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#9 – Fantasy Casting

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In Episode 9 of Cinema Crespodiso, Chris and Drew go over the Netflix Instant Pick of the Week, Chris reviews Oz the Great and Powerful and Dead Man Down, they both look at the new movies coming out on DVD and in theaters, and then they go into the Crespodome, where they discuss the possibility of a sequel to The Simpsons Movie, they review The Master, Tabloid and A Late Quartet, and they fantasy cast the new Justice League movie. Finally they wrap it all up with an experimental Lightning Round. There is plenty to go around so feel free to share with your friends! Dig it!

Review: ‘Oz the Great and Powerful’

“Oz the Great and the Powerful” is kind of a weird movie, as it is a prequel to a very popular film, but legally speaking can’t be too associated with that other very popular film, so some things can be referenced but others can’t, and we’re all like, “come on, we all know what’s going on here, why all the squabbling over copyrighted imagery?” Anyway, here it is, a prequel to “The Wizard of Oz,” the origin story of the man behind the curtain and the three witches who battle for control of the Oz empire.

Oscar “Oz” Diggs (James Franco, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Pineapple Express) is a carnival magician in turn of the century America, in the heartland of Kansas. He’s also a bit of a scumbag, as he woos local girls with the same story he gives everyone, but also at least knows he is a bit of a scumbag when he finds out that an old flame is getting married to some dude, and he refuses to stop it from happening because he feels like he doesn’t deserve such a nice person (and probably also because he doesn’t want to get locked down).Continue Reading …

Netflix pick for 3/4/13 – ‘Flirting With Disaster’

Flirting With Disaster

He’s had back to back critical and commercial hits with “The Fighter” and “Silver Linings Playbook,” but there was a time when David O. Russell movies kind of went under the radar: this is the period we’ll call the Pre-Three Kings phase of his career, which basically consists of two extremely odd “romantic comedies” – the incest-driven “Spanking the Monkey” and the infidelity-centric “Flirting With Disaster.”

In “Flirting With Disaster,” Mel (Ben Stiller, Mystery Men, Heavyweights) is on a quest to find his birth parents, and along with his wife (Patricia Arquette, True Romance) and case worker (Téa Leone, Tower Heist), they embark on a journey that takes longer than it should and involves quite a few mistakes, all of them hilarious. There ends up being some tension between Mel and the case worker, while his wife eventually comes into contact with a bisexual ATF Agent (Josh Brolin, No Country For Old Men) who ends up hanging out with the group along with his working partner and life partner (Richard Jenkins, The Visitor), and relationships threaten to crumble and/or combust at any moment.Continue Reading …

#8 – Homemade Jams

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Peace Love and Cinema…

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In Episode 8, Chris and Drew recap the 85th Academy Awards and review the results of their own Oscar ballots, they review the previous weekend’s box office and Chris reviews “Jack the Giant Slayer.” They also talk a little about “21 and Over” and how they re-edited their movie for Chinese audiences, they review “Searching for Sugar Man,” and so much more in the Crespodome, so enjoy the show and the numerous tangents, sidebars and other ramblings. Mahalo!

Review: ‘Jack the Giant Slayer’

“Jack the Giant Slayer” is a big ole bloated boring movie that never really gets to “so bad it is good” territories. Instead it is just forgettable, a fairy tale turned into a $200 million blockbuster, but somehow despite the scale and budget, it doesn’t feel like a big old blockbuster. Instead it is kind of a breezy tale of men versus giants, with some familiar iconography thrown in to tie it all to something preexisting, because obviously no one wants to watch something that isn’t based on something else, right?

The story centers around Jack (Nicholas Hoult, Warm Bodies), a young farmer boy who gets his hands on some magic beans, one of which causes a giant beanstalk to the grow into the heavens. But unlike in the old tale “Jack and the Beanstalk,” these heavens are filled with gross looking Giants who are eager to find a way back down to the Earth to eat humans. There is also some bit about a magic crown made from a melted down Giant’s heart and black magic that controls the Giants, and a usurper (Stanley Tucci, The Hunger Games, Captain America: The First Avenger) to the crown of the king (Ian McShane, Snow White and the Huntsman) and his rambunctious daughter (Eleanor Tomlinson, Alice in Wonderland) who really starts a lot of the mess to begin with when she runs off from home because she feels all like trapped and stuff.Continue Reading …

Review: ‘Searching for Sugar Man’

“Searching for Sugar Man” just won the Best Documentary award at the 85th annual Oscars, and it is pretty easy to see why this very likeable and well made film would get the accolades it has received over the last few months, culminating with the biggest movie award in the land of pretension awards, and to think it all started with a talented musician just falling through the cracks in the early 1970s.

A Swedish-British co-production, “Searching for Sugar Man” is an epic international story, as it starts with an American singer named Rodriguez in the 1970s and ends in South Africa in the present. Basically, Rodriguez was a very talented singer and songwriter who put together a couple of great albums in the early 70s, but his music didn’t go anywhere in America, and he ended up going back to his old construction job.Continue Reading …

Review: ‘The Master’

Paul Thomas Anderson’s “The Master” is now available for mass consumption in home viewing form, and now it can be seen by many more people, many of whom will be downright flummoxed by this film, a strange and meandering tale of two men and their friendship forged through some psychotherapy and a shared love of harsh drink. Oh, and one of those guys is starting a weird cult-like group that has more than a thing or two in common with Scientology.

The movie starts with Freddie Quell (Joaquin Phoenix, Walk the Line) in the Navy during World War II, but he isn’t shown doing any war type things. Instead he’s on a beach with a bunch of other naval men, doing different things like cutting up coconuts and wrestling around and making a large naked woman out of sand, and in most of these things, it is already obvious that Freddie is a little off. And when he’s on the ship with everyone, he siphons fuel from torpedoes and drinks it to get hammered and then passes out on a high perch where other sailors can through shit at him. And while we don’t see him in combat, we do get to see his exit interview from a VA hospital ward for soldiers with post-traumatic stress syndrome (though of course back then it was handled much differently than today), so maybe this guy is a little wacky because of what he’s seen and done in the name of war?Continue Reading …

Review: ‘Snitch’

This poster promises truck carnage. The movie delivers.

Welcome to the year of Dwayne “The Rock (copyright World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc)” Johnson, a year with four different movies featuring the most successful wrestler turned actor since Hulk Hogan, two of these movies from film franchises, another movie from the most bombastic director working today, and “Snitch,” a family drama and thriller about the downside of federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws in regards to the oh-so-costly War on Drugs (copyright Richard “Tricky Dick” Nixon).Continue Reading …

#7 – Oscar Night 2013

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In Episode 7 of Cinema Crespodiso, Chris and Drew talk a little about the 85th annual Oscars, they review Snitch and Taken 2, they look at the new movies coming out on DVD like Holy Motors and The Master, and new movies in theaters like Jack the Giant Killer and 21 & Over, and they talk about the Netflix Instant Pick of the Week! And in the Crespodome they go over everything from the history of the Oscars to the Razzies to Star Wars to Iron Man III and everything in between. So much entertainment, so little time! So get on it!

Review: ‘Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning’

“Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning” is a crazy movie because it is totally unexpected and weird and cool and really anyone into action movies or weird horror hybrids should definitely check this movie out, because despite the fact that it is a sequel to a sequel to a sequel to a not-very-good 90s movie about Vietnam soldiers turned into soldier cyborgs to battle for the government, it is still a pretty wild and awesome movie, full of the strangest little touches and an interesting enough story that it definitely stands out as a cinematic freak of nature, something actually fascinating to watch and enjoyable when it is all said and done.Continue Reading …