The onscreen Catherine Zeta-Jones is quite the contrast to the off-screen one. While off screen, she prefers 67-year-old hubby Michael Douglas; on screen she prefers her 25-year-old nanny. Or, at least, her character Sandy in “The Rebound,” a mother of two and recent divorcee, does.

There’s a lot to like about “The Rebound,” available on DVD and Blu- ray tomorrow, but it ends up too much like typical rom-com fare than it needs to be. Director Bart Freundlich (who has directed some great episodes of Showtime’s “Californication”) talks about how he was inspired by the New York set films about relationships by Woody Allen in an interview on the DVD, but “The Rebound” never lives up to that kind of potential. It’s tame when it needs to be excessive and excessive when it needs to be tame.

Sandy (Catherine Zeta-Jones) is living a typical suburban life with her two kids and husband when she stumbles across a tape of her husband cheating on her with a neighbor. After packing up the kids and heading to the city, she meets Aram (Justin Bartha), a young coffee shop employee living in the apartment beneath hers who agrees to start babysitting for her as she works late and goes on disappointing dates. As Aram becomes more and more responsible for the children, Sandy realizes she enjoys spending her late nights at home with the mature-beyond-his-years nanny than spending them with dates who have a bad habit of talking to her while they utilize a porter potty (Eh, it’s the city. Who can judge?).

Sandy and Aram begin seeing each other but have to face a world that scoffs at the idea of their 15-year age difference. Sandy’s friends see Aram as nothing but a rebound, and she becomes confused as to whether he is or isn’t. Thus, “The Rebound” presses forward trying desperately to be the next Woody Allen pic; the problem is there’s none of the subtlety or depth of Allen’s work. (more…)

Gina Carano might just be the next female action superstar, but it won’t be thanks to “Haywire.”

The new film shows Carana easily translating her MMA fighting chops to the big screen, and all that scrapping clearly didn’t mar her lovely features. But director Steven Soderbergh can’t leverage Carano’s unique screen presence, nor a cast far too good for such a rote spy caper.

“Haywire” marks Soderbergh’s second consecutive genre outing, and it’s clear he’s ill-suited for pulp. Last year’s “Contagion” couldn’t rouse our senses despite the fictional death of millions. Now, with “Haywire,” the soon-to-retire auteur wastes the debut of an electric lead.

Carano stars as Mallory, a private government contractor who takes assignments nations don’t want to claim as their own. The film’s electric opening finds her squaring off with a fellow agent (Channing Tatum, looking suitably hung over) in a diner and fleeing the scene in a stranger’s sports car.

It’s a grand introduction to Carano, who survives a splash of steaming coffee to the face and keeps on kicking.

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Few filmmakers have been more alert to the possibilities of working with non-professional actors than Steven Soderbergh. His 2005 “Bubble” was an exercise in trailer-park vérité, and the 2009 “Girlfriend Experience” provided a crossover showcase for porn star Sasha Grey.

Now Soderbergh has constructed a high-profile action picture around Mixed Martial Arts icon Gina Carano, a woman alarmingly skilled in the ways of head-kicking, gut-punching, throat-wringing and related modes of cage-match devastation. Unlike Angelina Jolie, Halle Berry, and other movie-land action chicks of the past, Carano demonstrates beyond doubt that if called upon, she actually could put you in the hospital.

“Haywire” is an old-school spy-versus-spy espionage tale. It would be nice if the story (scripted by Lem Dobbs, who previously wrote Soderbergh’s Kafka and The Limey) made a little more sense; at some points you might wish it made any sense at all. Carano plays Mallory Kane, a black-ops specialist in the employ of an international security firm run by her shifty onetime boyfriend Kenneth (Ewan McGregor).

When a shadowy figure named Coblenz (Michael Douglas) commissions Mallory’s services in extracting a Chinese journalist from bad-guy captivity in Barcelona, Kenneth dispatches her there with a team that includes the prickly hunk Aaron (Channing Tatum); she’s also told to coordinate with an ambiguous local character named Rodrigo (Antonio Banderas). The operation is a suitably tense undertaking, crowned by a back-alley smackdown in which Mallory, in an explosion of leg-sweeps and gob-smashes, reduces an oppo gunman to twitching insensibility. This is pretty great to watch, let me tell you.

Read the rest of the review at Reason.com

Paula Patton provides a convincing action heroine in the new film “Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol.” But Patton might not last 30 seconds – on screen or off – against the star of the upcoming “Haywire.

Gina Carano, a model-slash-actress-slash mixed martial artist, is the star of director Steven Soderbergh’s latest screen project.

“Haywire,” hitting theaters next month, casts Carano as a mysterious agent fighting back against those who double crossed her. Standard action movie bullet points, no doubt. But Carano’s off-screen scrapping lends the trailer a juicy kick, and the talented cast – including Michael Fassbender, Antonio Banderas and Michael Douglas – adds plenty of class to the proceedings.

Will Carano punch her way into action movie fans’ hearts? January is a dumping grounds for bad films, so “Haywire” should have precious little competition.

The rest may be up to Carano, whose delicate features clearly haven’t been rearranged too much in the ring.

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Barack Obama’s approval rating is presently a rousing 42%. That means the largest portion of the sane American public would love to see the first family pack up their Samsonites® and head back to the Winfrey City, famous for deep-dish pizza, Mayor Rahm, and the type of thuggish politics the head of the house is obviously comfortable with.

However, President Barack Obama’s latest fundraising report cites an “A-list of Hollywood stars, with donations from some of the top celebrities in the entertainment industry.” Apparently, left-coast liberals want to see to it that the best script reader since Martin Sheen has another shot at practicing lines on set while acting the part of President.

It’s not surprising that Hollywood is smitten with the “Yes We Can” man’s refusal to admit he can’t.  Those in the acting profession are impressed by amateurs like Barry Soetoro (stage name Barack Obama), who has proven to have a professional-level ability to make believe he’s something he is not. Heck, for a season, even Paul Giamatti was convinced he was John Adams.

What could be better for Hollywood than a President who swims around in a policy cesspool similar to the one they refuse to empty in Tinsel Town, overflowing with the squalid water of loose morals, abortion rights, angry feminists, racial indignation, class warfare, and overall elitist hypocrisy? (more…)

Most film critics start off each year with a list of their top 10 movies for the year before, an act of timing that often masks the fact that the first week of a new year is used to dump on an unsuspecting public the absolute worst garbage produced. This year is no exception, with the godawful-looking “Season of the Witch” coming out on Friday.

And so it is that I’ve taken a look back over the more than 100 movies I’ve seen in 2010, picking my 10 personal favorites. I won’t presume to say that they’re objectively the 10 best — I would have had to see more than 250 films last year to give an honest assessment of that. And while I know “The Social Network” is great filmmaking and appears to be the unanimous favorite for this year’s Best Picture Oscar, I think it’s too easy to simply agree with the pack. So, instead, I’m offering up 10 flicks that moved me, made me laugh, or thrilled me the most. Many of them were underrated and little-seen, but they are well worth renting now.

1. “Cyrus.” This indie film came out in July and served up what appeared to be the most unusual love triangle ever: Marisa Tomei as a lonely single mother, John C. Reilly as the even lonelier guy who is saved by her love, and Jonah Hill as her grown-up son, Cyrus, who seems way too close to his mom. Thankfully, nothing is as it first appears, and this crazily funny and surprisingly touching film winds up being my favorite gem of the year. (more…)

I may be wrong, but I’d say you’re lucky to be alive. For that matter, I think we might say the same for the rest of Southern California. 

Why it’s a left-wing film

One of the reasons I do what I do is because I believe in the power of popular entertainment culture to affect social and political change. Through their words and through the investment of millions upon millions of dollars, Hollywood obviously believes they can change the world and I just happen to agree with them. This power can be used for good and bad. Unfortunately, these days, it’s usually not used for good.

With the enormous powers of persuasion found in the magic of the motion picture, for a time, Hollywood was truly a force of tremendous good, a force for liberty and the ennobling of the human spirit. Best of all, Hollywood showed us idealized versions of ourselves through heroes and heroines who had codes of honor and integrity, who were selfless and if at first they didn’t comprehend that there was a bigger moral world beyond their own self-interest, they usually did before the final fade. This wasn’t the world as it was, this was the world as it should be. And the critics are wrong. Hollywood wasn’t lying or being hypocritical during their Golden Age, Hollywood was asking us to aspire to something better.

During WWII, Hollywood championed victory and during the Civil Rights era, they championed justice. And then it mostly went to shit when the flawed but brilliant men who ran the studios, the men who through their product envisioned a world in which their own weaknesses had been overcome, were pushed aside by those who sought affirmation and acceptance of those same flaws by normalizing them through the power of mass media. And we all know what followed. Loveless sex, narcissism, The State, humanism, the fascism of political correctness and the divisive evil of multiculturalism became the New Cinematic Values, and anyone who thinks this hasn’t had a corrosive effect simply doesn’t want to. (more…)

“Ten years from now the combustion engine will be a thing of the past.”

Why it’s a left-wing film

Before we get to it, let’s point out one of the sweet ironies of “The American President.” What an amazing experience it is to watch a film written by Aaron Sorkin that relies heavily on the theme of condemning personal character attacks in the world of politics. You know, the very same Aaron Sorkin responsible for some of the most sexist and vicious personal character attacks on Sarah Palin we’ve seen in a while. Not only has the “West Wing” creator publicly ridiculed the Governor’s hair, makeup, intelligence, and hobbies, he’s gone so far as to label her as “deranged.”

But here’s where it gets interesting. According to Wikipedia, Sorkin admits to writing the warm, witty and charming “American President” screenplay “while often high on crack cocaine.” However, according to Sorkin, he’s now sober and was therefore sober when he viciously trashed Palin in the most personal ways imaginable. The only conclusion one is left to make then, is that Sorkin’s such a degenerate of a human being that the crack pipe had nowhere to go with his personality other than up.

Back to business…

“The American President” is a left-wing fairytale in which Global Warming exists, law-abiding citizens owning handguns is the cause of crime, the left-wing media (but I repeat myself) would aid and abet a damaging character attack against a sitting Democratic president during an election year, flag burning is a virtue, Republicans actually do sit around in smoke-filled rooms plotting diabolically, the American sheeple can be manipulated into turning against a widowed president who goes out on a date, and liberalism’s problem is not liberalism — not all the provably failed ideas that make up liberalism, but rather a lack of fight for those ideas. (more…)

Not much information to go on, but according to People Magazine, the great Michael Douglas is expected to make a full recovery after a couple months of chemotherapy and radiation. 

Here’s to a full and speedy recovery…

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The cable channel History’s latest historical venture, America; the Story of Us – a twelve-part, cheap-looking, know-nothing celebrity driven monstrosity that insults the most basic of historically informed Americans intelligence, ended it’s broadcast run last week. The opening episode was the highest rated program in the history of the network attracting 5.7 million viewers, with subsequent episodes in the 2.0 to 2.5 million viewers range.

Abraham Lincoln and P.T. Barnum (you know, “You can fool some of the people some of the time…” and “There a sucker born every minute.”) had it right. It was the huge amount of money spent on advertising that bought those ratings. Ratings of course bring in advertising dollars but to put it bluntly, dog feces still smells bad and is hard to shake off of your foot. This series was the historical documentary equivalent a big steaming pile. In fact numerous Los Angeles-based cable documentary producers have quietly expressed their disdain to me at the poor execution, production values and content of The Story of Us.

The Story of Us was produced by Jane Root an English producer and former Discovery Channel President and BBC executive. So a foreign producer not only got the considerable money for this show but also tells us about us from a decidedly British, ill-informed and surface, slop politically correct point of view. At a time when American cable producers are starving for work, History shows their true colors by enriching an English company with a major series on our history. Most of the terribly produced reenactments were actually shot in Great Britain and South Africa, standing in for the good old USA! (more…)

Perhaps no other actor in the modern era has been able to slip into the skin of morally conflicted characters as well as Michael Douglas. Granted, he was kicking around Hollywood for nearly 20 years before his back-to-back breakthrough to mega-stardom in 1987 with “Fatal Attraction” and “Wall Street,” but he’s never looked back – nearly always portraying characters with real conflicts in dilemmas that spoke to the hottest issues of the day in films like “Falling Down,” “War of the Roses” and “Disclosure.”

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But the past decade has been unkind to Douglas at the box office, as he’s appeared in a string of ambitious yet arty films that have barely seen release, while being criminally ignored for an Oscar on 2000’s superb and highly underrated film “Wonder Boys.” This fall could see a big turnaround for him when the sequel to “Wall Street” comes out, with Douglas reprising his Oscar-winning turn as ruthless financial trader Gordon Gekko in a film that’s already caused a sensation at the Cannes Film Festival.

In the meantime, catch him while you can in the terrific new character-based dramedy “Solitary Man,” in which Douglas plays a downtrodden car salesman named Ben Kalmen, who’s turning 60 while his world is tumbling down around him. He had been ethically upright and successful in his business and his marriage until a doctor warned him six years ago that his heart might have serious problems. (more…)

Not only did Michael Douglas tell a French radio station it would be “unfair” for him to sign the latest “Free Polanski“ petition floating around Cannes for “somebody who did break the law,” he did so hours before the Charlotte Lewis story broke. 

Unlike some who are now rethinking their Polanski support in the face of these new allegations, one child rape was enough for Douglas.

Yawn. “Wall Street 2.” Yeah, I liked the first one. Michael Douglas is awesome in that movie and pretty much everything he does. I mean, who else could rock the V-neck sweater with no T-shirt like he did in “Basic Instinct” and still look cool?

Another needless sequel. Whatever.

What got my attention was the “money line” in the trailer (pun fully intended). Douglas says “I once gave a speech that said greed was good. Now, apparently, it’s legal.” Wow is that stupid.

Of course greed is legal. So is ambition. So is hard work. So is having a big ego. So what?

Leftists constantly whine about “greed” as if that desire is the root cause of all misery and evil in the world. Greed alone does nothing. I can sit on my couch all day watching TiVoed episodes of “Nip/Tuck” eating Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and declare myself “greedy” without accomplishing anything.

And no, you can not have one of my Reese’s Cups. They are crazy delicious and they are all mine. (more…)

Twenty-three years have passed since the first ”Wall Street” and a decade since news of an upcoming Oliver Stone movie elicited anything above the level of an eye roll. A director who once captured and even created a  zeitgeist is now pathetically chasing after it like a dollar bill tied to a string.

After the disastrous “Alexander,” both “World Trade Center” and “W.” were essentially television-level productions self-consciously obvious in their desperation to feel relevant. Arguably, “WTC” ended up being an above-average TV movie but “W.” was a complete embarrassment for everyone involved, especially those Leftist critics who carried its water one percentage below a fresh rating. And now comes a sequel nobody wanted with a truly terrible title: “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps,” which hits theatres April 23rd.

And as with all Shia LaBeouf movies, the first question that must be asked is: Shia LaBeouf?

Go back and watch the original “Wall Street.” It’s a terrific film with some great acting courtesy of Martin Sheen and Michael Douglas and a compelling story that immediately grabs you as you’re taken on a tour of how things work in the fascinating world of the stock market at the very top level. One of my favorite shots in all films is our first glimpse of Douglas’s Gordon Gekko through his office door just before it closes. Just like Charlie Sheen’s young Bud Fox, oh how we want to know what goes on in there. Great moviemaking.  (more…)

Rebooting Bond with Daniel Craig was Bold. Christopher Nolan’s Reinvention of Batman was genius. But some thought it was overly-ambitious, even audacious, to attempt to restart the Star Trek franchise. It has begun to pay off already for Paramount Pictures, and there will dividends for years to come.

A shiny new Enterprise is luring in a new generation of STAR TREK fans

J.J. Abrams is officially the Lazarus of movie directors as his all-new Star Trek has gone “Boldly Gone Where No Star Trek Movie has Gone Before.” With a cast of relative unknowns, the 42-year-old has resurrected a franchise that had been killed by insular “nerdyness” and timid imagination. The Gene Rodenberry creation didn’t so much bomb as it died slowly over a period of years. First, the 2002 movie Star Trek: Nemesis starring the Next Generation cast disappointed with a meager $43.3M domestic. Then, the final TV series Enterprise, which starred Scott Bakula, was not embraced by core fans or broader audiences and was canceled after four seasons, ending May 13, 2005.

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Several sources at competing studios have told me that J.J. Abrams’ all-new reboot of Star Trek (Paramount), which debuted last night at 7pm at many of its 3,849 locations, may have grossed as much as $6.5M-$7.5M. Studio honchos are “locked down tight” about actual numbers, but that is in the same ballpark as Transformers (Dreamworks/Paramount), which grabbed $8.8M in its previews starting at 8pm on Monday, July 2 during the summer of 2007. (What portion of ticket sales fall into Thursday and what percentage fall into Friday will likely be an open question even after final numbers are in.)

William Shatner (left) with Captain Kirk 2.0 Chris Pine

Keep in mind that Paramount never changed its Star Trek marketing to promote the 7pm Thursday start, so the opening night audience was likely heavy on Trekkers or Trekkies (not sure which term is “politically correct” anymore). So this was a “soft” opening and what amounts to a night of word-of-mouth screenings. Keep in mind that Transformers premiered during the summer when kids are more available while Star Trek has made its premiere during the school year.

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The all-new J.J. Abrams reboot of Star Trek (Paramount) will win the second weekend of the Hollywood Summer Box Office season by at least a couple of light years over Fox’s fast-fading X-Men Origins: Wolverine, but some of the astronomical numbers I’ve seen floating around in the blogosphere are very over-heated. Make no mistake, this movie will open extraordinarily well, but it’s not going to play out as a typical front-loaded blockbuster. Moviegoers need time to shake off the disappointment of the final TV series Enterprise (starring Scott Bakula and canceled after four seasons) and the disastrous 2002 final film Star Trek: Nemesis ($43.3M domestic). It will take time for a new generation of fans to discover the magic of Gene Rodenberry’s vision of the future through Abrams’ magical lens.

As of Wednesday night, Star Trek is cruising with 94% Fresh (positive) reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, and critics are slinging some seriously glowing hyperbole.

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In my Final Weekend Tracking column posted on Wednesday, I predicted that X-Men Origins: Wolverine (Fox) would reach $92M on opening weekend, despite soft reviews (now only 38% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes). My first fearless forecast of the 2009 summer blockbuster season appears to be close to dead-on (missed by only 5%).

Star-turned-producer Hugh Jackman has scored his second-biggest opening ever and, easily, his biggest as a solo star. Wolverine has mauled the competition with a massive $34.75M opening day (including $5M or so in Thursday midnight sales). That could translate to a 3-day of $86.8M, getting Hollywood’s most lucrative season off to a spectacular start.

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For something you expect to be a light, fluffy, slightly moronic romantic comedy, “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past” has an awfully seedy undercurrent to it. The over-arching story might be about the redemption of Conner Meade (Matthew McConaughey), a flashy, Manhattan-based, fashion photographer who uses women like Kleenex, but that doesn’t mean the film opposes the idea that emotionless sexual encounters with strangers can still be fun. As Conner learns life lessons about true love, much of the supporting cast comically, and as though it’s their duty, seeks out sex with those they’ve just met. 

Ultimately a movie has to be about something, and while “Ghosts” has its share of problems in every other area, having your protagonist go off in a wholesome direction while celebrating your supporting players sleazy ways, undercuts the one spot where the film had a chance to succeed — with a cohesive, unified theme.

It also leaves an unseemly aftertaste. (more…)

The great thing about a sequel is that it has a built-in audience. The problem with sequels is that, as the numbers after the title go up, so does the production budget. Very hard to know for sure, but sources have told me that the production budget for X-Men was in the $75M range. X-2: X-Men United may have had a budget of about $110M, while the cost of X-Men: The Last Stand was, in all likelihood, as much as $210M. Why doesn’t it make sense to just churn out X-Men 4?

Look at these numbers.

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