1988′s odd-couple, road action-comedy Midnight Run was one of my favorite movies growing up, and while I haven’t seen it in at least 15 years, I OWN IT YOU CAN’T CHANGE IT RAPE! RAPE! RAPE! Phew, sorry about that. Anyway, a sequel has been in the works for a while now, and Robert De Niro even agreed to return to star back in… uh… March 2010. Obviously, things have been moving faster than a speeding locomotive since then, and last night Deadline reported that our favorite slovenly, crustacean-loving onanist BRETT RATNER would be directing, from a script by the writers of GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra (who I’m sure have a knack for writing comedy). So, yes, they’ll be hitting you in the nuts with a bat, but on the bright side, at least the bat will have plenty of rusty nails sticking out of it.

Universal Pictures is picking up steam on Midnight Run 2, setting scribes David Elliot & Paul Lovett to rewrite it, and negotiating with Brett Ratner to helm a sequel that has Robert De Niro attached to reprise his role as bounty hunter Jack Walsh.
[The sequel] will continue the storyline of Walsh, the ex-Chicago cop who, when last seen, set free the turncoat mob accountant The Duke at LAX and walked away with a wad of cash he’d use to open a coffee shop. [Deadline]

So… instead of an odd-couple, buddy comedy about cops and mafiosos, it’ll be the story of an aging ex-bounty hunter’s crazy plan to turn a coffee shop around? That sounds more like We Bought a Zoo than Midnight Run, but I bet Ratner has got some great ideas for baked goods.

RATNER: Yeah, so I think the coffee shop should definitely sell, like, empanadas… and pizza rolls, OOH! And definitely those Chicago-style hot dogs, you know those ones that are like over-sized pigs in a blanket… (*starts to trail off as he daydreams, his hand slowly disappears down pants*) Hey, are you Asian?

Tom Cruise says he’ll be in this, as long as there’s no rehearsing.

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For people who don’t like that the Oscars are voted on almost exclusively by old, white men, there’s the Independent Spirit Awards, the awards show voted on almost exclusively by less old while men wearing Buddy Holly glasses. Seriously, most of the guys in this screencap came in the first 30 seconds of the monolog (video below), after which I think the director probably yelled “OKAY, THAT’S IT FOR GUYS IN GLASSES, PULL BACK FOUR, GO TO CAMERA SIX…”

Every year, the Independent Spirit Awards holds its younger, hipper, more casual, more t-shirts-with-sportcoatsy awards show the night before Oscars, and this year was no different. Seth Rogen did a 15-minute monolog, which at times sounded like he was bombing. Believe it or not, a giant warehouse full of loudly-clinking silverware is not the best comedy venue. Weird. Who’d have thought? But he wasn’t bombing, and in fact did pretty well, swearing a lot and even getting in a Brett Ratner dig. That kid’s going places, I tell ya, he’s like a young Billy Crystal. I especially liked the shot of Kirsten Dunst looking around to see if a joke was PC enough for her to laugh.

“I committed to watching all of your movies, that’s one of the things you have to do when you host. And I made it through at least the first five minutes of all of them. Some of them start pretty slow, I can tell you that.”

[The Independent Spirit Awards] have the distinction of being the only awards show that is completely inconsequential, like, literally. This won’t help you get paid anymore either. In fact, if anything, it PROVES you’ll work for nothing, so it f*cks you there.

“And most of all, without awards season, we wouldn’t know what a horrible bigot Brett Ratner is. That was crazy. Seriously, when that happened, was anyone like, ‘What?! Not Ratner!’”

“If this was the Oscars, after every funny joke, they’d have to cut to a shot of George Clooney looking charming. Since it’s the Independent Spirit Awards, they have to cut to Michael Shannon looking creepy.”

Anyway, you can check out the monolog and actual awards after the jump. SPOILER ALERT: they’re almost exactly the same as the Oscars. But it’s nice to see actors getting a free meal for once.

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Ratner judges Crotchfondlemania 2K12

Hot off his GLAAD-sponsored, I-didn’t-really-mean-to-say-rehearsal-was-for-fags apology tour, Brett Ratner is in talks to direct Dwayne and his The Rock-like Johnson in an adaptation of a graphic novel about Hercules for MGM. Now, I know Brett Ratner’s trying to buddy up to the gay community, but Brett Ratner directing The Rock in a Hercules movie sounds so homoerotic that I might have to go into it with a big bucket of buttered amyl poppers. Usually I only bring that out when GSP fights.

Dwayne Johnson is in talks to star in MGM’s “Hercules,” to be directed by Brett Ratner.
Scribe Ryan Condol adapted Steve Moore’s graphic novel “Hercules: The Thracian War,” which debuted in May 2008 via Radical Publishing. [Variety]

I don’t know much about the graphic novel, other than that it’s got a jacked dude wearing a hat made out of a lion’s skull (the foam cowboy hats of olden times). Here’s the description from Amazon:

Nearly 3,200 years ago, a tormented soul walked the Earth as neither man nor god: Hercules, powerful son of the god-king Zeus, and for this he received nothing but suffering. After 12 arduous labors and the loss of his family, this dark, world-weary soul turned his back on the gods, finding solace only in bloody battle. Over the years, he warmed to the company of six similar souls, bonded by their love of fighting and the presence of death never questioning where they go or who they fight, just how much they will be paid. Now the King of Thrace has hired these mercenaries to turn his men into the greatest army of all time, which means training them to be as bloodthirsty and ruthless as their own reputation. It is time for this band of lost souls to finally have their eyes opened to how far they have fallen and the narrow, perilous path to their own redemption.

This is why I can never get into graphic novels. They all seem so thuper theriouth. Anyway, a lot of people say The Rock is trying to follow the career blueprint of Arnold Schwarzenegger. And if that’s true, a Hercules movie is an apt starring vehicle for him. I just hope he gets to fight a bear in it like Arnold did, because that would be amazing.

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Classy move, guy who put Gabourey Sidibe next to the Empire State Building

It’s Tuesday and you know what that means – we’ve got a bunch of new old movies from which to choose for our home viewing pleasure.  This week we’ve got quite an eclectic mix: a couple movies that were snubbed by the Oscar nominations, two of Burnsy’s 10 Worst Films of 2011, some British imports, the usual gems that got lost at the theaters, and a half dozen awful looking amateur grindhouse flicks.

Today’s DVD releases:
Tower Heist
The Son Of No One
J. Edgar
Martha Marcy May Marlene
The Way
The Mighty Macs
London Boulevard
Retreat
5 Star Day
POP-U-larity!
Zaat
Jesus, The Total Douchebag

Click on over to the next page for the details.  To jump straight to some new additions streaming on Netflix, click here.

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Brett Ratner said a lot of things in the lead up to Tower Heist, like that he didn’t know Olivia Munn was Asian, that he “banged her a few times and forgot her,” and most importantly, that he never beat off in front of her while eating shrimp. But the thing that really stuck in peoples’ craw was when he said “rehearsal is for f*gs” at a Tower Heist rehearsal. He ended up resigning as Oscars producer, Eddie Murphy went with him, and now we’ve got Billy Crystal playing Charlie Back-Up Plan.

Well now it’s time to put all that f*g talk in our rear view, and the first stop on the Brett Ratner Redemption Tour is GLAAD, the group that speaks for all gay people, all of the time. Ratner will be directing a series of pro-tolerance videos starring prominent celebrities, though knowing Ratner, I bet they’ll be more like amateur-tolerance videos.

The Tower Heist director met with the organization this weekend in a sitdown that also brought in producer Brian Grazer and directors Adam Shankman and Bryan Singer, GLAAD said Wednesday. (We’ve posted an exclusive photo from the meeting.)

“Working together with GLAAD has been a very positive and enlightening experience for me, and I could not be more pleased to be developing this crucial campaign to help educate people that we all share the same humanity,” Ratner said.

“For instance, I like to masturbate while eating shrimp in front of Asian chicks, but this week I’ve met a number of bros who like to do it in front of androgynous Filipino boys, or hairy Armenians. The important thing to remember is that we’re all one family. When you arouse us, do we not pleasure ourselves with seafood? At the end of the day, that’s what makes us human.”

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