From what we hear, the movie adaptation of Hunter S. Thompson’s The Rum Diary has been finished for more than a year, just sitting around waiting for a release. It’s finally set to open October 28th, and now it has a trailer. And not a moment too soon. Johnny Depp was dangerously close to becoming permanently known as “that guy from the Bruckheimer movies with all the accessories.” Anyway, it’s nice to see him back drifting towards anarchy, poverty, and craziness, trying to live a decent life without hiring himself out as a Judas goat and all that.

Directed by Bruce Robinson, the cast is pretty insane, starring Depp as the newbie ex-pat Puerto Rican journalist Kemp, Richard Jenkins as Lotterman, Aaron Eckhardt as Sanderson, Amber Heard as Sanderson’s fianceé, and Giovanni Ribisi as Moberg (a character who gets blackout drunk and the next morning locates his car by smell — a man after my own heart), who I hear steals the show. So, from what we know, a real movie with a real cast and a real story. It’s nice to see that someone finally got around to actually releasing it between movies about explosions, aliens, and the military. The book it’s based on is quite popular, and I’m told there’s even a climactic rape scene that they reenact every year at the Puerto Rican Day Parade. What? I kid, I kid.

BOOM. MOTHERF**KIN BEDAZZLED TORTOISE, SON!

This is the second trailer for Let Me In (much longer than the first), Matt Reeves’ American remake of Tomas Alfredson’s Swedish vampire hit, Let the Right One In.  The no-foreigners version stars Chloe Moretz of Kick-Ass, Richard Jenkins, and Kodi Smit-Mcpussyname.  I know, I know, remaking a recent, successful foreign movie using an American cast and the director of Cloverfield sounds like a terrible idea.  But as my buddy Pete says, subtitles are hella gay.  And is it just me, or does this actually look not that bad? It has pretty visuals, and they even managed to make Richard Jenkins look like a scary child molester:

It’s impressive, because despite the pock marks, Richard Jenkins is usually the type of guy who could give your kid a candy and you let them eat it without even checking for hypos first.  He’s like that old lady who you’re mean to because she’s weird looking, but you later find out she was actually Jesus, and now you’re cursed. That was my favorite bible story.

Also, is it just me, or does that second poster look a little… menstrual?

[posters via CinemaBlend, trailer via Vulture]

A few weeks ago, there was some confusion as to the status of the Johnny Depp-starring Rum Diary movie, written and directed by Bruce Robinson, adapted from the Hunter S. Thompson novel.  The story was that it wouldn’t be finished in time for Cannes next month, which was worrisome considering it had been shooting more than a year ago.  Well worry no longer, because it’s at least finished enough to have a test screening in Huntington Beach last night.  FilmDrunkard Rob was there to tell us about it, because it’s not like he had anything better to do:

I was approached by the test screener creepers who hang out after flicks, and when he said Rum Diary, I practically snatched the invitation out of his hand.  I almost f*cked it up for myself though, saying I was in the industry and they weren’t gonna let me in.  But then I told em I’m still but a lowly student in a documentary filmmaking class and busted out my old ID card for good measure, thanking my lucky stars I still hold on to that relic.

The Scoop: It’s not Fear and Loathing, but that’s OK. Depp’s rendition of a younger Hunter has all the familiarity we love, but he’s not familiar with the drugs yet, still just a boozehound, forming his greater ideals.  His sidekick this time around is an alright dude [Aaron Eckhart as Sanderson, I believe. -Ed.], no Benicio that’s for damn sure.  But it’s Giovanni Ribisi who steals the show*. You see in Ribisi’s degenerate, Nazi sympathizing, junkie state, the beginnings of Hunter/Kemp’s drug aspirations. His every line is quotable and his every appearance is like a surprise mugging – but by cuddly unicorns, which turns out alright in the long run.  Lastly, Amber Heard (pictured) is the mermaid of my dreams, but you can tell the upper brass had a field day in the cutting room, leaving all gratuitous nudity on the floor, being one of the only detriments to the film.

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Bruce Robinson is writing and directing The Rum Diary, based on the Hunter S. Thompson novel, with Johnny Depp attached as the lead and Amber Heard as his slutty, er, free-spirited love interest.  Just joining the cast is Richard Jenkins (as Depp’s boss at the newspaper), with Aaron Eckhart supposedly close to a deal.

“Eckhart would play the third element of the central love triangle, which also involves Depp and Heard. “Diary” is the tale of Paul Kemp (Depp), a washed-up, hard-drinking journalist in 1950s Puerto Rico. Eckhart would play Sanderson, a wealthy landowner who believes everything has a price and introduces Kemp to a different standard of living. [Yahoo]

Eckhart’s a perfect choice for Sanderson, a slick PR rep.  Just look at that chin.  I’d do anything it told me.  What’s that, chin?  Buy your detergent?  Help stop gang violence?  Make a skin suit out of the neighbor?  Anything! I know you’d never steer me wrong!  …You know what I’d do if I had that chin?  Two chicks.  Boosh.

This is the trailer for The Visitor, playing at the SXSW festival in Austin, which also screened at Sundance.

Written and directed by Tom McCarthy, the man behind 2003’s quirky-cute The Station Agent, the plus side of this one is that it looks like it actually has a plot.  The downside?  This is what people are saying about it:

Official Synopsis: …in a world of six billion people, it only takes one to change your life.

CinemaBlend: …in its best moments, the film is a celebration of the transformative power of music, as elderly, worn down Walter learns the drums from an energetic and likable illegal immigrant.

Cinematical: …the result is a movie with a message, sure, but it works even better as a touching look at a lonely man who finds some warmth, friendship and affection in the most unexpected of places: His own forgotten apartment.

This reminds me of the time I dressed up like a Care Bear and made love to a unicorn under a rainbow.  The transcendancy of the moment was so luminescent that it could only be matched by sunlight reflected in the early morning dew of a spring meadow, or in the glow of a Thomas Kinkade painting.