Tag: Paul Rudd

Check Out The Poster For ‘This Is 40’

by Derek Kraneveldt

We’re now just a couple months away from Judd Apatow’s Knocked Up spinoff This Is 40, and Universal Pictures today released the one-sheet for the title.

17-year old me thought that Knocked Up was hilarious when it came out in 2007 (though I haven’t seen it since), so I’m quite looking forward to this one.

The film features much of the cast of Knocked Up, as well as other Apatow regulars, and follows Pete and Debbie as they deal with their growing family and hitting the ripe age of 40 years old.

This is 40 hits theatres on December 1st. Check out the poster (and trailer) below, and let us know what you think!

Geekscape Movie Reviews: The Perks Of Being A Wallflower

by Scott Alminiana

This weekend saw the limited release of the big-screen adaptation of the Stephen Chbosky novel The Perks of Being a Wallflower. While I’ve never read the book I did enjoy the movie immensely. Major credit for this goes to the fantastic cast of Logan Lerman, Emma Watson and Ezra Miller, with a supporting cast that includes Paul Rudd, Mae Whitman and Johnny Simmons among others. The movie was adapted and directed by Stephen Chbosky himself and this seems to only help make the movie that much more enjoyable as you can tell he truly has a connection and understanding of the story and what made the novel work.

The movie centers around Charlie (Logan Lerman) as he is about to enter high school as a freshman in 1991. Charlie narrates the story, via a voice-over, as he writes letters to an unknown person. It’s in these voice-overs that we initially learn that Charlie is a withdrawn and troubled kid. Upon entering school, Charlie has no friends and on his first day the only friend he seemingly makes is his English teacher played by Paul Rudd. Before too long though Charlie meets Patrick (Ezra Miller, who gives a fantastic performance), a flamboyantly hilarious senior and his step-sister Sam (a stunning Emma Watson with a flawless American accent). It’s Patrick and Sam who take Charlie under their wing and welcome him to, as Sam states in one part of the movie, the island of misfit toys. Together they discover music, such as David Bowie’s Heroes, and revel in things such as midnight showings of The Rocky Horror Picture Show. There are subplots including Mae Whitman as a buddhist punker friend of the group who dates Charlie to some humorous effect. There’s also another subplot including Patrick’s relationship with Johnny Simmons’ closeted quarterback character.

This movie has some pretty dark parts in it such as depression and suicide, but it’s these parts that make you realize that this isn’t your typical Hollywood high school movie. This is a movie that digs deeper and shows how mean kids really are in high school and the alienation and confusion most of us once felt oh so long ago. Logan Lerman, Ezra Miller and Emma Watson all give great performances that make you believe that these characters truly exist. As I said in the beginning of the review, Stephen Chbosky adapted and directed this from his own novel and his knowledge of the era and his love of the characters is present throughout. The Perks of Being a Wallflower is now open in Los Angeles and New York but hopefully will be opening in a theater near you. If and when it does, it is definitely a movie you should go see.

New Trailer For Judd Apatow’s ‘This Is 40’!

by Shawn Madden

So, if you haven’t seen the first trailer by now we are bringing you the second trailer for Judd Apatow’s upcoming sort-of-sequel to Knocked Up, This Is 40. The film focuses on Pete (Paul Rudd) and Debbie (Leslie Mann), characters first introduced to us in Knocked Up. Looks pretty good to me. I’m on board.

Writer/director/producer Judd Apatow (The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Funny People) brings audiences This Is 40, an original comedy that expands upon the story of Pete (Paul Rudd) and Debbie (Leslie Mann) from the blockbuster hit Knocked Up as we see first hand how they are dealing with their current state of life.

This Is 40 hits theaters December 21st.

Guilty Pleasure – Mac & Me

by Saintmort

Kids are idiots.

There I said it. We were all thinking it. Every single one of us at one time was a kid and at that time we were an idiot. Some people try to pretend they weren’t idiots. They say things like “That movie is terrible, even when I was a kid I knew it was bad”. No you didn’t. You’re a liar. At that time you enjoyed the taste of your own boogers and walked around with your bowel movements swimming around your ass. Your ability to have ‘taste’ in things was weak at best.

I’m not exempt from this “kids are idiots” thing. Because when I was a kid I thought Mac & Me was a better movie than E.T. I want to say that I don’t still feel this way (because I really don’t) but I’ve also realized that I own Mac & Me on both DVD and VHS yet I own no copies of E.T. so… maybe I do still believe that. Some people never stop being an idiot.

Mac & Me isn’t so much a movie as it’s a 90 minute commercial for McDonald’s starring a Mysterious Alien Creature (aka MAC) and a boy in a wheelchair. But I’m getting ahead of myself right now, let’s break this down a little better.

The movie opens on MAC’s home planet. Mac and his family are transported to Earth while searching for food and immediately break free from the laboratory that captured them. Mac gets separated from his family and ends up in the car of the Cruise family as they are moving into a new home.

Eric (a handicapped boy) discovers Mac and makes it his goal to help Mac reconnect with his family and return to their home planet. Actually I’m going to stop explaining the plot, if you’ve never seen it just think of the plot of E.T. it’s basically the same plot. Just with MAJOR product placement.

You see, remember that iconic Reese’s Pieces moment in E.T.? Well , imagine if that scene happened every 5 or 10 minutes and you’ll start to understand how bad the produce placement is. I mean for starters the alien is named after a McDonald’s sandwich, he survives off of Skittles and Coca-Cola and best of all there’s a giant dance sequence (while MAC’s disguised as a bear) in a McDonald’s (featuring Ronald McDonald).

This Always Happened at my McDonalds

I’m not saying that subliminal messages like this work. But I just took a break from writing to pick up chicken McNuggets. People will say this wasn’t product placement because the filmmaker says they never received payment from any of the products that appear in the movie. That’d be easier to believe if you didn’t have this trailer.

You see this film has bad reputation, but much like Joan Jett I don’t give a damn. I love and embrace this movie, but not just for the so bad, it’s good quality (although it helps). I remember always loving the design of Mac, even though he’s terrifying looking and has DSL constantly puckered on his face.

I guess it’s impossible for me to not mention the cliff sequence. If you’re not familiar with the scene I speak of, you’ve definitely never seen the movie. As I said earlier Eric is in a wheelchair, when he first sees Mac he chases him (well… wheels at him) suddenly he loses control and begins wheeling down a cliff. Without warning we get this incredible shot of a manniquinn strapped to a wheelchair falling into the water below. Mac of course saves Eric and their friendship begins to bloom. Don’t believe me? Here’s the infamous moment

The clip has developed a cult following when it became a running gag on Conan O’Brien’s show to play this clip whenever Paul Rudd was on (Even though he has absolutely nothing to do with the film, the biggest name in the film is either Jennifer Aniston as an uncredited extra or Ronald McDonald as himself). Perhaps if Paul continues doing this we’ll eventually see the Mac & Me sequel since the movie does promise that they will be back!

News Team Assemble! First Poster For ‘Anchorman 2’ Has Been Revealed

by Scott Alminiana

Put on some Sex Panther and get ready because Ron Burgundy and the Channel 4 News Team are back! First it was announced that a teaser trailer for Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues would be shown before The Dictator, which opens today, and now the first poster has been released.  And let me tell you, it’s like a glorious rainbow!

So back your bags, buy some scotch and come on back down to the Whale’s Vagina and lets have a party, but please leave your glass cases of emotion at home. The legend continues next year and the whole news team will be back. Until then stay classy.

 

Geekscape Movie Reviews: Wanderlust

by MCDave

Paul Rudd’s once up and down career has blossomed into a solid body of work. Beginning his upswing in 2004 with the instant classic Anchorman, Rudd then followed suit with another excellent supporting role in the hysterical comedy The 40 Year Old Virgin. After a few more successful secondary stints, his career finally took off when he starred in the 2009 smash hit Role Models. Just a mere three years later and Rudd finds himself once again teaming up with his Role Models director David Wain. But Wain and Rudd are no strangers to one another. The friends and colleagues have worked together on every film that Wain has directed, including their most recent collaboration, Wanderlust.

Wanderlust follows George (played by Rudd) and Linda (played by Aniston), a young married couple living in New York City and already struggling to make ends meet. But when George unexpectedly loses his job and Linda’s attempt at a documentary gets turned down by HBO, the duo can no longer afford their mortgage. While trekking to Atlanta to shack up with George’s more successful and far more intolerable older brother Rick, the husband and wife discover Elysium. Elysium is a commune-like property filled with dozens of free-spirited members living under the direction of a divine leader named Seth. Although the notion seems far fetched, could Elysium be just the lifestyle that this couple needs?

Wanderlust is an overly simplistic and re-hatched attempt at R-rated humor. The film’s story becomes lost behind the overly animated characters that exist on screen. As Wanderlust serves up its obvious plot twists, it becomes apparent how brutally shallow the movie really is. Rarely does a film cause its audience to give up on its leading characters so quickly. Pinpointing the problems in David Wain’s Wanderlust becomes a daunting task, mostly because there’s so much blame to go around.

In addition to its aimless plot, Wanderlust finds little solace in the performance given by its leading actress Jennifer Aniston. Although her co-star Paul Rudd is far from spectacular himself, Aniston is simply woeful throughout the film. With remarkable ease, the actress elevates her already unlikable character to a whole new level. But despite its questionable stars, Wanderlust does offer a wide variety of outlandishly comical side characters. With the aid of a few minor roles, there are a handful of laugh out loud moments which manage to keep the film mildly entertaining.

Unfortunately for fans of well written comedic genius, “shock comedy” has become the latest craze. Everything from the bathroom scene in Hall Pass to Maya Rudolph defecating on the street in Bridesmaids, the bigger the shock the better. Wanderlust rides this bandwagon and musters up plenty of full frontal nudity (both male and female). But don’t worry, I promise I won’t spoil the movie’s biggest shocker of all.

Wanderlust is a drifting hour and a half adventure to nowhere. Centered around over the top side characters and containing very little substance, the film becomes a somewhat purposeless experience. As is the case with any comedy, Wanderlust has the occasional highlight. However, the distant gap between these rare moments is far too difficult to withstand. Heed my advice and stay clear of Wanderlust

Stars: 1 and a half stars out of 4

Grade: C-

 

Note: When MCDave isn’t creating havoc at Geekscape, he’s critiquing films at Movie Reviews By Dave