Newsletter
-
Recent
Cloud
3d academy awards action actors actress adaptation book adaptation Brad Pitt Cameron Diaz child stars Christmas classic Comedy cult classics documentary drama DVD family Friends with benefits Harry Potter holiday Hollywood actresses horror Jennifer Aniston Julianne Moore justin timberlake Liam Neeson Matt Damon movie star movie trivia Octavia Spencer oscars remake romance romantic comedies romantic comedy romcom Ryan Gosling Seasonal sequel summer movies The Artist The Help The Notebook thrillerAd
Tag Archives: summer movies
Summer Movies To Look Forward To
The Avengers: These past few summers, did you ever find yourself wondering: Why so many superhero movies? One answer is that they are surefire box office smash hits, and the other is that they have all led up to The Avengers. The film, which stars Robert Downey Jr. and Scarlett Johansson as Iron Man and Black Widow, combines the superheroes of Marvel Comics in one epic battle against evil.
Men in Black III: The long-awaited third installment of the Men in Black series will be released this summer. The film highlights Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones in their familiar roles of Agent J and Agent K, along with Josh Brolin, who will be playing a young version of Agent K. Add time travel to the list of science fiction eccentricities in the film and MIB III is sure to be a hit.
Brave: Brave is the newest Pixar animated film and also happens to be the first to feature a girl in the lead role. The film is set in a medieval Ireland around Princess Merida, a skilled archer who is thrown into an epic adventure. Brave is sure to please young and old audiences alike.
The Amazing Spider-Man: The newest take on the Spider-Man comic books will star Andrew Garfield, recently made famous by his role in David Fincher’s The Social Network, as Peter Parker. He will star opposite Emma Stone and the film will take place during Parker’s high school years. This film is worth seeing if only to compare to the past trilogy starring Tobey Maguire.
Photo: Walt Disney Pictures 2012.
Great Summer Movies
Spend your summer with these great films from years past.
1. The Parent Trap (1961, 1998)
Both the original and the remake of this sweet and fun story make for a good summer flick. Hayley Mills shines as Susan and Sharon—estranged twins who meet at summer camp. Lindsay Lohan reprises the role in 1998 in a version just as endearing as the original.
2. My Girl (1991)
Veda Sultenfuss (Anna Chlumsky) spends her summer playing with her best friend Thomas J. (Macaulay Culkin), avoiding her dad’s funeral home basement, and nurturing her crush on the summer creative writing teacher at the local community college.
3. The Graduate (1967)
Benjamin Braddock (Dustin Hoffman) has just graduated from college and is spending his summer at home, mostly in the pool, when he reunites with family friend Elaine (Katharine Ross) and is seduced by her mother (Anne Bancroft).
4. American Pie 2 (2001)
The original American Pie cast returns for a sequel with the boys at a summer beach house where they try to seduce girls and make their living painting houses. Michelle (Alyson Hannigan) helps Jim (Jason Biggs) prepare for the return of his international crush (Shannon Elizabeth).
5. Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 1 & 2 (2005, 2008)
Four high school friends go their separate ways for the summer but remain connected by a pair of pants, which mysteriously fits them all, despite their different sizes and body types. Alexis Bledel, Amber Tamblyn, America Ferrera and Blake Lively star.
6. Dirty Dancing (1987)
Shy academic Frances “Baby” Houseman meets dance instructor Johnny Castle (Patrick Swayze) at an upscale family summer camp. Johnny teaches Baby “dirty dancing” which clashes with her WASP upbringing.
7. Mystic Pizza (1988)
Daisy (Julia Roberts) and Kat (Annabeth Gish) are two sisters of Portuguese descent who work at a pizza joint along with their friend Jojo (Lili Taylor). The three girls all nurture feminist sensibilities and wrestle with how to leave their small town.
Photo © Tomas Skopal – Fotolia.com
August Movie Round-Up, Part 2
Movie fans have some real treats in store over the last couple of weeks of August, with some great high summer treats – especially if you’re into sci-fi, horror and remakes! Here are a few of them.
Conan the Barbarian, for example, is a forthcoming feast of 3-D swords and sorcery. Jason Momoa plays the leading role. With Marcus Nispel in the director’s chair, Rose McGowan, Rose Nichols, Stephen Lang and Bob Sapp also star.
After his father is murdered and their village destroyed, Conan enters an unforgiving world, in which he exists as a robber, pirate, and war-monger. While on this destructive path, Conan comes upon the warlord responsible for his tribe’s elimination. As he tracks Khalar Zym, Conan takes on monsters, Zym’s henchmen, and Marique, a powerful witch. Hardcore fans will be interested to see how this remake matches up to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s original legend.
Another remake is on offer in the form of Fright Night, a fresh version of the 1985 Toma Holland original black comedy. When high school student Charley Brewster starts to come across various disappearances in his neighbourhood, all clues lead back to Jerry, a new neighbor of his mother, who, it turns out, is a vampire.
Charley contacts Peter Vincent (David Tennant), the host of his favorite TV show, for help in overcoming Jerry, who promptly threatens to kill Charley’s girlfriend, a popular UK exchange student called Amy, played by Imogen Poots. Toni Collette (In Her Shoes, Little Miss Sunshine, Muriel’s Wedding) plays Charley’s mom. Fright Night is in theaters starting August 19.
A week later, Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark goes on general release – another late summer horror remake. The original 1973 ABC made for TV flick of the same name has been recreated in a script by Matthew Robbins and Guillermo del Toro and directed by Troy Nixey.
The basic plot relates what happens after heroine Sally moves into a new home with her father and his girlfriend and is pursued by ruthless creatures keen to claim the young girl as one of their own.
This R-rated picture, distributed by FilmDistrict, has credible casting (Katie Holmes and Guy Pearce star) and its first trailer has gone down well online. If you loved the original or just horror in general, this could well be the August movie for you.
Photo © David Wood – Fotolia.com
August Movie Round-Up, Part 1
When it’s hot outside, chill out in a movie theater with one of these cool summer pictures! Here’s a round-up of upcoming flicks coming up in the first couple of weeks of August so you can start planning your viewing.
Rise of the Planet of the Apes, starring Andy Serkis, Freida Pinto and James Franco, is set in modern-day San Francisco, where man’s dabbling in genetic engineering result in the development of apes who wage war against man. This sci-fi picture is all about the ensuing battle for supremacy.
For something a little more light-hearted, The Change-Up, starring Ryan Reynolds and Jason Bateman, is a comedy set to be released on August 5. The story tells what happens when two best friends, Mitch, a carefree bachelor with endless admirers, and overwhelmed family man Dave trade places. They get the chance to try out each other’s lives and switch bodies thanks to a magic fountain … Olivia Wilde and Leslie Mann join Reynolds and Bateman in this amiable body swap comedy.
Also in August, Emma Stone, Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer star in The Help. Based on the New York Times number one best-seller, this drama tells the tale of three extraordinary women in 1960s Mississippi, whose alliance centres on a writing project which breaks all the rules of society at that time. A remarkable friendship results in this emotional and poignant story, which is nonetheless laced with humor. Above all, this film is about the ability to create change.
30 Minutes or Less from Columbia Pictures is based loosely on the true story of an unusual bank robbery from 2003 which took place in Erie, Pennsylvania.
The basic premise is that, having hired an assassin to murder his father for his insurance money, antagonist Dwayne and partner in crime Travis kidnap a pizza delivery driver and make him rob a bank with a bomb vest attached to his chest with a 9-hour timer to pay for the job to be done. Starring Jesse Eisenberg, Aziz Ansari, Danny McBride and Nick Swardson, this picture is directed by Ruben Fleischer, who also directed Zombieland. Catch it in theaters from August 12th.
Photo © Rafa Irusta – Fotolia.com
One Day: A Romantic Hit for Summer 2011
Last year, it was the novel everyone was reading – it was just as popular with men as it was with women, and translated into nearly 40 languages. Now One Day, the movie, is in selected theaters on July 8 before a more general release later in the summer. And it’s set to be this summer’s romantic smash hit.
The novel, by British author David Nicholls, was released in June 2010 in the US. It spent 12 weeks on The New York Times Trade Paperback Fiction Bestseller list, rising to the number four position. The New York Times Book Review named the novel one of the hundred most important books of last year.
The movie version stars Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess as Emma Morley and Dexter Mayhew, a star-crossed pair who, after spending the night of their college graduation together, can’t stop thinking about each other.
Over the next two decades, key turning points in their extraordinary on-off relationship/friendship are shown on the same day each year – July 15, the anniversary of their first encounter – as the pair face friendship, fights, missed opportunities and dashed hopes, tears and laughter. As the real meaning of this “one day” is revealed, the protagonists of this warm, witty and wise tale come to grips with the true nature of love and life itself.
While the handsome, wealthy Dexter becomes a TV superstar, heroine Emma is an awkward, working-class girl from the provincial north of England, who works as a waitress and then teaches in an inner-city public school.
Some fans have even taken to the Internet to complain that Hathaway is ‘too beautiful’ to play the character!
But this is a beautiful story, with a breathtaking turn in the plot at the end, which is a secret which binds everyone who has read it. Fans of the book are unlikely to be disappointed with this picture, directed by Lone Scherfig.
Photo © Bocos Benedict – Fotolia.com
Tagged One Day, summer 2011 movies, summer movies
Classic Summer Movies
It may be temptingly warm and sunny outside, but there’s also a great tradition of escaping the heat by sitting inside a cool, darkened theater and catching a movie. Since the middle of the 1970s, ‘summer movies’ have referred to the blockbuster pictures which everyone goes to see, and which are bankers for the big film studios. Traditionally, these films are defined by low-brow comedy, gun battles, spaceships and plenty of explosions, or by oversexed teenagers. Coming of age is another recurrent theme. It’s also a time for gross out movies (The Hangover II.)
Think Independence Day, with its occasionally cringeworthy dialogue (‘Let’s kick the tires and light the fires!’), and its laughable ending. (But still we went to see it in the millions.)
Meatballs, which launched Bill Murray’s career back in 1979, is another classic of the genre. He plays a summer camp counselor surrounded by a bunch of odd campers and trainee counselors.
In 1975, Jaws, created the summer blockbuster tradition, and the career of a young and then unknown movie maker by the name of Steven Spielberg. It also put people off so much as dipping their toe in the local swimming pool for the whole of that year’s summer months. It changed the landscape for pictures which were shown at this time of year.
There are, of course, countless others. And, even if it’s the depths of winter, classic movies which are about or set during the summer can brighten the long dark nights – from everyone’s all-time favorites like Grease and Dirty Dancing to My Girl, Stand by Me and I Know What You Did Last Summer.
Everyone has their own movie which encapsulates the feeling of summer – what’s yours?
Photo © drx – Fotolia.com