Weekly Weblinks: Rummaging and Wrecking

I’m out hitting a 52-mile stretch of garage sales today, and a community garage sale tomorrow, so I may not be right here on the site for a bit. But that doesn’t stop the Weekly Weblinks from going up right on schedule! This week’s blog posts include a review of a film coming out today, a couple films debuting at a film festival, and some retro classics.

In the news there’s some info on Michael Bay’s fourth Transformers picture, the latest on the Bay-produced Ninja Turtles, and some more puppets coming to the big screen that, as far as I know, have nothing at all to do with Michael Bay. This week’s selection of posts and news is also surprisingly heavy on Disney, but there’s more to the Weekly Weblinks than Bay or Disney, so whatever you’re interested in, read on!

Blog Posts:

T. over at The Focused Filmographer has an early review of Pixar’s latest movie, Brave. It’s out today, does it live up to the hype and expectations?

Back around Christmas time, I reviewed Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, and found it to be an excellent movie that flew under a lot of peoples’ radars. Now it’s blipped onto the radar of Eric at the Warning Sign, and he’s got his own review of it.

Ryan McNeely of 5 Word Movie Reviews is at the Edinburg Film Festival, and reviews a couple films he thinks may have some mainstream appeal, Grabbers, and Rent-a-Cat.

Andy, of Andy Watches Movies, holds up The Emperor’s New Groove as an unsung modern Disney classic. I’ve never seen the film myself; now I’m wondering if that’s an oversight I need to correct.

Do you like cheese? Do you like films about commandos? Do you like cheesy films about Commandos? Fogs’ Movie Reviews has you covered, with Cheese-tastic Classics: Commando, taking a look at Arnold Schwarzenegger’s 1986 film and finally answering the question of just how many people Arnie does shoot in that one scene.

News Blurbs:

A few months back, the fans on the internet (including myself) exploded over the changes that were being made to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in the upcoming Michael Bay-produced Ninja Turtles. Now IGN breaks the news that Paramount has stopped pre-production on the film, putting it indefinitely on hold. No reason for the delay has been specified. We can hope that it’s being done to retool it, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.

Speaking of Michael Bay, because of course, we must, EW has a few words from the director about the as-yet-untitled fourth film in the Transformers franchise. This is the last film Bay is planning to direct for the franchise, and while he has stated in the past that it’s to help set things up for whoever takes over after him, he is stressing that it is not a reboot. He also indicates that it may head into outer space, and that they’re trying to reduce the budget some. Considering the budget-heavy aspects of the films — i.e., the special effects — were among the few things the franchise had going for it, I’m not sure that’s a good sign.

The Hollywood Reporter writes that George Clooney and Grant Heslov are producing the film adaptation of August: Osage County, with Julia Roberts and Meryl Streep cast in the lead roles. I know little about the play other than it being set just outside Pawhuska, near the Osage reservation, but it comes very highly acclaimed and has apparently been very successful. Since I’m more of a film guy than a play guy, I’ll wait until the trailers start rolling in to decide whether I’ll check out this dark comedy, but what do the rest of you think?

Spielberg mentioned recently that Jurassic Park IV may be coming in the next few years. So who is attached to write the film? According to Entertainment Weekly, Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver, the writers of Rise of the Planet of the Apes have been tapped for the revival of the franchise.

Can you tell me how to get to Sesame Street? Fox would like to know, having secured the movie rights to the venerable children’s program. With a sequel to 2011’s The Muppets already in the works, and the news two weeks ago that the Jim Henson Company is planning on bringing Fraggle Rock to the big screen, this means that all of Jim Henson’s three biggest franchises will soon be appearing on the big screen. With the Jim Henson Company also producing The Happytime Murders for an adult audience, the 2010s are looking like a banner decade for puppet films. Do you think, just possibly, that everybody is trying to ride the success of The Muppets? Not that I’m objecting, of course; more Muppets is almost certainly a good thing.

Here’s something I was tipped off to by Bubbawheat, and which seems to have flown, no pun intended, under everybody else’s radar. Disney is producing an animated film entitled Planes, set in the same world as Pixar’s Cars franchise. Interestingly, only the Disney name appears to be attached to the property so far, which means the line between the two companies is getting even blurrier. Considering that the Cars franchise has always been vastly more popular with children than with critics and adults in general, it may be that Planes is slated to be a direct-to-video release. As Pixar has yet to do a direct-to-video release of a feature film, this may explain the absence of their name in the teaser trailer.

Just For Fun:

Speaking of Disney, they recently released a trailer for their upcoming movie Wreck-It Ralph. I was skeptical at first, but the trailer has started to win me over. This looks like it could be a fun homage to classic video games (and has several classic video game characters showing up in cameos.) The trailer is below, but that’s not the only treat here. Since Ralph is from a fictional video game, it only makes sense that people would want to be able to experience the game for themselves… and Disney has obliged with an online version of Fix-It Felix, Jr., the game where Ralph features as the villain. It’s done in a classic pixelated style, and like classic video games, it’s simple, addictive, and gets more challenging the further you go. It even keeps your high score for you. The one complaint I have is that it doesn’t feature the voice clip for Ralph shouting “I’m gonna wreck it!” Come on. You’re the company that made the movie, you have the license, make it complete, all right?