I’m good with critical analysis, with asking questions (no matter how stupid), but God do I suck at keeping up with every single press release, trailer, and trivial tidbit that comes screeching down this collective set of tubes, viruses, and nudity known as the internet. But hey, the kool thing is I can handpick what I hope will resonate the most. Do you really want to hear if Paris Hilton farted in public again? Neither do I, nor do I believe Paranormal Activity 4 is actually going to be something you can keep close to you. You’ll probably watch it, then wonder why you did. At any rate -

This pic is almost made of awesome. ALMOST.

Alas, one of these shapes is not like the other ones. Let’s see here, what’s awesome about this still from the upcoming Seven Psychopaths?

1) Legendary playwright Sam Rockwell holding an adorable dog whilst wearing a bear hat.

2) Christopher Walken, who from the shot is caught in the midst of being Christopher Walken, and that’s enough awesome to justify human existence.

3) Colin Farrell, looking dazed and…well looking like Colin Farrell.

THE ANSWER IS NOT 3. That’s not all that astonishing. Actually, I was all set to rip Mr. Farrell a new orifice, because most of the mainstream movies I’ve seen him in I LOATHE – but he’s an active supporter of the Special Olympics, the Anti-Bullying movement, and LGBT issues – so we have a conundrum. This is an uncomfortable occurrence I’ve noticed – an otherwise awesome human being either being stuck in doing what’s expected or pandering to what the majority accepts them for. Meh. I’m not going into anthropological study – too much other news to spew. Let’s hope Seven Psychopaths helps him raise the bar. It should because it also stars TOM WAITS and Woody from cheers. I think the only Woody Harrelson role I didn’t much like was Mickey from Natural Born Killers – just didn’t buy the hype, and he’s way kooler than that. If he can wring a strong performance out of a character whose sole bit of memorable dialogue is “Bill FUCKIN Murray!”, you know he’s awesome. And Tom Waits. Well, they’re saying he was the inspiration for Heath Ledger’s Joker. And…He’s Tom Waits. This one’s going to be awesome.

Then this happened, and I don’t much know what I think about it.

This is Dark Arc, what’s being described as “A Candy Colored David Lynch”. I don’t know what I think about that, especially after Crazy Clown TIme. Plus, I can think of more than a few others that share Lynch’s sensibilities that actually GET WHAT IT IS HE DOES. That’s hard as hell to describe, you get that one in the gut, or you don’t. But, unfortunately, this doesn’t remind me of Lynch in the slightest. It kind of brings The Great Gatsby to mind for some weird reason (the book, not the Luhrman…thing) or biopics of tragic artists…but not David Lynch. It may be kool, but I’ve always had a bit of trouble getting behind work about the problems of rich white people. Some stories are transcendent, but take The Ice Storm for instance – those people had it made and created their own hell. Boohoo. I’m still going to give the movie a shot, because even though the trailer seems a little insipid – I’m glad they didn’t blow the best parts of the film, like, oh, say…90% of every trailer released since 1989.

On an upbeat note – Rec 3′s getting released a day early – which was TODAY. God I suck. So that news is now pointless – but a tornado hit my little town…so…well excuses are like…freckles (see what I did there? With jokes like these, I could go on Ed Sullivan!) but THIS HAPPENED. So it’s been one of those weeks. I’d like to give a shout out to the most awesome Brandon Nichols who keeps me in the loop with press releases on this front, because I totally dropped the ball on that. THANKS MOTHER NATURE. He did his part, so sepukku’s on me this time.

I’d also like to give a shout out to Red Cross, the Lion’s Club, and everyone who’s done so much for this little town that no one seemed to know existed up until this point. Thankfully everyone survived, there were people with minor injuries, and a handful of serious ones, but 0 fatalities. Believe it or not, there are smaller towns than this that had trouble as well, and those people are also doing all they can to maintain. It sucks when life gets in the way of awesomesauce and stellar flicks, but it happens – this is one of the awesome things about movies, the escape from the normal slog we all have to face.

And speaking of escaping normalcy:

I found this interview with longtime Cinemaglob faves The Brothers Quay and couldn’t wait to share it. I love their animation something fierce.

Also: The Tall Man trailer, which I hear is like The Slender Man, so…I guess I’ll post both and let you decide. I really want to know what song’s playing in The Tall Man trailer, as it is rad – this could be kind of surprising, but has already achieved negative points in my eyes for not having Angus Scrimm in it. I hear Slender Man is possibly the scariest video game to hit in a long time. I’m backed up on my video games – the tradeoff for writing about movies is I haven’t played much of anything since Fez. Like the comic book movie article, I haven’t been on the cutting edge of gaming since Left 4 Dead came out – what I can say is the Indie Gaming community is turning into a beast, and some of the most creative games are lurking out there for free, so maybe, I don’t know, skip WarDiabloCraftMineQuilt and check out something cerebral.

Back to the Tall Man/Slender Man debacle – this is news to me, apparently there’s an entire community built around this Urban Legend type…character? Looks like I’ve stumbled on to a phenomenon, albeit inadvertently. In all honesty it sounds awesome, the video game being just one facet of an entire mythos that hasn’t been discussed much yet in the mainstream. Google Slender man, a whole slew of things pops up. I guess we’ve found our new bogeyman.

 Not to be confused with Booji Boi.

Well, that’s a wrap on the news front – check out http://www.freeindiegam.es/ for radness, and don’t forget to eat your awesomesauce!

Bonus Points:

We spoke to Trevor Henderson a few weeks back and since then he’s near completion on an excellent art zine dedicated to all things Lovecraftian titled Puffed Shoggoths. He also dropped this excellent print the other day:

You can pick that up here: http://www.etsy.com/listing/105461149/death-to-videodrome-original-art-print ALL HAIL THE NEW FLESH!

And if you caught The Bunny Game and dug the soundtrack as much as I did, keep an eye on http://www.risingbeast.bigcartel.com/ for a limited edition cassette release – for all you audiophiles that are dying to be kind and rewind, get your pencils and prepare to spool til your heart’s content!