Aronofsky has been attached to dozens of films that ended up not happening. But maybe the greatest director of his generation is going to cash-in. I don’t really believe it, but this article from Deadline has my dick hard. The article reports that,
Word is that Aronofsky–who worked for next to nothing upfront to get Black Swan made is in the throes of landing a healthy payday in the vicinity of $5 million against 5% of gross.
Say whaaaat? 5 million with 5% gross? That’s Will Smith-type money. Considering that the first made almost 400 million bucks, while being one of the worst films ever made, as well as being downloaded a bizillion times before it even came out. If this movie is good, Aronofsky might earn up to twenty million bucks. Woot, woot.
After almost a decade of making great cult-films Aronofsky is selling out. It is about fucking time if you ask me. Aronofsky said once that he only earned fifty thousand dollars for Requiem for a Dream. Fifty thousand dollars is a lot of money, but over a few years? You could make more money as a manager at McDonalds. A project which equated to about two and half to three years of work. It is also said that he earned almost nothing for The Wrestler and Black Swan as well.
My fear, however, is that Aronofsky will quit or be fired when Twenieth Century Fox wants to make a stupid, cheesy film. X-men Origins: Wolverine was proof-positive that the comic book movie-era was coming to an end, in terms of quality. And claims that Synder did justice to the X-men series is just not true.
I’m hardly a fanboy, but I was a huge comic book reader when I was young and loved the X-men animated series. No film has ever done justice to the either. Yes, the X-men series is better than its counterparts, but Wolverine was one of the worst comic book films ever made.
Anyway, I’m crossing my fingers for D-$.
-Collin
By Collin, on October 12th, 2010
Top Ten Movies Douchebags Love
I found this article today, “Top Ten Movies Douchebags Love” from Spike.com and through up a <3 symbol with my hands. This is one, dope article! I’m basically ripping off the premise and throwing myself in with this crowd. (Update – Let me know what you think! Comment at the bottom!!)
I’m going to be placing an X next to the movies I love, but be weary….if you rep these movies, you might be a huge bag of douche. Speaking of douche, one of my bffs drank douche in front of a filled lecture hall….for a project…..fact.
Disclaimer – All these movies are probably awesome, they might be some of greatest films of all time. I like the majority of movies on the list! But sometimes douche bags just have to come through and ruin movies for everyone!!
10. Pulp Fiction – X
This movie is almost exclusively watched by douche bags. Pulp Fiction hit Hollywood in 1994 and changed the mafia genre forever and in a very bad way. Don’t try to copy QT. I ain’t QT, you ain’t QT. Oh my god do douchebags love this movie.
Quentian Tarantino is fanboy worshiped, almost to death. The poor bastard. The director doesn’t help himself either.
How many people have Pulp Fiction as they’re favorite movie? Too many, that’s how many. God, I hate em’. I don’t know you, but if you have Pulp Fiction as one of your favorite movies, you are a douche bag. Number two on your list is probably Boondock Saints you corny bastard. Yeah, it is reeeeeeally cool to know Ezekiel 25 17 by heart. You douche.
9. Armageddon-
Michael Bay is the king of douche bag movies. Therefore, I’ve decided to give other movies a shot and only include one of his films on this list. I was torn which one to put on. Transformers and Pearl Harbor were close runners-up. But Pearl Harbor is just bad, it isn’t quite beloved by douche bags. And Transformers might deserve to be up here more than Armageddon, but whatever.
Armaggedon is one of a kind. It has one of my favorite lines in it: “Harry, I love you!”. I know lots of people who talk about the emotionally impact this movie has on them. Fuck you, you’re a douche.
8. Shawshank Redemption – X
This one hurt. I love this movie. I watched it again a few weeks ago and was moved AGAIN by the ending. I’ve seen the movie like twenty times and every time I get to the ending and I’m a wabbly-lipped. How does the director do it? But alas, so many douchebags love this movie. It is the go-to movie of douche bags who love movies, but have only watched a handful. It is number one on IMDB as the greatest movie of all time. (I‘M a Douche Bag.com?)
7. Cadyshack
This is the douche bag film of times past. This movie sucks and to prove your manliness a guy only needs to quote this gem of pig shit. The performances are good in it, but THAT good?
6. Fight Club -X
It will look like I ripped this one of from the Spike site, but I really didn’t! I just couldn’t agree more with the author’s opinion. This movie is awesome, but is beloved by D-bags. What a fucking bummer.
Fight Club is a critical look at a male consumer culture dangerously obsessed with their possessions and superficial shit they dreamed of having. Chuck Palaniuk’s book was a wake-up call for a generation of men who were pissed off and wanted to purge themselves of the Gordon Gekkos of the eighties.
Unfortunately, all was lost because of the awesome fight scenes, hyper-cool style of Fincher, and the interesting Shamylan-like twist that the story inherently contained. That was enough to get d-bags begging for more.
5. Rudy
Rudy is liked almost solely by D-bags. I legitimately can’t think of a person who could like this movie and not be educationally subnormal. It is so stupid. Who cares if some blue-collar guy plays one down for a college team? It is isn’t even pro. Besides being immortalized in a shitty film, what did that ever achieve? A more thoughtful movie would have shown him use his education to become a contributing member of society. Not log one sack in a throw away play on senior day. Who the fuck cares? But guys love this movie. LOVE it. Douchebags!
4. Animal House
I’m one of the few people who hate this movie, but that is besides the point. The following scenario always happens: A bro’ scrolls through his DVD collection and whips out Animal House and says, “Hey bro, you wanna’ watch this.”
And I respond, “Nah, man. That movies sucks.”
I have to endure a twenty-minute barrage o f the following:
1. Why I am gay.
2. Why I have no taste in movies, and
3. That I must hate all ‘the classics”.
3 . Saving Private Ryan – X
Controversial choice? No! Any war film where d-bags beg to “fast forward to the action scenes” is the true sign of a real prick who totally side-steps the point of an anti-war film. To be against war! When you enjoy watching people die in a film, you are kinda’ ENJOYING war. This is a masterful film, loved by totally inept people. It is a dangerous movie in the wrong hands.
2. Godfather 1 and 2- X
Godfather is not the best movie ever made. It’s not! I promise. Take my word for it. Both the movies are great and I watch them often, but for some reason whenever I say my favorite movie, some asshole gets butt-hurt and screams at me that, “The Godfathers are the greatest movies ever made, er wait, not the 3rd one”. Classic D-bag statement. That the 3rd one isn’t that good. I really wonder if people have seen the 3rd one. It is really good. Again, you’re just going to have to trust me. The whole incest thing with Sofia Coppola is kind of weird. But, whatevs.
1. Boondock Saints
I hate literally every frame of this movie. The people who quote this movie , know all the lines, dress up like the characters for Halloween, wear pea coats with beaded crosses, while doodling VERITAS on your hand…you suck. Least no ones ruining a good movie on this one.
By Collin, on October 12th, 2010
“Mono No Aware”, Never Let me Go, and Japanese themes of transience.
Never Let Me Go is ballsy. Really, really ballsy. It doesn’t have rape, extreme violence, or politically controversial topics. There isn’t nudity or cursing. It is a quiet movie, but manages to be one of the ballsiest mainstream films I’ve seen in a long time. It is about human beings that are harvested for their organs, but that isn’t why its daring. That sounds like it could be a Matrix-type, sci-fi film, but instead, the movie is about loss and the pain of the past. This movie is emotionally ballsy. It dares to make an audience care deeply for its characters, follow the characters for a portion of their lives, and then allows the audience no glimpse of hope for the characters’ fate.
I swear to god I felt the inklings of a Japanese film in this movie and lo-and-behold I find that the source material was written by the famous author Kazuo Ishgiruo. I’ve never read anything by him, but know the name. He’s one of those authors that you’re always like: “Ugh, I’ll read a book by him this summer.” And never do. Never Let Me Go reminded me of a term from my Japanese cinema class in college called “Mono no Aware”. It is hard to describe what that means, so here is the Google definition I found: “used to describe the awareness of mujo or the transience of things and a bittersweet sadness at their passing…” Think of the Japanese’s symbolic take on cherry blossoms, for example.
Take a look through some of the greatest Japanese films of all time and you’ll feel an almost undefinable sensation of loss, bittersweetness, and a sensitivity toward the impermanent. I’ve read that the Japanese culture is seemingly obsessed with death, but not in macabre way, but in a way that is sensitive towards the beauteous of the impermanent. Confused? Me too. Google the director Ozu and then go to the library and watch his movies. Things should make sense. Or even better, check out Grave of the Fireflies.
Anyway, where was I? Never Let Me Go…right. The plot lacks an explanation on why the clones, whose organs are to be taken from them, don’t hit the ground running. As in, escape. The story does indicate, loosely, that the clones long to help the sick, or feel dutifully that they have to donate their organs. Regardless, I think at least a conversation about escape is in order.
The movie could have been an Orwellian, Philip K. Dick-type, thriller. But instead, it seems to be indifferent to its science-fiction roots, only using the context to say something profound about human beings. This movie might be the most melancholy movie released this year. The best scene is one where the three main characters meet in the last year of their lives and visit a beach. A boat has washed ashore; trapped inland. The ocean representing the future, possibility, and hope, while the stranded boat is their inability to pass into that future or achieve any other life they wanted. At any moment, the story could have turned into The Island, or another film of the sorts, and probably would make more money, but luckily it stays true to its Japanese roots.
Never Let Me Go ends with a small misstep, but many will feel that the obligatory last scene needs to be there. I don’t, but maybe in an already ambiguous movie, an ambiguous ending would have been hard for many viewers to swallow. The film ends with the main character Kathy (Carey Mulligan) staring off into a meadow, clarifying in a voice-over what the movie is about thematically. I don’t know if that was necessary. The ending hits the perfect note, but maybe too many times. I would have rather her stare off into the same meadow in silence, considering what her life was about, I’m sure we would have done the same.
By: Collin Gilbert
By Collin, on October 11th, 2010
5 Reasons why The Social Network is the best movie this year
Most movies people love fall into the “very good” category. They’re enjoyable to watch, even re-watch, but are just not essential. Great films are essential. You’d take them on an island if you knew you’d be stranded. They teach us things, entertain us, and make life better. The Social Network, the best movie of the year, is one of these movies. (If you don’t believe me check out Joanna Angel’s review) I was the most skeptical person in the world on how a movie about Facebook’s Creator Mark Zuckerberg could be good. Here is why it is a great, not just good:
Trent Reznor comes through with the best soundtrack of the year.
I’m gonna buy this soundtrack. If you’re anything like me, you haven’t bought music in years. Trent Reznor is the face of Nine Inch Nails, famous for “I wanna fuck you like an animal”, and his soundtrack is the best of the year. Albeit, Clint Mansel’s soundtrack for Black Swan is still to be heard, but I’m fairly confident this one’s a keeper. It pulls the movie along, makes us feel uneasy along the way, knows when to be sincere, and knows Fincher’s filmmaking tone in an almost uncanny way. He created an electronic sound that fits the techno babble in Zuckberg’s head, but maintains the dark tone and pop-style which has made Fincher so famous. Just listen to the song below, it fucking jams.
Fincher nails every single shot.
I’m paraphrasing, but Fincher said this a long time ago: “A scene can be shot two ways, and one of them is probably wrong”. How true. It is so hard for filmmakers to get the shots they need, tell the story they’re trying to tell, keep the mood going. One wrong look from an actor, one misplaced camera angle or movement, one poorly-paced edit, can ruin everything. Fincher nailed everything. The Social Networ solidifies Fincher as a great, modern filmmaker.
David Fincher, once again, defines a generation.
Fincher’s film Fight Club did the impossible: It defined the nineties. A generation with a massive hangover from the yuppie era of the eighties, but which had an inclination for revolution and change. They had been told what they should want, what the American Dream was, and tried their best to reject it. The nineties knew they had been lied to and wanted to define meaning themselves. The Social Network defines my generation. A generation defined, not by ourselves, but the technology and pop culture that bind us all. Mark Zuckerberg of Fincher’s movie is fictitious. I doubt the real Zuckerberg really had such jealousy toward his business partner Eduardo Saverin regarding the Harvard Clubs. But that’s not the point… Zuckerberg, in the film, is the ultimate product of the tens. Confident, brainy, technologically savvy, but socially impotent. This is not a bad thing. Zuckerberg is merely a product of a generation that he helped create. Maybe he wanted to help people be more social by bringing them together on the internet. But who cares? Is a social savvy person better than Zuckerberg? The world is changing and people can no longer be critiqued by previous social norms or values.
The acting is some of the best I’ve seen in recent memory
A lot has been said about Andrew Garfield’s performance as Eduardo, he surely deserves a lot of award nominations. A lot has also been said about Eisenberg’s performance as Zuckerberg, it is subtle and quirky. He seems to have the perfect reactions whether it be regret, spite, sadness, or whatever. But I think Timberlake takes the cake for me. He’s proving he can do anything
The relationship between Zuckerberg and Saverin has the tragedy of great drama
There is something achingly painful about this film. Zuckerberg and Saverin’s relationship, and its falling out, is almost existential. Zuckerberg claims in interviews not to care about money or power. Then why did he destroy the business relationship he had with Saverin? Which is 100% true. What did Zuckerberg want? What do any of us want? Facebook had the exclusivity and simplicity that everyone wanted, but this exclusivity is gone now. Myspace was for white trash when I was in high school. Facebook was for college people. There is nothing white douche bags, like myself, like more than exclusivity. But now Facebook really is just like every other social networking website. So Zuckerberg’s idea wasn’t really anything so revolutionary. What Zuckerberg actually did, which is so genius it is almost painful, is get people in and then change the product when they’re addicted. Saverin wanted something different early on. He wanted to monetize the site and be included more, but was cut out completely and purposefully. If they were friends and if Zuckerberg really didn’t want money or power, than there really must have been something personal. It is too easy to say: it was just good business. That’s what assholes say to justify being asshole businessman. That was the eighties.
Say whaaaat? 5 million with 5% gross? That’s Will Smith-type money. Considering that the first made almost 400 million bucks, while being one of the worst films ever made, as well as being downloaded a bizillion times before it even came out. If this movie is good, Aronofsky might earn up to twenty million bucks. Woot, woot.
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