The TV Addict 

I know, I know. Didn’t we just have a trailer round-up last week? Well, that’s the thing about the summer season starting to rev up. The internet pretty much explodes with visually stimulating previews meant to entice you into forgoing all social interactions for some time in a darkened theatre. Or, depending on the film, convincing you to stay home instead.

TROPIC THUNDER – Red Band (NSFW)
I want to like Ben Stiller. He’s done enough good here and there that I want to like him (“Nobody makes me bleed my own blood”), but he just makes it hard by playing the same character over-and-over again and relying on the same comedic shtick (it goes something like this – just in French). It seems with TROPIC THUNDER he’s hit on something though. Not only does the film seem genuinely funny, it seems like it’s a dead on satire of war films and their productions, and impressively (and surprisingly) has more than a little bite, mocking action stars wanting to go dramatic, method actors, and … well, Eddie Murphy. On another note, I noticed in the credits that Ethan Coen helped write this script? How did I not know this till now? That’s amazing!

CITY OF EMBERS
I hadn’t even heard of this film till last week when a poster was revealed, and now this week its trailer. What impresses me most is that it feels like an amalgam of various genres I love. You get the post-apocalyptic feel of an underground city, yet the apocalyptic tension of it dying out on account of a power crisis. In a weird way it’s a prison break movie, but also a NATIONAL TREASURE like scavenger hunt for clues to actually escape. Finally, it’s got a fun, adventure-filled family film tone, but with the dark, industrial look of a film like Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s THE CITY OF LOST CHILDREN. Also you can’t help but look fowrad to Bill Murray, who is so awesome, I’m going to go ahead and consider him a genre.

THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR
I was moderately looking forward to THE MUMMY 3, but this trailer seems to want to talk me out of that. Why? It’s the incredibly lame, over-wrought voice-over (also, do we really need to be informed that this film comes from “Universal Pictures and the producers of THE MUMMY and THE MUMMY RETURNS?”). It’s the fact that it just breaks my heart to see Jet Li and Michelle Yeoh being wasted in Hollywood. It’s also the problem that having Rick O’Connell and company face yet another mummy is stretching things, not helped at all by the fact that it seems like the film tries to make fun of itself for it (“I hate mummies. They never play fair”). In the end, there’s too much of a been-there-done-that vibe to it that I find my interest quickly dissipating.

THE INCREDIBLE HULK International Trailer
I alluded to this when I posted the last INCREDIBLE HULK trailer, but now it’s getting tired and worn out. We get it. The film has a lot of action in it. It’s not at all like Ang Lee’s film. It’s getting old. I mean at this point these trailers intended effect on viewers is about as a subtle as … well, The Hulk.

AUSTRALIA
Though MOULIN ROUGE and ROMEO + JULIET were both films that became garishly annoying on second viewings, it looks like Baz Luhrman has settled down a bit for AUSTRALIA as this trailer reveals. His visual flair is still there, as this film is quite clearly gorgeous, it’s just not so hyperkinetic as his other works. I’m also looking forward to the film because it looks like a rousing amalgam westerns like RED RIVER, with some of the epic grandeur of GONE WITH THE WIND, or GIANT.

VICKY CHRISTINA BARCELONA
These days a good Woody Allen film is something worth celebrating, and if pre-buzz (including this review) is any indication, VICKY CHRISTINA BARCELONA – along with MATCH POINT – may just be one of his best in years. It’s also got a damn sexy cast, including Penelope Cruz, Scarlett Johansson, Patricia Clarkson, Javier Bardem , and Rebecca Hall (whom I developed a crush on in STARTER FOR 10). Oh yeah, and you may have heard – and in a moment see – that there’s a threesome, and a girl on girl kiss. If that’s your thing.