Archive for Video

  • “Love The Way You Lie” music video

    August 9th, 2010

    On Music Mondays I write about music.

    “Love The Way You Lie” by Eminem feat. Rihanna. Who’s that in the video? That be Megan Fox and Dominic Monghan. Warning: this is an intense song and violent video. What do you think?

    August 9th,2010 Blogging, Music Mondays, Video | Sections: , , , , , | No Comments

  • The A-Team review by Tim Hayes

    August 5th, 2010

    Mr. Hayes is not only the ALMT publicist and lead editor,
    but also contributes film journalism and reviews to Critic’s Notebook and Cinemattraction.

    Tim Hayes on Theatrical Thursdays

    The A-Team (2010) dir. Joe Carnahan

    Studio: 20th Century Fox
    Screenwriter: Skip Woods, Joe Carnahan, Brian Bloom
    Starring: Liam Neeson, Bradley Cooper, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, Sharlto Copley, Jessica Biel, Patrick Wilson, Gerald McRaney
    Genre: Action, Adventure
    MPAA Rating: PG-13 (for intense sequences of action and violence throughout, language and smoking)
    Official Website: ATeam-movie.com

    “The A-Team” tries hard to be as manic and crazy as the cool kids, and at least proves that not every Hollywood hero has to be aged 18-35. But it is getting difficult to tell all these films apart. When the A-Team fall out of the sky in a tank, is it because the writers want to let Hannibal Smith (Liam Neeson) show he can remember his trigonometry in a crisis, or is it just because Charlie’s Angels did it with a truck?


    In the TV show the team mostly fought for the little guy, but in this extended origin story their troubles are all down to fallout from the fall of Baghdad and a mercenary army called (not Blackwater but) Black Forest. You’re not going to confuse this film for one with George Clooney in it, but having the A-Team’s rampage across Europe be a post-Saddam hangover does give this thing something a bit like a political point. If you squint a bit.


    The third-best thing in the film is a gag involving Jessica Biel and 3D glasses (not what you’re thinking). The second-best is a moment when Hannibal, backlit by the golden light of reason, quotes Gandhi to the pacifist BA Baracus (Quinton Jackson) and converts him back to the path of violence – at least I hope it was supposed to be funny since I laughed for an hour.

    The best thing is Liam Neeson. I’m biased: this is Liam Neeson’s planet and we’re just borrowing it. Always a convincing tough-guy going all the way back to “Excalibur”, Neeson turned into something unique around 1990 by moving seamlessly through films by Clint Eastwood and Neil Jordan and Sam Raimi and Woody Allen in a single stretch. No actor currently breathing can call on such infinite sadness or humanity, and no one else could have done the comic-book mentoring thing in “Batman Begins” on the back of the heartbreakingly fallible sex researcher in “Kinsey” just the year before, one of the most profoundly moving pieces of acting you’ll ever see.

    If he chooses to roar towards his sixtieth year in a new niche as an agent of mayhem, sticking two tons of Semtex up a few movie cliches while jumping up and down on the laws of physics, that’s fine by me.

    August 5th,2010 Blogging, Film Reviews by Tim Hayes, Theatrical Thursdays, Video | Sections: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | No Comments

  • “Inception – Round Two: Life is but a dream” by Tim Hayes

    July 29th, 2010

    Mr. Hayes is not only the ALMT publicist and lead editor,
    but also contributes film journalism and reviews to Critic’s Notebook and Cinemattraction.

    Tim Hayes on Theatrical Thursdays

    Inception – Round Two: Life is but a dream

    “Inception” rolls on, to the tune of $142 million in the US and $220 worldwide. And people’s theories about what it all means are rolling on too, like the one that says it’s a big metaphor for the things directors have to do to get their movies made.

    Since Christopher Nolan and Leonardo DiCaprio look like they were separated at birth, there might be some mileage in that one.

    I’m sticking with last week’s explanation, that Christopher Nolan – intellectual, cultured, likes his film noir – also enjoys watching Michael Bay films where big guys shout at each other and leggy brunettes blow things up. Actually that’s not a theory, Wally Pfister said so weeks before “Inception” opened.

    Bottom line: “Inception” is a meaty, ambiguous movie, and whether or not it’s actually about capital-I ideas it’s still got a few of them in its head. And before it opened, people were already hoping it would “save the summer of 2010″ from mediocrity.

    So how do the next few months shape up for movie-goers who have acquired a taste for this kind of intellectual challenge?

    AUGUST

    “The Expendables”. Sylvester Stallone and a queue of other hard-nuts from Jason Statham on down are hired to infiltrate a South American country and overthrow its ruthless dictator.

    Could it be a dream: Stallone may be hoping to wake up and find it’s still 1985.

    Chances of passing the Bechdel test: You’d have to guess it’s unlikely.

    Intellectual challenge: Wondering if the plot will require Charisma Carpenter to take a shower.

    SEPTEMBER

    “Resident Evil: Afterlife”. Zombies, viruses and Milla Jovovich in some couture rags seem guaranteed.

    Could it be a dream: More of a nightmare.

    Chances of passing the Bechdel test: Jovovich, Ali Larter and Sienna Guillory are all back from earlier instalments. They may discuss high-caliber weaponry, so it’s possible.

    Intellectual challenge: To bear in mind that Milla Jovovich was the highest paid model in the world in 2004 and is one smart cookie.

    OCTOBER

    “Saw 3D”. Jigsaw, still the main character even though he’s been dead for four movies, is again played by Tobin Bell and continues to control the lives of other poor saps. Apparently they form a self-help group.

    Could it be a dream: Tobin Bell’s agent is probably dreaming he has gone to agent-heaven.

    Chances of passing the Bechdel test: Every single conversation in “Saw” is about Jigsaw. Slim.

    Intellectual challenge: Guessing which body part will be thrown towards the camera in slow motion next.

    NOVEMBER

    “Red Dawn”. China attempts to invade America but may have reckoned without those pesky kids.

    Could it be a dream: MGM, the company attempting to release this film, may go bankrupt first so the film’s very existence may yet be an illusion.

    Chances of passing the Bechdel test: The People’s Liberation Army is nearly 50% female, so maybe.

    Intellectual challenge: Admitting just how weird and wonderful the original was, while also being dreadful.

    On the whole I’m pinning my hopes on “Piranha 3D”.



    July 29th,2010 Blogging, Film Reviews by Tim Hayes, Theatrical Thursdays, Video | Sections: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | No Comments

  • I wish I were at Comic Con

    July 23rd, 2010

    On Fan Fridays I write about fandom.

    The ultimate fan event is going on right now in San Diego. And I should be there. I’m going to put it on my calendar for next year and hope my school schedule won’t interfere. I’m hoping to bring my Catwoman Summer Project there at the very least.

    So, what are we missing? Well, Ms. Angelina Jolie “Wows the Crowd” to promote “Salt”, “Dexter” (or Michael C. Hall) “Looks Great”, and Joss Whedon “Talks Avengers”, making it official that he would be directing the much hyped film.

    But how about this footage taken inside Comic Con, of a sneak peak at Johnny Depp back in black as Captain Jack Sparrow for “Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides” (2011)? It made my day.

    July 23rd,2010 Blogging, Fan Fridays, Video | Sections: , , , , , , , , , , , | No Comments

  • Inception review by Tim Hayes

    July 22nd, 2010

    Mr. Hayes is not only the ALMT publicist and lead editor,
    but also contributes film journalism and reviews to Critic’s Notebook and Cinemattraction.

    Tim Hayes on Theatrical Thursdays

    Inception dir. Christopher Nolan

    Studio: Warner Bros. Pictures
    Screenwriter: Christopher Nolan
    Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Marion Cotillard, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy, Cillian Murphy, Tom Berenger, Michael Caine
    Genre: Action, Sci-Fi
    MPAA Rating: PG-13 (for sequences of violence and action throughout)
    Official Website: Inceptionmovie.com

    (Spoilers are inevitable. Whatever happens in the next 400 words or so, you should watch “Inception”. See you in the comments.)

    With big films still lashed to superheroes and video games, “Inception” spends a few hundred million bucks gazing in a different direction, towards 1970s heist movies and 1960s super-spies, and cool guys with sharp suits and guilty secrets. Just when movies are queueing up to dig deeper into Jack Kirby’s imagination, “Inception” is more interested in Jim Steranko and kudos to it for that.

    If we get into the plot we’ll still be here in 4000 words, but you’ve heard the gist: Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) assembles a team to go into the dreams of Robert Fischer (Cillian Murphy) and plant an idea in his skull, a plan that ends up involving dreams within dreams within dreams. Already dangerous enough, the enterprise is at risk from Dom’s own subconscious and especially the shade of his wife Mal (Marion Cotillard), who crops up without warning and seems anything but stable.

    The bad news is that the film has problems and they’re not chicken feed. Show-don’t-Tell is out of fashion, but “Inception”‘s wish to over-explain is a bit nuts. It’s nothing but Tell for 140 minutes of non-stop exposition, and heavy-handed with it. Its dreams are the least dream-like dreams ever, not just because they’re strictly direct A-to-B affairs, but because they’re all filled with the sound of people explaining stuff to each other. Compared to the night-terrors of “Mulholland Drive”, “Inception” is a cartoon doodled in a dream diary.

    But quite a cartoon. Christopher Nolan’s cunning plan is to forget about the philosophy lesson and create a plausible way for four or five different Saturday-night movies to come in the same wrapper and play all at once. It’s an audacious trick, the kind only someone with a love of the popcorn stuff would try. Only a writer with the hours clocked up in the dark would build the opening sequence, and have Marion Cotillard stalk across a collapsing dreamscape like the most fatale femme in this or any other cosmos.

    Somewhere between the Jason Bourne dream and the James Bond dream, “Inception” shrugs and decides it just wants to be a slice of big dumb fun – you may or may not find this to be a let-down. The good news is that the level between the Bourne and the Bond is occupied by Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s solo mission, a thing of wonder. The film’s dodgy logic has sprung a leak by then, but in return you get a punch-up in a hotel built by MC Escher and some business with five bodies lashed together in zero gravity which really is nightmarish. Finally in a position to scene-steal in the mainstream, JGL pockets the whole thing while fighting upside down on the ceiling and plummeting down a lift shaft.

    July 22nd,2010 Blogging, Film Reviews by Tim Hayes, Theatrical Thursdays, Video | Sections: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments
←Older