TeleChimp | TV Journalism

Modern Family season 3 episode 1: Dude Ranch

The family decides to don their cow boots and hats and head to Jackson Hole, Wyoming for some fun and adventure in the great outdoors. While vacationing on Lost Creek Ranch, they try their hands at a little cattle herding, skeet shooting and horseback riding; there are also some big firsts, a huge surprise and an actual face off between Jay and a foe – a cowboy named Hank.

Modern Family season 3 episode 2: When Good Kids Go Bad

Mitch and Cam plan a nice evening with the whole family to break the happy news that they’re looking to adopt another child. However their parade is rained on when they realize Lily may not take well to another baby in the house. Meanwhile, Claire and Jay are each consumed with proving a certain point

Modern Family season 3 episode 3: Phil on Wire

The growing bond between man, Jay, and dog, Stella, is grating on Gloria’s nerves; Phil and Luke embark on a new adventure involving a tightrope, but it’s Claire with the missteps, as she tries to teach the girls a life lesson; and Cameron chooses the most inopportune time to start a juice fast.

Modern Family season 3 episode 4: Door to Door

Everyone sets their eyes on a goal: Jay is determined to help Manny sell wrapping paper for a school fundraiser; Claire petitions the city for a stop sign to be installed at a high-traffic intersection; Mitchell is hell bent on proving a point with Cameron, and neither one of them will back down; Phil and Luke will stop at nothing to create a viral video sensation; and Gloria is desperate to find Stella after losing him.

Modern Family season 3 episode 5: Hit and Run

Jay is frustrated at work, Manny is stressed out about school work, Gloria would like to help but no one seems to want it. Phil and Claire run into Councilman Duane Bailey again, who is out campaigning for his second run, and he’s just as irritating as they remembered — so much so that Claire may give him a run for his money. Mitch and Cam get into a fender bender and the other car flees, which becomes the tipping point for all the men in the family who decides to take out their frustrations on the kid giving Haley problems.

Modern Family season 3 episode 6: Go Bullfrogs

It’s father-daughter time, as Phil takes Haley on a college tour of his old alma mater, and Claire, having a rare night alone, forces Mitchell and Cameron to take her for a fun night out with the boys — but ends up alone with one particular man candy who is anything but gay. Meanwhile, Gloria and Jay deal with a potential situation at home that may require having “the talk” with Manny.

Modern Family season 3 episode 7: Tree House

Hanging out with Shorty and his girlfriend, Darlene, makes Gloria envious of how much those two do as a couple, so she gives Jay an ultimatum to step it up for a night of salsa dancing or else. Meanwhile, Cameron take a bet a little too far when Mitchell and Crispin challenge him to get a hot girl’s number at the bar, and Phil builds a tree house for Luke, but ends up being the one to make a new friend.

Modern Family season 3 episode 8: After The Fire

After a neighbor’s home burns down, the whole family rallies and organizes a community drive to help do some good – though it’s not all good, as Jay throws out his back, Cameron does some posturing with a huge moving truck, Claire discovers that Mitchell and Gloria have been spending a lot of time together, and Luke and Manny get their hands on some of the donated toys.

Modern Family season 3 episode 9: Punkin Chunkin

When an old neighborhood kid returns to town as a hugely successful internet billionaire, it gets Phil thinking of what could have been. Jay feels Manny could use a little dose of constructive criticism, and Cameron is offended when Mitchell questions the authenticity of his colorful childhood stories. It all comes to a head at Thanksgiving with the family divided between the “Dreamers” and the “Pritchetts” — and nothing settles the score like a punkin chunkin challenge.

Popularity: 6% [?]

Taylor Lautner, the famous werewolf boy Jacob from the Twilight series, will make his debut as an action hero in John Singleton’s latest movie, Abduction.

Hitting the theatres on 23rd September 2011, Abduction is about a young man, Nathan played by Taylor Lautner, who realized that his parents are not his own and his life is a lie and thus he sets to uncover the truth of his life along with his love interest Karen, played by Lily Collins.

The movie was premiered at The Grauman’s Chinese, California on Thursday night, 15th September 2011.

Abduction

The 19-year-old actor was joined on the red carpet by his co-star Lily Collins. The other famous young couple Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez came hand in hand to the special screening. Also present at the promotional premier were other cast members of Abduction such as Sigourney Weaver, Elisabeth Rohm and Antonique Smith. Taylor Lautner’s “The Twilight Saga’s Eclipse” co-star Booboo Stewart was also present at the premier of Abduction.

In an exclusive interview when ask about his latest movie review, Taylor Lautner said that Abduction has everything in it- action, thriller, drama, romance. He further said that this movie has given me a chance to do awesome action and fighting scene for which I have been waiting long.

The female lead character Karen, is been played by 22 years old British American Actress Lily Collins who has also played a award winning role in 2008 released Herself – One to Watch.

Taylor Lautner has really shaped up in the last two years for his latest movies. Apart from his most appreciated role as Jacob in the Twilight Series, he has landed in many other roles in movies such as Valentine’s Day and now as the main role in his latest movie Abduction.

Popularity: 4% [?]

Rounders (1998)

- Starring Matt Damon

The year 1998 was a little before Matt Damon reinvented himself as Jason Bourne, who was basically a better and meaner Bond albeit without much by way of a past memory. This was the year he was cast , as Mike McDermott, in Rounders. Early in the movie, Mike chats with his girlfriend Jo (Gretchen Mol) about his poker-playing and she expresses incredulity that Mike associates with someone called ‘Worm’ (Edward Norton). That exchange underlines the essence of the movie: the two lives that Mike McDermott lives. One is as Mike the law student, and the other is the exciting and uncertain life of a “rounder” who mingles with sleazy card-sharps and shady underworld figures.

The makers have done some serious research and are able to give the viewers a peek into New York’s underground high stakes poker world. Not that we’d be able to verify, but it looks and feels authentic all the same. Technical brilliance is where most of the good qualities of the movie exist. but, the drama is not all that engaging. And that’s just the beginning.

Matt Damon fails to look convincing as the shrewd poker player who’s confused about what he really wants (did we mention he’s also a law student?). That’s especially so when he’s shown making hardened card-sharps part with their ill-gotten money. By the way, that is only until he gets cleaned out by bigger fish, a Russian gangster who goes by the name of KGB (John Malkovich). That sets the tone for the rest of the movie. The remaining film can simply be summed up thus: Mike quits poker on Jo’s say-so, but then old buddy ‘Worm’ comes back from prison and Mike has to help him pay off a long-standing debt. The two go on a poker-spree to achieve just that by hook or by crook.

Sounds familiar? It did to us. Rounders is, at its core, a heist movie. It’s the age-old formula of a con going on the straight, only to come back for one last bank/ heist job in order to, take your pick: settle an old score, pay off a debt, save a friend’s life, or all three. Rounders just modifies that formula to fit the context of poker. In the end, the good guy wins back his honour and his money, and all is well with the world. No surprises there: it’s Hollywood, and winning in the end is kind of part of the job description for the hero.

Rounders hits, more than it misses. It is heavy on techniques and jargon, more familiar to those who watch televised poker, or frequent the smoky rooms of Vegas as well as Atlantic City. The dark side of those rooms is effectively unwrapped in this movie. Dahl is an superb filmmaker and intense storyteller. He makes you feel and see sides of the world, that some of us would rather not. The movie is slow in pace, but then again, so is life itself. In the beginning, I thought I was going to see Good Will Hunting goes to Vegas (as witnessed by a nice scene at a poker game), but the movie ups the ante by going into the abuse of a talent, and the repercussions of the actions. Like only a few other filmmakers can, he lets you know the people here, and makes you care, and makes you leave the theater re-evaluating your own life, and the chances you take. See a matinee of this one, if you are patient, or have a strong knowledge of cards.

For the most part, the performances are done very well. I would highly recommend this movie for people to go see. You do not really need a background in the fundamentals of poker to understand the plot or language. The plot is very believable in which a person can definitely relate to how one person (McDermott) could be placed in this situation. It makes people see the dark side of the gambling underworld and all of the corruption involved. This would not be a movie I would consider bringing the whole family to. Younger kids would have a difficult time understanding this movie and their are some scenes that show violence which also may not be appropriate for children. I would give this movie a two and a half star rating.

So far, not so bad; what really proves to be the movie’s downside is that it tries to be too many things. It’s a sports film, but the protagonist plays the illegal version of it. It’s almost a heist film, but for the fact that poker is a sport. And it finishes off by being a coming-of-age tale, as Mike decides to stop being so confused. Instead of messing around with the illegal (and dangerous) variety of poker, he takes his winnings from the climactic finale game and heads to Vegas to be a legit player.

Conclusion

All in all, it is an entertaining film. Poker enthusiasts will appreciate the technical accuracy of the film; everybody else will like it for the caper it is at its heart. Those expecting a classic in the same league as The Cincinnati Kid, however, may be mildly disappointed

Popularity: 14% [?]

The recently released live action film Captain America: The First Avenger has struck a deep chord with fans of television/ movie adaptations of marvel comics storylines. .Anyone that grew up (or maybe didn’t completely grow up at all) reading Marvel Comics and claim to know their superheroes would definitely know the Captain America story well; of a gaunt youth going by the name of Steve Rogers, who was born during the great depression and lost his dad when he was a adolescent and his mother when he was in his late teens. Becoming appalled by newsreel footage of the Nazis in Europe, Rogers decided to try to join the Army. But, due to his frailty and bad health, he was turned down. A little later his earnest plea is heard by General Chester Phillips of the U.S. Army and young Steve Rogers is selected for a top secret US Government program called “operation rebirth” during WW-II, and is administered a Super-Soldier serum and is exposed to “vita-rays” to accelerate and alleviate the serum’s effect on his body. At the end of that experiment Captain America emerges the pinnacle of human physical perfection. He then goes on to spearhead the American onslaught against Nazi Germany.

Old school Marvel aficionados will care for the fact that “Captain America: The First Avenger” remains dedicated to the original comic book storyline; loyal almost to a fault. Everybody else will love this movie as well, particularly for the thoroughly honest way this movie has been made.

Actor Chris Evans, who plays the title character in Friday’s release of “Captain America: The First Avenger,” put on 15 lbs. of muscle to play the role.

Making the movie wasn’t as simple as one would think; the people involved with the making of the movie had to figure out how the six-foot something Evans, who they’d managed to turn into a remarkably muscled specimen, was going to fit into the role of a frail young Steve Rodgers before the experiment. It may seem that shooting the part of ‘Skinny Steve’ before Evans gained all that muscle would have been the sensible thing to do. But wait a minute; take some time out here to picture Evans prior to bulking up, think back the Fantastic Four movies where Chris Evans played The Human Torch. So now you know that even at that point, passing Evans off as a wan skinny Steve Rogers would have been a stretch and would have involved altering the storyline to make it so that Steve used to be a normal human male. We already know, from the surprising loyalty to the comic that the makers have shown for the comic book, that even mulling over that adjustment would have been sacrilege.

Initially, director Joe Johnston used the ‘body-double and head-replacement’, but that did not pan out too well as the body double could not replicate the original actor’s movement well.

The filmmakers now decided to use a technology called “shrinking”: essentially erasing portions of Chris Evan’s muscular body on screen. The filmmakers used a “shrinking” technique and computers to basically erase portions of Evans’ strong physique on screen. It involved reshaping the jaw line, shrinking the skeleton, particularly the shoulders to make them look slimmer.

The makers of the movie admit that this part was more harrowing than any of the more impressive special effects that were put in and the movie has not disappointed.

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Popularity: 13% [?]

What do you except when you throw a burning matchstick in warehouse full of gasoline… a huge boom….

That is exactly what Warner Bros planned when the official teaser trailer was released during the screening of harry potter. And to say well it has done the job for you.

The short 90sec teaser trailer showing virtually nothing has generated a significant stir in the internet community. The latest Batman Series which is named “The Dark Knight Rises” will be the concluding part of Christopher Nolan’s successful “Batman” trilogy.

The trailer shows the images of collapsing skyscrapers of Gotham City making a batman logo in the sky.

Christian Bale who plays Batman will be facing his latest nemesis Bane which is played by Brit Tom Hardy. The movie trailer also shows Robbie William in a particular role; well to know what exactly is he is playing we will have to wait for the movie.

Another trailer doing rounds on internet also shows Commissioner Gordon played by Gary Oldman fighting for his life in a hospital bed begging Bruce Wayne to revive his black-clad superhero.

Taking into consideration the success of “Dark Knight” thanks to the brilliant performance by late Heath Ledger the expectation from “The Dark Knight Rises” will be huge.

Well for now it’s the trailers which make us feel frustrated thinking we have to wait almost a year to see the movie when it will hit the theaters on July 20 2012.

Popularity: 2% [?]

One of the most anticipated movie of this year Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2, which is the final adventure in the Harry Potter film series is out. And so the excitement for the movie by millions of Harry Potter fans can be understood.

The epic finale portrays the war between the good and evil forces of the wizarding world which escalates into an all-out war.

So far the result for the movie has been over whelming and the collections have started making new records.  The final Harry Potter movie broke the record of highest grossing midnight sales which was held by “The Twilight Saga: Eclipse”, with screening sales of around 43.5 million in US.  And its international sales has been around $82 in just two day of its release.

Responding to the initial success Warner domestic distribution prexy Dan Fellman said “What an incredible beginning for the movie that ends it all. Everyone at Warner Bros joins me in congratulating the many people behind the ‘Harry Potter’ films. We know this is just the start of what promises to be an astounding weekend and a magical summer.”

We hope this magic continues for Warner bros with great success of Harry Potter.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Thanks to its bumper opening & fantastic box-office earnings for “Transformers” and its sequel we expect more sequels of Transformers. Even though “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” didn’t live upto the expectations of the critics and audience, it was no surprise to the three-quel,”Transformers: Dark of the Moon,” making box-office history and a ton of money in the initial days of its release.

It is learned that ,”Transformers: Dark of the Moon,” had collections around $97.5 million over the holiday weekend, which makes it the biggest opening-weekend record holder for this year so far, which was previously set by “Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.”

Well that’s the reason we’ll be getting more “Transformers” movies, no matter what Bay and star Shia LaBeouf have said or decided about their “retirement” plans. Even Paramount is currently thinking of ways to keep the franchise going,” Boxoffice.com editor Phil Contrino told MTV News. “Unfortunately, making a deal for a property this big won’t be easy,” he added, speaking to moving forward with the franchise without Bay and LaBeouf. “I’m sure a bunch of directors and stars will be kicked around publicly before new hires are made.”

According to senior writer Anthony Breznican from Entertainment Weekly, who said that the robots will live on to rule future box offices. “We will definitely see another movie; how soon is a good question,” he said. “I took Bay seriously when he said he was finished directing [the 'Transformers' films], and they can reboot them again with someone else. That’s not something you say if it’s a negotiating tactic. I believed him. I think Shia is serious,” he added. “Three movies in this universe are a lot for an actor. Unless you want to be known only as the ‘Transformers’ guy, you have to move on and do something different.

” Harry Potter’ will be gargantuan,” Breznican said of “Deathly Hallows, Part 2″ being the next big competition for “Dark of the Moon.” “People are going to want to see it again and again, and that’s a real tribute to the filmmakers and J.K. Rowling’s storytelling. It’s a story where you invest a lot in those characters and they invest a lot back. There is a lot of sacrifice and affection; that movie packs an emotional punch,” he said. “It’s going to blow ‘Transformers: Dark of the Moon’ out of the water.”

Popularity: 2% [?]

David Cronenberg is a cult author hometown and one of the greatest players in Toronto has never been on the stage of world cinema.

So you would think that a dangerous method, his first new film in four years, would be an obvious choice of the gala opening of the slot 2011 Toronto International Film Festival – especially when there is no Horror.

But guess again. This movie, laden with prestige, will almost certainly be in the TIFF lineup, but not in the prime opening night gala slot.

That is because for the second consecutive year, TIFF has been trumped by a rival film festival in Venice, which starts two weeks earlier than the younger but livelier Toronto event.

Here we go again.

Last year it was Barney’s Version, produced by Robert Lantos, that had its world premiere in Venice and turned up at TIFF just a few days later. Now we can rerun the tape and we’re seeing almost the same story playing out in 2011.

Score: The Hockey Musical opened the 2010 Toronto film festival instead of Barney, the year’s most keenly anticipated Canadian movie.

A Dangerous Method is clearly British in most respects rather than Canadian, but because Cronenberg was in the director’s chair, we’re entitled to claim it as our own. The History of Violence in 2005 and Eastern Promises in 2007, the last two Cronenberg movies at TIFF, were both big hits.

A Dangerous Method is based on British writer Christopher Hampton’s play The Talking Cure, about how Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung more or less invented psychoanalysis more than a century ago.

Set in Zurich and Vienna, it tells the story of Jung’s relationship with a woman named Sabina Spielrein, who went on to become a noted female psychoanalyst after being Jung’s patient in a sexually charged relationship.

Hampton, who won a screenwriting Oscar for Dangerous Liaisons and was a nominee for Atonement, adapted his own play. Viggo Mortensen plays Freud, Michael Fassbender is cast as Jung, and Keira Knightley has the fascinating role of Sabina.

Last week Sony Pictures Classics announced it has acquired U.S. distribution rights to A Dangerous Method. SPC was also the U.S. distributor for Barney.

But why should Toronto is eclipsed by Venice in both cases?

In case you were wondering, neither Lantos nor Cronenberg resides in the Lido or on the Grand Canal. Nor are they among the regulars at Harry’s Bar.

Indeed, they live around the corner from one another in Forest Hill. Both are Toronto boosters, but it serves the interest of their movies to be showcased at both these important festivals on opposite sides of the ocean.

Every year the Venice festival unspools before TIFF. And out of pride, Piers Handling and Cameron Bailey are not going to hand their opening night gala slot to a movie that has just had its world premiere at a rival festival.

So they’ll be looking for another movie to draw a standing ovation while waving the maple leaf flag at Roy Thomson Hall on Thursday, Sept. 8.

It won’t be Midnight’s Children, about India’s leap from colony to independence. It’s based on Salman Rushdie’s Booker Prize novel and directed by the gifted and fearless Deepa Mehta, who gave TIFF a night to remember with the premiere of her magnificent Water in 2005.

Why not? Because her new movie filmed earlier this year in Sri Lanka, won’t be ready in time. Mehta will be in the editing room, with a post-production schedule that goes until the end of the year. And Midnight’s Children won’t be at TIFF in the fall of 2012, either, because it is almost sure to be released in the first half of the year.

While we’re on the subject of Barney, we note that will be released on DVD next week eOne. And for those of us who have seen and enjoyed the movie on the big screen, but left even thirstier, the DVD offers some delicious dishes with half an hour of deleted scenes. Among them: a torrid exchange in which Saul Rubinek as the father of the hippie Barney’s girlfriend, Clara, visits horrible Barney (Paul Giamatti), after the suicide of Clara.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Tom Hanks’ Playtone production company is producing a six-season adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s award winning novel “American Gods” for HBO.

The series, currently in development, is one of a handful of projects Hanks’ production company is working on.

Each season of the series, expected to debut in 2013; will consist of 10-12 episodes with a budget of $35-40 million per season.

“American Gods,” published in 2001, surmises the existence of gods and mythological entities is dependent on whether we believe in them. The book presents a landscape where the power of these gods wanes resulting from a lack of belief in the old gods in favor of the gods of the contemporary era – media, celebrity, technology and drugs.

The novel itself is a blend of Americana, fantasy, ancient lore and modern mythology, all centering on a mysterious character named Shadow.

“There are some crazy things in there. We’ll probably be doing more effects in there than it’s been done on a television series,” Gary Goetzman, Hanks’ Playtone partner, told the Hollywood Reporter

The report said the series will delve into the rich, religious folklore from the novelization and will feature deities from Greek and Nordic mythology, in addition to the Judeo-Christian monotheistic God.

The Playtone Company, founded by Hanks and Goetzman in 1996, is an American production company heavily involved in film and television, having produced Castaway, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Mamma Mia, My Big Fat Greek Life and Band of Brothers, in addition to various television and film soundtracks in the past.

The company’s future projects include Major Matt Mason, a live-action family film about space adventure, as well as a film version of the Broadway musical American Idiot, based off the 2003 Green Day album of the same name.

Popularity: 2% [?]

I do not like most sports movies. They are too predictable. After a series of defeats, zany situations, general hilarity, and the realization that team spirit is in itself a victory rally good to triumph.

But I saw “Win Win” Sunday despite the title because I wanted to escape reality for a few hours, preferably amidst air-conditioning.

“Win Win” is amazing. I rank my top 25 sports movies of all-time at the end of this column, and “Win Win” comes in 11^th.

Like “The Hustler” and “Raging Bull,” “Win Win” is only marginally about sports.

Paul Giamatti, who looks like a sportswriter, is Mike Flaherty, a storefront New Jersey lawyer. The store isn’t doing well. So he cheats. He tells a judge he’ll serve as guardian for an old guy named Leo (Burt Young).

Leo’s brain is going but his savings account is healthy. Leo wants to stay in the house he has long owned. But Flaherty stashes him in an old folk’s home and cashes a $1,500 monthly guardian check.

Leo’s daughter is in rehab in Ohio, and her son, Kyle, escapes to New Jersey to move in with Leo. Kyle (Alex Shaffer) dyes his hair Ric Flair blond, has a black eye, and he smokes. Since the kid can’t stay in the retirement home, he ends up with Flaherty and his family.

Flaherty coaches the local high school wrestling team, which is even less successful than his law practice. Turns out Kyle is a former Ohio wrestling star, and he becomes a star for Flaherty.

The wrestling scenes are thrilling, which is a surprise since the grappling I watch tends to involve sequined robes and metal folding chairs.

“Win Win” is warm and moving and funny. The crowd at the Regal Ballantyne Village Stadium 5 occasionally cheered aloud. Instead of sitting in plush seats, we were on high school gymnasium bleachers.

Shaffer’s previous acting experience includes one high school play. In real life he’s a 119-pound New Jersey high school wrestling star. Kyle is a 119-pound New Jersey wrestling star. The longer the movie goes, the more human Kyle becomes.

Four notes about my movie rankings:

The Last time I did this, I left out “Hoosiers.” I forgot about it. I did a radio interview about the column with a station in Los Angeles and the hosts were incredulous that I omitted “Hoosiers” and extremely condescending. So I told them “Hoosiers” wasn’t good enough to make my list, even though “Happy Gilmore” did. I had a blast.

“Rudy” is not in my top 25 because I met Rudy when he spoke at the Charlotte Touchdown Club. You know what Rudy does for a living? He’s Rudy.

Our conversation went like this. RUDY: Hi, I’m Rudy. ME: What do you for a living these days, Rudy? RUDY: I’m Rudy. ME: Good, I’m Tom. But what do you do? RUDY: I’m Rudy. Get off the bench!

“Waterboy” is fun and can be interpreted at various levels. Adam Sandler challenge the viewer. His most important, is not easy.

The film that I have I left out.

Popularity: 2% [?]