The time is upon us, friends. When the super-heroes come out of hiding to save the world...again. When cute, quirky characters suddenly start spouting off quips and indulging in zany adventures. When groups of misfit-yet-idealistic teens band together to protect a little thing called "home" from greedy developers.
When Will Smith says "Aw, hell naw..." after far too long a hiatus.
Yes, it's almost the start of summer movie season. Let's see what's in store this May...popcorn-flick wise, anyway.
1)Battle For Terra- Judging from the trailers, this is "Delgo...in...SPACE!"
Yeah, I got nothing.
2)X-Men Origins: Wolverine- Few people will be aware of the obscure, all but forgotten character known as Wolverine. A mere footnote in the comics, he got understandably little play in the first three X-Men movies. I suppose Fox decided to throw his small cult of dedicated fans a bone.
3)Star Trek- So, you have a long-running space opera franchise, right? One with an extensive, convoluted, extremely involved continuity. A continuity that the franchise owners, right or wrong, view as an obstacle to drawing in an audience beyond the aging, jaded, vanishing core fan-base.
So, they decide to try a reboot. But, they know the core fan-base is already feeling alienated and angry over a multitude of creative misfires in recent years. So, they also try to include as many ties and references to the classic series as they can.
All they have to do is pull off the perfect combination of fresh and new viewer friendly yet deep and rewarding to lifetime fans! Why, nothing could be simpler!
...Trekkies, welcome to the special hell fans and writers of DC Comics Legion of Super-Heroes have had to deal with for over 20 years.
Brought to you by the writers who wrote the immortal "Anthony Anderson scarfs donuts and shrieks" bits from 2007's Transformers. Whee.
4)Angels and Demons- Hey, have you ever actually -read- a Dan Brown novel? He tends to remind the reader of which big name Hollywood stars his characters physically resemble. Come to think of it, his books are also paced just like a spec screenplay for a summer popcorn flick! Hmmm...
5)Terminator Salvation- In this entry, the hapless freedom fighters in the future cower before their most frightening, intense antagonist yet: Christian Bale's temper.
There may also be killer robots.
6)Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian- This film has Amy Adams in it! Really, she's far more entertaining than the ten zillion FX that will share the screen. I'd watch her read the phonebook.
7)Drag Me to Hell- It's a Sam Raimi horror film. Really, what more do you need?
Advance reviews have compared it to the better of the old EC horror comics. It has no slashers or torture porn. It's not "based on a story where a family truly claimed their house was haunted!"
Like I said, what more do you need?
8)UP- It's a Pixar movie.
That's right. Don't even think about it. Pre-order the tickets now. It's a Pavlovian response by this point, isn't it?
They have trained you well. Soon, all will know the peace that is Lasseter. The jolly, shiny peace.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I didn't know that the new Night at the Museum and Up both came out this movie.
Even better.
This is going to be a great month!!
Posted by Shanna (Member # 7900) on :
I'm SOO excited for UP! I just got done watching "Spirited Away" and they had a segment on the dvd where Lasseter explained that whenever the Pixar crew hit a brick wall and didn't know how to proceed with a scene, they'd all pile into a room and watch one of Miyazaki's films. To me, it certainly explains their desire be creative and defy convention.
Star Trek, Angels and Demons, and X-Men Origins are also on my summer list. I WAS most excited for Wolverine but I'm losing my joy with every stupid tv commercial. The slapstick humor is not encouraging. But my comic book geeky-coworker and I will certainly be there at midnight.
I won't be seeing the other movies.
Posted by Raymond Arnold (Member # 11712) on :
Up until recently I was annoyed at how the Terminator movie wouldn't have Summer Glau or continue any of the plot threads from the TV show. But the newest trailer is one of the coolest movie trailers I've ever seen, and introduces some neat concepts.
Christian Bale explosions aside, I think it's on the top of my must see list, followed closely by Star Trek, followed closely by Up, followed closely by Wolverine, followed... crap, these ALL come out in May?
Posted by Vincent1 (Member # 11729) on :
I'm sure I'll see a few of those. Why is Hollywood holding on to the need to release good movies in the summer (May, June, July)? There hasn't been a big movie released in at least three months. Why do all the studio’s want to compete with each other? why not space them out? Get a weekend or two to yourself. Right now we get a flurry of movies at Christmas, the rest of the year we wait for summer?
I understand that the kids are out of school (starting in June). But Why not space out the blockbusters. No one see's movies in the late winter/early spring because there aren't any good movies to see; not because they don't want to go to the movies. I promise with the same advertising the same people who are going to see Star Trek in May would have seen it in March. Btw: I thought the new terminator movie was a very bad idea until I saw the trailer , then I wanted to see, despite Bale’s temper.
Posted by Raymond Arnold (Member # 11712) on :
What I'm confused about is why they postponed Harry Potter because they were "afraid they wouldn't have a summer blockbuster," and then proceed to squeeze all these movies into May. I can already tell you they'll be losing about 12 dollars from me personally because I won't have the time to see them all when they first come out, and by the time I get to see them they'll probably be in the cheapo theaters.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
May always has the most bang. It's the open of the Summer movie season.
They were more worried about the back half of the movie season, in July and August, where there aren't as many big name fancy pants movies. Plus they felt they could make more money from a Summer release.
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
Ever since films like Jaws proved in the 1970s that an "event film" released in the summer time could become a blockbuster, the studios have tried to duplicate it.
This usually means they plan to release such "tentpoles" around the major holiday weekends, when it's assumed the maximum amount of people will have the time to go to the movies. So they tend to be front-loaded near Memorial Day and the Fourth of July.
Posted by Raia (Member # 4700) on :
Is it worth seeing if you've already seen the Planet Earth documentary?
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
My local paper's review made it sound like there's a lot of footage re-used, but that it's still worth watching.
Posted by Shan (Member # 4550) on :
I have not seen the Planet Earth documentary, so don't know the answer to that one.
However, not only was the show delightful, the trip down memory lane of Sunday family nights watching Wild Animal Kingdom and other Disney specials was really cool. If for no other reason than that all the wee ones in the theater really helped to intensify the oohs and ahhs of discovery and cool things. Posted by Corwin (Member # 5705) on :
I'll go see X-Men, Star Trek and Terminator, and probably Up if they show it with subtitles and not dubbed (most animation movies are shown dubbed...). But I'm a bit annoyed that the three movies I'm likely to see are all sequels/prequels/whatever-quels.
Edit: Terminator comes out in June here, and Up in July. The other France May releases that I might see include "War, Inc." and "Flash of Genius".
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)