Pretty simple update this week as the theatrical new releases all seem to be cowering in fear of The Bat Man. Now I’m sure the movie is great and Heath Ledger is perfection and Christopher Nolan finally has discovered how to shoot an action sequence, but something about the torrential buzz for the film is really giving me a bad taste in my mouth. I’d boycott the film but it seems pop culture would then be legally required to put a bounty on my head.

For DVD releases next Tuesday it all comes down to one simple release, Spaced: The Complete Series. The brilliant brainchild of Simon Pegg, Jessica Hynes, Edgar Wright and Nick Frost about a pair of friends (Pegg and Hynes) who lie about being a couple so that they can rent an awesome apartment. But with oodles of geeky references, and fantastic camera work and absurd characters. It is one of the best television shows ever made, and should be required viewing for any fan of the all powerful Pegg/Wright/Frost triumvirate.

As always trailers are after the break! (more…)

Along with several staff members at my theater, we have recently decided that we are going to write up a variation of the “Laminate list”. The Laminate List goes by all sorts of different names, but is generally known as the list of 5 celebrities that one is allowed to sleep with. But rather then this be a list about sleeping with people, we decided that we wanted to make it more of a fan list styled phone tree. So that if one of your Top 5 celebrities happens to come into the theater and you are not working, you would get a phone call and be provided the opportunity to stop in to the theater and possibly actually get to meet them.

Now at most places of business this would be a completely frivolous list. More of a way to pass the time and ignore whatever it is you are supposed to be doing. But I work at a movie theater in a relatively major metropolitan city. Celebrities are actually a fairly regular occurrence here in Minneapolis. A handful call the area home, and countless others swing on buy during their various tours, press meetings, or even being paid to party at our nightclubs.

Unfortunately, of the three Landmark Theaters in town mine is by far the least hip and the furthest away from the cultural epicenter that is Uptown. Because of this our level of celebrities tends to be rather low. Sure we got Bai Ling that one time, but who hasn’t had her? Or then there was the time Ned Beatty hung out for an afternoon, which was cool, but he also did it in part because he was trying to get us to sell his new CD. Which, by the way, was entirely devoted to him singing Gospel songs. I’m pretty sure we still have a case of them lying around somewhere. But outside of that we haven’t garnered much higher then the Minneapolis Mayor or local Sportscaster Mark Rosen.

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Going to keep it a bit shorter today, as I am running a bit low on time and material to work with. Not much released on DVD this week besides two vastly overrated/overwatched films in Alvin and the Chipmunks and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. I’m sure both will sell umpteen thousand copies this upcoming Tuesday but I’ll be quite content in avoiding both.

The one thing I am very excited about for DVD releases is Terry Jones’ BBC documentary series Medieval Times, a series devoted to dispelling many of the myths of the middle ages. It’s a fascinating show, as BBC documentaries are want to be, and I can’t recommend it enough. Unfortunately, I have no trailer or scenes for it to show you, so you’ll just have to take my word for it.

The other DVD release of the week that I find passably interesting is a comedy called The Good Night starring Martin Freeman, Gwenyth Paltrow, Penelope Cruz, Simon Pegg, and Danny DeVito. It’s about a man (Freeman) who obsessively dreams about a woman (Cruz) he has never met before. Normally I would never dare to recommend any film with Gwenyth Paltrow in it but I must admit I have a deep an unflinching man-crush on Simon Pegg and thus all logic and reason about a film is thrown out the window once his is involved.

Case in point, my first theatrical pick of the weekend is the Simon Pegg vehicle Run, Fatboy Run. Starring Pegg, Thandie Newton, and Hank Azaria is has the ignominious pleasure of being directed by David Schwimmer, yet this is countered by the film being written by Michael Ian Black. Sure it will probably be far less then good, but Pegg is irresistible. That and I am fascinated by the Pegg/Schwimmer/Black trio.

Thankfully I have one last recommendation up my sleeve, which should redeem this entire debacle. That movie is Stephen Chow’s new film CJ7. You may know Chow from Shaolin Soccer, and you should know him from Kung Fu Hustle, and it is my hope that with CJ7 Chow only further entrenches himself within the American mainstream. I barely know what is coming to the multiplexes this weekend, but let me assure you, anything else you see will not be better then CJ7.

As always trailers are after the break. Enjoy!

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