Pictured: Mickey Rourke as Whiplash in Iron Man 2
Guiding you through the next few popcorn-strewn months of film.
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Only the trolliest of the tweens have time to see all the summer movies. The rest of us have to make economical, judicious choices between rivals.
We decided to put together a guide, a breakdown of sorts into choices between rivals of genre or theme, as opposed to the market-contrived rivals of opening weekend and star-power. It's a movie-lovers kind of list. So it might take some planning and patience to stay at home while everyone else goes out and watches a big budget stinker. You'll hear them say (like we have all said before), "Well, for what it is, it was pretty good." Whatever that means.
And who says you need to see anything on opening weekend? Exactly. Point is, don't be a lemming. Don't choose a movie just because it's another weekend in the summertime. Wait for the good stuff.
That said, this is just a list of movies we're excited about, framed in gentle recommendation of one over the other, for the flippin' summer-fun of it. Oh, and we haven't seen these yet. These are judgments based on the trailers and countless hours of research (read: Google). So if some of these turn out to be awful, don't get mad.
For the sword / sandal epics, we choose Robin Hood over Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
As much as we like Jake Gyllenhaal, video games, and movies about the Middle East, the old cronies Ridley Scott and Russell Crowe know how to choose their projects. This is no newfangled Guy Ritchie genre-bending ironic mash-up-of-English-legends a la Sherlock Holmes. It's a straightforward Western culture morality epic, like Gladiator and Kingdom of Heaven. At least the ethnicity of the filmmakers matches the characters. Prince of Persia is the Pirates of the Caribbean in the desert, which some fast-food junkies may prefer.
For the supernatural horror, we choose Jonah Hex over A Nightmare on Elm Street's reboot.
Successful horror movies of yore keep their charm because of their underdog, against all odds, shoe-string budget chutzpah. Avoid such multi-million dollar reboots like the plague (did we really need Michael Bay to re-produce Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th and Elm Street? His "people" must think so). Instead, try an original comic book supernatural-hero played by an Oscar-winning Josh Brolin, joined by Megan Fox and the always interesting and villainous John Malkovich. Jonah Hex is the story of an ex-confederate soldier who works as a bounty hunter, with a harrowing past that wants more than his blood.
For the action / multi-buddy movie, we choose The A-Team over The Expendables.
We really thought The Expendables was a comedy, but it's not. It pulls out all the right-wing action stars in Hollywood (Stallone, Willis, Schwarzenegger and a pile of others including Jet Li) and it is going to show you, seriously, why foreigners are still the scariest bad guys on earth. The choice is clear. Starring the newest action star on the block, Liam Neeson as Hannibal, The A-Team always knew action heroes were a tongue-in-cheek affair. "There is no plan B."
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SOURCE: Relevant Magazine
Luke Nelson
