The Dark Knight Rises

What great news to start my work week.

Here’s the newly released poster for the upcoming Batman movie “The Dark Knight Rises” which is the third movie with Christopher Nolan at the helm. I just finished reading a Batman graphic novel yesterday (Yes, I read), and if there’s one game I could add to my library of video games this year, I’d get the upcoming Batman: Arkham City (make that two, I gotta have LA Noire as well). Yes, I’m a big Batman fan. However, I’m no Hollywood reporter so I won’t go into the process of naming the stars, who’s reprising roles, any speculative plots, and whatnot. I’m only putting this up as a fan of Christopher Nolan movies, and Batman, of course.

My girlfriend Ice will be quick to point out that Nolan’s movies in general are rife with great storytelling, and I agree with her  completely. Aside from the storytelling, I love the stark amount of grit and realism that Nolan’s Batman movies have. They’re so far detached from the Tim Burton ones, which were also good, and the Joel Schumacher ones, which were campy as hell, but enjoyable nonetheless. I could go on in length about the movies in general but I’ll reserve that for a different discussion. I have real work to do after all.

I’ll just end by putting up another released photo. This time, it’s a still of Tom Hardy, who’s slated to play Bane in the upcoming movie. Enjoy!

DROP: My Life Downhill

In recent years, longboarding has been on the up and up in many parts of the world. In what looks to be a steady paradigm shift, many “core” skate shops have started to carry products to satisfy a still-growing longboarding market, only to see that market keep those shops in business. A few personalities are becoming burgeoning superstars, attracting more people to step on a board and ride. The development of more events, more coverage, and more signs that point to longboarding eventually getting past that tipping point into total mainstream acceptance.

Mark McCrudden’s film “DROP: My Life Downhill” is a documentary on one important facet of the steady rise of longboarding, downhill skateboarding. It’s equal parts of insight on the sport straight from its most established stars, and a whole lot of great skate footage. The great treatment of the run that Martin Siegrist, Mischo Erban, and Erik Lundberg share could be a film on its own. But instead, it serves as a great side to a healthy portion of what exactly the world of a downhill skateboarder is like.

The community aspect of the sport really gets brought out in the film, where the same racers engaged in a back and forth downhill battle, are the same people who hang out afterwards. It also exposes the rather unglamorous undertakings these lifers have to go through to get to the hills they want to bomb. Hours upon hours of road trips, the luxury of taking showers, the odd jobs needed in order to raise funds, these and others are the kinds of sacrifices made all in order to get sufficiently stoked. But despite the grueling nature of events leading up to getting downhill, DROP most certainly posits the point that the fun you have in the end most certainly justifies the hard work and sacrifice put in to getting there.

It’s a must-see for anyone looking to get into downhill skateboarding, or longboarding in general. It might be hasty to call it now, but perhaps some years down the line, it might be at par with the Dogtown and Z-Boys documentary that marked a watershed moment in skateboarding that kept it around and thriving to see new evolutions of the form everyday.

Watch DROP. Then head out of your house, grab your board (don’t forget your gear), and just go out and skate!

Andrew Garfield, Spider Man.

A whole lot of superhero movies are in the works and set to release within the next couple of years. Captain America, Thor, Green Lantern, possibly a new Batman movie, and The Avengers are all gearing up to eventually hit the big screens. Among those was a proposed idea to remake the Spider-Man franchise.

Sure, I’ve got some knowledge of the basic comic book story-arc, and I did like the movies (with the exception of the third). But coming from a movie standpoint, rebooting a pretty successful franchise entails taking a big risk. And from what I’ve heard, the reboot brings back the storyline to when Peter Parker was in high school. And with the story changes, casting followed suit.

So here’s the first shot released of Andrew Garfield as the new Spider Man.

Andrew Garfield seems like an interesting choice for Peter Parker. He’s been in some good movies with some big stars, and was most recently seen alongside Jesse Eisenberg and Justin Timberlake in “The Social Network” and with Keira Knightley and Carey Mulligan in an film adaptation of  Kazuo Ishiguro’s “Never Let Me Go”, which Time Magazine called “The best novel of the decade”.

The official statements regarding his casting certainly tried to hype up his acting prowess. And from what movies of his I’ve seen, he’s a pretty good actor, and many ladies can attest to him not being bad to look at either. And though Spider Man is seen as rather thin in the comics, this role certainly leaves Garfield with a big costume to fill. Hopefully whoever comes up with a story can find one that stays faithful to the comic books and at the same time serves a vehicle to showcase some real acting talent, considering the many personal and interior conflicts that go with being Spider Man, if not a problem endemic to most superheroes.

Oh, And here’s a shot of Emma Stone, who plays Gwen Stacy in the reboot.

whether you saw her in “Superbad”, “Zombieland”, “Easy A”, and even her bit part in “Ghosts of Girlfriends Past”, it isn’t hard to find a reason for any moviegoer to develop a big, if not debilitating crush on Emma Stone. Although I liked her as a redhead, having her in the cast gives me another reason to catch the new Spider Man movie hitting theaters in the summer of 2012.