The Beaver - Too Right!

The next movie we're reviewing as part of the 2012 Halloween meltdown is "The Beaver." Wait you say - this movie has nothing to do with the spookiest time of the year - we beg to differ. This movie contains three elements that we are sure will terrify most sane people:

1. Mel Gibson
2. Australian-Speak
3. Beaver hand puppets

 Mel Gibson with his hand up a Beaver's bum...

Kudos to Jody for casting though - Mel Gibson was hands down (or up) the best choice in Hollywood for the role. Randy Quaid and Charlie Sheen no doubt would have turned in great performances but could never have mastered Australian English the way Mad Max can. The plot goes something like this - a fairly depressed middle-aged man on the verge of suicide runs across a hand puppet in the trash and it more or less possesses him. We were wondering if the story might actually be Mel Gibson's autobiography but the movie doesn't include any Russian girlfriends getting punched in the face.

Jody Foster felt compelled to tell this story - we're not sure why - about how mental illness and hand puppets don't mix. Wrapped in this sad personal tale (or tail) is the larger question of why Beavers are so misunderstood and maligned in our society. This movie is just one more blatant attempt at Beaver character assassination. Don't believe there is a plot to ruin the noble Beaver's reputation; well just think about this:

• Why are they the butt of so many adolescent jokes?
• Why do we tend to associate them with kids who have buck teeth and glasses?
• Why do they also seem so busy - are they on something?
• How come we only focus on the fact they cut down trees instead building up the watershed?

Why are they so busy, don't they take vacations - are they on speed?

Now take the Wolverine. Here's a creature not too distantly related to Beavers who gets associated with really cool superheros and Cold War freedom fighters. The Beaver in this movie is not only not cool, he's kind of like an evil spirit (and as we know there is nothing more disturbing than an Australian accent) which opens up whole new avenues to negatively label Beavers. He's funny and lovable at first, but then we're introduced to Darth Beaver who enjoys beating up Mel as regularly as Mel tends to beat up his ex-wives. There are other characters in the movie - Jody Foster just seems to be there in order to do on camera directing. The guy who played Chekov in Star Trek is there looking like he is 16 going on 32 playing a high school senior with some serious beaver-envy issues. The girl from Hunger Games is in this too  - at the high school graduation it seems as though she might pull out a bow and arrow and start shooting but she wimps out on that.

Overall the film is like watching a slow moving train wreck - but not a very interesting one and of course, the noble Beaver is the ultimate casualty here.

Ok - this clip is R-rated, but we show this here only to illustrate the infamous anti-beaver propaganda campaign now underway in our society...

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Summer Movie Blockbusters - 2011

The nights are getting shorter, the weather is getting warmer, Charlie Sheen is getting crazier and Osama Bin Laden is now on a seafood diet (or on something's diet) - all that adds up to Summertime 2011 ! And one of the best parts of our Summer each year is anticipation of the year's greatest movies or least the most entertaining ones - which tend to get packed into the two to three month window between late May and Mid-August.

It's time for this year's crop of Summer movie blockbusters. Since they haven't been released yet it is a bit of a guessing game as to which movies will actually dominate the box office but we're willing to apply our intuition and predict what we think will be big.

The creative team behind Super 8

Blockbuster Prediction 1 - Super 8
Top on our list is the much anticipated "Super 8." It's a sci-fi classic waiting to happen - directed by J.J. Abrams, produced by Steven Spielberg and starring Dakota Fanning's little sister, Alice - it's alien meets Ohio flick in the best tradition of the genre.

These kids were making their own movie before it showed up...

Now this doesn't appear to a cuddly E.T. type of situation - it looks like we'll be getting more War of The World's / Battle of Los Angeles with this action thriller. For those of us who live near Wright Patterson Air Force Base - we always knew they were shipping aliens here from out west - now we have the proof!

Next on our list is...

Blockbuster Prediction 1 - Cowboys & Aliens
This movie comes out after Super 8 and indicates a trend we will be witnessing throughout the Summer. Many if not most of the big releases are going to be sci-fi films - it makes you wonder why the sy-fy channel changed its name and decided to focus on men in tights instead of fiction. Anyway this movie, directed by Jon Favreau (both an actor and director - directed the Iron Man films) highlights a powerful cast including James Bond in exile (Daniel Craig), Harrison Ford and Sam Rockwell.

It is supposed to take place in Arizona but was filmed in New Mexico

There's something both exciting and dangerous about mixing genres like this (we just watched a flick called Aliens versus Ninjas the other night, not a pretty sight) - but with Steven Spielberg behind the scenes on this project and veterans like Harrison Ford in front the screen we're confident it will work out well.

The other sci-fi blockbuster contenders for this Summer include:

1. X-Men First Class (X-men as the original rat pack working for JFK)
2. Rise of the Planet of The Apes (digital chimps are better than monkey suits)
3. Apollo 18 (why no one wants to go back to the moon)

Some other Notable Releases include:

1. Fright Night (a remake of the 1985 classic with Colin Farrel and Doctor Who's David Tennant)
2. Pirates of the Caribbean something - we don't really know which one this is and figured we had to list it but c'mon - talk about beating a dead horse (a.k.a. Keith Richards)...
3. Hobo with a Shotgun - It seems impossible that people won't want to see a movie with a title like this, right? Rutger, you've come a long way since Bladerunner.
4. The Beaver - Again a title that's hard to ignore. What's even better; this is a movie where a crazy man (Mel Gibson) plays a crazy man. If only this movie had Charlie Sheen in it...
5. Cars 2 - They probably waited too long for the sequel, Paul Newman has been dead how long now?
6. And yes - we are merely going to ignore Transformers whatever the number is and hope it goes away.
7. Glee Live 3D - just kidding.

So there you have it - what's going to be big and what looks interesting for Summer 2011.


Copyright 2011, Raving Reviews™

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Why is Mel Gibson so Crazy?

This is a question that has perplexed us over the past year - Mel Gibson, Hollywood megastar, director and producer seems to be getting progressively more insane. What could be behind this transformation? Is it some sort of addiction, mental breakdown or has he become one of his disturbed characters (perhaps a mix of Mad Max and the Patriot)?

Think we're exaggerating? The following is just one of a flood of phone recordings & voicemails that Mel's ex released and are now floating around the Internet. Don't listen to this if you are faint of heart or can't tolerate foul language (it's somewhere beyond R-rated).

Mad Mel, Mean Mel, Wacky Mel - anything but
well-adjusted or Mild-Mannered Mel.

And Mel hasn't limited his poor behavior to his hapless gal pals, he's been arrested and poured abuse on the police as well. So when not punching his wife while holding his baby he drives around L.A. trashed on Tequila. Could this all be attributed to alcoholism?

He doesn't know where his anger comes from...

Even while he's sober he still blames Jews for creating all the wars in the world.

And no this wasn't a real apology...

So, again we us ask ourselves why is Mel Gibson so freaking crazy?

• Is it lack of success? No, can't be that, he's made hundreds of millions of dollars and achieved success at all levels of the motion picture industry.
• Is it the fact he was an American living in Australia for too many years? This is a distinct possibility as an Aussie accent has been know to induce psychosis in some Americans. He also may be related to Russell Crowe, we think.
• Did the Jews do this to him, yeah probably, and they're loving it...
• Is Mel becoming one of his bloodthirsty characters, wishing he could go around chopping up the neighbors - it's certainly possible.
• Is it because Mel uses Tequila for tap water in house now? We heard he does...
• Or maybe it's all the creative pressure - nay, he's a freaking loon.
  

Ultimately we may never know what happened to Mad Mel. Perhaps his journey into the heart of darkness in Apocalyptico and Passion of Christ was too much for him. One hopes that he can take advantage of his new personality (or personalities) and become a Right Wing talk show host - making even more money.

Of course, this has got us wondering about a lot of other things to, such as:

• Why are the Bengals the worst team in football and why do we still root for them?
• Are dogs really smarter than cats (and just faking the dumb act)?
• Is Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) human or an evil pod person?
• Is Hugh Hefner really a young guy wearing an old guy suit?
• Did we really land on the moon and if so how come we didn't bring back any refrigerator magnets?
  

We will attempt to answer those and many other questions here on Raving Reviews.


Copyright 2010, Raving Reviews

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