Thursday, August 05, 2010

OK, maybe I will go see "The Other Guys"

Before I get into any of that, think: What's the best possible news you could hear about the return of "Glee" to make it even better than the wickedly funny/cheesy/outright entertaining show already is?

Well, how about Sue Sylvester's mom? In what, even if you don't watch the show you'll have to concede is rather genius casting, Carol Burnett will play the nazi-hunting mother of Jane Lynch's cheerleading coach/bully extraordinaire on a November episode of the Fox show. The only possibly bad news there? In the place where I first saw this, in Michael Ausiello's Entertainment Weekly column, it was pretty clear this will be for only one episode. Oh well.

And the baseball season may well have ended for the Orioles in, well, the second week of April or so, but my favorite team of lovable losers is now 2-0 under new manager Buck Showalter and are now guaranteed to win their fifth series of the year (out of 35, yes, but always look on the bright side of life.) As I heard some dude on ESPN radio say, and though of course I couldn't see him, it seemed to be with a straight face, "here come the Orioles," so watch out.

In their honor, here's a picture I found this morning of Philip Seymour Hoffman as A's manager Art Howe in the upcoming flick "Moneyball" that just made me smile. The flick itself is directed by Bennett Miller from the Michael Lewis book about general manager Billy Beane, who kept the team's payroll low and its winning percentage high (as opposed to the Orioles, who, oh well ...) One Brad Pitt is set to play Beane, who often clashed with Howe on the direction the team was taking. Anyways, this flick is one I'm definitely looking forward to. Here's the pic, which gets bigger if you click on it:


OK, finally on to the main event, I suppose. Although I managed to give up smoking long ago (and was never terribly good at it anyway), I still have plenty of bad habits, and the worst of them all just might be Will Ferrell movies. I haven't quite seen them all (I managed to just say no to whatever that basketball flick was called), but it's definitely well more than half, and I really can't explain why.

There all universally pretty stupid, but sometimes very funny too. An example: That "Stepbrothers" flick with John C. Reilly was a hoot. Yes, really. So, while I was at first at least trying to resist seeing his new flick directed by Adam McKay, "The Other Guys," it looks like it has enough going for it to make me spring for a matinee or so (though not this week, because I have to work six days and on my day off, I'm gonna see "The Kids Are All Right" instead, since that has one week at best to survive around here.)

The upside: Steve Coogan is not only in it, but is apparently the big bad, and I'll watch him in just about anything. Markie Mark and Samuel L. Jackson should also be very funny.

The downside: If it's bad, it will just be a 90-minute SNL sketch, and I already made that mistake once this year already with the not-even-for-90-seconds-funny "MacGruber" (yes, I see far too many movies.)

Anyways, if you happen to see this this weekend, please feel free to let me know if it was any good, and in the meantime, enjoy this mysteriously bleeped, four-minute clip of footage screened at Comic-Con, and have a perfectly pleasant Thursday. Peace out.

5 comments:

Bob said...

I'm definitely planning to see "The Other Guys." I'm not a Ferrell worshipper by any stretch (and yes "Semi-Pro" was as dreadful as they come), but the man is definitely funny. "Blades of Glory" is Dumb Comedy Gold and he's wonderful in "Stranger Than Fiction." Plus, I'm right there with you on Coogan. I just hope he gets a more interesting role than the one he had in "Tropic Thunder."
Really looking forward to "Moneyball" too. Should be quite a bit different from the average baseball movie.
And finally I would be remiss if I didn't say, "Here come the O's!" Buck Showalter is already the greatest Orioles manager since at least Joe Altobelli.

Reel Fanatic said...

If they somehow don't lose 100 games this year, Bob, I might even be ready say the best since Earl Weaver

M. Dean said...

This is off-topic, but I just watched Kick-Ass. What a delightful film. The DVD had some technical bugs, but I found my way around it. I thought that the theme music could have been a little darker, but other than that it was a wonderfully fun flick.

Reel Fanatic said...

I'm with you 100 percent on that, M Dean ... I can fully understand why so many people were put off by Hit-Girl, but if people couldn't take that, they clearly weren't the target audience for a truly great comic book flick

Movie 2010 said...

lot's of positive review about The Other Guys..seems its gonna dominate the box offide..let's see

Watch The Other Guys Online