FILM:
Celluloid sizzlers

Blockbusters and foreign gems provide big-screen escapism for the months ahead

by SARAH ROWLAND

Along with this season’s usual onslaught of blockbusters, there are plenty of foreign gems for those looking for a little escapism without having to fork out airfare. But let’s start with the studio monsters.

It’s been over 25 years since Catherine Bach launched a yeast infection epidemic with those trend-setting, crotch-defying cut-offs she sported in almost every episode of The Dukes of Hazzard. Now a whole new generation of young girls can discover the joys of bacterial itch after watching Jessica Simpson squeeze her carb-free ass into a pair of Daisy Dukes. The movie adaptation of the ’80s hit TV show also stars Johnny Knoxville and Seann William Scott, playing the good old boys, never meaning no harm (Aug. 5).

Another small screen makeover to look out for is Bewitched (June 24), starring Will Ferrell and Nicole Kidman. The film took more than a decade and several screenwriters to bugger up the plot nice and good—the story has something to do with Ferrell playing a producer looking for someone to play Samantha, only to end up casting a real witch. Still, seeing Nicole wiggle her feline nose is worth checking out.

Never one to miss an opportunity to play a freak, Johnny Depp takes on eccentric candy baron Willy Wonka in the remake of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (July 15). Sin City poster girl Jessica Alba is apparently the new comic book adaptation it-girl, as she will take the role of the Invisible Woman in Fantastic Four (July 8), a film based on the Marvel Comic series.

Jumping on the prequel bandwagon, the Batman franchise offers Batman Begins (June 15). Starring Christian Bale and Katie Holmes and directed by Christopher Nolan (Memento), this Warner Bros. cash cow has a lot of potential.

Big budgets and small beaks

With the highest-approved budget in history (approx. $200-million), Spielberg’s War of the Worlds (June 29) should give Bruce Wayne and co. a run for their money. The film is based on H.G. Wells’s sci-fi novel, which received international attention in the ’50s when Orson Welless’ radio play adaptation was so convincing that the American public really thought the States was being invaded by Martians. Speaking of people who buy into interplanetary hoaxes, everyone’s favourite Scientologist Tom Cruise stars in this Spielberg UFO extravaganza.

Continuing with the theme of remakes and adaptations, Steve Martin will channel Peter Sellers’ most memorable role as he trips over himself looking for clues in The Pink Panther (Aug. 5). Meanwhile, Richard Linklater will revisit the 1976 Bad News Bears (July 22) with Billy Bob Thornton replacing Walter Matthau as coach Buttermaker. D.E.B.S. director Angela Robinson just finished Herbie: Fully Loaded (June 22) featuring Lindsay Lohan behind the talking wheel. And George A. Romero will revive his undead in Land of the Dead (June 24), which features Asia Argento (daughter of Italian film horror guru Dario Argento).

Another singing teen tartlet hitting the big screen is Hilary Duff, who plays Heather Locklear’s matchmaking daughter in what looks like this season’s god awful, never-should-have-been made family comedy The Perfect Man (June 17). And it’s that time of the year when John Cusack pumps out anther romcom: Must Love Dogs (July 29).

In the keepin’-it-real section, there are several docs to look forward to, including Rock School (June 17), which is the true story that Jack Black’s The School of Rock was loosely based on.

A documentary with a slightly less sexy title is The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill (August). This critically acclaimed slice of beaked life chronicles the fall and rise of Mark Bittner, a homeless San Franciscan who wrote a bestseller about the flock of talking birds that changed his life. In the Realms of the Unreal (June) is Jessica Yu’s doc about Henry Darger, novelist, outsider artist and janitor, and Murderball (July 15) follows some lean mean wheelchair-bound athletes as they fight to win the rugby championships at the Paralympic Games.

Hot exports and local highlights

Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels producer Matthew Vaughn makes his directorial debut with a coke-dealer-making-one-last-doomed-deal-before-he-retires thriller Layer Cake (July), featuring one of Britain’s grittiest contemporary actors, Daniel Craig (The Mother, Endearing Love, The Jacket). Also from England is Paul Pavlikovsky’s lesbian love story My Summer of Love (July 1), which has already garnered a lot of ink thanks to Nathalie Press’s performance. She’s the Brit beauty who starred in Wasp, which won best short at the 2005 Oscars.

Over to Germany, where they’ve produced the perfect pretty boy heartthrob, pooling together genes from River Phoenix and Gael García Bernal to create Daniel Brühl (Good Bye Lenin!). The baby-faced actor stars in The Edukators (July 29), a film about a group of activists tied up in a love triangle. The sexy comedy had moviegoers at last year’s Montreal World Film Fest laughing in the aisles. Another hit at the 2004 WFF was Kontroll (TBA), a dark Hungarian comedy about gangster-style security guards working in the Budapest subway system. Also receiving a lot of critical buzz is Whisky (July 22). Not to be confused with the whistler Whiskey movies about pro boarders who break bottles over their heads and make themselves puke, this is a deadpan comedy from Uruguay.

On the local front, we have Les États nordiques (June 17), the debut feature from Denis Côté. And let us not forget festival season, starting with Fantasia (July 7–24). After that, we have Comedia (July 14-24), the film portion of Just for Laughs. Paul Provenza’s The Aristocrats, an all-star film about the death of the joke, opens the 10-day event. And finally, after several public relations gaffs and endless headlines, the WFF will unspool Aug. 26–Sept 5.