I mean, they already had me at the teaser, but this full fledged trailer for Tron Legacy almost guarantees that I will need to purchase new pants always. I recall being a little disappointed with the Recognizer when we first saw pics of it. But seeing it in full on CG slowly descending like the menacing evil we know and love, boy, that shit gave me chills. Love the new discs. So much more sleek than glowy frisbees. And of course the new light cycles make me squee.
Now the only question is do I see it in 3D or 2D? I’m thinking this might be worth the 3D spectacle.
Goddamn, looks like I’ll be watching more network television this season that I normally care to. Maggie Q will be cast in a CW reboot of the Nikita franchise. She will play the title role, a new Nikita hired to replace the original one who goes rogue. I’ve never seen any Nikita, neither the film nor the remake nor the television series, but I have seen Maggie Q in Mission Impossible III and Live Free Die Hard and always thought she had the chops to be a headliner of some kind. I’m excited to see her kicking some ass as a new Nikita. The only thing that would totally destroy my entire collection of pants is if Dichan Lachman was in this show as well. The two of them need to kick asses side by side or against each other.
Damn you, CW! Damn you for making me want to watch you!
Children of Invention and White on Rice are opening next Friday in New York City and to celebrate, the producers are giving you a chance to win the DVD of both films for free! For the next eight days, there will be one trivia question per day posted on the site. Four questions will be related to White on Rice, four will be related to Children of Invention. The first person to email the correct answer will win the DVD of the film in question. And of course, all the NYC Angry Zen Minions can check out the premier of both films next weekend!
So good luck! You’ve got eight days to win awesomeness!
There’s this live action/CG Speedy Gonzales movie coming up with George Lopez providing the voice of our favorite speedy mouse. As dumb fuck an idea as I think this is, if the Chipmunk movies are any indication, this movies will make gigantic fuck tons of money for Warner Bros.
Speedy got me thinking about other cartoon characters that are representative caricatures of different cultures. I didn’t do an exhaustive examination, but the other character that obviously stuck out right away was Apu from the Simpsons.
Speedy cartoons portray a number of questionable Mexican stereotypes. While Speedy is wicked fast and always alert, many of his fellow mice are portrayed as slow, lazy, drunks, especially Speedy’s cousin Slowpoke. Speedy also wears a big yellow sombrero and speaks in heavily accented Spanglish.
Apu represents the stereotypical Indian convenience store owner and is one of the few non-yellow character in the entire Simpsons cast. He tends to leave things on the shelf way past their expiration date. He’s been shot, stabbed, and robbed and he still welcomes you with a nice smile and a friendly “Come again” when you leave.
Certainly, Speedy and Apu portray stereotypes of Mexicans and Indians. But does that mean they are necessarily racist? I mean no one ever uses racial invectives when talking to or about either of these characters. They’re both considered respected parts of their respective communities and not ostracized. The characters around Speedy and Apu don’t really care that they’re different. Sure, they may laugh at them once in a while, but it’s never in a demeaning way. There are many minorities who would love to be treated in such a manner.
I’m usually pretty quick to judge things as racist. But in the cases of Speedy and Apu, I’m not so sure. Yes, they do represent stereotypes. Yes, they talk with funny accents. But no one in their universes really gives that much of a shit. They are welcomed parts of their communities. That doesn’t sound all that racist to me.
So, Angry Zen Minions, what do you think of Speedy and Apu?
Yes, Natalie, why would horribly animated CG birds do something like that?
So this is Birdemic: Shock and Terror, an indy low-budget horror film tribute to Hitchcock’s The Birds that is so bad, it breaks through the badness barrier to the land known as so bad but SOOOO FUCKING GOOD!
Today is the day that Disney releases Ponyo on DVD and Blu-Ray as well as special edition DVD versions of Castle in the Sky, Totoro, and Kiki’s Delivery Service. I was sent the Blu-Ray Hi Def version of Ponyo and the special edition of Castle in the Sky for review. I’ve already reviewed Ponyo and if you haven’t seen Castle in the Sky yet, this is version to get. The films are both excellent, as you’d expect from Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli.
Now some of you may already have DVD versions of Castle in the Sky, Totoro, and Kik’s Delivery Service. I’m sad to report that you should have waited for these special editions. It’s not that the film transfers are any better, though they are lovingly reproduced for the DVD format. It’s that along with the Ponyo release, the special editions come with a second DVD with all the bonus features. If you get the Ponyo Blu-Ray Hi Def combo pack, the special features are on the Blu-Ray disc while an Hi Def version of the film is on a regular DVD. The special edition DVD of Ponyo is just like the other three with one disc for the film and one disc for the bonuses.
The bonus material makes it all worth it.
The “Behind the Studio” feature takes you behind the scenes of Studio Ghibli with production documentaries and new interviews with Hayao Miyazaki. There are also interviews with the English language voice actors. By nature, I’m a subtitle fan but I’ve always been impressed with the quality of the voices that Disney is able to get for their dubs. For the most part, the English language voice actors match fairly well with the characters.
“Enter the Lands” gives you an overview of the characters of each film.
The “World of Ghibli” feature is a sort of interactive thingy that lets you click around this illustration featuring Ghibli characters. It’s sort of like an interactive preview of each film. For example, clicking on Totoro gives you a short clip from the movie with a voice-over explaining who/what Totoro is. Each area is dedicated to a Ghibli film. It’s a fun way to preview the films and it does kinda feel like you’re exploring the world viewed through Ghibli’s lens.
You can also see the film as a storyboard. Storyboard features are usually kind of dull. The drawings are fairly simple and representational and don’t really add much insight to the film-making process. However, Ghibli storyboards are something else. Even though they’re unfinished illustrations, there’s so much detail in the boards. They don’t skimp on backgrounds. It’s all in there.
My only disappointment is that there isn’t a feature of just Miyazaki in his studio drawing. They cut to clips of him drawing a bit here and there, but no full on hour or so with just him and a piece of paper. Okay, so maybe only a handful of people would find that interesting. But I would love to sit there for a few hours and watch him draw and paint his fantastical worlds.
These are terrific releases. I’m so glad that John Lasseter managed to convince Disney to acquire the domestic rights to release Ghibli films. These special edition DVDs are the releases every Ghibli fan has been waiting for.
The special edition DVDs of Ponyo, Castle in the Sky, Totoro, and Kiki’s Delivery Service retail for $29.99 USD. If you’ve got a great stonking big HD tele with a Blu-Ray player, the Blu-Ray of Ponyo is $39.99 USD. Although, Amazon somehow has them for much less. So whether you have a birthday or anniversary coming up or something equally momentous, tell your loved ones that you want these now.
Starting a new feature here at AZM. Since so many terrible ideas get green lit for films these days, I thought I’d throw out a some of my own for shits and giggles. And so begins Throwing Pitches with The Martial Arts Kids.
We all know that the 2010 The Karate Kid movie should be titled The Kung Fu Kid. But it’s not just for accuracy’s sake. There’s a potential monster of a franchise that they’re missing out here. The Kung Fu Kid opens up a whole world of possibilities for similarly titles Martial Arts Kid movies that could bring in some serious bank. They’re easy to write. All you have to do is just change the location, replace the kid, and get a new martial art and you have a whole new movie. The plot works because everyone can relate to being an outsider trying to find their way. Let’s take a look at some of the possibilities.
The Capoeira Kid – High flying acrobatic moves are perfect for onscreen action.
The Jujitsu Kid – You could have a Japanese kid in Brazil learning Jujitsu from a Brazilian master which would be kind of ironic and awesome. And since MMA is so popular these days, this would be an instant hit.
The Kali Kid – This is where you start introducing audiences to lesser known martial arts. Take them to the Philippines where our kid learns Kali.
The Iaido Kid – We can even go hardcore traditional with a kid learning the ancient way of drawing the sword from an old, wizened Hanzo Hatori. You know he’d fit perfectly in a Karate Kid type flick.
Krav Maga – With this one, you can get more political. You get a Palestinian kid in a Jewish neighborhood learning Krav Maga to deal with the Israeli bullies. By the end of the fighting, they all become friends. Togetherness through martial arts. It practically writes itself!
The Martial Arts Kid – Okay, so the title needs a little work, but once you’ve introduced all the kids in their respective movies, you bring them all together for one giant cross-over movie tournament type deal.
Oh, and for an added bonus, each movie has a remix of Joe Esposito’s “You’re the Best.” That song just ties it all together!
So of course, this isn’t an exhaustive list of martial arts that could work. I just chose a small sampling that I thought would lend themselves well to the big screen. What other martial arts do you think would work in this most amazing franchise?
The Last Dragon is one of my all time favorite films. I know the entire film by heart. I will annoy the shit out of you if you watch it with me because I will quote the entire fucking thing. It is far from a perfect movie. In fact, there’s much in it that is downright awful. But it all somehow works. There’s a strange magic to this movie that makes you believe in the power of The Glow. Now there’s a remake in the works that I haven’t mentioned here at all. It does not impress me. In fact, I predict a big ol’ bag of fail. And I’ve come up with a list of reasons why I believe 2010’s The Last Dragon will suck and suck awful damn hard.
The Plot
In the original film, arcade owner Eddie Arkadian kidnaps top veejay Laura Charles to get her to play a music video starring Eddie’s girlfriend, Angela Viracco, on Laura’s weekly music video show and it’s up to Bruce Leroy to save her.
I’m not making that shit up.
If that sounds like something completely batshit insane, it is. Arkadian is quite mad and waaaaay over the top. And while it somehow works in this instance, there’s no possible way this plot would work in modern times. First of all, what cable channel plays music videos anymore? And where are all the arcades? And what the fuck is a veejay? Even if the remake is set in the 1980’s, this plot still doesn’t make any fucking sense.
It’s a Remake of an Homage The Last Dragon is full of martial art movie cliches. It’s got the wise old master, a quest for knowledge, a seemingly unstoppable villain. It pays a lot of reverence to Bruce Lee and can almost be watched as an homage to Bruce. Now you may hear that the folks who want to remake the film want to sort of pay tribute to the original. Dur? You can’t pay tribute to an homage! That’s just fucking redundant.
Sam Jackson Does Not a Good Movie Make
A number of people are excited that Sam “Mother Fucking” Jackson will be playing the villain Sho’nuff, the Shogun of Harlem, the Baddest Mo Fo Low Down Around This Town. I’m sorry, but there’s only one Sho’nuff and sadly, Julius Carry is no longer with us. As good as he is at saying “Mother Fucker,” Sam Jackson just doesn’t cut it.
Part of it may be that it’s terribly difficult to see him as anyone other than Sam “Mother Fucking” Jackson. Julius Carry was a relatively unknown actor at the time so it was easy not to get distracted by his star power. Sam Jackson is Sam Jackson is Sam Jackson and I think that will hurt the movie greatly. For Sho’nuff to work, you kind of have to have someone who’s personality can get lost in the character. And while maybe there was a time that Sam Jackson was that person, I don’t think that time is now.
Besides, he really sucks in these cheesy genre flicks. Snakes on a Plane, he fucking phoned in. The Spirit, he went completely batshit crazy.
This Scene:
There’s no possible way they can recreate this scene to my satisfaction. Never. It just doesn’t work in a modern context and it barely works here. The only reason you don’t chuck the DVD out the window right now is because of Sho’nuff. He’s the biggest reason I love this movie so much. And the remake doesn’t have him. Boo!
No Actor is as Awkward as Taimak
Our star, Bruce Leroy, is played by 19-year-old martial artist Taimak who is horribly awkward throughout the entire movie. This is because he is a martial artist first, actor… um… maybe never. He is not good at acting. But again, it somehow works in this movie. It’s not artificial, it’s all real. All of his little uncomfortable quirks that make Laura fall in love with him, those are all real. You can’t recreate that. If you hire an actor, it’ll come off horribly forced. A martial artist might work, but there’s no guarantee. Somehow, all of Taimak’s faults worked for the character. It was one of those happy accidents. That’s not something you can recreate on purpose.
Today’s Pop Music Sucks
Okay, this might be a little old man of me and certainly the 80’s were no highlight in the history of American pop music. But seriously folks, today’s pop music is bullshit. Fucking autotune everywhere. Fucking sing-song-rapping. No good can come of this.
So there you go, six horribly biased reasons I don’t think this remake will be any good. If the producers want my money, which is doubtful if they read this, they should open it the same weekend as Airbender. I will pay actual money to see The Last Dragon opening day if it opens the same day as Airbender. I want to see Airbender go down in flames and if that means shelling out money to see a remake that I’m basically allergic to, I’ll fucking do it.
Follow AZM on Twitter
