Previews and Reviews that are Z's Views
What do you think of the new poster for Jordan Peele’s Nope? I like it. Bonus points for the tagline: A New Terror from the Mind of Academy Award Winner Jordan Peele. That lets us know it will be horror, and how often do we get a horror film from an Academy Award Winner? Deal me in.
J.J. Abrams’ UFO documentary series looks interesting. If I had Showtime, I’d tune in. Oh, and I like the movie’s tagline: Are You Ready?
UFO is a four-part docu-series from J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot and Glen Zipper exploring our fascination with unidentified flying objects, and what clandestine influence the American government, lucrative private companies and the military may have in shielding the truth behind extraterrestrial phenomena to further their own agendas. Watch the premiere on Sunday, August 8 at 9/8c on SHOWTIME.
This alt movie poster for Way of the Gun by Derek Zimmerman got me thinking about the movie. I’m a big fan of it, yet Way of the Gun isn’t a movie you often hear discussed. That’s a shame.
Way of the Gun was written and directed by Christopher McQuarrie lately best known for writing and directing the Mission Impossible mega-hits. When Way of the Gun came out McQuarrie was best known as the writer of The Usual Suspects and that was enough to get me in the theater. I wasn’t disappointed.
Way of the Gun also contains a amazing cast: Ryan Phillippe, Benico Del Toro, Juliette Lewis, Taye Diggs, Nicky Katt, Geoffrey Lewis, Scott Wilson, James Caan and Sarah Silverman.
Here’s the synopsis:
Two criminal drifters without sympathy get more than they bargained for after kidnapping and holding for ransom the surrogate mother of a powerful and shady man.
I think perhaps the opening turned off some folks and they didn’t finish the movie. I’ve watched Way of the Gun more than a couple of times and enjoyed it more with each revisit. Perhaps it’s time for another viewing.
I really like this poster for Charles Bronson in The Mechanic. The artist who created it is Nikos Bogris. You can see more of his work here.
The original movie poster had the tagline: “The call him the Mechanic. He has 100 ways to kill… and they all work.” Bogris left off the tagline, so his poster doesn’t really tell/show you that Bronson is a hit man. For all we know he is a womanizing auto mechanic. I still prefer Bogris’ poster to the original. I hope you like it as well.
I know movie fans will like this one. We have the poster and trailer for The Last Duel directed by Ridley Scott and starring Jodie Comer, Adam Driver, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck.
Watch the new trailer for “The Last Duel” a tale of betrayal & vengeance set against the brutality of 14th century France directed by Ridley Scott and starring Jodie Comer, Adam Driver, Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. In theaters October 15.
Back in February I posted about something that Sam Vivano (former MAD magazine art director and friend of Al Jaffee) called The Jaffee Project. Sam’s idea was to get friends and fans of Al Jaffee to send in birthday cards to celebrate Jaffee’s 100th birthday. Al Jaffee was the artist who invented (and produced for decades) Mad Magazine‘s fold-in page as well as Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions.
I sent in a birthday card wishing Mr. Jaffee a happy 100th and thanking him for all of the smiles he brought to me and fans around the world with the art he produced art for Mad Magazine. Little did I know Mr. Jaffee would present me with another smile. I received the post card above yesterday. What a cool gesture for Al Jaffee to respond to all of his fans. I love it when someone you admire turns out to be worthy of the admiration.
Tom at TV Over Mind came up with a list of Five Underrated Acting Scenes from Sylvester Stallone. While the list or the presentation isn’t the best. (The used the photo above for heading <I added the text for my post> and it isn’t their number one choice. Also some of the example that they picked were not the best choices for Sly most underrated acting scenes. With that said, using just his top five, I’ll rank those same picks and then give you what I think are some much better choices.
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Tom at TVOM |
Craig |
5. Talking to Adonis in Creed II during the fight |
5. The final fight in Rocky V: Since this is more of a physical scene than an “acting” scene I rated it lower. |
4. The final fight in Rocky V |
4. The atrium scene in Oscar: Oscar is underrated. Sly’s performance is good but there are many scenes in other movies that should have made the grade. |
3. The atrium scene in Oscar |
3. Talking to Adonis in Creed II during the fight: Sly has better scenes in Creed II than this one. |
2. PTSD scene in Rambo: First Blood |
2. The Rocky Balboa speech: This is a good choice and it became so popular I can see why Tom listed it in his first spot. |
1. The Rocky Balboa speech |
1. PTSD scene in Rambo: First Blood: Sly gives a classic performance and shows that Rambo isn’t all blood and guts. |
Other scenes that should have made the cut:
Rocky: So many to choose, but since I am going to limit it to one from each additional film, I’ll go with the scene where Rocky tells Adrian if he is just standing when the final bell sounds…
FIST: Again many to choose from, but this time I’ll go with the scene where Sly is talking to the men about the trucker that was hurt and although the company won’t take care of him., their union will.
Rocky III: The scene on the beach with Talia Shire where she asks Rocky what he’s afraid of and he answers…
Cop Land: So many great scenes… For me it is a toss up between Sly’s scene with Annabella Sciorra or his scene with DeNiro.
Get Carter: Sly’s rooftop scene with Rachel Leigh Cook is one of his best.
Rocky Balboa: Any scene where he is talking about Adrian.
Creed: The scene in the locker room when Rocky explains to Creed why he isn’t going to get treatment for his cancer. One of Sly’s all-time best scenes.
I really like everything about this Alien art by Alex Ogle.
First, it tells a story or at least makes you want to know what happened before and after what we see. Second, Alex’s color choices are awesome. They highlight the pen and ink work instead of drawing attention away from the foundation of the piece.
This art reminds me of a synthesis of Bernie Wrightson and Kyle Holtz, but is 100% Alex Ogle. You can see more of Alex’s art at his Instagram page.
Finally a poster that uses art instead of photos! I like it and the trailer for Naked Singularity starring John Boyega and Olivia Cooke. Deal me in.
Naked Singularity tells the story of Casi (John Boyega), a promising young NYC public defender whose idealism is beginning to crack under the daily injustices of the very justice system he’s trying to make right. Doubting all he has worked for and seeing signs of the universe collapsing all around him, he is pulled into a dangerous high-stakes drug heist by an unpredictable former client (Olivia Cooke) in an effort to beat the broken system at its own game.
Phil Pirrello decided to rank The 25 Scariest Sci-Fi Movies Ever Made. I decided to play along using just his top five to see how we’d compare. The results are below…
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Pirrello |
Zablo |
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1. The Thing (1982) |
1. Alien: Because we had never seen a creature like this and because anyone in the cast could die the scare factor was increased. |
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2. Alien (1979) |
2. The Thing: Watch the blood test scene and tell me that The Thing doesn’t belong in the top two. I dare ya! |
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3. The Fly (1986) |
3. Aliens: If the colonial marines can’t stand up to them, what can? (Congrats to Sigourney Weaver for making the top 3 with two different directors!) |
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4. Aliens (1986) |
4. The Fly: Equal parts scary and gory. |
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5. The Invisible Man (2020) |
5. The Invisible Man: was much better than I thought it would be. |
Other films in Pirrello’s list that I would have rated higher: Pitch Black; 10 Cloverfield Lane; Us; Predator; A Quiet Place; and Terminator.
This was too good not to share and goes out especially to Papa Stas.
Jordan Harper has worked as a journalist, rock critic and television writer. He was a writer on Gotham and the lead writer on The Mentalist. Harper also writes crime fiction.
His crime novel She Rides Shotgun won multiple awards including being named the 2018 Edgar Award Winner for Best Debut Novel. She Rides Shotgun gets my highest recommendation as well. If you like crime fiction, then you owe it to yourself to take a look.
Eli Cranor interviewed Jordan Harper and it is well worth a read. Hats off to Cranor for a fun, insightful interview.
Jordan Harper has a newsletter and occasionally posts on Twitter.
What We Do in the Shadows is one of my favorite current shows. If you don’t watch it, you should consider checking it out. If you do watch, you know how good it is. Below is the teaser for season 3 which premieres on September 2nd!
A look into the daily (or rather, nightly) lives of four vampires who have “lived” together for hundreds and hundreds of years in Staten Island.
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Rob Hunter at Film School Rejects posted 29 Things We Learned from Barry Sonnenfeld’s ‘Get Shorty’ Commentary. Before you click over here are three of my favorites and my thoughts on each…
They did about thirty takes of the scene where Chili (Travolta) punches Bones (Dennis Farina). (It always surprises me when I read about shots that require so many takes. 30 seems like a lot to film a scene of a guy getting punched. It’s not like the actor’s are forgetting dialogue. – Craig)
Sonnenfeld is also a producer on the film because he brought the film to Danny DeVito‘s attention after reading the novel on a cruise. He envisioned DeVito as “the perfect Chili Palmer,” but they went with Travolta who ended up being the perfect Chili Palmer. DeVito bought the rights, and they were off to the races. (DeVito as Chili Palmer? Even DeVito didn’t see that. Travolta was the right choice. – Craig)
Preview audiences were asked what their least favorite scenes were, and their number one pick was Ray hitting Fay (Hart) because you should never show a man hitting a woman. “My feeling was, first of all, it’s okay for them not to like this scene. You’re not supposed to hit a woman… (Exactly. The audience shouldn’t like that scene, but it should stay in the movie. What kind of bad guys do we end up with if they never do anything the audience doesn’t like? – Craig)
Here we have the poster and trailer for Risen. The poster is okay and the trailer is better. This kind of reminds me of Invasion of the Body Snatchers meets Arrival (2016). I’ll check it out at some point.
Disaster unfolds when a meteor strikes a small town, turning the environment uninhabitable and killing everything in the surrounding area. Exobiologist Lauren Stone is called to find answers to the unearthly event. As she begins to uncover the truth, imminent danger awakens and it becomes a race against time to save mankind.
