Dunn’s Top 20 Movies of 2012

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It was a great year for movies. I didn’t have a problem finding 20 movies that I loved this year, and there was a bunch of flicks that were great the didn’t quite make my list (i.e. Dredd). I waited so long to make the list because I wanted to see as many movies as I could, but I still couldn’t see everything (I’m most bummed about missing Wreck It Ralph). But out of what I was able to see, here are 20 of my favorites:

20. The Comedy
19. The Raid
18. Seven Psychopaths
17. Killer Joe
16. Searching for Sugarman
15. Paul Williams Is Still Alive
14. Lincoln
13. Looper
12. Cloud Atlas
11. Silver Linings Playbook

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Ash’s Top 10 Movies of 2012

Here are Ash’s Top 10 movies of the year. Does she have better taste than me? Well she has The Raid as number 2 and Dredd didn’t even make my list, so you be the judge:

The_Raid

10. Dredd
9. Looper
8. Django Unchained
7. Cloud Atlas
6. Silver Linings Playbook
5. The Avengers
4. American Scream
3. Moonrise Kingdom
2. The Raid
1. Cabin in the woods

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Fake Movie Friday- Where’s the Spinach?

Over dinner I asked Adam and Evelyn to give me a title. After Adam suggested ‘MS DOS: The Movie’ I thought I would never get a good one. Then the following question was asked, and afterwards I was told that it would be my title. Critics who throw the word around like it was candy could describe this film as “whimsical.”

Where’s the Spinach?
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Fake Movie Friday Submissions: The Littlest Werewolf

Hurray! Lisa LoFaso has submitted her first Fake Movie Friday! Thanks Lisa! Keep ’em coming:
So I gave this premise to Tigs around Halloween but he said I had to write it and I never finished it. So now, here is my first attempt at a Fake Movie Friday. Hopefully it doesn’t suck too bad.
The Littlest Werewolf

Fake Movie Friday: Fever Dream Monsters

So I think I did a similar movie two weeks or so ago (and plenty of times before that), but no one read it so whatever. Colm gave me the title:

Fever Dream Monsters

Rachel has just moved into a small, pastoral, midwestern town. Very few of the other towns folk like her, and she’s not incredibly likable anyway. She very standoffish and stands out even more because of her all black, goth appearance. She opened up a tattoo parlor there, Evil Ink, in hopes to freak out some citizens and attract others. Which it does. The small fan base she has are other outcasts from the town, and mostly younger than Rachel. She seems to attract the high school emo kids and those coming back from college. Continue reading

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Movie Movie Podcast #32: Bullet Bodies

We made it through the January lull and now we’re knee deep in the February slump! The year can only get better from here, right? Right!?!?! Join Peter, Russ, Alex and myself as we play good cop / bad cop with Bullet to the Head, leave Warm Bodies for dead and discuss our favorite Super Bowl trailers (spoiler: Fast 6 is best). Recorded on February 6th 2013.

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The Star of Guardians of the Galaxy Will Be…

Chris Pratt.

Chris Pratt will be starring as the half-human lead in the weird Marvel space-epic, Guardians of the Galaxy.  Apparently every single white male on earth tested for this part, and at no point did Chris Pratt’s name come up, but he’s an inspired choice.  He’s the funniest guy in nearly everything he’s in, most girls seem to think he’s awesome (he is), and he did his “serious” turn in Zero Dark Thirty as a badass army dude, so I think this will work out really well.

I don’t know who is overseeing a lot of the casting decisions at Marvel, but they are crushing it.  They don’t break the bank on any actors, but they get people who’ll become stars and wrap them into 4-6 picture deals before their asking price skyrockets.

Smart. Smart. Smart.

James Gunn directing and Chris Pratt starring in a Marvel Space Action Film? Win.

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The “Fast” Franchise and Alphabetical Hell

So we all know the Super Bowl was yesterday and it was a great game, but what was even greater was the Fast and Furious commercial that showed the vehicular mayhem that is going to be unleashed this Memorial Day.  I can’t wait for it.

I only had one tiny issue with the spot:  Why call it Fast and Furious 6?  You’ve created an illogical mess of titling these films over the years, so why go so basic now?  I never thought a franchise could mess names up more than Rambo:

1. First Blood

2. Rambo: First Blood Part 2

3. Rambo III

4. Rambo

 

The Fast franchise looked at Rambo and decided to get even stupider.  Lets look back at these titles and laugh for a minute:

1. The Fast and The Furious – nothing wrong with this one.  It’s a great title and lets you know what you’ll be in for.

2. 2 Fast 2 Furious – THE GREATEST TITLE IN HISTORY.  It lets you know this is going to be double the stupidity, and double the other stuff you’d like doubled, but it now comes before the first film if you like alphabetizing.

3. The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift – this is a spinoff sidequel, so I really don’t have an issue with this title, but it’ll get hairy later on.  This is technically the last film in the Fast chronology.

4. Fast and Furious – All they did was drop THE from the titles and thats ok!?!? They didn’t even call it Fast and FOURious.  Just dropped a few the’s and called it a day.

5. Fast Five – This title is perfect, cause it’s simple. It’s the 5th Fast movie, so it’s Fast Five.

Up to this point however, I don’t think any of the titles would even be consecutive in a DVD rack.  Now we’re getting

6. Fast and Furious 6 – which yes, I get that it’s the 6th Fast film, but theres only one film up to this point called Fast and Furious, and it’s the 4th film.  So this should technically be Fast and Furious 2

Or you call it Fast 6 cause it’s the 6th Fast movie.  Because it’s definitely not Fast and Furious 6.  Also yes there are 6 Fast movies, but if you take chronological order into account, this would be the 5th film, because Tokyo Drift is the last one.  Or just call it Furiou6

Anyway you slice it, I feel like JJ Abrams and Damon Lindelof have something to do with the titles of these films.  I do hope however that the 7th and final film is titled Furious.  Just Furious. No one would see that coming.

I’ll be the midnight screening of Fast and Furious 6 no matter what.

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The Marvel Universe, Phase 3, and Hulk

There are some really exciting rumors floating around the Marvel camp in regards to what’s going to be happening with Hulk and with Phase 3.

What we already know:

Kevin Feige has already stated that Ant-Man and Doctor Strange are part of Phase 3.  Ant-Man already has a film ready to come out after the Thanos/Cosmic heavy Phase 2 ends.  Strange I think will be a cool character to flesh out as well.  Whether or not he can hold up his own movie or not is another story.
What we are speculating:

The folks over at Latino-Review, who often nail their super early Marvel movie rumors, came out yesterday with a story that not only will the Hulk be getting his own film AGAIN in Phase 3, but he will be the lynchpin of the whole series of films!  The rumor is that because of Hulk’s extremely violent and dangerous actions (which I’m assuming will take place in Avengers 2), The Illuminati (group of marvel heroes) decide that the safest bet is to send Hulk into space, which will lead to the Phase 3 Hulk film based on Planet Hulk.  Planet Hulk is just about the only interesting thing you could do with him at this point, so if he were to get a movie, this version of Hulk I think would really lend himself to a film like this.  Hulk needs to fight things that are bigger and scarier than him, so him on a planet full of monsters sounds perfect.  Also we know that the long in development Hulk TV series has for the most part been shelved.  It is my thinking that if the Hulk wasn’t so wildly popular in Avengers, they’d continue with it, but now that people like Hulk so much, they have to give us what we want.

The best part of this in my opinion is that Avengers 3 would largely co-op the World War Hulk storyline, which was also huge and widely popular.

I really hope this happens.  I think it would be an awesome followup to Phase 2.  I’m sure they wont call the Illuminati, the Illuminati, and I’m sure they’ll be different characters plugged in, but I think this has the potential to be a gigantic success.  We know Marvel really plans ahead, so it would totally make sense that they are already working on the Phase 3 stuff.  Phase 2, outside of Guardians of the Galaxy, doesn’t really have any real risks associated with it.  But I think if that works, then we’ve been more exposed to other planets and the masses would accept a Hulk/Gladiator type movie.   Also when you consider there is a Hulk cartoon coming out this fall that has a lot of the Planet Hulk monsters on it, I bet that’s Marvels way of getting the kids used to the idea of the other monsters Hulk fights/allies with.

The only thing I’m thinking is that their World War Hulk storyline might have a little more black and white added to it, in that they might make a villain have more to do with all of it instead of just having Hulk fight all of these good guys.  I’ll leave that to the writers though.

Anyway, Ant-Man, Doctor Strange, and an increased Hulk presence, Marvel will have given me everything I want for a massive Avengers 3.  Except for Black Panther.

 

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