Cinematical

Cinematical has just received this exclusive clip from the upcoming film Choke, based on one of my personal favorite Chuck Palahniuk (Fight Club) books. Choke stars Sam Rockwell as Victor Mancini, a snarky sex addict who cons well-to-do folks out of their money by fake-choking in restaurants while subsequently feeding off the sympathy of others. He then uses this money to help pay his mother's (Anjelica Huston) mental hospital bills. In the clip above -- which is one of a few flashbacks in the film -- young Victor and his mother visit the zoo ... at night ... and they're not exactly there to buy cotton candy. You can learn more about Choke over at its official website. I saw the film back at Sundance and liked it quite a bit -- especially Rockwell's off-the-charts performance as Mancini. Definitely see this one when you get the chance; it arrives in theaters on September 26. Additionally, watch the trailer and another clip over on Moviefone. Enjoy.

Welcome back to another edition of Insert Caption -- the game where we definitely rock it with sexy Jesus all night long. Last week we asked you to strap in Statham-style and race to be the first one to knock us over with a caption for an image from the flick Death Race. Congrats to all three of our winners -- your thirst for speed, prison humor and bald men is quite inspiring to us all.


1. "You sank my battleship!!" -- Jason F.

2. "Unfortunately, the Death Staring Contest proved unpopular." -- Dan N.

3. "In the prisons of the future, its all about survival of the baldest." -- Ben K.

See full image and all captions




This week we're trading in our set of death wheels for a little fun with the theater kids as they rock it out in the new comedy Hamlet 2. In the flick (which has been getting great buzz for a long time now), the hilarious Steve Coogan stars as a failed actor-turned-drama teacher who rallies his students around an absurd, politically incorrect staging of, well, Hamlet 2. The aspirings behind our three favorite captions will prance away with one Hamlet 2 t-shirt, one Hamlet 2 wristband, one sexy Jesus action figure, and one Hamlet 2 car air freshener. I personally have the action figure dancing on my desk as we speak and -- um, yeah -- this Jesus is pretty sexy. (Do I go to hell for saying that?) Sound off below!



Read the official rules for this contest

A brief, sum-it-all-up-in-one-line description of The House Bunny would probably go something like this: Imagine if a sequel to Legally Blonde and a sequel to Clueless had a child and it was adopted by a sequel to Revenge of the Nerds. That's The House Bunny. Thankfully, a strong and very funny performance from Anna Faris -- as well as decent-enough turns from Emma Stone and Kat Dennings -- save this late summer slacker from flunking out of theaters completely. It's familiar, it doesn't make you work for a laugh and, heck, for some it might be a nice way to cap off a long, dark, foul-mouthed summer full of superheroes, stoners and sequels.

To Shelley Darlingson (Faris), living in the Playboy Mansion is a fairytale come true. Sure, she's not a centerfold ... yet ... and was only featured in a few pictorials (Girls with GEDs, Girls with Charlie Sheen), but that doesn't stop her from bringing half-naked cheer and joy to anyone within shouting distance. Things take a turn for the worse, however, when Shelley's told that Hef doesn't want her in the mansion anymore -- that 27 is, like, 59 in Bunny years. With nowhere to go, a suitcase full of skimpy outfits and the rusty, beaten-up station wagon she arrived in, Shelley wanders the streets until eventually she stumbles upon a whole bunch of mansions that look just like home ... only they're fraternity and sorority houses ... but good ol' Shelley don't know the difference.

We get a lot of videos and stuff sent to us here at Cinematical headquarters, but the one above is certainly one of my favorites so far. Not because it's totally unique or different, but because it's extremely well edited, features a whole bunch of great movies and really spends time to focus on why we love these films and what, exactly, attracts us to them. The video was edited by Cinematical ready Sean Grady, and dammit if the Oscars shouldn't ask this dude to throw together their next montage. As far as titles go, he calls it Matinee Uber-Edit ... and it's truly worth the seven-or-so minutes in length, if only for the righteous Uncle Buck scene thrown in the middle. Sean uses some of our favorite classic movie scores to highlight this visual journey -- check it out above. Trust me, if you're a fanboy-ish movie nerd, you're going to love this thing.

And thanks, Sean, for sending it our way. Keep up the good work dude!

An Australian artist by the name of Josh McMahon has created some very cool fan art for the Batman universe. Above, check out an image of Kristen Bell as Harley Quinn. While I'm not so sure the actress would do wonders with that role, I think this doctored-up photo is damn pretty to look at ... and it kinda puts me in the mood to see Quinn in the next Batman flick. Over on McMahon's gallery (which includes several other fan-inspired images), he says that, originally, he planned to use this image as an April Fools Joke and team with a bunch of websites to trick the world into believing Kristen Bell had a small cameo in The Dark Knight. All I'll say is that would've been a fun couple of days right there ... We've included three images in the gallery below (larger version of Bell, a sample image from Batman 3 with Marion Cotillard as Catwoman and another with Anne Hathaway as Batgirl), then head on over to McMahon's page to see a whole bunch more.

Whaddya think? Kristen Bell as Harley Quinn? Marion Cotillard as Catwoman?



[via Slashfilm]

"I tend to make an ass out of myself a lot. And so that's kinda the cool thing that comedy has given me -- the ability to laugh at myself." -- Anna Faris

You might not know it yet, and she might not know it yet, but the female answer to Judd Apatow and Seth Rogen and all those, well, dudes, has finally arrived in the form of ... a Playboy bunny? In her latest film The House Bunny, Anna Faris plays a Playboy bunny who's kicked out of the mansion, and, in searching for a new place to crash, stumbles into the dorkiest sorority house on campus and signs up to be their house mother. It's a familiar PG-13 comedy that doesn't exactly re-invent the wheel, but if there's one reason to see the film, it's Faris. Here, at least, she proves there's definitely room for big, female-centric comedies in Hollywood.

Cinematical sat down with Faris earlier this week, where we spoke about her new film, what it's like to be on the cover of Playboy and how, exactly, she went from starring in dramatic theater productions in Seattle to landing the lead role in a little comedy called Scary Movie.

Cinematical: So congrats on landing the cover of Playboy!

Anna Faris: [laughs] Thank you!

Cinematical: What's up with that? Was anyone caught by surprise or freaked out at seeing you on the cover?

AF: Yeah, I thought it was awesome -- it was rad -- and that all my ex-boyfriends would think, ya know ...

Cinematical: They'd be feverishly flipping through the pages thinking your career was over and this was a last ditch effort to do whatever ...

AF: [laughs] Probably ... but yeah, it was great. Ya know, we planned it awhile ago and just wanted it to tie into the film and all that. My parents are pretty conservative, but they were really happy and excited for me. In fact, I'm taking them to the premiere tomorrow, which the party afterwards is at the [Playboy] mansion ... so [laughs] I'm going to try to drag them up there.

Cinematical has just been informed that Nia Vardalos' My Life in Ruins has scheduled a May 8, 2009 release date, which, so far, puts it opposite Star Trek as the weekend's only other wide release. And yes, we're told it will be a wide release, and that a brand, spanky new trailer will arrive soon (pay no attention to the one leaked online earlier in the month). Produced by Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, Ruins stars Nia Vardalos as she returns to her Greek roots (and to the country itself) as a tour guide who discovers her romantic side while showing a ragtag group of tourists around. Directed by Donald Petrie (How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days), Richard Dreyfuss and Rachel Dratch also star.

Fox Searchlight must have a good feeling about this flick if they're throwing it out right at the beginning of the summer -- and opposite the giganto Star Trek -- though the film's low-key vibes and romantic scenery will counter the ridiculous Trekker fanboy-ish quite well. Will My Life in Ruins bring Vardalos some more big, fat Greek luck? We shall see ...

It's a lonely day in the neighborhood ....

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince: I'm not sure whether Warner Bros. was prepared for the ridiculous fanboy (and girl) backlash that came with pushing the film's release date back several months to the middle of July, 2009, though it looks like they've re-grouped, dusted themselves off and are preparing to get that marketing machine up and running again. Following a statement from Warners chief Alan Horn (included after the jump) comes word from our friends at Bloghogwarts that Warner Bros. has sent in a new trailer (marked at a minute and a half) to the BBFC for approval. Could this be the studio's version of make-up sex? (PG rated make-up sex, of course.) Only time will tell ...

Inglorious Bastards: These days, when it comes to the cast of Quentin Tarantino's WWII flick Inglorious Bastards, nothing is set in stone (or badass, motherf**king stone, as QT would say). Thus, we want to be real careful about this latest news (via Variety) that Michael Fassbender is "in talks" to join the ensemble cast. Note that he's "in talks", as were a few other guys (Simon Pegg, David Krumholtz, though the latter is still mentioned by the trade) before they dropped out. Though they don't say who he'd be playing, the German-speaking actor would most likely take on the role of badass motherf**king Nazi in charge of total damage ... which sounds about right to me. Fassbender, of course, is best known for his role as Stelios in 300, and is still set to appear opposite Abbie Cornish in Wuthering Heights.

Above: At the request of director Michael Bay, Transformers 2 star Megan Fox turns her B into a C.

Lord knows what Megan Fox is doing in the above photo (exercising her breasts for an action scene?), though it may have something to do with Michael Bay's main directorial note (mentioned in this earlier post), which is to "just look hot." Regardless of Fox's boob shuffle, her and co-star Shia LaBeouf are back to work on the set of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, and, yes, it certainly looks like they've worked Shia's bandaged hand into the script (based on the photos below). They even added a bunch of badass blood to it! Seeing as folks who get injured in movies never wear any bandages, it should be rather interesting to see how they work this in (ahem, too many nights up late "thinking" about Megan Fox???). Check out a few photos from the set (and Shia's bloody, bandaged hand) in the gallery below, then scope out the rest over at Spoiler TV.

Update: Thanks to Cinematical reader Erik for pointing out the fact that Fox is wearing a ring on a certain finger. Does it mean something? Here, take a closer look at this photo to the right (and click to enlarge). You tell us ...

What if someone took the video game Pac-Man and turned it into an independent live-action, horror-thriller? Well, check out the video above, because that's exactly what these fine folks did on what looks to be a budget of about twenty bucks. This time, however, we're seeing things from the ghosts POV and Pac-Man is the hunter, instead of the hunted. The Pac-Man graphics are on the cheap, and they even cut in scenes from the video game to use as a substitute for at least one kill, but as a whole -- with a solid, heart-pounding score and clever acting -- this thing is definitely worth a watch. Loved the ending!

Whaddya think? CGI feature-length Pac-Man movie in 2011, starring ... who?