Films of 2014: Summer

Well the new year is upon us and usually the first couple months of movie releases fall into two distinct categories.

1. Nationwide expansions of year-end Oscar hopefuls that only played in New York & Los Angeles during December.  

2. Films moved to January-February because the movie studio doesn't think there is enough box office potential to release them at any other time during the year.  

January 3rd:

Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones.

January 10th:

The Legend of Hercules (no stars, reportedly horrible CGI effects and directed by schlockmeister Renny Harlin - this one will flop spectacularly and will be out on home video by the beginning of March).  

Lone Survivor - nationwide expansion of the Mark Wahlberg war movie released in December in the major cities.

Her - nationwide expansion of the Spike Jonze directed sci-fi fantasy about a man who falls in love with the AI operating system of his smart phone.  Already released in New York & L.A. in December.

January 17th:

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit.  This reboot of the Clancy-inspired franchise starring Chris Pine was originally scheduled for December but was pushed back until January.  We'll have to wait and see how it fares.

The Devil's Due.  Low-budget riff on Rosemary's Baby.  

The Nut Job.  Animated family film.

Ride Along.  Yet another "actor rides along with a real cop" film starring Kevin Hart and Ice Cube.  

January 24th:

I, Frankenstein. Much-delayed (filming was completed in 2011, has been in post-production hell for over a year) horror/action hybrid film starring Aaron Eckhart.  This one looks terrible, cheesy CGI ala Van Helsing and direction by Paul W.S. Anderson puts this one squarely in my "no way in hell will I watch this" pile.  Originally planned as a summer release the studio decided it was just not up to the challenge so relegated it to the January dumping ground.  

January 31st:

That Awkward Moment. (comedy)

Labor Day - nationwide expansion of the Ivan Reitman drama starring Kate Winslet that was released in December in New York and Los Angeles.  

The only films in January I'm interested in are the two holdovers from December; Her and Labor Day.  Will probably watch the Jack Ryan film when it comes out on home video.

I'll be updating this thread with each months new releases throughout the year.

"Devil's Due" looks like a fun "B" horror movie. The rest... meh. "I Frankenstein" looks particularly ridiculous.

Fat Freddy wrote:

"Devil's Due" looks like a fun "B" horror movie. The rest... meh. "I Frankenstein" looks particularly ridiculous.

The only positive I can find about I, Frankenstein is that Bill Nighy is involved (one of the best actors on the planet) and it also co-stars the amazingly hot Yvonne Strahovski from the TV show "Chuck". (although she deserves much better than this crap)

Her (the movie, not the above photo) is the only title that looks remotely interesting to me. The trailer for Jack Ryan looks kind of cool, although the whole production is the most inane thing I've seen pass a studio.

corplhicks wrote:

although the whole production is the most inane thing I've seen pass a studio.

I'm sure if you spent a few minutes you could come up with several thousand other titles that were far worse. After all, crap like Caveman and Doctor Detroit were released by major studios, this film has the potential to look like a masterpiece by comparison.   

Hollywood's name for this time of year: "F**k you, it's January."

I am looking forward to Lone Survivor. I read the book and it was excellent. I trained with several Seals back in '07 during the surge in Iraq, but I didn't know anyone involved in Operation Redwings.

S.D. wrote:

corplhicks wrote:

although the whole production is the most inane thing I've seen pass a studio.

I'm sure if you spent a few minutes you could come up with several thousand other titles that were far worse.  After all, crap like Caveman and Doctor Detroit were released by major studios, this film has the potential to look like a masterpiece by comparison.    

Well, I guess inane is the wrong word. It just was a weird concept to throw out there. From what I've been reading, the Jack Ryan name is boilerplate. The characters are only loosely connected and the script isn't based on any Clancy writings. And then we've got Branagh--a perfectly competent, hell, great director, don't get me wrong--directing an action flick. Everybody's favorite hit-and-miss-yet-always-missing-the-mark-somehow writer David Koepp is writing along with a total rookie (although I wouldn't be surprised if there have been several uncredited writers attached to this at some point). So it seems like a hodge podge of sorts that makes me ask "why?" Then again, I can see how the Jack Ryan name would draw in a particular crowd, however diminished it may be today. Regardless, I actually think it may be pretty good.

Witchfinder wrote:

I am looking forward to Lone Survivor.  I read the book and it was excellent.  I trained with several Seals back in '07 during the surge in Iraq, but I didn't know anyone involved in Operation Redwings.  

When war movies go for total realism in analyzing a particular situation, such as Black Hawk Down, count me in. I had no idea that's what this was based on. So I'll add it to the list.

corplhicks wrote:

Well, I guess inane is the wrong word. It just was a weird concept to throw out there. From what I've been reading, the Jack Ryan name is boilerplate. The characters are only loosely connected and the script isn't based on any Clancy writings.

In other words it's exactly the same as the James Bond series.  They use the book title, a few character names and then throw out the rest of the novel.  Then when they ran out of novels they started creating titles that "sounded" like Ian Fleming titles.

S.D. wrote:

corplhicks wrote:

Well, I guess inane is the wrong word. It just was a weird concept to throw out there. From what I've been reading, the Jack Ryan name is boilerplate. The characters are only loosely connected and the script isn't based on any Clancy writings.

In other words it's exactly the same as the James Bond series.  They use the book title, a few character names and then throw out the rest of the novel.  Then when they ran out of novels they started creating titles that "sounded" like Ian Fleming titles.

That's mind-blowing; I never thought of that. Although there are a handful of Jack Ryan novels (Sum of All Fears, anyone?) that they could have used. But still, you're right.

Not Sum of All Fears. Without Remorse. It's been a long ass time since I've read those.

corplhicks wrote:

Not Sum of All Fears. Without Remorse. It's been a long ass time since I've read those.

Sum Of All Fears was already made into a completely forgettable 2002 film starring Ben Affleck and Morgan Freeman, seriously, I saw it in the theater and I can't remember a millisecond from it.

I've seen some pretty good reviews of "Her" (the local guy put it in his top 5 of 2013 - obviously he saw the advance release).   I think it could be an interesting premise depending on where they go with it.  Of course, I'm warped so I'm pretty sure it won't go in any direction I'd approve of.   

S.D. wrote:

corplhicks wrote:

Not Sum of All Fears. Without Remorse. It's been a long ass time since I've read those.

Sum Of All Fears was already made into a completely forgettable 2002 film starring Ben Affleck and Morgan Freeman, seriously, I saw it in the theater and I can't remember a millisecond from it.  

That's what I meant, I put the wrong movie title in the previous post. And yes, it was very forgettable...probably why I didn't remember it.

corplhicks wrote:

S.D. wrote:

corplhicks wrote:

although the whole production is the most inane thing I've seen pass a studio.

I'm sure if you spent a few minutes you could come up with several thousand other titles that were far worse.  After all, crap like Caveman and Doctor Detroit were released by major studios, this film has the potential to look like a masterpiece by comparison.    

Well, I guess inane is the wrong word. It just was a weird concept to throw out there. From what I've been reading, the Jack Ryan name is boilerplate. The characters are only loosely connected and the script isn't based on any Clancy writings. And then we've got Branagh--a perfectly competent, hell, great director, don't get me wrong--directing an action flick. Everybody's favorite hit-and-miss-yet-always-missing-the-mark-somehow writer David Koepp is writing along with a total rookie (although I wouldn't be surprised if there have been several uncredited writers attached to this at some point). So it seems like a hodge podge of sorts that makes me ask "why?" Then again, I can see how the Jack Ryan name would draw in a particular crowd, however diminished it may be today. Regardless, I actually think it may be pretty good.

Witchfinder wrote:

I am looking forward to Lone Survivor.  I read the book and it was excellent.  I trained with several Seals back in '07 during the surge in Iraq, but I didn't know anyone involved in Operation Redwings.  

When war movies go for total realism in analyzing a particular situation, such as Black Hawk Down, count me in. I had no idea that's what this was based on. So I'll add it to the list.

It's based on this incident: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Red_Wings

tohostudios wrote:

I've seen some pretty good reviews of "Her" (the local guy put it in his top 5 of 2013 - obviously he saw the advance release).   I think it could be an interesting premise depending on where they go with it.  Of course, I'm warped so I'm pretty sure it won't go in any direction I'd approve of.   

I'm going to go see it this weekend, there are still a handful of 2013 titles I need to see before I can put together my year-end list. I've been excited about Her since I first read about it early in the year but my work schedule was too hectic over the holidays to make it to the theater.

My catch-up list: Her, Captain Phillips, Philomena, Inside Llewelyn Davis, The Wolf Of Wall Street. I'm guessing by the time I watch those I will have seen over 80 films released in 2013.

S.D. wrote:

tohostudios wrote:

I've seen some pretty good reviews of "Her" (the local guy put it in his top 5 of 2013 - obviously he saw the advance release).   I think it could be an interesting premise depending on where they go with it.  Of course, I'm warped so I'm pretty sure it won't go in any direction I'd approve of.   

I'm going to go see it this weekend, there are still a handful of 2013 titles I need to see before I can put together my year-end list.  I've been excited about Her since I first read about it early in the year but my work schedule was too hectic over the holidays to make it to the theater.

My catch-up list:  Her, Captain Phillips, Philomena, Inside Llewelyn Davis, The Wolf Of Wall Street.  I'm guessing by the time I watch those I will have seen over 80 films released in 2013.

Our local guy liked Wolf Of Wall Street too.  In fact, his review almost makes me want to see it.  He said something to the effect that "even though as you're watching it, you think 'these people are disgusting', you still keep watching".  He also said the 3 hr running time is not an issue; it never gets boring.   And...it was just short of getting an NC17 rating which of course tells me to wait for the "Director's Cut".

I'm not expecting Wolf Of Wall Street to be as good as American Hustle (which I've seen twice already) but I'm always interested to see what Marty comes up with.  I have no attention span issues so the running time doesn't phase me at all and I don't have the hangups of the people decrying the film as pornography.  I wouldn't expect a director's cut, Marty tends to avoid those usually.

Hell, even Philomena had to battle the MPAA to get a PG-13 rating, they actually used the "f-word" more than once in the film (you are only allowed 1 by the MPAA in a PG-13 film). Can you believe that nonsense? You can say F*ck once…but if you say it twice then your audience must be 4 years older! That's about as stupid as you can possibly get.

Sounds like you and our local guy agree; he had American Hustle in his top 5 too. 

After rewatching this, he doesn't have "Wolf..." in his top 10 but he did give it positive review.  And I didn't remember that he ranked "Her" as his best of the year.

http://fox2now.com/2013/12/24/reel-world-2013-top-10-movies/

this month must see priorities:
Paranormal Activity: Marked Ones
Wolf of Wall Street
Hercules: The Legend Begins
Twelve Years a Slave

Lone Survivor got a decent review from James Berardenelli, but this I had no idea:

"Lone Survivor is director Peter Berg's "reward" for making Battleship for Universal Pictures. The studio agreed to bankroll Lone Survivor only if Berg first helmed what they hoped would launch a new summer movie franchise. (We all know how that turned out.)"

So now we know why Battleshit happened. Interesting.

I want to see Devils Due and The Wolf of Wall St out of that list.

If I want to oggle Yvonne Strahovski (and I always do   ) I'll just watch Chuck re runs!

I went and caught Her at the Arclight in Hollywood yesterday afternoon. Spike Jonze continually makes strange and interesting films and Her is no different. Her is probably one of the least commercial of the major awards contendors, probably a little too quiet and contemplative to break into the mainstream but definitely worthwhile for those inclined toward more artistic fare.

The film is set in a near-future Los Angeles (you can tell it's the future because of all the extra skyscrapers and the subway actually goes all the way to the beach). Joaquin Phoenix drops the overtly crazy here instead creating an introverted loner who during his post-divorce depression purchases an "operating system" (voiced by Scarlett Johansson) that listens, learns and adapts to him. The majority of the film takes place directly with these two characters though there are a few small, well-drawn performances from Olivia Wilde, Amy Adams and Rooney Mara. Scarlett does a brilliant job bringing the character of the virtual Samantha to life, her breathy voice that cracks charmingly having to carry the entire character (she is never seen on screen).

While I suppose you could classify the film as sci-fi it is really about loneliness and the loss of human interaction in a social media world.

That's one I want to see. Unfortunately it'll probably have to wait till it shows up on demand. I rarely have the time to go to the theaters anymore and it's even less when I want to go see something 'artsy' that my wife won't watch.

"Dead Snow 2: Red vs. Dead," the sequel to the Norwegian Nazi-zombie horror flick, comes out in February (in Norway anyway; dunno about the U.S.)