February, 2008 | The End of the Page

February 28, 2008
by Luke
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Waving Good-Bye to New Line Cinema

Well, another independent studio falls into the gaping maw of the major studios. New Line will officially fold into Warner Brothers and they will compliment their release plates to form a more cohesive schedule. Supposedly the New Line brand will stay on an they will continue to release films that fit the genres they worked in, in essence becoming an indie arm for WB. I can only hope that they will let the studio do what it does best, which is make some really kick ass films, such as: The Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Evil Dead, Critters, most of the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Pump Up the Volume, My Own Private Idaho, Glengarry Glen Ross, A Few Good Men, Menace II Society, Malice, The Mask, SeVen, Dark City, the Blade trilogy, American History X, Magnolia, the Final Destination trilogy (with another coming in super bloody 3-D), The Cell, Hedwig and the Angry inch, most of the Friday the 13th franchise (including the absolutely hilarious Jason X), Wedding Crashers and Domino. Those are honestly on a sampling of the enjoyment that New Line has brought in their forty years of service to the movie going audience. Continue reading →

February 26, 2008
by Luke
1 Comment

The Moment of Truth – For Us or Them?

From the moment I heard about the idea for this show I knew that we as a society fell one more notch down the evolutionary ladder. For those who don’t know, Moment of Truth is a game show on the hypocritical right-wing Fox network (do I sound biased?) where people go on and answer questions for money. The contestants are hooked to lie detectors and the more questions they answer honestly the higher amount of money they win. Obviously the questions are made to be embarrassing and awkward to answer in front of a live television audience, but wait, there’s more! They also bring on special guests from that person’s life, their whole family is there, best friends, basically anyone and everyone who could possibly be emotionally harmed by these skeletons in the closet. All those people are front and center so the contestant feels the pressure of destroying their relationships and we get to see it all in crisp clean high definition. Continue reading →

February 24, 2008
by Luke
3 Comments

Oscar Wrap-Up 2008

Another year has passed and another year of watching Jon Stewart polish off the Oscars like it was just another episode of The Daily Show. I swear the man cannot be fazed. As for the winners, I made predictions a while back, so let’s see how I matched up: (I’ll mark the ones I got right with a “*”) Continue reading →

February 23, 2008
by Luke
3 Comments

Spiderwick Chronicles – Fails to Wrap Me in its Web

We have been inundated recently by fantasy movies for children all due to one little boy and his magic wand and another little man and his ring. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy and the multi-billion franchise blockbuster of Harry Potter made every movie studio want to jump on the fantasy bandwagon, which comes complete with a wise-cracking imaginary creature at the helm and a menacing arch enemy biting at your heels. There are even more films to add to this list, but let me get to the task at hand, talking about this new little boy and his own recent brush with the supernatural. Once again, this is an adaptation of a popular series of children’s books, but this film has a very tidy and complete ending, so I walked out not feeling a franchise was in its future. Maybe for once the studios felt that one was enough, or more likely they were just waiting to see how the audience would react to it. Since this review is coming out a whole week after its release, you might already know by now that it is not the blockbuster the studio was hoping for. Let’s try and figure out why… Continue reading →

February 20, 2008
by Luke
0 comments

Duma Key – Unlocking More Than You Ever Wanted To See

Continuing his quest to become the most prolific horror writer in history, Stephen King unleashed a new tale of heaven meets hell on the sandy beaches of an island called Duma Key. The story follows a sturdy Midwestern man named Edgar Freemantle who has worked long and worked hard to have the good life. On the far end of middle age he has built his construction company into a multi-million dollar empire, kept his wife happy and healthy and raised his two wonderful daughters. Retirement plans weren’t nearly on his mind yet, but other plans, more devious and more red plans were already in action. A crane on his work-site backs into his truck and just misses taking his life. What it did succeed in taking was his right arm, a crack out of his skull, the mobility of his right leg and lastly, the happiness of his marriage. Edgar begins to have rage issues when he wakes up in the hospital and after numerous therapy sessions it is decided that maybe he needs what is referred to as a “geographic cure”. Time to pick up and move on. His doctor also suggests a hobby, “something to build hedges against the night” as King put it. Edgar sees a brochure for Duma Key and knows it is the place he will start his new life. The hobby he digs up from his past is drawing, which leads to painting, which leads to things he never could have dreamed of in his worst nightmares. Continue reading →

February 16, 2008
by Luke
1 Comment

Jumper – One Hop, Skip and a Jump from Being Good.

There are times when the track record of a director can set the bar too high even for themselves to reach. This weekend brought the release of Jumper, which was helmed by Doug Liman (Swingers, Go, The Bourne Identity, Mr. and Mrs. Smith). That is a hell of a wake of well thought out, well executed and well liked films and this is what Jumper wanted to tag itself onto. Unfortunately it falls directly to the bottom of the totem pole. Doug Liman now gets to rest comfortably in companionship with other directors like Joel Schumacher and John McTiernan who have brought us some amazing and amazingly terrible films. Continue reading →

February 10, 2008
by Luke
0 comments

Making the move!

Welcome to the new and improved daily blog of yours truly. It’s been great writing for everyone over on MySpace, but I have decided that the limitations on the blogging platform are just too much now. I want to expand, I want to explore and, of course, I want to express myself in ways that platform won’t allow. So here I am over at Wordpress. For now this is a free blog hosted on their site, but if the demand reaches a necessary point I’ll rent a host and move it over there. But to get to that point, which would be an incredibly happy problem to have, you need to keep reading, keep commenting and tell your friends to come over and do the same. Thanks once again to all my wonderful and avid readers! Let’s head down this road together and see where it takes us. Continue reading →

The End of the Page

Opinions and Commentary on the World, On Screen and Off.

Monthly Archives: February 2008