Folded in among today’s DVD releases, presumably overlooked amid your Twilight sequels and Harold and Kumar 3D yuletides and “Shakespeare didn’t write his plays!” screeds, is one of 2011′s best films: The Sunset Limited, written by Cormac McCarthy, directed by Tommy Lee Jones, starring Jones and Samuel L. Jackson. Wait, you might be thinking. (You might be!) What a fine pedigree! What an excellent cast! I would have gone to see that! Did it not play at my local art house or multiplex? No, hypothetical reader, it did not. It was made for HBO, and since Sunset Limited, based on McCarthy’s play, is primarily a two-handed conversation piece about race, class, mortality, and despair, it’s probably not surprising that it found a home on a pay cable network rather than at a Hollywood studio. But this is nothing new; dialogue and intellect-driven efforts like this migrated to television long ago, as studios lost interest in telling small stories.
Since they started airing in the mid-1960s, TV movies have taken risks — either on subject matter or on rising young talent. The results weren’t always commendable; there’s a reason that the phrase “made-for-TV movie” calls up images of Tori Spelling cowering on Lifetime, or broadcast networks airing simultaneous dramatizations of the lurid Amy Fisher story. But between the networks and cable, we’ve seen an assortment of genuinely beguiling television movies; we’ve gathered ten of our favorites after the jump, with plenty of room for yours in the comments. (And, just to keep it simple, we’ve steered clear of miniseries, documentaries, and films like The Believer that were intended for theatrical release but premiered on television instead).
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Welcome to “Trailer Park,” our regular Friday feature where we collect the week’s new trailers all in one place and do a little “judging a book by its cover,” ranking them from worst to best and taking our best guess at what they may be hiding. We’ve got six new trailers this week, with an emphasis on family-friendly fare. Check ‘em out after the jump.
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Remember earlier this year, when yet another phoned in performance from Samuel L. Jackson — this time in the trailer for the straight-to-DVD video-game-centered action flick Arena — inspired Flavorwire film editor Jason Bailey to write an entire post on actors who have made the unfortunate transition from once brilliant work to lazy, paycheck roles? Well, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, Jackson is now the highest grossing movie actor of all time. So congrats, Sam. It worked!
As Entertainment Weekly‘s Darren Franich is quick to point out, “The bulk of Jackson’s estimated $7.2 billion gross comes from big franchise films where he had, at best, a supporting role.” Also, the people at Guinness apparently did not adjust the numbers to reflect inflation. But still, are you at all surprised by this news, given how many bad movies Jackson — who averages a whopping four films a year — has been in of late?
Welcome to “Trailer Park,” our regular Friday feature where we collect the week’s new trailers all in one place and do a little “judging a book by its cover,” ranking them from worst to best and taking our best guess at what they may be hiding. We’ve got eight new trailers this week, running the gamut from a big-budget superhero all-star tentpole to indies about cross-dressing and prostitution. Check ‘em out after the jump.
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We don’t know about you, but we’ve already got our tickets for Killer Elite, which hits theaters — presumably with a roundhouse kick — this Friday. See Jason Statham kicking ass while tied to a chair! Thrill to the most ill-advised facial hair of Clive Owen’s career! Groove to the straight-faced use of Scorpions’ “Rock You Like a Hurricane!” (I know we’ve harped on this, but seriously, that’s what makes it the year’s funniest trailer.) And, most of all, calculate how much coin once-respected “actor’s actor” Robert DeNiro pocketed for appearing in this swill!
Actors make movies for many reasons: to stretch their skills, to work with admired co-stars or filmmakers, to help tell a story that they believe has value. And, sometimes, they make a movie for a nice chunk of cheddar. Mr. DeNiro, for one, has certainly had no qualms — particularly over the last decade or so — with lending his well-regarded talents to several projects that were in no danger of contributing to his Oscar shelf; in honor of his latest payday performance, let’s take a look at ten of his fellow thespians, and the depths to which they’ve traveled for a few extra zeros.
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Last Friday, during our weekly trailer roundup, we asked a glib but honest question: “Are we all agreed that we’ve passed the tipping point with Samuel L. Jackson?” The query was posed in response to the release of the trailer for Arena, a (from all indications) aggressively stupid straight-to-DVD video-game-centered action flick — and just another in a long, long line of terrible movies from an actor once considered to be among the finest of his generation. Jackson certainly isn’t alone, though; there are plenty of film actors who have proven themselves capable of brilliance but have apparently made the conscious decision to (barely) expend their energies on lazy, paycheck roles.
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Welcome to “Trailer Park,” our regular Friday feature where we collect the week’s new trailers all in one place and do a little “judging a book by its cover,” ranking them from worst to best and taking our best guess at what they may be hiding. This week, we’ve got ten new ones — taken as a group, a rather eclectic mix of styles and subjects indicating that the summer movie season is drawing to a close. Check ‘em all out after the jump.
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We’re always on the lookout for cool pop-culture related visual art, so we can’t thank the good folks at Brain Pickings enough for drawing our attention to Israeli artist Noma Bar and his book Guess Who: The Many Faces of Noma Bar. This 2007 volume collects 50 of Bar’s minimalist vector portraits of iconic figures from the world of film, science, literature, politics, music, and more. We’ve picked out ten of our favorites from the book; check ‘em out after the jump.
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Even though it’s just hitting shelves today, chances are you’ve already heard plenty about Adam Mansbach’s profanity-laced children’s book for adults, Go the F*** to Sleep — in fact, maybe you were even one of those people who received a pirated PDF version of the book, helping to drive its pre-release buzz through the roof. The unconventional bedtime story — which was inspired by Mansbach’s own experiences with his daughter — has already spent 50 days in the Top 100 on Amazon.com, and is currently sitting pretty in the number two spot.
If you haven’t read Go the F*** to Sleep yet, and you’re curious as to what all the fuss is all about, you can currently download an audiobook version read by Samuel L. Jackson for free here. In even more exiting news, The Guardian reports that Werner Herzog is also working on a recording of the book that will be unveiled at an event at the New York Public Library. Based on previous spoofs of the auteur’s deadpan delivery, we’re expecting it will be hilarious.
Like films that feature only one actor, movies that are set in one location can be a hard sell for audiences — unless you’ve got an amazing script and a solid cast. Case in point, the trailer for The Sunset Limited, an HBO Films adaptation of a Cormac McCarthy play that stars Tommy Lee Jones (who also directs) and Samuel L. Jackson, just landed online, and it looks fantastic. (This might be at least in part because McCarthy adapted the screenplay himself.) Like all of his work, the storyline is intense: A man stops another man from throwing himself in front of a train, and then forces him to come back to his apartment; there, the men proceed to debate on a variety of important topics — including but not limited to religion. Click through to check it out, and let us know in the comments what you think.
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