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Check out an extended clip from one of the year's best movies before it arrives on DVD tomorrow.
Along with Amy Adams nabbing the role of Lois Lane and Anne Hathaway slipping into Catwoman's leather ensemble, James Sprader's new gig as the boss of bosses on The Office is among the best casting news we've heard this year. His character, Robert California, was the highlight of the otherwise draggy season finale, alternately entrancing viewers and freaking them out with his creepily intense vibe. It's an acting style that's familiar to any follower of the actor's big screen work. After getting his start mostly playing straight-up assholes in movies like Pretty in Pink and Mannequin, Spader began to take a walk on the wild and weird side around the time of 1987's Less Than Zero and hasn't looked back. Here are his five creepiest roles on the big screen:
Taylor Lautner is Taking It to the Max
Taylor Lautner, the werewolf with the chiseled abs from Twilight: New Moon, has just gotten a franchise of his own. He's been cast as the lead in Max Steel, a film adaptation of a cartoon and toy line from toymaker Mattel. Mattel is probably thrilled to have landed such a red-hot actor, since their He-Man movie seems to be mired in development hell; meanwhile, their chief rival Hasbro already has the Transformers and G.I. Joe franchises, plus Battleship and Monopoly in development. We'd worry about whether Lautner has the chops to carry a franchise -- remember, New Moon is only his fifth movie -- but something tells us he'll do just fine in the not-terribly-challenging role of a teenage kid who gets injected with nanites that make him into a super-powered secret agent. Check out Steel's origin story in condensed form below, then watch all three seasons on Hulu.
Aww, why am I picking on little Post-Grad? This modest movie starring Rory Gilmore and Matt Saracen is completely minding its own business and is totally harmless, but still -- I keep seeing the commercials for it, and I can't helped but be irked by all the things whoever made Post-Grad (the person who directed Shark Tale? And the person who wrote a thing Demi Moore directed?) lifted from Reality Bites.
When you have the ability to purchase a robot duplicate and send it out in the world, why would you make it look exactly like you, except with a floppy, blonde toupée? Omar G. and Pablo G. -- the Flying Gallaga Bros. -- ask that very question while watching the trailer for Surrogates, Bruce Willis' new actioner about people staying in their apartments while sending robots to do the risky stuff, like shopping and driving and going to work. See vloggers Omar and Pablo dissect the logic of this world (via animated surrogates, of course) in the latest installment of Trailers Without Pity, and weigh the drawbacks/benefits of such a lifestyle. Click the link, or watch it below!
By now the omnipresent District 9 buzz has undoubtedly reached you, and you're probably doubting that anything could be as good as people are saying this movie is. And I could sit here and illuminate the things that are wrong with it, but that would be futile -- because ten years from now this movie is going to be considered a classic, and rightfully so. It's a sci-fi movie that doesn't necessarily bust out of its genre roots, but it's far more Escape from New York than Independence Day, and I mean that as high praise. Escape from New York has a lot of flaws, but Escape from New York is also a great movie. So is District 9.
We were delighted to see that Hulu had a nice variety of John Hughes movie clips posted, so we thought we'd share some with you, today, in this time of mourning. Safe for work, unless you work somewhere where they have no souls. ...Or get uncomfortable when Judd Nelson describes teen sex in intimate detail. Or have a strict anti-Anthony Michael Hall policy. (There's a lot of AMH in these clips.)
As a general rule, the only thing I hate more than romantic comedies is talking animal movies. I think I've made that clear. But for some reason there will always be one of the latter every couple of years that has me enthralled from the marketing get-go, which somehow convinces me to fork over my hard-earned cash and sit down in a family-filled theater to watch something really, really dumb. Alvin and The Chipmunks was an example of this inexplicable phenomenon, and I fricking loved it. Loved it. And now it seems G-Force has filled my stupid talking animal movie excitement quota, because I really want to see it. Not that there aren't drawbacks: Penelope Cruz is involved and there's a fart joke in the trailer, but there actually seems to be a lot of good outweighing the bad in this movie. Trailers Without Pity: Gamer
In a world where prisons are overcrowded, and reality shows have gone too far, and men are made slaves for our amusement, and Michael C. Hall is extremely creepy... there are these two guys named Omar and Pablo who have a show where they talk about movie trailers. That show is called "Trailers Without Pity," and this week they're talking about the trailer for Gamer, starring Gerard Butler, Kyra Sedgwick and Michael C. Hall. In it, a kid is able to remote-control convict Butler through a kill-or-be-killed real-life video game, until Butler decides that he wants out to see his family. See what Omar and Pablo think of all this below, or click here!
Chris Columbus has given us a mixed bag. On the one hand, he did the first two Home Alone movies and the first two Harry Potters, and they were all pretty good. On the other hand, he also did Mrs. Doubtfire and Bicentennial Man. Shudder. Well, now he's channeling John Hughes for a teenage romp through the night after graduation, after a nerd declares his love for a hot chick, and the hot chick turns out to actually be kinda cool about it. Pablo and Omar Gallaga are skeptical of the whole affair, as evidenced by the latest installment of their vlog, "Trailers Without Pity." See what they have to say about the ILYBC trailer and Hayden Panettiere's cleavage below, or click here!
What do you think of Beth Cooper? Yeah, that's what we thought.
MOST RECENT POSTS
Attack the Block: Watch An Exclusive Extended Scene (Plus: Q&A With the Director)
Going to (Robert) California: James Spader's Creepiest Performances Before The Office
Taylor Lautner is Taking It to the Max
I Liked Post-Grad Better When It Was Called Reality Bites
Trailers Without Pity: Surrogates
For Once You Can Actually Believe the Hype: A Spoiler-Free District 9 Review
Hulu Remembers John Hughes Through the Magic of Video
Why G-Force is a Must-See Film
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