Cronenberg’s signature style of body horror. Unlike the original Fly, the change from man to monster is gradual, forming a path in our head (aided by Goldblum’s unique tics) that helps us remember that this is the same man we’ve seen since the start of the film, regardless of how heavy or complex the makeup gets, especially helpful since the Goldblum’s makeup changes every time we see him. This is also what makes the scares so effective. When we see Seth’s fingernails break off or vomit corrosive acid or when his head quite literally collapses, it’s not shocking just because of what we see, its shocking because we’ve come to identify with his character and can empathize with his plight. The emphasis here is on “showing” as much as they could to iron out the instances of “telling” from the original.

The score by Howard Shore is absolutely fantastic, big and booming, accentuating the excitement and tension. Despite over two decades of technology, the animatronics still look incredible and help add a layer of realism to the situations, expect when they needed something to wringle, like with the dying baboon or the maggot baby, in instances like those it was apparent that it was operated by some kind of motor, but still impressive none the less. The film doesn’t have a “happy ending” coda like the original, which irritated me about that film so much, and here the lack one really does serve to pack a mighty wallop as you’re just left there to sit and take it all in while the end credits roll. If there was anything that the original had that I missed in the remake it, would be that “boom-boom” sound the teleporter in the original made that was just so eerie.

Neat little bit of trivia; Director David Cronenberg makes a cameo as the gynecologist who appears in Veronica’s dream. I like that. The director only appears in the story when the laws of reality are blurred, it reminds me of the thought that Alfred Hitchcock put into his own cameos, such as the one in “Rear Window” were he is winding a clock to symbolize how he is the one controlling time.

“The Fly” is a tragedy, pure and simple. Many of Brundle’s mutations serve as parallels for aging, drug addiction, sexually transmitted diseases and terminal illnesses. The acting is great, the pacing is terrific, the score is pulse pounding and the scares are genuinely effective. I will admit it is a not a film for everyone, but it is well executed.

Final Score:

4 1/2 out of 5. Outstanding.