There’s about two ways to show magic on screen — the first is demonstrating the tricks, usually in an unbroken shot (if they’re smart), and hope it’s almost like being there in person. When Danny Atlas (Jesse Eisenberg) is introduced, it looks like they’re going this way. He asks someone from the crowd to pick a card, and he flips through the deck. He says he went too fast, so he does it again. Now we’re seeing this from the face in the crowd’s perspective, so the trick is played like it’s for us.

One card is shown a millisecond longer than the others, and that fraction is so perfectly timed that you notice it, but don’t notice whether you’re supposed to notice it. When the cards are flipped through again, you see it again. Then, when Atlas fans out the deck and asks if it’s in there and you don’t notice it, you realize you’ve been fooled. How that sequence is timed is so good, it’s the show-stopper.

The second way is to focus on the showmanship, and we get that in the following bit with Merritt Osbourne (Woody Harrelson), a gifted hypnotist but, more accurately, grifter who can pick up visual cues from marks, expose their darkest secrets, then blackmail them.

And while those two beats work very well, the movie never quite reaches that level again, nor does it decide which way to stick with. The succeeding two magicians we meet, Jack Wilder (Dave Franco), a straight-up thief, and Henley Reeves (Ilsa Fisher), a straight-up escape artist whose routine isn’t anything different from your standard Penn & Teller stunt — except, without, you know, Penn & Teller.

Is this a parody or a ripoff? Warm Bodies is so up front with its copies — copies– of Twilight that, judging from the trailer alone, by the time it hit theatres, I was sure it had to be a straight-up uppercut to tweener romance. I’m not so sure now.

But I am certain that the leads, Nicholas Hoult and Teresa Palmer, were chosen for their resemblances to Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart (respectively, I think), both in looks and in their mutual tendency to overact. The story, however, is lifted from Romeo and Juliet and Zombies — and at least anyone who has yet to take freshman literature should be able to make the connection between Juliet and Julie (Palmer) and R (Hoult) and Romeo. That gets a pass though, since Shakespeare probably stole the story from somewhere else.

Anywho, Julie and R live in your standard zombie apocalypse. A big wall separates the humans from the Corpses (as they’re so called). And there’s a special subset of Corpses called “Bonies” (feel free to giggle like a high-school freshman who has yet to read Romeo and Juliet yet) — these are the folks who’ve decomposed to the point of full-on skeletalization. Somehow they’re still able to move and sniff, but there’s more than a few suspensions of disbelief.

It is really unfair to be disappointed in a film because of bad casting luck early in its production. Alex Cross originally was meant to star the phenomenal Idris Elba as the titular detective, in what was supposed to be a more exciting and action oriented take on the character.

Then Mr. Elba had to back out and we got left with Tyler Perry. Now I don’t hate the films of Tyler Perry, I just never watch them. They are not made for me, so I don’t feel the urge to sit down with them. Perry was inoffensive enough in his brief role in Star Trek, so the news wasn’t immediately  loathsome.

Then this trailer hits, and all the regret and lament for what could have been comes rushing back. For the people who do not know what Alex Cross is all about, here is the synopsis:

After Washington DC detective Alex Cross is told that a family member has been murdered, he vows to track down the killer. He soon discovers that she was not his first victim and that things are now what they seem.

Despite the lead, the film has some fantastic actors, and the trailer makes it seem that most of them are on their A game.

Check out the new trailer after the jump.

For the record, I am not a ‘tween girl. In fact, I’m no kind of girl at all. Perhaps that’s why I just don’t get the whole Twilight phenomenon.

The books are not very well written, the story is cliche’ and the characters are drawn from the worst sort of tepid, melodramatic sources. Still, it is hugely successful as a book a movie series. Maybe ‘tween girls know more than I do? Who knows.

Whatever the reasons, Twilight is huge and the final filmic installment of the franchise is almost upon us. That means, of course, promotional material.

This time around said promotional material takes the form of a new teaser trailer for Breaking Dawn Part 2. This particular one shows us the trio and how things have changed for them, but in other ways, have stayed pretty much the same. Oh, and Bella needs a snack.

Check out the new teaser after the break. See what all the fuss is about when The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 hits theaters on November 19.

In a weekend that had tons of free-range beasts, moviegoers had the choice of watching Sam Worthington hang out on a ledge, Vampires take on genetic Werewolves, or Liam Neeson just take on wolves. And it looks like the man and his “particular set of skills” continued to dominate the hearts of men and women everywhere, by bringing The Grey to the #1 spot this weekend with an estimated $20 Million.

Close behind the dramatic man vs. beast tale was the fourth installment of the “Kate Beckinsale in leather” films known as Underworld. Not a terrible second weekend for the flick, as it raked in $12 Million, just halfing its take from last weekend. In the third spot this weekend, Katherine Heigl continues to make mens’ stomaches turn with her One for the Money “comedy”, which only made $11.7 Million this weekend.