Big Screen Entries for October, 2012

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Disney and Lucasfilm: envisioning the future

Mr. Marks handled the news beautifully. I don't have much to add, except to say that I chuckled when Lucas ...

Gene Hackman defends wife against foul-mouthed street person

Why can't this post be about 10 new Gene Hackman films opening next year instead of a tidbit found on ...

Need a last minute Halloween costume?

Last year you learned how to transform a bottle of fake blood and a pair of sunglasses into The Godfather's ...

Like a bolt out of the blue, Disney buys LucasFilm

Who cares if the planned sequel sucks? George sold out his fans for $4 billion bucks!

The Force is now with the house the mouse built and that means 2015 will see the first of many ...

Review: Fun Size

"Fun Size" fits all...except its target demographic

Nickelodeon Movies presents a politically incorrect, "hard PG-13" theatrical release that can't possibly air unedited on its parent cable channel. ...

A closer look at the posters for Skyfall and Lincoln

I dunno, guys — some people are all, "Hey, that's in pretty poor taste," but I'm feeling like there's maybe ...

Interview: Jonny Weston

"Chasing Mavericks" star pays visit to San Diego

Jonny Weston. The name alone oozes all-American appeal (and marquee value). Charleston, South Carolina native Jonny Weston "grew up surfing." ...

Amazing Spider-Man - the Reader's Comic Book Guy weighs in

Warning: Review includes some mild spoilers and speculation that will probably prove so dead-on accurate as to spoil a main aspect of the proposed sequel

WARNING - this review assumes the reader has already seen the flick, in case you want to avoid a few ...

18 Days

Publicly-collaborated series of ten short films on Egypt's Jan 25 revolution

18 Days speaks to the 18 days beginning from the January 25 revolution in Egypt against Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. ...

A closer look at the trailer for The Tall Man

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_QqA0sDMec&feature=watch-vrec Wow. That was unscary. The only reason for noticing? One more for the ever-growing gallery of horror-film creepy-children's art. ...

Retired film critic Gene Shalit gets 'thumbs down' from Massachusetts police

Gene Shalit faces a charge of driving to endanger after the retired Today Show movie critic introduced his car to ...

EXCLUSIVE, BABY: First on-set photo from Arnold's new Conan film!

Other websites have already reported that Arnold Schwarzenegger will be strapping on the ol' loincloth and once more taking up ...

Opening this week

This week's big opening is Cloud Atlas, a multi-character, multi-narrative collaboration between the enormously gifted Tom Twkwer and the at ...

DVDs to watch on Halloween - the good, the bad, and the better than you'd think

THE GOOD The oh-so-weird 1973 psycho killer film Wicked Wicked takes place at the historic (and reportedly haunted) Hotel Del ...

Review: The Girl

Hitchcock and bull.

Saved by the Bell: Wedding in Las Vegas notwithstanding, it is seldom you'll catch me watching let alone writing about ...

Review: How to Survive a Plague

David France’s documentary about the advancements made in AIDS research, composed almost entirely of archival footage, is not much to ...

A closer look at the posters for Rise of the Guardians

Um, guys? If they pull this one off, I'll eat my spun-sugar hat. It starts off okay...I like the "more ...

Bert Fields, a Hollywood lawyer on the side of America's good taste

Ageless movie star Tom Cruise is suing the publishers of Life & Style and InTouch for suggesting that he has ...

**L@@K** RARE VINTAGE ORIGINAL UNITED ARTISTS TRANSAMERCA WATERING CAN MINT

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/24/34248/ You are looking at an original UNITED ARTISTS TRANSAMERCA watering can from the early '70's. The design is patterned ...

Montgomery Clift: Judgement at 6th & C

Why does this mural located on 6th at C mock me? Am I to be mocked? http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/23/34229/ Who better to ...

A closer look at the trailer for Animal Farm

Okay, I lied a little - the latest iteration of Animal Farm doesn't have a trailer yet. But yesterday's Internet ...

Fun Size fits all!

Dammit, I want to see Fun Size! I am nothing if not a Johnny Knoxville completest. Who says I only ...

National Theatre Live continues at Reading Cinemas Gaslamp 15

I have yet to attend one of National Theatre Live's presentations, but my pal Jean Lowerison, theater critic for SDGLN ...

Married anti-Obama documentarian shows off fiancé at conference on Christian values

Married man has fiance!

This winner of the this year's best "Gee, I didn't know it was loaded" excuse goes to born-againer Dinesh D'Souza, ...

A closer look at the poster for The Hobbit

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/19/33866/ Ha, ha, look at those dwarves! Such funny-looking fellows, with their bulbous noses and their huge beards and their...waitaminute. ...

Weekend movies @ South Bay Drive-In

Why are movie tickets so expensive? At the risk of sounding crotchety, I have to complain that they used to ...

Free movies: Anaglyph 3D edition

Let's close the week with a handful of 3D oddities from the copyright snubbing folks at YouTube. All of the ...

A closer look at the trailer for The Croods

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ4QJCjvN8c "I get it, Dad. I will never do anything new or different." "Good man, Thunk." This, this is why ...

Review: Alex Cross

Alex Cross is a detective whose powers of deduction border on the clairvoyant; he can look at your shirt and ...

Also playing!

Goodness, but there are a lot of movies out there. Halloween, just in time for Halloween! No, not the new ...

Opening this week - UPDATED

A bit of an odd week; still, let's have at it. Aaron Paul and Mary Elizabeth Winstead get drunk in ...

Review: Here Comes the Boom

Wanna' have fun? Go see Here Comes the Boom only pretend it's called The Passion of the Kevin James. It's ...

A closer look at the trailer for Cloud Atlas

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWnAqFyaQ5s Set faces to quizzical, Mr. Hanks: http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/18/33814/ And if the guy who fell in love with the script looks ...

Election's over - Honey Boo Boo endorses Barack Obama

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/17/33748/

Review: Ten reasons not to see The War of the Buttons

10.) You have zero interest in seeing what it would have been like had Walt Disney produced a live-action Nazi ...

Overheard at AMC Mission Valley

The crowd was particularly restless during last night's screening of Alex Cross, the first actor-for-hire job Tyler Perry has accepted. ...

The Dark Knight and Apple Maps

I don't care that this has already been posted on every site everywhere. It made me laugh, and so I'm ...

Sam Raimi and the Raping Tree

Hey kids! Did you know that the director of Spider-Man — no, not that Spider-Man, the first one, with Tobey ...

There but for the grace of John Wayne's The War Wagon go I

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/16/33689/ I've been on a John Wayne jag of late, trying my best to catch up on what remains of ...

San Diego Asian Film Foundation becomes Pacific Arts Movement

You can call it Pac-Arts, or you can call it SDAFF, but "as a kind request" please do not refer ...

Jesus Christ Superstar do-over in local theaters 10-29 and 11-1

"I have waited 42 years for Jesus Christ Superstar to play arenas in the UK, and it is great to ...

Double feature at SDMA

The San Diego Museum of Art (1450 El Prado) is screening Nosferatu and Shadows and Fog as part of their ...

A closer look at Brad Pitt's ad for Chanel No. 5

Bear with me on this one, people... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGs4CjeJiJQ&feature=player_embedded Astonishingly, folks are calling movie star Brad Pitt's ad for Chanel No. ...

A closer look at the trailer for Silent Hill: Revelation 3D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMWrZmD0AN4 A few thoughts: http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/15/33572/ Man, I had no idea Michelle Williams needed the work this badly. http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/15/33573/ Man, Andrew ...

What's Xenu? Tom Cruise leaving Scientology to impress a chick?

Tom Cruise will give up his desperate attempts to turn the works of a sci-fi writer into an accepted religion ...

Interview: Seven Psychopaths wrangler, Martin McDonagh

Matt drew review duty for Seven Psychopaths while I was fortunate enough to spend some time with the film’s writer/director, ...

Seven Psychopaths: question for discussion

So don't even bother with this until after you've seen the film. But after you've seen the film — you ...

Free movies of the week - sleight of hand edition

Autumn, and there's magic in the air...hey, here's The Illusionist: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6ojY3IAsO4&feature=related And as you well remember, the Hollywood law of ...

Opening this week

Aw - who's more adorable? I think it's fair to say that Seven Psychopaths is this week's big winner, no ...

Led Zeppelin Celebration Day local screenings Oct. 17

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/11/33398/ Led Zeppelin: Celebration Day, the film account of Led Zeppelin's 2007 reunion concert at London's 02 Arena, will open ...

First annual Barrio Film Festival accepting submissions

Attention filmmakers! The Roots Factory (1878 Main Street) and The Barrio Logan Arts District are accepting independent short film submissions ...

Review: Sinister

With the Saw franchise desperately in need of a creative miter box to guide it through a new sequel, this ...

The magic of Hollywood

I love this shot of Natalie Portman on the set of Terrence Malick's Significant Whispers (not its real title). http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/11/33365/ ...

A closer look at certain, um, parts of the trailer for Hitchcock

First shot of Scarlett Johansson in the trailer: http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/11/33357/ I mean, I guess it's a step up from her introduction ...

A closer look at the trailer for Hitchcock

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TT6e0bRbgU8 First reaction: Man, Hannibal Lecter has really let himself go. Maybe it's time to lay off the liver and ...

Enter to win the Blu-ray Anniversary Combo Pack of E.T.

What do you mean "Reader employees and their families are not eligible?" to win the Deluxe Anniversary Blu-ray Combo Pack ...

Debbie Reynolds hospitalized in L.A.

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/10/33299/ Debbie Reynolds and I go way back. Sort of... Believe me when I tell you that I have seen ...

Paul Blevins to unleash True Love Zombie

Oh, my God. What have I done? http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/09/33249/ When I first interviewed horror film aficionado and first-time filmmaker Paul Blevins ...

Iron Fist with Live Soundtrack

On Thursday, October 25 at 8 p.m. Tijuana-based electronica artists Nortec Collective perform a live, self-styled version of the Iron ...

Free movies: "Columbo" Day edition

You can watch clips of The Marx Bros. in Horse Feathers starting here, but if you want to cut to ...

Dept. of missed opportunities: Hungry Hungry Hippos

So last week, the Internet was all grumpy about the long-rumored Hungry Hungry Hippos movie actually getting greenlit. Not me, ...

Head Explodes in #4 Clairemont Town Square

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/08/33124/ Last night's 35mm presentation of Butter was in uniform focus throughout. The pre-show aneurism had nothing to do with ...

Farewell to a legend: Gloria Penner

There are times that even I don't have the heart to use my "dig a hole" catchphrase. While we never ...

South Bay Drive-In weekend movies

This weekend South Bay Drive-In (2170 Coronado Ave) screens 6 movies. Frankenweenie, Looper, and Taken 2 will play at 8 ...

Santee Drive-In movies tonight

Santee Drive-In* (10990 North Woodside Ave) is screening Hotel Transylvania (PG) and Taken 2 (PG-13) at 8 p.m. and 11:45 ...

Opening this week

Some directors deserve the utmost respect. Even if a screener of the latest Carlos Saura film appeared in my mailbox, ...

German Currents Film Festival at year two

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/04/32901/ The ceiling of MoPA's Joan and Irwin Jacobs Theatre will cast its twinkle light on a crop of San ...

Tips on how to survive a kiddie matinee

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/04/32873/ Studios want critics to see children's films with an audience, generally at 10am on a Saturday morning at Edwards ...

End this trend: tile-rooftop chases

Seeing Scott's illustration on his Taken 2 review... http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/04/32861/ ...reminded me of this shot from 2009's little-seen The International... http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/04/32862/ ...

Super-spoilery but possibly substantial complaint about the plot of Looper

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/04/32859/ Okay, so don't probably read this unless you've seen the film and feel like jawing about it... But this ...

Mean street style: Scorsese accoutrement for everyday living

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/03/32803/ Label: Licensed Hugo Automation Style: Short sleeve graphic tee Color: Black Sizes: Small to 3XL Cost: $16.07 on eBay ...

Review: Taken 2

Fans with short attention spans will applaud director Olivier Megaton’s inability to hold an image on screen for more than ...

A Home for Spielberg

Today is moving day and while making one last pass at the dumpster, I noticed that a neighbor had cleansed ...

Interview: Director Lisa Immordino Vreeland on Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/02/32709/ In an interview with writer Bob Colacello, fashion editor Diana Vreeland summed up what it means to be a ...

On the set of The Lone Ranger Armie Hammer gets a taste of Johnny Depp's method

http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/01/32628/ I hear he's pretty sensitive about the Crow thing.

Well played, Seven Psychopaths

This just arrived, FedEx: http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2012/oct/01/32615/ Let's zoom in on that tag (which is not, of course, censored in the movie): ...

Review: 10 Years

Why is it that regurgitated sputum like American Pie Reunion is released on 3,192 screens while a congenial, handsomely-cast, and ...

Celebrity Yarmulkes

Hopefully, enough days have passed since last week's celebration of Yom Kippur and this post will count against next year's ...