Hosts: David McVay, Josh Philpott & Richard Gray
This week David, Josh and Richard review a pair of new releases, first the new remake of Footloose followed by the new robot fighting film Real Steel. Plus a brand new Lists of Five – Five of Our Favourite Movie Robots. Make sure stay tuned at the end for a visit from Nicholas “The Little Geek” McVay who gives his opinions on Real Steel. Film Actually is the official movie podcast of geekactually.com.
Just a reminder that we continue the re-numbering of the episodes. This show is officially episode 59 but if you have been a long time listener you might know it better as episode 151. In a couple of weeks all past episodes of Film actually will be re-numbered from 1 onwards, sorry about any confusion or inconvenience.
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This show carries an explicit tag due to infrequent coarse language.
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What We’ve Been Watching:
A collection of other things we’ve been watching this week. David and Richard watched the terrible new release rom com What’s Your Number?. Josh and Richard rave about Drive. And then they went old school with David watching The Sword and the Sorcerer and Richard watching Can’t Buy Me Love.
Feature Film Review 1
Footloose directed by Craig Brewer. It is written by Dean Pitchford & Craig Brewer based on the 1984 movie. It stars Kenny Wormald, Julianne Hough, Andie MacDowell, Miles Teller and Dennis Quaid.
Ren MacCormack is transplanted from Boston to the small southern town of Bomont where he experiences a heavy dose of culture shock. A few years prior, the community was rocked by a tragic accident that killed five teenagers after a night out and Bomont’s local councilmen and the beloved Reverend Shaw Moore responded by implementing ordinances that prohibit loud music and dancing. Not one to bow to the status quo, Ren challenges the ban, revitalizing the town and falling in love with the minister’s troubled daughter Ariel in the process. Source: Paramount Pictures
Our Verdict: A good remake that, because of its faithfulness to the original’s script, seems more like a re-staging of the original rather than a remake. Worth a look even though the older members of the audience might get the feeling that they’ve seen it all before.
Watch the trailer here: http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/paramount/footloose/
Feature Film Review 2
Real Steel directed by Shawn Levy. It is written by John Gatinas based on a story by Dan Gilroy and Jeremy Leven and, in part, on the short story “Steel” by Richard Matheson. It stars Hugh Jackman, Dakota Goyo, Evangeline Lilly, Anthony Mackie, Kevin Durand, Hope Davis and James Rebhorn.
Set in the near-future where the sport of boxing has gone high-tech, washed-up fighter Charlie, who lost his chance at a title when 2000-pound, 8-foot-tall steel robots took over the ring is now nothing but a small-time promoter, earning just enough money piecing together low-end bots from scrap metal to get from one underground boxing venue to the next. When Charlie hits rock bottom, he reluctantly teams up with his estranged son Max to build and train a championship contender. As the stakes in the brutal, no-holds-barred arena are raised, Charlie and Max, against all odds, get one last shot at a comeback. Source: Modified from the Dreamworks official synopsis.
Our Verdict: Opinions differ on this one. David and Richard enjoyed this fun family romp. They believed the film has heart and got excited by the Rockyesque fight scenes and storyline. Josh really didn’t care for this film feeling that he just couldn’t connect or care about any of the characters. Nicholas “The Little Geek” McVay jumps in to say that as a kid, he loved it and would recommend it to friends.
Watch the trailer here: http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/dreamworks/realsteel/
Before the Lists of Five we pay tribute to, and mourn the loss of, the great character actor Charles Napier.
Lists of Five
This week our Lists of Five: Five of our Favourite Movie Robots. Love a good movie robot? So do we, here are five of them.
Just a reminder, because we never like to just make things easy on ourselves, our lists are not necessarily top five lists, they are more or a less a list of film recommendations within the theme of the list.
The Rest…
David’s “My Year With Movies” blog is on Tumbr
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The Reel Junkies podcast can be found at weekendronin.com
Brad and Charlie (formerly of “Movie Fan House”) are back, their new site is ReboundRadio.com and their new podcast is “Good Day Sir!”
Rachelle is over at The Funky Film Show, Thursdays on Radio Freemantle 107.9 FM or radiofreemantle.com
Find out about Josh’s other site and to listen to his other show “DLC Live” go to RawDLC.com or follow him on Twitter @DoGM3At
Find more by Richard Gray by visiting theReelBits.com or follow him on Twitter @DVDbits
Our show logo is by Josh Spencer over at Spencer Cartoons at http://attackninja.blogspot.com
The opening clip is from the original “Footloose”.
The closing music is Blake Shelton’s reworking of the classic song “Footloose” from the 2001 remake.
