Behold: the last Saw poster we'll ever see...

Click here for a 3D-spinning version (the embed code that Lionsgate sends me never seems to work on Blogger). You certainly can't say that Lionsgate isn't going hogwild with the promotion for this alleged series finale...

Scott Mendelson

Ssshh... don't tell boys it's about Supergirl! Andrea Romano confirms sexism in Superman/Batman Apocalypse title change.

Confirming what I've long suspected, Andrea Romano commented to Newsarama's Jill Pantozzi that the reason the recently-released Superman/Batman Apocalypse was not called 'Supergirl' was that Warner marketing put the kibosh on female-driven projects at DCAU after the comparability poor sales of the Wonder Woman DVD.

“I think the main reason why they didn’t call this piece Supergirl is because for some reason theWonder Woman home video that we made, which was very, very good and filled with (fe)male* characters, didn’t sell well,” she told us. “And so marketing people said, female titled pieces don’t sell well. So this is a female piece, it’s got a very strong feminine character in it but they called it Superman/Batman: Apocalypse just to get people to come into the video stores and buy them.”

So yes, Warner's DCAU marketing department is so frightened of marketing to girls and/or getting boys to see a movie primarily about a female super hero, that they removed any trace of Supergirl both from the film's title and the film's trailer. The sad thing is, aside from the principal of this kind of thinking, is that Wonder Woman (still the best film in this ongoing series) was not a poor seller in the long run, it just didn't sell quite as many copies quite as quickly as Batman: Gotham Knights or Superman: Doomsday. So newsflash young women of the world: not only does Disney no longer market to you, but the DC Animated Universe is no longer allowed to make movies that are marketed to you. And if they have the nerve to make a female-driven picture, then they have to disguise it as a testosterone-filled sausage-fest. Just fantastic.

Scott Mendelson

* Romano said that Wonder Woman was 'filled with many male characters', which was likely a typo. I presume she meant 'female characters', as there were only a few men in Wonder Woman.

Skyline gets a full-length trailer.

Looks pretty terrific, especially for the alleged $20 million cost. We'll see how much of the big effects shots have already been revealed in the trailer, but this looks like an exciting little sci-fi thriller. Plus, anything that nets Donald Faison a solid payday is alright by me. This one comes out November 12th.

Scott Mendelson

Critics didn't kill the Sex and the City franchise. It wasn't really dead.

“It's over. The franchise is dead. The press killed it. Your magazine f------ killed it. New York Magazine. It's like all the critics got together and said, 'this franchise must die.' Because they all had the exact same review. It's like they didn't see the movie."

That was Chris Noth discussing the apparent demise of the Sex and the City franchise in an interview with New York Magazine. If the franchise is truly finished, it is surely not the fault of magazines and critics. Not that critics are blameless, as they pounced on the film with a vicious campaign of vitriol that likely would have been tempered for a more male-driven franchise (how much worse could it have been than Iron Man 2?). It is also not the fault of the second film itself. Yes, it was allegedly terrible, and many fans were turned off just as much as the critics, but it still passed the primary test for a franchise picture: it made lots of money. If the series is no more, then it is purely the fault of Warner Bros. By that I mean, they have prematurely snuffed out a genuinely-profitable franchise.

Sex and the City 2 cost $100 million. It grossed $288 million worldwide. That, ladies and gentleman, is profit. Lots of profit. It will make more money than Angelina Jolie's Salt (cost: $110 million, worldwide gross: $284 million), which itself is having a sequel readied as we speak. It will make more money than G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, which will get a sequel after grossing $302 million on a $175 million budget. And if The Last Airbender gets a sequel (a 50/50 proposition), it too will earn that from a $300 million worldwide gross off a $150 million budget. And both Star Trek and X-Men Origins: Wolverine will get sequels after each grossing around $380 million worldwide on $150 million+ budgets. Granted, Star Trek 2 is expected to break out in a The Dark Knight/Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest fashion, but does anyone think that a Wolverine Takes Japan will outgross or even equal the $373 million-take of the much-loathed original?

Yes, the original Sex and the City grossed $415 million on a $65 million budget, so the second film was less profitable than the first. But there's a pretty simple solution to this: keep the bring the budget back down to earth for the third picture. A Sex and the City 3 which costs $75 million would be profitable even at a worldwide gross of $225 million, which is a reasonable expectation for a theoretical third picture. Here's another free tip: don't open your female-driven R-rated comedy over Memorial Day weekend, since the family-driven holiday will leave little time for the wives and mothers in your audience to plan a 'girls' night out'. Point being, if Sex and the City is a dead series, it is not the fault of the critics, or even the second film's alleged downturn in quality, but simply the fault of a studio that doesn't recognize easy money when it sees it.

Scott Mendelson

Oh no! George Lucas to offer us the choice to watch the Star Wars series in 3D?!

Oh wait... we can choose to see them in 3D theaters or not? We don't HAVE to give him and 20th Century Fox our money if we don't want to? Oh... nevermind. Anyway, starting in winter 2012, Lucas will be releasing one Star Wars film per year into theaters with a 3D conversion, starting with The Phantom Menace and ending with Return of the Jedi in 2017. As usual, this is less about George Lucas's greed (he's already worth $3 billion, and he's pledged to give half his estate to charity upon his death) and more about him using his Star Wars films to play around with new technology, in this case perfecting the much-maligned art of 3D conversion. Finding time to see all six of them in a theater at one time would be a bit much, but revisiting them in 3D at one per year during the dead-zone of January/February is perfectly fine. First of all, it will have been 15 years since these things were in theaters in any form, so it's not like he's milking the cow every couple years (nearly 14 years after the Special Edition releases in 1997, Star Wars: Special Edition still has the second-biggest January opening in history). Second of all, and this is a biggie to those who accuse George Lucas of being purely out for financial gain, Lucas was among those who signed 'The Giving Pledge' amongst billionaires to give half their estates to charity. So a ticket for The Phantom Menace 3D is a partially charitable donation to whatever foundation Lucas bestows his billions (probably education-related). Of course, if you're one of those overgrown children who still has a temper-tantrum every time George Lucas mentions Star Wars, here's some free advice: don't see the 3D converted versions in theaters. See, feel better? Sometimes the simplest solution is the best.

Scott Mendelson

Coen Brothers True Grit remake gets a powerful teaser.

It's amazing what the right music can do. As I've said any number of times, sometimes it's all about the soundtrack choices for a trailer. Like Star Trek, Where the Wild Things Are, and Inception, this is a trailer where the music does 90% of the work. Without that, we just have a series of quick shots establishing the core plot and the four main characters. But mixed in with the Peasall sisters singing a moody and almost creepy cover of 'Where No One Stands Alone', the 75-second piece establishes this Coen Brothers remake as a genuine bit of western myth-making. This is a powerful piece of stand-alone editing, which makes it a remarkable teaser for what should be a major player over the holiday season. True Grit, with Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, Josh Brolin, Barry Pepper, and Hailee Steinfeld, opens wide on Christmas Day. Between this and Tron Legacy a week prior, Jeff Bridges is going to have a very, very merry Christmas indeed.

Scott Mendelson

There is no such thing as a 3D movie. 3D is not a genre, it's a tool.

There's a new article out from Anne Thompson, who I usually enjoy, regarding the alleged downturn of 3D. Basically the gist is that 3D is in peril, and the big savior of the format will be Tron: Legacy. The piece itself is harmless, and to be fair it's more of an advertisement for Tron: Legacy than a real discussion about 3D. But it's just another notch in the 'dear god, the 3D sky is falling' bit that forgets the most important part of this whole mess... I'm going to try really hard not to turn this into another endless rant, so bear with me. It's the movie. It's the movie. It's the movie, stupid...

Piranha 3D didn't break out mainly because it was an uber-gruesome R-rated horror film that was advertised as just the sort of thing you can catch for free on the SyFy Channel on Saturday night (which, to be fair, is indeed truth in advertising). Yet, the $24 million piece of soulless garbage has made $63 million worldwide, so the film is still a genuine hit. Cats and Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore was a sequel no one asked for nine years after the fact. It was also so terrible that my three-year old was bored. But it still crossed $100 million+ worldwide. Step Up 3D may not have exploded despite actually being shot in 3D, but the $40 million picture has grossed $137 million worldwide, more than the $114 million global take of Step Up, but less than the $150 million worldwide gross of Step Up 2. And Alpha and Omega may be an out-and-out flop, but did anyone think that the terribly-bland looking Lionsgate cartoon was going to break out? Remember, Lionsgate's far more ambitious Battle For Terra (ironically, a 3D animated version of Avatar six months prior to Avatar) grossed only $3.7 million worldwide. Yes, that's the lowest-grossing 3D movie on record. Regardless, the former $20 million wolf-pack romance has already grossed $16 million worldwide and still has at least a few weeks left.

Let's take a look at what did break out. Despicable Me is just a couple days away from becoming the 10th-biggest animated film in domestic history. Was it because of the 3D? No, it's because Despicable Me (which I finally saw this weekend in a 2D second-run theater) is a wonderfully inventive and clever movie, a joy from start to finish and a genuine crowd-pleaser. It opened to $56 million because Universal did a bang-up job selling the movie, contrasting the subversive story (root for the super villain!) with kid-pleasing comedy (the kids, and the yellow minions). Resident Evil: Afterlife has basically performed like every other entry in the franchise, with more muscular overseas numbers and a token 3D ticket price boost. And The Legend of the Guardians opened with $16 million, which isn't too bad considering the somewhat challenging material (it's an action film about owls, and it looks just scary enough to make parents nervous). Had the film not cost $90 million. And while The Last Airbender was one of the worst films of the year, it opened like gangbusters ($69 million over five days) not because of the 3D conversion but because of the rabid fanbase of the original Avatar: The Last Airbender cartoon and the (now on life-support) bankability of M. Night Shyamalan. And of course, Toy Story 3 was the best film of the year, and it would have been just as effective on an iPhone.

Point being, not one of these movies was a hit or a flop because of being offered (sometimes exclusively) in 3D. As always, it's the movie itself. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part I will open to $100 million+ in November, and it won't have anything to do with its 3D conversion. Tron: Legacy will open based on its marketing campaign, which 90% of the audience will have experienced in 2D theaters and on 2D computer screens. My Soul to Take will live or die based on the marketing campaign that highlights horror pioneer Wes Craven. And Saw VII will get far more of a boost out of opening unopposed on Halloween weekend and/or being the alleged series finale than it will from a 3D conversion (I would hope that the fact that Saw VI was the best of the series would help too).

Until we see a film that would have flopped in 2D but became a mega-smash due to being in 3D, the 3D format remains a tool, a way to enhance the viewing experience and/or spend $5 million in order to charge $5 extra per ticket. There is no such genre as 'the 3D film'. What filmmakers over the next year or so have to decide is whether they want to be a 3D film, or a film that happens to be in 3D.

Scott Mendelson

Weekend box office (09/26/10): Wall Street 2 is number 01, while Legend of the Guardians cost too much.

The funny thing about long-delayed sequels is that it's generally pretty easy for them to top the opening weekends of their predecessors purely due to inflation. So while Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps is a genuine mainstream hit with $19 million on 3,565 screens ($5,330 per screen) over its debut weekend, it's basically just double the figures as the original Wall Street posted back in 1987, despite opening with 5x the dollar amount. The original film opened with $4.3 million in 730 theaters ($5,622 per screen). Adjusted for relative inflation, that would give the original Oliver Stone cautionary tale around $10 million in 2010 dollars. But outside of its context from the 23-year old original film, this sequel performed well on its own accord.

It is Michael Douglas's first number 01 opening since Don't Say A Word's $17 million debut almost nine years ago to the weekend, and it's his second-biggest opening weekend ever, behind the $21 million opening of You, Me, and Dupree. For Shia LeBeouf, this almost qualifies as a relative comedown, as this is his lowest live-action opening weekend since Holes ($16 million) made him a recognizable name back in 2003. But when you work with Steven Spielberg and Michael Bay, a $19 million opening for an Oliver Stone drama almost feels like a letdown. This is actually Oliver Stone's biggest Fri-Sun gross of his career, although final figures may put it below the $18.7 million debut of World Trade Center. Point being, while Oliver Stone may be known as a director who alternates between controversial battering rams and hard-leftist documentaries, when he makes a mainstream picture, audiences generally show up. The film pulled a 2.7x weekend multiplier, which actually counts as solid in these front-loaded days. The film apparently cost $60 million, so it will have to do decent worldwide coin as well to really make money for Fox, but the picture debuted with $9 million in overseas grosses as well, giving the film a solid $28 million worldwide gross in the first three days. Where it goes from here is an open question. Usually I'd say that a picture like this would be a second choice for general audiences for awhile, but Ben Affleck's The Town seems to be filling that slot at the moment (more on that one later).

Coming in second place was the Zack Snyder animated action fable, Legends of the Guardian: The Owls of Ga'Hoole (no, I don't know how to pronounce that either). While the film's $16.3 million opening weekend isn't too bad, especially for a Warner Bros cartoon (aside from Happy Feet, the WB feature animation department is a study in tragedy), this film allegedly cost an absurd $150 million. Credit Warner Bros. for again giving Zack Snyder a blank check and complete creative freedom, but this one is going to cost them a lot more than Watchmen did. If Sucker Punch doesn't deliver financially in March, then Snyder is probably going to have to take a couple work-for-hire gigs (I hear Chris Nolan is looking for someone to direct Superman?). The other wide opener was a the ensemble comedy, You Again. The horribly-reviewed 'high school returns to torment you in adulthood' comedy, which starred Kristen Bell, Jamie Lee Curtis, Sigourney Weaver, Kristin Chenoweth, Bette White, and Victor Garber, grossed just $8.3 million. To those who thought that Betty White was going to be some kind of magic ingredient, I must have forgotten about Lake Placid and its $40 million opening in July 1999 (for the record, it also opened with $10 million, and it's a vastly underrated horror comedy).

In limited release news, the educational system-in-crisis documentary Waiting For "Superman" had a smashing four-screen debut, opening with $141,000 for a $35,250 per screen average. Lionsgate inexplicably debuted Buried on 11 screens, and was rewarded with just $111,000. I have no idea what Lionsgate was thinking. As it is, arthouse audiences don’t generally see horror/suspense films at their local art house, unless they are foreign/uber-acclaimed. If you’re going to see something in limited release this weekend, it’ll probably be Waiting For "Superman", Never Let Me Go ($442,000 in ten days), or some other would-be awards-bait. Buried is set to go wide on October 8th, where it will face off against Wes Craven's My Soul to Take (a film so awesome that it underwent a quick 3D conversion and sent Craven scurrying back to the Scream franchise). Sony put The Virginity Hit on 700 screens, apparently as a favor to producer Will Ferrell, and they got $300,000 for their troubles. Finally, Woody Allen's You Will Meet a Tall, Dark Stranger opened on six screens and grossed a solid $27,167 per screen.

In holdover news, all four wide debuts from last week had good-to-okay holds. Ben Affleck's The Town is quickly becoming a water-cooler success story, with general audiences finding the film a cut above the usual mainstream entertainment. While I can only shake my head and implore them to rent Gone Baby Gone, I have no ill will toward the many talented people who have a success on their hands. The film dropped just 32% in weekend two, grossing $16 million and ending day ten with $49 million. The well-liked high-school comedy Easy A dropped an equally reasonable 39%, ending its second weekend with $32 million. Mean Girls dropped 44% and Clueless dropped 33% in their respective second weekends, so the Emma Stone vehicle is in some high good company.

The M. Night Shyamalan-produced spook story Devil dropped 47%, which isn't too bad for a cheap horror flick (new ten-day total: $21 million). As glad as I am so see that it didn’t completely implode, it should have opened closer to Halloween. Frankly, it could have done wonders as the PG-13 alternative to the bevy of R-rated horror product (Let Me In, My Soul To Take, Paranormal Activity 2, Saw VII) over Halloween weekend (especially with kids buying tickets to Devil and sneaking into the other R-rated films). Finally, Lionsgate lost 48% in weekend two with its cartoon Alpha and Omega, with the cheapie pulling in $15 million in ten days.

In other holdover news, Resident Evil: Afterlife has grossed $52 million, making it the highest-grossing entry in the long-running franchise. Worldwide, the $60 million video game sequel has grossed a massive $155 million and counting. So yeah, coming in September 2013 will be Resident Evil: Resurrection. Inception has crossed $755 million worldwide. Of note is that the film is just $500,000 away from surpassing The Dark Knight in overseas grosses. At $287 million in domestic grosses, it is the fifth-biggest grossing live-action film not based on anything pre-established in literature or history, behind only Avatar ($760 million), ET ($435 million), Independence Day ($306 million), and The Sixth Sense ($293 million).

That's it for this weekend. Join us next time when Overture returns from a seven month hiatus with the wide release (Jack Goes Boating went out limited last weekend) of the dynamite horror remake Let Me In. Sony unleashes David Fincher's much-raved-about 'founding-of-Facebook' drama The Social Network. And Paramount finally releases the years-delayed Renee Zellwigger horror picture Case 39. The most important release of the weekend will likely be the semi-wide release through AMC of the unrated horror film Hatchet II. It's been decades since we had a wide release of a quasi-mainstream unrated picture, and its success could open the floodgates for this kind of thing.

Scott Mendelson

Blu Ray Review: Superman/Batman Apocalypse (2010)

Superman/Batman Apocalypse
2010
78 minutes

rated PG-13
Available September 28th on DVD, Blu Ray, iTunes, and On Demand from WHV.

by Scott Mendelson

It is perhaps unfair for me to be overly critical of Superman/Batman Apocalypse, as I was not a fan of the comic book story arc from which it is adapted from. The early Jeph Loeb issues of the Superman/Batman comic were full of fan-friendly moments and epic smackdowns, but they lacked a genuine emotional drive and anything resembling complex storytelling. And so was the case with the 'Supergirl' arc, which ran in issues 8-13 back in 2004. The story existed to reintroduce the character of Supergirl, who had been killed off in Crisis on Infinite Earths back in 1985. But the movie version has its own sins to account for, as (like Superman/Batman Public Enemies), it actually alters a rousing climax that robs the story of what geek-pleasing moments it initially contained.

A token amount of plot - a Kryptonian spaceship crashes onto Earth, bringing with it a frightened young girl with powers identical to the fabled last son of Krypton. Superman is elated to discover that he apparently has a teenage cousin, Batman is deeply suspicious of this new visitor with untapped and unchecked powers, and Wonder Woman wants to take the child to train in Themyscira. As Kara Zor-El tries to decide what her own fate should be, the tyrannical Darkseid sees her as a potential weapon in his unending war against Superman.

Like Public Enemies, the film has a bare-minimum of plot and character from which to hang a nonstop parade of super-powered smackdowns. Frankly, the entire last half of the film is one epic battle after another. Yes, there is a terrific mass battle scene at the midway point between the army of Themyscira and an army of Doomsday clones, but it's never a good idea to peak at the start of your extended action climax. Furthermore, the actual climax alters the narrative of the original comic, robbing it of pathos (which to be fair, was partially due to some misdirection), and changing what is supposed to be an epic, possibly final battle against Darkseid into super-powered beings going at it in an empty cornfield. Considering all the blood-pumping showdowns that Superman and Darkseid have had in Superman: The Animated Series and Justice League, this one just comes off like a Tuesday-night beatdown.

Speaking of Darkseid, that brings us to arguably the most shocking bit of miscasting in the entire DC Animated Universe history. I have been a fan of Andre Braugher since the pilot episode of Homicide: Life on the Street back in January 1993. But whatever intensity and authority he has brought to Frank Pembleton and any number of roles post-Homicide is missing from his vocal work as the omnipresent overlord and arguable arch enemy of the entire DC universe. I do not know whether to fault voice-director Andrea Romano (first time for everything...) or Braugher himself, but the choice to speak in a soft-spoken monotone comes off more like Andre Braugher performing the voice of Darkseid while reading a storybook to his children. It is bad enough that the producers and director Lauren Montgomery (who directed the dynamite Wonder Woman movie last year) cast nearly every major character with their original vocalist from the Batman, Superman, and Justice League animated series (Kevin Conroy as Batman, Tim Daly as Superman, Susan Eisenberg as Wonder Woman, etc) but then decided not to have Michael Ironside reprise his definitive work as the master of Apocalypse. But Braugher doesn't work at all as a replacement for Ironside, robbing the film of its central source of menace and intensity.

The rest of the cast is fine, if unremarkable, and the animation is gorgeous and colorful per usual. But the central villain is fatally miscast, and the film lacks even the token gravitas that the fanboy-friendly original comic book happened to contain. This is simply not one of the better efforts in the DC AU filmography, but fans of the original story arc will enjoy seeing this relatively faithful adaptation. The next project is All-Star Superman, which frankly is better source material to start with. Better luck next time, gang.

Grade: C

The Blu Ray -
The film looks and sounds wonderful, as usual with these relatively high-budget (for a direct-to-DVD cartoon) projects. The film is presented in 1.78:1, and the visuals are bright, colorful, and crisp, with smooth motion and a solid contrast. The English 5.1 DTS HD Master Audio sounds perfectly fine on my meager English 2.0 set-up, and the English SDH subtitles are perfectly functional. As for the extras, it's the usual slate of goodies for a DCAU title. There are the 'first-look' featurettes for three prior DCAU films, as well as the first-look featurette for the aforementioned All-Star Superman. There are fifty minutes worth of documentary material, split up into four featurettes. There is a 22-minute piece on Darkseid and the comic book history of Jack Kirby's New Gods. There are two five-minute featurettes on Orion and Mr. Miracle respectively. And there is an eighteen-minute look at the comic book history of Supergirl. As usual, the hardcore experts won't learn anything new, but they are great for those who aren't comic book obsessives.

There are two other bonus features of note, aside from a DVD containing the feature in standard definition and a digital copy. First off is a collection of four Superman: The Animated Series episodes featuring Supergirl and/or Darkseid. Two things of note: First of all, the two 2-part episodes are listed in opposite chronological order ("Apocalypse... Now!" comes before "Little Girl Lost"), and all four episodes are almost embarrassingly superior to the main feature. "Apocalypse... Now!" specifically is one of the best episodes in the entire Bruce Timm cannon, and it has all of the high stakes and powerhouse emotion that Superman/Batman Apocalypse lacks. The final bonus feature is the best, as this disc contains yet another DC Showcase Presents short cartoon, this time highlighting the Green Arrow. This is easily the best of these shorts yet, as it's a rousingly exciting and laugh-out-loud funny action story involving a distracted Green Arrow having to perform unplanned heroics at an airport when terrorists attempt to murder a young princess. The action is terrific and the dialogue between Green Arrow and the wise-beyond her years princess is witty and droll.

Mediocre film, but with a fine audio/visual transfer and extras that are completely superior to the feature in question. Unless you're a completest, it's worth a rental at best, if only for the fantastic Green Arrow short.

David O. Russell's The Fighter gets a trailer. Why are Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale starring in a Tapout movie?

My issue with The Fighter is that it looks like the kind of low-end MMA fight melodrama that Tapout puts out a few times a year. Take away the big stars and director David O.Russell, and it's just another movie from the people who brought you Circle of Pain, Unrivaled, or Beatdown (I have to watch this stuff for work related reasons). For that matter, Mark Wahlberg isn't that much better of an actor than the likes of Hector Echavarria or Tony Schiena. I've long believed that Donnie Wahlberg is the far superior, far more natural and credible performer of the two. It might be worth it to see Christian Bale go crazy, but this looks as contrived and as cliched as can be. And the trailer loses huge points by not giving billing to Oscar nominee Melissa Leo.

Scott Mendelson

Review: Let Me In (2010)

Let Me In
2010
115 minutes
rated R

Opens nationwide from Overture on October 1st.

by Scott Mendelson

Let Me In is a fine motion picture, a moody and character-driven horror film that shows a patience and intelligence rare in the genre. It is visually gorgeous, subtly acted, and genuinely unnerving in several key moments. It is surely one of the better genre pictures of the year, and it heralds director Matt Reeves (Cloverfield) as a genuine talent, having succeeded with two very different horror pictures in just over two years. Yes, it is a remake of the equally fine Swedish horror film Let the Right One In, and it is nearly identical in structure and narrative to the earlier picture. But, this remake is just different enough, in both character choices and focus, to stand beside the original with pride and on its own as a remarkable horror film.

A token amount of plot - It's 1983 Owen (Kodi Smit-McPhee) lives with his newly-separated mother in a small apartment complex in New Mexico. He is lonely and embittered, having suffered the near daily victimization at the hands of a trio of school bullies. But a new friendship is formed when Abby (Chloe Crace Moretz), an equally withdrawn twelve-year old apparently living with her father (Richard Jenkins), moves in next door. Abby is slow to open up, initially stating that the two children cannot be friends. But as friendship and possibly something more blossoms, a series of savage murders rock the small town, and Owen realizes that Abby's arrival and the murder spree may be connected in the most unexpected way. In short, Abby is a vampire, possessed with the need for a constant supply of human blood.

For fans of Let the Right One In, Matt Reeves's Let Me In is akin to seeing your favorite play redone with a different set of actors in a slightly different setting. It's the same story, but what a joy to see such pros as Richard Jenkins and Elias Koteas (sympathetically beaten-down as the cop investigating what he thinks are satanic homicides) play in this particular sandbox. Koteas especially proves that he is one of the most reliable character actors around, as he brings credibility and empathy to every role he plays. Chloe Moretz turns in her second bravura performance of the year, as the Kick-Ass star again brings three-dimensionality and warmth to what could have been a stock character-as-plot point. Kodi Smit-McPhee has the hardest role, as he is in nearly every scene of the film yet is reactionary for most of the running time. None of these actors get big acting moments or big speeches (there is very little dialogue in the film), but each member of the relatively small cast makes the most with their face and their body language. This film, if nothing else, is a master-class in underacting.

Like the best live-theater revivals, Matt Reeves takes the previous picture and stays mostly true to the story and the tone. There are minor alterations, mainly simplifications of the narrative so that the film can focus on our main characters. Aside from a major second-act incident being used as a tone-setting prologue, a stunningly-shot car accident sequence in the middle of the film, and a slight alteration near the climax that gives Koteas more to do (the latter two are among the best scenes in the film), the plot is pretty-much beat for beat from the Swedish picture. But while Tomas Alfredson's original had a certain objective and clinical feel, Matt Reeves brings a tighter, more claustrophobic feel to the proceedings. The film is shot largely in close-up, as the camera pulls away only to capture the moments of violence, only to then close in on the carnage. The special effects are minimal and precise, with Reeves only using CGI to allow action to occur in long, unbroken takes. Because Reeves puts a greater emphasis on the human face, the violence actually has more sting than even the first picture.

Setting the film in 1983 small-town America turns the story on its ear. Owen's home life resembles a Spielberg-ian broken home, which makes Owen's relationship with his new-found special friend into a ghoulish, R-rated variation on ET: The Extra-Terrestrial. Yes, some relationship details are excised and a major revelation about the young girl is no longer there (hint - there is no nudity), streamlining the story and making the characters more 'normal' actually increases the unsettling nature of the story. Abby is just a girl with a major problem, and Owen is just the young boy who is trying to understand his new friend. What is similar about both films is the refreshingly asexual portrayal of vampirism. While most vampire stories use vampirism as a metaphor for rape (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) or allegedly inappropriate sexual behavior (Twilight, The Lost Boys), these two films treat the condition as a crippling addiction, with nothing remotely glamorous or envious. There is nothing cool or hip about Abby's unquenchable need for blood and the damage it reeks around her.

If you haven't seen the Swedish original, Let Me In is a must-see genre picture. It's an intelligent, thoughtful, and often soulful character study that ennobles the horror genre. If you have seen the original, the superlatives still apply, but it is merely a question of whether you feel the desire to see the same story told in a slightly different fashion. But regardless of whether an American version of Let the Right One In was necessary, Let Me In is one of the finest remakes in recent memory, and a startlingly compelling motion picture by its own right. Let the Right One In was one of the best films of 2008. Let Me In is one of the best films of 2010.

Grade: A-

I didn't see Elmo complaining. Katy Perry segment forced off Sesame Street due to complaints about her... um... looking like Katy Perry.

She's not exposing any actual flesh, other than a bit of leg. None of her lyrics are profane. There is not a hint of sexuality or any lust in Elmo's eyes. She's singing a song about opposites (hot/cold, up/down, etc). Yet, for the apparent crime of, well, being genetically gifted, Perry's music duet with Elmo will not be airing on television as intended. The video debuted on Monday, and apparently parents (or perhaps one social values group typing out countless complaints) have bemoaned the token amount of cleavage that Perry's dress allows us to view. It's a green and yellow summer dress. Either the whole world is filled with sexually-frustrated Oscar the Grouches, or some conservative group spent Monday and Tuesday hammering out letters of protest.

I'm not going to get into the history of audience uproar over allegedly sexual content on television, I'm just going to say this: Katy Perry is cute. She looks cute in that outfit, which is apparently a make-believe wedding dress (notice the white tiera). She's not naked, she's not acting vulgar, and she's not espousing some subversive propaganda. She's an attractive singer singing an asexual song with a puppet about being fickle. Parents may find that of prurient interest, but I guarantee anyone still young enough to un-ironically watch Sesame Street isn't going to notice or care about how low-cut her dress is. There was a segment three years ago featuring Tina Fey dressed like a pirate. That was also of prurient interest to this particular parent, but that doesn't mean I'm going to write in to complain.

When I was six years old, I was forced everyday at four o'clock to make a major decision. From 4:00-5:00pm, I was allowed to watch an hour of television. But 30 minutes of that had to be Sesame Street. Which means that every single weekday, I had to Sophie's choose between watching He-Man and the Masters of the Universe at 4 or watching GI Joe at 4:30. I was certainly into girls at that young age, thanks to Mia Sara in Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Bebe Neuwirth in Cheers. But I still would have chosen watching He-Man toss a boulder at Skeletor versus watching Madonna (the 80s equivalent of Perry) chase Grover around Sesame Street in a low-cut dress.

Today, I'd rather watch She-Ra toss a boulder at Skelator, but that's because I'm a grownup. Point being, kids do notice this stuff, but it's the parents that teach them that it's of paramount importance, or that it's dirty or wrong and something to be ashamed of. Absent any actual objectionable content, it appears that Katy Perry has been (partially?) edited out of Sesame Street for being too (to quote Zoolander) ridiculously good looking. Apparently, the monster at the end of this story is... us.

Scott Mendelson

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part I gets a full trailer.

I'm running out of superlatives, so I'll make this quick. I am amused by how the first portion of the trailer seems to mirror the opening half of the final trailer for Lord of the Rings: Return of the King seven years ago. Similar mood, similar glum prognostications of doom, similar moody montages of peril and suffering. I half expected to see Hugo Weaving ordering Harry Potter to 'become who you were born to be'. If it needs to be said, the Harry Potter series has long shed its reputation as the lesser fantasy cousin of the Lord of the Rings films. It is now a towering achievement on its own, and I cannot believe it's already been nine years since it started. The board is set, the pieces are moving. We come to it at last... the grand finale of the definitive film franchise of our generation.

Scott Mendelson

Review: The Town (2010)

The Town
2010
125 minutes
rated R

by Scott Mendelson

The Town is a film that is crippled by its own fairytale desires. While the picture pertains to be a character-driven drama about a Boston bank robber and his desire to go straight, it is undone by a refusal to even acknowledge that its lead character has anything to truly atone for. It is one thing to have a sympathetic portrait of an anti-hero as he struggles to be decent in a world that values his indecency. But it is another to take a straight-up criminal and convince us that he is actually some kind of hero. As a result, the key relationships don't work, the action scenes lack suspense, and the audience is left with no reason to care about the outcome.

A token amount of plot: Doug MacRay (Ben Affleck) is a brains behind a four-person robbery team that operates in Boston. During their most recent bank job, the hothead of the team, James Coughlin (Jeremy Renner), takes manager Claire Keesey (Rebecca Hall) as a hostage for the getaway. Although she is released unharmed, Keesey is emotionally shaken from the experience, and James gets spooked when it turns out that she's from the neighborhood. Fearing bloodshed if James pokes around, Doug offers to inquire as to whether Claire is a danger to their unit. But complications ensue when Doug and the unknowing Claire fall in love, which leaves Doug even more determined to leave the life behind. But can he balance his newfound romance with his loyalty to his neighborhood? And what will become of him when FBI agent Adam Fowley (Jon Hamm) closes in on the tightly knit team?

At its core, The Town is a well-acted, and somewhat well-written variation on the 'but he cries at opera' genre. Affleck's Doug may be a brutal and theoretically murderous armed robber, but it's okay because he has dimples and protects his new girlfriend from threats old (he puts on a mask and attacks her cat-calling neighbors) and new (James isn't thrilled when he finds out that his pal is dating an eyewitnesses to their crime spree). Nevermind that his inexplicable romance puts Claire in further danger from both his fellow criminals and from a suspicious FBI, it's okay because well, he's oh-so conflicted and felt bad about the initial hostage-taking.

Further contrivance comes in the character of Claire herself, especially when contrasted with the only other major female in the film. Claire is portrayed as a perfect upper-class woman, someone who donates her time to kids, tends her garden, wears nice suits, and keeps her hair perfectly done even for a trip to the laundry mat. The other woman in Doug's life is Krista (Blake Lively), James's drug-addicted sister who looks shot-to-hell at all times, has a daughter with an unknown father, and still pines for Doug at every opportunity. Yes, the two women are supposed to represent the big choice that Doug has to make (a new life versus his old one), but Claire is so perfect and Krista is so flawed that the virgin/whore dynamic is more than a little discomforting.

Aside from the gender issues and the fantasy elements in play, the film is itself a pretty generic heist picture. There is the usual opening job that establishes the thieves and their opposition (Jon Hamm's FBI agent is the only truly adult character in the picture, and his blunt authority is a highlight). We have the mid-film heist, although said sequence really has no impact on the rest of the film (it's not a game-changer in any real sense of the narrative), it's just there to have an action scene between the opening and the climax. I certainly won't spoil how the film climaxes, but I will say you can probably guess with 95% accuracy how the finale goes down. While the second act chase is well staged, there is next to no suspense in any of the elaborate chases and gunfights since we know that Affleck and his crew can't murder anyone lest Doug become less of a sympathetic bank robber (it's not for lack of trying, Doug and his crew are just really bad shots).

Like last year's Public Enemies, we are asked to root for a serial criminal purely because he had a crappy childhood, is played by a handsome movie star, and treats his new girlfriend with a token amount of respect. And like that Michael Mann misfire, the most engaging portion of the film is spent with the law enforcement side, as Jon Hamm is a perfect mix of movie star scenery-chewing and realistic character-acting. Jeremy Renner does good work as the tightly-wound tough guy on the crew, and his bitter cynicism is a nice antidote to Doug's pie-in-the-sky fairytale ideas. Pete Postlethwaite and Chris Cooper turn in glorified cameos, although only Cooper has an actual scene to play (Postlethwaite is the mustache-twirling baddie who threatens Doug's new damsel).

Blake Lively does what she can, but her character is such a contrivance that all that's left is her outfit and giant earrings. It's saddening that this genuinely solid actress's portrayal of stereotypical lower-class trash is being hailed as an acting-breakthrough (oooh... she looks uglier, that must be ACTING), as if her spirited work in Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants or The Private Lives of Peppa Lee wasn't proof enough that she's more than her looks. Rebecca Hall gets some solid emotional moments, but her character quickly becomes a prize to be won, and its telling that we never see her outside of her interactions with Affleck or Hamm. Ben Affleck himself turns in a rote star turn, but he directs himself in so many soulful closeups, allows himself so many gratuitous glamor moments (he actually has a shirtless workout montage), and gives his character so many excuses and moral cop-outs that the film becomes an exercise in ego.

In the end, The Town is a stridently conventional potboiler, made to look more impressive than it is by its solid cast and the general lack of big studio crime dramas. While it pretends to be a realistic examination of class, the generational lure of crime, and the tightness of community, it's basically just about a bank robber who hits on his former hostage and spends the rest of the film trying to justify his callousness. By all means, excuse Doug's violent criminal activity and public endangerment because he looks like Ben Affleck and buys his new girlfriend a shiny necklace. Go ahead and root for Doug and Claire to have their happily-ever-after, as long as you realize that she can do better and that he'd gladly shoot you in the face if you got in the way of his star-crossed romantic dreams.

Grade: C

Review: Devil (2010)

Devil
2010
80 minutes
rated PG-13

by Scott Mendelson

Devil is a deliciously old-fashioned throwback of a horror film. It is a myth, a ghost story told around a campfire, and a deliciously entertaining piece of pop entertainment. It is overly moralistic and quite heavy-handed in spots, but it succeeds in its very limited ambitions. It will not gross you out or send you to bed deeply disturbed. But it will make you jump out of your seat, nervously giggle to yourself, and send you out of the theater with a big goofy grin on your face. It's not high art, but it's quite a bit of fun.

A token amount of plot: Five random strangers find themselves stuck in an elevator in the middle of a large office building. But this is no ordinary elevator failure, and the five strangers may just be there for a reason. Meanwhile, an emotionally wounded cop is sent to investigate a suicide in the same building, and he soon finds himself in the middle of a second investigation as violence strikes the five trapped passengers. Just why have these five people been brought together? What is seemingly trying to do them harm? Is one of them a murderer, or is there a possibly spiritual answer to the mayhem?

The film is based on a story by M. Night Shyamalan, but the screenplay comes from Brian Nelson (Hard Candy) and it's directed by John Erick Dowdle (Quarantine). As such, the film feels like a meld of all three talents, as you get agnostic theology and predestination from Shyamalan, hard-nosed dialogue of people crumbling under stress from Nelson, and strong direction for unknown character actors by Dowdle (like Quarantine, this is a solid portrayal of normal people caught up in unthinkable circumstances). The less-is-more edict also feels like a return to Shyamalan's roots, as a single ghostly face on a security camera elicits chills in a manner similar random specks of blood in Unbreakable or a single blurry alien being caught on tape at a child's birthday party in Signs.

While Devil eventually dives into schmaltz right at the finish line, it works as a bruised-forearm picture almost right up to the end. I could have done without yet another unnecessary voice over, which not only spells out the themes, but actually operates as a spoiler for the movie itself. But it's somewhat forgivable as it solidifies the film as a read-it-aloud-at-bedtime ghost story that it's striving to be. But the film is well-acted by a generally unknown cast (I recognized only Matt Craven), and it succeeds in being a goofy bit of scary amusement. In terms of pure entertainment value, this is the best thing that Shyamalan has put his name on since Signs eight years ago. For a man with such a legendary ego, it's interesting that he'd allow someone else to tell his stories, let alone tell them better than he has been doing for the last several years.

Devil is a lean, mean, popcorn-flying thriller. It is not really a horror film, as it doesn't really horrify or inspire dread past the closing credits. But in this age of 'can you top this?' gorefests and remakes of 80s horror classics, Devil is a genuinely original scary movie that startles rather than repulses. What it lacks in ambition, it makes up for with sheer competence and craft, along with a genuine sense of goose-bumping fun. It's well-acted, it's sharply paced, and it delivers the 'wanna hear a scary story?' goods. The M. Night Chronicles is off to a fine and spooky start. Some may call it a glorified Twilight Zone episode. But I prefer to think of Devil as a feature-length version of the kind of story that Alvin Schwartz used to collect for his Scary Stories to Tell In the Dark collections. I mean that as a compliment.

Grade: B

Weekend box office: The Town wins crowded weekend, Easy A breaks out, Devil and Alpha & Omega open OK. (09/19/10).

In a stupidly crowded weekend at the box office, we had four major wide releases and at least two major limited debuts. Without further ado, let's dive in. Coming in at number 01 was Ben Affleck's crime thriller The Town. With $23.8 million, the Affleck-directed picture out-grossed the entire domestic take of Affleck's directorial debut, the obscenely good Gone Baby Gone. This second Affleck-directed thriller is a more conventional story, involving a Boston bank robber who wants to get out of the life and finds a possible escape with a new romance. It also boasts a more marketable cast, with Ben Affleck starring this time around, along with Jon Hamm, Rebecca Hall, Jeremy Renner, and Blake Lively. Warner Bros sold this one as 'from the studio that brought you The Departed', which usually makes me roll my eyes (it's also the studio that brought you Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, Lethal Weapon, and Casablanca). The picture opened a bit below the $28.6 million debut of The Departed, but the Scorsese picture cost $90 million while the Affleck one cost only $40 million.

Most importantly for the marketing, Warner Bros. attached the trailer to Inception, insuring that everyone who saw Inception in a theater ($285 million and counting) also saw a sneak peak of The Town. Oddly enough, this is this is Ben Affleck's biggest opening weekends ever, and arguably the biggest one that was sold mainly on him. Affleck has some huge openers, but they are all either Michael Bay epics (Pearl Harbor -$59m, Armageddon -$36m), pre-established franchises (Daredevil -$40m, Sum of All Fears -$31m), or ensemble pieces (He’s Just Not That Into You -$27m). Take away those (and you can certainly argue that he gets partial credit for at least a few of those openings), and his biggest opening weekend is $17 million for Changing Lanes, which is also one of his best films and performances. The typical Ben Affleck star-vehicle opens around the $13 million range (Forces of Nature, Bounce, Paycheck, etc). So technically speaking, The Town represents Ben Affleck's biggest opening weekend for a pure star vehicle. For what it's worth, it's also Affleck's first number 01 opening since Daredevil in February 2003. The film received a B+ from Cinemascore, so this should be a somewhat long-term player in the next couple months.

Not to be outdone, Easy A was in second place with a strong $17.7 million. The well-reviewed high-school variation on The Scarlett Letter was preordained to shoot Emma Stone to stardom, and it would seem to have accomplished just that. The film boasts an uncommonly strong cast for a high school comedy, as it features Amanda Bynes (this may or may not be her final role), Malcolm McDowell, Thomas Haden Church, Lisa Kudrow, and most amusingly, a Murder One reunion with Patricia Clarkson and Stanley Tucci playing Stone's parents (both respected thespians broke out with juicy supporting roles in the first season of that 1995 groundbreaker). Comparisons abounded, with critics calling this 'the next Clueless' or the 'next Mean Girls'. For now, let's just congratulate Screen Gems for a solid marketing job (and actually releasing a good movie for once), and call the $8 million-budgeted comedy 'the first Easy A'. Welcome to stardom, Emma Stone.

Third place went to Devil, which has a somewhat complicated background. The supernatural thriller debuted to $12.2 million, which is an okay debut no matter how you slice it (the film was acquired by Universal for $26 million). The film is the first of a planned anthology series called The M. Night Chronicles, in which M. Night Shyamalan lets other filmmakers play around with his story ideas (it was directed by the Dowdle brothers). Rogue/Universal wobbled for the last few months on how much to use M. Night Shyamalan's name in the marketing materials after The Last Airbender opened with $70 million in five days but was torn to shreds by critics and audiences. Audiences were allegedly laughing and/or booing when his name came up in the initial preview, yet his last picture grossed $131 million. In the end, the film opened $2 million below Quarantine, the last picture that was directed by the Dowdle brothers. It played less like a Shyamalan entry and more like a lower-end Screen Gems horror picture.

This is another classic case of a studio botching the endgame by not screening the film for critics and thus leaving the impression that the film is worse than it actually is (sadly, Quarantine suffered the same fate). Ironically, the film is the most purely enjoyable thing that M. Night Shyamalan has put his name on since Signs. It's an old-fashioned campfire tale, and it's remarkably entertaining and even occasionally scary. Sadly, this is also the lowest opening weekend for any project with Shaymalan's name attached, as it opened even lower than the $18 million debut of Lady in the Water and the $15 million debut of Stuart Little (which he wrote). Although Devil was a much cheaper proposition than either of those (Lady in the Water cost $70 million while Stuart Little cost $133 million), so the film will be a tidy moneymaker in the long run. The next one of these things will be directed by Daniel Stamm, who just scored with The Last Exorcism (now at $40 million). Expect Reincarnate, concerning a jury deliberating a case with supernatural implications, to be released late next year.

The final wide release was the Lionsgate 3D cartoon Alpha and Omega. The terrible-looking romantic comedy involving two wolves being relocated for reproductive purposes opened with $9.1 million. Sadly, that's Lionsgate's biggest debut for an animated film thus far. Shame on anyone who didn't see Battle For Terra yet paid to see this one in theaters. Since this one only cost $20 million, it will likely be profitable, and we'll probably see a direct-to-DVD sequel in a few years, ala the unforgivably bad Happily N'Ever After. Last weekend's lone new release, Resident Evil Afterlife, plunged 62% in its second weekend, which is about par for the course for the franchise. Still, in ten days, the fourth entry has $43.8 million, putting it just $8 million away from being the highest-grosser in the series. Ironically, one of the film's hooks was the return of Paul W.S. Anderson, who directed the initial Resident Evil. I say ironically because Resident Evil Apocalypse and Resident Evil Extinction were much better films than the boring and cheap-looking original. Oh, and Twilight Saga: Eclipse finally crossed $300 million on Sunday, and The Expendables crossed the $100 million mark.

There were two notable limited-release debuts this weekend. First off is the 'documentary thriller' Catfish. Powered by a full-on marketing campaign by Universal, the somewhat misleadingly marketed documentary (it's not a thriller, it's simply occasionally tense and awkward due to what transpires onscreen) debuted with $257,285 on twelve screens, for a decent $21,440 per-screen average. The film will expand into nineteen additional markets next weekend. We also have the four-screen debut of the sci-fi drama Never Let Me Go. The proverbial opening shot of the Oscar race opened on Wednesday (WHY?!) and has amassed $156,733 on four screens thus far, with $111,734 of that coming from the weekend. The $27,934 per-screen average is quite strong, but the coming weeks will tell the tale.

And that's all the news for this weekend. Join us next weekend when Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps squares off against The Legend of the Guardians, and You Again. In limited release, we get a new Woody Allen film (You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger) on Wednesday, and a Friday limited bow for Buried (the Ryan Reynolds in a box chiller), the education-in-crisis documentary Waiting For Superman, and Howl. Until then, take care and keep reading.

Scott Mendelson

As Yom Kippur approaches, it's time to forgive some infamous sins of cinema.

Yom Kippur starts this Saturday. As one of the two highest-of-high holy days in the Jewish religion, Yom Kippur basically involves asking forgiveness for the past transgressions against God over the previous year. But arguably as important is Erev Yom Kippur, which is the day before the high holy day, which involves asking the actual people you've transgressed against for atonement. In that spirit, let us take a few moments to finally let go of a few alleged transgressions in recent cinema history. Don't do it for them, do it for yourself.

Kevin Costner
Alleged Sin: Beating out Martin Scorsese at the 1990 Academy Awards

For nearly twenty years, critics and film nerds have been condemning Kevin Costner for having the gall to 'deny' Martin Scorsese the Best Director Oscar that theoretically should have been his for Goodfellas. As a result, a once beloved film, one that revived the western as an occasionally viable film genre, is now looked upon with ridicule and scorn. Never-mind that Kevin Costner directed a critically-acclaimed smash hit. Never-mind that he somehow directed a three-hour revisionist western that managed to gross $494 million worldwide. Never-mind that this allegedly 'politically-correct' fable contains brutal violence and native-American characters that are neither savage (Graham Greene's nuanced and humorous performance still holds up) or noble (at one point they shoot down an unarmed and surrendering enemy tribesman). The film's initial quality has been surpassed by the 'Scorsese was robbed!' bandwagon.

Why we should let it go:
Because it's been twenty years. Let's not pretend that had The Godfather part III not been considered a disappointment, then Francis Ford Coppola probably would have won instead for finishing off his classic trilogy on a high note. Third of all, Dances With Wolves remains an exceptional motion picture. It's a thoughtful epic, a mournful drama, and a sterling action film. As for Costner's post Wolves output, we got twenty years of tricks (The Postman, The Bodyguard, 3000 Miles to Graceland) as well as some glorious treats (JFK, A Perfect World, Tin Cup, Open Range, The Upside of Anger), and everything in between (Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, Wyatt Earp, Waterworld, Swing Vote).

Scorsese's Goodfellas ended a post-Raging Bull slump that saw him taking an unknown Tim Burton's sloppy seconds (Burton was originally going to direct After Hours, but he passed out of respect for Scorsese). Cape Fear, Age of Innocence, Bringing Out the Dead, Gangs of New York, The Aviator, The Departed, and Shutter Island. All either critical and/or box office smashes. Marty's doing just fine, and he finally won that Oscar sixteen years later. It's time to admit that Dances With Wolves was a pretty terrific film back in 1990.

Joel Schumacher
Alleged Sin: Wrecking the 1990s Batman franchise.

We all know the story. After parents cried foul over the violence and kinkiness of Batman Returns, Tim Burton left the franchise and Batman Forever was directed by Joel Schumacher, then a guy most famous for directing Falling Down, Saint Elmo's Fire and The Lost Boys. Schumacher gave us Batman Forever, a somewhat campy and neon-colored Batman adventure that felt awkwardly crossed the 1970s Darknight Detective days with the 1950s gee-whiz era. As a stand-alone film, it works pretty well, balancing out the bad (Tommy Lee Jones's terrible turn as Two-Face, moments where the Batmobile drives up the wall of a building) with the good (Jim Carrey's scary/funny turn as the Riddler, the strong chemistry between Chris O'Donnell and Michael Gough). The film was a smash hit and audience favorite, so Schumacher followed it up two years later with Batman & Robin. That's when everything went to hell.

Under strict studio orders to make a toy-friendly picture, Schumacher plunged completely into camp, giving us a Batman picture not based on the 1960s TV show, but one lodged firmly in the late 50s/early 1960s nadir. Buried beneath a solid story of Bruce Wayne coming to terms with becoming a surrogate father as his own (Alfred) lay near death stood a thousand miles of cheese: Schwarzenegger's Mr. Freeze ice-puns, Uma Thurman's sexy but grating May West impression, Alicia Silverstone's halfhearted attempt at playing a feminist Batgirl, George Clooney's overly cheerful Batman, etc. The film crashed and burned after opening weekend, Clooney fell on the sword, and the Batman series was dead for eight long years.

Why we should let it go: First of all, had Clooney not floundered so badly, he might not have made the defining choice to act for art, forgoing big paydays and instead making artier, more personal pictures that have made him one of the most interesting movie stars of his generation. Sure we get an occasional The Perfect Storm and Ocean's 11, but Clooney's filmography is filled with the likes of Out of Sight, Good Night and Good Luck, Syriana, Michael Clayton, Confessions of A Dangerous Mind, and Up in the Air. Second of all, the audience rejection of such an overtly fan-unfriendly adaptation of a comic book property gave notice to studios that the next wave of comic book films should at least try to appeal to the hardcore fans.

Had Batman & Robin been just a little bit better and been a little less of a financial failure (it grossed $238 million, but at a cost of $200 million), then maybe we wouldn't have gotten the wave of reverent comic book adaptations (X-Men, Spider-Man, etc) that jump-started the 2000s. Most importantly, had Joel Schumacher not killed the Batman franchise, Chris Nolan never would have had the chance to bring it back to life in its current glorious form. Let's face it, without Batman & Robin, there would never have been a Batman Begins. For that alone, we owe Schumacher just our forgiveness, but our thanks.

George Lucas
Alleged Sin: Wrecking the Star Wars franchise with the prequel trilogy

There was no more anticipated film in modern history than Star Wars: Episode One: The Phantom Menace. Released nineteen years after Return of the Jedi, the first chapter in a three-part prequel saga was the verifiable holy grail of film nerds everywhere. Then, on May 19th, 1999, it was released. And the fans, the hardcore fans who worshiped the original trilogy as children, cried foul. It was too juvenile, it was too concerned with galactic politics, Jake Lloyd was kinda terrible as Anakin Skywalker, and the film lacked a Han Solo type character, a roguish prick to balance out the solemnity of the whole affair. They complained that Natalie Portman's Queen Amidala was too regal and not enough like Princess Lea (ie - 17-year old Portman just wasn't sexy enough). And that Jar Jar Binks character as an unholy creation of adolescent pandering, a jabbering, farting, doo-doo joke making monstrosity, right? Despite cries of treason from the nerds, regular audiences ironically liked it just fine, powering the film to a $431 million domestic gross and $924 million worldwide, making the film the second-highest grossing film in history behind Titanic at that point. While the next two films in the trilogy tried to make amends (there was less Jar-Jar, more action, and more hard violence), The Phantom Menace is considered the original sin in the eyes of film nerds everywhere.

Why we should let it go: Because it's been eleven years. Because bitterness is like taking poison and expecting the other person to die. Because your kids will think that Jar Jar Binks is pretty funny, they won't mind a badly-directed Jake Lloyd, and they'll enjoy the youth-skewed adventure of The Phantom Menace, and that will give you the excuse to show them the rest of the films. Because your kids may very well discover Star Wars through the dynamite Clone Wars TV show currently on Cartoon Network. Because you weren't eight years old when The Phantom Menace came out. You were in your late teens if not significantly older. The Star Wars trilogy was never intended to be judged as adult entertainment. That The Empire Strikes Back was so somber, character-driven, and mythical may very well have been an accident, giving dramatic weight and pathos to what was supposed to be a series of outer-space adventures. At heart, the original Star Wars trilogy was an homage to Flash Gordon, done up with state of the art effects with some political substance thrown in for good measure (Palatine = Nixon and Ewoks = Vietnamese). Because I still see kids on the playground playing their own Star Wars adventures. I'm pretty sure they don't complain about Jar Jar and debate whether or not George Lucas raped their childhoods.

Because, here's a dirty little secret: the prequel trilogy IS more adult than the original trilogy. The first three films were a classic hero's journey, complete with good guys who wear white and bad guys who wear black. Save for the inner conflict of Darth Vader in the last act of Return of the Jedi, there was little-to-no moral ambiguity and the series ended up a relatively happy note. But the prequel trilogy muddied up the waters, giving us Jedi who arguably do more harm than good (the tipping point is Mace Windu's attempt to murder a defeated Palpatine at a critical moment), a galactic senate that willingly gives up its power out of fear and deprives its citizens of liberty in the process, and a dashing hero who is revealed to be a murderous loose cannon even before he actually goes over to the Dark Side (massacring sand-people is not the Jedi way). If Palpatine is now supposed to be Dick Cheney or George W. Bush, then the Jedi is us, the patriotic opposition who stood on the sidelines and knew damn well what was going on but did little to stop it until it was too late. Yes, Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith have their issues, but at the end of the day, they have the courage to point the finger straight back at us, the theoretically good people who sat by while evil triumphed.

Scott Mendelson