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What
we gave it:
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| What We Said: | "I could get into a long clichéd rant about the ability of Hollywood to take absolutely anything intelligent and multi-layered and transform it into a blundering farce of vampire kung fu masters fighting in slow motion. To be completely honest, however, I don't have the energy. Is there anybody out there who's still in the dark about most Hollywood movies being idiotic dogshit? LXG looks asinine, and any money sent its way would only be interpreted as encouragement for further installments in the franchise." | |
| How It Turned Out: |
The Trailer Trash would like to offer a full retraction for our assertion that League of Extraordinary Gentlemen would be "idiotic dogshit." We regret any confusion we might have caused readers who assumed from our review that they would be in for an idiotic dogshit film. We now know, of course, that LXG is not a film at all, but rather a two hour slideshow of random images, presented in such a way as to promote the deepest pain and resentment in a viewer possible. Based on its silly trailer, we fully expected LXG to be awful. What we didn't expect what none of us could have expected was that it would be the most awful thing in the history of mankind. Folks, LXG is Batman & Robin awful. It's Avengers awful (also starring Sean "Eagle Eye With the Scripts" Connery). It's Blade II awful. Well, maybe not Blade II awful. But it's really bad. We'd like to officially award LXG the Blade II Award For Cinematic Incompetence. Certainly, many films in a given year are horrible and even reprehensible but only a few manage to actually be stupid within the own parameters they set for themselves, leaving gaping plot holes and circular internal logic in their lumbering wakes. We won't waste time pointing out the many historical anachronisms, gaping plot holes or senseless, ridiculously complex doublecrosses. Instead, we'd like to point out two of the more unintentionally laugh-inducing scenes in the film:
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| Were We Close? |
Nope but only because our brains lacked the capacity to imagine evil as pure and all-encompassing as this. Word has it that Sean Connery locked horns repeatedly with the director on the set. Hearing that might urge you to give the man a small amount of respect. Do not give into this impulse. Let's keep in mind that Connery is on record as saying he turned down the role of Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings trilogy because it sounded "silly." Ol' Eagle-Eye-With-The-Scripts saw immediately that one of the most adored, highest-grossing films of the century wasn't worth his time, savvily opting on for League of Extraordinary Gentlemen instead. Several other of Connery's smooth manouvres:
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What
we gave it:
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| What We Said: | "I predict Pirates of the Caribbean will break attendance records the first weekend it's out, taking into account a country-wide heat wave and a total lack of air conditioning everywhere but in movie theaters, and theater owners giving tickets away, and free booze. Otherwise, look for this to most likely make a lot of money anyway. The CGI skeletons will get all the boys who play Counterstrike and Everquest into the theater; Johnny Depp will bring the women; Olando Bloom will bring the girls; and Geoffrey Rush will bring, let's hope, the sincerest of apologies." | |
| How It Turned Out: |
Not
too badly, really. The early sneak preview trailer of Pirates
of the Caribbean certainly tried hard to play up every one
of the more unwatchable aspects of the film, like the plot taken from
an eighth grader's notebook and kind of not-good CGI, ignoring Johnny
Depp's scene-stealing and hilarious performance entirely. Luckily, actual
non-trailer-making people without copious brain damage got a chance
to see the film, pronounced Depp charming as all hell, and Pirates
sailed off to enormous box office returns on a sea of great buzz, the
abominable teaser trailer forgotten.
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| Were We Close? | Yep. We predicted the film would make a lot of money, that the girls would come for steamy platefulls of Orlando Bloom, and that the boys would come for the cool CGI swashbuckling. What we didn't predict is that Pirates would actually be a lot of fun. Go figure. Though, in our defense, take another look at that first preview trailer, and tell me you'd have thought any different. |
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What
we gave it:
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| What We Said: | "THANK
YOU FOR USING FILMSOFT MOVIE GENERATOR 2.03. PLEASE CHOOSE HEROINE'S BREAST
SIZE: (A) LARGE (B) RIDICULOUSLY LARGE (C) HERNIA INDUCING
THANK YOU. PLEASE CHOOSE HEROINE'S LIP SIZE: (A) FULL (B) GENEROUSLY BIG (C) COLLAGEN-INJECTED DUFFEL BAGS THANK YOU. PLEASE CHOOSE TIGHTNESS OF HEROINE'S CLOTHING: (A) VERY TIGHT (B) PREPOSTEROUSLY TIGHT (C) LABIA VISIBLE" |
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| How It Turned Out: |
Your guess is as good as ours, really. Like most films released in 2003, Lara Croft 2 garnered about as little buzz around the Trailer Trash offices as it's possible to get for a film, with most staff voting it "I don't care, go away," and the remainder opting for "Lauren Quaff? Is that like a sex thing?" Unlike most films released in 2003, however, our stance seems to have accurately mirrored the feelings of most of the North American populace. Poor Lara sank like a stone within a week of release. |
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| Were We Close? |
Hard to say at this point, since as of press time only 11 people have actually seen the Lara Croft sequel, and they remain tight-lipped about the experience. However, advance word on the streets is that the scenes of a wetsuited Lara in the trailer were "airbrushed," and that in the film itself you "can totally see her nipples for most of the film." How this will affect DVD sales are uncertain, though given the crisp pause feature on most DVD players, we predict sales will go through the roof, due largely to:
Some might find it somewhat upsetting that the only conversational point people can make about a film starring a strong female protagonist is that viewers can "kind of make out her nipples in it," and how unbelievably awesome that is. However, given lacklustre ticket sales so far, and Lara Croft 2's $95M price tag, we're actually wondering if the nipple rumors weren't generated by a savvy Jolie and Croft 2's director, who quickly raced to the editing booth to digitally add a few nipples in. |
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What
we gave it:
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| What We Said: | "The only truly notable no-shows for American Wedding are creators Paul and Chris Weitz, who last surfaced directing the infinitely watchable About a Boy. In truth, though, I wonder if films like these even demand name-brand directors. Does it really matter who's pointing the camera at a flailing Jason Biggs falling off a roof with a hand glued to his penis? The important thing here is only that someone is there recording the moment for posterity, so that I don't miss a single moment of his humiliating antics." | |
| How It Turned Out: |
About how you'd expect. For those of us who enjoy the American Pie series, American Wedding was the best of the bunch, offering a streamlined cast and wall-to-wall laughs. For those of us who hate American Pie and everything associated with it, this latest infraction proved yet again why America is spinning right down the crapper. Both are probably right. Either way, we laughed like goddamn hyenas while watching this, and proclaim American Wedding an Official Trailer Trash Brutha 4 Lyfe while pouring generous amounts of malt liquor onto the ground for no reason whatsoever. |
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| Were We Close? |
Dead on. While Wedding trims about half the cast from the first two Pies, The Trailer Trash was sly enough to note that only the unfunny, deadweight cast members were missing from the latest installment. "Hmmm, suspiciousalmost too suspicious," we said at the time, puffing knowingly on a single pipe (we passed it around, and took turns posing with it in front of bookshelves with snifters of single malt whiskey while the others took pictures). Wedding proved our suspicions correct, throwing only the foulest jokes and most enjoyable characters from the first two films at us at an unyielding pace. Diehard fans of the "Oz" character from the first two Pies are no doubt crying all over their Chris Klein stalker maps right now but for the rest of us, the slimmer cast made for a much funnier, tighter film. Do we want to see another one? God no. But Wedding proved a fitting hilarious closer to a clumsy, earnest and ultimately ingratiating series. |
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No-Shows: Bad Boys II, Charlie's Angels 16: The Fullest Throttle of All, and many others. Nope. We just didn't care. If you did, more power to you. May you clutch the DVDs to your fat quivering bosoms as you race home for multiple viewings, only to be followed by still more multiple viewings. So long as you're not interacting with other human beings, enjoy with our blessing. |
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And that's it. We hope you'll join us next year for more of the same that's assuming Joel Silver and his legions of Matrix apologizers don't find us first and rough us up all sweet-like; our arms broken, our knee caps molested. Here's hoping that's not the casesee you in 12 short months for the 2004 Summer Scorecard! In the meantime, we're off to watch a few trailers. And if no one's watching, molest a few kneecaps.
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