The Flickcast

Movie Review: ‘Silent House’

Posted on March 12, 2012

This decent thriller and remake of the Uruguayan film La Casa Muda is more fun than scary — the jumps, false alarms, little girls, bumps in the night, close-ups of the heroine’s boobies, etc. — border on abuse they’re used so often; first it’s spooky, then it’s overused, then it comes back around to being funny, like a joke that goes on and keeps going.

I counted at least three times the heroine hid under something. First a dining table, then a bed, then a pool table while someone ominously walked around and/or spotted and made snatch for her. Three times something crashed off camera and someone else dismissed it.

Twice a character appears to be dead; four times a little girl, ostensibly meant to inspire terror, appears from nowhere; twice does someone mysteriously stuff something down their pants; and a whopping eight-and-a-half times is the heroine surprised by something benign.

‘The Loved Ones’ Finally Getting a Stateside Release

Posted on March 12, 2012

Paramount Insurge has picked up the rights to Australian horror film The Loved Ones, and is expected to hit theaters as soon as this summer. This film has garnered a lot of buzz since it’s Australian release in 2009.

This is the first feature for writer-director Sean Byrne. The film stars Robin McLeavy, who currently has a recurring role on AMC’s Hell On Wheels. She will also be starring in the upcoming historical-horror Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.

In The Loved Ones, high school senior Brent Mitchell wraps his car around a tree, killing his father. Constantly confronted by his mother’s emotional collapse after the accident, Brent escapes into a marijuana fueled world of loud metal music to block the pain and guilt. Dejected and out of sorts, he has a shot at happiness with his girlfriend Holly, a grounded, caring girl with drop dead good looks. Unfortunately, Lola Stone asked Brent Mitchell to the prom,and when Brent said no, Lola snaps and decided to take what she wants. She enlists her daddy’s help to throw a prom of her own where she is queen and Brent is king, whether he likes it or not.

The film is touted as a mixture of Sixteen Candles and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Paramount is taking a cue from the success of Paranormal Activity, which was released due to fan demand. You can go to the official website for The Loved Ones and you can enter to bring the movie to your local theater.

Take a look at the trailer after the jump.

Fan Made Walt Disney Movie Poster Should Turn a Few Heads

Posted on March 12, 2012

The fan community is certainly one of the strongest forces in the entertainment industry since the rise of the internet. Long gone is the idea of an old-timey press room where the barrier between the readers and the writers held strong. Now fanboys like Harry Knowles hold power purely because of the geek credibility that he currently weilds.

With a rule like that, fans are the true final word as to whether a film gets a sequel, if not a multi-film franchise, so why wouldn’t they be the ones who decide what movie ideas get made?

A few years ago, a fan put together a little photoshopped poster where Sam Jackson takes on a ridiculous plot like poisonous snakes being let loose on a plane mid-flight. 32 million dollars in production and $62 million in ticket sales later, Snakes on a Plane was considered somewhat of a win by New Line.

Now, fans are at it again with a (far superior) photoshop job showcasing a possible Walt Disney biopic starring the lovable Ryan Gosling, simply titled Walt. You can thank French artist Pascal Witaszek for being the brains (and eye) behind this one.

Take a look at the image after the jump, and help share this so we can get a seemingly awesome film like this made by a talented team.

Box Office Report: ‘John Carter’ Lands with a Thud, While ‘The Lorax’ Continues To Bring in The Green

Posted on March 12, 2012

That unfortunate loud thudding noise you just heard was John Carter‘s opening weekend. The mega budget, would be franchise starter came in at a beyond disappointing 30.6 million. Good enough for second place to last week’s winner, The Lorax.

Speaking of this week’s box office champion, The Lorax hauled in an impressive 39.1 million, representing a mild 44% drop from last week’s huge opening numbers. With a massive opening, and a mild drop, the Dr. Suess adaptation is in prime shape to be the break out hit of the spring. It really only has The Hungar Game to compete with, and that audience is similar but far from exact.

Project X held well, and preformed strongly in the wake of a solid opening weekend. This week it was announced that a sequel to the found footage party film was possibly underway, and a continued strong presence at the box office goes a long way in validating that decision.

Film Score Friday: ‘The Complete Harry Potter Film Music Collection’ by The City of Prague Philharmonic

Posted on March 9, 2012

One of my favorite things to cover in my weekly film score review is compilations. These sets are the most easily digestible forms of film music, and represented my entry into the world. It was the combined ‘Best Of’ albums of John Williams, James Horner and Danny Elfman that captivated me so much as a child. Now I take great pleasure in shining a light on these sets today, hoping that some non film score fans give them a shot.

In the world of film music compilations there is a top dog who has been releasing stellar sets over and over again. Silva Screen Records has been nailing it with re-recorded compilations of some of today’s most recognizable franchises. Mostly using the excellent City of Prague Philharmonic, these sets have been some of the most fun I have been able to review in my many months of writing about film music.

Today’s set is no exception, The Complete Harry Potter Film Music Collection is a well crafted, well performed and generally a great listen from start to finish. The set smashes together musical highlights from the eight film series that takes you on a journey from the optimistic sense of wonder in the first film all the way through the dark and dangerous end. It is a musical time-capsule that follows the decade long franchise.

Movie Review: ‘Friends With Kids’

Posted on March 9, 2012

Friends with Kids is one of those high concept romantic comedies that posits a Big Life Question—in this case: can a couple have a baby together and keep the romance?—and then spends the next 90 minutes trying to answer it. Think of it as the No Strings Attached—can friends sleep together without emotional complications?—of the ticking biological clock set.

Julie (Jennifer Westfeldt, best known for 2002’s Kissing Jessica Stein) and Jason (Adam Scott) are good college friends who live on different floors of the same apartment building on Riverside Drive. They watch in alarm as their coupled friends Leslie and Alex (Maya Rudolph and Chris O’Dowd) and Missy and Ben (Kristen Wiig and Jon Hamm, Westerfeldt’s real-life partner) conceive and bear children, and proceed to ruin their lives and relationships. At every point the parents are haggard, distraught and argumentative. Fathers are irresponsible and immature. Mothers depressed and resentful. Their looks are sunk. So are their libidos and marriages.

Julie and Jason vow the same will not happen to them, whenever they should each happen to find the mate of their dreams. Problem is: Julie’s not getting younger. There’s no man in sight and she wants a baby. So Jason, a commitment-phobe who’s known for never sleeping with the same woman for longer than a week, hatches a plan, the kind of conceit they come up with in movies and then build the next two acts on, even though it wouldn’t fly for five seconds in real life: he and Julie will have a baby together, totally without ties. Just as parenting partners. Call it Parents Without Benefits.

‘Angry Birds Space’ Uses Actual Astronaut in Space to Showcase New Physics

Posted on March 9, 2012

Angry Birds can rightfully be classified as a phenomenon. Between the countless downloads and the merchandise that sells like gangbusters the game has reached the top pop culture status.

Rovio likes to keep the game fresh, with constant seasonal updates and other new level packs to keep the fans coming back for more. While these updates do present some minor new additions to the Angry Birds experience, there hasn’t been any major advance in the game play since day one.

That is all changing with the impending release of Angry Birds Space, the next installment in the series, and the first to revolutionize it’s game play. Space will showcase gravity free physics, and force players adjust while sending their mad avian buddies through small gravity fields set up around the environment.

Up until now the game play was a bit of a mystery, it was hard to imagine what that meant compared to the standard Angry Birds action. With the help of an astronaut, actually in space no less, Rovio has revealed exactly how this new physics will work in your pig hunting adventures.

Beyond the massive cool factor of having an actual space inhabiting astronaut play with Angry Birds plushes to demonstrate gravity free physics, the game play on display in this new video is awesome. We can’t wait to get our hands on Angry Birds Space when it is launched March 22nd.

Check out the physics showcase video after the jump.

Raspberry Pi Mini-Computer Has Manufacturing Issue, May Be Delayed

Posted on March 9, 2012

In addition to movies, TV and comics, we also like tech and gadgets here at The Flickcast. We also like to help support cool projects when we find them.

And really, what could be cooler than a $25.00 Linux-powered computer about the size of a credit card you can order right now? Well, probably quite a few things but stil, that doesn’t mean it’s not cool too. What am I talking about?

Well, a bunch of enterprising folks got together and formed the Raspberry Pie Foundation with the goal of making a computer that could be sold for $25.00. They succeeded but, unfortunately, have run into a bit of a “manufacturing hiccup” on their way to shipping the devices.

According to the company, the computers were accidentally equipped with non-magnetic ethernet jacks, which would result in a lack of network connectivity. However, according to the company, it is “a very minor problem to fix, and the factory is nearly done working on replacing them on the first set of boards.”

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