IMPORTANT SITE NEWS!

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News Round Up!

Okay I've been busy doing all kind of silly things like working and getting married so BLAMMO has taken a bit of a hit of late so here's a quick news round up:

Shutter Island:
The new Martin Scorsesee and Leonardo DiCaprio collaboration gets it's first trailer here (LINK) and looks deliciously like a by numbers mystery thriller. In any other director's hands this may sound dull as dish water but as anybody who knows anything about movies understands Scorsesee is a film making titan meaning this almost guarantees this will be Hitchcock style goodness.

Star Trek 11:
Didn't get a chance to review this for you before but JJ Abrahms' Star Trek was really good fun. The cast were superb (Pine's Kirk was an especially pleasing surprise whilst both making teh character his own yet retaining teh essence of Shatner's original) and the oh so very pretty 'add lens flare to every single shot' direction by Abrahms himself was both exciting and intelligent. Yeah it had some slow sections that didn't quite sit perfectly (and though I love him to death felt Pegg's Scotty seemed slightly disconnected with the rest of the universe) but it was both a brilliant action movie and, more surprisingly, an excellent Star Trek movie. 4 'I am and always will be your friend's out of 5

Remaking/ prequaling Alien:
Ah yes. What a shit idea. Not content with the turd that is Alien Resurrection (or the unmentionable AVP movies) Hollywood have discovered yet another way of flogging a dead horse. Ah well it worked for Terminator Salvation I suppose and I am intrigued to see how they heavy handedly chuck in the giant pilot seen in the original Alien.

The White Room:
Diora Baird's science fiction horror goes into production. Yeah maybe not as big news as Alien but it means we get to put Ms Baird's piccie up again so screw you all.

Mission Impossible IV:
JJ Abrahms (again) fancies another attempt at the M.I. series which, if the last one was anything to go by, is no real bad thing. Best end with a better final act this time and choose to release it at a time when the Cruisemeister isn't America's Most hated Actor (AMHA).

Avatar:
James Cameron's much hyped new 3d movie is released soon and... *yawn, snore*

Okay normal service shall resume from this point onwards.

Terminator: Salvation

The original 1984 Terminator, an extremely low budget B Movie style flick created by a fledgling James Cameron, made a star of Arnold Schwarzenegger and an instant classic was born. 1991's high budget, high thrills sequel is considered by many to be one of those rare things - a follow up that is actually superior to the original. Then Terminator 3 came along in 2003 and showed us the vital ingredient to the series wasn't Arnie, the established title or even terminating robots themselves but Cameron... and his absence was a death blow to the series. The film utterly sucked and even hot naked female terminators couldn't lift this from pissing on the original movies.

The Terminator was dead. Arnie became a politician and Cameron stayed in the oceans diving for treasure or 3D or whatever.

Then something strange happened: Fox green lit a spin off tv series to fill in where the writers strike had left the Kiefer Sutherland action show '24'.

Suddenly people were talking about The Terminator again and simply disregarding the 3rd movie. I like this kind of thinking and I do the same with George Lucas related material. Ahem - I digress.

Somehow this rekindling of interest somehow led to super hack McG somehow getting the rights to make a 200 million dollar fourth movie to the series. And SOMEHOW this superhack (who's previous Box Office awesomness in the past had provided us with Charlie's Angels and its Full Throttle sequel) got the world's most serious actor, Christian Bale, to star in it. We nerds all cried ourselves to sleep at night until a trailer turned up which actually looked rather good. Then Doctor Evil himself (Michael Bay) stated that he thought the movie looked shit, was a rip off of Transformers and would get pounded in the box office so we nerds decided fuck him - we love McG!

Anyway maybe I should review the film now?

Terminator Salvation isn't a good film by any stretch of the imagination but by ye godz it's fun! It's clumsy, badly written and features an ending that'll make you puke on your lap... yet still I couldn't help but enjoy it. It's like those He Man sweets you could get in the eighties that consisted of pure artificial colours moulded into a vague shape and sold to children under the character's name: they were yummy and fun but no way should you think about what you just put in your mouth.

Terminator is very much like this. It feels like a B Movie but with huge explosions and giant robots. Bale is every bit as convincing as you'd expect and young Anton Yelchin (last seen as Chekov in the new Star Trek) is simply perfect as the young Kyle Rees. And though both are bogged down with some weak dialogue and some very heavy handed homages to the previous films it just doesn't matter IT'S STILL MUCH BETTER THAN TERMINATOR 3.

And that's pretty much how I felt throughout the movie. Weak plot devices, strange character decisions and a large twist spoilt by the trailer (luckily thanks to the new US style trailers we get that seem to show the entire movie in bullet points I've stopped watching them and only watch teasers so this wasn't ruined for me) just don't seem to apply to the film because it never really stops feeling like a trash 80s movie. In the same way you don't complain about Snake Pliskin's character development or how nobody seems to be able to shoot John Matrix as he stands in front of a hundred mercenaries with guns I found myself forgiving almost all of T4's sins.

Not all though. The afore mentioned ending really is horrifically bad and McG should be punished severely for choosing Danny Elfman to score the movie. Every Mad Max style moment is ruined by an extremely ill fitting score where if the traditional theme wouldn't have fit then pure silence would have been far more suitable. Also the clumsiness of some scenes really do make you yearn for a better director (and writers whilst we're at it) but all in all I'm happy to report that when Terminator Salvation works it really does work.

However, to state once more for record, the important thing is this - Terminator Salvation is MUCH better than T3: Return ofthe Machines. Buy some pop corn and a ticket, enjoy the paper thin plot and big explosions and go home and laugh about the fantastic T-800 model 101 reveal. You'll have time to hate on cinema again when Michael Bay makes Bumblebee fart on The Jesus.

A solid 3 'Much better than I expected' out of 5

Bad News Blammo

David Carradine, star of Kung Fu, Death Race 2000 and Kill Bill, has died. Sadly it seems that the seventy two year old hung himself.

Yes - Bill killed Bill.

Sucks.

Pandorum - Trailer

Two things that make me worry about this sci-fi film that's on it's way. The first is it's "brought to you by the producers of Resident Evil". That's chilling enough. The second is Dennis Quaid. Sorry, but after the pain that was The Day After Tomorrow, I find I struggle to watch Inner Space now. Almost similar to liking bananas, being violently sick after eating some and then blaming them for the rest of your life for making you violently sick, even though they probably didn't.

One main thing that makes me excited for this sci-fi film that's on it's way. It look's absolutely fucking AMAZING. I don't even want to read about it. I'd like to be pleasantly surprised as a film like this hasn't really been seen well since Event Horizon, and that made me all doughy eyed like I'd been staring at Elizabeth Banks all day. In fact, I'm going to watch this trailer, then stare at Elizabeth Banks all day. Adieu.

Iron Sky

In 1944 a group of nazis escaped to the dark side of the moon... now they're coming back!

IRON SKY was announced on our sister blog over at NBoN (link on side of page) a good year or so ago but word is a trailer has just been released... so I got all excited and started to type up this article. However after some serious googling it seems I was mistaken but atleast it gives us anotehr chance to talk about what has to be a BLAMMO tastic experience when the completed movie is released in 2010!

Website

Without a damned clue

I don't want to sound like a stuck record but I hated this idea from the moment I heard of its conception. I love Sherlock Holmes. The stories I loved, the Basil Rathbone films I loved and, especially, the Jermey Brett ITV televsion series (which pretty much got it exactly right).

This however sounded awful from the start. Guy Ritchie directing? Oh heck. Robert Downey Jnr as Holmes? I love him, he's great, he's totally wrong. It's not that I mind people messing with the old stories at all (I loved the comedy version of Without a Clue starring Michael Caine and Sir Ben Kingsley) it's just I think I'm still a little hurt from the messing up of other classics that have occured of late (Lucas and Spielberg I'm looking straight at you).

If nothing else this does give me the the opportunity to tell a joke:

Sherlock Holmes and Watson go camping together and wake up beneath a beautiful blanket of stars.

Sherlock asks "What does this tell you, old friend?"

"Well", says Watson, "Astronomically, it tells me that there are millions of galaxies and potentially billions of planets. Astrologically, it tells me that Saturn is in Leo. Horologically, I deduce that the time is approximately a quarter past three. Meteorologically, I suspect that we will have a beautiful day tomorrow. Theologically, I can see that God is all powerful and that we are a small and insignificant part of the universe". Pleased with himself he pauses and turns his head "Why do you ask? What does it tell you Holmes, old chap?"

Holmes turns towards his old friend and answers "Some fucker's stolen our tent."

Anyway here's the trailer so you can see yourself if you think this is more Casino Royale or Johnny English: