Who could the next Batman be

The cat is out of the bag. In perhaps the most ill-advised move since the announcement of a Point Break reboot (which was just earlier this year – Hollywood is really pushing the throttle on these bad ideas), WB has announced that Batman will make an appearance in the next Man of Steel movie. It’s slated for 2015 and it’s unclear how big a role the Caped Crusader will play in Zach Snyder’s follow-up feature (the original earned a camel dick rating from yours truly at BMC).

What is known: Henry Cavill will be reprising the Superman role, David S. Goyer is back on board as a writer, fanboys are frenetically stroking their shafts, and it’s looking very much like Batman and Superman will go toe-to-toe in this one. The lone proposition there I can get on board with is Cavill, and it’s a lukewarm response at that.

Alas, WB has pushed the full retard button and the role of Batman must be recast. This is upsetting to me because pretty much the only thing I liked about The Dark Knight Rises was that it brought closure to the Dark Knight saga. Chris Nolan had laid down this mammoth gauntlet, and there was a tacit understanding that only a select few (and perhaps none of his generation) could touch this source material again. He had elevated the character and, more importantly, the superhero movie to a level of reverence, and on a much grander, sweeping, epic scale than what I consider to be the second greatest oeuvre in the genre, Unbreakable.

Since I’m a slave to popular trends and, well, everyone else is doing it, here is a list of my picks for the next Batman. Whatever. It’s rainy and I’m bored.

The names hereunder may surprise you. When you consider the most celebrated and iconic superhero performances ever captured on film, they have come from the least likely candidates. Neither Michael Keaton nor Christopher Reeve was a huge star when cast, and neither fit the bill physically. So when I drop the name of some unassuming, middling TV star and you’re like ‘Ben, seriously wtf?’ just think about how straight up imposing Mike Keaton was at 5’9” and 160 lbs and give me benefit of the doubt, okay? Because I know shit.

Adrian Pasdar

Elected on a platform tripling Arkham Asylum's budget

This is my number one draft pick right here. One of those rare actors who everyone acknowledges ‘Yeah, this guy is a hard ass’ without him ever having to lift a finger. Seriously. He is a already a superhero in Heroes, but all he really did in that show was look damn good in a suit and give his younger brother (Milo Ventimiglia as an infinitely stronger superhero) stern talkings to about what an unmitigated fuckup he is. DUDE. Petrelli for President.

  

Let’s also not forget Pasdar’s turn in Season 7 of Burn Notice, in which he is all kinds of jacked up and spends four or six whole episodes telling mercs to clear a path or their shit will get ended in the realest of ways. I don’t think he even fires a gun. He just leers menacingly.

Pasdar is suave, has the dark, brooding thing down pat, and is a legit good actor. His Bruce/Batman would rule to the end of time. He’s pretty much too good to be in whatever this movie will turn out to be. Nothing that Snyder has up his sleeve can be as good as Pasdar in this role.

Tahmoh Penikett

Tahmoh is my go-to actor for pretty much any action role that needs doing (cept Bond). Tahmoh is a god among insects.

For starters: he is a beast. The guy is 6’3”, probably 210 (but could easily go up to 225) and an accomplished muay thai practitioner. The fights scenes he has performed on camera have been a shit-ton more convincing than that keysi mumbo jumbo Nolan opted for, not to mention every second movie these days. Who’s ever heard of this bullshit? Keysi sounds like a cheap pornstar name. Tom Cruise does it in Jack Reacher, and you know what else Tom Cruise does? Dudes up the ass. Muay thai is for baddasses like Tony Jaa and Van Damme. You can say what you want about The Quest and the Muscles from Brussels himself, Van Damme has done enough cocaine to kill a family of large barnyard animals as well as three-quarters of Motley Crue.

Let’s not forget that wherever Tahmoh shows up, he is the dark horse. He played the Fox Mulder role in Dollhouse, if Mulder were less of a geek and more of a Terminator. And, sure, the Adama family rules the roost up on Battlestar Galactica but let’s be real: who does everyone wish they could be in this show? Team Agathon, baby. Team Agathon will sledgehammer your nancy ass.

And then some, fracker.

 

The only strike against him is that he already played a bit part in Man of Steel, but a) blink and you miss it; and b) there are myriad examples of actors who played multiple roles within one SF universe, so this should hardly be a problem.

And perhaps Tahmoh’s strongest asset: he has that Mike Keaton glint in his eyes that tells you he could snap at the push of a button. That devil-may-care quality about Keaton’s performance is something that people sadly tend to forget, and that has been absent from the Batman franchise since he retired the cape. Of all the Batmans, I maintain Keaton was the most frightening, because you feel his screws are just barely tighter than the criminals he’s chasing. Not only is he the sole Batman who full-on kills people, but he does it in such ingenious, vicious, horrific fashion. He murders baddies in ways that will guarantee they shit their pants first. And not just a coffee break shit. A nice, big, spicy Thai Express Special shit. That’s the Batman I want to see again and that I’m convinced Tahmoh can deliver.

Also: Canada. Boom.

Wes Bentley

He's the best piece of ass in three states

I don't feel there's much to say about this one. If he manages to bring even half the unhingedness of his real life into the movie, we'll have a real show-stopper on our hands.

Jai Courtney

The first thing you might say is: who’s Jai Courtney? And when I explain, your next question might be ‘Really??’ And, well, yes. Really. He rules.

Plus, what would be your counterarguments?

1. He’s too young.

Bale was only three years older when he was cast.

2. He doesn’t have the voice for it.

Audio engineering and, also, that’s a stupid reason.

3. Not tough-looking enough.

QED

The opposite ends of his mandible are in different time zones. He looks plenty tough. Also, none of us actually believes that Tom Cruise could have beaten his ass in Jack Reacher. The only reason why Tom Cruise beats his ass is because Tom Cruise bought the rights to the franchise so that Tom Cruise could beat whoever’s ass Tom Cruise wanted to beat on any particular day. Because he needs to puff out his chest every few years. Because he takes it from dudes.

That’s it. Four candidates. How many more do you need? Realistically, you only need one and there’s no way in tarnation that Zach Snyder can come up with better. In fact, if any of you have Snyder or Goyer’s e-mail address, let me know and I’ll go see them and have a little pow-wow. A little schmooze between Jews, you know?

Oh, fuck, and Malkovich.

John Malkovich

To be fair, this movie will probably be a joke so fuck it: let’s have a joke Batman in there.

Got thoughts? Leave comments.

Pacific Rim

Directed by Guillermo del Toro

Starring Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day, Max 'Dirty' Martini, Robert Kazinsky, Clifton Collins Jr., and Ron Perlman.

I’ve been thinking of bringing back the Boozy Movie Chronicles for a little while now, and there seemed like no better way to do it than giant alien sea monsters vs. giant robots. Read back that value proposition in your mind: ‘Giant alien sea monsters vs. giant robots.’ Guys, it’s like they custom-built a movie to get drunk at.

I went to see it with old high school friend Ben, whose movie-boozing prowess I may have doubted initially. That is, until he came out with this nugget: ‘Hey, so, this movie is like a Japanese monster flick so shouldn’t we pound sake the entire time?’ I felt almost personally offended by the infallibility of his reasoning and how much more mentally prepared he was. He may as well have pulled out a lightsaber and said ‘Your powers are weak, old man.’ What a champ.

Pacific Rim runs on comic book logic, which in terms of balls-to-the-wallness is second only to Charlie Sheen logic. This entire 140-minute fare exists only to justify FX shots of Optimus Prime slugging Godzilla in the face with various large pieces of metal. Of course, to have a single monster fighting against a single robot is (as Brett Ratner would have put it) for fags, so the screenwriters lift the plot directly from Ninja Turtles and put an inter-dimensional portal in the middle of the ocean. Progressively bigger and badder monsters keep emerging from it so humankind, naturally, keeps building bigger and badder giant robots like it’s some kind or inter-galactic dick-measuring contest.

Just pause on that one. Can you imagine a movie getting off to a stronger start?

Yeah, me neither.

Talking about the plot of this movie is like discussing the lyrics in a Hendrix song. The movie itself is a shell, and it feels like the producers kept coming back to the screenwriters saying: ‘Guys, we need more story here.’ And about three hours and two bottles of Jack Daniels later the writers said to themselves: ‘Optimus Prime punching a giant alien crab a bunch of times counts as story, right?’

In stark contrast to last week’s Man of Steel, Pacific Rim knows exactly the kind of movie it is and embraces its nature fully. Plus Pacific Rim is basically two-hours of money shot. It doesn’t need a fluffer; it straight up delivers on every level. It cleverly circumvents the B-movie dilemma of ‘How do we make Guy A or Guy B stand out in this movie?’ by simply making everyone and everything in it rule hard.

I'm telling you, that thing is super-glued on

• Charlie Hunnam is a solid leading man who delivers even the most cheeseball lines with such assuredness you have to respect him.
• Idris Elba has the Bill Pullman role, only funnier, more street cred, and I’m pretty sure he’s wearing a giant fake moustache for the entire movie so of course he gets about twice as many close-ups as anyone else.
• Three-armed, jetpack-powered, knife-wielding Chinese giant destruction robot? Check.
• Charlie Day as one of the world’s leading biologists? Sold.
• Australians vying to prove their Australianess by having the biggest testicles around (and succeeding).
• Ron Perlman has no reason to exist in this movie other than he’s Ron Perlman. Hellboy 4 life.

At one of the movie’s pivotal moments, Max Martini encapsulates Pacific Rim’s MO in a single line: ‘We can either sit here and do nothing or grab those flare guns and do something really stupid.’ The movie knows exactly when and how many times to push the Full Retard Button. 

Not always the best idea, but invariably the most tempting one

 

There’s a point at which the only way forward is for the movie to go full retard and Rinko Kikuchi literally presses a big red button that may as well have ‘full retard’ written on it. It’s glorious.

To wit, here are some counter-examples of movies that press the Full Retard Button too many times or cannot back it up:

The Matrix sequels

Ghost Rider

Paycheck

Die Another Day

Gamer

Identity

Be Cool

I don’t know really where I’m going with this review; I’m still sorta drunk from last night. Just go see the movie and if I’ve missed anything leave it in the comments or whatever.

Damage: 7/10 (pre-movie: 100 ml Stoli vodka; during: ½ bottle Sawanotsuru deluxe sake) – Yes, I realise that usually wouldn’t warrant a 7/10, but I’ve been on heavy medication for the last three months which has had serious impact on my drinking abilities

Boozy rating: 8/10 (loses one point for not having Van Damme in it and one point for not having enough screaming civilians or boobs)

Next week: The Wolverine

 

Skyfall review and my hopefuls for the next James Bond

Directed by Sam Mendes

Starring Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Javier Bardem, Ralph Fiennes, Ben Whishaw, Naomie Harris, Bérénice Lim Marlohe, and Albert Finney

Part I: The Review

It’s 2012; colour me disappointed. All the big movies this year, the ones I’ve championed for months prior to release – to the point of telling friends “this is the only movie” – have let me down. The Dark Knight did not rise to the occasion, Looper was sluggish and ineffective, Taken 2 paled in comparison to the original, and Prometheus lit a mighty dull fire.

And now the new Bond film, Skyfall, is a bit too “whatever” for my liking – especially when you consider the unanimous critical praise it has received. Sweet Jesus is this movie mediocre. Towards the end of its Titanic-esque runtime it had me longing for the days of Pierce Brosnan’s para-ski-doos and CGI’ed windsurfing antics.

Following a yawn-inducing opening chase, less involving and mysterious than the one in The World is Not Enough, Bond is shot and presumed dead while on mission in Istanbul. He goes underground. His target escapes with a list of secret identities belonging to all MI6 agents serving undercover in terrorist organisations. Ominous techno-terrorist Raoul Silva is behind its theft and later commits shocking attacks on British soil that summon Bond back from self-exile and into active duty.

Critics and audiences went on bloody murder about Quantum of Solace, which for my money is a better Bond movie than this. The action set-pieces were more kinetic, invigorating, and energetically edited. The Bond girls in Quantum felt like real people, not ciphers used to expedite the plot before being discarded or lost in the scenery. Most importantly, it felt like Bond was grappling with forces much bigger than himself and still only seeing the tip of the iceberg (the enormity of shadowy organisation “Quantum” is only alluded to). Plus Bond is so much more of a devil-may-care badass in that one, dropping henchmen off roofs and stranding key hostages in the middle of the desert as if giving a fuck just wasn’t on the menu.

Oh, and because Olga Kurylenko is a goddess.

Skyfall is lacklustre on almost every proto-Bond movie front. It doesn’t have the globetrotting allure of previous instalments. For all the praise Javier Bardem gets on his performance of baddie Silva (which, I must admit, is pretty strong), his screen time is limited and his dastardly plot is not very dastardly at all, nor is it executed with the grandiose villainy that you’d expect of a legendary Bond nemesis. Silva is merely okay.

Skyfall is also perplexingly being touted as the least sexist Bond entry to date, when really it is anything but. For fear of spoiling the movie, I’ll say but this: every female in the film, true to 007 standards, is either less competent than Bond at Bond-like activities or requires Bond to save her. In other words, business as usual. The only difference is none of them wears a bikini this time. Yay feminism.

To the film’s credit, Roger Deakins’ photography is sublime (although such praise is akin to dining at a five-star restaurant and saying “Wow! The food is really good here!”) and Adele’s “Skyfall”  is the best Bond title song since the Shirley Bassey days. Pretty much everything else fizzles. Sub-plots are abruptly dropped, the movie is lined with characters that don’t matter, the action sequences are not involving or suspenseful, and the villain is not nearly as scary as he’s intended to be. On the whole, Sam Mendes’ directorial style is far too detached and the entire production crew, much like Craig’s grizzled hero, seems to have forgotten how much fun James Bond is supposed to be.

Part II: The Future of Bond

Skyfall also marks the addition of recurring characters Moneypenny (Naomie Harris), Garreth Mallory (Ralph Fiennes – who is in top form, as always) and the re-introduction of the Q character (who, thank fuck, is expertly played Ben Whishaw rather than the oafish, risible John Cleese). Make no mistake, MGM is laying long-term groundwork for this franchise, and with good reason: it makes a shit-ton of money. Daniel Craig has overcome a lot of backlash and delivered a superb Bond over three films, but all good things must come to an end. I reckon he still has two picture left in him, as he’s in much better shape than any of his predecessors were at his age… except maybe Roger Moore.

Who knew?? Right?

So let’s assume Dan exits stage left by 2016-2017; the Bond mantle will fall to another. Who’ll it be?

Everybody’s got their predictions, some better than others. It’s a shame that a lot of strong contenders are from Craig’s generation, and will thus be well over the hill by the time they recast the role. (I’m thinking of Dougray Scott, Gerry Butler, and Eric Bana, primarily).

My prediction is that they’ll find another Dalton, a more mature actor who’ll crank out 2-3 pictures before calling it quits. With that in mind, my list covers a broad age range, leading with the youngest at the probable start of filming (I posit 2017). I’ve kept criteria from MGM’s previous selections in mind, meaning likely candidates are from the UK and Oceania (I doubt they would select a North American) and not huge, global film/franchise stars (as a clever friend recently pointed out to me, this gives the studio more leverage with their salary and contract).

Oliver Jackson-Cohen

Age (2017): 31

Nationality: English

Best known for: Killer in Faster

Pros: Tall, dark, handsome, and unafraid of physically demanding roles, Jackson-Cohen would be a strong choice. With popular support he could ably out-do Roger Moore’s 12-year stint as Bond, and he has the acting chops to lend the character the same gravitas as Craig did.

Cons: My only concern is that he is too young and too handsome (seriously, this cat is fucking gorgeous, people) for audiences to accept him as the lean, mean soldier that Craig has created. 

Chiwetel Ejiofor

Age (2017): 40

Nationality: English

Best known for: “Hey, it’s that guy from Love, Actually!”

Pros: He’d be my top contender were it not for the main con (below). He’s the appropriate age, a handsome, charismatic, chameleonic actor, far enough below the radar, and has proven, demonstrable ass-kicking ability from Serenity and Redbelt.

Con: He’s black and the world may not be ready for a black blockbuster star who isn’t Will Smith. And, seriously, fuck the world for being that way because Chiwetel would be a fucking God among insects if it were otherwise.

Jonathan Rhys-Meyers

Age (2017): 40

Nationality: Irish

Best known for: Being The King -- TV’s The Tudors and playing Elvis (like a boss)

Pros: Back in the mid-2000s, rumours circulated that a young gun named Jon Rhys-Meyers would follow in Brosnan’s footsteps. Rhys-Meyers dismissed his chances of playing Bond, at the time saying he was too young but, given the chance, he’d be thrilled to.

Well, 13 years later he may get that chance. I realise that the fresh-faced, slender Irishman would be a dark horse in this category, but he has the looks, the wit, and the resume to hold down the saga for at least a few pictures.

Cons: He doesn’t have the rugged, square-jawed masculinity or the sultry baritone that we’ve come to associate with Bond. 

Andrew Lincoln

Age (2017): 44

Nationality: English

Best known for: “Hey, it’s that other guy from Love, Actually!”

Pros: Yep, he and Chiwetel fought for Keira Knightley in Love, Actually and now they’re fighting over the coveted 007 title in Boozy Movie Chronicles. Whooda thunk it?

Lincoln is suave and, not unlike Craig, has a fierce intelligence behind those pale blue eyes. Currently a small-town sheriff/expert zombie killer on AMC’s phenomenal The Walking Dead, Lincoln’s TV contract will likely be up around the time Bond is recast.

Cons: Granted, the rather slight, 5’10” Brit would have to bulk up for the role, but crazier things have happened. (Anyone remember Adrian Brody in Predators? Holy fucknuggets.)

His hairline also can’t recede much farther if he has any hopes of landing Bond and his increasingly high-profile TV performance as a Southern lawman might put him out of the running.

Karl Urban

Age (2017): 45

Nationality: Kiwi

Best known as: Star Trek's Leonard "Bones" McCoy

Sure, he’ll be 45 but he’s the motherfuckin Law. Try thinking of a movie where Karl Urban doesn’t rule shit. Oh, wait, that’s right: there is none. This cat comes within inches of pwning Jason Bourne TWICE, which places him on a short list of 21st century King Badasses in my books.

Cons: We’ve only seen a non-UK Bond once and only for one picture. Again, the world may still not be ready. Also, as a sex symbol he is really an acquired taste (but then again so was Daniel Craig).

His Star Trek appearances don't seem to be getting him typecast, but in the next few years he may become too well-known and bankable a star for the Bond role.

Guy Pearce

Age (2017): 50

Nationality: English/Australian

Best known for: Being the pre-eminent character actor of his generation

Pros: Pearce looks remarkably good for his age and, as this year’s Lockout showed us, he is still in phenomenal shape. His versatility as an actor would also mean that he could take the role in any direction and do so convincingly.

Cons: Starting at age 50 he would likely only do 2 movies and, more importantly, he probably has zero interest in the role.




Got thoughts on who the next Bond could be? Leave them below.