Films to look out for at the Venice Film Festival

Most of us can't make it to Italy for the Venice Film Festival, but the good news is that our critic Jon Frosch is reporting on the event for France 24. On the eve of the festival's opening, he highlights the selections on his radar. Those interested in this year's award season should watch for reviews of Parkland, the story of JFK's assassination that will play at the fest. Another upcoming 2013 release, Gravity, will play out of competition (it's also playing at Toronto).  The rest of the lineup includes films from a who's-who of indie directors, including David Gordon Green, Kelly Reichardt, Errol Morris, and Xavier Dolan. Check out his first post here, and circle back as he continues his coverage of the festival.

'Elysium' footage sneak peek: 5 things to know about the follow-up from 'District 9' director Neill Blomkamp

Yesterday, Sony previewed several minutes of footage from Elysium, the Matt Damon-led sci-fi movie that's coming out on August 9. The imaginative project looks like it's on track to be a huge hit like Inception. In a market saturated by derivative content, Elysium is a rare beast: a big-budget
movie derived from a completely original concept. Previously, all that was known about the movie was that Matt Damon and countless other poor people live on a ravaged Earth, while the rich live in a space station free of violence, poverty, and disease. The preview gave some more savory details about the feature, which comes courtesy of District 9 director Neill Blomkamp.

1. On Elysium, they can cure cancer. The clip showed a woman sunbathing, then going into what looks a cross between a tanning bed and the robot surgery machine in Prometheus. "Detecting trace amounts of cancer," the machine chirps. "Cancer cells--cleared!" This comes in handy later, because Damon's character gets exposed to radiation in a workplace accident and has just five days to live unless he can get into one of those cure-all machines.

2. Elysium is about a dystopia, with strong parallels to current social issues. Back to that "workplace accident." Damon is told by his boss that he will lose his job unless he goes into some dangeous machinery to fix a jammed door. He's on parole, making him already barely employable, and received a warning from his boss after his arm was broken by a robot roughing him up. He goes in to fix the problem, but it ends up nearly killing him. Surely, nothing like that ever happens in America...

3. Data can be downloaded from the brain. Hacking into someone's brain appears to be a very of-the-moment sci-fi concept. The first time I recall it happening was in The Matrix, and Inception explored the same concept in a more ethereal way. In Elysium, the plot hinges on Damon's crew downloading brain data from an important official from the space station. The information gives them details about how to break down their system and gain access to the fortress-like utopia.

4. Damon turns into a cyborg to get to Elysium. If you want to fight robots, you have to be part robot, right? Since he only has days to live anyway, Damon consents to having his body robot-ized so he can take on the robots that protect Elysium's residents and keep the Earthlings in place. POV shots show that it turns his vision into a video game, locking him into targets and flashing "reload" in the corner of his vision.

5. Paradise looks like a terrarium. Earth looks like--Detroit? The shots of the space station Elysium show a lush, verdant area with amazing views. Some opening shots of Earth show skyscrapers with crapshoot appendages sticking out the sides (I wouldn't want to live in one of those) that recall skyscraper cities in any number of sci-fi films, including Blade Runner. What's more interesting are flat, rundown warehouse-y areas that are similar to the slums in Blomkamp's District 9. The preview didn't connect the urban and suburban places together, but that will likely be clarified in the film itself.

Despite the sneak peeks, the preview left some of the biggest questions unanswered. How exactly does Damon gain access to the space station? How do the people in Elysium and Earth react to the insurrection? And how did things get so unequal to begin with?

Are you ready for the new 'Spider-Man'?

Watching the trailer for The Amazing Spider-Man, I already feel old. It feels like just yesterday that I was watching Tobey Maguire as Spider-Man giving Kirsten Dunst that iconic upside-down kiss. Man, that background music makes that moment feel so cheesy. On second thought, maybe it is time for a new Spider-Man.

However, the fact that they're re-booting the franchise just five years after the third film starring the original cast of characters signals so much that's wrong with Hollywood. Spider-Man "4" was originally going to star Maguire and Dunst and be directed by Sam Raimi. It was only after those oft-cited "creative differences" emerged that Columbia went ahead with an all-new cast and director. The trailer shows us we'll be getting a lot more of the same-old. Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone have the same feel as original stars Maguire and Dunst (even though Stone plays Gwen Stacy, not the Dunst role of Mary Jane Watson). IMDB says Rhys Ifans plays "Dr. Connor/The Lizard," so that solves who the mysterious green, monstrous enemy in the trailer is right off the bat--though comic book fans undoubtedly knew that already.

One thing I'm excited about is that an entire set piece appears to take place on the Williamsburg Bridge. I live near the bridge, and last year I saw the production filming a number of times. One night, they trained high-powered lights on the bridge that lit it up from end to end. I thought that was the kind of thing that was normally done in CGI, so the time, money, and effort that went into that impressed me. I was completely charmed by director Marc Webb's (500) Days of Summer, but I wonder how much of that sensibility will translate to this big-budget, action-centered production.

Of all the superhero franchises, Spider-Man definitely skews young. There certainly isn't the kind of darkness in the Batman series that changed with each director's iteration and made the superhero have appeal beyond the youth set. If they're only going for kids, perhaps it makes sense that a reboot will occur just ten years after the original and five years after the third film in the franchise. 

I can't help feeling a little bored with it all. The Amazing Spider-Man will have to live up to something that's only ten years old in our cultural memory. When Hollywood is already remaking something that premiered in this millennium, how can they expect adults to show up? And how can original screenplays ever have a shot?

So let's talk about 'Moonrise Kingdom'

Despite some recent films that disappointed more than they charmed, the fans haven't left Wes Anderson. Since his trailer for the upcoming release Moonrise Kingdom (May 25!) was posted last week, I've seen plenty of people repost it on Facebook. People I thought would have been jaded about the director were expressing excitement. Why?

 

Personally, I was most charmed by Anderson's style when it was still novel. Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums are my favorite Anderson films, and the rest of them felt like rehashes of his earlier work. If it's possible to OD on irony,  an Anderson film can provide that dangerous dose. Fantastic Mr. Fox was something of a rebound for the director, but I still found myself wearied by his stylized dialogue rather than energized by its arch formality and preciousness.

Moonrise Kingdom has a couple things going for it. One, its 1970s-esque feel. Anderson's always been nostalgic, and at least this time the cast members that look like they are wearing thrifted clothing will be doing so since they're actually supposed to be part of another era.

Two, Anderson's once again returned to children. The story centers on two pre-teens who run away together, sending their small town and the staff of a summer camp on a wild chase in order to find them. At this age, children are often trying to be adults unsuccessfully, so hearing adult words put in their mouth rings true to me. The irony of their statements and actions only underscores what it's like to grow up, during that period when your adult and children parts are all jumbled together.

As a footnote, it's worth noting that Anderson has included some bigwig action stars (Bruce Willis) as well as an arthouse darling (Tilda Swinton). Swinton has one dashing scene where she bursts in and declares "Where is the boy? I am told that he has just been struck by lightning." This is quintessential Anderson, but it also reveals one of the weaknesses of his work. If a scene like this is played for comedy instead of drama, it undercuts the emotional impact of the narrative.

When I think about Rushmore, I think of the sadness and betrayal Max Fischer (played by Jason Schwartzman) experienced after he found out Bill Murray's character was having an affair with his teacher crush. The heart of The Royal Tenenbaums was Royal's (Gene Hackman) isolation after he was abandoned by his family. Though Anderson's other films had characters designed to provoke empathy, it didn't stick. In order to work for me, Moonrise Kingdom can't just charm me with its wit. It will have to make me care.

'Unstoppable' up against 'Morning Glory,' 'Skyline'

By Sarah Sluis

Director Tony Scott switches tracks with Unstoppable (3,207 theatres), a runaway train action film that follows up his train-hostage movie, The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, which also starred Denzel Washington. According to critic Ethan Alter, it's more of the same--"solid but unexceptional." He pegs Scott as a genre director, who has achieved various degrees of success with his "slick, violent, male-dominated action movies." It may be a formula film, but it's one that's expected to compete for first place this weekend against the animated family film Megamind, which should earn at least $20 million in its second weekend.

Morning Glory (2,518 theatres) opened on Wednesday to $1 million, behind two already-playing films, Megamind and Due Date. That puts the workplace romantic comedy at a disadvantage for the weekend. Critic Rex Roberts lamented the "poorly imagined or undeveloped" characters, "although watching them run through their set-pieces provokes enough chuckles to keep us in our seats until the final telegraphed plot twist sends us off into the sunrise." With its age-diverse cast and friendly subject matter, Morning Glory will live or die by word-of-mouth, so audiences will have to love this movie more than critics have (it's tracking at 55% on Rotten Tomatoes).

The trailer for Skyline (2,880 theatres) is reminiscent of Independence Day, with huge spaceships hovering above America's biggest cities. Though the special effects are impressive, which makes sense given the special effects background of the directors, the story itself appears to never rise above made-for-TV standards. "Don't waste your time trying to work out what's going on. It's clear by the end that the filmmakers had no idea either," THR critic Megan Lehmann advises.

Tiny Furniture, from promising indie filmmaker Lena Dunham, will open in one theatre in New York City. I praised the film back when it played at BAM Cinema Fest. Though not as enthusiastic about the slice-of-life, introspective movie, critic Maria Garcia pointed out the similarities between Dunham and Woody Allen, but also mused that the movie could be considered "a cinematic blog chronicling the nihilism of twenty-something-year-olds."

The anti-global warming documentary Cool It will hit 41 theatres. "Cool It is at its most effective when it stops dwelling on what that film�and the scientific community at large�gets wrong about global warming and instead focuses on what practical suggestions they have to offer," critic Ethan Alter concludes. The documentary's antagonist stance to blockbuster An Inconvenient Truth could either help or hurt the movie.

On Monday, we'll see if Unstoppable was able to unseat its superhero competitor, Megamind, if audiences were lured to Skyline and if Morning Glory was able to get itself back on track. Fair Game will also expand from 46 to 175 theatres, giving the movie a chance to try to repeat its $14,000 per-screen average in more theatres.

Disney teases 'Tangled,' 'Tron: Legacy'

By Sarah Sluis

After Disney releases Secretariat this Friday, it has two big releases left on its 2010 slate: Tangled, the studio's fiftieth animated feature and a return to fairy tale princesses, and Tron: Legacy, a supersized sequel to the 1982 cult hit. I had the chance to watch 20 minutes of Tron: Legacy in 2D and a feature-length version of Tangled in unfinished form, also in 2D.

First up, Tron: Legacy. I came into the preview with pretty low expectations. The first Tron teaser trailer, which you can watch on YouTube, starts and ends with a motorcycle chase scene. It looks "cool," but not enough to make me care. I need plot. Based on the preview I saw, the actual film should have appeal that extends beyond fanboys. Sean Bailey, Disney's head of production, dropped the term "character-driven," and I really hope that's true. The scenes we saw set up a compelling relationship between the father Kevin Flynn (Jeff Bridges) and his son Sam (Garrett Hedlund). Sam feels abandoned by his father, who mysteriously disappeared when he was a child, and their reunion scene is ice-cold. Clearly something will have to happen to bring father and son closer together.

We also saw a short portion in 3D, which revealed that the movie will use a strategy that Alice in Wonderland should have: all the real-life sequences will be in 2D, and the sequences inside the video-game world will be in 3D (note: this could change, but was consistent with the footage I saw).

My takeaway: The footage changed my outlook from "don't care" to "I will need to see this."

Next up, Tangled. Those that grew up with The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast will experience a

little bit of deja vu within the entirely new and oh-so-gently parodic Tangled. Though the directors firmly claim the animated feature is not a parody, the male love interest (and him alone) is given some Shrek-inspired goofiness. When a character says at the end of a fairy tale, "You're probably wondering if we get married?" how can you not say you're poking a little bit of fun at the genre?

Tangled will score the most points for turning the passive Rapunzel character, burdened by her long locks, into a strong, determined young woman whose hair is part weapon, part magical tool. She's also a blonde-haired, beautiful girl who favors pink and purple dresses, but let's stop while we're ahead. In one of the funniest and most realistic sequences, she's struck by a mixture of guilt and giddy freedom after leaving her tower/prison. How true! What kid doesn't feel a little wistful when striking out on their own, and the move also underscores the psychologically manipulative relationship the princess has with her "mother."

While many of the most sweeping scenes were presented in unfinished form, one was completed. A scene in which thousands of magic lanterns rise into the sky displayed the most startlingly beautiful luminescence I have ever seen in CG animation. Animated movies have begun to really raise the bar in their visual look--How to Train Your Dragon and Wall-E, for example, had a high-end, live-action look to them. Tangled is a bit of a mix, with some details seeming more cartoony (like too-smooth faces and rather generic interiors), while other rise above. The forest seems enchanted, conveying a diverse topography. While falling in the "cartoon" category, the expressive horse Maximus and chameleon Pascal are two of the most charming characters in the movie (though the horse wins by several body lengths, so to speak).

Tangled has songs--but they fall to the background. Mandy Moore, a singer, voices Rapunzel, and Broadway veteran Donna Murphy (the witchy mother) performs her songs with impeccable elocution. The brief, haunting tune that Rapunzel sings to activate her hair has the most impact, but Rapunzel's opening "I Wish" song (learn more about the trope here) fails to ignite. To be fair, I heard the songs before they were mixed with surround sound and mastered, which could bump up their impact, but the soundtrack didn't seem the focus here.

Each of these films should do incredibly well for Disney. I hope Tron: Legacy has even more special-effects tricks up its sleeve than I saw, and that Tangled's unfinished scenes end up just as awe-inspiring as the magic lantern scenes. Mark your calendars: Disney's set list is one of the best in town. And check out my pictures from Disney's post-screening reception below, completed with one blue Tron-inspired side of the room, and another decked out in Medieval ivy and giant lanterns.

Tangled:

Tron: Legacy:

'Knowing' bests 'I Love You, Man' and 'Duplicity'

By Sarah Sluis

Knowing may have used some of those secret numbers in its plotline to glean advance knowledge of its box-office dominance: it pulled in $24.8 million, 37% more than runner-up I Love You, Man, while

releasing in only 20% more theatres. The Nicolas Cage starrer opened on par with his films Gone in 60 Seconds and Con Air, though it only pulled in half as much as his hit from two years ago, Ghost Rider.

Funnymen Paul Rudd and Jason Segal drove viewers to see I Love You, Man, which finished second with $18 million. Nearly even with the bromantic comedy, number three finisher Duplicity earned $14.4 million. All three of these titles will have little competition next weekend, giving them plenty of time to pick up more box office through word of mouth.

Right below Duplicity, kiddie flick Race to Witch Mountain earned $13 million, but will likely drop heavily next weekend with the release of Monsters vs. Aliens. Would-be blockbuster Watchmen earned half that at number five, coming in at $6.7 million and approaching the $100 million mark, which is still far under

the film's production costs. At number six, horror flick The Last House on the Left pulled in $5.9 million in its second week, but will have to withstand competition next week with the release of The Haunting in Connecticut.

Filling out the bottom four are long-lasting releases Slumdog Millionaire ($2.7 million), Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail ($2.5 million), Coraline ($2.1 million) and Paul Blart: Mall Cop ($1.8 million), all of which have been in theatres for at least a month. Of the four, Madea Goes to Jail and Coraline have not yet grossed $100 million, and are unlikely to pass the mark at the domestic box office.

This week, Monsters vs. Aliens and The Haunting of Connecticut open wide. The collapse of credit markets prevented many theatres from securing funding to convert their screens to digital, meaning the 3D family film will open on far fewer 3D screens than expected, yet another effect of the recession.

Preview: I Love You Man

By Sarah Sluis

Genres like romantic comedies work because they offer a predictable experience and predictable returns

at the box office. They're a safe investment, but in order to keep making them over and over again, you have to constantly innovate and twist the material. Sometimes, in the process, you move so far in another direction you create a new genre. Romantic comedies have gone through all types of incarnations, and the "bromance" might be the latest, based on my screening of Paramount's I Love You Man.

I Love You Man takes the plot structure of a romantic comedy, but recasts both the roles as men, and their relationship as that peculiar neologism "bromance." Unlike the buddy comedy, which brings to mind bantering cops and Grumpy Old Men cautiously circling each other before grudgingly accepting each other's company, I Love You Man has "man dates," nervous phone calls, and all the other hallmarks of a romantic comedy. It's also really, really funny, using that Judd Apatow-honed mix of vulgarity and sweetness. While not Apatow-produced, the movie casts Paul Rudd and Jason Segal, Apatow veterans, in leading roles.

Borrowing from those date-before-a-big-event deadline romantic comedies, Paul Rudd stars as a recently engaged "girlfriend guy," the kind of person who's always in a relationship. He lacks a cohort of male friends to hang out with�and invite to his wedding. Feeling freshly insecure about his lack of male friends, he decides to go in search of a best man for his wedding. There's the obvious joke (a botched date with a guy who assumes he is gay), before Rudd makes a friend at an open house (Jason Segal). Segal (Forgetting Sarah Marshall) plays a Venice Beach loafer who wears Uggs on the boardwalk, eclectic vintage tees, and doesn't clean up after his dog. He's really cool, so cool that Rudd goes through all those nervous first date jitters before they settle down into a friendship. They bond and jam together to the point where their friendship comes between Rudd's relationship with his fiance (the fantastic "The Office" veteran Rashida Jones). True to romantic comedy convention, it all ends up okay in the end.

As a female, I half-expected to be alienated by the story of male bonding, but Rashida Jones provides a great entry point into the film. She's totally amused by Rudd's nervousness picking up the phone with Segal, his rambling voice mails, and his awkward vulnerability around his budding relationship with Segal. Paul Rudd himself has always played the sensitive, slightly neurotic type, a "girl's guy," and he's just as puzzled and out-of-place in the "man cave" as a female would be.

Paul Rudd most recently starred in fall's Role Models, itself a story of male bonding, albeit one of a big brother-little brother mentoring variety. I Love You Man is far bolder than that film or Apatow's male bonding tales, so I'm curious to see what other stories of bromance come to Hollywood. Wes Anderson, for example, recently signed on to write a screenplay for My Best Friend, a remake of French film Mon Meilleur Ami, about a friendless man who must go in search of a best friend in order to settle a bet.

This cluster of successful films exploring extremely close male friendship begs the question--why now, what is it about these films that have made them resonate with audiences? They open dialogue about about what it means to be gay or straight, but, as a whole, have also been critiqued for negative portrayals. Screenwriter Mike White, for example, famously spoke out against Judd Apatow films for their jokes lambasting women and gay men. I Love You Man takes audience expectations of gay behavior and does the opposite. For example, Rudd's gay brother, played by SNL's Andy Samberg (of "Lazy Sunday" fame) plays an Equinox personal trainer that likes to seduce straight, married guys "for the challenge," a counterpoint to Rudd's pursuit of male friendship. In a role reversal, it is Samberg who must counsel Rudd on how to not come off as gay, and to avoid overstating his love of films such as The Devil Wears Prada. Whether this breaks down, or reinforces gay stereotypes will depend, I think, on the open-mindedness of the audience.

While I can only speculate on how America as a whole will respond to this "I need a male friend, but I don't want to come of as gay" comedy, I Love Man should be applauded for its light-hearted re-definition of the romantic and buddy comedy, and original portrayal of male friendship. The honest performances and "bromance" chemistry between Segal and Rudd is just as unusual, and real, as two teen boys telling each other "I Love You" at the end of Superbad, and makes you realize how few films put a close friendship center stage. Maybe it's only a matter of time before we see a male counterpoint to, dare I say, Thelma & Louise driving off a cliff together.

McG gives a sneak peek of 'Terminator: Salvation'

By Sarah Sluis

Substituting a Levi's jean jacket for a blazer, and spattering profanities alongside phrases like "we were going for the patina of Children of Men and Road Warrior," McG presented two scenes from the new Terminator: Salvation movie yesterday, which Warner Bros. will release this Memorial Day weekend.

Not all the special effects were complete, meaning that animated sketches often subbed for the giant, Transformers-like robots. One, a "harvester," plucks humans from the ground in order to conduct experiments. For those of us that were tots when the first Terminator released, the "harvester" robot bears a strong resemblance to the "tripod" in the children's trilogy frequently assigned in grade school classrooms.

As someone who usually squirms in her seat after the third and fourth chorus of a car chase (give me an Adaptation car crash anytime), I was riveted by the first sequence. Tightly paced, the set-piece not only provided thrills, but also expository information about the robots' astonishing capabilities. It starts out at a gas station (for those plausibly motivated explosions!) and ends up on a desert highway. Bleakly colored, the showdown/chase has a post-apocalyptic look achieved by a Terminator-specific film stock, and the arid location adds to the wasted feel, giving it that wide-open vulnerability of a North by Northwest plane chase. Repeat: I was impressed.

To soothe fans who pictured a comic-action take on Terminator la Charlie's Angels, McG repeatedly mentioned his desire to "honor the mythology" of Terminator. The writing team focused on the plot of the first two films, brushing over Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines and altogether abandoning "The Sarah Connor Chronicles." Like a suitor courting James Cameron's daughter, he flew out to visit him and announce his honorable intentions once he signed on to the flick. On Cameron's set, he met Sam Worthington and cast him in the film. The choice sounds suspiciously like a poach, but could end up working in Cameron's favor if Worthington gains star power before Avatar's release.

So Terminator: Salvation has at least one good action sequence, power stars Christian Bale and Sam

Worthington--but, with six-ish writers floating around on IMDB alone, will it have a compelling plot? Time travel, which will figure into the already arced-out Terminator 5 and 6, is an easy way to lose your audience and a film's believability. Sure, the time travel spin is what made the original not-just-another action film, but all those layers of time travel could cross that fine line between satisfying complexity and a hopeless muddle. While McG feels confident they've ironed out all the contradictions, audiences will have to wait until Memorial Day to find out.

'Twilight' a romance of meaningful glances

By Sarah Sluis

Like a teenage daydream ignited by the examination of each possible meaning of that look your lab
partner gave you in biology, Twilight imbues meaningful glances with more smoldering romance than one would think possible in this millennium.  Caught in a romance that transcends time, Edward and Bella just have to search each other's pale, slender-chinned, slow-motion, extreme close-up faces, and make eye contact.  The audience shrieks, sighs, and they know, we know, that it doesn't matter that Edward is a vampire and Bella is a human.  They will be together, forever.  Repeat this moment every couple scenes (in a tree, in a house, in a parking lot, in biology class!) like a fugue, and you have the thrill and electricity of Twilight.

Overwrought emotion is frequently dismissed as melodrama, but with Twilight the sustained palpablity of emotion is a compliment.  Some moments of dialogue may inspire a too-good-to-be-true laughter among more jaded audience members, but that doesn't mean they're not enjoying it.  What kind of person would throw away a love note just because it's too earnest in some points?  For fangirls in the throes of a relationship with Edward and Bella (Stephenie Meyer's series now numbers four) there are private jokes.  A scene in which Edward calls himself a lion and Bella a lamb inspired gasping shrieks among the fangirls seated below me, melting over the enunciation of the pet name they had only ever read.

Like arty vampire picture Let the Right One In, Twilight
takes time to show us the "rules" and the

day-to-day life of vampires.  We get to visit Edward's house, the residence of several vampires.  The modern space has a large, framed, modern color block painting.  Upon closer examination, we see dozens of graduation caps acquired by the perpetually high school-age Cullen family.  "Yeah, it's kind of a family joke," notes Edward wryly.  Bella remarks on the lack of a bed in Edward's room (he doesn't sleep), in an exchange remarkably devoid of innuendo.  We learn the powerful vampires love to play baseball, but only in a
thunderstorm, when the cracks of their bats blend in with the thunder.  The rendering of the game is no Quidditch, and I bet producer Summit Entertainment wished they had spent a little more on special effects, which could have been more robust and drawn out.  But because we are so emotionally invested in Edward and Bella, the thrilling escape scene in a Jeep that follows surpasses, for a brief moment, the emotional impact of Quantum of Solace.  Ouch.

Twilight will undoubtedly do well at the box office, so the question everyone is asking now is HOW well.  Over 2,000 screenings are sold out, more than many of the previous Harry Potter movies.  The word-of mouth among the series' devotees is effusive:  as soon as the girls at the advance screening could rip their embargoed cell phones out of the manila envelopes (I screened the film on Tuesday, and Summit required we relinquish all cell phones during the film, even wanding audience members to check), their fingers started sending gushing texts.  Forget word-of-mouth, Twlight will succeed based on Facebook statuses and Twitters. 

As far as numbers, I'll enter my "superstar" prediction here: $100 million in four weeks.  This summer's Sex and the City, with its older, but still devoted, fan base, passed the $100 million mark in its third week (it made $99 million through its second week).  Most of this year's animated pictures have passed $100 million in two weeks.  The cautionary comparison is live-action HSM3: Senior Year, an aging franchise, but still one with a devoted legion of Zac Efron fans.  That film has earned $84 million through its fourth week--I see that as Twilight's worst-case scenario, which would still vastly exceed the film's sub-$40 million production budget.  Summit Entertainment still claims they  only expect $40 million in returns, but the numbers $50 and $60 million have also been floated around.  If Twilight can earn $50 million in its first week, and drop less than 50% each subsequent week (exponential decay, the subject of Twilight girls' math homework!), it will make $100 million in four weeks.  However, as much as I would like to see this film succeed, vaulting the stars, the series, and Summit into a big deal, I don't see girls successfully dragging their relatives to Twilight over next week's Thanksgiving weekend.  Time will tell.

CGI 'Monsters vs. Aliens' first entry in DreamWorks' all-3D plan

By Sarah Sluis

Last week I saw a preview of scenes from Monsters vs. Aliens in 3D.  The film, which will release on March 27, 2009, also recently unveiled its trailer online.

Unlike home-runner Pixar, DreamWorks' animated pictures have been much more uneven, critically and commercially.  Monsters vs. Aliens comes eight years after Pixar's Monsters, Inc., and employs a similar monsters-are-our-friends take on the freakish creatures.  Although I wish the two studios could stop their critter competition (rats in Ratatouille and Flushed Away; fish in Finding Nemo and Shark's Tale; insects in A Bug's Life and Antz), the latest offering looks like a worthy match to Pixar's offering.

Conceptualized and animated entirely in 3D, the film forgoes using the popping effect to shock (a la my previous benchmark, Universal Studios' theme park ride Terminator in 3D) but often makes something as simple as an over-the-shoulder shot pop out, bringing the 3D effect to the most quotidian of film compositions.  The first set-piece, in which the United States president (Stephen Colbert) attempts to make contact with the alien spaceship, makes the most cinematic use of 3D--staircases jut out from the center of the screen, helicopters swoop in, and missiles (including one emblazoned with "E.T. Go Home") fire to impressive 3D effect.  The new wave of 3D glasses are clear and not meant to cause headaches, but it took me the greater part of one sequence for my eyes to adjust and the whisper of a headache to subside.  The polarized glasses also have some unintended effects: the red EXIT sign multiplied by seven and cast itself into my left eyeline.  Not the biggest deal, but if you're paying the premium price ($15.00 for an adult 3D ticket in Manhattan, a $3.00, 25% markup), you want the image to look perfect.

From a storytelling perspective, there is much to commend: little details, like a series of preemptive comedic shrieks, temper the scare factor for youngsters.  For adults, the voice casting plays on the star personas (roly-poly Seth Rogen plays a blob, "House, M.D."'s Hugh Laurie plays a mad scientist cockroach, Stephen Colbert as the President...).  Along with a smattering of Shrek-like allusions to classic monster and alien films, the snappy dialogue, visual gags, and mild gross-out humor will please adults and kids alike.  Watching the film, I knew exactly which moments would prompt eager kids to whisper to their parents with glee ("Daddy! That man just scanned his butt!").  The film also avoids one of my biggest pet peeves: when a marketing campaign gives away too many plot points, forcing the audience to spend half the film waiting to get to the moment you saw or predicted from a thirty-second commercial.  Based on the introduction of the clips, it appears the monsters' defeat of the aliens marks the turning point, not the climax, earning the film major points according to my rubric.  Perhaps DreamWorks is taking a lesson from Pixar and its tantalizing teaser trailers.  With most animation moving into 3D, and DreamWorks committed to making all of their films in 3D from this point onward, the relative success of Disney competitor Bolt 3D stands to foreshadow Monsters vs. Aliens' success this March.