Language:

Genre: Comedy, Romance

Cast: Jessica Alba, Ashton Kutcher, Bradley Cooper, Kathy Bates, Jessica Biel, Eric Dane, Patrick Dempsey, Jennifer Garner, Topher Grace, Taylor Lautner, Anne Hathaway, Jamie Foxx, Hector Elizondo, Shirley MacLaine, Emma Roberts

Director: Garry Marshall

Music: John Debney

Reasons to watch: The star-cast.

Reasons not to watch: Absolutely no realism. Stone-age humor.

Storyline: It’s Valentine’s Day and love is in the air. The locals in Los Angeles are bracing themselves for all the chances on offer and the romantic cherry pies that is definitive of V-Day. Florist Reed Bennett (Ashton Kutcher) has proposed to girlfriend Morley Clarkson (Jessica Alba) who is uncertain and reluctant to take the next step forward; Julia Fitzpatrick (Jennifer Garner), a school teacher is all set to floor her apparently on-a-business-trip doc boyfriend (Patrick Dempsey); football star Sean Jackson (Eric Dane) is healing from the wounds of a bad breakup and is considering to ‘move on’; a long flight journey brings together Kate Hazeltine (Julia Roberts) and Holden (Bradley Cooper); having entered a new relationship with Jake (Topher Grace), phone sex employee Liz (Anne Hathaway) battles to sustain her ‘knack’ at daily gigs; sports correspondent Kelvin Moore (Jamie Foxx) hooks up with public relations consultant Kara Monahan (Jessica Biel) by hearing her out on a day she expresses deep sorrow and sings the blues; Grace (Emma Roberts) has a very important American Pie-like agenda of flummoxing her virginity before getting out of college for good; and finally (wait let me take a breather)…  yes, and finally after 50 years of happy married life, infidelity surfaces in the lives of Edgar (Hector Elizondo) and Estelle (Shirley MacLaine).

Climax Handling: You watch this movie and it will haunt you forever making you feel guilty for having spoiled a wonderful day because after 122 excruciatingly painful minutes, the movie is fittingly endless.

Points:

Holden: Stalin once said, “No retreat, no surrender.”
Kate: I think that was from a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie.

The movie is totally anachronistic like Holden’s statement and as ignorant as Kate’s response.

Rating: 4/10

Comments: Don’t waste your V-Day watching this mass celebrity gimmick. Save your money… Save your time…. And save your love!

David Twohy, writer and director of Pitch Black and The Chronicles of Riddick will be directing this movie for which he also pens down the screenplay. Grapevine has it that the movie will not be anything like the previous edition of Chronicles and will be more along a Pitch Black like dark character-driven storyline.

It is also known that production won’t begin until Diesel is done with Fast Five, the fifth movie in The Fast & The Furious franchise.

It is known that Depp will continue to play the role of Captain Jack Sparrow who sets off on a quest to find the Fountain of Youth. Previous reports say that Cruz’s character will be “Sparrow’s foil and equal in many ways”.

The fourth Pirates movie will be helmed by director Rob Marshall of Nine fame and is all set for a May 2011 release with shooting to begin this Summer at Hawaii.

Director: M. Night Shyamalan

Cast: Noah Ringer, Nicola Peltz, Jackson Rathbone, Dev Patel

Release Date: July 2nd 2010

Summary: Based on a Nickelodeon TV series, The Last Airbender is about the dangerous journey of a hesitant young child who strives to bring unity in a war torn world where civilization exists as four mighty empires.

The movie which is still untitled will go into production later this year and director Marc Webb who gave us 500 Days of Summer will be directing the much awaited reboot with screenplay by James Vanderbilt. Avi Arad and Laura Ziskin will be producing the movie.

The month of July in 2012 will see two big releases – one being the Spidey reboot and the other being the sequel to the most critical reboot hit of the year Star Trek.

Having come out with the news during Disney’s first quarter financial call, Cars 2 will now occupy the release date previously occupied by Disney’s The Bear and The Bow. So with these two movies set for close releases, it is quite obvious that one of the two will be shifted to an early 2012 release.

The sequel Cars 2 features Lightning McQueen and Mater competing in a race that tracks the whole world.

Felton known for his role as Draco Malfoy in the Potter franchise, will be playing the role of an expert dealing with the supernatural in the movie.

The story based on true events, is about the haunting of a young couple by a supernatural being which gets accidentally unleashed when a college experiment goes haywire.

Production work started this week and the movie has raised expectations with both Twilight and Harry Potter stars coming together for the first time.

Dear John exceeded expectations when it made a collection of $32.4 million in it’s weekend opening in North America. This put an end to Avatar’s rule in the box office. With a weekend collection of $23.6 million, Cameron’s epic saga has hauled $2.2 billion globally of which $630 million is from the US.

At the Santa Barbara Film Festival, Cameron was asked about the upcoming sequel to Avatar. And his reply was, “I definitely have a story arc in mind for the second film and even on a very vague base for a third film. That doesn’t mean we’ll do a third film – it doesn’t mean we’ll stop at a third film. We’ll just have to see where it goes.”

But this doesn’t necessarily have to be Cameron’s next release. So we just need to do what we are used to doing…. Wait and watch!

Repo Men

Director: Miguel Sapochnik

Cast: Jude Law, Forest Whitaker

Previous Release date: April 2nd 2010

New Release date: March 19th 2010

Reason cited: To avoid competition with Clash of the Titans.

The Kids Are All Right

Director: Lisa Cholodenko

Cast: Annette Bening, Julianne Moore, Mia Wasikowska, Josh Hutcherson, Mark Ruffalo

Previous Release date: January 25th 2010

New Release date: July 7th 2010

Priest

Director: Scott Stewart

Cast: Paul Bettany, Cam Gigandet, Maggie Q, Karl Urban, Christopher Plummer

Previous Release date: August 20th 2010

New Release date: January 14th 2011

Reason cited: The film will now be a Digital 3D release.

Takers

Director: John Luessenhop

Cast: Zoe Saldana, Hayden Christensen, Chris Brown, Paul Walker, Matt Dillon, Jay Hernandez, Michael Ealy

Previous Release date: May 14th 2010

New Release date: August 20th 2010

Reason cited: Priest’s move to 2011 spurred this change.

The Roommate

Director: Christian E. Christiansen

Cast: Cam Gigandet, Minka Kelly, Billy Zane, Denneel Harris

Previous Release date: September 17th 2010

New Release date: February 4th 2011

Easy A

Director: Will Gluck

Cast: Emma Stone, Amanda Bynes, Cam Gigandet, Lisa Kudrow, Stanley Tucci, Thomas Haden Church, Malcolm McDowell

Previous Release date: Was not announced.

New Release date: September 17th 2010

Reason cited: Release in place of The Roommate.

Cowboys & Aliens

Director: Jon Favreau

Cast: Olivia Wilde, Daniel Craig, Jon Favreau (Voice rendering)

Official Release date: July 29th 2011

Underworld IV

Director: Unconfirmed

Cast: Len Wiseman, Kate Beckinsale

Previous Release date: January 14th 2011

New Release date: September 23rd 2010

Reason cited: It will not be in Digital 3D as it was previously slated to be.

Battleship

Director: Peter Berg

Cast: Taylor Lautner (confirmed to star as Stretch Armstrong)

Previous Release date: July 2011

New Release date: May 25th 2012

Reason cited: According to a press release, the reason behind the delay is to “give it the time and resources to thoroughly realize its huge-scale ambitions.”

Language:

Genre: Drama, Mystery, Thriller

Cast: Russell Crowe, Ben Affleck, Rachel McAdams, Helen Mirren

Director: Kevin Macdonald

Music: Alex Heffes

Reasons to watch: The element of surprise that hits you hard when you think you’ve got it all figured out.

Reasons not to watch: Unless you loathe Russell Crowe, you have every reason to watch it.

Storyline: Based on the similarly titled BBC mini-series, State of Play is a fictional thriller that instantly strikes a chord with the current times. Russell Crowe stars as Cal McCaffrey, a no-nonsense journalist employed at the Washington Globe. He puts himself on the line as he begins to investigate the death of Sonia Baker, the research assistant and love interest of his congressman friend Stephen Collins (Ben Affleck). Stephen’s political career takes a slump as the young woman’s death publicizes their affair. In order to help Stephen regain his political status, protect Stephen’s wife and to get a story up and running for the Washington Globe, Cal teams up with young inquisitive blogger Della Frye (Rachel McAdams) to solve the murder which he later on finds out is only a small piece in a conspiracy of much larger magnitude. Both timely and timeless, State of Play is a thriller that questions the existence and genuineness of newspapers and blogs that work in a vicious 24-hour cycle. It also addresses the functioning of private military organizations for whom war means an opportunity to make money.

Climax Handling: A shade implausible with minor errors that can very well be forgiven as the rest of the movie packs a punch.

Points: Money and power – a lethal combination.

Rating:8.5/10