Catching Teaser

Get More: 2013 MTV Movie Awards, Latest Movie News, Jennifer Lawrence, Elizabeth Banks

JA from MNPP here, with another example of what's become commonplace these days - the teaser for the trailer for the movie. In this case we have a preview for the trailer premiere of the second Hunger Games movie Catching Fire; the trailer proper will be unvelied during the MTV Movie Awards on April 14th, but for now they're giving us three whole shots amid flashes of fire and "Hosted By Rebel Wilson"-isms. We have a shot of the crowd waiting for Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) and Peeta (Josh Hutcherson), we have Effie (Elizabeth Banks, all cotton-candy'd up) about to lead them onto the stage, and we have a typically forced smile from everlasting sourpuss (with good reason, of course) Katniss as she greets her admirers.

I can't decide if this is more or less egregious an empty promotional tool than that seizure-inducer they released for The Wolverine last week before getting around to the proper trailer; that one had more images for us to look at (including a couple examples of shirtless Hugh Jackman, natch), but it compressed them into just a dozen seconds or so of strobe-like flashes; this one has fewer things for us to look at but it pauses long enough to give each moment a feeliing, a character beat. That robotic waving of Effie's hands, and Jennifer's grimace. (And I'm not the only one already happy to see the latter's face again, right? The Oscars were only a month ago but I already missed her.) And then I can't decide how depressing it is that this is a conversation I'm having with myself. And then I get distracted by another shiny thing and forget my momentary consternation til the next time. Ooh shiny!

12 Word Reviews: "Brave", "Beasts of Southern Wild", "Moonrise Kingdom"

My 1000+ word review of Magic Mike will be up tomorrow but in the meantime, let's clear the cache with a few words, a dozen in point of fact, on movies I didn't review properly.

Beasts of the Southern Wild (Benh Zeitlin)
A six year old girl learns survival lessons from her father in a drowned world. But synopsis won't due its real poetry any justice. See it!
10WR: Overwhelming sense of loss tempered by vivid originality, guileless acting, flexible allegory.  A-
Oscar? I doubted it at an Oscar contender at first (defiantly weird and filled with first timers) but it has tremendous critical approval, and there's nothing else even remotely like it on the filmscape. It's very difficult to shake once you've experienced it. Could factor in across the board or, more likely, fight for a few key nods. Adapted Screenplay might be the safest bet (so far).

Brave (Mark Andrews, Brenda Chapman, and Steve Purcell)
A Scottish princess seeks to transform her fate but the magic she calls on has dangerous repercussions.
10WR: Refreshing steps outside Pixar comfort zones but oddly disjointed. Still... that hair! B
Oscar? A good bet in the Animated Feature category (Pixar has only missed that nomination once -- just last year with Cars 2) but anything beyond that and the music categories will be a tough sell.

What kind of bird are you?

Moonrise Kingdom (Wes Anderson)
Troubled pen pals run away from home (and scout camp) in this darkly sweet tale of adolescent (and adult) loneliness.
10WR: Amusing affectations are balm and escape from real pain.Anderson's second best! B+
Oscar? That brilliant last movement in the end credits, with the narration of Desplat's music could go a long way for selling Best Original Score. But how about Screenplay and Art Direction? Too affected or just right?

People Like Us (Alex Kurtzman)
A young man (Chris Pine) discovers a half sister (Elizabeth Banks) he didn't know existed but keeps the truth from her and his angry recently widowed mother (Michelle Pfeiffer. 
10WR: Strong actresses but uncomfortably incestuous plot bizarrely filmed like an action flick. C-
Oscar? If it's an unlikely hit, Pfeiffer could win traction in Supporting Actress.

poll by twiigs.com

Peace , Love & Misunderstanding (Bruce Beresford)
An uptight depressed lawyer visits her estranged hippie mother and their cultures clash... again.
10WR: Kindhearted with enjoyable if obvious performances. Too programmatic when complexity is needed. C
Oscar? No. Though it sure is nice to see Jane Fonda back onscreen.

Prometheus (Ridley Scott)
A team of scientists seeks our genetic ancestors on a far away planet and discovers the diabolical origins of those pesky acid-blooded creepy crawlies instead.
10WR: Tremendously visual. Intermittently heart-stopping --  that abortion sequence!. Plot is a tough sell.  B
Oscar? We discussed this! 

YOUR TURN in the comments

Yes, No, Maybe So: "People Like Us"

It's time to buy your tickets -- or not -- for a new movie based entirely on its trailer. This one is called People Like Us and stars Chris Pine and Elizabeth Banks (who introduces the trailer... I find it so weird when they do that). The film also stars La Pfeiffer but they weirdly pretend like it doesn't until halfway through. Which also happened with Dark Shadows. Marketing departments clearly think she has no bankability anymore which is depressing. She has a robust online fan community still -- far more than some other 80s superstars -- so it stands to reason that they go see movies if she's in them. Unfortunately there are few case studies to be had. And maybe Hollywood is basing everything on Chéri bombing a few years back?

Let's break it down after the jump.

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Review: Hunger Games

This review was originally published in my column at Towleroad. Congratulations to Towleroad for winning Outstanding Blog at the GLAAD Awards

"The Hunger Games," now in their 74th year, began as a way to punish an uprising against the government. The totalitarian regime of Panem (in what remains of the former United States) maintains total control over the outlying districts. Each of the 12 districts is required to send forth two "tributes" annually, a boy and a girl between the ages of 12 to 18 chosen by lottery. They are shipped to the Capital where they are paraded about and then shipped off to die for the amusement of the masses. Everyone in the nation watches. There are no alternatives in this dystopia. Only one adolescent will live bringing supposed honor (and maybe food?) to their starving district... or so claims the capital. What honor there is in forcing teenagers to kill each other is not a question the Capitol asks itself.

Any similarities that The Hunger Games has to the Japanese classic Battle Royale (2000), which also features schoolchildren forced to kill each other by a totalitarian regime -- only one survivor allowed -- are, according to The Hunger Games author Suzanne Collins, entirely coincidental. Another film in this subgenre, the little seen Series 7: The Contenders (2001) also features mandatory lotteried killing for televised amusement. In short, the ideas are nothing new, just the treatment; these are topics we're obviously grappling with in popular culture in this era of televised "reality" and winner takes all capitalistic vice. The gap between the haves and have nots grows and this dystopia gives it steroids.

"The Reaping" Effie chooses tributes from District 12

When 12 year old Primrose Everdeen (Willow Shields) is named as tribute in "The Reaping" ceremony, her protective sister Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) volunteers to take her place. The district also sends Peeta (Josh Hutcherson) a sweet strong baker's son who Katniss knows a little. Will they kill or be killed? 

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Pretty Panem Princesses

JA from MNPP here. Have you guys seen the bizarre (and wonderful, genius even, if you ask me) merchandizing choices that the team behind The Hunger Games movies have been making? First I assume we all know the basic story, but if not here's the quick take - in a future dystopia, The Hunger Games are a televised battle fought every year by the children of this society's twelve districts. Fought to the death, that is. The survivor of the battle wins food (yes, food) for the starving people of their district. Such a light and airy premise! Happy, happy stuff.

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Anyway this is a big Hollywood movie they're making so they have to make money somehow, and so naturally they have decided that the best way to sell this movie's premise is with nail polish.

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Naturally! Okay a little more context is needed. The first district is The Capitol, and it's a city and it's filled with rich vain types. There are good people and there are bad people there, it's not cut and dry, but there's  a definite focus on the ways in which we distract ourselves with frivolity in the face of the world's horrors. If you've seen the trailer then you've most definitely seen Elizabeth Banks as Effie Trinket, who typifies the people therein. That's her in the ad above, and now there's an entire website devoted to "Capitol Couture" and it looks like any old fashion website. Except, you know, with an undercurrent of violent, horrible death.

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Since the books are very critical of this thoughtless extravagance by the super-rich and the literally life-or-death inequalities deeply embedded within these societies, I've seen a lot of people online who have gotten upset that the movie is using these same kinds of frivolous extravagances as its marketing tools. But I dunno... it seems kind of brilliantly ballsy to me. I haven't seen the nail polish in person but if I'd been the one designing it I'd have really wanted it to say somewhere on the label that this bottle was bottled by only the most downtrodden of serfs, working the most horrible hours you can imagine. And when you're done getting dolled up, you're going to look like a crazy purple clown lady, won't that be just terrific?

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 Can you imagine? But even without getting that explicit, I really do feel as if the nudge is there. Come for the pretty fingernails, and stay for the state-sanctioned murder of innocents! Or am I projecting? What's y'all's take on this?