Weekend Movie Guide: Armond White vs. Pete Hammond

Looks great, doesn’t it?

THIS WEEK: It seems no one wants to open against the Movie That Shall Not Be Named (above), from producer Jerry Bruckheimer (heretofore referred to as “The Antichrist”). Unless you live in NY or LA, which case you can see Woody Allen’s latest, which the critics assure us is more than just another turgid discussion about categorical imperatives.  The good news is, Hesher is still out! See it!  AND, this week’s guide prominently features both Pete Hammond and Armond White. 

Movies Covered This Week: MTSHNBN, Midnight in Paris (NY and LA), Louder Than a Bomb, Horrible Movie Night (LA), Too Big to Fail (HBO).

The Movie That Shall Not Be Named (MTSHNBN): Johnny Depp is back, with MORE EYELINER! MORE SH*T IN HIS HAIR! MORE WINKY SWASHBUCKLING!

ROTTENTOMATOES SCORE: 34%

GRATUITOUS REVIEW QUOTES:

“Marshall deserves props for putting the ‘show’ back into the [MTSHNBN] business. But face it, he’s polishing a giant turd.” -Peter Travers, RollingStone

“YAWNY DEPP” -Headline, NY Post

“Its one real act of piracy is stealing away your excitement.” -Owen Glieberman, EW

“Repetitious, tedious, and pretty much joyless.” -Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel

“Disney should prepare for another huge Pirate’s booty.” -Pete Hammond

“This is the perfect summer movie.” -Pete Hammond

“The best Pirates of them all.” -Pete Hammond

“An exciting blend of clever comedy, swashbuckling adventure and thrilling action, all in brilliant digital 3D.” -Pete Hammond

“Depp is perfect.” -Pete Hammond

“Depp and Cruz sizzle onscreen.” -Pete Hammond

“Box office will be through the roof worldwide, hopefully leading to the beginning of a new trilogy [!!!!] with these irresistible scallywags.” -Pete Hammond

“Rob Marshall uses his background in movie musicals to bring an almost lyrical grace to the mayhem.” -Pete Hammond

While I don’t have any hard proof that the studio paid Pete Hammond for that review, I will say that if he gives that kind of blow job for free he’s a disgrace to whores.

ARMCHAIR ANALYSIS: I missed my MTSHNBN press screening this week, unfortunately.  But based on that clip at the top of the page, I assume the whole thing is Johnny Depp swinging from chandeliers, ruining fancy dinner parties, and juggling a priceless vase while a monkey sidekick covers his eyes.

NEXT PAGE: Midnight in Paris (you won’t want to miss Armond White’s review!)

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS: Woody Allen’s critically-acclaimed new film in which Owen Wilson ditches his wife Rachel McAdams’s turgid discussions about categorical imperatives in the hopes of  discovering the “true Parisien nightlife.”  He’s basically the yuppie Batman.

ROTTENTOMATOES: 91%

“Midnight in Paris is as light as a soufflé, and almost as sweet.” -Claudia Puig, USA Today

“In a film so ripe with temptations for posturing, exaggeration and satirical overacting, nobody is anything less than natural, unpretentious and funny as hell.” -Rex Reed, NY Observer

“This supernatural comedy isn’t just Allen’s best film in more than a decade; it’s the only one that manages to rise above its tidy parable structure and be easy, graceful, and glancingly funny, as if buoyed by its befuddled hero’s enchantment.” -David Edelstein, NY Mag

“The groupie-like celebration of Allen’s doubled-up cultural insecurity and ambition represents a global degradation of culture standards.” -Armond White

“It’s another half-thought-out conceit, like Allen’s dreary 1985 The Purple Rose of Cairo, which traduced all modernist theories about cinema history and cultural projection into a slapstick fiasco that was more sentimental than incisive about Depression-era anomie or the 20th-century condition.” -Armond White

“Linking Gil’s bad attitude with the efflorescence of the early 20th-century’s art adventurers would be insulting if those achievements still mattered to today’s uprooted culture.” -Armond White

“Without Gordon Willis’ harmonious monochrome, cinematographer Darius Khondji’s color overture lacks thematic coherence.” -Armond White

“Allen invokes Gertrude Stein’s genius (casting rotund actress Kathy Bates, yet giving her nothing to do) as carelessly as his once-impudent New Yorker magazine short-story spoofs that helped deflate highbrow tradition by pretending to make it accessible but actually causing it to be dismissed by the mainstream through easy irreverence.” -Armond White

I love you so much, Armond White.  “SCHWARZBAUM IS A DYKE!” I imagine him later adding, dropping the mic and stomping off stage.

ARMCHAIR ANALYSIS: I’ve liked Woody Allen movies before, even a couple of the modern ones, but for some reason I get the feeling I’m going to agree with A-Dubz on this one. ZOMG, I HOPE IT HAS RACHEL MCADAMS’ BUTT.

NEXT PAGE: Louder Than a Bomb

The last thing I want to see is a documentary that humanizes slam poets. I GIVE THIS FILM A SEVEN! (*thunderous finger snaps*)

NEXT PAGE: Too Big to Fail

Too Big to Fail

On Monday, May 23rd at 9:00p.m. ET/PT, HBO Films presents TOO BIG TOO FAIL. The film is based on Andrew Ross Sorkin’s bestselling book of the same name. Directed by Oscar -winner Curtis Hanson (“L.A. Confidential”), the film offers an intimate look at the epochal Wall Street financial crisis of 2008 and explores the inner sanctum of the powerful men and women who decided the fate of the world’s economy in a matter of a few weeks. Centering on Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, the film goes behind closed doors to examine the symbiotic relationship between Wall Street and Washington.

The film’s stellar cast includes stars Oscar-winner William Hurt, seven-time Emmy-winner Edward Asner, Billy Crudup, Paul Giamatti, Topher Grace, Matthew Modine, two-time Emmy-winner Cynthia Nixon, Michael O’Keefe, Bill Pullman, three-time Emmy-winner Tony Shalhoub, and two-time Emmy-winner James Woods.

You’d be hard pressed to find a more talented cast and crew than this, but the more I read about the financial crisis, the more pissed I get that more people aren’t in jail.  And I feel like I’m all stocked up on “impotent rage.”  That said, you had me at “Topher Grace.”  Also looking forward to Khloe Kardashian in “This Ain’t Too Big to Fail XXX.”

NEXT PAGE: Horrible Movie Night

The guy who runs Horrible Movie Night helped us get Parry Gripp on the Frotcast a while back, so I’m happy to plug the latest HMN, a Saturday night screening of Psycho Cop 2 at the Complex Theater in Santa Monica. It looks pretty awesome anyway.

We’ve just added more members of the cast of “Psycho Cop 2”, who will join Adam Rifkin (director), Dan Povenmire (writer), and the psycho cop himself, Bobby Ray Shafer.  They all have gone on to Hollywood greatness, with Adam Rifkin directing (among others) “Mousehunt”, “Detroit Rock City”, and “Look”; Dan Povenmire co-creating the massive cartoon hit for Disney, “Phineas & Ferb”; and Bobby Ray currently featured in “The Office” as Bob Vance the refrigeration guy.

$10, doors at 7:15, rapture or no rapture.

 

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