People seem to think Hugh Jackmandeserves better than a boxing robot movie. But seriously, is his starring inReal Steelany worse than his appearances in Van Helsing, Swordfish or pretty much anything else he’s done since breaking out as Wolverine in the first X-Menmovie? Sure, he’s an entertaining Oscar host, and he’s apparently very enjoyable on the stage. But try to name one movie he’s really good in that warrants him roles better than a robot boxer trainer in a silly sci-fi sports flick directed by Shawn Levy. And don’t say The Prestige, because that film wasn’t great for any doing of his.
Interestingly enough, Real Steel, which has a very ’80s-action-film-sounding title, is being produced by Steven Spielberg, who also oversees the Transformersmovies. Are robots his new aliens? Okay, I guess Transformers are also aliens, and before that he’d already given us alien/robot crossovers like *batteries not includedand (sort of) Artificial Intelligence: A.I.(because so many people think those robots at the end of the film are aliens). But in all likelihood, Real Steel will be released in summer 2011, which has just been announced as when we’ll also be getting Transformers 3.
Although I have no interest in seeing either of these movies, I can’t wait to see which of the dueling Spielberg-produced robot blockbusters wins the season’s box office. Maybe Spielberg can even ready Indiana Jones 5by then, too, and include robots in it. After the ridiculousness of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, I wouldn’t be surprised by such an idea.
Check out what the other film blogs are saying about Jackman signing on to Real Steel after the jump: …Read more
A lot of people have wondered how a brilliant film like Ratatouillecould be denied a Best Picture Oscar nomination. Well, I’ve finally uncovered the conspiracy, and it involves food, obviously. See, Ratatouille celebrates great French cuisine. But apparently the Academy is in the pockets of the American fast food industry, because all five of the Best Picture contenders have some sort of connection to the greasy, fatty and popular foods that keep America overweight and complacent.
What, you don’t believe me? OK, well here’s the obvious ones: There Will Be Bloodhas a line about drinking milkshakes (the line is now such a popular catch phrase, I’m shocked McDonalds hasn’t yet given its customers a movie tie-in); Junohas a hamburger phone; No Country For Old Menhas that slaughterhouse bolt pistol. Now here’s the less noticeable and the real stretch: Michael Claytondeals with a fictional company called U-North, which is pretty much supposed to be the real company Monsato, which got its start as the supplier of saccharin, caffeine and vanillin to Coca-Cola; and Atonementis the latest film to have a “small fry” actress nominated for an Oscar (yeah, that’s all I’ve got).
We’ve had a bit of trouble getting this episode to go through the iTunes feed, so we hope this re-post will fix the problem. The original post, with episode description and embedded player, is here.
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People seem to think 
