A little less than a month ago Movieline presented you with some snippets from a clip blending the heights of Eastern batsh*ttery with the depths of Western selling out -- an art form perhaps better known as "the Japanese TV commercial." Factor in Quentin Tarantino, however -- particularly as the free-swinging, language-butchering, kimono-rocking kung-fu "Uncle Tara-san" -- and, well, yeah. Even the Japanese probably don't have a word for that. Thankfully they have video, however, and you can see the finished product after the jump.
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If it's felt like there's been something missing from awards season -- or 2009 in general -- it's probably because there's been no Mickey Rourke, our crown prince of comebacks, our potentate of purse dogs. Luckily, Nerdist (by way of Vulture) pointed us to this little gem guaranteed to tide us over until Rourke's whip-wielding Iron Man 2 turn: the end credits of video game Rogue Warrior 2, which perfectly set the NSFW musings of Rourke (who voiced one of the game's characters) to an ambient beat. How could he have spent so much time pursuing boxing as a second career when music was his true vocation? The clip, after the jump:
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This morning on the Today Show, Matt Lauer introduced Meredith Baxter, America's beloved Family Ties matriarch, and immediately asked her to "reveal something about herself." Wait what? The camera turned to an uncomfortable Baxter who admitted that after three marriages (that resulted in five children), she has realized that she is a lesbian. The actress explained that she lives a "very out" life in Los Angeles, is happily committed to a general contractor named Nancy, and recently vacationed on a cruise with 1,200 lesbians. So what was the impetus for the sudden announcement?
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The International Animated Film Society's Annie Awards nominations are out. Here's the shortlist for Best Animated Feature:
· Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs -- Sony Pictures Animation
· Coraline -- Laika
· Fantastic Mr. Fox -- 20th Century Fox
· The Princess and the Frog -- Walt Disney Animation Studios
· The Secret of Kells -- Cartoon Saloon
· Up -- Pixar Animation Studios
Most notable here is the omission of Hayao Miyazaki's Ponyo and the $879 million-earning (not a typo) Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs, and the inclusion of The Secret of Kells.
The what?
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Big Love was originally positioned to be HBO's next great drama, and though it certainly hit that high bar of quality in its second and third seasons, it hasn't quite gotten its due. Part of the problem was the epic, WGA strike-induced break that wrecked the momentum between those two seasons (Season Two premiered in 2007, but Season 3 didn't come on until this past January), while somewhere along the way, the sexier, messier True Blood usurped it in buzz. Still, it did manage an Emmy nomination for Best Drama this last fall, and the imminent Season Four might finally offer Big Love a shot at the big time. (At the very least, can it score one of its actresses an Emmy nom? Chloe Sevigny is ridiculously overdue). The arty Season Four trailer, after the jump:
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When Movieline dropped by the Museum of Modern Art a while back for a preview of the Tim Burton exhibition opening there this weekend, the director offered up a bounty of fun insights about everything from Mars Attacks! to his recently unearthed Hansel and Gretel. Also among them was Burton's recollection of his youth in sunny Burbank, where he grew up cultivating his artistic side in a suburban hell he couldn't wait to escape. "Have you ever seen Dante's Inferno?" he rhetorically asked the MoMA gathering; Burton elaborates in a video after jump.
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Quentin Tarantino's obsession with Asian pop culture knows virtually no limits, which may or may not have inspired his appearance in a new commercial campaign for Japanese cell phone giant SoftBank. The spots themselves haven't yet emerged online as far as I can tell, but a recent SoftBank press conference announcing the ads -- complete with "Uncle Tara-chan" outtakes -- should hold you over just fine until the real thing(s). Click through for the video.
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Twilight wasn't Taylor Lautner's movie -- it was Robert Pattinson's. Sickly, sparkly, dreamy-haired, runs-like-a-girl (according to Kristen Stewart) Robert Pattinson. New Moon, on the other hand, is Taylor's and Taylor's alone, the culmination of a destiny forged one frigid, February morning in 1992, when a future superstar pulled in his first breath, then flexed his tiny, newborn abs to the rapturous applause of the entire Grand Rapids Metropolitan Hospital obstetrics department.
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Earlier in the week we reported how Brüno's DVD and Blu-ray release would restore the film to its original state in full, glorious La ToyaVision. But to further entice you, Universal has sweetened the deal with some bonus material starring disgraced MLB player/manager, Pete Rose. (Except they put the scene on YouTube, defeating the enticement purposes somewhat.) In it, Rose is invited to kick back on the same Pedrolounger as La Toya and Paula Abdul. Sadly, it's a gag that offers decreasing comedy returns, smacking of the trying-too-hardness that weighed down most of this box office underperformer. Still, it's nice to see Rose hasn't lost his capacity for compassion, and that he clings steadfastly to the No Body Hair On My Sushi policy enacted following an unfortunate incident at the Reds' 1990 World Series celebration banquet.
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The good news: We have a trailer for Salt, the Phillip Noyce-directed spy thriller once meant to star Tom Cruise, then rewritten to accommodate the gifts of noted orphan-farming she-commando, Angelina Jolie. The bad news: It's dubbed completely in Russian.
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In the second major sponsor switch-off of the week, Stephen Colbert agreed to back the U.S. Speedskating team last night after their original sponsor, DSB Bank, folded. A heroic gesture for sure, commemorated by special guest Dan Jansen and executive director of U.S. Speedskating Bob Crowley, who signed papers on air. Despite the fanfare though, it's Colbert's fans -- and not the show -- who will be supporting the team. Now, if only he could volunteer members of the Colbert Nation to pay for a scripted drama on NBC. The bit in question comes about two minutes into the provided link. [Colbert Report]
The induction of a new Royal at Walt Disney Parks is always a grandly ceremonious affair, involving the unfurling of comically oversized scrolls and the bellowing of decrees by stately Magic Kingdom spokespeople in tri-cornered hats, the various members of their adoptive family looking on in delight. (And, in select cases -- specifically at Disneyland Resort Paris -- they celebrate afterward with a two-day orgy.)
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· That's OK, neither did we. But our Man in London remembered, and that was enough to send us hunting down the evidence. And there it was: Mr. T and Boy George, together at last.
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I honestly don't know much about Brian McKnight outside of the fact that he sang that song "One, you make my dreams come true, Two, electric boogaloo, etc..." and that he was one of the non-Hitler-like contestants on the last season of Celebrity Apprentice -- but apparently he has a show! It's called The Brian McKnight Show, and it airs on The CW Plus. (Other things I didn't know: That The CW came in a plus-size.)
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If you can't wait until the Emmerichian disasterpiece 2012 arrives in theaters next month, then it's your lucky day. Rather, Oct. 27 is your lucky day, because that's when the good people at The Asylum -- those geniuses who brought you Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus -- unveil their schlocky new grab-your-family-and-flee-the-apocalypse knockoff 2012: Supernova on DVD. Click through for the trailer.
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