The Movie Filter

Kevin Smith scares me and he wants to scare you too.

August 9, 2006
By Jeff Roedel

At long last noted philanderer Jack Nicholson admits to being a home wrecker. The world’s most annoying Lakers fan—that’s right, I’m snubbing you, Dyan Cannon--spent the last couple decades living next door to Marlon Brando on Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles. Since The Godfather’s death, Nicholson purchased the dilapidated mansion and now says he plans to raze the building and, I kid you not, plant a field of frangipani flowers on the plot. I think Nicholson must be growing another kind of plant in his yard.

The big news this week is that Clerks II director Kevin Smith is already talking about his next project…and it’s probably going to be a horror movie. Apparently the slacker comedy director decided on the horror genre via an age-old Hollywood method, the hallowed game of rock-paper-scissors. Read all about it right here, if you dare.

Déjà vu, Denzel Washington’s time-traveling murder mystery is the first major Hollywood film to shoot in New Orleans after Katrina, and it gets some ink over at the LA Times.

Out this week on DVD is Spike Lee’s latest joint Inside Man. It’s a tate thriller with humor and style that I thoroughly enjoyed in the theater. Plus, Clive Owen pretty much can do no wrong as far as I’m concerned. The guy is an acting machine, and his shrouded bank robber is a remarkable, nuanced performance. Rent Closer.

Out in theaters this Friday is Oliver Stone’s World Trade Center. If anyone sees it this weekend, please leave some feedback and let me know what you thought of it. I’ll pass for now, but may give it a chance on DVD. I just spent a week in New York City. Every time I’m in New York someone who’s never been drags me down to Ground Zero. I’ve never wanted to see it. Ever. Never mind it’s just a big whole in the skyscraping financial district. I saw the towers come down on CNN, why do I need to go look at the footprints of the buildings? So, why pay money to watch World Trade Center? Nicolas “Ghostrider” Cage? No. Maggie “I’m cuter than my little brother, I swear” Gyllenhaal? Maybe. Maria “The Cooler” Bello? Definitely. Well, definitely maybe.

Breaking news from the Advocate: Storytelling, acting carry 'Listener'. You know, this is not a knock on the Advocate at all. I see headlines like this all over the map. Granted, most are from The Onion or snippy celebrity blogs with severe sarcasm addictions, but not exclusively. Good storytelling and acting made a movie worth watching? Really!?! It’s almost like the public has forgotten what quality storytelling, acting and directing actually look like, so we have to be reminded of their presence in the most blunt of terms whenever they do rear their creative heads.

And finally, in future flop news, rumors are swirling over at MTV Films that Avril Lavigne and Kristin Cavallari will star in the upcoming murder drama Lost Summer. Why are so many untrained actors getting roles in major feature films? Who’s handing out the crazy pills? One reviewer called the novel “Laguna Beach meets Cape Fear.” I bet light bulbs went off in dozens of heads at MTV when they read that. Dozens of dyed, gelled to death heads.

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