Night at the Museum still box office champ and other signs of the apocalypse

Here's the thing. I don't even really hate Ben Stiller. Yeah, I left
watching Zoolander with a bunch of my college buddies to smash my head
against the wall for a couple hours. True, I only thought Meet the
Fockers was funny for about ten minutes. But I didn't really start
ragging on Stiller until I saw the trailer to Night at the Museum.
Now, trailers aren't always a good representation of what a movie is
going to be like. However, when I see a trailer to a movie as
ridiculous and uninteresting as Night at the Museum and then watch it
dominate the box office, I begin to get that Johnny Ola feeling. You
know, that feeling that Michael Corleone gets in Havana in GF 2 after
he realizes that Fredo knows Johnny Ola, which means that Fredo must
be the traitor. The reason I get this feeling is because for every
Night of the Museum that comes out, three more equally bad ideas for a
movie are greenlit – if not more. I also get this feeling because for
every baffled head rub and snicker I had while watching the trailer,
many, many other people said, "hey, let's go see that." This leads me
to think that some sort of global catastrophe is certainly on the way
and because Ben Stiller is the poster child, I'm blaming him. So, the
eternal optimist that I'm not leads me to believe that in 2007 we will
be bombarded with similar movies. But, in the spirit of the New Year,
I spent the last hour or so doing research looking through the
scheduled release dates for movies that shouldn't give me that Johnny
Ola feeling in 2007. Here's some of how the research went:

JANUARY

The Good German – I know I've already mentioned it, showed a picture
and mentioned it again, but it finally goes nationwide January 19th.
George Clooney has SHOCKINGLY become one of my favorite actors and it
just looks like a cool idea for a movie being set in post WWII
Germany.

Must move the mouse past Code Name: The Cleaner starring Cedric the
Entertainer.

Freedom Writers: I barely eluded Code Name: The Cleaner and clicked on
this one that has Hillary Swank and Imelda Staunton (from Vera Drake).
Based on a book written by one high school teacher and 150 of her
students, it's about a group of students who struggle to make sense of
the world they live in and find out who the true heroes are/have been.
Seems like a natural fit for an inspiring, loosely based on real life
Hollywood movie.

Alpha Dog: This one was inevitable ever since rap was
popularized in the suburbs. Set in suburban LA, privileged teenagers
with too much money and too time on their hands run wild imitating the
thuggish behavior from the music the idolize. Could have just as
easily been set in my hometown of Clarence, New York – a rural suburb
of Buffalo. Has the potential to be a provocative film if it manages
to stick mainly with realism and avoid coming off as too preachy.
Maybe director Nick Cassavetes got a little direction from the recent
film Thirteen, which was about a mother dealing with her
thirteen-year-old daughter as she begins to get exposed to more and
more adult type themes before the mother is ready. Thirteen managed
to bring some issues to light without preaching and I'm hoping for the
same out of Alpha Dog. Then again, Cassavetes did make John Q.


FEBRUARY

Hannibal Rising – So I don't really know how to feel about this one.
It's about the dark path that led Hannibal Lector to become one of the
most terrifying characters in movie history. Starring Gaspard Ulliel
instead of Anthony Hopkins, (I guess they realized that Hopkins
wouldn't work as a young Hannibal) this is another in the line of "how
did the famous character become that way." But it worked very well
for Batman and even better for James Bond with Casino Royale, so I'm
willing to give it a shot.

I clicked on Code Name: The Cleaner. It's only 84 minutes and stars Cedric the Entertainer. Somehow, a "mild-mannered cleaner with amnesia" got tangled in a supposed government conspiracy which inevitably will lead to the action and comedy labels that are listed under genre. I know it was you, Fredo. I need to take a walk.


Reno 911 – Anyone who thinks this movie will be dumb should watch a couple of episodes of the show. Add an R rating and the melting of
limitations to what they can portray, it could be very, very funny.



MARCH

Reign over me – I promise there are almost no sarcastic undertones in
this one and it even stars Adam Sandler. I clicked on this one having
no idea what it was about and was more than pleasantly surprised.
Sandler plays a man trying to cope with family deaths during 9/11 and
begins rekindling a friendship with an old college friend (Don
Cheadle). Directed by The Upside of Anger director Mike Binder, this
looks like another attempt at a real character from Sandler, who
proved he's not a bad actor in the right role with Punch Drunk Love.
The Upside of Anger was one of the most surprising movies I've
ever seen. After only renting it because I was outvoted by the two
girls I was with at Blockbuster, I liked it far more than either of
them. Looking forward to this one, too.



Sunshine – Director Danny Boyle, who recently made the very good
Millions, steps into the science fiction genre. Set 50 years in the
future, it centers on a crew sent to
Re-ignite a part of the sun that is dying. A few years before this
mission, another crew was beset with the same mission but was never
heard of again. For me, sci-fi is very hit or miss, but the ones that
hit usually hit very hard. Seems like a creative idea – I hope it
works.

Zodiac – Director David Fincher once again takes on material dealing
with serial killers, like he did with Se7en. Starring Jake Gyllenhaal
and Robert Downey, Jr., this one chronicles the infamous Zodiac Killer
as he terrorizes a San Francisco Bay community. Fincher is perfect
for this type of dark material and Gyllenhaal has shown recently with
Jarhead and Brokeback Mountain that he has a lot of character range.
When not in prison, Downey can act, too.

Coming soon: Part 2 looking at the 2007 release schedule has
collaborations between Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez and
Jamie Foxx with Chris Cooper, Anthony Hopkins returning to portraying
a killer evading law enforcement and another run with the Shrek
franchise.