It’s like we can’t be trusted.
I was going to hold my tongue about all this until you made your way down below and beheld the sight of Venom and Co. swinging face first into your lives in the latest SPIDER-MAN 3 trailer. However, I just couldn’t shake the drifting thought about why Sony has sought fit to release this “International” trailer with oodles of the very thing you know every geek and his imaginary girlfriend who lives in Canada wants to see: Venom.
I make mention of it below in the column but, really, when you see this version of the trailer it seems like the whole storyline has shifted focus. It’s rare to see such a departure in what is accentuated and what is not, Uncle Ben’s murderer, The Sandman, barely even rates a mention in the international trailer whereas, in the domestic one, Ben’s killer is afforded the weight of the entire feature with nary a mention of that tough man in black.
Surely this isn’t a GODZILLA issue; the tease that everyone wants but are denied until opening day to behold the craptacular behemoth that would sink its way back into the ocean with nary a whimper. The studio has released not only the transformation of Topher Grace into the destructive black beast but you get a look at the moves he has in mid-air and even a vampire-like smile, jagged canines and all, that is really a sight to behold. It was enough for me to even pause the damn trailer and wonder at the top shelf make-up job they did to get Grace moved over from pretty boy to downright creepy.
And, really, the crux of the issue is that this version of the trailer isn’t Sony’s latest entry into what American kids are getting amped up to see as they watch their twenty or so minutes of Coming Attractions before their Spring features. You’ve got to be a nerd like me and actually visit a site that is based in the UK and only then can you see this thing. The international audiences are rolling into this version with a plethora of dangers that the American trailer barely scratched. For the record, and in fairness in reporting, neither trailer deals with how Gwen Stacy factors into the mix. She will in a great way but there isn’t anything to really go off of. However, the international trailer tosses in a heaping helping of the many directions that this film is going to but why is the average American, at this stage of the game, only being led to believe that this is a film that deals with a black suit that gives Spider-Man new powers, the struggle he is going to have with Harry and the fight he’s going to have with Sandman by film’s end? 
(My honest opinion is that Haden Church is going to serve a near perfunctory role if this film is going to be juggling no less than seven major plot points but he may not. Perhaps he and Venom are going to be a super bad tag team with Harry eventually siding with Peter in a battle royale the likes of which have never been seen before! Probably not.)
As well, the wrong answer of “Maybe the studio just wasn’t quite ready with the effects to be put into the domestic trailer prior to its release” isn’t even accurate if any geek worth his table salt saw the workprint of the trailer where Venom was actually excised from its final cut. Hell, even that may have been deliberate but it doesn’t change the fact that limeys and everyone else in the not-so-free world is getting a pimp looking trailer while we’re left with Sand city and a partial air battle between Harry and Peter.
Back in black never looked so damn good.
MAGICIANS (2007)
Director: Andrew O’Connor
Cast: Robert Webb, David Mitchell, Juliet Stevenson, Peter Capaldi
Release: May 18, 2007 (UK…Damn Limeys)
Synopsis: From the team behind the hit UK TV series Peep Show comes this high concept comedy film about a magic double act who fall out when one is involved in an accident with a guillotine. The story follows the rivalry between the magician’s years later as they enter a major magic competition.
View Trailer:
* Large (QuickTime)
Prognosis: Positive. Loved it.
After enduring the debate of what was better, THE ILLUSIONIST or THE PRESTIGE (It was PRESTIGE, by the way, in case you really would like to know), I knew the world could handle just one more movie dealing in the black arts. Too bad for me, though, that I would have to jaunt over to merry old England in order to be able and see it.
It’s moments like this that I wish some money grubbing exec-u-tard would come up with a way to capitalize on global distribution of films; I’m available for such a position if anyone cares to create the position for me. At the moment, though, all I can do is appreciate the marketing campaign for this film that looks and feels like a splendid time at the talkies.
“In the world…â€
I would usually turn tail as soon as these words are spoken as, come on, am I really to believe that some dime store magicians really have a lock on the global art of making coins disappear before my eyes? No, but I erred on the side on irony as we make our way through the entertaining lives of two guys who are supposed to be partners, which makes their getting along at the beginning all the more foreboding for what’s to come, only to howl when these men committed the truest rendering of The Marie Antoinette as they lopped off their female assistant’s melon…accidentally.
We simply blaze through the rest of the exposition, the only real gripe I have is that we whip at an unbelievable pace through it all, when we come to where the crux of the action will take place: a magic-off, as it were.
These guys suck and it’s their pathetic natures that make this film appear so appealing; if you were to do a movie starring Gob, the hapless magician of Arrested Development, it would be far and away a fun film if only because you have a guy who believes he’s great when, in fact, it’s only his tenuous grasp on this notion that keeps him from packing it all in. And you get that with this trailer. As one dude comes up with a trick to be buried up to his neck in sand, assistants who are quite unstable, having the occasional reminder that your partner was the one who pulled the rope that beheaded your previous assistant and an old fart that has a trick where he makes lit cigarettes disappear by extinguishing them using his tongue.
“Shot my wand?â€
“Kiss my ass.â€
Using Electric Six’s “Gay Bar†as the frenetic musical backdrop for what these two protagonists are going through as they battle one another for supremacy on a scale that only they would care about is pitch perfect. The world doesn’t care, but these guys have the kind of heart that can be amusing, like Gob desperately trying to make a coin trick work. The comment that one of them makes to a woman who agrees to be his assistant when she says that lighting can’t strike twice and counters with, “Well, technically, it can…â€
This is the kind of film I’d like to see when those in the UK get a chance to do so as well.
Director: James Longley
Release: Coming Soon In Limited Release
Synopsis: Iraq in Fragments illuminates post-war Iraq in three acts, building a picture of a country pulled in different directions by religion and ethnicity. Filmed in verité style with no scripted narration, the film explores the lives of ordinary Iraqis to illustrate and give background to larger trends in Iraqi society.
View Trailer:
* Large (QuickTime)
Prognosis: Positive. Before we delve into this trailer, do me a favor and just give a passing glance at this news story right here: http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2922669
I’ll wait.
Now, keeping in mind that our same armed forces are preventing the wholesale detailing of what’s going on over in Iraq, check to see how many newspaper bureaus in America are keeping representatives over there on a 24/7 schedule, along with the reports from fellow journalists over there about what free speech means to guys in APCs with machine guns, and you get a pretty good starting point about how much you think you know of what’s going on within the boundaries of that volatile nation.
“The future of Iraq will be in three pieces…â€
Talk about having Kurt Russell take a chair and sit on your windpipe to get your attention (Any TANGO AND CASH fans in the house?), this trailer opens with chaos only to compose itself ever briefly where we get a real weathered looking man giving us his opinion about where his country is going from where it is today.
We linger just long enough to see the awards this film garnered from the Sundance Film Festival, to say nothing of its Academy Award nomination, providing an excellent pivot point to establish its credibility with an audience.
What makes this trailer at least “feel†different from all the other trailers that have dealt with this Godforsaken war, lest you believe God is genuinely helping us in this effort at which point I’ll pray for YOUR soul, is that we’re not given a lot of explosive action to latch onto. Instead, and this is almost as terrifying, the tense string arrangement that plays underneath men and children going about their daily lives, an Iraqi policeman directing traffic in the open (I’m on edge as I think a bomb is going to go off at any moment) and an unseen man looks like he’s talking about resisting the very same occupiers that are just there to do their jobs and get home to their families.
It’s riveting.
“The movie is a quiet revelation.â€
Yes. That’s exactly the kind of vibe this movie puts out. We seem to be following a young boy around the streets of some city, some place, but we also get views of people cheering in the streets with their flags held high, there seems to be some kind of meeting which no doubt concerns their future in Iraq, some masked men start beating one of their own and, by the end, you have zero idea why you’ve been as captivated as you have been.
Not a shot gets fired, not one bomb goes off, not one voiceover tells me why I should go spend my money on this movie. The visuals stand alone and it’s within these non-narrated pictures that I am able to just concentrate that these Iraqis are all just people, trying to do a job and make it home to their families.
Director: D.J. Caruso
Cast: Shia LaBeouf, David Morse, Sarah Roemer, Carrie-Anne Moss
Release: April 13, 2007
Synopsis: After his father’s death, Kale (Shia LaBeouf) becomes sullen, withdrawn, and troubled – so much so that he finds himself under a court-ordered sentence of house arrest. His mother, Julie (Carrie-Anne Moss), works night and day to support herself and her son, only to be met with indifference and lethargy. The walls of his house begin to close in on Kale. He becomes a voyeur as his interests turn outside the windows of his suburban home towards those of his neighbors, one of which Kale begins to suspect is a serial killer. But, are his suspicions merely the product of cabin fever and his overactive imagination?
View Trailer:
* Large (QuickTime)
Prognosis: Negative. I know I’ve made much of my “respek knuckles†admiration for Even Stevens.
This happy-happy feeling carries over to this trailer as I see that Shia Labeouf is not only making excellent strides to wiggle free of his child star image but with a movie like this you can’t help but at least feel that he’s at least not going to be seen at the local Midas dealership, installing mufflers singing, “Truuust the Miiidas touch.â€
That said, however, I can go on and on about how many movies this flick is cribbing from in one way or another. From AMERICAN BEAUTY, GIRL NEXT DOOR, FRIGHT NIGHT, MEN AT WORK and REAR WINDOW there seems be a menudo soup-like dropping of all these things to make a full-length movie. I’m not so sure it works.
From the outset we get the clue that Shia did something to be placed on house arrest; it’s a pretty nice arrest, as well, because the suburban street he lives on seems awfully detached from any other suburban street I’ve ever lived on. This, I take it, is the point to making the absurd come to life, we’re in the land of make-believe.
“All Kale has is the window…â€
So, Shia, pimpin’ out his ankle bracelet with a totally rad stickers, a skull and flames (Oooh!), decides to entertain himself by lecherously peeping into the lives of his neighbors. By the way, want to know when you’re living in the land of Not Real? You have a svelte honey sunbathing next door and another thin cutie who takes off her clothes in from of open windows. The closest thing I’ve come to that is a view into a house where my Midwest neighbors, who I think didn’t believe in the notion of moderation and exercise, motored down heaps of food every night. I didn’t even want there to be an open window anywhere near my field of vision.
But, Shia hit the lottery with all the cheatin’ and whorin’ on his block, and when he gets spied on by someone he was trying to watch the girl obviously sees no problem with coming on over, by herself, and taking part in the life of a human viewfinder. And, yeah, she’s good looking too.
So, fast forward through all this crap that the girl actually strikes up a relationship with this pervert, again, why couldn’t I have lived on this block, and we come up to a murder. See, when you’re a voyeur you are bound to look upon something that is usually reserved for dark rooms in basements and kill zones that comprise of crawl spaces in the attic. No, this shit goes down for the whole block to see in rather bright fluorescent lighting.
We then speed things up by Shia playing the part of Chicken Little, no one believing him (Oh noes!) about what he’s spied with his eyes, and motor right into everyone becoming a potential next victim for this guy who then takes out Shia’s buddy and lady friend.
Not even the quick clips at the end can make up for what appears to be a very crap story. I can’t even swallow the premise, much less wrap my head around what I am supposed to believe happens when a serial killer lives across the street and no one believes a witness who’s seen everything go down.
Director: Sam Raimi
Cast: Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Thomas Haden Church, Topher Grace, Bryce Dallas Howard, Dylan Baker, Elizabeth Banks
Release: May 4, 2007
Synopsis: A lot of shi# goes down and that’s all you really need to know. Maybe we’ll even find out what happens to all that black and white webbing that’s stuck to the sides of buildings.
View Trailer:
* Large (QuickTime)
Prognosis: Positive. This is an interesting case study of how domestic and international audiences are treated differently. It’s a wonder why this business is so bass ackwards and seeing this just makes one wonder why we’re not given the goods that every other market around the world where English isn’t even the primary language. It’s not about xenophobia, it’s about geeky jollies and our domestic denial of it from the studio.
The opening sequence is extended here where we’re actually allowed to linger a bit and get emotionally attached to Mary Jane and Peter; yeah it’s fake but, I’ll tell you what, that few moments between this pair makes all the difference. The love between these two is wonderfully established and it serves Gwen Stacy’s presence as a real threat later on. The domestic trailer simply glosses over all this pivotal pairing.
Um yeah, and when Peter confides in Aunt May that he’s going to ask Mary Jane to marry him we get a deeper sense of context for the ring that she gives him and he later loses in the air battle between him and Harry. The American trailer just shows us the ring wistfully as if were any other piece of jewelry. It’s not a coincidence that the moment we see the ring now it has more weight. Double kudos for the scene, silence, scene, silence editing for the moments of action between the two of them. Quite effective.
And the air battle! Those little green orbs that are to kill Peter and his quick comedic quip? In seconds we’re in the thick of what’s at stake for both of these men. Domestic trailer? Had all the power of a squirrel fart.
The symbiote’s liquid take-over of Spider-Man’s suit is much better represented here, certainly is a lot more fun watch as it makes its way all over his body, as even the moments where Peter questions its origins, with Dr. Connors’ summation of the black goo, that it amplifies aggression and that it likes Peter, is shockingly sharp and informative and puts to shame the trailer that I thought was the Alpha Beta of trailers just months ago.
The moment where the trailer REALLY kicks up to an 11 is where Peter stares into a mirror only to be met with the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it sinister visage of a howling Venom. It’s angry, it’s vicious and only gets better when he finally tries to get rid of the thing on his body. As Topher Grace not only realizes that Parker is the dark colored Spidey and a drip of Vengance Personified starts to engulf our real favorite actor to come out of That 70’s Show it is the full-blown display of Venom’s rage that gets my Godzilla bucking vote of Best Reveal for 2007. It’s phenomenally evocative and much better than the Sandman storyline in the domestic trailer that now feels awfully secondary to this threat. Oh, and Topher’s “Hey, Parker†as he briefly reveals his humanity, his vampire-colored eyes and teeth, body builder physique and all? Just sweet icing.
There’s more at stake here and even MJ’s admission about what it’s going to take to keep them together as a couple just humanizes this comic book movie even further. It’s the grounding of the most far-flung characters that has ever been stuffed into one picture (you got Sandman, Harry’s Goblin incarnation, Peter’s struggle with the black suit AND Venom) that should make this movie the one sequel to SPIDER-MAN 2 that could actually surpass the legend of the previous entries.
As to why this isn’t the trailer that we Americans are getting in order to get ready for what’s coming and why, as a studio, you would hold back on what you’re giving the domestic market is beyond my ken. I’m damn near insulted at what we were given weeks ago compared to this.
Regardless, THIS is the trailer that’s getting me in the mood to revisit my 5 year-old inner child.
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