Wednesday, June 01, 2011

A Wednesday clip show, with Fincher, Pulp and even "Star Wars"

Actually, before we jump right into that, there's an intriguing bit of movie news out there today about a reunion of director Noah Baumbach and Jesse Eisenberg.

If you've never seen "The Squid and the Whale," while not the most uplifting of movies, there are few rentals I can recommend higher. Baumbach's directing debut (I believe) was an autobiographical tale of sorts about the divorce of his parents, played by Laura Linney and Jeff Daniels, with Eisenberg playing a character at least loosely based on Baumbach himself.

It was just a sweet little movie, and of course since then, Eisenberg has gone on to become more than a bit of a star. He'll next be seen in August in the Ruben Fleischer ("Zombieland") comedy "30 Minutes or Less" with veryfunnyman Aziz Ansari, and now comes word this morning that he's set to make another movie with Baumbach.

The movie, titled "While We're Young," is apparently about a Brooklynite 20-something couple who inspire an older, uptight documentarian and his wife to loosen up (according to the always reliable The Playlist, at least). If this all comes together, Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts would play the older couple, and Eisenberg and an actress to be named later the younger one.

Sounds like a comedy of manners (or lack thereof) perfect for Baumbach, so here's hoping this all comes together.

And now, because I'm in a bit of a hurry to go swimming before work, let's just jump right into the clips. For about a week or so, a very shaky camera pirated copy of the trailer for David Fincher's thoroughly unnecessary remake of "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" has been circulating on the Internet. Well, Sony apparently finally got fed up, and pulled that copy while replacing it with this spiffy official version.

I have to say, however, that as shiny as it all looks, it seems to be pretty much a shot-for-shot remake of the original Swedish movie, which is already pretty sublime entertainment, so what's the point of all this? Daniel Craig may well turn out to be an upgrade as Blomkvist, but in movies, there will always only be one Lisbeth Salander, because Noomi Rapace took over the role so completely. Having been burned once by what Matt Reeves did to one of my favorite movies with "Let Me In," I'm not ready to give in yet and believe there's any reason for this to be happening. Anyways, after that mini-rant, here's the cleaned-up trailer for you to "enjoy."



Next up, HBO has been on a real roll lately with "Treme" and even more so with "Game of Thrones," which really does get better and better as the weeks go by. And very soon (June 26, to be precise), the fourth season of "True Blood" will premiere. Though I'm not terribly enamored with the sometimes extreme liberties the show takes with Charlaine Harris' already very good Sookie Stackhouse novels, the show still remains a fun and funky brew. And now, through it's HBO Go toy and on to You Tube, HBO has leaked the first three minutes or so of the season 4 premiere, with more chunky bits to come before it's all unveiled. Enjoy, and then stick around for the return of Pulp and even pure, unspiffied up "Star Wars."



When I was supposedly in graduate school (but actually just having a blast in Athens, Ga.), Pulp's "Different Class" was easily one of my favorite albums, and it's one that I still listen to fairly often today. Here, performing I'm not sure where, is Pulp reunited, with Jarvis Cocker clearly just as cheeky as ever, performing "Disco 2000," and sounding great. Enjoy.



And finally today, where can you see the original "Star Wars" (now episode IV, I suppose), without any 3-D, extra footage or any other kind of enhancement? Why here, of course. I couldn't think of anything better to brighten up a Wednesday morning, so here, as promised, is the movie in its blissfully low-tech entirety. Enjoy, and have a perfectly endurable Wednesday. Peace out.

1 comment:

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And now, since I'm in the little bit of the hurry to go swimming prior to work, let's just leap proper in to the clips. For about a 7 days or so, a incredibly shaky digital camera pirated duplicate with the trailer
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