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Vulture:

Scott teases the spaceships and caves filled with ominously gridded egg placement that you might expect from a movie that “shares DNA” with the Alien series, but there’s also waterfalls, dust storms, and a very intriguing plot hint: This team of spacemen (which includes Charlize Theron, Michael Fassbender, Noomi Rapace, and Idris Elba) goes looking for the beginning of life itself, and instead finds something epic that will probably pick them off one by one[.]

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Director Jason Reitman and screenwriter Diablo Cody sure have grown up since making the indie smash “Juno.”

The duo re-team for “Young Adult,” and while it’s only been four years since “Juno” struck sleeper movie gold, it’s clear the filmmakers used that time wisely.

“Young Adult” lacks the preciousness that nearly derailed “Juno,” and the movie spotlights a lead character you’d rather slug than give a tender embrace. That smacks of both confidence and daring, but Reitman and Cody can’t deliver a third act worthy of their otherwise biting dark comedy.

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Charlize Theron is that rare big-screen beauty who’s willing to subvert her looks in order to fully inhabit a difficult character. She did it to play a grotesque real-life killer in the 2003 “Monster” (for which she won an Oscar), and she does it again, in a different way, in “Young Adult,” portraying a woman whose ugliness is all on the inside.

Mavis Gary is a mess, a one-time high-school hottie now going to seed at 37. She’s a best-selling author, sort of (she ghost-writes a series of popular Young Adult novels), but her Minneapolis apartment is a pit, she has a serious bourbon problem, and she chugs Coke for breakfast after waking up next to whichever random lug she happened to bring home the night before.

One day Mavis gets a blast email announcing the birth of a baby, adorable photo attached. It’s from Buddy Slade, her old high school boyfriend. High school was 20 years ago, but Mavis remembers it—and Buddy—fondly: She wasn’t a mess then. Giving the matter some self-centered thought, she decides that Buddy is the guy she was meant to be with. He’s still living in their corny hometown, married now, and with the baby, it’s true; but why should that stand in the way of her winning him back?

In “Young Adult,” director Jason Reitman and his “Juno” scribe Diablo Cody attempt something tricky. Cody’s story is a deconstruction of that Hollywood staple, the romantic comedy hooked on an idiotic premise. These are the kind of pictures in which a woman desperate for a child has herself artificially inseminated and then discovers that the requisite fluid has been anonymously donated by her adoring best friend. Or two girlfriends discover that their long-planned weddings have been accidentally scheduled at the Plaza Hotel on the very same day. The trailer for “Young Adult” might seem to promise exactly that sort of disposable chuckle fest. But the movie is actually much darker, and more daring.

Read the full review at Reason.com

Well fiddle-dee-dee … another fairy-tale inspired story in the making in Hollywood!

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Guess Universal Pictures decided to get on board with the fairy tale trend after “Alice in Wonderland” and “Red Riding Hood” were received so well from the critics. Not! “Alice” scored a mediocre 52 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes, while ‘Red’ sits at a measly 11 percent.

But Hollywood doesn’t make movies for critics, they make them for the money, and any film that bounces off of a fairy tale is likely to bring in major dough. With director Tim Burton’s “Alice” raking in more than $300 million, I’m sure “Alice” producer Joe Roth is looking to bring in a similar dollar amount with his new spin on a classic yarn.

The Roth-produced “Snow White and the Huntsman,” hitting theaters in Summer 2012, is Hollywood’s latest attempt to turn a fairy tale into a blockbuster. In a twist to the genre, the Huntsman (a “Thor”-reminiscent Chris Hemsworth) is ordered to take Snow White (Kristen Stewart) into the woods to be killed. He ends up becoming her protector as they battle to take down the Evil Queen (Charlize Theron).

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The 2007 smash ‘Juno’ left movie goers irrevocably divided. Either you loved Ellen Page as a wiseacre trying to give her new baby a good home, or you balked at the hamburger phone, quirky songs and other precious elements lined up for our pleasure.

Now, ‘Juno’ director Jason Reitman and screenwriter Diablo Cody are back with ‘Young Adult,’ an upcoming dramedy dropped into the schedule for maximum Oscar consideration – Dec. 9.

The trailer offers a far different vibe than ‘Juno,’ but there’s a snarkiness that unites the two projects. Charlize Theron stars as a former high school princess who returns home and decides to win back and old flame (Patrick Wilson). But said flame is already married and has a child on the way.

“We can beat this thing together,” she tells him in the trailer’s kiss-off line.

Cody earned an Oscar for her ‘Juno’ script, but she’s still an unpredictable force in the film industry. Her attempt at wink-wink horror, 2009’s ‘Jennifer’s Body,’ showed a serious lack of understanding for an admittedly tricky genre. She had better luck as a driving force behind Showtime’s ‘The United States of Tara.’

But Reitman may be the surest bet in Hollywood these days. His first three movies – ‘Thank You for Smoking,’ ‘Juno’ and ‘Up in the Air’ – reveal a gifted filmmaker with a penchant for quality material. His presence alone is enough to make ‘Young Adult’ one of the year’s must-see movies.

As I’ve written before, 2010 was actually a good year for movies.  The King’s Speech, The Fighter, Inception, Toy Story 3, Tangled, and How to Train Your Dragon were all great entertainment.  We’ve seen terrific starring roles from actors ranging from the heretofore unwatchable James Franco to the ever impressive Christian Bale, from the magnificent Colin Firth to the chameleonic Geoffrey Rush.  We’ve seen some actresses in supporting roles who have outshone their second-tier parts: Melissa Leo and Amy Adams in The Fighter, Helena Bonham Carter in The King’s Speech.

But when we look at the leading actresses of 2010, the dearth of great performances and great parts is stunning.  The Golden Globe nominees for best actress this year were Halle Berry in the anonymous flick Frankie and Alice, playing a crazy person in her usual over-the-top style; Nicole Kidman in the anonymous flick Rabbit Hole, playing a grieving mother in her usual cold and remote style; Jennifer Lawrence in Winter’s Bone, playing a teenage girl looking for her meth-making dad; Natalie Portman in Black Swan, playing a crazy person with a constipated look plastered on her mug; and Michelle Williams in Blue Valentine, playing a spoiled girl who gets knocked up, married, and presumably divorced.  Has anyone seen any of these women in any of these films?  And if the disastrous Natalie Portman – Queen Amidala masturbating, anyone? – is the frontrunner for Best Actress at the Oscars, how far have female figures fallen?

Far.  Quick, think of the ten greatest living film actors.  It’s not that tough – we have iconic male film stars all the time.  Now think of the ten greatest living film actresses.  Now take away all women over 50.  Still thinking, aren’t you? (more…)

It’s the end of the world – and I feel haunted

Imagine that the entire world as you’ve known it has come to an end right before your eyes. Almost everyone has died, or gone crazy scavenging for food, even becoming cannibals in the name of survival. Your beautiful wife, who was the light of your life, left you to wander off in the night and die rather than endure another terrifying day of huddling from the elements and hiding from the human monsters that most everyone else has become. 

And now all that’s left is you – and the ten-year-old son whose care has become your entire purpose of your existence. You had a good life once – until just a decade before – with a dignified career, nights at the opera, and joy emanating from every pore of your beautiful spouse. But now it’s all a memory, and a fading one at that. You haven’t been called by your own name in so long that you and your son are only known as Man and Boy. 

What then, the universe asks? Do you keep a faith in God, or curse the hopelessness around you? Do you try to maintain the fire of a good soul and pass moral values to your son, or do you let your morals and humanity eventually slip away? If your morals slip away in the middle of nowhere, does anyone notice? 

Those are the questions that lie at the root of director John Hillcoat’s profoundly moving adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book “The Road.” Starring Viggo Mortensen in an alternately feral and saintly performance of shattering emotional depth – his are the most haunted eyes I’ve ever seen sustained in a film performance – it is a film that doesn’t shy from some of the most disturbing questions of human existence, yet also guides viewers gently through to a sense of grace and hope that will move, for even days afterward, those brave enough to take the journey.  (more…)

First off, let me ask the question: in today’s PC, non-sexualized world, am I allowed to use the word “actress?” I guess I’ll chance it.

My friend Kitty sent me this link to an article about the ongoing saga of turning the 1,100 page book “Atlas Shrugged,” by Ayn Rand, into a feature film:

Rand’s popular but polarizing book — it’s derided by many literary critics but has a huge public following — tells the story of Dagny Taggart, a railroad executive trying to keep her corporation competitive in the face of what she perceives as a lack of innovation and individual responsibility. (more…)