What I wanna see in ...FEBRUARY

With the cinematic wasteland of January all but behind us (studios like to dump their "mistakes" during that month since no one goes to the movies anyway, so they won't waste their potential cash cows there), February rolls along with barely more quality stuff except maybe for a few lesser-budget offerings that may still prove to be worth the trip to the multiplex. Not that I'll be making it, but still, those down here are the only few I'd do it for. 

Feb.3rd

Dan Radcliffe, AKA Harry Hairy Potter, could've gone the superstar way after his 8-movie blockbuster stint as the boy who lived, but he punctuated the above-mentioned with a gutsy and acclaimed turn on stage, and decided to come back to the screen in a period creeper that reminds not just a little gothic stories that made Mary Shelley and Robert Louis Stevenson into iconic names. Plus the trailer looks deliciously moody and scary, and God knows audiences are tired of the torture-porn/found footage genres that for the last 15 years composed the horror movie landscape. This Woman in Black spearheads a return to atmosphere horror, and gladly it does. 

Here's a great example of how the "found-footage" can let go of horror movies and instead provide a very cool and fresh deconstruction of other genres (which also became a subgenre in itself last decade). Michael B. Jordan is one of those cool fresh faces that's been popping up a lot in TV shows recently, and seeing him finally make the leap in a movie starring role is quite a thrill. And I'll admit it, the trailer made me geek out all sorts of ways. 

Feb.10th

Denzel has become little more than a cliche of himself role after role these last 15 years, after such an amazing string of knock-out performances from the late 80s to the late 90s. The only times he's shown a hint of it since is when playing an evil friggin bastard (as the Academy recognized with the otherwise forgettable Training Day). Ryan Reynolds' shtick has run its course a while back, but maybe going toe-to-toe with badass Denzel will stirr the pot and inspire something fresh from him. But the real kicker is seeing if director Daniel Espinosa is as cool as his 2010 debut Snabba Cash led us to believe. Or if he'll just turn out another sell-out one-trick pony.

Feb.17th

Oh, get off my back! So I'm the biggest Nic Cage basher in town and I never went softly on the abomination of a property rape that was the first Ghost Rider. But that one was directed by washed-out hack Mark Steven Johnson, and this one by the insane guys behind those ludicrous Crank films; if you're gonna make a film just for the money, go out all and make it batsh*t insane, and also bring back Cage just to drive the cheese factor up to 11. And Ciaran Hinds as the Devil, you say? Where's my ticket!

Reese Whiterspoon has milked the rom-com field so badly it now comes out powdered, so she'll soon try to re-invent herself with an Iraq War drama, then get a boob job and facelift and try to go back to her roots. Not that I'm comparing her to Meg Ryan's former career... And yes, the still pathetically self-named McG never got any love from me. BUT the idea of Tom Hardy squaring off with Captain Kirk in an action comedy compensates quite beautifully. 

I've never really bore any interest for The Borrowers, but seeing how completely out of the box Miyasaki went for The Little Mermaid (that's what Ponyo was about, for those who didn't know...) and considering the onslaught of masterpieces rolled out of his Studio Ghibli in the past 25 years, this one is a no brainer!