September's Cinematic Suckage

I had a rant all prepared about Prop 8 and the Ground Zero mosque debate, but I have decided that I'm going to keep those opinions to myself -- for now, anyway.

Instead, I'm going to continue my rant about the sad state of movies this summer. I've already whined about the bad movies being foisted upon us this month, but I'm afraid next month looks even worse...

There is not a single movie scheduled for wide release in September which makes me say "I have to see that!"

The first wide release of the month is Robert Rodriguez' Machete on September 3rd, a feature-length movie based on the fake trailer he created for his and Quentin Tarantino's Grindhouse. While I found Rodriguez' Planet Terror to be by far the superior of the two films that made up Grindhouse ( Tarantino's Death Proof was just plain boring), there's something about Machete that just seems so... well, for lack of a better word, stupid. I simply have no interest in seeing this movie, despite its (mostly) excellent cast:

I have to wonder how Lohan managed to stay sober enough to make this movie.

September 10's big release is 'director' Paul W.S. Anderson's fourth entry in the video game-inspired Resident Evil series, Resident Evil: Afetrlife 3D. Milla Jovovich (Anderson's wife) reprises her role as the genetically-engineered zombie killer, Alice in this totally unnecessary sequel. Y'all know by now how much I love a good zombie flick (the operative word there being 'good'), but come on:

I'll give it this much: At least the 3D isn't an afterthought, as with so many of this summer's films.

September 17th brings us two major wide releases. Easy A stars another excellent cast in what looks like a completely ridiculous teen comedy loosely based on Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, a book every high-schooler never reads:

Do Stanley Tucci and Patricia Clarkson really need the money that badly?

The 17th also sees the Ben Affleck directed crime drama, The Town, about a woman (Rebecca Hall) who unknowingly falls in love with a man (Affleck) who abducted her in a bank robbery. Jon Hamm, Jeremy Renner and Blake Lively (really?) co-star:

Meh. I'll wait for cable.

The 24th has three major releases about which I could care less, but two limited-release movies I really do want to see. First up, Watchmen director Zack Snyder's CGI family film Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole:

"Lord of the Owls?" Somehow, I don't think even children will be interested in this film.

Then there's Oliver Stone's long-awaited (by some) sequel to Wall Street, Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (and what the hell does that title even mean?):

I'm not even going to talk about the Kristin Bell/Jamie Lee Curtis/Sigourney Weaver comedy You Again. It just seems like a complete waste of time and talent, even if Betty White's in it.

The last weekend of September does hold two promising limited-release movies, the first of which is the Ryan Reynolds thriller Buried, about an American who is captured and ransomed by Iraqi hostiles:

And finally there's Howl, starring the sexually ambiguous James Franco as 50's beat poet Allen Ginsberg:

I guess I'll be spending my September movie dollars at the art houses, this year.

And how about you? What movies do you want to see next month? You know I love when you leave me you comments.

More, anon.
Prospero