Trailer Park and Rentals Tips to help your hibernation

What was with the trailers for Mission Impossible 3 with Tom Cruise and Keri Russell (yes, from TV's "Felicity") and Miami Vice with Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx as Crockett and Tubbs? I got no sense of a plot or story aside from some posing and dialogue. Hey look, Phillip Seymour Hoffman is a bad guy in MI3. So what does he want? Anything? Why is he so bad? Was that Laurence Fishburne?

Miami Vice has Michael Mann directing, and the man does crime well (Heat and Collateral), but give me something to go on here. Are these guys cops or crooks? Blech. "Smooth that's how we do it." Do what for chrissakes!???!!! All atmosphere, nothing to whet the appetite. It's like a date with a good looking person with no personality or charm. Makes me dread another summer of remakes and sequels.

The trailer for The Inside Man is far more engrossing, involve a great cast: Denzel Washington, Clive Owen as the baddie, as well as Jodie Foster, Willem Dafoe, and Chiwetel Ejiofor, who was such a charming villain in Serenity. And it appears we have Spike Lee doing a heist flick where all is not as it seems. Interesting.

Looking forward to Match Point in the next few weeks. Out of the usual confines of New York, Woody Allen is giving us a movie of love, lust and temptaion. I saw the trailer, loved it, and then saw "Directed by Woody Allen". That's a Woody Allen picture? Well alrighty then, he'll get my $10. And apparently, Scarlett Johansen may be giving Angelina Jolie a run in the "Best Seduction With Just a Look" category.

Good rental bets:



New release: Red Eye, a suspense movie starring Rachel McAdams and Cillian Murphy, two very pretty people who can "bring it" acting-wise. I'm looking forward to seeing this.

Some good work from the directors Lee, Jackson and Mann mentioned above:

The Frighteners - A really terrific movie from Peter Jackson with Michael J. Fox as a ghostbusting conman who has to deal with some bloodlusting spooks. It was a horror comedy that didn't skimp on the horror. The scares are well done and it does creep the hell out of you in places. It's been re-released on DVD, never having really caught on in theaters. Give it a shot, especially if you liked Shaun of the Dead.

25th Hour - Spike Lee gives us the last free hours of a New York City small-time drug dealer, played by Ed Norton, who must put his affairs in order before starting a prison sentence. Great, engrossing work from Edward Norton and a solid cast including Barry Pepper, Rosario Dawson, and Phillip Seymour Hoffman.

Heat - What? Just consider this an excuse to rewatch one of my favourite heist movies with a team of cops led by a pedal to the metal Al Pachino and a team of crooks led by the masterfully subtle Robert Deniro. Sooooo good with a home theater surround sound. The movie will make you want to pull off your own heist.