Evan Goldberg and Seth Rogen’s This is the End was appealing from the start. Co-written by the same duo that directed it and that brought us the scripts for Superbad and Pineapple Express, This is the End is based on the short film, Jay and Seth versus the Apocalypse, also written by the same duo, that chronicles how Seth Rogen and Jay Baruchel, playing versions of themselves, would manage the apocalypse. As a feature film, This is the End shows how their whole crew–led by James Franco, Danny McBride, Jonah Hill, Craig Robinson, Rogen and Baruchel–would make out during the Christian apocalypse. What’s not to love? Honestly, you had me at apocalypse; throw in a slew of actors playing versions of themselves? I could not resist.

And I did not resist. And boy, am I happy I didn’t! I’m not sure when the last time was that I laughed so hard during a movie. There were even a few times that I laughed so hard I cried, which, albeit knowing my track record of crying isn’t saying all that much, but still those were tears of joy! From concept to execution, this movie got it right!

The characters– all versions of the actors themselves– were perfect in an over-the-top and, yet, completely believable way. Would James Franco make “art” inspired by fruit as breasts and his time on Freaks and Geeks? Absolutely! Would Michael Cera do a boat load of coke at a party? Sure, why not? Would Craig Robinson really leave Aziz Ansari to die? Who wouldn’t? Each portrayal was so carefully crafted and suited each person’s real-life persona perfectly. The plot, too, was hilarious and also scary. I found myself jumping as often as I was laughing, which, in case your haven’t been paying attention, was a lot.

With as many anticipatory scares as there were funny and greatly-timed jokes, I’m not sure what else one could ask for in this movie. After all, This is the End is not a great movie in that it breaks boundaries of any sort, but it is a hilarious, incredibly meta one. If you were expecting an Oscar contender, you won’t find it in this movie, but if you were hoping for a light, highly entertaining comedy, then I recommend you get yourself to the theater as fast!

SEE IT.

Do you hear that? It’s that faint, ever-so-slight sound that arises when a film that is poised to get a number of Oscar nominations–if not the actual gold men themselves–starts to surface. I know what you’re thinking: how do I know a film will get nominated for a lot of Oscars this year, let alone even more than one? Well, it’s easy, you see. First, you make a biopic about beloved (so they say) British princess to the people, Princess Diana. And then you cast brilliant actress Naomi Watts in the role, cutting her hair in the process. If this thing doesn’t get at least three Oscars nominations, I will be floored.

And so, the movie in question, the ever so subtly titled, Diana, is coming to the surface. First up on its marketing plan– after the ever so carefully released photographs– is the teaser trailer. And here, right now, you can watch the very teaser trailer I am referring to.

Just what exactly did I learn from this short trailer? Not much really, except for the fact that this movie will most definitely be nominated for an Oscar. As if I didn’t know that already (which I did, just read what I wrote above), the trailer’s swelling music and promise of a dramatic plot arc says everything we need to know.

Who else is in the movie? Does it matter? It doesn’t, especially since Watts is the only star star (you know the kind). Who’s directing the film? Again, I’m not sure it matters, but since you keep asking questions, it’s Oliver Hirschbiegel. Any more questions? Good. Watch the trailer below and prepare yourself to see the for your consideration adds come December.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Sofia Coppola is back in the directing chair, this time with the movie, The Bling Ring, which documents the true-life tale of the group of Calabasis-based teenagers who were convicted of burglarizing the homes of pop culture celebrities, including Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan. Doesn’t sound like a typical Coppola film, huh? Well, after one look at the trailer, and the viewer is immediately reminded of the super fun trailer of her other film that focuses on the role of celebrity, Marie Antoinette. And as was the case with Marie Antoinette, once The Bling Ring starts playing, the viewer is immediately aware of the depth this seemingly light-hearted film contains. With Coppola aboard, what could have been a silly film that both idolizes and criticizes its lead characters at once, turned into a film that used its fairly simplistic plot to point at themes and motifs that are of great relevance to society at large. Typical Coppola, am I right?

Aside from its perceived relevance to present day Western culture, allow me to describe what else I liked about the film: it’s cinematography comes first to mind. And rightfully so. The Bling Ring is that much more special that it was brilliant cinematographer Harris Savides’s last film before his untimely death. It dripped in Savides-esque pictures, making the film’s dedication to him even more bittersweet.

The acting too should, like the film itself, not be discredited. Yes, each of the film’s leads, whether it be Katie Chang, Israel Broussard, Emma Watson, Claire Julien, Taissa Farmiga, or even Leslie Mann, were cloaked in an overwhelming veil of vanity and insipidness. But, don’t forget that that was the point. The valley-girl affectations and the disaffected attitudes were all apart of the brilliance that made up this movie– and its true life tale. The soundtrack too, true to Coppola style, was flawless and captured the LA that I spent my formative high school years in perfectly.

All in all, this was a Coppola film to the very core, and I don’ hate it.

SEE IT.

Good news, Banterers! We finally have a trailer of Killing Season in our midst. Oh, what’s Killing Season you ask? Oh you haven’t been following it for years since you learned the plot was a little reminiscent of the best short story in the world, The Most Dangerous Game? Oh, that’s interesting. Well, please, allow me to inform you: Killing Season is the long-awaited (maybe just by me) Mark Steven Johnson film that stars John Travolta as a jilted ex-Serbian soldier who has a bone to pick (his own) with an American soldier who once tried to kill him. Obviously Robert DeNiro plays the American soldier in question. What we’re left with is John Travolta trying to act, and that includes a terrible attempt at a Serbian accent (where is Serbia again, Travolta?) and Robert DeNiro just being awesome and trying to avoid death by enraged maniac.

Could this movie get better?! Well, I guess that’s a bit of a touchy subject, because as rumor once had it, Robert DeNiro’s American character was once slotted to be played by the one and only Nicolas Cage. And I can decisively tell you that the one thing better than this movie would be a Face/Off reunion where John Travolta tries to play the crazy one.

Alas, we will have to make do with what we got and, luckily, what we got ain’t half bad (or it is, but that’s what makes it good!). Killing Season is out at theaters July 12th. If you don’t want to spend money on this thing, then get a MoviePass! But also, you can watch it on Video on Demand as well, although I’m not sure why you’d want to.

I would say check out the trailer below, but something appears to have gone wrong with YouTube, so I’ll post the video once they get it back up and running. Happy hunting!

You’d have to be living under a rock to not know that beloved AMC show, Breaking Bad, will be coming to a rapid, bittersweet end five seasons after it began this Fall. Even I, who has only seen one episode (I know, I know! It was really good, but then I got caught up by school. I will return when it is over completely!) knows how big of a deal this is. Helping revolutionize the way we looks at television, Breaking Bad is one of those shows that makes you think you’d be okay just living off television. I mean, not me personally–no, I love talkies and the big screen spectacle of it all–but for some people surely.

Anyway, I digress; back to the task at hand: Breaking Bad. How many of us have thought about the what if’s of the great show. You know, what if Walter White gets caught? I guess that’s an easier one. A not so easy one is: what if Walter White was not played by equally beloved Bryan Cranston– who has come to symbolize the show–but instead by another, more famous actor? I guess this question was on the tip of at least one person’s tongue, and now that person has used his tongue to speak up. Just what did he say? Well, this person in question delivered a monologue from Season 4. And luckily, the people over at The Playlist were able to track down the original clip for all of our comparisons!

So, just who is this person in question? Oh, you know, small, equally beloved actor, Samuel L. Jackson. Well, now that I know Jackson is a fan, I guess I HAVE to start watching for reals. Check out the two videos below and leave your thoughts!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

For anyone who has read and loved Max Brooks’s World War Z, the book that follows one man’s attempts to chronicle the effects of the Zombie Apocalypse in a post-apocalyptic world, you are probably feeling the same dread I am facing with its upcoming turn as feature film. While the film features the same name and a zombie apocalypse, the similarities seem to stop there. That is, World War Z, the movie, seems to be an as-it-happens zombie apocalypse tale, telling the story as if it is actually occurring. On the other hand, World War Z, the book, has very little–if any-present-day action. Although, this might not immediately stand out as a red flag, believe me when I say that this changes the overall intention of the book.

While I could see your point that this might not necessarily be a bad thing, I can’t imagine it’s a good thing given its assertion of coming directly from the book. That is, after Brad Pitt’s studio engaged in a long, drawn out bidding war with Leonardo DiCaprio’s studio (modern day Montagues and Capulets, if you ask me), why go and change the whole damn thing? Was that always the intention? Or was it maybe due to the fact that no writer and director team seemed up to the task to translate an admittedly difficult plot (on the big screen, that is) into a desirable motion picture?

Either way, we get what we get, I suppose. And what we get (and keep on getting) are clips of the quickly impending zombie apocalypse. In this most recent clip, watch the Brad Pitt-played lead and his family figure out that their lives are about to change….dramatically. Now, tell me, are you excited about this movie? Clearly, I will be seeing this as it had me with the word “zombie,” but I will be trying to divorce it in my mind from the book. It’s the only way!

World War Z is out June 22! Check out the clip below:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Well then, do I have something fun in store for you. The company that brought you the original The Hunger Games and it’s brilliant marketing strategy plan, which included traditional posters and clips as well as a portrait series and viral campaign, is back. And it is back with a vengeance. Although, would we have expected anything less from the studio that gave us arguably the most successful young adult book series turned feature film series–in terms of ticket sales AND overall quality (take that, Twilight)– to date? That answer is no.

And so following in its own footsteps, Lionsgate has amped up their marketing campaign once again. This time, they have The Hunger Games’s very own Tumblr blog, Capitol Couture. The first post to grace this reopening is “Issue One: Chroma Nouveau,” which gives an exclusive first look at the clothes, plots, and dialogue that returning stars Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, and Liam Hemsworth will be donning, acting out, and saying, respectively. Sounds exciting right? Well it is, ain’t no one not excited to see this film, am I right? Check out the blog here: www.capitolcouture.pn.

We’ll have updates as they develop. Happy Hunting!

Chan-wook Park shot an iPhone short film in 2011. It was perhaps of poor cinematic quality, but the mere fact that someone as prolific as Park was using a mobile device to experiment in visual storytelling was news enough for me. In that same year, the musician Adam Green came out with a the feature-length The Wrong Ferrari, shot entirely on his 2010 iPhone over the course of his band’s tour in Europe, and again, of poor filmic quality. But with advancements in the technology like the iPhone 4S’s 1080p shooting capabilities, the Filmic Pro app, and websites like www.iphoneography.com, filmmakers are turning to their verbal communication devices to shoot movies and film fests are taking notice.

I knew I could just do it myself,” says actor and filmmaker Russell Simpson who has submitted his iPhone short, The Last Job, to the New Media Film Festival (NMFF). “I could have found a DP, rented a camera, used lighting and sound and called in all these favors, but financially this was way more viable.

“I know there was a lot of hype around using an iPhone as a filmmaking tool,” he continues, “and I was very skeptical at first, but it really is amazing what you can do with it. Ultimately, with no pre-production you can’t underestimate how you can just pick it up and go into greasy, guerilla filmmaking mode.”

There are somewhere around 30 mobile film festivals around the world (at least that I could suss out via Google). Tony Myers from Smartmoviemaking.com compiled a pretty comprehensive list in 2012, which hopefully will be updated soon! Some of the fests are exclusively web-based, like the Shortsnonstop Festival that has open submissions all year long, some have prestigious jurors from Fox, Pixar and ILM like NMFF held in Hollywood next month, and some have niche requirements like Mobile Film Festival of France where all filmmakers submitting must be a resident of France, or Women+Film Voices Film Festival where each submission must be about an inspiring woman. And some of the fests have dropped off the face of the festival earth entirely, (Mobile Screenfest doesn’t have anything on their website past 2011), but others seem to be gaining momentum each year and attracting more eyes and more submissions. Case in point: NMFF had a 30 percent higher submission rate this year.

“A lot of people don’t know that [the making of content for mobile devices] has been around for at least ten years,” says founder and director of NMFF, Susan Johnston. Films made on mobile devices seems to be just a natural progression: “It is very exciting to see all of the different apps people are using to create mobile films at much more cinematic levels.”

This year in the Mobile Category, NMFF is screening a web series that was filmed in one continuous take, a music video that used an 8mm film app and an action short, all made with mobile phones.

“Ask yourself” (says Johnston): ‘What story do I want to tell, how do I want to tell it, will it stand on it’s own and will it stand the test of time?’ then go out and film it and enter it where it can be screened in competition and possibly distributed. Everyone can now use their mobile phone to make a film.”

Whether that’s a good thing is yet to be figured out. We’ve all seen and been a part of the continued democratization of the cinematic culture, but only decades to come and some very well-read, stuffy-pants professors in 2067 will be able to tell us whether it has been detrimental to filmmaking or whether it has opened possibilities never dreamed of before and changed the way people see art forever. For now, I’m enjoying watching high-quality short films like Simpson’s, House of Cards on Netflix and keeping the muck outta my living room.

Noah Baumbach’s Frances Ha was a no brainer from the trailer. Co-written by Baumbach himself and his rumored girlfriend/star of the film, Greta Gerwig, Frances Ha tells the story–the black and white story, I might add– of 27 year old, eccentric Frances who is trying to make it in New York City. As my mom, Edie, says: “She’s typical, N.Y.C.” With a trailer that promised a soundtrack made up of great artists, such as David Bowie, Paul McCartney, and T.Rex and a cast that starred Gerwig as the main character along side Sting and Meryl Streep progeny, Mickey Sumner and Grace Gummer, respectively, there was no question that I would be watching this movie. Loving it on the other hand? That certainly wasn’t a given, but luckily it came to fruition.

I mean, what’s not to love? Frances Ha was just dripping in all good things Baumbach. That’s right, the director of Kicking and Screaming, The Squid and the Whale, and Greenberg, proves once again that he is adept at revealing the detailed intricacies that make individual people so interesting and special. Do not be fooled, however: this is not only a testament to Baumbach, but also to Gerwig as well. After all, there would be no interesting, special person in question without her being created and developed on the page. In short, Baumbach and Gerwig prove to be great collaborators.

The greatness of this collaboration is also evidenced by Gerwig’s excellent performance. Operating under the belief that a great performance is equal parts actor and director, Gerwig’s take on Frances was subtle and complex. What could have been an annoyingly trite character turned into one that I could most definitely relate to. While, yes, you do get the sense Gerwig is just playing a different version of herself, show me one person who doesn’t love that person!

Just keep the compliments coming: expectedly, Baumbach crafted another excellent soundtrack–how does one person, leaving Sofia Coppola aside, understand the power of pop music so well?! I might never understand this genius, but I definitely do appreciate it. Finally, one of Baumbach’s most interesting choices in this film was to make it in black and white. “How pretentious,” surely some of you are thinking, but it’s not. I swear it! In fact, I think the black and white made the tale even more universal. As if Frances wasn’t universal already.

At the end of the day, Frances Ha gets it right.

SEE IT.

Yes, it is true: Baz Lurhmann’s The Great Gatsby came out weeks ago, but ever since I had been dreading seeing it. This dread was less like the dread I felt with something like War Horse, which I dreaded and subsequently haven’t seen, and more like the dread I felt surrounding Lincoln in which I dreaded it but knew I had to see it. Side note: what is it with Steven Spielberg films as of late that I dread? Anyway, so I dreaded The Great Gatsby, but knew I had to see it before it left theaters, which in turn made me dread it more.

Dragging my feet, I finally saw the thing last night, and it, quite expectedly, justified my hymning and hawing. It’s just that to take such an epic book and turn it into a movie, it better be a damn good movie. And this version of The Great Gatsby was no such thing. Sure, Leonardo DiCaprio did a good job– as good a job as he always does–but that’s pretty much the highest praise I have for this movie.

Other than DiCaprio, the acting was rather throwaway. Carrie Mulligan was fine, Tobey Maguire was worse, Jason Clarke was cute, and so it went. There was one exception other than DiCaprio: Joel Edgerton did a good job, which I suppose is fairly unsurprising if you know his body of work well, but given that I didn’t, it was a pleasant surprise.

Outside of the acting, what else could go wrong? I mean, since the plot comes from the book–and the book is a renowned classic–what else could possibly be bad? Well, I’m happy you asked. Everything that went wrong can be summed up in what word: spectacle. Before the film came out, everyone seemed to tout the word ‘spectacle’ around like it was a good thing. Luhrmann was praised for doing this movie because his other films–Romeo + Juliet, Moulin Rouge, even Australia–were spectacles. Surely everyone thought that The Great Gatsby, too, needed to be a spectacle. But with a movie full of anachronisms whose plot is anything but–that is, that is great precisely because it takes into account the time period–the movie fell flat. The editing, the music, the footage all seemed out of place and further added to a feeling of irrelevance that seemed to surround the film.

What should have been a commendable adaptation–this being the first big screen one since 1974–turned out to be a lackluster representation devoid of what made Gatsby great in the first place.

RENT IT.