2012 started off a little lame in the movie department but after The Avengers officially kicked off the 2012 Summer Movie Season with a BANG (and “Smash!”) things are looking up for the rest of the year. Here are some films that I am really looking forward to watching.
MAY 2012
Moonrise Kingdom
Opens: May 25th 2012
Cast: Bruce Willis, Bill Murray, Edward Norton, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton
Director: Wes Anderson
I’ve been a Wes Anderson fan since I rented his first movie Bottle Rocket back in 1996. His masterpiece Rushmore only made me a bigger fan (a film he has yet to top in my opinion). The plot, which is set in the 1960’s about a pair of young lovers (one a boy scout) who flee their New England island town, prompting a local search party led by the Sheriff and the girl’s parents to find them, sounds a bit tame but with Anderson writing the script and the actors he has assembled I’m sure this one will be worth checking out.
JUNE 2012
Prometheus
Opens: June 8th 2012
Cast: Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender, Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, Guy Pearce
Director: Ridley Scott
I love how Ridley Scott is trying to tell everyone this is not an Alien prequel, when in the trailer it is clear that this story is about the ship that Ripley and the crew of the Nostromo go to investigate and end up finding Space-Jockey’s and Face-Huggers (both of which can be seen in the Prometheus trailer). But I guess Scott just wants this film to stand on its own without the Alien baggage (I am of course speaking of the shit that was Alien 3 and Alien: Resurrection). This one looks pretty fucking awesome and could be the reboot of the whole franchise.
JULY 2012
The Amazing Spider-Man
Opens: July 3rd 2012
Cast: Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Rhys Ifans, Denis Leary
Director: Marc Webb
I never liked the Sam Raimi Spider-Man’s – okay, Part 2 was pretty good – so I’m looking forward to a new take on our Friendly Neighborhood Wall-Crawller. I loved Andrew Garfield in The Social Network and I think he brings a much-needed youthfulness and accidental “coolness” and to the character (Toby always seems TOO nerdy). I think this one is gonna be a hit. Too bad Marvel doesn’t own the film rights to Spider-Man, how cool would it be to see Spidey join The Avengers for part 2?
The Dark Knight Rises
Opens: July 20th 2012
Cast: Christian Bale, Gary Oldman, Tom Hardy, Anne Hathaway, Michael Caine
Director: Christopher Nolan
I have faith that Christopher Nolan can take the second-rate Batman villain of Bane, the cheesiness of Hathaway’s Catwoman costume, and Christian Bale’s bat-growl and make this closing chapter of his Batman Trilogy a homerun. I’ll be honest though, I’m not sure it can beat The Dark Knight but it’s sure gonna be fun watching this film try to. I’ll be there opening night at the local IMAX theater for this one, along with a bazillion other fanboys.
AUGUST 2012
Red Hook Summer
Opens: August 2012
Cast: Spike Lee, Turron Kofi Alleyne, Samantha Ivers, Limary Agosto, Heather Simms
Director: Spike Lee
What’s this? A sequel to Do the Right Thing? Well okay maybe not, but it does have the return of Mookie, played by Spike Lee himself. This is also Lee’s first non-documentary film since Miracle At St. Anna. The story follows a young kid named Flik who finds himself dumped at a Brooklyn housing project for the Summer with a firebrand preacher of a grandfather whom he’s never met. His only distraction from the boredom is a girl from church. But hey, this is a Spike Lee Joint, so you know things are going to get heated in the projects soon enough and Flik will soon be anything but bored.
Total Recall
Opens: August 3rd 2012
Cast: Colin Farrell, Kate Beckinsale, Bryan Cranston, Jessica Biel, Bill Nighy
Director: Len Wiseman
Too bad Philip K. Dick didn’t live long enough to see all his books be turned into awesome movies – Blade Runner, Minority Report, A Scanner Darkly, and the first Total Recall, speaking of which is one of Arnold’s best films and a blast to watch. Hopefully this remake will capture the fun that original had, even though the story takes place all on Earth and not on Mars. Oh, and hopefully there is a three-breastessed prostitute in this new film as well.
SEPTEMBER 2012
Argo
Opens: September 14th 2012
Cast: Ben Affleck, Bryan Cranston, Clea DuVall, John Goodman, Alan Arkin
Director: Ben Affleck
This is the true story of the plan by the CIA to rescue six U.S. diplomats held hostage at their embassy in Iran in 1979 by convincing officials they were members of a camera crew scouting the area for a Hollywood movie. Sometimes truth is stranger then fiction right? I’ve been diggin’ what Ben Affleck has been doing behind the camera lately – The Town was great and Gone Baby Gone is one of the best directorial debuts in a long time. On the other hand, I’m not much of a fan of Affleck’s acting abilities – but I do like the “Serpico” look he is rocking in this movie.
Dredd
Opens: September 21st 2012
Cast: Karl Urban, Olivia Thirlby, Lena Headey, Jason Cope, Domhnall Gleeson
Director: Pete Travis
The first Judge Dredd movie back in 1995 sucked much ass. I’ve never been much a Dredd comic reader – but I’ve read enough to know that Stallone’s version was a train-wreck (Stallone bearly wore the helmet in the whole movie and dudes, that helmet IS Judge Dredd!). I have high hopes for this new movie though – Karl Urban, aka Eomer from Lord of the Rings and Bones from Star Trek, is a cool dude. Here’s hoping he keeps that motherfucking helmet on the whole movie.
Savages
Opens: September 28th 2012
Cast: Taylor Kitsch, Aaron Johnson, Blake Lively, Salma Hayek, Benicio Del Toro
Director: Oliver Stone
Too bad Oliver Stone went the way of Francis Ford Coppola – once great film directors that for some reason lost all their mojo and started making shit. What was Stone’s last great film? I’m gonna have to go with JFK – a film he made over 20 years ago. Since then he’s given us Any Given Sunday (sucked), Alexander (sucked), World Trade Center (sucked), and Wall Street Part 2 (sucked). Fuck man, stop smoking the ganja Stone and start making good movies again. He’s on the right path with The Savages, a story about kidnapping, ransoms, and pot growing (hey wait! no pot for Mr. Stone!). Plus he’s got a great cast – I’ll watch anything Benicio is in.
OCTOBER 2012
The Master
Opens: October 2012
Cast: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Joaquin Phoenix, Amy Adams, Laura Dern, Rami Malek
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson
Some people may say Paul Thomas Anderson is too pretentious and full of himself. I say he is one of the finest filmmakers that there’s ever been. The dude made Boogie Nights, one of the top 1o movies of the 1990’s, when he was like 13 years old or some shit. Then he follows that up with Magnolia and manages to get me to cry over a brilliant Tom Cruise performance. TOM FUCKING CRUISE! (Kinda ironic that The Master is about L. Ron Hubard and the church of Scientology and how it might be all bullshit) P.T Anderson works with film the way a artist works with paint. He mixes and matches till the picture comes in to a life all its own. There is no way in hell I’m missing out on seeing The Master when it comes to theaters.
click HERE to watch a 5 minute clip of some dudes talking about the movie and controversy that will no doubt follow in its wake
Cast: James Gandolfini, Brad Garrett, Jack Huston, Christopher McDonald, Molly Price
Director: David Chase
I’ve been watching hella episodes of The Sopranos lately and I gotta say, James Gandolfini will ALWAYS be Tony Soprano. Period. No matter what he does that roll will stay with him for the rest of his life. And really, he should be proud of that. His performance in that series is one of the greatest acting jobs in the history of motherfucking acting. This movie reunites Gandolfini, The Sopranos creator David Chase, and New Jersey on a story not about the Mob but rock and roll in the 60’s. I’m in.
NOVEMBER 2012
Cast: Ben Affleck, Rachel McAdams, Olga Kurylenko, Rachel Weisz, Javier Bardem
Director: Terrence Malick
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Opens: December 14th 2012
Cast: Martin Freeman, Ian McKellen, Andy Serkis, Richard Armitage, Luke Evans
Director: Peter Jackson
Along with Dark Knight Rises, this is the movie I am looking forward to the most this year. Peter Jackson silenced all the naysayers that said that the J.R.R Tolkein book The Lord of the Rings was unfilmable. It took ten years of his life to film all three movies back to back. The result was one of the greatest movie trilogies of all time. So I’m stoked that Jackson is back to give us the prequel. For awhile he was out and director Guillermo Del Toro was attached to the film. Now I love Del Toro’s films but his style is different then Jackson’s and The Hobbit would have seemed like it was part of another series – and not part of Jackson’s world. But Peter took the film back like Golem taking back that ring and it looks like it’s gonna rock!
World War Z
Opens: December 21st 2012
Cast: Brad Pitt, Mireille Enos, James Badge Dale, Lucy Aharish, Julia Levy-Boeken
Director: Marc Forster
I’m fucking sick of zombies. But that wasn’t the case back in the 80’s when I was a youngster and into gore and special effects (ask my sister about the one time I constructed a fake thumb, stuck a knife through it, dosed it in fake blood, and surprised her with it). Back in the 80’s zombies were few and far between. The only ones were Romero’s films and some even more low-budget Italian ones, oh, and the comedy Return of the Living Dead. So to get your fix of zombies you had to dig deep in the local video store horror section and uncover them and watch them over and over and over. But nowadays the undead can be found at your local Burger King and Wal-Mart’s. Shit, there are zombies on Saturday morning cartoons. Fucking Nickelodeon and Sesame Street. Regardless, I’ll still be checking this Brad Pitt zombie film, as it could very well spell the end of the genre.
Django Unchained
Opens: December 25th 2012
Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell
Director: Quentin Tarantino
I respect Tarantino for sticking to his guns and making films HE wants to see. He is a fanboy at heart. But I wish he would make slightly better films. Well, maybe “better” isn’t the right word – more serious films I think. It just seems like he making these “comic booky” “exploitation” films ie: Kill Bill, Inglourious Basterds. And this one looks to be a mixture of the two. But hey, the dude can direct the fuck of actors and I think he is one of the best ones around in terms of taking a washed up actor and finding the gold nugget in them. He LOVES actors, and actors are what drive 90% of movies. And he also can write dialog like nobody’s business.
Lincoln
Opens: December 2012
Cast: Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Tommy Lee Jones
Director: Steven Spielberg
Daniel Day-Lewis as Abraham Lincoln. Nuff Said.
The Institute of Idle Time 