In 2001, after Paz Vega's sexy and moving performance in Sex and Lucia, I was poised for her to break out in America, or at least become a staple of quality indie films. I tried to keep hope alive after her false-start in Spanglish and a number of appearances in even more mediocre films, but I'm disappointed to report that her latest starring role in the Thriller/Comedy Cat Run isn't doing my optimism any favors. At least this overstuffed, almost incoherent trailer sure isn't.
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Here's some (ahem) uplifting news to start the week: Real life just got a little bit closer to Pixar movies! Or at least closer to Up. A group of scientists have found that you actually can make a house float simply by tying hundreds of helium balloons to it. 300 balloons, to be exact. If this feat into isn't cause for universal celebration, I'm not sure what is. Surely, an even larger group of scientists is working to take this research to its natural conclusion and find a way for humans to actually live inside the Pixar movies we love so dearly. Check out the video of the floating house after the jump.
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As promised, here's that new trailer for Puss in Boots. Here's all you need to know about the first teaser trailer the Shrek spin-off: It starts with an Inception-like montage of words and dissonant horns that ends in a "nine lives" joke. Har! Higher level here, folks! Let's take a look at this warlock.
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Ha! [Cue honking gag horn] It'll all make sense after a look at the trailer for Super, James Gunn's outrageous (and outrageously violent) comedy featuring Rainn Wilson as a schmo-turned-crime-fighter working to reclaim his estranged wife (Liv Tyler) from an evil drug lord (Kevin Bacon). Along the way he enlists a young sidekick (Ellen Page) whose expertise in comics (and enthusiasm for head-busting) comes in handy on his quest.
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It's a good week to be an animation fan, what with Rango garnering rave reviews and a new trailer for the Shrek spin-off Puss in Boots hitting the web. (Unless, like me, you caught the Puss in Boots teaser in theaters at midnight in front of the aptly-named Beastly. Not a smart life choice, in retrospect.) But what mystical, family-friendly, Eastern-influenced laughs await us in the new trailer for Kung Fu Panda 2?
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The Internet is popping with loving reviews for Gore Verbinski's Rango, but might Water for Elephants be the first great, no-caveats-like-it's-animated film of the year? If the second trailer for the Reese Witherspoon-Robert Pattinson three-hanky weeper is any indication, quite possibly.
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Every now and then a trailer comes along and offers a glimpse of a movie you had no idea you wanted to see, if only because you wouldn't have thought it could exist in a million years. Case in point: the trailer for this Australian thriller In Her Skin. Until now, I had no idea that there was any hope of getting a Lifetime movie starring Guy Pearce and Sam Neill. But here we are!
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Are there two more adorable television stars than John Krasinski and Ginnifer Goodwin? The answer you're looking for is, "No." Which makes the second trailer for Something Borrowed all the more disconcerting. After all, how could something that features two should-be-wildly-more-famous-than-they-are stars look so... tepid?
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Forget Drive Angry and please, please forget Bad Teacher; if any movie was ever justified in jumping on this red-band trailer trend, its Rubber. I mean, points for effort, but how are you supposed to sell a high concept movie about a tire that can explode people's heads without actually showing some exploding heads? Or at least an exploding bunny. Thus, I present the just-released red-band trailer for Rubber which features all sorts of creatures exploding. Only, why does this suddenly look like an art film?
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I usually avoid trailers for martial arts film altogether because, let's face it, it's not too hard to make even the worse film in this genre look mind-blowing and cool in an two-minute trailer. And while the fight choreography in Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zen indeed looks awesome, I was struck more by the chaotic opening war scene and the gorgeous period detail here, both of which set this one way ahead of the pack. At least as far as trailers go. Also, the director of Infernal Affairs, the original Hong Kong version of The Departed, is in charge here, so maybe we can expect a fun, convoluted narrative to compliment the action?
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First things first: No one around here condones homophobia or any legislation under its influence, and generally speaking, any statement against said legislation is one worth backing. But that's not why I'm pumped for the short film Porno Melodrama, which purports to be a direct reaction to institutionalized hate in Lithuania. I'm pumped because holy Christ this trailer.
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Based on this trailer, the Mildred Pierce miniseries from Todd Haynes still looks like a total knockout and guaranteed Emmy-hog. In terms of production-value, the cable-TV trappings don't seem to have compromised one iota of Todd Haynes' visual panache and meticulous attention to detail which made his last revisionist 50's melodrama Far From Heaven such a treat, and while Guy Pearce is still mostly relegated to the background, Kate Winslet looks like she'll have a grand showcase for her considerable talents in the titular role. And yet I have to admit, I'm still pretty baffled as to why the thing exists.
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Fresh on the heels of his Oscar loss, here's a trailer for another doc about Bansky, this time made by someone other than Banksy. It examines the hypocrisy and commerce involved in art industry and how old rules get complicated when applied to the street art movement by following a guy who is literally trying to sell a piece of Bansky's art that he (sort of) took off a wall. That's a little bit interesting, but it seems like Exit Through the Giftshop already covered the same territory with more wit and style. Also, the characters in this film seem like jerks and I am not interested to spend an entire movie with them.
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Sure, last night's Oscars left a lot to be desired, but what better way to wash away the hangover and hazy memories of smart-ass tweets than a killer trailer? Thus, I present the preview for Kelly Reichardt's new Western Meek's Cutoff, in which Michelle Williams and a three-family wagon team follow a shady-looking mountain man named Stephen Meek (Bruce Greenwood) over the Cascade Mountains only to find out he may not actually know where he's going. Also, water is scarce.
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I've been fascinated with Ray Kurzweil since reading a Rolling Stone interview with him several years ago. In a nutshell, Kurzweil believes very strongly that humans and machines will merge within the next forty years or so, and that mortality itself will become obsolete. He's coined an entire borderline-religous movement based around the day where humans and technology merged, which he calls singularity. This wouldn't be so interesting if the guy wasn't a bonafide genius who Bill Gates and the owners of Google regularly call into meetings. So he's not a total uninformed crackpot. Also, he has a personal obsession with living to see singularity so that he will be able to resurrect his dead father. In other words, it's about time someone made a movie about the guy.
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