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Frankly My Dear...

    Frankly My Dear...

    Tyler Perry to do ‘The Marriage Counselor’

    Posted: 23 Sep 2011 04:17 AM PDT

    Just when you might have thought that Tyler Perry was pushing his plays-to-films formula to bed, making the leap to playing Detective Alex Cross, producing “Precious,” directing “For Colored girls.”

    Lionsgate announces “Not so fast.” His 13th film for the studio — and they’ve all been moneymakers, some less than others — will be based on his 2008 play “The Marriage Counselor.” It’s about a couple, the wife being a marriage counselor, who have their own marital issues.

    A real horse race at the box office this weekend

    Posted: 23 Sep 2011 03:46 AM PDT

    Can Brad Pitt open a movie, REALLY open a movie? It’s been a while since he’s tried. “Moneyball” is his best Oscar shot since “Benjamin Button,” and I think, a better movie. VERY good reviews, overall, for this one. But will his fans, his FEMALE fans, show up for a baseball picture? A $15 million-plus take would be a “win.”

    Same with Taylor Lautner. Can he open a movie on his own? Weak reviews for “Abduction” won’t necessarily kill his first picture as the lead. But without R. Patts and K. Stew, will the Twihards show up? Again, a $15 million-plus take would be a good thing.

    I figure everybody whose kids wanted to see “Lion King” in 3D saw it last weekend. The Guru figures otherwise. A 30-40% falloff might put it, “Moneyball” and “Abduction” in the same mid-to-upper-teens take at the box office.

    “Killer Elite” is a guys’ action picture, with enough Jason Statham-Clive Owen footage to interest their female fans. Very violent, terrific dialogue, mixed to poor reviews. Not a lot of box office potential, though. $10-12 million, U.S.

    And the wild card is the new, Florida-filmed family picture, “Dolphin Tale.” Charles Martin Smith’s stock could go way up if that thing does what I figure — $20-ish. The Guru thinks that’s way high, but since kids’ pictures are harder to predict, I am guessing high. It’s pretty good, in the “Free Willy” vein. Touching. It works. I hope it does well. My kids enjoyed it.

    My take on the tale of the tape — “Dolphin Tale,” “Moneyball,” “Lion King,” “Abduction,” “Killer Elite.”

    Movie Review: Abduction

    Posted: 22 Sep 2011 09:01 PM PDT

    "Twilight" alumnus Taylor Lautner makes his debut as a leading man in an action film tailor-made — ahem — for him. "Abduction" puts Lautner in motion and never goes very far wrong as long as he remains in motion.

    The buff teen werewolf of "Twilight" plays a young man who has his world upended and finds himself on the run when enemy agents attack his home and the people he knew as his parents aren't who they say they are. In the opening minutes, we meet Nathan (Lautner), a  studly wrestler in high school, constantly tested by his strict and martial dad (Jason Isaacs), nurtured by his more understanding mom (Maria Bello).

    If only they knew how he "surfed" on the hood of a pal's pickup truck, how he gets blotto at teen beer busts. Dad finds out and punishes the kid with more mixed martial arts training. No wonder the boy’s in therapy. Sigourney Weaver is there to listen when Nathan complains that "I still have the dreams."

    But a class project with his elusive, unavailable neighbor (Lily Collins, eyebrows to die for) sends them to a missing-children website. That's where they find a toddler photo of Nathan, reported as "missing." And in asking about that, the teens trigger an explosion of revelations about Nathan’s past and a desperate escape that sends boy and girl on the lam, with no idea of who is after them or who they can trust.

    Nathan fights and struggles to outsmart the folks chasing him: Michael Nyqvist of "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" and Alfred Molina. And Lautner, who came of age in the obscenely successful "Twilight" films, struggles to make his acting as effortless as his fights. As Nathan, he asks his mom, "Are you my mother?" Compare his stone-faced asking of the question with Bello’s rich, warm, alarmed way of playing the reaction: "You don’t understand, baby. It’s complicated."

    Director John Singleton is more concerned with the fights and chases than the human interplay between his two attractive young leads. Collins, daughter of singer Phil and the future Snow White, manages moments of pathos.

    "Are we going to die, Nathan?"

    Lautner remains impassive.

    But the script and Singleton see to it that Molina’s performance delivers a light touch, and the younger players never let us lose the sense that we’re dealing with young people who don't know how to process all this information that’s been thrown at them. Lautner seems in over his head because that’s the way Nathan should react.

    With its violence, underage drinking, reckless behavior and profanity, "Abduction" falls in the same corner of the youth market as the "Twilight" movies. Some moments and many lines ("Sometimes, I feel like a freak.") feel cribbed from that series.

    And with a plot that most adults will stay a step or two ahead of,  "Abduction" isn’t going to challenge anybody who has seem more than one "on the lam" picture. But Lautner, as action hero, doesn’t embarrass himself, not by a long shot. He may not play the tender moments like an old pro. But then again, neither have Arnold, Sly or Jason Statham.

    MPAA Rating: PG-13 for sequences of intense violence and action, brief language, some sexual content and teen partying

    Cast: Taylor Lautner, Lily Collins, Alfred Molina, Michael Nyqvist, Sigourney Weaver, Maria Bello, Jason Isaacs

    Credits: Directed by John Singleton, written by Shawn Christensen. A Lionsgate release.

    Running time: 1:46

    Movie Preview: The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

    Posted: 22 Sep 2011 12:30 PM PDT

    Here’s the newest trailer. Not a lot of new footage (I caught most of this in a trailer I saw in a theater a few weeks back). Still looks good. As good as the original? Not yet. Maybe they’re saving the best stuff.

    ‘Monster’ director might direct ‘Thor 2′?

    Posted: 22 Sep 2011 12:23 PM PDT

    Every now and again I think of Patty Jenkins, who did such a marvelous job directing “Monster,” the Charlize Theron Oscar winner and the finest movie ever shot in Orlando.

    And usually I think, “Whatever happened to Patty Jenkins?” You direct an Oscar winning indie drama, the world should be your oyster, right?

    Not so much. A little TV directing, here and there. Did she not get the credit she deserved? Did she try a lot of projects that didn’t get off the ground? Other things take precedence in her life.

    She struck me as the uncompromising type, determined to go her own way. Maybe not, but that’s how she came across when I met her on-set back in 2003-2004.

    Now her name has come up as a possible director for “Thor 2.”

    Knock me over with a feather. Doesn’t seem like her thing, but Kenneth Branagh wasn’t exactly superhero movie proven (he had done that  “Frankenstein,” similar in scale) when he signed on, and he did a bang-up job, for the most part.She could use a break.

    Weinstein picks up Sean Penn glam rock drama

    Posted: 22 Sep 2011 06:35 AM PDT

    We’ve been seeing images of Sean Penn, looking ever-so-feminine in “This Must Be the Place,” and now we know we’ll get to see the movie.
    The Weinstein Co. has picked it up.

    He plays an aging cross-dressing glam rocker in the film, settling his “daddy issues” by looking for his father’s executioner. Frances McDormand and Judd Hirsch also star.

    The Weinstein Company (TWC) announced today that it has acquired from the producers Lucky Red, Indigo Film and Medusa Film all rights to THIS MUST BE THE PLACE for North America. The Italian/French/Irish co-production from award-winning director Paolo Sorrentino (IL DIVO, THE CONSEQUENCES OF LOVE) premiered at this year's Cannes Film Festival, as part of the official selection.

    THIS MUST BE THE PLACE, starring Sean Penn and written by Sorrentino and Umberto Contarello, tells the story of an aging rock star on a journey of self-discovery. The film is produced by Nicola Giuliano and Francesca Cima for Indigo Film, Andrea Occhipinti for Lucky Red and Medusa Film in co-production with ARP in France and Element Pictures in Ireland in association with Pathè International, Italian leading banking group Banca Intesa and the support of Eurimages and the Irish Film Board.