Movie Cliché Supercut: "Let Her Go!"

Here's one of the most commonly used lines in action/thriller movies -- so common that I haven't even really thought about how often it is used -- made a lot more execrable and laughable seen in such quick succession. Highlights: Jon Lovitz in Loaded Weapon and Richard Gere's horrible Irish accent in The Jackal.

Friday Clips #10

We're long overdue for a Friday Clips post! Below: a supercut of Wes Anderson's POV-vehicle shots; an Honest Trailer of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which is actually one of their more positive efforts but still points out, deservingly, lapses in the movie's narrative logic; a LEGO short film that spoofs Guardian of the Galaxy's mix tape; a video showing Pixar's beautiful colour script at work...

Final Cut 2013: A Cinema Tribute

Nick Bosworth over at JoBlo.com has put together this fantastic tribute to the movies of 2013. Containing a phenomenal 283 films spread over 8 minutes of sensory overload, the mash-up does an effective job of encapsulating the landscape of cinema in the past year -- although the choices, understandably, are mostly geared towards Western audiences. A number of films haven't made it to our shores just yet, but see how many you can spot:

Don't Worry, It's Just a Cat

Cats: the source of all false terror. I'm sure there are way more examples but not a bad start, Vulture:

Friday Clips #7

Movies in Movies: A Montage - this is great, a supercut of scenes featuring characters in movies watching movies

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Fake Daria trailer with Aubrey Plaza

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Awkward interview with Bruce Willis - possibly the most cringey thing you'll watch this week (next to the Fox interview with Reza Aslan)

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Pacific Rim trailer, done Toho-style

Friday Clips #6

Three funny supercuts to start off, then an Onion Kickstarter spoof, James Gandolfini in Sesame Street, and a beautiful time-lapse short film...

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Friday Clips #5

Time for some quick clips to perk up this grey Friday arvo!

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Awesome recreation of the opening scene of Casino Royale in LEGO: I did a blog on car movies over at Flicks and a commenter shared this wicked supercut of car chase sequences: This needs no explanation: A short and sweet message from Gareth Edwards, director of the upcoming remake of Godzilla:

Ray Harryhausen: "If you make fantasy too real, it loses the quality of a dream."

AMEN! I was watching Life of Pi last night thinking, "Okay, that's a pretty impressive and realistic-looking computer-generated tiger and all... but...". This weird kind of feeling - attributed to a phenomenon called "uncanny valley" - has yet, for me anyway, to be overcome by CGI, no matter how good it looks. There's so such problem with Harryhausen's pioneering stop-motion animation creations. The hand-crafted charm, the jittery quality, the fact that an actual three-dimensional object was photographed, the onus being on the viewer to do some work filling in the gaps - these elements make, say the skeleton army in Jason and the Argonauts, feel a whole lot more real than some of the slick, overblown CGI effects we've seen and been accustomed to in recent years.

Anywho Ray Harryhausen's passing is a great loss to the film world. Without this guy there would be no Star Wars, no Jurassic Park, no The Thing, no Nightmare Before Christmas etc!  A lot of Hollywood's greatest and most memorable creatures, aliens and monsters simply would not exist.

Here's a pretty good comp of Harryhausen's work:
If you 'd like to catch up on some of the films he's worked on, this is a list of what we've got in our library:

The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms
It Came from Beneath the Sea
Earth vs the Flying Saucers
20 Million Miles to Earth
The 7th Voyage of Sinbad
Mysterious Island
Jason and the Argonauts
First Men in the Moon
One Millions Years B.C.
The Valley of Gwangi
The Golden Voyage of Sinbad
Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger
Clash of the Titans

Friday Clips #2

Good afternoon! Here are some wondrous Friday Clips to distract you from your boring desk job, cleaning up the mess your kids left in the lounge and me from writing a teary-eyed obit for Roger Ebert...

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If there's an actor better at losing his nut onscreen than Nic Cage, it's probably Gary Oldman. A supercut of his finest moments: Trailers for two comedies re-cut into sinister thrillers: Pineapple Express 2 April Fools trailer:

The Worst Films of 2012 Review Themselves

The John Carter swipe's gotta hurt!

Source: Film.com
PS: If anyone's hanging out for A Thousand Words, it's coming to DVD and Blu-ray on January 2.

Mad Drunk

Dang, that's a lot of drinking. I don't recommend driving after watching this.
PS: Mad Men - Season 5 is coming to DVD and Blu-ray in November. Add it to your queue here.

'Cos it's pretty dreary outside...

Let's watch aaall the breaking glass in Total Recall, and Bruce Willis sell his dignity in a couple of TV commercials for a Russian bank (from the director of Torque no less):

2011: The Cinescape

End of the year, feeling burnt out and can't remember what cinema in 2011 was like? Watch this thoughtful, beautifully edited compilation of clips from some key films that defined the year. Lots of big-hitters like Tree of Life, Harry Potter 7.2, Submarine and Transformers 3, but see if you can spot all those barely-there split-second clips of less high-profile films (Ip Man 2!).

Every Michael Bay Explosion Ever

Don't think this needs any further explanation... what can I say, the guy loves it when things go BOOM.