Sure, the other Movieline guys might be busy at Comic-Con with realish-looking, 10-foot CGI aliens, lycanthrope six-packs, and, um, Jonah Hill doing some spray-paint-assisted Street Fighter promotion. But I can argue that I'm having much more fun here at home, safely 125 miles away from the teeming, shower-impaired masses in San Diego (I know, I know, harping on the smell at Comic-Con is cliche, but: this), because I was sitting by my computer when the red-band trailer for Hot Tub Time Machine, the much-anticipated John Cusack vehicle that does not involve a battleship being tossed at his Apocalypse-fleeing family, was posted this morning. And that trailer will now serve as the subject of our latest installment of the Two-Minute Verdict.
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Now that Comic-Con is getting underway, it's time for studios to begin releasing all the goodies that Con attendees will have to stand in line to see on a bigger screen. First up, we have the trailer for Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland semi-sequel, and unlike the Freddy Krueger tease from earlier, this clip's got a lot to show off.
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Today's Two-Minute Verdict examines Creation, the Charles Darwin biopic which has the dubious honor of being the first non-Canadian film in quite some time to open the Toronto International Film Festival. Let's have a look at its trailer, then, and predict what might evolve.
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I've said pretty much all I can say about the genius of Tyler Perry, which doesn't leave me a lot of room for processing the formula at work in the new trailer for his upcoming I Can Do Bad All by Myself. You know the melodrama drill: Black woman adrift, wayward kids, moustache-twirling bad guys, chaste hunks, spiritual rebirth, and Perry's own muumuu-ed Madea to provide a nucleus for it all. Ho-hum, just another masterpiece -- except wait! Is that Gladys Knight?
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Today the 2-Minute Verdict turns its judgmental eye towards Mystery Team, the Sundance Film Festival "comedy sensation" about a Bloodhound Gang-type trio of neighborhood crime-solvers who refuse to grow up. Cinematical described it as "Encyclopedia Brown meets Napoleon Dynamite with a pinch of Ace Ventura." CinemaBlend called it "the Rocky Horror Picture Show of mystery movies." And Slashfilm called it "funnier and more original than 99% of the comedies Hollywood releases now-a-days." Now that we've seen the trailer, we can finally throw in our two cents: "Really terrible-looking!"
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Once upon a time, the vampire genre was a hip, gayish place, saved from falling into disrepair by stylish stories like The Hunger and Interview with the Vampire. Now, though, the lusty heterosexuals of Twilight and True Blood have moved in and indulged in a bit of genre gentrification, and it's time for homoeroticism-tinged fantasy to find a new niche. Fortunately, with her new film The Vintner's Luck, Whale Rider director Niki Caro has seen fit to inaugurate what may be the newest fantasy frontier: French dudes having sex with hot, male angels.
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The trailer for Drew Barrymore's directorial debut Whip It has been released, and if I told you the logline, you could pretty much create this trailer in your head. So why am I actually kind of heartened and hopeful for the movie?
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Are you bereft about the imminent cinematic end of Harry Potter, yet Twilight's chastity-belted vampires hold no appeal? You might be interested, then, in a teaser trailer that's been attached to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince; from Christopher Columbus, director of the first two Potter movies, it's a film entitled, Waitwaitwait Don't Go Anywhere, We Have, Like, An American Harry Potter Coming Out Soon. My bad, that was the working title. Apparently, it's now named Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief. Almost as long!
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It's been a bounteous day for new trailers here at Movieline, beginning with Megan Fox's penetrating work as a razor-toothed, castrating cheer-demon in Jennifer's Body, and continuing with the perfume-infused froggerie that is Coco Before Chanel. The third and last preview to withstand the scrutiny of our esteemed Two-Minute Verdict judging panel is for Jim Sheridan's Brothers -- a domestic love triangle in which Spider-Man and the guy-who-threatened-to-replace-Spider-Man fight for the affections of Queen Amidala.
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The idea of French superstar Audrey Tatutou playing designer Coco Chanel makes plenty of sense; if anything, it's as on the Gallic nose as Michael Bay's idea of Paris as a place solely occupied by escargot-adjacent mimes. Still, even we were unprepared for the sheer, dangerous levels of Frenchiness present in the new trailer for Coco Before Chanel.
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Anybody who's followed the aftermath of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen knows that inside Megan Fox's lithe, photogenic frame, there's the soul of a serious actress waiting to captivate Hollywood. And this morning, with the red-band trailer for her horror comedy Jennifer's Body debuting online, we know that we'll have to wait at least one more film for that takeover to occur.
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In this installment of the Two-Minute Verdict, we contemplate Steven Soderbergh and Warner Bros.'s attempt to sell you a story of corporate malfeasance, investigative intrigue, corn-centric scandal, and prodigious 21st-century greed. Oh -- and a doughy, bumbling Matt Damon. The results are mixed.
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The trailer has just been released for Couples Retreat, a comedy about skilled improvisational actors and the perfectly taut bikini bodies who love them. With a cast that includes Jon Favreau, Vince Vaughn, and Jason Bateman, one might expect a comedy built on wild, manic riffing and off-kilter observations. So why is the trailer cut together as though the film's merely an island-set version of the typical schlub/hot wife sitcom?
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This installment of Movieline's Two-Minute Verdict has a look at the trailer for The Invention of Lying, Ricky Gervais's forthcoming comedy about one man who discovers the secret to survival in a world where truth runs roughshod over love, careers and other fragile relationships: The lie. Which obviously looked all right on paper, but is it actually of use (read: funny) in practice? Should I be honest?
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The Oscar season tends to be reliably biopic-heavy, but is Mira Nair's Amelia flying in at the end of a trend? The suddenly expanded crop of potential Best Picture nominees is actually an eclectic group for once, and virtually nowhere to be found is the usual childhood flashback-triggered story of an entire, famous life. Now, Fox Searchlight has released the trailer for Amelia, and amidst an upcoming slate of splashy musicals, soccer dramas, and harrowing urban masterpieces, this conventional story of the famed aviatrix looks a little square.
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