Rick's Flicks Picks on AWN

Based on a BBC miniseries, which starred Bill Nighy and James McAvoy, Kevin Macdonald's American feature version brings back the hero journalist to the big screen before they are blogged out of existence. I am aware of the irony in that statement for I am blogging right now. The director of THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND mixes journalism and politics and murder in a film well aware of how all three are changing in modern society.

Cal McAffrey (Russell Crowe, THE INSIDER) is a veteran reporter for the Washington Globe, a top newspaper that has been bought by a bigger corporation that's demanding profits. His editor Cameron Lynne (Helen Mirren, THE QUEEN) feels the pressure the most, valuing Cal's journalistic integrity, but salivating over cheaper, faster blog-style reporters like the young Della Frye (Rachel McAdams, THE NOTEBOOK). A big story breaks involving Cal's friend, congressman Stephen Collins (Ben Affleck, HOLLYWOODLAND). Turns out, he was having an affair with his researcher, who has been murdered. It also turns out that their friendship has been on the rocks ever since Cal slept with Collins' wife Anne (Robin Wright Penn, FORREST GUMP). How does the young woman's death relate to the murder of a purse-snatcher? Is the military contractor that Collins is fighting against involved? Cal digs for the truth anyway he can, which doesn't make for fast headlines, while Della can turn out copy fast based solely on knee-jerk speculation.

This week's Getting Buzzed list has three films that have made appearances here before and will certainly be at the top of my Most Anticipated Summer Films list coming next week. With some of these new trailers, I'm getting excited about the summer season starting up. How about you?

10) Shorts (August 7)
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Robert Rodriguez has taken a break from his adult fare to return to kid-friendly entertainment. This fantasy flick looks like it could be fun. Hoping it's in the vein of the first SPY KIDS and not SHARKBOY AND LAVAGIRL.

9) Il Divo (April 24)
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This drama about former Italian prime minister Giulio Andreotti looks electric. Andreotti is a fascinating figure and this tale of his power and influence feels not like your typical biopic. The trailer makes it feel like a hip gangster flick. The film won the Prix du Jury at Cannes, so the French liked it.

Pedro Almodovar has always been a filmmaker of grand ambition, which is evident in this early film that mixes surrealism with nunsploitation films. Religion and gay themes have been a signature of his work and they're used here to provoke. THE TIME OF LONDON named it one of the 50 most controversial films. It was rejected by the Cannes Film Festival for being anti-Catholic. His two previous films before this one dealt with drugs, sex, violence and religion, but this is the one that made people sit up and notice.

Yolanda Bel (Cristina Sanchez Pascual, PEPI, LUCI, BOM) is a singer who deals drugs on the side. When her boyfriend kills himself via an overdose, she goes on the lam, and seeks refuge from Mother Superior Julia (Julieta Serrano, WOMEN ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN), a fan she met at a concert. The nun's parish is in dire economic straits, but she will put all other concerns aside to impress Yolanda. Mother Superior is not only obsessed with the sexy singer, but a drug addict as well. Making matters worse, the church's biggest backer, the Marquise (Mary Carrillo), pulls her financial support, wanting to know what happened to her daughter Virginia, who went on a mission to Africa and hasn't been heard from since.

ADVENTURELAND isn't as funny as I thought it would be. That's because it's not really a comedy — a dramedy at best. Ads have played up the humor and that it's written and directed by SUPERBAD's Greg Mottola, who used what power he earned on the Judd Apatow-produced comedy to revisit this story, which he had written years before. It's a personal '80s coming-of-age story that feels authentic due to its keen feel for setting and tone. While many of the characters could be described in a few words, it wouldn't tell you all there is to tell about them. Just like life.

James Brennan (Jesse Eisenberg, THE SQUID AND THE WHALE) has just graduated college and is looking forward to a summer trip cavorting around Europe with his friends before starting grad school at Columbia. However, his parents give him surprise news on his graduation day — his father has been demoted and they don't have the money to send him to Europe or pay for his apartment in NYC. So he has to go back home to Pittsburgh and find a job. The only work he can get is at the old school amusement park Adventureland.



There he meets a collection of oddball characters. Bobby (Bill Hader, SNL) and Paulette (Kristen Wiig, GHOST TOWN) are the unflappable couple who run the amusement park. Well, Bobby does get a little heated around litterbugs. James' old friend Frigo (Matt Bush, ONE LAST THING) has an obsession with punching guys in the balls when they least expect it. Joel (Martin Starr, KNOCKED UP), who shows James the con of the amusement park games, is one of those eccentric looking guys who only extenuates his eccentricities by smoking a pipe. Mike Connell (Ryan Reynolds, DEFINITELY, MAYBE) is the cool older guy who only works maintenance at the park so he can play in a band at night. You know the kind of guy who comes to the park with his guitar for no other reason than it makes him look cool, and helps sell his story about jamming with Lou Reed. Lisa P (Margarita Levieva, THE INVISIBLE) is the town tease, a good Catholic girl who dresses like she should be saying Hail Marys all day long. But James can't resist Em (Kristen Stewart, TWILIGHT). She's the cool rocker girl who seems to have it all together. That's until you see what her life is really like.

What struck me most is that the film doesn't judge its characters. It presents them as they are. It doesn't apologize for the characters it wants us to like when they do wrong and it doesn't demonize the characters it wants us not to like. A perfect example of this is with Connell and Lisa P. Connell puts on a good front, but it's easy to see he's a fraud. But the film doesn't need to force some comeuppance upon him. Lisa P is shallow and not too bright, but even she gets to have a deep moment or two where Mottola doesn't pull the rug out from under her to make her depth just the butt of a joke.

This non-judgmental tone also stretches to its main characters. James is a 21-year-old virgin, but the film doesn't make it out like he has to fix that problem to be normal. And yet, the film is honest about James being a 21-year-old virgin. Moral stances he took when he was younger aren't as firm anymore. Kristen's budding relationship with James has more behind it then girl meets cute nice guy. Her rocky home life has led to rocky relationships, none of which could be called commitments. And just because these two have seen each other doesn't mean the rest of the world around them has stopped looking.

While the film is set in the 1980s, the film isn't a '80s spoof. It has the bright flashy clothing and the asymmetrical hairstyles, but Mottola resists the urge to make those questionable fashion choices the main punchline to every joke. For those raised in the Reagan era, you just have to think, "what were we thinking?" More importantly what ADVENTURELAND gets right is the feel of a summer job and a summer romance. Working at the amusement park with its repetitive soundtrack playing over crappy speakers and puking children is not too much fun, but the people you work with make it the best time of your life. The guy who threatens to stab you over a stuffed animal is crazy, but it makes for a great story to tell. Each day is a new adventure and that's how being young feels sometimes. That's why the film's title is so perfect, because the adventure this film is about is the adventure of being young.

Nominated for Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award in 1988 after winning the Audience Award at the Cannes Film Festival, director Mira Nair's breakthrough feature debut has a storied history. Nair and Sooni Taraporevala interviewed Bombay (now Mumbai) street kids about their experiences and developed a screenplay from their stories. They opened an acting school where they trained the kids to perform naturally, casting from the best of group. Following the production, they set up a foundation to support the children in the film, which still exists, providing aide for street kids in several cities in India.

As a result, SALAAM BOMBAY! is a harrowing tale of children finding the means to survive on the streets. Krishna (Shafiq Syed) works for the circus, and one day, he is left behind after running an errand. He travels to Bombay where he holds out hope that if he can earn 500 rupees, he can go back to his home village and reunite with his family. But whether his mother sent him or sold him to the circus is unclear. In Bombay, Krishna is known as Chaipau, or "Tea and Bread," which is screamed from top floors of apartments when someone wants something from the food stand where he works. While the street life is harsh, there are moments of levity. The prostitute Rekha (Anita Kanwar) is kind to him, giving him money from time to time. Krishna befriends her daughter Manju (Hansa Vithal), who gets quite jealous when he becomes smitten by Sweet Sixteen (Chanda Sharma), a beautiful girl who has been either kidnapped or sold into prostitution where men will bid on her virginity.

The buzz list this week is an eclectic mix of work from some great directors and actors. From the directors, their new films move them into new directions, tackling subject that are unexpected. There are two films that feature two of the breakout performers of last year. So get ready to get buzzed.

Melting Fast
Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (July 1)
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ICE AGE 2, with its sitcom script, wasn't good, but it seems Fox is going to force Blue Sky to make these films until they aren't profitable anymore. What a shame, because HORTON HEARS A WHO showed they can cook up much more than stale leftovers.

With the second film in the rebooted Bond franchise now on DVD, This Weekend's Film Festival celebrates the iconic British spy with a collection of his greatest screen adventures. Some critics have argued that QUANTUM OF SOLACE took the fun out of the Bond series, but its gritty realism and continuing emotional center are something that was present in past installments. In the lineup we have Connery, Lazenby, Moore and Craig. We have Bianchi, Rigg, Bouqet, Green, and Kurylenko. After this look at 007, your impression of the legendary hero will be shaken and stirred.

The second Bond film, FROM RUSSIAN WITH LOVE, may be the best balanced of the series. It contains many of the great conventions like Q, and the bad ones like the talking villain. Bond archnemesis Blofeld is introduced as an unseen mysterious figure. In this adventure, SPECTRE wants to start a war between the U.S. and Russia and uses Russian agent and beauty Tatiana Romanov (Daniela Bianchi) as a trap for Bond, played with suave skill by Sean Connery. The heated adversarial relationship between the male and female spies is a quintessential element of the series and works rarely better than here. The plot gives them reasons to put aside their differences and fall in love… or lust. A unique element of this entry, especially for one coming in 1963, is the crucial character of Kerim Bey, a smart, brave and sexually appealing Turkish spy. Before Bourne upped Bond and then Bond tried to up Bourne, the vicious fight sequence between Bond and SPECTRE thug Red Grant, played wonderfully by Robert Shaw, was as raw as any modern fight gets. And unlike modern fight choreography, the audience can make out what is happening, giving it real tension. This edition really set the bar high for the series. To quote my original review, "Being a spy can be a rough job, between murderous assassins and femme fatales, but James Bond is the man that can handle all elements with strength and smarts."

For those whom felt WATCHMEN was too much a literal adaptation of the comic, they may want to watch the new short based on the UNDER THE HOOD material from the original graphic novel. In the original WATCHMEN story, the original Nite Owl, Hollis Mason, wrote an autobiography, which was excerpted for the comic. Instead of filming a "based upon" sequence, director Eric Matthies and writer Hans Rodionoff craft a 1970s news program called "The Culpepper Minute" to chronicle the origin of Nite Owl and the superhero team called the Minutemen.

The TV news magazine style is reminiscent to 20/20 and even features vintage period commercials. Stephen McHattie gets a chance to shine as Mason, the first masked superhero to reveal his identity after previously keeping it secret. McHattie's performance makes one wish he had been more prominent in the feature. The short serves as a fascinating prequel to the WATCHMEN feature, giving a deeper insight into his Hollis Mason character, as well as other key characters such as Sally Jupiter (Carla Gugino, SPY KIDS). Through seeing the story told prior to the events of the feature film, the short contains wonderful irony, especially for fans of the comic. I loved when Rorschach's prison psychologist says he'd love to get into the mind of one of the masks.

Five new trailers hit this week that got the buzz-o-meter buzzing. A hitman romance directed by an actor. A doc about an infamous boxer. A new vampire film from a Korean master. A new drama from a Spanish master. And a quirky-looking romance with two wonderful young stars. See what piqued my interest this week.

On the Bubble
Cloudy with the Chance of Meatballs (Sept. 18)
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With March Madness kicking off this week, I thought it fitting to have a film listed as on the bubble. With the release of the first trailer for Sony's CLOUDY WITH THE CHANCE OF MEATBALLS, I'm lukewarm. As an animation fan, I hold onto hope that every animated feature will be good, but nothing in CLOUDY looks promising. The children's book seemed to have a subtle subversive comment on gross consumerism, but from the trailer MEATBALLS seems like an average outcast makes good story. Judge for yourself.

Director Mike Newell (FOUR WEDDINGS AND A FUNERAL) attempts a screen adaptation of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's magical realism classic and translates it into a marginal romance novel. In the transition, the story lost all its nuance, making the grand romance feel stiff instead of passionate. All the pieces are there and a good movie often breaks through, but it lacks the spark that would have given it life.

Florentino Ariza is smitten by Fermina Daza (Giovanna Mezzogiorno, 2001's ONE LAST KISS) upon laying eyes on her for the first time. Florentino is played as a tortured teen by Unax Ugalde (GOYA'S GHOST) and as an adult by Oscar-winner Javier Bardem (NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN). As a teen, Florentino's every thought is consumed by Fermina, but her rich father Lorenzo (John Leguizamo, SUMMER OF SAM) can't have a clerk marrying his daughter, so he sends her away to live with her cousin Hildebranda Sanchez (Catalina Sandino Moreno, MARIA FULL OF GRACE). Florentino saves himself for her, but when she returns, she rejects him and marries the doctor Juvenal Urbino (Benjamin Bratt, TV's LAW & ORDER). Now Florentino, played by Bardem, becomes an unassuming ladies man, who keeps a journal of all his sexual conquests, but secretly longs for his soul mate Fermina. So when Juvenal dies, which we see at the start of the film, Florentino goes to Fermina on the day of the funeral to declare his love once again, and is rejected once again for his insensitivity.

Movies love affair with the vampire stretches back to the earliest days of the cinema. Various directors have put their stamp on the horror subgenre and when it comes to pop culture vamps few films exceed THE LOST BOYS in popularity. So why does Joel Schumacher's fairly standard vampire flick have such staying power? Why does it float above so many others like it? The cast. They were good then and now the film stands as a time capsule for a period in film history.

Michael Emerson (Jason Patric, RUSH) moves with his recently divorced mother Lucy (Dianne Wiest, HANNAH AND HER SISTERS) and little brother Sam (Corey Haim, LUCAS) to live with his hippie grandpa (Barnard Hughes, TRON) in Santa Carla, the murder capitol of the U.S. On the boardwalk, he is smitten by Star (Jami Gertz, 1992's JERSEY GIRL), a street kid who hangs with a gang of punked out lost boys, lead by David (Kiefer Sutherland, TV's 24). Not wanting to look like a wuss, Michael takes David's increasingly dangerous challenges. In the meantime, Sam meets the Frog Brothers, Edgar (Corey Feldman, DREAM A LITTLE DREAM) and Alan (Jamison Newlander, 1988's THE BLOB), at comic book shop, where they warn the new kid in town to read up on vampires, because it could save his life. At first Sam doesn't believe in bloodsuckers, but when it turns out that Michael has been tricked into drinking blood, he might have Dracula living in the next room.

Movie nerds are supposed to be misunderstood, awkward people, but likeable. Drew Barrymore plays her lead character in NEVER BEEN KISSED with awkwardness to spare, but also with a huge dose of annoying. There are reasons why some nerds are not liked, Barrymore's Josie Geller reminds us of them all.

Josie is a copy editor at the Chicago Sun-Times. I wonder if this was done to try and butter up Roger Ebert for a good review? I guess, it worked; it's the only thing that explains his three star review of this junk. Anyways, Josie really wants to be a reporter, but Gus the editor (John C. Reilly, CHICAGO) doesn't think she has the strength to be a hardnosed journalist. But then in an editorial meeting, unpredictable publisher Rigfort (Garry Marshall, A LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN) randomly picks Josie to go undercover as the high school student to discover what the modern teen is really like. When Josie tells her slacker brother Rob (David Arquette, SCREAM) what her assignment is, he reminds her that high school was hell for her. And sure enough, Josie has the same set of social skills she had back then. A threesome of popular girls ridicules her and the big man on campus Guy (Jeremy Jordan, BIO-DOME) makes joke out of her, until Rob poses as a student and makes her popular.