TAKE A LEAP!, NOT A POLAROID
Horror and cartoons take over the big screen this week writes Chris Lackner.
MOVIES
Big releases on Aug. 25: Leap!; Polaroid. Big picture: Leap! is Frozen meets Oliver Twist meets So You Think You Can Dance meets Amelie meets The Goonies. (It must have been a hell of a Hollywood pitch meeting). Two cute orphan runaways head to Paris to follow their dreams — feisty redhead Felicie (voiced by Elle Fanning) and the young inventor Victor (Dane DeHaan). Felicie must pretend to be the child of an elite family to sneak in to a prestigious ballet school. There were no maybes involved: Canada’s own Carly Rae Jepsen got the call to voice the orphan dancer’s unlikely mentor, a mysterious school custodian.
Meanwhile, Polaroid is The Ring meets Final Destination meets Needful Things. It also makes me ponder the endless supply of stupid people in horror-movie scripts. How many people can possibly react like this? “Wow! Look at the creepy, goosebump inducing item that I just discovered in this dusty, old box (attic/basement etc.)? Gosh golly, I think I’ll keep it!”
In Polaroid, a millennial working at an antique shop (oh Tinseltown, such creative screenwriters!) finds a vintage Polaroid camera that knocks off the people it captures in stills — and is probably inhabited by the spirit of a serial killer. Forecast: I assume the idea of an “ancient” pre-digital camera alone — minus the evil spirit — will be enough to terrorize the minds of this film’s young audience. Not having to be selective about your photographs, develop photos and no selfie sticks — the horror, the horror!
TV
Big events: Death Note (Aug. 25, Netflix); Disjointed (Aug. 25, Netflix). Big picture: It’s not even close to Halloween yet, but it appears to be a good week for demonic forces. Death Note is big -budget Netflix original. The adaptation of a Japanese manga is essentially Hellraiser meets Pan’s Labyrinth meets Aladdin. A high school slacker inherits a book (it literally falls from the sky) that summons the powers of an ancient death god — a beasty with the teeth of a piranha, the body of porcupine and glowing orange eyes.
Basically, whoever’s name is written in the creature’s book winds up gonzo. What starts as a grand exercise in taking out bad guys and “making the world a better place” rapidly gets out of hand (as all such plans usually do).
Meanwhile, Disjointed (starring Kathy Bates) is a new sitcom from Chuck Lorre.
It’s like Cheers meets Weeds as it follows the staff and clientele of a cannabis dispensary. Forecast: Death Note will be well received by genre fans. However, am I the only one who misses a good old-fashioned genie? Three wishes? Maybe a few wisecracks. Then it’s all over. A built-in check on absolute power.
MUSIC
Big releases on Aug. 25: Iron & Wine (Beast Epic); Queens of the Stone Age (Villains). Big picture: I’ve always liked Iron & Wine because the one-man band is named after two of my favourite things.
The new album plays against title, scaling back his epic sonic affairs down to their softer, finer points.
In other words, expect many stripped-down ballads.
Meanwhile, Josh Homme and company get kinda political on Queens of the Stone Age’s seventh album. Nevertheless, they’re still ready to rock, and they even bring a bit of the funk. The band’s single The Evil Has Landed was released on Aug. 10, oddly prescient given the headlines that began that week south of the border. Forecast: Hail to the Queens. They’re ready to hard rock the nearest arena or the nearest iPod. Villains begone.