Ok. So does it really matter? um no!

I no longer work at Village 8 theatres therefore are not handling Louisville Exclusive films. But that doesn't mean I can't post anything about films. This blog didn't belong to Village 8 nor Exclusive Films because I started this blog on my own time and wanted to discuss films in general with relation to Village 8, but since I don't belong there anymore I can literally do what I want in this film discussion- sweet!

Anybody catch X-Men Origins: Wolverine? Cause it's pretty good. Not as strong of a story as I would like, but yet entertaining especially with Wade Wilson aka Deadpool near the beginning of the film. The story is off a bit like The Blob was never really apart of the Weapon X program that I'm aware of and I don't think he was ever skinny at one point in his life. Silver Fox was not the sister of Emma Frost aka White Queen. Emma Frost wasn't able to have the ability of turning into a diamond until she was in her young adulthood. Deadpool never received the ability of Cyclops in his Weapon XI transformation or blades that pop out of his arms, but he did receive the healing factor of Wolverine. I guess that was all changed for Hollywood purposes much like X-Men 3, but do they ever learn!?! I guess not. Also it's never explained in the film of why James Howlett (Logan/Wolverine) or Jimmy changed his name to Logan or why people started calling him that. So there are holes in the film, but it is by far better than X3, which was destroyed by Brett Ratner.

I do wish the filmmakers would have stuck with more of the Weapon X program in the film instead of just moving along throughout the timeline. More missions and more Wade Wilson would have been nice. It could have easily set itself up for a sequel.

Also be sure to stay for the credits are there are 2 different extra scenes after the credits, however you won't get to see both just 1 of them. So you might have to catch the other ending at a different theatre. I know though for a fact that another theatre here in Louisville does have both ending credit scenes and that is Stoneybrook Cinemas... be sure to check it out. The one I saw was a little cheesy, but I heard the other ending is really cool. So take that for what it's worth.

--JN

Upcoming Exclusive Films!!!

Hot of the presses in a long time is FINALLY our new list of Exclusive Films!! Now some dates are missing but they are being worked on.

Opening Dates to June

Phoebe In Wonderland on April 17

Pray the Devil Back to Hell on April 24

Alien Trespass on May 1

The Great Buck Howard on May 8

Everlasting Moments on May 22

Hunger on June 19

I'm very excited about "Alien Trespass" (because if your a fan of weird humor Sci-Fi then this film is for you BIG TIME!! see "The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra"). I'm also happy about "The Great Buck Howard" which anything Tom Hanks related is generally going to be very good especially if John Malkovich is in it.

--LouEx

Thoughts, Insights, & Indie Films

Our most recent Louisville Exclusive Films. If these films don't spell independent then I don't know what does! However both have great concepts in interesting story lines. One is a road trip involving Star Wars nerds (guilty!) trying to steal Episode 1 from George Lucas's ranch before it is released, which obviously will have good inside humor to those who have seen Stars Wars like a 100 times (guilty!) in "Fanboys". However what I know now, but didn't know then is when Episode 1 came out I would have deemed the road trip pointless because if you can't read between the lines Episode 1 was TERRIBLE!! "Episode 6: Return of the Jedi" & "Episode 1: A New Hope" are still my favorites.

The other film is something which is hard to film - realness! "Medicine For Melancholy" which is filmed kind of like a documentary (but it's not I assure you). It's a style of filming that is not only intriguing but hard to do without fantastic actors exploring what could very well be the future of dramas. I'm not saying it's the only film to have done this, but this film certainly gives the film community a fighting chance to keep artistic values of actual filmmaking to a different degree in which people can finally catch on. The acting is dead on that they can make a porn movie seem credible.

Here are the links to each of the films description & information in case your curious. "Fanboys" last day will be April 16.

Fanboys- http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0489049/

Medicine for Melancholy- http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1133989/

--LouEx

Thoughts, Insights, and Inspirations

Yeah, so tiny picture to the left. Anyways, this was the most recent Louisville Exclusive indie film. I'm reminded of what this film could be about as described by the really fun band Better Than Ezra.



(Written by Kevin Griffin)
Looking around the house
Hidden behind the window and the door
Searching for signs of life but there's nobody home
Well maybe I'm just too sure
And maybe I'm just too frightened by the sound of it
Pieces of note fall down but the letter said

Uh huh, it was good
Living with you
Uh huh, it was good
Good, good, good, good, good, good

Sitting around the house
Watching the sun trace shadows on the floor
Searching for signs of life but there's nobody home
Well maybe I'll call or write you a letter
Now maybe we'll see on the Fourth of July
But I'm not too sure
And I'm not too proud
Well I'm not to sure
And I'm not to proud to say

Uh huh, it was good
Living with you
Uh huh, it was good
Yeah you were so good
Yeah you were so damn good.
(Yeah, that's right!)


Now was this film based on this song? Only time will tell. But maybe it was so it could become a conspiracy theory... of what I don't know. But it has to star Viggo Mortensen & Jason Issacs two of the best actors in our world otherwise it wouldn't be GOOD! I love puns.

Here is the actual synopsis for those bored with my weird humor. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0436364/

By the way what's your thoughts on this film?

--LouEx

Thoughts, Insights, and Donkey Punches.... what?

Here are the two most recent Louisville Exclusive Films that we have playing at Village 8. I'll go into some detail. I am also going to start to include links to the film synopsis and such because it makes this post even easier for me.

"Clancy" which is a local made film in Louisville, KY has been playing at Village 8 since March 6 thanks to the support of our locals. Here is the info on the film > http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1160369/

"Donkey Punch" which opened on March 20 is not getting much support. It's last day is March 26. And no, it's not a porno which is what the title could and may suggest especially if you've seen Clerks II. In fact, the last porno played at Village 8 before it was bought by mainstream cinemas back in the day was like in 1978 I think - "Debbie Does Dallas." Useless information, ah thank you! But it's not a film that involves Donkey's actually punching something or getting punched or even Donkey's becoming UFC fighters; however I might want to see that now, someone call Uwe Boll. In fact here is the real info on Donkey Punch > http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0988849/

I'm curious to hear what your thoughts are on either of these films. I did see Clancy from a special preview I got back in February. But I want to hear your sides on these titles.

--LouEx

2009 Oscar Thought... I know it was like a month ago

It's been 1 month and 3 days since the 2009 Oscars showed. While it may be old news I still have somewhat an opinion on it. While the producers and writers of the show kept quite about what's going to happen and making it a mystery of who will present I must say I was at first not caring who or how they were going to present. But then I watched it and I was changing my mind rather quickly. The production of the 81st Oscars was probably the best they've ever done. I enjoyed the way that there was 5 actors/actresses presenting the Best Actor categories which was very creative. And then I thought, are they going to do this with every category, we'll watching this til 3 a.m. (eastern time), but alas they didn't which was a good thing. My favorite presentation though was Steve Martin with Tina Fey giving out the Best Screenplay awards and I don't think I would have wanted it any other way.

As the host goes, Hugh Jackman was by far exceeding my expectations. I knew he could sing from previous stories on his background acting, but I didn't know he could SING! He gave this persona of courteousness and I felt like I've known him for a long time. I give the producers 4 thumbs up if I could for choosing Hugh Jackman. Now as a return host, not so sure because now the mystery is gone. Getting a comedian like most hosts are is a better bet each time because they know how to change an environment each time with their comedy. I wouldn't mind Hugh back, but wait at least 4-5 years to do so.

For a fun bit, I really loved James Franco & Seth Rogen in the short film by Judd Apatow and Jack Black pretty much stating the truth that Pixar wins just about every time and he was going to bet on them with his Dreamworks money...classic.

Now on to the winnings. I'm not going to rant about who should have been nominated because no matter what I can do the people/films nominated are the ones who are going to win out of their respective category. No surprises really this year and only 2 upsets. Slumdog Millionaire winning Sound Mixing over the Dark Knight, in which I was sure Dark Knight would sweep the sound categories because it should have. If you close your eyes and listen to the whole film of The Dark Knight compared with Slumdog, you will find that you will get a better emotional feel of the film The Dark Knight because of it's sound.

The other upset was Best Foreign Film, which was actually the biggest upset of the night. 'Departures' beating out the heavy favorites 'Waltz With Bashir' & 'The Class' was to me a little shocking considering Departures has not been hyped at all, as well as not getting hardly any screen time. Departures is slated for the U.S. in May.

So I missed 6 total categories this year which if memory serves me correctly this is the best I've ever done missing - Best Actor, Best Song, Best Sound Mixing, Best Short Documentary, Best Short Animated, and Best Foreign Film. I would have originally missed 5 if I hadn't changed my vote on Best Song from 'Jai Ho' to 'Down to Earth' at the last second. My previous best is missing 7 a couple of times. But it's always the Short Film categories that do me in because it's really hard to actually pick those winners when you have so little resources in watching them. There needs to be a Short Film channel on TV/Cable. And then of course there are always upsets in the Oscars so picking an almost 24 out of 24 is very rare. I'm sure some people have done it before, but I think this year, there probably wasn't a perfect score. However when I look at it I could have done even better if I had just listened to my gut feeling of Sean Penn winning & not changing Best Song. Besides, Sean Penn winning wasn't an upset since he and Mickey Rourke were at a dead heat for probability of winning. Oh well.

So that's it. My initial thoughts on the 81st Oscars. Overall, best Oscar show in a while. I hope they can 1 up it next year.

--LouEx

So.......NEWS!

It's obvious that I haven't posted much in a while. Well, it's been quite around these parts in the Louisville Exclusives world as well as the film world. Granted there are some exciting films coming up in mainstream, but it's been a no news world right now in film. I did hear that Kentucky passed a tax bill to help bring in more filmmaking in Kentucky. Now it's not official as it still has to be passed by more people, but it got out of it's first round winning I think 94-2 or 96-2 vote in for bringing and creating Kentucky as a state to where you can make films now and I will now scream and yell................................................ ok that's out of my system. This is very exciting because now I might be able to start developing more projects without having to move to Los Angeles or Georgia (even I love going there because I've got some good film buddies down there).

I still need to report on my thoughts of the past Oscars so - hint - it was good with not many upsets. But I will (I PROMISE) to write a separate piece on the Oscars. Also we still have our current Exclusive Film, "Clancy", which was made right here in Louisville by a local - Jefferson Moore who played Jesus for about 4-5 years at the Southeast Easter Padget (which might be the world's biggest stage Easter padget) as well as starring in a Papa Johns commercial (Dominos & Pizza Hut are better! Unless if you want local- Clifton's Pizza reins supreme!). "Clancy" though as sold out quite a few times for us which is great ranking right up there with "Tell No One" & "Broken English"

That's it! Got a Ryan Adams concert to attend

Later, 

--Lou Ex