Among my favorite film books is Michael J. Weldon's two-volume "Psychotronic" film guide. The first was published in 1983 and the second in 1996 (Michael hopes to publish a third at some point). Unlike Leonard Maltin's annual book, Weldon doesn't update an existing guide; each new guide is an entirely new volume. If you want to read about Halloween, you need Vol. 1 and if you want to read about Halloween 4, you need Vol. 2. A "Psychotronic" movie can be fairly easy to define. It's basically any of the "lower" film genres, dealing with the more questionable elements of society: horror, sci-fi, bikers, strippers, superheroes, zombies, kung-fu, vampires, comic books, drugs, sex, action heroes, rock 'n' roll, midnight movies, monsters, witches, cults, serial killers, magic, time travel, robberies, heists, contract killers, gladiators, Spaghetti Westerns, mad scientists, murder mysteries, pimps, voyeurs, etc.

Note: The above video contains mild profanity. You've been warned.

So you know how after a film comes out, they'll throw together one of those commercials featuring moviegoers outside the theater, telling everyone how much they loved the film? They don't do it as much anymore, but it's always fun to watch some random fat dude with a sign proclaiming his love for the latest Hollywood release. Anyway, some very funny folks got together and recorded a parody of one of these commercials for the new film Step Up 2 the Streets. Ya know, that movie with all the kids dancing in the streets? In its first week, Step Up 2 pulled in roughly $28 million, which means them kids out there definitely step up to the box office when one of these urban dance flicks arrives. The video, which you can watch above (via Funny or Die), comes with the description: "The Step Up franchise is like You Got Served for white people!"

Personally, I thought it was hilarious. Just try not to take offense -- it's all in good humor. Step Up 2 the Streets is currently playing in your local theater.

[Thanks ivamarie for the tip]

Finding a theme to bind together five trailers for this column every week can be tricky. Sometimes a common element jumps out at me, and other times I have to spend some time searching before I find one. Still other times there's no similarity to be found, which leads us to this week's topic. We're firing a barrel of buckshot (metaphorically speaking) at some new trailers, and we'll talk about the first five we hit. Ready? Lock and load.

Starting Out in the Evening
Frank Langella plays an aging novelist who can't get publishers to even look at his new book, but a young female grad student thinks she can revive people's interest in his work. Langella's character is so old school he actually uses a typewriter, and this looks like a truly great performance. The plot reminds me a bit of Finding Forrester, but only on a superficial level. James reviewed the film at the Toronto International Film Festival, and you can read that right here.

I am Legend
There's a new full-length trailer for this third adaptation of Richard Matheson's classic novel about a lone human in a world overrun with mutated survivors of a global plague. I'm not clear on whether the plague victim's in the movie are actually vampires like they are in the book or some other kind of mutation, but you finally get a peek at them here, as well as some mutant dogs. Beyond the basic premise, this doesn't look like it's going to be a particularly faithful adaptation, but I've always felt a film should judged for what it is and not how similar it is to the source material. This should be good.