Week of « Prev | Next »
8 articles
Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Zooey Deschanel Connect in ‘(500) Days of Summer’
17 July 2009 5:50 AM, PDT
Chicago – Romantic comedies have been so sanitized, obviously for the protection of the movie consumer, that it is refreshing to meet a reality-based couple as they interact, co-mingle, love and clash in “(500) Days of Summer.”
Rating: 4.0/5.0 Summer is actually the name of the woman in the relationship, played by Zooey Deschanel. She is a co-worker of Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) at a greeting card company, where they meet cute after Summer admires Tom’s taste in music.
An office karaoke party is the next step in their coming together, with hints and flirtations becoming into a more subsistent intermingling. And so begins their excursion as a couple for 500 days.
The film uses a technique that skips from day-to-day, never in order (Day 6 might be followed by Day 438), as the dynamics of the romance play out through the various stages of the couple’s emotional interaction. Tom remains the hopeful optimist about the pairing throughout,
(more)
adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
HollywoodChicago.com Hookup: 25 Run-of-Engagement ‘Humpday’ Passes With Mark Duplass
16 July 2009 3:57 PM, PDT
Chicago – In our latest edition of HollywoodChicago.com Hookup: Film, we have 25 admit-two run-of-engagement tickets to the new comedy “Humpday” with Mark Duplass (the writer of “Baghead”), Joshua Leonard, Alycia Delmore, Lynn Shelton and Trina Willard from director Lynn Shelton.
“Humpday” opens in Chicago on July 24, 2009. To win your “Humpday” pass courtesy of HollywoodChicago.com, all you need to do is tell us your best dare story in this Web-based submission form. That’s it! Directions to enter this HollywoodChicago.com Hookup and win can be found beneath the graphic below.
“Humpday” stars Mark Duplass and Joshua Leonard from director Lynn Shelton.
Image credit: Magnolia Pictures
Here is the synopsis for “Humpday”:
It has been a decade since Ben (Mark Duplass) and Andrew (Joshua Leonard) were the bad boys of their college campus. Ben has settled down and found a job, wife and home. Andrew took the alternate route
(more)
adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
‘Flight of the Conchords,’ ‘Family Guy’ Lead Surprising 2009 Emmy Nominees
16 July 2009 6:58 AM, PDT
Chicago – The 61st Annual Emmy Nominations were announced today and there were a few surprises, a few disappointments, and a variety of unusual choices. The Academy of Television Arts and Sciences displayed a desire to move forward with some first-time nominees, mostly ignoring some tired staples like “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Desperate Housewives,” but also missed some arguably deserving choices.
The Best Drama and Best Comedy categories expanded to seven nominees this year, which allowed for a wide variety of networks to claim a “Best” nominee.
Photo credit: Fox
The nominees for Best Drama are “Big Love,” “Breaking Bad,” “Damages,” “Dexter,” “House,” “Lost,” and “Mad Men”. The refusal to give in to pressure to nominate the last season of “ER” is nice and its hard to argue with too many of their actual choices, but HBO’s great “In Treatment” needed to be in that seven and “True
(more)
adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
Video Game Review: ‘Guitar Hero: Smash Hits’ a Memorable Diversion Between Major Releases
15 July 2009 1:22 PM, PDT
Chicago – How do you judge a game like “Guitar Hero: Smash Hits”? Like a greatest hits collection for a respected artist, the actual content of the title is sure to give fans what they’re looking for with hours of entertainment. Only when you look deeper at the decisions made in the production of the game and the delivery of its content does “Smash Hits” begin to frustrate.
Video Game Rating: 3.5/5.0 To tide fans over between the great “Guitar Hero: Metallica” and the anticipated “Guitar Hero 5,” Activision and Beenox Studios went back and remastered some of the best tracks from their first five games - “Guitar Hero,” “Guitar Hero II,” “Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the ’80s,” “Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock,” and “Guitar Hero: Aerosmith”. All of the 48 chosen ones have been remastered for the entire band approach that started with “Guitar Hero: World Tour”.
Guitar Hero: Smash Hits
(more)
adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
DVD, TV Review: TNT’s ‘Leverage’ Delivers Entertainment Despite Flaws
15 July 2009 12:31 PM, PDT
Chicago – In a world where corporate bailouts and scumbags like Bernie Madoff dominate the news, it would seem like TNT’s “Leverage” would be a natural choice for a summer diversion. The Timothy Hutton star vehicle is essentially “Robin Hood” for the modern age or “Ocean’s 11” if Danny Ocean were a bit more philanthropic and it may not be groundbreaking television but it is something the broadcast network offerings have not been this season - mostly entertaining.x
TV Rating: 3.0/5.0 Hutton stars as Nate Ford, a former insurance investigator who watched as corruption and corporate neglect led to the death of his son. In the first season, now on DVD (more details on that at the bottom of this review), Ford gathered a team of social and technical experts who assisted him in revenge schemes to try and balance the fight between David and Goliath.
Photo credit:
(more)
adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
TV Review: New TNT Cop Drama ‘Dark Blue’ Has Potential For Explosion
14 July 2009 11:56 PM, PDT
Chicago – TNT on Tuesday launched executive producer Jerry Bruckheimer’s no-holes-barred cop drama, “Dark Blue”. Like Bruckheimer’s successful predecessors in its genre (“C.S.I: Miami”, “C.S.I. New York”, “Cold Case”, and “Without a Trace”), “Dark Blue” provides captivating crime scenarios, an easy-on-the-eyes cast (including Dylan McDermott of “The Practice”), and just enough suspense to keep engaged.
Television Rating: 3.0/5.0 Unlike “C.S.I.: Miami”, “Dark Blue” achieves both subtle and speedy depth in its characters. McDermott’s “Lt. Carter Shaw”, with his “just-rolled-out-of-a-bed-of-nails” demeanor, creates far more intrigue than one-dimensional David Caruso‘s “stand-firm, wince-in-thought, turn-sideways, wince-in-thought-again,” dance as “Horatio Caine”.
Dylan McDermott stars in TNT’s drama series “Dark Blue”.
Photo credit: Danny Feld
The series opens with a charge as an undercover FBI agent, at the hands of a criminal team and undercover cop Dean Bendis (Logan Marshall-Green of TV’s “The O.C”), is electrocuted within inches of his life.
(more)
adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’ Discovers the Wizard of Awe
14 July 2009 7:28 AM, PDT
Chicago – The Harry Potter phenomenon, born from the pen of J.K. Rowling and nurtured through the utter magic of modern filmmaking, has reached a monumental creative peak with the film “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.”
Rating: 4.5/5.0 Combining the darker elements of Harry’s wizardly battles with the timeless struggle of adolescence, Half-Blood Prince succeeds by further humanizing its legendary characters and produces a spectacle that is a feast for both their legion of admirers and more importantly those not as familiar with the books.
In this installment, Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) has been “outed” by the press as a possible “chosen one” within the good vs. evil battle with the dark Lord Voldermort. Directly paralleling the real world paparazzi, Harry looks to escape from the limelight between terms at the Hogwarts School, only to be pulled into another chapter of the conflict by his headmaster and mentor, Professor Albus Dumbledore
(more)
adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
DVD Review: Fifth Season of HBO’s ‘Entourage’ Entertains, But Shows Age
13 July 2009 2:34 PM, PDT
Chicago – How does a show about the “next big thing” in Hollywood age? Do we really want to see the boys of “Entourage” grow up? The first two seasons of Creator Doug Ellin’s incredibly clever show crackled with wit rarely seen on television and stood with the best comedies. But season five, now on DVD, shows a series with a slight identity crisis, a comedy that is still entertaining but missing the spark that once defined it.
DVD Rating: 3.5/5.0 If there was a “jump the shark” moment for “Entourage” it was, ironically, the same disastrous event in the fictional career of Vincent Chase (Adrian Grenier) - the fictional epic “Medellin”. The writers and producers spent so much time on the project that they lost a lot of the creative energy from the first two seasons in the story of an ambitious film gone disastrously wrong.
Entourage: The Complete
(more)
adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
8 articles
