Ten movies you should watch instantly off of Netflix

Thanks to some clever synergy between TiVos, Xbox 360s and Roku boxes, Netflix's streaming features have become easier and easier to take advantage of if you have a subscription. The main issue however is that 95% of their films are throwaway direct-to-DVD comedy movies or pieces from the '80s that are best left forgotten. However, there are quite a few gems in their 30,000 or so movies that they have available and here are the ones you totally need to check out on a lazy sunday.

1. Batman: The Movie

After seeing The Dark Knight, its pretty easy to forget the pitfalls that the Batman franchise has been through before the mature Christopher Nolan reboot of the franchise. The plot of the 1960s Batman movie involved around an exploding shark and The Penguin's plan to use a powder based dehydrated team of pirates to take on Batman and Robin after he snuck them into their lair and poured water on them. Its a horrible movie that hasn't passed the test of time at all...and that's why you should watch it.

2. Persepolis

On a more serious note, if you're an animation fanboy that's declared hand drawn is dead, you obviously haven't seen Marjane Satrapi and Vincent Paronnaud's adaptation of Persepolis. The film serves as both a coming of age story and a tale of the Iranian Revolution, all done in a beautiful hand inked style with the occasional scene in Adobe AfterEffects. The English dub with Iggy Pop was really well done too, but Netflix currently only offers it with subtitles in its original French form.

3. Boiler Room

On the surface, this looks like your average beef-headed financial drama with montages set to hip hop music and an occasional appearance by Vin Diesel. While in one sense, this wouldn't be too far from the truth but on the other, Boiler Room is a fantastically stylized drama about the morally bankrupt and fast paced world of brokerage firms. Its an exciting movie, and the chances are you've never seen it.

4. Confessions of a Superhero

If you have Netflix set up for an Xbox 360 or TiVo, you'd be able to catch this one in HD. This one follows the dreams and aspirations of costumed panhandlers on the Hollywood strip, its quirky and touchy at the same time and totally worth it if you're into strange documentaries.

5. Sukiyaki Western Django

This "western" film comes from none other than Takashi Miike, the director of the cult slasher film Ichi the Killer. The most interesting aspect of this Japanese film is that the entire movie is spoken in English despite none of the actors being particularly fluent in the language. Without subtitles, this movie will have an odd 1950s Godzilla vibe where unintentional humor arrises from the awkwardness of the movie. Yet, this would sell the movie short at the same time, Sukiyaki Western Django features a distinctly vivid color palette and features some really nice action scenes and over the top violence. Also, Quentin Tarantino's cameo in the first five minutes of the film makes it worth a viewing alone.

6. Lupin the 3rd: The Castle of Cagliostro

This is Hayao Miyazaki's first film but its also Steven Spielberg's favorite adventure movie. While the movie lacks a lot of the themes you'd expect judging on Miyazaki's later works such as Princess Mononoke or Spirited Away, it still features the same token flight scenes and expressions most anime fanboys have come to expect. Its a really fun movie too.

7. Outsourced

Another HD streaming film, Outsourced is a culture-clash comedy and a love story centered around a cocky man whose sent to India on a job selling cheap American pride paraphernalia. If you haven't seen this I HIGHLY recommend you do, its satirical without being disrespectful of Indian culture. Worth seeing if you've already captured the Indian fever from Slumdog Millionaire and Sita Sings the Blues.

8. The King of Kong

I've seriously seen this movie over thirty times and I'm still up for watching it when people are around. This documentary tells the story of a modest middle school science teacher who gets the world high score in the classic Arcade game Donkey Kong. Little did he know he'd get caught up in a controversy involving a porn star who calls himself "Mr. Awesome" and would ultimately get his score disqualified by possibly the closest you could come to a real life version of Ben Stiller from the Dodgeball movie. This is a hilarious and uplifting documentary that's sure to touch the 30 year old man child in all of us.

9. Pee-Wee's Big Adventure

In the spirit of The Castle of Cagliostro being visionary director Hayao Miyazaki's first film, Pee-Wee's Big Adventure was the first movie from superstar director Tim Burton. This movie introduced Pee-Wee Herman to the masses and was quite a funny romp at the same time too and Danny Elfman's score is as good as ever.

10. Grindhouse: Double Feature

Much of the buzz on Grindhouse died down after the film was a box office flop. Fanboys loved it but the decision to release both films separately on DVD sans the fake trailers from Edgar Wright and Eli Roth. With this the strength of the presentation was gone and you'd soon learn that Death Proof was no more than an "average" Quentin Tarantino film and Planet Terror was no where near the quality of the George Romero films it was inspired by. Luckily, thanks to Starz you can now finally watch the movie in the theatrical version that captured the hearts of a generation of fanboys.

Indie-Darling High School President Gets Assassinated from Theaters

Following the distributor, Yari Film Group's bankruptcy the film Assassination of a High School President may not get a true theatric run but rather a release direct-to-DVD. While I can't directly speak on the quality of the film, as I haven't seen it the reviews and buzz from critics and bloggers alike have been overwhelmingly positive and there's no reason this film does not deserve to see the proper light of day when rubbish like Miss March is released every week (sorry Ezra).

So what's a film geek to do? Become a fan of the film on Facebook and add the title to your Netflix queue. Pass the word along on your blog, Twitter, Tumblr, whatever to let the studio know your interested. Also check out the teaser trailer below.



source: SlashFilm

New Up Trailer Continues to Look Awesome

While the previous Up trailer teased the premise of Pixar's next movie, this is the first one to reveal the details of the plot and even give us a brief glimpse of a villain slated to appear in the latter half of the movie. Check out the full trailer below, and make sure to click that swank HD button.

Watchmen's Opening Titles

Still unsure about Watchmen after reading Pat's glowing review last night? Fair enough. Today the animation blog, Motionographer posted the complete opening credits to Watchmen. I'd recommend you check it out, it establishes the humor and rules of the Watchmen universe quite immediately and is rather stylish to boot. Even the snobby review that The New Yorker wrote for Watchmen mentioned how good this sequence was if you don't take our word for it.

YouTube Pick of the Week: Watchmen as a Saturday Morning Cartoon

Later tonight Pat will deliver the full review of Watchmen but in the meantime, check out the Watchmen gang as a Saturday Morning Cartoon. I don't think Alan Moore would approve.

Review: MY BLOODY VALENTINE 3D

Horror films have been in a bit of a rut lately, with most movies being a remake of sorts (Asian or of the '80s slasher variety) or low-budget torture porn movies often followed with a number of sorts in yearly installments. While the movies are still popular in their niche the films are often critically panned and ignored by the general public. With a tag line of "Nothing says 'date movie' like a 3D ride to hell" you'd either ironically want to see it or label it as another stupid horror remake and ignore it completely. I'm pleased to say both reactions would be perfectly acceptable and depending on which one you've chosen you'd know whether or not its worth seeing this movie.



Seeing My Bloody Valentine 3D was a surreal experience. It's the kind of movie that you'd completely forget about upon leaving the theater but have fond memories of it anyway. The plot follows around a sheriff in a small mining town ten years after a miner brutally massacred a bunch of teenagers with a pick-axe. After the murderer was shot dead and buried by the cops, the small mining town became a tourist attraction of sorts from the popularity of the horror story. Now the killer has mysteriously returned while in the meantime the hot shot sheriff is suspicious that his wife has been cheating on him. Don't expect any more set-up than that during the film's short sans credits 90 minute run time.

If your expecting a thriller with elaborately crafted scares, you might as well stop reading this review now half the theater was laughing at any given time during the movie. My Bloody Valentine 3D NEVER takes itself seriously and as a result almost turns into a weird parody of the current horror remake scene, playing off of every single 3D gimmick in the process. The original 1981 My Bloody Valentine was not a horror classic by any means and if taken seriously this could have just been another forgettable remake much like last spring's Prom Night.

Without spoiling anything, the events revolve around the death of a woman who's only function in the film was to be naked for five or so minutes. The scene is ridiculous and we keep on getting glimpses of the sheriff re-watching the suggestive witness tape throughout. A lot of the characters would shout at sporadic moments and scenes that would supposed to be dramatic would drag on way longer than they should for comedic effect. At one time the sheriff stood by the grave and argued whether or not the killer was actually dead for upwards of 10 minutes, usually repeating the same "are you SURE he was dead?" line again and again.

If you've enjoyed Snakes on a Plane and are tired of catching up on the underwhelming Academy Award nominees grab ahold of some sarcastic friends and a $2 REAL-D surcharge and you'd be up for a fantastic time. Just don't expect to think much.

Pushing Daisies movie a possibility, right after Arrested Development movie gets re-uncanceled

Bryan Fuller's Pushing Daisies has been a hit with the critics but ultimately after the first season was cut short from the writer's strike, the viewership has dwindled ever since. Luckily as with other cult shows Firefly and Arrested Development the possibility of a movie is very possible with the cast seeming to be committed as well as a desire to close all the loose ends from the second half of season 2 after its abrupt cancellation.

TV Guide revealed that Fuller is only really interested if he could get all six members of the cast back together. With all the former members going on to future projects, that could become increasingly difficult. Rumor states that with the Arrested Development movie much of the delay is focused around actor Micheal Cera who's recently pulled himself onto the A-list with hit films Juno and Superbad.

With the remaining three episodes of the second season of Pushing Daisies being held back by ABC and with the last episode staying on a cliffhanger there is a strong possibility that we'll see more of this series in the future. Currently Bryan Fuller's Dead Like Me is getting a direct-to-DVD movie five years after its cancellation, so this can very well be the case for Pushing Daisies.

Chris's 10 most anticipated of 2009

Okay, I admit it. I'm starting to feel a little guilty with all these lists I've done lately but when the biggest news of the day is Bride Wars tracking stronger than Marley and Me in the box office, I'd much rather think about the good movies to come than sulk over the current movie rut. I guess last year we had Cloverfield at this time...that movie was awesome.

10. My Bloody Valentine 3-D


"Nothing says Date Movie like a 3D ride to hell", with a tagline like that this movie knows it will fall squarely in the guilty pleasure category. Like most of Lion's Gate's back catalog I am absolutely positive that this film will be roasted by the critics, and for good reason too. This film will likely have very little suspense and consist mostly of gimmicky thrills and projectiles thrown at the camera, however that is the exact reason I want to see this movie. Unlike similar gimmick films like Journey to the Center of the Earth in 3D where thrills are delivered by the way of a T-Rex drooling on the camera this is the first 3D slasher film in a VERY long time like at least since that horrible Friday the 13th Part III: 3D...and I'm positive Jason X would have been quite awesome had it been released in 3D.

9. 9


Yeah, that's right, I just put the film 9 as my number 9 most anticipated film of 2009. Opportunity aside, this film is shaping up to look quite awesome as anyone who's seen the original short film (available on The Animation Show Vol. 1 and you can easily find it on video sharing sites like YouTube) this is a top tier high concept film on a very small budget. This is also the first 3D animated feature where I can't imagine any of the characters showing up in a Happy Meal, while this film will likely be safe for families very few 3D feature films have been this artistic (notable exception being 2008's WALL-E). Also, with Tim Burton and the director of Wanted backing the piece as producers I'm pretty sure this will turn out quite well.

8. Funny People

This is the first Judd Apatow directed film since the fantastic Knocked Up and The 40-Year-Old Virgin. While this man has built a comedy empire for himself as a producer on great comedies such as Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Superbad as well as the horribly mediocre Drillbit Taylor, this is his first time in the director's chair in a couple of years. With his longtime talent Seth Rogen and his friend Adam Sandler on board this will likely do well in the box office (Sandler could star in the most braindead comedies in the world and still reach #1) but this also seems like Apatow's most serious piece in his entire canon being more of a look inside the world behind stand-up comedy as opposed to a straight-up dramedy.

7. Monsters vs. Aliens


Coming straight off the heels of the surprisingly good Kung-Fu Panda and the unsurprisingly awful Shrek The Third, Dreamworks is slowly building up its reputation from just "the guys who did Shrek" to its own breed to 3D animated comedy. Despite coming from the director of the abysmal Shark Tale this one's actually shaping up to look like an incredibly fun movie, 3D or not.

6. Star Trek


I've never been a big fan of Star Trek there is just too much back story and fandom behind it for me ever to grasp its Forbidden Planet inspired universe. That is until now, J.J. Abrams the creator of Lost and the producer of last year's low budget monster hit Cloverfield will tackle the next to impossible task of relaunching Star Trek to a modern audience which will eventually lead into a new TV series. There's a lot of pressure behind this title but if the first trailer is any indication, I'm actually pretty excited. Plus, I get to see Zachary "Sylar" Quinto as Spock and as a Heroes fanboy, that's worth the price of admission alone.

5. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen


I have a weird love-hate relationship with the Transformers franchise. When I saw it in theaters I knew it was the typical Michael Bay trashy film but between all the shaking seats, lame jokes, overacting and explosions I was able to see it as the ultimate "guy" movie with a solid 90 minutes of giant robots smashing things in the tail-end of the film and a good 20 minutes of the camera solely ogling over Megan Fox. Yet on DVD I can't sit through the movie at all, maybe its because all the novelty of its visual tour-de-force is lost on the 42 inch and it makes all the dialogue and characters (which the movie lacked) come out more. With all the exposition of the first movie out of the way, I'm certain Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen will deliver two and a half hours of robots crushing things except this time its in IMAX 3D so any additional headache from the mindlessness of the film will be multiplied by the fact that your watching the entire thing with 3D glasses on a two story screen. Yeah, and that's a good thing

4. Avatar

I have to be honest, I know absolutely nothing about this film apart from the fact that its from James Cameron. With a resume as versatile as Terminator 2, Aliens and the Titanic the chances are that this will be a pretty awesome film. Cameron also claims that this will be the first 3D animated motion captured film that will bridge the gap of the uncanny valley. A bold claim but at the same time I never noticed the 3D animation used for the second half of Harvey Dent's face in The Dark Knight and I thought the first hour of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was produced using very elaborate make-up. I've been fooled before and this one will fool me with a pair of 3D glasses, which is always a plus.

3. Coraline


With so many 3D animated movies on the list its great to see a stop-motion animated film come out that looks every bit as promising as its 3D counterparts. This film pairs together Henry Selick (Nightmare Before Christmas, James and the Giant Peach among others) and popular sci-fi fantasy writer Neil Gaiman together for a horror comedy romp that at the very least will wind up on hoodies sold at Hot Topic in a couple of years. This movie will also be released for 3D glasses (notice a trend?) but its the first animated one that is actually shot in 3D. If you've read the book you'd know what kind of eccentricity is in store and the visuals that the plot would entail.

2. Watchmen

I'd have to disagree with Mark on this one, I'm confident that Warner Bros. has enough lawyers behind this one that it will certainly reach its 2009 release date. Either that or they'd pay Fox some royalties and get this out, this movie is too big to hold off for a year and with Harry Potter being the only other major Warner Bros. release of the year they definitely need a few other heavy hitters because none of their films will ever be as big as The Dark Knight in a very long time. Watchmen looks like it has everything that 300 and Sin City had in terms of style but it also has a great plot to top it off too. Despite the trailer using a song made for Batman and Robin, this will be pretty amazing.

1. Up
Not to sound like a Pixar fanboy but this senior citizen action adventure film looks like one of the most solid releases of the year. Like several others on this list, this one will be released in 3D but this is the only 3D film on the list that I wouldn't mind to watch on a screen in 2D, the visuals and plot look strong enough to hold their own. Pete Doctor's last film, Monster's Inc. was the funniest of all the Pixar movies and his localization of Howl's Moving Castle was better than watching the film with subtitles. I'll be the first in line.

Honorable mentions:

Astroboy

I REALLY want this one to be good and I'm sure it will deliver but it just doesn't look as much as a surefire hit as the other animated movies its up against. I'm a huge fan of Tezuka's manga though and the film Metropolis prooves that his work is as good for film adaptation as anything else.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

2008 called, it wants its movie back.

Chris Cookson's Top Five of '08

5. Tokyo Gore Police/The Machine Girl (tie or double-feature extravaganza)

Merry Christmas from The Movie Watch

Alongside the Christmas tree, Nativity Sets, Wreaths and Cookies, nothing defines the Christmas season more than the movies that are traditionally aired year after year on Television. Each year, November has at least a two or three Christmas movies with some being forgettable comedies like Surviving Christmas and others being future classics like Elf. With Christmas Eve being tonight and Christmas day following soon after (not to mention being a few days into Hanukkah for our Jewish readers) and slow news from the world of Hollywood there's no better time to list Chris Cookson's top ten Christmas flicks.

If you thought Episode I was bad...

Then you have to see the Star Wars Holiday Special. Aired only once on CBS in 1978 this special has become a cult classic among Star Wars fans for its camp value and use of the original Star Wars cast. In short the plot follows Chewbacca on a quest to go home to celebrate Christmas...err...Life Day. In the typical "Star Wars fashion" all things go sour as Darth Vader has plans to ruin the festivities. Throughout the special you also get to see entire scenes performed in Wookiee, meet Chewbacca's son Lumpy, Carrie Fisher singing over the Star Wars theme and an oddly suggestive video from the Jefferson Starship.

The special is absolutely horrid with the sole action scene consisting of a Stormtrooper bending down to pick up a blaster and then falling off a ledge. The special is a must-see for Star Wars fans and a great endurance test for just about anyone. I've seen it three or four times now and I still can't watch the entire thing in a single sitting. Its impossible.

George Lucas wants every copy of the special burned and forgotten. He has publically said "The special from 1978 really didn't have much to do with us, you know. I can't remember what network it was on, but it was a thing that they did. We kind of let them do it. It was done by... I can't even remember who the group was, but they were variety TV guys. We let them use the characters and stuff and that probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, but you learn from those experiences. I had a wonderful time on Young Indiana Jones. It was a great series. We did it for four years. I spent those four or five years actually working on it. That's really all I did during those years. It was really a great experience and I love television."

The special earned itself a special place in the Star Wars canon. The Star Wars Animated Adventure segment was the first time the character Boba Fett was introduced in the Star Wars mythos. This was also the first time we saw Chewbacca's home planet of Kashyyyk and this was later used as a model for Star Wars Episode III. Since the release the special has been spoofed by Robot Chicken, South Park and it even earned spot in the music video for Weird Al's White & Nerdy.

So if you haven't seen it already, cozy up against the fireplace and make a tray of Wookiee Ookies. Below is the Star Wars Holiday Special.

Dragonball live-action movie continues to look awful

Following in the tradition of live-action cartoon adaptations, the new Dragonball movie (now with the not so subtle subtitle Dragonball: Evolutions) looks more akin to to a throwaway D-rate kung fu movie than it does a proper homage to the anime and manga series of the same name. Between numerous reshoots and rumors of cancellation long ago this trailer doesn't do much to tide away my already very low expectations for it. Understandably, Dragonball and its spin-off Dragonball Z are by no means high art this is looking about on par with your average video game movie. However, the film is being produced by Stephen Chow who directed and starred in the awesome Shaolin Soccer and Kung Fu Hustle among others. Though I doubt he'll be able to save the film, much like how the Wachowski brothers failed to create a compelling Speed Racer film.

See the trailer after the jump...

Guillermo del Toro's Animated Remake of The Witches Set to Terrify New Generation of Third Graders

The 1990 film version of the Roald Dahl book, "The Witches" featured some crafty mouse puppets from the Jim Henson company, a bald incarnation of Angelica Huston, an early Rowan Atkinson, and a fair amount of near child nudity towards the end. I remember a good amount of deep emotional scars from the film between seeing it once in third grade and again on a Saturday afternoon on the late UPN network.

The upcoming remake of the film will be shot entirely with stop-motion animation and will be directed by Guillermo del Toro (Pan's Labyrinth, Hellboy & Hellboy II) with Alfonso Cuarón (Children of Men, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban) maintaining a producing role backstage. The project started back in 2006 when Cuarón and Del Toro discussed collaborating on a film adaption of a Roald Dahl book. Soon after Del Toro wrote up the screenplay for it.

There is no date set for this project, and with Guillermo del Toro's upcoming adaptation of "The Hobbit", it's hard to judge when we'll actually get to see anything from this movie. If Corpse Bride and Coraline are any indication, stop-motion animation has come a long way in recent years.


Above is the trailer for the original film. Though someone has also uploaded the entire film onto YouTube but there's a good chance that will be removed due to the obvious copyright violation.

First trailer for Up, Pixar's next film appears online

When WALL-E was released Pixar broke its tradition of including a teaser for the studio's next film alongside the previews and instead opted for giving Disney's Bolt the full spotlight. Now the first official teaser for the film has surfaced, while there was previously footage of a house with balloon's attached to it this is the first time we get a glimpse into the characters and the premise of the film. Much like the teaser for WALL-E, Pixar seems to be banking more on reminding audiences of the studio's ridiculously high reputation than fully focusing on the film itself.


You can download the trailer at Disney.com in these resolutions: 480p, 720p, 1080p.

Up will be directed by Pete Doctor who's directorial debut was Monster's Inc. and has directed the English localization of Hayao Miyazaki's Howl's Moving Castle. Up will hit theaters May 29th, 2009.

Review: BEVERLY HILLS CHIHUAHUA

I had it coming. Ever since I penned my Beverly Hills Chihuahua defending debut post at the Movie Watch I knew I was destined to see it, even if I knew I'll be eating crow in the process. The result, well as I stated in my previous post Beverly Hills Chihuahua is far from a Disney classic but considering the awfully low pedigree it's coming from (Raja Gosnell, the director of the dreadful Scooby-Doo live-action movies and Big Momma's House amoung others) I found the film to be a pleasant surprise. Beverly Hills Chihuahua will entertain anyone in the 6-9 year old crowd that laughed at the teaser before WALL-E and is inoffensive enough to keep parents from checking their watch too often.

The plot of Beverly Hills Chihuahua mostly serves as a vehicle just to get more talking animals on the screen. The basic premise follows Chloe (voiced by Drew Barrymore), a spoiled Paris Hilton-esque chihuahua as she gets lost in Mexico and caught up in a dog fighting circuit. There's also Papi a day laborer who sounds and acts like George Lopez (voiced by George Lopez) who is in love with our titular hero. Offensive stereotypes aside the plot is very simple but it has a few genuine moments here and there which sort of half work due to a lack of a proper build-up.

Luckily, the horrible CG seen in the teaser trailer is fairly scarce in the actual movie and apart from a few "pee-jokes" the humor is fairly low-key. As for Raja Gosnell this is a huge step up from his previous dreadful work but as an actual Disney branded movie it would be a bit of a letdown for families expecting the depth of WALL-E or even Bolt for that matter. Then again, the Disney "brand" has already been diluted to the point where a Little Mermaid prequel is reduced to a plot about hip hop music spreading to Atlantica.

The question of whether or not you should see it really boils down to how much your "kids" want to see it and if you'd like anything that happens to have a cute animal in the leading role. Young children will love the quirkiness (albeit wholly unoriginal) in the film and parents will love the fact that it gives them an hour and a half of peace while being mildly amusing at the same time. While I cannot recommend Beverly Hills Chihuahua, you can certainly do a lot worse, even when dealing with Disney comedies about anthropomorphic dogs.

New Spaceballs Spinoff Animated Series continues to look awful

The first commercial for G4's long in development Spaceballs: The Animated Series has recently gone online here (very NSFW). If you set aside the offensively bad and stiff Flash animation, you still have an incredibly juvenile looking series that retains the Spaceballs franchise in name only. The most depressing thing about this latest trailer is that the series was penned by none other than Mel Brooks himself, he's even including two voices in the series. This is not even just a dumb advertisement on G4's behalf either, but it represents the entire marketing campaign for the series (again, NSFW).

Mel Brooks would be rolling in his grave...if he was dead...and he didn't write this.

Added Note***

Taken From Wikipedia:

Spaceballs is a 1987 science fiction parody film of Star Wars co-written, directed by, and starring Mel Brooks. It was released on June 24, 1987, and earned only modest returns, but has gone on to become a cult classic on video.
Its plot and characters contain numerous parodies of elements from the original Star Wars trilogy and Star Trek in particular, as well as other popular science fiction films. The script was written by Mel Brooks in only six months, and was approved by George Lucas, as he was a big fan of Brooks's previous films.[1] Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic was also involved in the special visual effects for the film. As of 2007, an animated sequel TV series is in preparation.

Robert Downey Jr. rejoins Ben Stiller in Mastermind

Moviehole recently announced that Robert Downey Jr. and Tina Fey could possibly star in the upcoming Ben Stiller produced animated film Mastermind. The film follows the trials and tribulations of a supervillain after killing off the hero, Uberman in the first few minutes of the film. The movie will be directed by Dreamworks Animation veterans Cameron Hood and Kyle Jefferson and has a screenplay written by Alan Schoolcraft and Brent Simons. Ben Stiller has also stated that he may provide the voice for the main character but he's unsure of it at this point.

The last superhero satire helmed by Ben Stiller was the critically panned Mystery Men. Though, Tropic Thunder which was both written and directed by Ben Stiller received critical acclaim and box office success alike. With this film reuniting Stiller and Downey Jr. could we have a Ben Stiller renaissance? this film is still a long way off but at least its looking slightly more promising than the Jerry Seinfeld produced Bee Movie.

BREAKING NEWS: Harry Potter 6 pushed to July 2009

In a recent press release Warner Bros. announced that they will push Harry Potter and the Half-Blood prince from a Thanksgiving weekend release over to July 17, 2009.

in their press release they wrote:

"Our reasons for shifting 'Half-Blood Prince' to summer are twofold: we know the summer season is an ideal window for a family tent pole release, as proven by the success of our last Harry Potter film, which is the second-highest grossing film in the franchise, behind only the first installment. Additionally, like every other studio, we are still feeling the repercussions of the writers' strike, which impacted the readiness of scripts for other films--changing the competitive landscape for 2009 and offering new windows of opportunity that we wanted to take advantage of. We agreed the best strategy was to move 'Half-Blood Prince' to July, where it perfectly fills the gap for a major tent pole release for mid-summer."

consequently, Disney moved Bolt's release date up a week to November 21, 2008 in response to this announcement.

Editorial: In defense of Beverly Hills Chihuahua

As long as I'm a new contributor on the Movie Watch, I might as well blow any reputation I might have in my first post. Yesterday I read that Ezra said that he'd rather watch the direct-to-DVD sequel to 101 Dalmatians. While I would not expect Beverly Hills Chihuahua to be the next Citizen Kane or anything after seeing the latest trailer it looks far from a throw away family film.

I'll admit it, I was as negative as everyone else when I saw the first poster for this movie. It didn't really show much besides for two chihuahuas, an Aztec temple and a large marquee bragging about the voice roles of George Lopez (ugh) and Drew Barrymore. Many felt it looked like the worst movie of the year, though with films like Meet Dave and The Love Guru (yes, I've seen them) I'd beg to differ. The second punch to this movie's face was the teaser that was attached to WALL-E. This teaser really said little what the movie was actually about and for 90% of the people in the audience it would be the only footage they'd see from the actual movie before its September release. For the seasoned movie viewer the teaser really had nothing to offer besides for poorly animated Chihuahua's playing the drums. With the inevitable pop-culture references as implied by an old DJ BOBO pop song blaring in the background with Chihuahua's singing and dancing behind it. This teaser made the offensive trailer for Madagascar seem tame. The fact that this movie also is helmed by the director of the live-action Scooby-Doo movies and Big Mamma's House didn't do much to win me over on this movie either.

However when I saw that new trailer that was posted by Disney up on YouTube more recently it was a very different movie than the gimmicky dreck I was expecting. The new trailer seemed more like Homeward Bound with a pretty inoffensive and subdued sense of humor. The trailer even did the miraculous job of putting the teaser into perspective making the little prologue about the Aztecs before the opening make a lot more sense. The trailer also had very little CGI apart from the obvious moving lips on the dogs whereas the teaser was completely 3D animated. The other surprise was that there were no pop-culture references in the full trailer either apart from that Scarface line but that's so deeply embedded into our culture I don't know if it even counts. In a world where the trailer for Madagascar Escape 2 Africa was getting an uproarious laugh in the movie theater this is a great thing. Sure, it had its share of lame jokes in the trailer but so do a lot of Disney movies. If you judged Enchanted by its trailer it would look pretty formulaic as well. Disney is concerned first and foremost with families and if showing a gang of chihuahuas playing the bongos was enough to get the kids excited, then it will ultimately be a success.

The new trailer made me develop quite a soft spot for this movie. It reminded me a lot of the movies I've been forced to sit through in elementary school just to get the mangey kids quite for an hour or so. I had no clue at that time what the general fan consensus those movies had. In fact, a lot of the films I fondly remembered received terrible reviews, such as Mouse Hunt whereas Babe was nominated for an Academy Award and I had no idea at the time. I was crushed when I saw Roger Ebert's scathing review of Home Alone when they opened up their review archive to the internet. But at the same time I agreed with a lot of his criticism. He may have missed the point of a simple dumb family movie. Roger Ebert had a point in that it would have more emotional resonance if they showed Kevin as a vulnerable and defenseless kid in the face of criminals, but it would seem entirely out of place among the various slapstick gags that were to follow. If screenwriter John Hughes were to follow Ebert's advice he'd have to retool the film entirely for something that's already become a classic family movie in its current state.

To get things straight I'm still not going to go out of my way to see Beverly Hills Chihuahua, that is unless by some weird miracle it winds up getting a Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. However, this is definitely something I'd watch on a lazy sunday had it been on Disney Channel or something and in comparison to other non-Disney family dreck like Fly Me to the Moon and Space Chimps this movie's looking pretty promising for its fairly young audience. At the very least prints of Salvador Dali's short film Destino will be screened before all the prints of Beverly Hills Chihuahua, that's worth the price of admission alone or it could make a better stoner film than Pineapple Express, and that's saying a lot.

New Contributor to The Movie Watch

Hey guys! Its Chris Cookson and I just joined as a contributor to The Movie Watch. Unlike the LA-bound Ezra, Chris resides in Stamford, Connecticut a suburb of New York City and also shares a background in animation as a Digital Animation major from the Brookyln based Pratt Institute. Apart from being a movie buff, Chris has been a lifelong Nintendo fanboy and enjoys a good trip to Taco Bell.

Expect to see a couple of posts from me a week and if we ever have a podcast on this site, I'll be all over it. My first post will be tomorrow where I guarantee that I'll lose any street cred I ever had on this site.