Critics Consensus: The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is Short on Razzle Dazzle

"Burt Wonderstone" tries to take an episode of Arrested Development to full length, except Steve Carell and Jim Carrey aren't as funny as Will Arnett and Ben Stiller. POOF! It'll magically appear in a Redbox by summer.

Really looking forward to Ghibli's "From Up on Poppy Hill", written by Miyazaki and directed by his son, who some folks still haven't entirely forgiven for "Earthsea". Well, everybody deserves another shot.

Harmony Korine pretty much guarantees that his films are a lot of things. I don't know if they're 'good' precisely, but they're never boring. And it seems that at least some of its critics haven't figured out that it's satire, so I'm in for that one, Franco be damned.

"Blancanieves" looks interesting, like a Spanish Guy Maddin perhaps. And "Reality", the follow-up to Matteo Garrone's "Gomorrah", looks good to me. I almost want to watch "Upside Down" just for how badly it pissed off critic Matt Pais (one of my least favorite). I just read the synopsis for "K-11" and I'll have to shower as soon as possible.

I can't believe how much further they've managed to milk the Amityville hoax. Let's see a documentary about the kids traumatized by being raised with fraudulent parents staging scary-ass antics around you and insisting against all sane revelation that it's "too true". I might be scarred too, but it doesn't make the "many bottles of wine" any more real as paranormal phenomena.

Mar 14 - 05:29 PM

Franco be damned?! C'mon, man! He looks, sounds, and acts wonderfully absurd in Spring Breakers. I find it oddly compelling.

Mar 14 - 07:17 PM

Franco is a fine actor, but his artistic pretentions are awful. Read his inauguration poem for Obama, or some of his short fiction. Trite. His montage art he showed off at a Berlin gallery. Sub-Banksy. His short film concept "Interior: Leather Bar" was the laughing stock of Sundance. His musings about performance art is juvenile. He's managed to collaborate on some terrible EDM. His academic career is a fraud (as some of his professsors have confessed). If he wasn't trying so hard to be taken seriously as some kind of genius when he very clearly is not, he might be a little more bearable.

Korine, on the other hand, is more intriguing. His photography, writing, artwork, songwriting (with Bjork), and, of course, his films, which, weird as they are, they do so a singular aesthetic vision - Harmony Korine films look like Harmony Korine films and unlike anyone else's. He can be frustratingly obscure and deliberately grotesque, but there is an underlying, unique meaning in them. "Gummo" and "Mister Lonely" are fascinating films. "Spring Breakers" will probably be more of a goof, like his previous "Trash Humpers", a deliberately pathetic gross-fest meant to subvert the dirty underbelly of Joe Francis' Rum-ham nightmares.

Mar 14 - 09:03 PM

Agree that Franco is becoming pretentious and a little annoying with the wannabe renaissance man act he has going now. But, as you said, he is a great actor, and I think he really shines in roles that would normally be tough to sell for many actors.

Mar 14 - 11:58 PM

Lance Reeder

Yeah, but then he struggles in roles that could be performed by a shaved monkey, like both you said because he feels the need to try to be pretentious. It's like he wants to be Steve Buscemi or Christopher Walken and memorable in everything he's in. Spiderman 3 I just remember thinking, if you're the worst actor in this movie that's saying something.

Mar 15 - 05:04 PM

Yeah I agree, Franco isn't bad at all. What brought on the Franco hate. I'm just thrilled to see that Spring Breakers is more than "over 21" or "Project X". The "DISNEY GIRLS GONE WHORE!" marketing campaign has been excruciating especially with most disney girl gone whore films being complete and utter crap. Anne Hathaway in Havoc for example or Vanessa Hugensin (spelling) in Sucker Punch or Lindsey Lohan in absolutely everything after mean Girls. Anyone here Finish "I know who killed me?" Anyways, very happy to see the movie is much more than a project for Selena Gomez to show all her fans she has boobs now.

Mar 14 - 08:09 PM

This Guy

Spring Breakers...fresh? and it has Selena Gomez in a bikini? So this movie has it all going for it.....nice

Mar 14 - 05:33 PM

Daniel Irwin

Plus, it's from the screenwriter of "Kids", one of the most controversial films of the 90's. Korine very much reminds me of Nicolas Winding Refn.

Mar 14 - 05:38 PM

? You don't mind if I ask, which Korine films have you seen?

Mar 14 - 05:53 PM

Dave J

Seen "Gummo" because it was on Bravo a few times as well as his interviews afterwards which he says that basically uses things he can find anywhere and hopes to turn it into a film; saw "Kids" which the characters don't do nothing but act like a bunch of misfits which any film makers can do as well if they're willing to put the time, and saw bits and parts of "Julien Donkey Boy" which was extremely forgettable! Harmony Korine is a forgettable film maker and the only way I'll watch his latest flick is if it's on the movie channel!

Mar 15 - 02:29 PM

Well, the problem may be that as a result of watching these films on basic cable, they have edited out quite a bit of the more interesting parts. But, as far as "Julien Donkey-Boy" (horrible title, I will concede) goes: how can you forget Werner Herzog, high on cough syrup, watching a western wearing a gas mask? Where else will you find such vintage moody brooding!

Mar 16 - 12:21 AM

I am looking forward to Spring Breakers a good bit, but I honestly do not feel like Korine has done anything on the level of Drive, Bronson, Valhalla Rising, Pusher II, or even Pusher III. Refn is a filmmaker other director's envy.

Mar 14 - 07:20 PM

Korine has never been particularly interested in conventional storytelling, so it's difficult to compare (which is why I was confused by it).

Mar 14 - 09:08 PM

True. I prefer Refn's style to Korine's, but I commend both of them for being uncompromising filmmakers, even if sometimes it does not make for a film that is exactly good (I find the first Pusher film from Refn to be incredibly slow and uninvolving, and Fear X is pretty bad as well).

Mar 15 - 12:02 AM

I saw kids and thought it was a lot like Cather in the Rye in the sense that all the adults around me were protesting it and I couldn't quite figure out why, hell I still don't know why those two things are protested. I'll Red Box Spring Breakers or rent it from a library as if it will be playing in a theater around my area.

Mar 14 - 08:11 PM

"Kids" was written by Korine, but it isn't really like his own films. See if your library has "Gummo" (good luck!).

Mar 14 - 09:09 PM

Bummer, not streaming on Netflix. Have to wait for this one.

Mar 14 - 11:34 PM

Infernal Dude

Kids was a time and place thing. There was very little out that was quite as direct as it was. Aids, sex, and drugs in the '90s. A whole generation of parents saw what their kids were dealing with.

Mar 14 - 11:49 PM

Dave J

Excuse me, Korine is not in the same league as Nicolas Winding Refn- not even close! The main difference the characters Refn creates are easily to understand whereas what Korine does is that if he were to find a dead cat some place as well as other things he can find then he would used it hoping to get some kind of movie out of it!

Mar 15 - 02:27 PM

Excuse you, I have it good authority that the cat was purchased from a local Xenian Chinese restaurant!

Mar 16 - 12:19 AM

David Tanny

Spring Breakers scored about what I was thinking...and hoping. Looks like a good one.

Mar 14 - 05:47 PM

Very disappointed in how Burt Wonderstone turned out. I was looking forward to it until I saw the first trailer, which did not get a single genuine laugh out of me. The premise and cast are golden, the script and execution seem to have left a lot to be desired.

The Call looked meh at best to me, not at all shocked to see a WWE film be in the 30's on the T-meter.

Spring Breakers on the otherhand, looks like something worth watching just based off the material paired with the director, as well as Franco in some absolutely brilliant stunt casting. From the reviews and trailers, it seems like it will be subverting the whole party genre, as well as the excessive "party hard" lifestyle that is all the rage these days, but doing it in a wonderfully pulp-ish, possibly even over the top manner. Hope it plays near me soon so I can catch it.

The trailer for K-11 was TERRIBLE. I totally understand why Kristen Stewart jumped ship on her mom's directing debut.

Mar 14 - 07:13 PM

Awww Sad, she ditched her Mom's film after all her Mom has done for her? How can some one in a major block buster franchise have reservations on a films quality? Bummer.

Mar 14 - 08:14 PM

Cannot say I really blame K-Stew; K-11 had one of the worst trailers I have seen for a theatrical release in quite a while.

Mar 15 - 12:05 AM

King Simba

Everyone has their standards I guess.

Besides, Twilight was a pretty good paycheck. Stewart's salary for the last film was probably more than the entire budget of K-11.

Mar 15 - 04:49 PM

I don't know why but I always Forget about the Money. Yeah K-11 looks like she was asked to do this on a favor and not the 5-6 figures she should be accustomed to.

Mar 16 - 09:49 AM

K-Stew's mom sure must have a thing for transexual s/m and child molesters.

Mar 14 - 09:12 PM