Last Friday, during our weekly trailer roundup, we asked a glib but honest question: “Are we all agreed that we’ve passed the tipping point with Samuel L. Jackson?” The query was posed in response to the release of the trailer for Arena, a (from all indications) aggressively stupid straight-to-DVD video-game-centered action flick — and just another in a long, long line of terrible movies from an actor once considered to be among the finest of his generation. Jackson certainly isn’t alone, though; there are plenty of film actors who have proven themselves capable of brilliance but have apparently made the conscious decision to (barely) expend their energies on lazy, paycheck roles.
Welcome to “Trailer Park,” our regular Friday feature where we collect the week’s new trailers all in one place and do a little “judging a book by its cover,” ranking them from worst to best and taking our best guess at what they may be hiding. This week, we’ve got ten new ones — taken as a group, a rather eclectic mix of styles and subjects indicating that the summer movie season is drawing to a close. Check ‘em all out after the jump.
We’re always on the lookout for cool pop-culture related visual art, so we can’t thank the good folks at Brain Pickings enough for drawing our attention to Israeli artist Noma Bar and his book Guess Who: The Many Faces of Noma Bar. This 2007 volume collects 50 of Bar’s minimalist vector portraits of iconic figures from the world of film, science, literature, politics, music, and more. We’ve picked out ten of our favorites from the book; check ‘em out after the jump.
Even though it’s just hitting shelves today, chances are you’ve already heard plenty about Adam Mansbach’s profanity-laced children’s book for adults, Go the F*** to Sleep — in fact, maybe you were even one of those people who received a pirated PDF version of the book, helping to drive its pre-release buzz through the roof. The unconventional bedtime story — which was inspired by Mansbach’s own experiences with his daughter — has already spent 50 days in the Top 100 on Amazon.com, and is currently sitting pretty in the number two spot.
If you haven’t read Go the F*** to Sleep yet, and you’re curious as to what all the fuss is all about, you can currently download an audiobook version read by Samuel L. Jackson for free here. In even more exiting news, The Guardianreports that Werner Herzog is also working on a recording of the book that will be unveiled at an event at the New York Public Library. Based on previous spoofs of the auteur’s deadpan delivery, we’re expecting it will be hilarious.
Like films that feature only one actor, movies that are set in one location can be a hard sell for audiences — unless you’ve got an amazing script and a solid cast. Case in point, the trailer for The Sunset Limited, an HBO Films adaptation of a Cormac McCarthy play that stars Tommy Lee Jones (who also directs) and Samuel L. Jackson, just landed online, and it looks fantastic. (This might be at least in part because McCarthy adapted the screenplay himself.) Like all of his work, the storyline is intense: A man stops another man from throwing himself in front of a train, and then forces him to come back to his apartment; there, the men proceed to debate on a variety of important topics — including but not limited to religion. Click through to check it out, and let us know in the comments what you think.
If you ever wore a felt-tip pen around your neck, wished the letter magnets on your refrigerator would rearrange themselves, or longed to bust the corner bodega for selling bogus videotapes, then surely you were a fan of PBS’s early ’90s series Ghostwriter. For those who missed out, Ghostwriter was an educational TV show about a group of multicultural middle school kids who solved mysteries with the aid of a friendly ghost (who had a penchant for words), set against the vaguely gritty backdrop of Fort Greene, Brooklyn. What wasn’t so obvious to us back then was the impressive array of celebrity cameos peppered throughout the series — such as a Samuel L. Jackson playing Ghostwriter Team member Jamal Jenkins’ father. Word! Check out the surprising array of stars featured in Ghostwriter episodes below.
New York Fashion Week begins today, and according to the Wall Street Journal, in a rejection of “the air-brushed perfection of the digital age,” one of the most sought after looks at model casting calls was gapped teeth. Frankly, we couldn’t be more excited. We’ve always found it refreshing when celebrities embrace what makes them unique — instead of paying to get it fixed — and to see this kind of thing happening on the runways can only mean good things for gap-happy youths everywhere. Imagine fashion-minded young girls deciding not to get braces! After the jump, we present 10 of our favorite gap-toothed beauties, from old school favorites like Lauren Hutton to young upstarts like Ed Westwick. Leave anyone we’ve missed in the comments.
1. So, what do we think of Betty White’s latest SNL promos? (Or do we even have to ask?) She also cameos in the trailer for this new Kristen Bell comedy. [via Vulture]
2. When old-guy attempts to be hip go horribly wrong: Roger Waters commissioned tags on an Elliott Smith memorial wall. [via Village Voice]
3. Neil LaBute and Samuel L. Jackson (who worked together on Lakeview Terrace) are teaming up on a new Showtime project about a white supremacist family. [via Variety]
4. Attention literary types: The One Book, One Twitter book club launches today, and readers worldwide are being asked to tackle Neil Gaiman’s American Gods. [via Guardian]
5. What will Bruce Willis’ new fragrance smell like? Evidently, “it embodies every individual feature of the Hollywood star: strong, self-confident, consistent.” Yikes. [via Luxist]
In 2007, Jon Favreau had the audacity to make an Iron Man movie that was actually good. Two years later, we have our first glimpse of the inevitable sequel. What follows is a play-by-play breakdown of the new trailer for Iron Man 2 (or, as we call it, War Machine: Origins), featuring Mickey Rourke’s Burning Man-appropriate metal teeth, Scarlett Johansson’s laughable attempts at be-leathered badassery, and the brazen ripoff of a Dark Knight set-piece.
For your pleasure, we’ve highlighted some of the best parts (Sam Jackson as Nick Fury) and some of the worst (basically all the parts that do not include Sam Jackson as Nick Fury).
1. Is Rupert Murdoch hoping to be the Don Vito Corleone of the online news publishing world? [via LAT]
2. Five members of Kids in the Hall will reunite in a murder-mystery comedy called Death Comes to Town. [via Variety]
3. Tommy Lee Jones with direct/star in a film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s The Sunset Limited with Samuel L. Jackson. [via HitFix]
4. After all that New Moon drama, Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke has signed on to helm that goth version of Little Red Riding Hood for Leonardo DiCaprio’s Appian Way. [via Variety]
5. You could win a lock of one band member’s hair if you buy HEALTH’s new album. [via ChordStrike]
