The AFI FEST 2010 presented by Audi announces this year’s crown jewels. The festival is springing off with the world premiere of Love and Other Drugs staring Ann Hathaway and Jake Gyllenhaal in a Viagra-fueled tale of romance, and plans to end with a bang with Natalie Portman’s pirouetting spiral of self destruction in Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan.
Other gala screenings announced include the romance Blue Valentine, Barney’s Version starring Dustin Hoffman and Paul Giamatti, Abel- A tale about a disturbed child trying to become his own father, Company Men with …
Ladies and gentlemen, fire up your projectors, the very first Anaheim International Film Festival is about to start! 5 days, almost 100 films. The festival features an array of selections ranging from heartbreaking documentaries, trashy horror, and rollicking comedies sprinkled with a slew of shorts.
Don’t have much time? Come check out the One Minute Film Festival, a snack-sized fast paced whirlwind of entertainment. For those of you with little ones there’s a delightful children’s animation program and even old classics like Sixteen Candles you can come enjoy together as a …
Time to show that France is about more than berets, mime camp, and children drinking wine. This year’s festival has teamed up with Record Makers to celebrate their label’s 10 year anniversary. These guys know how to party, and with their catalog of slick techno disco-pimp grooves it’s a union that puts the “ménage à trios” back in “Ooh La La”. The festival drips signature Parisian style with a line-up showcasing the sounds of French sensuality, spirited revolution, dancey techno beats, wafty accordion, and laid back countryside drives.
Ooh La …
Comic-Con is something people wait for all year. Sure, you are taking time off work and driving for hours to come down and check out new Magic the Gathering cards, but think of all the free things! Getting something by standing in line for it is better than a job because you will feel like you earned it. Plus, it’s educational. Where else can you find such a rare opportunity to see so many celebrities up close and take tense awkward photos with them while you feed them peanuts? Sometimes …
This year’s E3 involved a whole lot of flailing around as everyone made a mad dash to grab their slice of the motion game controller market pie. There was one question on everyone’s collective minds- “Who’s going to pay for that broken lamp?”. Racket’s hot tip: Invest in living room furniture. Ikea is going to make a killing.
Tom Cruise prevents Kinect related accidents before they even happen.
Kinect- The most potential for collateral damage of any motion controlled gaming device yet. Sure, getting to hand-wave through menus …
How to Train Your Dragon
Dreamworks
9/10
How to Train Your Dragon is hands down one of the best Dreamworks films to come out in years. It goes to show that when they drop the saucy wink-at-the-camera humor shtick and get their hands on a good story with some heartfelt characters they can really wow. It follows the unlikely friendship between a boy and a salamander-dog-cat-dragon thing. What could easily have just been a boy-and-his-Pokemon type plot delivers a compelling and beautifully animated tale. Vikings and Dragons are at war and bumbling young …
Ratchet and Clank
A Crack in Time
Insomniac Studios
8/10
The hardest working lombax in the galaxy is at it again, ready to take on a soap opera worth of cosmic drama with guns blazing. Shocking reveals, long lost relatives, and time travel hijinx keep you busy while jetting around on the heels of villainous madmen up to no good. Meanwhile your trusty companion Clank is off on a mystical mission, floating around tinkering with the fabric of time and space like it was a broken remote. If you have played the series before, …
What do you mean you don’t get to fight a Kraken?!
Bio Shock 2
8 out of 10
2K Games
Daddy’s home! Rapture is looking a bit more strung out than usual this time around. 10 years of smelling like fish chum and being damp has made the residents a bit cranky it seems. This time around you play the beefy Big Daddy- part overzealous dentist, part salvage yard worker, topped off with a set of brass balls big enough to sink a tanker. You stumble to consciousness after a bad day at work …
The most magnificent things are often created with the simplest tools. The Man Who Planted Trees is a beautiful and heartfelt tale about the power of small gestures to make a remarkable difference in the world and tells the story of an old man who single-handedly transforms a wind parched wasteland into a thriving oasis of beauty and life. The show was performed at the Orange County Performing Arts Center by a cheerful duo of Scotsmen from the Puppet State Theater Company. I had seen the elegantly animated Academy Award …
A Town Called Panic
Aardman Animation
10/10
Another hit from the studio that brought Wallace and Grommet to the screen. This hysterically hyperkinetic adventure has charm in spades. Unlikely roommates Cowboy and Indian end up getting mixed up in more than they bargained for when they try to build their friend and landlord Horse the best birthday present ever and instead end up making a mess of epic proportions that turns their tiny town upside down. Based on the Belgian TV show shorts which originally aired under the French title, Panic Au Village …
Yeasayer
Odd Blood
8/10
Danced to by white girls, adored by Germans, inspiring to mankind. Following their previous album, All Hour Cymbals, comes Yeasayer’s newest release, Odd Blood, as they kick off their tour playing recently at the Guggenheim in NY and the Natural History Museum in LA. The album is messy sound, indie vocals, and clear dance beats laced with a funk-filled psychedelic blending of ambient melodies. You can hear the band’s self claimed gospel roots that emerge to take form of a spirit elevating primordial world-music vision quest. The pronouncedly mechanical …
Dante’s Inferno
EA Games
7/10
Based on Dante’s epic poem about descending through the 9 circles of Hell while being guided by Virgil, who you may remember as the owl-guy from Mighty Max. In an effort to bolster buzz EA Games launched a series of contrived promotion gimmicks, including trying to claim the game was being boycotted as “immoral” by staging fake protests with paid bible thumpers, and bribing reviewers with $200 checks, which we here at Racket are still waiting to receive. The only thing blasphemous about this game is the sacrilegious …
Moon- 9/10
Sony Picture Classics
Out on DVD and Blu-Ray- Jan. 12
Moon is a well constructed and beautifully shot sci-fi film written and directed by Duncan Jones, who is also known as the son of David Bowie. The movie stars Sam Rockwell, who gives a surprising performance as a lonely moon-miner, and his only companion, a computer that communicates via emoticon smoothly voiced by an unseen Kevin Spacey. The film is paired with a stunning and well-matched soundtrack from composer Clint Maswell, best known for his work doing the music for Darren …
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Sony Pictures
10 of 10
On DVD and Blu-Ray Jan. 5th
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, based off of the classic children’s book by Judi Barret, is a deliciously delightful film about an overzealous young inventor who cooks up a plan to make it rain a hail of cheeseburgers and ice-cream to save the townsfolk from a fate of sardines. Meatballs is bright and imaginative and has an awesome early 80’s feel that pops with color; even the end credits are gorgeous. It also is just a …
JoJo’s Fashion Show: World Tour
iWin Games
8/10
I’m not going to apologize for reviewing a children’s dress up game- deal with it. Jojo’s is my guilty pleasure. Where other fashion games are mostly empty fantasies in taffeta and bubblegum pink, Jojo’s steps it up with style boot camp that pulls looks right off the hottest current day runways to make addicts out of even the toughest fashionistas. I’ve whiled away countless hours on the other two incarnations, sucking in friends along with me. Jojo’s is more than a dress-up game, it is …
Sherlock Holmes- “Bros Before Hoes”
Warner Brothers
7/10
Sherlock Holmes trades in his opium pipe and monocle for a pile of action-packed Blow and brass knuckles in this Bro-rotic romance bowler-hat adventure.
Holmes is given a case seemingly more fitting for Scooby Doo- tracking down a spooky magician’s ghost. You know the drill: ancient cult, dudes in robes, world domination, diffusing a bomb, if it weren’t for those pesky kids… Unlike Scooby Doo, though, Holmes is out to get laid. The twist is, he has his sights set on his trusty companion Watson. Jealous …
