Mr. Brown's Trailer Reviews: Pain and Gain

Hello again, Michael Bay.

Hollywood's biggest hack has returned, and this time, we're not being treated to robot-on-robot CGI carnage, robot testicles, dog humping, or a dude stuffing an animal cracker down a woman's pants. This time, he's making a smaller, low-budget character piece that's borrowing from Quentin Tarantino and Joel & Ethan Coen flicks.

No, really. That's what Pain and Gain looks like, and it's what Bay was aiming for: an unholy union of Tarantino's lurid and hypnotic dialogue, the Coen Brothers' idiosyncratic characters, and Bay's own directorial traits of fast editing cuts, slow-motion shots of sunrises and sunsets, and Bay's camera lusting over beautiful women in bikinis, skimpy outfits, ass shots, etc. The only thin missing is his signature trademark of racial stereotypes being trotted out for cheap laughs, though I'm certain it'll be in the finished product. Anywho, here's the red-band trailer for Pain and Gain, due out April 26.

Despite everything i've said about this hack, i'll probably see this film, solely because i'm a fan of both Mark Wahlberg and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. and maybe the duo will be entertaining, despite Bay thinking he can rip-off Fargo and Reservoir Dogs and dumb it down for his audience.

Comments

Cowardice

I was looking forward to watching the James Franco/Seth Rogen comedy The Interview on Christmas Day, even more so than Angelina Jolie's WWII drama Unbroken , or Rob Marshall's Into the Woods . I like what the writing and directing duo of Rogen and his pal Evan Goldberg have done with comedies like Superbad , Pineapple Express and their debut feature, This Is the End . In light of Sony being hacked (which now appears to be North Korea's doing) and threats of attacking theaters that carry the comedy, three things happened today: 1.) Every major theater chain - AMC, Regal, Cinemark, Arclight, etc, had decided to pull out from showing The Interview on its scheduled release date. 2.) This prompted Sony Pictures to basically cancel the release date of the film amid threats of blowing up theaters. 3.) Both Sony and the theater chains basically caved into the demands of cyber terrorism from North Korea. Are you fucking kidding me? We just caved into terr...

I'm Dreaming of a White Oscars

What does Stephen Hawking, the godfather of computer science, a hotel manager breaking out from prison during the first World War, a young boy and his family growing up through 12 years and the battle of wills between a aspiring musician and his near-abusive professor have in common? On the surface, these are different films ranging in different subjects. But when you look at the people who stared, wrote and directed these various movies, A few patterns begin to emerge: 1. The cast is predominately white. 2. The story mostly centers on a male protagonist. 3. The filmmakers behind the project are white and male. And all of those films I've mentioned: The Theory of Everything , The Imitation Game , The Grand Budapest Hotel , Boyhood and Whiplash - have all been nominated for Best Picture for this year's 87th annual Academy Awards. Before I go any further, I just want to say that this is not an attack on the films themselves. Most of the films mentioned I really...

Mad Max and the Awards Season Or: Let It Go, Let It Go...

And so, the Oscar race has officially begun, with the Nation Board of Review's annual best of list, applauding and honoring the creme de la creme in film for 2015. I definitely didn't expect to see films like Sicario and Straight Outta Compton to be on their list of the 10 best movies of the year, so big brownie points to them for their inclusion. Drew Goddard winning Best Adapted Screenplay was a shock, and well-deserved for taking the source material and creating a funny, exciting script where Matt Damon "has to science the shit" out of being stuck on an unforgiving planet like Mars after being marooned by mistake by his fellow astronauts. I think The Martian is easily Ridley Scott's best and most enjoyable film in years (yes, I'm taking into account that I liked Prometheus ) , and it's fun to see the director this playful, though I think Damon winning Best Actor and Scott taking Best Director is a bit of a stretch. But then came the pick for Bes...

Mr. Brown Versus

Search This Blog