BuzzSugar

What Is the Best Action Movie of 2009?

BuzzSugar — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 15:30:17 PST

2009 had an amazing Summer at the box office, and that was due in part to some amazing action flicks. Surprisingly, they weren't all blockbusters, and they weren't all about just blowing stuff up. What was your favorite action flick of the year?

Don't forget to vote on all of my Best of 2009 polls!

What to Netflix: New DVD Tuesday

BuzzSugar — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 06:30:25 PDT

All of the new DVD releases hit stores (and Netflix) on Tuesdays. So each week in What to Netflix: New DVD Tuesday, I sort through the best of the batch and tell you what to add to your queue. Also out this week: The Great Buck Howard, Monk: Season Seven, and Psych: Season Three.

Watchmen
Do you guys remember when it was all Watchmen hype, all the time? It seems like that went on forever and then finally the movie, based on the critically acclaimed comic book series by Dave Gibbons and Alan Moore, hit theaters. And it was fun, especially for those of us who had read the book. Director Zack Snyder made a faithful adaptation, which has its benefits and drawbacks. Visually it is a feast for the eyes, especially the opening sequence, and I think it's definitely worth taking home if you didn't catch it on the big screen. The cast is pretty cool, too, and includes Jackie Earle Haley, Malin Akerman, Billy Crudup, Matthew Goode, Carla Gugino, and Patrick Wilson.

There are lots of DVD extras, like a director's cut of the film (186 minutes) on some versions, a featurette titled "The Phenomenon: The Comic That Changed Comics," and webisodes.

64%

Two more DVDS to check out if you

Coraline
In my opinion, this stop-motion animated adaptation of Neil Gaiman's book is one of the better movies to hit theaters so far this year. It's clear that the filmmakers embarked on a painstakingly careful process to bring this strange and sometimes scary story to the big screen.

Dakota Fanning voices Coraline, a little girl who discovers an alternate version of her life - a way better and more interesting version. But when her "Other Mother" (voiced by Teri Hatcher) tries to keep her forever, Coraline must dig deep and tap into her bravery to get back home. It's immensely entertaining and I highly recommend adding this to your queue!

Special features include a featurette in which director and screenwriter Henry Selick and Coraline author Neil Gaiman take fans deeper into the intricacies of Coraline's worlds, deleted scenes, and a special making-of featurette.

88%

Pushing Daisies: Season Two
I've said it before and I'll say it again: I'm so bummed that ABC let this whimsical gem of a show go. Thankfully the DVD is out now so you can keep it with you forevermore. Pushing Daisies will live on in our DVD collections and our hearts!

Special features in this second season DVD set include "The Master Pie Maker" (a peek inside the mind of creator Bryan Fuller), "From Oven to Table" (bringing a script idea to life), "Secret Sweet Ingredients" (spotlight on composer Jim Dooley), and "Add a Little Magic" (a look at the show's visual effects).

Watchmen Gearing Up For a BD-Live Screening on Facebook

GeekSugar — Tue, 12 May 2009 11:05:23 PDT

One of the coolest things about the Blu-ray takeover is BD-Live, which allows you do cool stuff like watch movies while recording your own commentary track - I've done The Dark Knight with my nearest and dearest and confirm its awesomeness.

For the Watchmen's Blu-ray release, it'll also get a revolutionary welcome on social network site Facebook. The Blu-ray discs will capitalize on the BD-Live feature and enable you to have "community screenings" on Facebook; you'll be able to watch the movie simultaneously with your Facebook friends and make status updates for your commentary.

The Blu-ray disc (which you'll need) will come out some time in July, and in the meantime, make sure you seek out all your Facebook friends who are also Watchmen fans!

Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

In the Spotlight: Watch Good Dog of Watchmen's Goode

PetSugar — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 04:15:45 PDT

Admittedly, I don't know much about superhero movies . . . but I know quite a bit about super cute smooshies. For those of you just as (un) comic book savvy as I am, the movie, Watchmen, is based on a series of the same name and was adapted to the big screen by acclaimed director, Zack Snyder. As far as the plot goes, my quick research revealed there are good guys and bad guys, including Matthew Goode.

OK that was my long winded way of introducing this cute Boxer puppy. The lucky twosome got a cab to transport them from somewhere in Dublin to somewhere else in Dublin – not always the easiest thing to do with a larger dog! I can't wait to see more of this pup but check out their Irish car trip in the photos below.

View 5 Photos ›

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What Movie Will You See in Theaters This Weekend?

BuzzSugar — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 08:30:45 PDT

It's kind of a random time of year for movies, and I'm curious to see what audiences are in the mood for. This weekend has lots to offer, including a new animated feature, a horror flick, and some holdovers from previous weekends - including an Oscar winner.

So tell me: What, if any, movie will you see this weekend?

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Box Office: Nicolas Cage's Knowing Is No. 1

BuzzSugar — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 05:30:27 PDT

The special effects thriller Knowing handily won the box office over the weekend with an estimated $24.8 million. Meanwhile, Paul Rudd and Jason Segel's comedy I Love You, Man came in second place with an estimated $18 million, followed by Duplicity, starring Clive Owen and Julia Roberts, at No. 3.

Race to Witch Mountain slid to No. 4 after winning the top spot a week ago, while Watchmen continued its free-fall to the fifth spot, earning a total of $98.1 million since debuting three weeks ago.

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Box Office: Watchmen Gives Up Top Spot to Witch Mountain

BuzzSugar — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 06:30:18 PDT

Last week Watchmen screenwriter David Hayter posted an open letter to fans asking them to buy more tickets to see his movie, warning that "if it drops off the radar after the first weekend, they will never allow a film like this to be made again."

Well, it looks like his plea went unheeded as Watchmen slipped from the top spot, coming in at No. 2 behind Disney's family-friendly Race to Witch Mountain.

The Last House on the Left took the third spot, followed by Taken at No. 4 and Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail at No. 5.

Photo courtesy of Walt Disney Pictures

Toy Box: Watchmen Action Figures Hit Shelves

LilSugar — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 12:00:56 PDT

While parents flock to theaters to see the very adult-oriented flick Watchmen, action figures like this Watchmen Movie Figure Wave 1 ($17) are jumping on and off shelves.

Most young children won't be exposed to the Watchmen film (it's rated R and, according to Buzz, quite graphic), but the appeal of the toys is understandable. This one in particular has a grandiose Mr. Incredible look to it. Do you ever buy your children toys from movies or books they haven't seen or read?

Box Office: Who's Watching the Watchmen? Everyone

BuzzSugar — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 08:30:46 PDT

Zack Snyder's long-awaited screen adaptation of Watchmen finally hit theaters over the weekend and scored the best opening of the year with an estimated $55.7 million. Apparently that's actually a bit of a disappointment to the studio which, according to Variety, "had hoped Watchmen would match, or even best, the $70.9 million domestic opening of Zack Snyder's previous film, 300, which bowed on the same weekend in 2007."

The rest of the top five at the box office was all mixed up with Tyler Perry's Madea Goes to Jail coming in second place, followed by Taken in third, Slumdog Millionaire in fourth, and Paul Blart: Mall Cop in the fifth spot. Oh, Paul Blart. America just can't seem to quit you.

So what did you see over the weekend? Did you venture out into the world of Watchmen?

Photos courtesy of Warner Bros.

Watchmen: Fun For Fans

BuzzSugar — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 09:30:33 PST

It's obviously difficult to adapt a beloved written (and, in this case, drawn) work for the big screen - and it’s downright impossible to make an adaptation that satisfies every viewer (or certainly every megafan). I truly enjoyed reading the comic book series Watchmen by Dave Gibbons and Alan Moore, and having seen the film adaptation, I don't dislike it. It's probably the best we could have asked for as far as adaptations go. And I know it's useless now to say that the work should never have been brought to film in the first place (though I do feel that way), so now that it has been made into a movie, is it any good? From a fan's perspective I say, sure, it's fine. But I don't have any other perspective to go by.

I have no idea how this movie comes across to someone who has never read the comic book series. I can't even pretend to be unbiased about this - as a fan, just seeing these characters come to life is incredibly exciting. But as a standalone movie, I can admit that it's probably not great. Essentially, it's made for the fanboys (and fangirls) and other viewers may not understand or like it. It's campy, sometimes resembling a silly soap opera, and truthfully I am hard-pressed to remember any distinct images or scenes from the movie, just a few days after seeing it. It's certainly temporary entertainment, and for some it may be frustrating to watch. For more about the movie and my take,

The opening credits (which I got to see at Wondercon, awesomely) are perhaps my favorite part of the whole thing as we hear Bob Dylan's "The Times, They Are A-Changing" and go through a series of slow-motion images of what's been happening politically over the Cold War years, along with images depicting the rise and fall of masked vigilantes in the US. Originally revered as society's helpers, by the 1980s masked crime-fighters have become hated, and people want their good ol' police officers back protecting them. One "mask" is the dark outlaw Rorschach, who still wears a mask of ever-shifting ink blots over his face. Now in 1985 New York City, Rorschach notices that someone has been murdering former masked avengers one by one and he becomes determined to get to the bottom of it. Meanwhile, tensions between the US and the Soviet Union are reaching a boil and nuclear war seems imminent. The movie strings together several different stories of the various former crime-fighters while simultaneously increasing the threat of nuclear destruction within the US-Soviet conflict.

Director Zack Snyder is very faithful to the written work (though he makes some decisions to make certain scenes bigger or smaller, like a particular sex scene that seems to go on for approximately forever). So any real issues one has with the story of Watchmen or with the characters are probably issues with the source material itself and not so much with Snyder's adaptation. That said, even having read the series, the movie is way more violent than I thought it would be. At times it's that cartoonish violence that's easy to take, but some of the gore is startling. In movie form it's just gruesome.

Despite this faithfulness to the material, though, there's a weightiness and a complexity to the written work that doesn't quite come through, leaving many of the scenes to fall flat and empty. The written work is expansive and complicated and multilayered - to pare it all down to a storyline people can understand (even in the lengthy running time of approximately 162 minutes) is an insanely massive task to take on. And in attempting to do so, some parts of the book simply don’t translate well. Dr. Manhattan (a physicist who has an accident in his lab, resulting in his becoming an all-powerful blue, glowy giant being), for example, comes across as just silly and in fact, I found myself at times bored or annoyed with him. His scenes with Laurie are even more tiresome.

Perhaps unsurprisingly (but no less satisfyingly), the best moments come from Rorschach. Aside from being a fan favorite in general, Jackie Earle Haley does a marvelous job making us care about Rorschach and see him as a disturbed man with a strong sense of right and wrong. He's pitiable and a little bit frightening, too. It's easy to root for Rorschach; it's easy for the audience to want to be on his side. We know that he's a bit messed up but somehow all the more likable because of it. And the dark electricity Haley brings to the screen in each of his scenes sets the character of Rorschach apart from the rest.

And maybe I'm easily amused, but the ever-shifting mask he wears is unendingly cool to watch.

See, that's the thing. As a fan, I forgive so much. I don't know how to recommend this movie to the uninitiated - I have no idea what it looks like, or if it's worth the nearly three hours in a movie theater. But as a fan I was going to go anyway, and short of total disaster, I was probably always going to think what I think: that it's cool-looking and super satisfying to see these characters come to life.

Photos courtesy of Warner Bros.