Movie: Juno * Official Site * Buy It on Amazon	On DVD:	April 15, 2008
Runtime: 96 minutes	In Theaters:	Dec. 25, 2007
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for mature thematic material, sexual content and language	Gecko Rating:

If you think a movie about teen pregnancy can’t be sweet and funny, then you need to see Juno. Under Jason Reitman’s skillful directing, this movie is smart and touching, and scored an Oscar for Diablo Cody’s thoughtful screenplay.

Other Oscar noms include Best Picture and Best Actress for the brilliant Ellen Page, whose hip dialogue and lightning timing make the movie what it is – a feel-good flick with a few heartbreaking moments.

Page plays Juno MacGuff, a 16-year-old girl who learns she’s pregnant from a one-time sexual encounter with her best friend, Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera).

More after the jump!

Though she’d rather not be pregnant, Juno takes it all in stride – first considering an abortion, then deciding to see it through and give the baby up for adoption. After telling her dad (J.K. Simmons) and stepmom (Allison Janney), they set about finding potential parents for the baby.

Juno strikes gold in the ad section of the local Penny Saver: Mark (Jason Bateman) and Vanessa Loring (Jennifer Garner) are a yuppie couple living in the suburbs. Vanessa is a little obsessive-compulsive, but Juno finds a kindred spirit in Mark, with whom she shares a love of grunge music and horror films.

But all is not peachy with this couple. With the prospect of her baby going to a broken home, Juno has to figure out the best path to take.

Try not to miss this movie. Trust me on this. And after you see it, let me know what you think.

DVD Extras: 20 minutes of deleted/expanded scenes with or without without commentary from Reitman and Cody. One features Page performing a song on guitar. Featurettes look at Cody, the teen actors, Reitman, and the movie in general. There’s also a music video in which the cast poses and “jams” with a rock song, as well as some gag segments with the cast.

Parents Should Know: This movie contains plenty of sexual references, but little is seen onscreen. Language includes colorful phrases and words. In short, it’s best for kids 15 and older (even though the rating is PG-13). 

Check out the trailer:

Image: Juno, Fox Searchlight, 2008

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Universal Pictures and Marvel Studios have released the first poster for The Incredible Hulk, set to hit theaters on June 13. Cool, huh?! Ok, I admit I’m giddy with excitement over this one. Check out the first trailer.

Directed by Louis Leterrier, the action-thriller stars Edward Norton, Liv Tyler, Tim Roth, Tim Blake Nelson, Ty Burrell and William Hurt. And look for Robert Downey, Jr. to cross over as Tony Stark / Iron Man.  

Image: The Incredible Hulk, Universal Pictures, Marvel Enterprises, 2008 

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Sean Astin has signed on for the CGI-animated Spirit of the Forest, an eco-fairy tale for Fantastic Films International and Dygra Films.

Has anyone seen any Dygra films? I haven’t, so I’m curious to hear your thoughts.

The former hobbit joins Giovanni Ribisi, Ron Perlman and Anjelica Huston for the film, scheduled for screening at next month’s Festival de Cannes with plans for a 2009 release.

Astin and Ribisi play two gopher friends whose home is threatened when an evil businesswoman (Huston - she plays a lot of evil women lately) plans to tear down their forest to build a highway. With the help of an old oak tree (Perlman), the animals and their friends fight back with a vengeance.

More after the jump…

Astin says the eco-topic is close to his heart. “In Lord of the Rings, my favorite element in the story was the Ents, these massive trees getting cut down that fought for their own survival; in Spirit, the trees also come to life,” said Astin, noting the environmental message in both films. “It’s another way of telling a story that needs to continue to be told. Progress comes at a price.”

Spain-based Dygra’s The Living Forest (2001) and Midsummer Dream (2005) each won the Spanish equivalent of an Oscar for best animated feature. Forest will hit theaters in September in Spain.

Sounds cute! I wonder if it’ll be similar to Over the Hedge, which also had an eco-theme. I’ve been a big fan of Sean Astin’s since Lord of the Rings, and also after reading his book, There and Back Again: An Actor’s Tale. I highly recommend it.

Image: Spirit of the Forest, Dygra Films, 2008

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ESPN Films announced today that it’ll co-produce with Robert Redford a theatrical movie about Brooklyn Dodgers star Jackie Robinson.

Redford has been working on the project for several years. He’ll play Branch Rickey, the team’s general manager and the force behind the success of the black baseball player.

Attached to direct is Thomas Carter, whose credits include Coach Carter, Save the Last Dance, and scores of TV shows dating back to The White Shadow (remember that show, starring Ken Howard?) and Hill Street Blues.

The as-yet-untitled movie has the blessing of Rachel Robinson (Jackie Robinson’s widow), as well as Branch Rickey, Jr.

Image: Robert Redford, Lions for Lambs, MGM Home Entertainment, 2007

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Moviegoers came out in force for the slasher movie Prom Night this weekend, followed by Street Kings, which I didn’t think was all that great.

1-Prom Night - $22.3M

2-Street Kings - $12.0M

3-21 - $10.8M

4-Nim’s Island - $9.0M

5-Leatherheads - $6.3M

6-Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who! - $5.9M

7-Smart People - $4.1M

8-The Ruins - $3.3M

9-Superhero Movie - $3.1M

10-Drillbit Taylor - $2.0M

Image: Prom Night, Screen Gems, 2008

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Natalie Portman has signed to star as the romantic Catherine Earnshaw in the latest movie adaptation of Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The English lit classic tells of the passionate, tragic love story between Catherine and a man known simply as Heathcliff. Olivia Hetreed (Girl With a Pearl Earring) wrote the script, and John Maybury is attached to direct. No male lead at this writing.

Wuthering Heights has been brought to the small and big screen many times over the years — IMDB.com lists 14 versions dating back to 1920. That production was directed by A.V. Bramble and shot on location around the Bronte family home in Haworth, West Yorkshire.

The 1939 version, directed by William Wyler and starring Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon, scored eight Oscar nominations. The 1992 movie featured Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche as the star-crossed lovers.

The newest Wuthering Heights is scheduled for a 2010 release date.

Photo: Natalie Portman, The Other Boleyn Girl, Columbia Pictures, 2008

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Movie: Street Kings * Keanu Interview * Official Site	In Theaters:	April 11, 2008
Directed by: David Ayer	Runtime:	109 minutes
MPAA Rating: R for strong violence and pervasive language	Gecko Rating:

As much as I love Keanu Reeves (in a he-seems-like-a-really-nice-guy kind of way), his acting always feels like he’s reading from a cue card. Kind of wooden. Not a whole lot of range. And it doesn’t help when he’s playing a cliched anti-hero-alcoholic cop like in Street Kings.

In a Reuters story, Fox Searchlight president Peter Rice called this movie “a story that’s familiar, but told in a fresh way.” I beg to differ. This movie has every cliche known to crime-thriller fans, from rogue cops to dirty cops to dead cops with grieving widows.

Reeves plays Detective Tom Ludlow, a veteran LAPD cop who’s struggling emotionally after the death of his wife. He’s kind of a Jack Bauer type, in that he doesn’t always play by the rules to get the job done. When Ludlow busts up a porn ring and rescues two little girls, he shoots all the suspects, then…

…fires off a few rounds of one of their guns to make it look like he was fired on first.

When Ludlow’s former partner, Terrence Washington (Terry Crews), is gunned down in a convenience store, the security video implies that Ludlow stood by and let it happen. In reality, he was following his partner on a tip that he might be involved in shady dealings, and tried to warn him when he saw what was happening.

When Ludlow’s mentor, Capt. Jack Wander (Forest Whitaker) banishes him to a desk job, Ludlow sets off on his own investigation which leads to assorted seedy creatures in L.A.’s underbelly, played by guys with real-life names like Cedric the Entertainer, Common, and The Game. (Yes, I know who these guys are, but their ridiculous names bug the heck out of me.)

And here’s what else bugs me about this movie:

1) I think that James Ellroy, who penned the screenplay, needs to take some time off or find a different genre or something. It’s been 11 years since L.A. Confidential came out in theaters. Let’s move on.

2) You can see the plot coming 1000 miles away. World-weary alcoholic cop, slain ex-partner, seedy characters, green-behind-the-ears sidekick (played by Chris Evans), lurking Internal Affairs guy (played by Hugh Laurie), worried nurse-girlfriend (played by Martha Higareda), yada yada yada. I knew where this movie was headed in the first five minutes.

3) Forest Whitaker’s character was way too deer-in-the-headlights to be believable. I don’t care who you are. You don’t spend that many years on a police force without being jaded and cynical. And it bugs me that a veteran cop like Tom Ludlow wouldn’t have any inkling that his co-workers were dirty. Please. What was he, born yesterday?

Ok, that’s all I have to say about this movie.

  Images: Street Kings, Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2008

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Movie: Smart People * Trailer * Official Site	In Theaters:	April 11, 2008
Directed by: Noam Murro	Runtime:	95 minutes
MPAA Rating: R for language, brief teen drug and alcohol use, and some sexuality	Gecko Rating:

After the success of Juno, I can imagine it would be tough for Ellen Page to keep raising the bar higher and higher. I mean, what do you do after Juno? That movie was so much HER, you just felt like she must be playing an extension of herself. I think that’s partly why Smart People seems like Juno Lite.

The ensemble cast features Page as Vanessa Wetherhold, a Type-A high school student, intent on scoring high on her SATs so she can get into Stanford University and, undoubtedly, away from her kooky family. Dennis Quaid plays her gruff dad, Lawrence, a self-absorbed English professor at Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Mellon University. He’s still grieving the loss of his wife a few years earlier and can’t bear to give her clothes to Goodwill, even though, as Vanessa reminds him…

…it would be a great tax write-off.

Lawrence’s college-student son, James (Ashton Holmes), is living in the Carnegie Mellon dorm. When Lawrence visits him one night to complain about a high credit card charge, his ratty old car gets towed, and he can’t talk the security person (a former student whose name he can’t remember) into letting him retrieve his briefcase from the car. So Lawrence climbs the fence and ends up in the hospital with a seizure-induced trauma and concussion.

Can’t drive for six months, claims Lawrence’s E.R. doctor, Janet (Sarah Jessica Parker), with whom he strikes up a romance of sorts. But lo and behold, when Lawrence gets home, his adopted brother, Chuck (Thomas Haden Church), is on hand to be his chauffeur. Chuck’s not exactly a pillar of responsibility. He leaves Chuck standing in the rain, gets Vanessa drunk and has to fend off her awkward sexual advances, and steals a beloved sweatshirt of Lawrence’s dead wife.

The message I get from this rambling movie is that we’re all kooky in our own way, and we all grieve and get by in our own way. But sometimes the slackers actually have it more together than the “smart” people. At one point, Chuck declares giddily, “I’m happy with my life!” And it makes you think that maybe the slackers have it right. They never worry about getting ahead, making more money, being at the top of their game. You know, maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Not caring certainly simplifies things.

But back to my Juno Lite thought: Like Juno, this movie is about a dysfunctional family (and there’s even a pregnancy), but it doesn’t have the same verve as Juno. The actors are great, and the script by Mark Jude Poirier is pretty good, but I didn’t really care about any of the characters. The whole movie just sort of lies there, leaving you wanting something…more…

The bright spot for me is Thomas Haden Church, who has this devil-may-care attitude that brightens up a dismal household. He seems like he’d be a fun guy to hang around with. Have a beer or whatever.

Images: Smart People, Miramax Films, 2008

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More after the jump…

Also in Theaters:

The Visitor: Walter Vale (Richard Jenkins) is an economics professor who’s completely bored with his life in Connecticut. On a trip to his NYC apartment, he finds a couple living there and strikes up a friendship. Rated PG-13 for brief strong language. Official Site

Bra Boys: Russell Crowe narrates this documentary about a gang in Australia known as the “Bra Boys.” Living near Sydney, four brothers enjoy both surfing and getting into trouble. But when one kills an extortionist, the others get involved. Rated R for language, some violent content and reckless behavior. Official Site

Dark Matters. Liu Xing (Liu Ye) is a Chinese student who comes to America to study the origins of the universe. He’s soon noticed by the head of the department at his university, Jacob Reiser (Aidan Quinn), who takes the young man under his wing. A rivalry develops, involving violence and revenge. Rated R for a scene of violence, brief sexual content and language. Official Site

Young @ Heart. The world’s oldest cover band — a group of senior citizens — put the kids to shame by performing tunes from Jimi Hendrix, Coldplay, and Sonic Youth. Rated PG for some mild language and thematic elements. Official Site

Body of War. This documentary profiles the life of Tomas Young, a young man who joined the military after 9/11. Thinking he was going to be sent to Afghanistan to fight al-Qaeda, Tomas instead found himself in Iraq, where he became paralyzed after being shot in the chest. Not rated. Official Site

The Dhamma Brothers. This documentary profiles an experimental program in an Alabama maximum-security prison. Hardcore convicts find peace during a ten-day meditation retreat, during which time they are not to utter a single word. Not rated. Official Site

Images: Street Kings, Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2008; Prom Night, Screen Gems, 2008; Smart People, Miramax Films, 2008; Chaos Theory, Warner Bros. Pictures, 2008; The Visitor, Overture Films, 2008

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More after the jump…

Also in Theaters:

The Visitor: Walter Vale (Richard Jenkins) is an economics professor who’s completely bored with his life in Connecticut. On a trip to his NYC apartment, he finds a couple living there and strikes up a friendship. Rated PG-13 for brief strong language. Official Site

Bra Boys: Russell Crowe narrates this documentary about a gang in Australia known as the “Bra Boys.” Living near Sydney, four brothers enjoy both surfing and getting into trouble. But when one kills an extortionist, the others get involved. Rated R for language, some violent content and reckless behavior. Official Site

Dark Matters. Liu Xing (Liu Ye) is a Chinese student who comes to America to study the origins of the universe. He’s soon noticed by the head of the department at his university, Jacob Reiser (Aidan Quinn), who takes the young man under his wing. A rivalry develops, involving violence and revenge. Rated R for a scene of violence, brief sexual content and language. Official Site

Young @ Heart. The world’s oldest cover band — a group of senior citizens — put the kids to shame by performing tunes from Jimi Hendrix, Coldplay, and Sonic Youth. Rated PG for some mild language and thematic elements. Official Site

Body of War. This documentary profiles the life of Tomas Young, a young man who joined the military after 9/11. Thinking he was going to be sent to Afghanistan to fight al-Qaeda, Tomas instead found himself in Iraq, where he became paralyzed after being shot in the chest. Not rated. Official Site

The Dhamma Brothers. This documentary profiles an experimental program in an Alabama maximum-security prison. Hardcore convicts find peace during a ten-day meditation retreat, during which time they are not to utter a single word. Not rated. Official Site

Images: Street Kings, Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2008; Prom Night, Screen Gems, 2008; Smart People, Miramax Films, 2008; Chaos Theory, Warner Bros. Pictures, 2008; The Visitor, Overture Films, 2008

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