the game plan Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Here's a dirty little secret: sometimes film critics don't want to see movies. It's true. When we start out, ambitious and full of energy, we'll sit through any old thing, but after a while, when the formulas begin to wear on you, you can smell a turkey from watching the trailer. Sometimes you can smell a stinkbomb just from the title alone. I thought, for fun, I'd go over some titles I haven't seen and give you an idea of what might go through a critic's head. Of course, some of this is self-justification for not being able to see every single movie that comes through town. Frankly, it's impossible for one person to do, and so we resort to a porcupine-like defense, just in case anyone asks us about a movie we haven't seen: "It looked terrible."

Here's one: How to Cook Your Life (1 screen). What is that? Without even looking, it sounds like a bunch of actresses on a single set with too much dialogue, probably a lot of violin music and tears. And what could it mean? Why would I want to cook my life? It sounds painful, doesn't it? (It's really a film by the German director Dorris Dorrie about trying to equate cooking with Zen philosophy.) Then we have Hitman (9 screens), which irritated critics to no end, but seems to have pleased a fair number of moviegoers. Question: how many hitman movies have you seen in the past five or ten years? Is there an actor working today who hasn't played a hitman? What kind of brass cojones must it have taken to actually use the title "Hitman" on a middling, forgettable piece of work like this one?

The Game Plan
So, The Rock plays Joe Kingman, a star quarterback delighting in money and game. Then he gets some big news -- a long-ago fling resulted in a cute daughter who is now 7 years old. Now he's got to trade in partying for play dates and ballet to become a good dad. It might sound a bit hokey, but as James Rocchi says: "it works as a pretty solid example of how the skillful execution of some of the oldest plays in the book can still get the ball to the end zone." Besides, it might be the perfect thing for families to pop in before the Superbowl. The kids should be happy, and then you can wait and see who will come out on top -- the Giants or the Patriots.

The DVD includes a good collection of features: bloopers with Marv Albert, deleted scenes, ESPN exclusives, behind-the-scenes featurette, controlling the mood lighting in Joe's apartment (I've no idea.. check it out and see...), "Peyton's Makeover Madness Set-Top Activity," and a "unique" commentary by The Rock and director Andy Fickman.

Check out James' Review | Buy the DVD

Sydney White
It's family day on New DVD Picks of the Week! If your kids are a bit older, Sydney White might be more your style, or rather, theirs. A teen spoof on Snow White (once called Sydney White and the Seven Dorks), this flick stars Amanda Bynes as a girl who decides to change the social hierarchy of her college after getting banished from her late-mother's sorority. She winds up at a condemned house with a bunch of awkward frat boys and begins to shake up the system, and bring down the bitchy blonde girls. It's got Danny Strong going for it (Gilmore Girls & Buffy), but watch out for some wild stereotyping.

The special features, well, they're what you'd expect from this sort of movie -- deleted scenes, gag reel, a bunch of featurettes like "The Skooze" and "Kappa's Forever," something on the Rubix Cube, and meeting the dorks.

Check out Kim's Review | Buy the DVD


Other New DVD Releases (January 22)

Saw IV
Adrift in Manhattan
This Sporting Life -- Criterion
Sex and Breakfast
Blonde Ambition

Check out Peter Martin's Indies on DVD for even more new releases.

Welcome to another edition of our world famous Insert Caption game! Last week we asked you to break out your mad skills and provide the best caption for a photo from this week's new release, Mad Money. And after sorting through a number of stripper-related captions, as well as a few on Scientology (are Scientologists allowed to be strippers?), we locked in on the following three winners ...

1. "Hillary Clinton and her aides celebrate another great campaign fundraiser." -- Illinois and Back

2. "Who said stripping isn't a career?" -- Wayne

3. "See, clippin' coupons CAN really save money!!" -- Tee

See full image and all captions

Since we're inching closer and closer to The Superbowl, this week we're checking in on Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson who plays a star NFL quarterback in The Game Plan. While throwing touchdowns and scoring points aren't a problem whatsoever, the 8-year-old daughter he discovers from a previous relationship proves to be tougher than any linebacker past, present and future. The three writers of our favorite captions this week will win their own copy of The Game Plan DVD, for those long, lonely days in February when it finally hits that the NFL season is over and done with. Sound off below ...

Read the official rules for this contest

I have to say, there was a time when I would really look forward to a new Farrelly Brothers flick. But not long after There's Something About Mary, Dumb and Dumber and Outside Providence (a personal favorite, which was written by the boys, who did not direct it), they began to lose it. The downward spiral began with Me, Myself and Irene, continued with Shallow Hal and bottomed out with Stuck on You. And it's real sad that I've come to the point where I've actually skipped their last two films, Fever Pitch (directed, but not written by) and The Heartbreak Kid. But some felt The Heartbreak Kid would be their rebound film; reuniting with Ben Stiller for the first time since Mary, the brothers were sure to find their magic again. Unfortunately, they did not. The film, which was predicted to open at number one this weekend with at least $20 million, came in at number two (with only $14 million) behind The Game Plan (a film in its second week; it grabbed $16.3 million).

The film marks the first "bomb" for DreamWorks this year, and who are they blaming for the lackluster opening? Yup, the critics. But if the critics -- and their harsh reviews (including one from our own James Rocchi) -- are to blame, then how do you explain the box office success that was Norbit? That film is currently sitting at a dreadful 9% at Rotten Tomatoes, while The Heartbreak Kid is at 30%. So did moviegoers all of a sudden decide to listen to the critics? Or is DreamWorks just looking to blame someone other than themselves and the Farrelly Brothers? Personally, with the success that Judd Apatow has had in these last two years, I really feel people expect more out of their comedy. That, coupled with poor placement and crappy-looking trailers, kept people away from Stiller and Co. this past weekend. But that's just my opinion ...

... so here's where I ask you: Why didn't you go see The Heartbreak Kid this weekend?

Another macho man has made the obligatory leap into the kiddie pool. This time it's Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson who has gone and starred opposite a child in this weekend's new release The Game Plan. Could it damage his potential for further tough guy roles? Does he care? He's already signed on to another kid friendly part in Witch Mountain, so perhaps he's no longer worried about audiences accepting him as a muscle man with attitude.

The Rock, like Vin Diesel before him, may have jumped the gun on doing a Disney family film before securing an iconic place next to Schwarzenegger, Stallone and other action hero types. His movie may therefore lack that necessary extreme between the character we associate with The Rock and the character he must take on for the movie -- like the type of contrast that made Kindergarten Cop so funny.

But there are worse things he could do. Other action stars and macho actors have made some pretty terrible mistakes that had nothing to do with working with kids, and many of these mistakes were career altering. Let's just hope Dwayne Johnson never has to suffer such ideas as these:


1. Junior (1994, Ivan Reitman)

For a macho guy, finding out you have a kid is domesticating, but finding out you're pregnant is emasculating. Nothing says an action hero has gone soft like giving him a bun in the oven, and it's no wonder that Arnold Schwarzenegger had difficulty maintaining his image in action movies for the next decade -- until Terminator 3. I'm certain that if The Rock tried doing a movie in which he's with child rather than with a child, he'd cause far more problems for his career. At least Schwarzenegger had just a few months earlier released True Lies, and fans likely held onto the hope he would be back on top one day.

Featuring Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson and Madison Pettis, The Game Plan feels both grimly modern and charmingly retro. The plot, with Johnson's all-star pro football quarterback discovering he's the father of an 8-year-old girl (Pettis), feels like it was deliberately calculated in some horrible, airless conference room at Disney where a group of development execs were locked in and denied lattes and e-mail until they came up with the perfect movie for separated dads to take their 'tween daughters to during court-mandated custodial weekends. At the same time, The Game Plan has the gentle, breezy execution of prior Disney family films like The Parent Trap and Freaky Friday, where the children are plucky, the parents are clueless-yet-kindhearted and the plot's schemes and complications all culminate in a cleansing, healing hug at the happy ending. Walking out of The Game Plan, I snuck a peek at my watch -- not because I was curious about the hour, but because The Game Plan was so numbingly, charming similar to Disney family films from years gone by I thought I might have fallen through a wormhole back to the Carter administration.

The timeless-but-not-quite-tired nature of the pitch can explain a lot of that feeling; strip away the more modern details, and you could have made The Game Plan in the '50s or '70s with Hayley Mills or the young Jodie Foster as Peyton. Johnson is Joe "The King" Kingman, ace QB for the Boston Rebels. Joe's bravado and self-regard would be unbearable, but for the fact that he can deliver: During the fourth down with the clock running in the game they have to win to make it to the playoffs, Joe tells his teammates "Everyone get on The King's back and I will lead you to the promised land." And they do, and he does. Joe lives in one of those stylized ice-kingdom high-tech apartments, makes money for himself and his agent (Kyra Sedgwick) and enjoys the good life, despite a nagging feeling of ennui and never having won a championship. At which point the plucky, perky Peyton (Pettis) shows up: She's his daughter, a reminder of a long-past, long-over marriage in Joe's youth. Apparently Joe's ex-wife Sarah is off to Africa for a month, and she's leaving Peyton with Joe. Joe is not necessarily prepared for this, and the film hurls itself into wringing laughs from all of the flailing and fumbling that adjustment entails. Peyton figures Joe out immediately: "You sure got a lot of pictures of yourself in here. ..." Joe has no clue about how to be a father figure, let alone an actual father; he barely has a sense of how to be a grown-up.

Things were kind of dead at the box office this past weekend. Not that people weren't going to the movies, it's just that a lot of them paid to see a flick that had dead folks walking around. Here's the final tally:

1. Resident Evil: Extinction: $24 million.
2. Good Luck Chuck: $14 million.
3. The Brave One: $7.4 million.
4. 3:10 to Yuma: $6.35 million.
5. Eastern Promises: $5.7 million.

This coming weekend oddly enough brings us three films whose stars all saw their early successes on TV, including Easy Reader from The Electric Company, a professional wrestler, and a cast member from In Living Color.

The Feast of Love
What's It All About: In what is described as a modern take on A Midsummer Night's Dream, Morgan Freeman plays a man who witnesses the effects love has on several small town residents.
Why It Might Do Well: The trailer has a great deal of appeal, hitting funny and romantic notes with equal skill.
Why It Might Not Do Well: A relatively small release will keep this one out of the top five, but it should do reasonably well and ultimately find its audience on DVD.
Number of Theaters: 1,200
Prediction: $4.5 million

The Game Plan
What's It All About: An NFL star played by Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson suddenly finds himself caring for a seven-year-old daughter he never knew he had.
Why It Might Do Well: There aren't a lot of family friendly comedies in theaters just now, so this one may find its niche.
Why It Might Not Do Well: The plot is nothing new, and based on the trailer Johnson doesn't look entirely comfortable in the role.
Number of Theaters: 2,800
Prediction: $14 million

The Kingdom
What's It All About: FBI agents investigate an attack on U.S. forces in Saudi Arabia.
Why It Might Do Well: Jamie Foxx leads a strong cast that also includes Jennifer Garner and Jason Bateman. I'm betting this will be the big money maker this week.
Why It Might Not Do Well: Given the current situation in the Middle East, this may hit too close to home for some.
Number of Theaters: 2,700
Prediction: $22 million

I've got a feeling that next week's results will look something like this:
1. The Kingdom
2. The Game Plan
3. Resident Evil: Extinction
4. Good Luck Chuck
5. The Brave One

No perfect scores last week, but Porcalina and Josh took top honors. Nice going guys. Here's how everyone did:
1. Porcalina: 13
1. Josh: 13
2. Bubba8193: 12
3. Matt: 11
3. Mario: 11
3. Dave: 11
4. Anna07: 10
4. Ray: 10
4. Chris: 10
4. Max: 10
5. ABIRD006: 9
5. Gregory Rubinstein: 9
6. MikeJM79: 8
6. Marshall: 8
7. Gina: 7
8. Peter: 6

Here's how the competition works:
Please post your prediction in the comments section below before 5:00PM on Saturday. One point for every top five movie correctly named, two points for every correct placement, and one extra point for the top movie.

Poor Kim Richards. The former child star wasn't in too many films, but already one of them has been remade (Assault on Precinct 13, in which she briefly appears before memorably being gunned down) and another is on its way to the recycle bin. It's her best remembered, too: Escape to Witch Mountain. Previously we heard that Andy Fickman (She's the Man) would be directing a new version of the 1975 Disney pic, which was already redone once, for television, in 1995, and that Dwayne Johnson (aka The Rock), who stars in Fickman's new movie, The Game Plan, would be starring as a cab driver who picks up a pair of siblings with supernatural powers. Now we've got at least one of the siblings, the one that Richards played in the original and its first sequel (but not its sequel, where she was replaced by Growing Pains' Tracey Gold). According to MTV Movies Blog, AnnaSophia Robb (The Bridge to Terrabitha) has been cast in the new movie, titled only Witch Mountain, though whether or not her character will be named "Tia" was not revealed. Also as of yet unknown: who will play her brother, Tony.

The most interesting thing that was clarified was that Witch Mountain is not really a remake. Fickman told MTV that he didn't want to mess with something he loved as a kid, so instead the new movie is more like another chapter in the story of Witch Mountain (sounds like Robb could be a new character after all). The director also regurgitated the usual line about how people who have seen the original and people who haven't can all enjoy this next installment. Fickman also said his movie will be more like Alexander Key's novel, meaning it will be much darker in tone, and that The Rock will be the one who helps the kids elude an evil millionaire who seeks to exploit them. He fills the shoes of the original film's Eddie Albert, who Fickman believes was a laughable protector for Tia and Tony. The director promises the not-remake will be "a pretty bad-ass ride." You know, just as you'd expect from a movie featuring The Rock and children.

Based on the description, I'm going to go out on a limb and say this one is like The Sandlot ... but for swimmers. With swimming slowly becoming the next go-to sport for big-screen "feel good" films, Disney has decided to hop in the water with Pool Rats; a new comedy to be directed by Andy Fickman. With a script being written by Fickman, Nichole Millard and Kathryn Price, project reunites the same creative team (writers, directors, producers) behind Disney's The Game Plan -- an upcoming family comedy staring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. While the filmmakers would like to produce a film that's in the vein of Meatballs or Little Darlings, expect the flick to still project Disney's family-friendly vibe (which kind of stinks, because I'd love to see a Sandlot-type film featuring a bunch of foul-mouthed knuckleheads).

Based on Fickman's own real-life experiences, the film will revolve around the "wild times" one man has while coaching a neighborhood league swim team during a summer that changes both his life and the lives of his swimmers. Pic follows in the footsteps of the Lionsgate film Pride, which received decent reviews, but failed to make any kind of splash when it hit theaters this past spring. For my money, I'm a huge fan of the little-seen indie The Big Bad Swim -- starring one of my favorite up-and-coming actresses, Jess Weixler (Teeth). That film is about a group of local folks who sign up for a swim class and, in turn, learn a lot about themselves and help change the lives of those around them. I'm not sure whether the film was ever picked up (I know it played a ton of film festivals), but if you ever get a chance, I highly recommend it. As far as Pool Rats goes, there's no cast or production start lined up yet; expect it to arrive at some point next summer while most of us are looking for a way to cool off during those ridiculously hot days.

Before he was known for his acting chops -- or for crushing WWF wrestlers with his signature Rock Bottom move -- Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson was pretty adept at crushing quarterbacks as a member of the 1991 NCAA champion Miami Hurricanes football team. This fall, he returns to the gridiron for the family-oriented Disney flick The Game Plan, about a superstar NFL QB who's forced to question his swingin' bachelor lifestyle -- and his pigskin career -- when he finds out he has a seven-year-old daughter. We have an exclusive first look at the poster below (click on the image for a larger version).