Five things we’ve learned from the Skyfall teaser…

Hello! Kaboom. The name is Fall, Skyfall. And this is the teaser trailer. Which is now officially considered abso-f*ing-lutely f*ing awesome. Awesome.

Some things we’ve learned. First of all: this one is quite tough and strikes home. London is one of the major settings of this film, and it appears we might see an attack on the Underground. With memories of 2005 relatively fresh and the Olympics with all their security fuss on the agenda, this is more than topical.

Second: It looks gorgeous. But that’s to be expected when you pair director Sam Mendes with cinematographer Roger Deakins and costume designer Tom Ford (that’s his tuxedo that Bond is wearing in the Shanghai bit). A bit too gorgeous for Daniel Craig’s ‘roughed up’ version of Bond? Perhaps; we’ll have to see.

Third: The best villain introduction since ever, as Javier Bardem’s big baddie Silva walks away from an explosion, and we only see him in silhouette…

Fourth: the classic Aston Martin DB5 is back!

And finally: is this going to be a perfect double bill with Christopher Nolan’s Inception? I had strong ‘Nolanesque’ feelings with this teaser. It somehow reminded me quite a bit of The Dark Knight, with the terror striking close to home and a protagonist in psychological shambles… And Inception was, as Nolan proclaimed, his “Bond” film. Which does not mean I would not like to see the man doing a ‘real’ Bond flick.

But that’s fantasizing about the far future, while in the immediate one there is so much to look forward to. Not only Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises, but also Sam Mendes’ Skyfall. Officially proclaimed awesome. What a year!

PS Probably a coincidence, but Bane, the villain in The Dark Knight Rises, made his first appearance in the comic book series Knightfall. Not only is this an alliteration of Skyfall, in this comic book Bane also broke Batman’s mind and his back. Is Bond awaiting a similar fate? This teaser surely leaves open the possibility….

The Jasper’s Take Awards 2011: Winners

Yesterday I already twittered (is that how you spell it, or is to “I twoot”?) the winners of the first – perhaps annual – Jasper’s Take Awards. These are completely immaterial, ceremonyless, non-carpet, celeb-free, low-cal awards given out for achievements in cinema that are usually overlooked by the Oscars, the Globes, the Baftas and the likes. These are the winners, and this is why they’ve won.

The Tess Benedict Award for Most Mediocre Film of the Year goes to The Eagle. A film that is so completely redundant that it should not have been made. Actually, it was so redundant that, despite the fact that it was already made, they shelved it for a year before releasing it. Because there was already another, better film about the same subject: Centurion. It is actually a pity, considering that if The Eagle had beaten Centurion in terms of release dates, it would have been a completely acceptable, entertaining little adventure film.

The ‘Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark’ award for worst use of 3D in a Motion Picture was a close call. Technically I might argue that the worst 3D I have seen this year was in the Dutch film Nova Zembla. But if we consider budgets, and experiences in making this types of film, the biggest let down – and the winner of this award – must be Pirates of the Carribean: On Stranger Tides. Whatever you think of the third Pirates film, at least it offered state-of-the-art visual effects and set-pieces like you had never seen before. Its successor managed to add to that prize-winning formula the hottest new film technology of the last 3 years and come up with… absolutely nothing. No sea battles, no stunning set-pieces, just dark boredom.

The Muhammar Khadaffi Award for morally most reprehensible film that is nonetheless succesfull was an easy choice this year. Yes, both Transformers: Dark of the Moon and The Change Up offered very bleak, pessimistic visions of what our civilization has come to. But truly the most morally depraving thing film studios have done this year was releasing Green Lantern. A film that was so bad and ugly, so boring, such an assault on the senses and such a joust at our cognitive and rational capabilities that it does not deserve to exist. Not a crime against our standards and values, but against Film. And on this website we shall have none of it.

Disclaimer: A film that was not nominated and that you may find missing in relation to this award is The Hangover 2. But I can’t honestly nominate it, because I had better things to do.

We close the Jasper’s Take Awards on a positive note though. The Mind Heist Award for most enthusiasticating trailer! Goes to Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Sure the other nominees (The Dark Knight Rises, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, The Muppets and The Guard) were at least as exciting, but the difference is this: those are films I would have seen (and will see) anyway. While Tinker Tailor… might well have past my attention had it nto been for that fantastic first trailer.

So that’s it for the Jasper’s Take Awards 2011 then. Stay tuned, because before the year is over there will still be reviews of Puss in Boots, Tresspass and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, I will finish my early Oscar predictions and on 30 and 31 December I will share with you my top tens of best and worst films of 2011.

Trailer for The Dark Knight Rises online!!!

Quick analysis? This is gonna be dark stuff, with Bruce Wayne leaning on a cane. Michael Caine’s Alfred is in tears and Commissioner Gordon (Gary Oldman) is in a tight spot, politically. A masked Anne Hathaway whispers ominously, and then the shit hits the fan. The Arkham prioners are set loose on the streets of Gotham once more and it turns into a very nasty revolution.  With Batman getting Bane’s “permission to die”… Wow.

Most remarkable is how light the film looks. Batman used to lurk in the shadows: now he is brought into full daylight.

My only worry is about the CG on the collapsing football field and the flying Batwing-kinda-thing. That really needs some more polishing. But there is plenty of time for that in post-production, as The Dark Knight Rises is not set to premiere until July.

Announcement: Jasper’s Take Awards 2011: Nominations

Of course, this being the end of the year, I will publish my lists of best and worst films of the year. These lists will be uploaded on 30 and 31 December. Next to that there will be a novelty on this website: the Jasper’s Take Awards. These awards celebrate all those qualities films can possess that are generally overlooked by the Academy, the Hollywood Foreign Press Agency and the British Academy. Below you can find the categories, if you want to nominate people or films for a category, then just post a response to this blogpost. Also, if you have strong arguments in favor of or against a particular nomination, let me know…

The Tess Benedict Award for Most Mediocre Film of the Year

“Does he make you laugh?’ asks Danny Ocean (George Clooney) to Tess Benedict (Julia Roberts) of her new husband Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia) in Ocean’s Eleven. “He does not make me cry” she answers. The Tess Benedict Award celebrates those movies that leave us entirely untouched. Neither arousing nor angering us they simply exist. It is time to acknowledge such mediocrity. The nominees for this award are:

Ironclad

Flypaper

The Rite

The Eagle

The Lincoln Lawyer

The ‘Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark’ award for worst use of 3D in a Motion Picture

Of course we do need to be afraid of the dark. Very afraid. In fact, being too dark and still using darkening 3D is the serious fault in most of the following nominees.

Pirates of the Carribean: On Stranger Tides

Nova Zembla

Conan the Barbarian

The Green Hornet

Green Lantern

The Muhammar Khadaffi Award for morally most reprehensible film that is nonetheless succesfull.

Needs no further explanation. Nominees:

Green Lantern

The Change Up

Transformers: Dark of the Moon

The Mind Heist Award for most enthusiasticating trailer!

Mind Heist is the song by Zach Hemsey that was used for the trailer of Inception, to great effect. This award celebrates those trailers that make us want to abso-fucking-litely see the film. The quality of the trailer, it should be said, is absolutely independent of the quality of the film. Nominees:

The Guard

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

The Artist

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

The Entire Muppet Parody Trailer Campaign

The Jasper’s Take Awards wiinners will be announced on twitter in real time on the evening of 20 December, and will subsequently be listed on this website.

The Artists of the Silent Screen

This week The Artist opens. Michael Hazanavicius film about a silent movie star losing everything after the introduction of sound calls into recollection Singing in the Rain, of course. But instead of celebrating the new by being a musical, The Artist celebrates the old by being, oh well almost at least, a silent film. Which in this case mean a film without dialogue and sound effects. not without music. But that is nitpicking, especially since we all know that silent movies weren’t silent at all: there were always musicians, sound effects, actors speaking dialogue behind the screen or lecturers exlaining the film.

I hope to see and review The Artist this weekend. But to wet your appetite I present you a few fragments of some of the best silent cinema of the first Hollywood Golden Age (1915-1927).

Charlie Chaplin in The Circus (1928 – Chaplin would not make a sound film until 1936′s Modern Times)

Buster Keaton in The General (1927)

Rudolph Valentino in Blood and Sand (1922)

And finally the trailer that this film is all about: The Artist, starring Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo.

The Last of the Muppet (parody trailer)s

‘Meta’ is usually not a good idea in films. Movies about movies, and movies in movies…. Once you’ve seen one you’ve seen all of them (with the exception of such fare as Adaptation and Le Mépris perhaps). And with the exception of the latest and last trailer for The Muppets. Being done with parodying other films (most notably romantic comedies, The Hangover 2, Green Lantern and The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo), Kermit & co. have now cast their satirical spotlights upon… themselves (oh, and Paranormal Activity, Twilight and Puss in Boots)! I’m not sure whether it is the best of the parody trailers, but it is fun, and this has absolutely been the best film advertising campaign I’ve seen in my life. A pity We’ll have to wait until February to see the film over here…

The Pirates Film That Is Going To Be Fun (unlike that other monstrosity)

The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists

Dir. Peter Lord & Jeff Newitt. Starring: Hugh Grant, Imelda Staunton, Brendan Gleeson, Jeremy Piven, Brian Blessed, Salma Hayek, Martin Freeman & David Tennant

Release date: April 25th 2012 (NL)

Preview: The Dark Knight Rises

Last week Warner Bros. released the teaser poster for Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises, and yesterday they also put an HD version of the first teaser online. A shoddy low-quality version had already been leaked to the internet, but its quality was so bad that hardly anything could be seen or heard in it.

The new teaser still tells us little about the plot: there are some images from Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, and a voice-over by Liam Neeson that comes from the first film. Then: an image of Gary Oldman’s commissioner Gordon on a hospital bed: hurt, weak. He insists that Batman must come back, that they were “in this together”. An unseen Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) doubt whether Batman still exists. Then there are shots of someone climbing out of a hole and of Bane (Tom Hardy). One of his face and one of him approaching a stumbling Batman in an underground location.

And that is it. I am thrilled. I am very much looking forward to the film, yet I am afraid as well. Mostly because of the cast list. The Dark Knight Rises sees Bale returning as Bruce Wayne/Batman, and Gary Oldman, Morgan Freeman (Lucius Fox) and Michael Caine (Alfred) return as well.

Tom Hardy will be Bane, who in the comics is a genetically engineered super-soldier or villain. Anne Hathaway is cast as Selina Kyle, and may transform into Catwoman. Hathaway is new to Nolan, but Marion Cotillard and Joseph Gorden-Levitt are not: they worked with him on Inception. Gorden-Levitt will be police officer John Blake, and Cotillard will play Miranda Tate, in the comics also known as Talia Al Ghul, the estranged daughter of Ra’s Al Ghul, Batman’s enemy from Begins. Josh Pence is cast as a young Ra’s, and Liam Neeson is rumoured to return as the old version of the character.

Such long cast lists lead to problems; see last years Iron Man 2. All these well-known actors and characters can hardly all be given the screen time they need to develop their characters properly and play a major role in what still should be the story of Batman. At worst, we could get a mess of a film. However, considering Nolan’s disciplined style of filmmaking that is not likely. More likely is that the film will show an extreme version of the template of The Dark Knight and Inception, in which supporting characters’ emotional or personal development are sidelined in order for them to schematically inhabit the various political, moral or mythological points Nolan wants make.

Something else I fear is that Nolan might move away from the realistic tone of his previous Batman films, and indulge in the more metaphysical themes and plotlines some of the comics (for instance Frank Millar’s “The Dark Knight Returns”) offer. That is something I would not be fond of.

But I had similar fears back in 2007, when I first learned that Heath Ledger, whom I, at the time, only remembered as the teenage heart-throb from 10 Things I Hate About You and A Knight’s Tale, would play The Joker, a role made iconic by Jack Nicholson. And I had my doubts about the pitch for Inception as well: A thriller set within the architecture of the mind? And in both cases my doubts and fears were met by great films. Let’s hope Nolan can do it again.

Mupdate – full trailer arrived for The Muppets

Over the last few weeks there were already three teaser trailers for The Muppets, which parodied trailers for romantic comedies, The Hangover 2 and The Green Lantern (see previous blog post), but  now there is a full trailer online. Are you already getting #greenwithenvy?

As a reminder of how funny the muppets can be, see this clip from their television show:

The Big True Grit Anxiety Build-up Coen Brothers Oeuvre Review Scene List

As I am going to see True Grit tonight, finally, I have literally nothing else on my midn all day. Hence, my favourite scenes from previous Coen Brothers films.

“Y’a know, for kids” (The Hudsucker Proxy). Tim Robbins’ upstatr nitwit CEO invents the hulahoop. You know, for kids. What follows is an amazing 6 minute montage of product development, placement, failure and eventual success.

“And it’s a beautiful day” (Fargo). After all the demented outrageousness that is Fargo Marge Gunderson (played by the amazing Frances McDormand) provides for the first time true heart and warmth to a Coen Borthers film.

“The Big Inception”. No movie scene here, but a recut of images from stoner-bowling epic (really a niche market genre) The Big Lebowski to the music of the trailer of last year’s mega-hit Inception. A mix up trailer that showcases soem brilliant editing and yet captures the mood of the Coen Brothers film perfectly.

“Down to the River”. Gospel music, the American South in the Great Depression, George Clooney as an idiot. It all comes together in O Brother Where Art Thou.

“The Old Sheriff”. Tommy Lee Jones sees the world go to hell as monstrous killer Anton Chigurh arrives in town. Start around 5.00.

“The security of your shit” (Burn after Reading). They don’t come more retarded than Brad Pitt’s Chad Feldheimer.

“When the truth is found to be lies” (A Serious Man).  The brothers were surprised that they got an Oscar nomination for A Serious Man. I was not.