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With the continued absence of Monkey it falls to me to try and provide some guidance in terms of what is showing at your local cinemas. I don’t really like the amount of attention that Monkey provided to some of the crap that has been coming our way, so without a further ado:

High School Musical 3: If you are a mindless teenager (or preteen) that is controlled by your peers, has no free will and craves the universal acceptance of your fellow wannabetards, you will go and see this no matter what anyone says. Everyone else need not bother. That is all I have to say about that. (The same goes for College Road Trip.)

So what has happened at the box-office since Monkey last took a peak:

• Lakeview Terrace
• Nights in Rodanthe
• Pineapple Express
• Stop-Loss
• Max Payne

In an effort to share the heavy-lifting I have decided to embed the Trialer Addict trailers with these previews. I apologise to anybody on a slow internet connection (but to be honest, just because they are there does not mean you have to watch them. And if you are the partial to watching movie trailers, then why are you on a slow connection?)

Lakeview Terrace

America must be a terrifying place.  It seems you are never safe no matter what you do, where you live or what lengths you go to protect yourself.  I mean, where else, except in America, would having Samuel L. Jackson as your next-door neighbour be a bad thing? The man is practically made of cool. Not so in Lakeview Terrace, where Jackson plays a demented LAPD officer hell-bent on forcing out his new interracial neighbours (you know, because it sets a terrible precedent for the kids.)

When Chris and Lisa Mattson (played by Patrick Wilson and Kerry Washington) move into their dream home, little do they know what is in store for them.  Next-door neighbor Abel Turner (Jackson) is not only an LAPD officer, but a bastion of the community.  So naturally when he takes a disliking to them and goes about trying to force them out of his community things get a little bit tense.

So far, so good. Until, that is, you take a look at who is in the director’s seat: Niel LaBute. Niel made his name with the insanely successful Nurse Betty, but really left his skid mark in the underpants of cinema with the 2006 remake of The Wicker Man. I doubt I could ever bring myself to forgive him for that, I am just not a big enough person.

Anyway, back to the present… Lakeview Terrace looks like a bland little thriller with the typical formula thrown in: Couple move into idyllic home in lovely neighbourhood. The neighbours seem nice, until one of them is revealed to be a raging psychopath, but only to them because when they look for help everyone thinks they are crazy. Therefore it is up to them to take matters into their own hands which is when the shit well and truly hits the fan.

Walrus Rating: Rental

Nights in Rodanthe

Hands up anyone who still finds Richard Gere irrisistable. Wow, that explains a lot… Richard Gere has seemingly been it all. He has gone from being a prostitute to hiring one, been an officer and a gentleman, an attorney and a gynecologist. In fact, he has played some kind of doctor several times in his career, which leads me to believe that there must be a number of women out there who harbour certain doctor/patient fantasies for Mr. Gere.

Nights in Rodanthe reunites Gere with Diane Lane who previously starred opposite each other in the cheating wife/jealous husband drama Unfaithful. (No, Nights in Rodanthe is not the prequel, I don’t think…)

Here Gere plays Dr. Paul Flanner who is trying to reunite with his estranged son (played by James Franco) who he lost touch with because he decided being a great doctor is more important than anything else in his life.

Lane plays Adrienne Willis, a woman recovering from the unbearable chaos of a wayward husband and a rebellious teenage daughter. She decides to manage her best friend’s beach hotel for a weekend.  This just happens to be the same beach hotel where Dr. Flanner is to be the sole lonely guest that very weekend <gasp>.

Predictably romance ensues as can only happen in Hollywood. With zingers like “There is a kind of love that makes you feel that anything is possible, I want you to know that you can have that” this one is definitely not high up on my list of things to see.

(By the way, ladies, before you start sending in your hate mail about how a male reviewer can never truly appreciate romantic films, consider this: I enjoyed The Notebook.)

Walrus Verdict: Skip (unless you are a menopausal divorcee.)

Pineapple Express

With his good looks and all the effort that Hollywood has made to make him a leading man (see for example: Spider Man, Tristan + Isolde, Annapolis, Flyboys) it can be easy to overlook that James Franco’s breakout role was in a short-lived Judd Apatow produced series called Freaks and Geeks. Therefore it is no surprise to see Franco reunited with Apatow and his favourite muse Seth Rogen in the stoner comedy Pineapple Express.

Rogen plays Dale Denton a court-process clerk and super-stoner who pretty much just lives to light up.  He has a favourite dealer Saul Silver (Franco) who introduces him to a rare variety of super-skunk called the Pineapple Express. One night while Dale is looking for a quiet place to toke he becomes the sole witness to a murder by a drug dealer and a corrupt cop. Hijinks ensue and Dale and Saul are forced to flee for their lives (but not before stocking up on more weed and snacks of course…)

As Monkey mentioned in a previous roundup, Judd Apatow has had a bit of a mixed record in the last few years.  On the better side we have such films as Anchorman, The 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up. On the crap side we have films like Walk Hard and You Don’t Mess with the Zohan. (And they were really, really crap.) Furthermore, there seems to be a bit of Judd Apatow overload at the moment.

For what it is worth, the trailer looks funny, so I might just get together with some bros and give this one a look.

Walrus Rating: Cinema (but you might need to be super-stoned to truly appreciate it)

Stop-Loss

Stop-Loss seems like one of a breed of truly awful films: the American conscience movie.  I am tempted to call it an “All your Iraq are belong to us” protest film, which it is, but it is a little more insidious than that simplistic definition will allow for.

When the United States attacked Iraq they did so without the approval of the United Nations and to the complete and utter disapproval of most of the world. Subsequent to the initial invasion the very reason for it (the fallacious statements that Iraq had so-called Weapons of Mass Destruction) has now been successfully debunked.

The cost of that war to the people of Iraq cannot be measured and the horrific loss of lives still continues. Some studies have put the number of dead due to the war at over a million. Furthermore the global instability and the cost to the American economy are starting to take its toll as well. It has been estimated that the cost of this war to the American economy is in the region of $3 trillion (that is $3,000,000,000,000!)

Which is why, when presented by an American film about volunteer American soldiers who willingly joined The War to “do the right thing” and then suffer under the consequences of thier foolhardiness, I am not all that inclined to give a damn.

Stop-loss is an American military term that refers to the involuntary and unilateral extension of a serviceman’s enlistment contract in order to retain them in active duty beyond their original end of service date. It’s kind of like getting told that you have another year at school right after you have matriculated.

Ryan Phillippe plays decorated war hero Sgt. Brandon King who returns from Iraq and tries to resume his life in his small Texas hometown. However when Brandon is ordered back to Iraq to serve another tour, he rebels against the orders.

Stop-Loss is directed by Kimberly Pierce who’s previous film, Boys Don’t Cry was a smash hit on the independent and art-film circuits.

Walrus rating: Skip

Max Payne

Max Payne was a successful third-person shooter game for the PC, PS2 and Xbox consoles. Of note were its stylish graphics, dark storyline and Matrix-like “Bullet Time” slow motion dynamic. Outside of the gaming community not many people would have heard of it, which makes its big-screen transition a little puzzling. That being said, I am a gaming geek who will probably go and see it just for that reason (thereby validating Hollywood’s evil little plan.)

Max Payne (the movie) stars Mark Wahlberg in the title role as a cop trying to track down the murderer of his wife and newborn child.  As he digs deeper into the criminal underground surrounding the murders he is also drown into an underworld filled with designer drugs and demonic hallucinations.

He is joined on his search by sexy assassin Mona Sax (played by That ’70s Show star Mila Kunis) who is looking to avenge the death of her sister (played by forthcoming Quantum of Solace hottie Olga Kurylenko)

Walrus Rating: Cinema (for gamers), Rental (for normal folks)

Just for fun here is a Saturday Night Live sketch where Mark Wahlberg talks to some farm animals: