It was only two short years ago the world was treated to the box office "masterpiece," of the last Transformers film and it looks like we're gearing up for, well, more of the same. Check out the teaser trailer for Transformers:The Last Knights, which will feature Bumblebee, Optimus Prime, and explosions galore!
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This trailer if an emotional one. Today, the first teaser for next and (quite possibly) last film, starring Hugh Jackman as Wolverine was released online and it isn't easy to watch. Set to Johnny Cash's classic, Hurt, Logan will follow Wolverine in his old age along side Professor X. Its one of those things you knew was coming but you still weren't ready for it. Check out the trailer below and get ready to say goodbye to an action character we've known and over for nearly a decade and a half in March 2017. What was once one of 2016's early Oscar contenders with frequent comparisons to David Fincher's Gone Girl, has had critics divided since it's October 7th release. Aside from the low reviews, has nearly doubled it's modest 45 million budget and continues to do well. While many critics have stated that the twist can be seen from early on, I'd argue that that's one of the least interesting hands at work in this film. Emily Blunt, who play's Rachel, a divorcee with an more than minor alcohol problem, is superb. Not only cycling through the range of emotions (or sometimes, lack there of), an alcoholic would go through, but supported with some exception camera angles that may seem sluggish to some. The intentional blurring in and out of focus in the background through many of Rachel's scenes, were enough to immerse viewers in the sense of her inebriation, whilst never getting too carried away. Other scenes were a bit 'choppy,' but manageable and those few problems were non-existent through the last leg of the film. The perils, exploitation, manipulation, fear and sadness of alcohol abuse shone through Blunt's performance. To me, this film feels more about the effects of alcoholism and the behavior of people around you more so than a simple "who don' it," film presented from the trailer. Predicable plot alone, nearly every member of the cast performed spectacularly well. Coupled with Blunt's magnificent performance and the interesting take on alcohol and abuse, this is a movie you'll want to catch while it's still in theaters and might still be a contender for award season.
(Slight spoilers ahead) It's been a long crawl to the end of the summer and for the box office, it hasn't been a great one. Despite the many poor films releases since June, our last big box office pop-corn film is DC's Suicide Squad. With an early August release and without much competition, the movie's being billed as the new "Guardians of the Galaxy," in terms of it's projected weekend gross of $140 million but will the poor reviews and controversial behind the scenes stories keep fans away from the theater this weekend? Suicide Squad is DC's second big film this year, equally as expensive as Batman v Superman, (which was both a commercial and critical failure) needing to make $800 million to break even. David Ayer's Anti-Hero ensemble film managed to bring in some of Hollywoods elite's who arguably, (and possibly, purposefully) out act many of their lesser known counter parts. It's not hard to guess from the trailer that Will Smith's Dead Shot, Viola Davis' Amanda Waller and Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn had most of the screen time, which benefited this film heavily, but others in the background cast fell to the same tired action movie tropes that didn't work two decades ago and certainly wouldn't now. The beginning third of the film opens with such strange editing and effects like fun statistics thrown on the screen like Captain Boomerang's fetish for Pink Unicorns is so ridiculous that it actually works but, it all disappears once we get deeper into the brooding story line. Cara Delvingne plays Enchantress, a demonic spirit who posses a female Doctor by the name of June Moone, who has become the love interest of Joel Kinnaman's Rick Flagg. While she manages to deliver two static versions of the same person, the most confusing scene is arguably one that occurs in a subway where, upon deciding that they could actually control her, Kinnaman request the evil Enchantress' help thus leading to a classic case of "well we knew that wasn't going to work out." It's hard to pick apart villains in comic book films these days because with so man interacting characters, it's rare to see one fully developed in time to get the audience behind them as well as excited for them to pull off (and of course, fail at succeeding) their diabolical plan. Fortunately for the viewers, every other character in this film is better than Delvingne's Enchantress. The back stories were, for the most part, pretty interesting and a fun break away from the dragged on fight scene towards the end against Enchantress' evil soldiers turned monsters. Deadshot's is heart felt, as is Jay Hernandez's El Diablo, while Quinn's highlights some psychological abuse at the hands of Mr. J himself. Which brings us to the second biggest problem of the film. Jared Leto has been, for months, talking only about his acting process behind becoming the Joker for Suicide Squad. Fear of living up to the incredibly high standard set by late actor, Heathe Ledger, to sending used condoms and rats to his fellow cast mates, he seemed all determined to give us a memorable version of the iconic villain, but it's memorable for all the wrong reasons. Leto's Joker becomes a manic mess without anything really dangerous or fun to do. Even in his own scene's, nothing diabolical or violent happens to establish that you're looking at a criminal with a dangerous history. It's more or so just that we should fear him because of what he's done, but it would have been nice to see him do something aside from a guttural laugh, wide eyes and shooting an automatic fire arm. It's a shame that we found out earlier today from Leto himself that quite a few scenes were left on the cutting room floor. It also doesn't help that there was apparently competing cuts of the film as well as some high pressure on director David Ayer as well. While the film failed miserably at making a believable villain of Enchantress, Davis' cold and calculated Waller really shined through, pulling the strings behind the scenes and a fun mid-credit scene lays foundation for next years Justice League. While some of the characters are fun to watch, the lack of a strong antagonist and some very poor editing choices strain this high anticipated title, leading really to a mash up of current pop hits and fun visuals that fill the first half but are virtually gone by the second. It feels as if two different directors filmed portions of this film and fitted them together. Suicide Squad is like being served a hot meal and being told you can only eat it when it's cold. Fortunately for us, DC may be able to learn from their mistakes when the sequel is released as well as a hopefully much better Joker experience in the planned solo Batman film. Until then, we'll just have to wait and see if an extended cut will be released with some alternate scenes like Batman v Superman or if we'll just have to cross our fingers and hope that Justice League can turn around DC's losing streak.
November's quickly approaching and one of the years most anticipated films is J.K. Rowling's Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find them and this is the best trailer we've had yet. Newt Scamander appears to be in more trouble than just having to capture the beasts he's lost as Colin Farrell's Percival Graves is tracking him down too. Take a look at the official comic con trailer below! It's no secret that the latest film in the Divergent series under-performed and now the fate of the franchise has been decided. According to Variety, the new hope for the franchise will lie on a much smaller screen than the previous films had, with a TV movie that will lead into a spin-off series. While it sounds like the reports in the beginning stages, none of the original actors have reportedly signed on for the project nor have any studios been contacted to host a supposed spin-off series. Lee Toland Kreiger is set to direct the TV film so for fans of the series, hopefully they'll get some version to wrap up the once massive franchise.
Let me be frank when I say this, Warcraft the film is nearly unwatchable. I, somehow absolutely adored everything Duncan Jones did in the film but only because of my many years spent with the long running Blizzard franchise. If I had no prior knowledge of, well, anything happening in this film, I'd probably have laughed and left disappointed. Despite the very low reviews for the film nearly a decade in the making, Warcraft has gone on to break records in almost everywhere but stateside. As a matter of fact, it's now the highest grossing video game film of all time beating out Prince of Persia. This might not be terribly shocking considering at one point the MMO version of the PC title, World of Warcraft, boasted an incredible 10 million players world wide. The movie's beautiful to look at, regardless of some ridiculous moments and it's an amazing feeling to see these characters and units from the games up on the big screen but for new comers, the movies a bit convoluted. The future is uncertain for the film franchise due to the fact that Warcraft grossed $37 million in the U.S. and over $200 million in China. Whether we'll get to dive back in to one of the most popular franchise has yet to be seen but if you were a fan, (like I oddly was) then keep your fingers crossed.
This weekend was an odd one for the Memorial day box office. A weekend which generally see's record breaking numbers fell short of expectations for two of the years biggest films. Both X Men: Apocalypse and Alice Through the Looking Glass, were released this past weekend in America, but due to low receptions from critics and low turn out from movie goers, both movies are in a bit of trouble. (Mind you this was the 6th highest opening for an X Men film and a far cry from it's predecessor, Days of Future Past) Thankfully, X Men was able to pull more from it's release over seas before its North American debut, which added quite a to it's total gross. Having already $185.8 million in the bank, X Men: Apocalypse low debut of $65 million instead of an estimated $80 million over the weekend. Of course with tomorrow being an additional day for the long holiday, there's always time for X Men to make up a bit more. As far as Alice Through the Looking Glass, the Disney sequel only brought in a low $65 million from other territories and an estimated low of $30 million over the weekend, putting it in major trouble against it's $93.2 million dollar box office haul against it's budget of $170 million. This is also another addition to veteran actors Johnny Depp's long list of box office flops. While we still have another day, it doesn't look like either of these highly anticipated films are going to make their mark this weekend. Do you think people were turned away from the reviews or did the weather drive people away from the theaters?
Apocalypse is upon us this memorial day weekend but is it worth the 144 minute run time despite the hefty box office competition and the low reviews? X Men Apocalypse picks up a decade after the events of Days of Future Past, with the now up and running Xavier School filled with mutants of all kinds. After the short opening explaining how Apocalypse, also known as En Sabah Nur, came to be, the beginning half of the movie becomes a revolving door of characters rebuilding relationships while Apocalypse seeks the strongest mutants to use as his legendary four horsemen. Erik, or Magneto, has gone into a life of hiding after his failed assassination of the President on the White House lawn, his intervention in an accident of a fellow factory worker exposes his mutant power and effectively ends his new life and alter ego through a series of tragic events. To be frank, Apocalypse has not had the best reception by critics, and is actually the lowest scoring film in the franchise just sitting above the incredibly awful X Men Origins: Wolverine. The beginning has plenty of cool effects but its gets a bit boring watching the un-challenged, Apocalypse, displaying his all mighty power over and over again. While a relatively flat villain, (which is a shame considering his history in the X-men verse), as well as some moments of "eye-rolling," dialogue, the movies still a fun summer blockbuster that he franchise has become known for. The younger versions of famous characters like Storm, Jean Grey, Cyclops and Nightcrawler were an honest treat and didn't get nearly enough screen time. (There was a whole scene that sounded quite fun and was teased for months but didn't make the final cut.) The same goes for the four horsemen. While Angel is significantly more fun than the previous version in X Men: The Last Stand, Psylocke and Storm both suffered from the "too many characters to have actual growth," phenomenon that seems to his these films. A shame because X Men is usually pretty good at juggling characters but it's understandable that you can't make a 3 hour film. Hopefully all the cut footage will find it's way to the directors cut when we see that possibly towards the end of the year. Another issue that comes with anticipating one big show off is most of the interesting scenes were shown throughout the multiple trailers for the film. Once the fight began, you could kind of guess what you'd see next. A surprising cameo ties nicely into the original franchise as a sort of easter egg, with the opportunity to once again create a new story line. That, coupled with the extremely exciting end credit scene featuring a key character in the Apocalypse story line (click for spoilers) may also mean that's not the end for him. As far as the future, things sound to be up in the air. With talks of a Phenoix Saga film, an X-Force Spin off, and the final Wolverine, it certainly looks like we're closing the door on this new trilogy and will hopefully see the young cast again in the future. Apocalypse is in no means as poor as the reviews make it sound but its certainly below its predecessors. The characters, while limited, as still fun. The special effects are amazing and whether a fan of the older films of news, James Macavoy and Michael Fassbender provide for some emotional moments just like Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellan did so perfectly before them. Whatever happens next, Bryan Singer still manager to fit this film into the complicated puzzle for the X Men franchise and it's certainly worth a look.
Various sources are reporting this morning that current James Bond actor, Daniel Craig, might not return to the role after last years extremely successful Spectre. If you've followed the long development of the 24th Bond film, you'll know that Daniel Craig did not have the best time filming this role. Between budget and production woes to expressing his distaste over the senseless sexism, it was pretty much inevitable that this would end up happening. He even found himself in the hot seat last year after commenting that he'd rather harm himself than return to the role. Craig is allegedly walking away from a massive deal with MGM with would have included shares and a co-producer position for two more films, yielding a pay day of £68m. Speculation for a replacement have been circulating for some time with recent names like newcomer from the highly successful Kingsman: The Secret Service, Taron Egerton, to High Rise and more recently BBC's The Night Manager, Tom Hiddleston, only time will tell what will happen next for the decade old franchise.
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