Check This Out: The Evolution of the Superhero Movie Graph

There's really no denying that superhero movies are in their prime right now. Years ago, no one thought comic book adaptations would become the mainstream mega-hits that they are today. And to show us the history and evolution of that genre, we've got another great graph to feature today called The Evolution of the Superhero Movie. This comes from the guys who made the Sequels That Bombed, $400 Million Club, and Harry Potter Directors graphics previously. This is one of my all-time favorites though, just because it's dealing with an area of cinema that I'm very familiar with. And so with that, check this out fullsize below.

Mike Dougherty Explains How He Would've Written X-Men 3

You're probably wondering why I'm writing about X-Men 3 some three years or so after it first came out. Well, despite making some $234 million a the box office, most comic book fans hated the movie, claiming it was a huge let down and that they butchered the Dark Phoenix storyline. Well, you may have also heard the name Mike Dougherty recently, and that's because he directed the cult horror hit Trick 'r Treat (buy the DVD). But before he directed that, he worked closely with Bryan Singer and is credited as one of the writers on X2. He even helped brainstorm an entire story for X-Men 3 with Singer that never got used. But what if?

Brandon's Word: 2012 Will Send Your Eyes and Brain to War

"It's the end of the world as we know it… [again]." -R.E.M. (Except that last part, of course.)

I'm very tempted to make this review comprised of a single sentence. That review would read: 2012 is delicious candy for the eyes, brain-boggling insanity for your mind, and tooth-rotting idealism for your superego; and it's a film not to be missed in theatres.

Since you all are so used to my verbosity, though, (and because 2012 does actually deserve more than a single sentence) I won't leave it to just that line. So let's get to it, shall we? This is Roland Emmerich's third

Fantastic Mr. Fox Has Universal Acclaim from Critics So Far!

Inspired by this amusing post on Awards Daily titled "How to Build a Sturdy Foxhole", I thought I'd point out that Wes Anderson's Fantastic Mr. Fox, which hits limited theaters (in New York and Los Angeles) this weekend before expanding on Thanksgiving, is getting positive reviews. Over on Metacritic, Fantastic Mr. Fox currently has a score of 87, which earns it the "universal acclaim" tag. Ryan points out that 7 of the 9 reviews tracked have a score of 80 or above, which is pretty damn impressive. In comparison, Where the Wild Things Are only has a score of 71 on Metacritic, but it also has quite a few perfect 100 reviews, too.

The Weekly Moviegoer - What Do You Do When the Movie is Over?

What do you do when the movie is over? The last scene has played, the credits have begun, the lights have come up, maybe you clapped, maybe you read the credit scroll to the end, you exit the auditorium and then… Because you are reading a movie blog, I presume you like to discuss movies, but where do you go for the discussion, and how long does it last?

Despite the fact that I write about movies, I feel like I don't talk enough about a movie — immediately and with real people — after seeing it in the theater. Sometimes a friend and I will exchange a few words about

Eastwood's Hereafter is About the '04 Tsunami and Dead People!

Yep, you read that headline right! Last night, a story hit Variety reporting that Belgian actress Cecile de France had joined the cast of Clint Eastwood's new film Hereafter, which (in previous articles) has been described as a supernatural thriller, without any major plot details beyond that. Reading on, I noticed that they said it had already been shooting for a month, which is quite amazing considering Clint just finished Invictus, which hits theaters in December and potentially could win Best Picture. Damn he is a workhorse! But then I started to think back to some details about Hereafter that I'd heard in various places recently.

Brandon's Word: The Fourth Kind is Outright Malarkey!

DISCLAIMER - Please Read Before Continuing:
So, here's the thing. This past week I found myself in Orlando, Florida. (I'll spare you the details, but it had something to do with me turning yet another year older, a seven-hour game of Monopoly, and a hedgehog.) While in Orlando, William Goss invited me to attend a screening of The Fourth Kind with him. Since I was missing all of the Los Angeles screening dates, I thought, Why not? Truth be told, the trailer was (hell, still is) one of my favorites of the year. It's creepy in all the right ways. It's intriguing without giving too much away, and it's visually stunning. That said, I was pretty damned excited to see The Fourth Kind.

Martin Scorsese Picks 11 Scariest Horror Movies of All Time!

If there is anyone I would want to choose what movies I watch this Halloween weekend (besides Stephen King or Wes Craven), I'd want it to be Oscar winning director Martin Scorsese. He's a genius filmmaker and I'm sure he knows great horror when he sees it. I think this would've been much better coordinated if his new movie Shutter Island was actually out in theaters (damn you Paramount), but either way this is a great list. The Daily Beast asked Scorsese to choose some horror movies for Halloween and he came up with his own list of the 11 Scariest Horror Movies of All Time. Read on to see what great classics he chose!

Inevitable Talk of Paranormal Activity Sequel from Paramount

In its fifth weekend at the box office, surprise indie horror hit Paranormal Activity was able to knock down the reigning Halloween horror champion - the Saw franchise - off its throne to win the weekend before the holiday is officially upon us. Saw VI came in at #2, opening to an estimated $14.8 million while Paranormal Activity took in an estimated $22 million from only 1,945 theaters and pushed it's total gross up to $62.5 million. Not bad for a flick that only cost $11,000 to make. However, the risk of overkill is upon us as the LA Times says Paramount isn't past developing a sequel to the extremely low-budget smash hit.

Mastodon Explains How Exactly They Came to Score Jonah Hex

Do you remember the news that heavy metal band Mastodon would be scoring the Jonah Hex movie? Yea, I'm still a bit bewildered by that, but it's being cleared up today, finally. Paste (via SlashFilm) just did an interview with Mastodon recently and got the full story, including that they're not dropping any all-out heavy metal tracks into the movie, but rather recording instrumental songs that will be integrated into the score, similar to how Linkin Park worked with Steve Jablonsky for the Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen score. It's actually kind of fascinating to hear and I'm much more excited to hear their score knowing this.

A Trip Through Disney History for The Princess and the Frog

The magic of Disney. There's nothing quite like it. There's nothing quite like Disneyland, or Walt Disney and his Imagineers, or the 48 animated movies created in his name over more than 70 years. A few weeks ago, Disney invited a small group of movie journalists, myself included, to experience the classic world of Walt Disney in a trip to Disneyland, the Disney Archives, and finally, back to the Animation Studio for a look at The Princess and the Frog and a chat with directors Ron Clements and John Musker. You may be wondering what a trip to Disneyland has to do with any movie and remarkably it has a lot to do with one.

The Weekly Moviegoer - Do Release Windows Really Matter?

Do you pay attention to movie release windows? If movies came out on DVD and Blu-Ray sooner, would it encourage you to wait to see more titles on home video instead of seeing them in the theater?

I can't imagine that the general population would answer yes to either of these questions. But the chance that they would is of great worry to American cinemas. That's why whenever a release window is shortened, the National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO) throws a fit. It's been awhile since one of the studios had the gall to significantly venture lower than the average length of time between theatrical release and

Must Read: New Yorker's Phenomenal Profile on James Cameron

I just finished reading, perhaps, the best article about the career and life of James Cameron that I have ever read. The New Yorker just published their epic (12 pages long - fitting for Cameron) profile on the filmmaker, detailing his early life and early career, from Terminator to The Abyss, his five wives (there are some funny stories in that section), to what he's been doing the last 10 years (scuba diving, developing 3D cameras, etc), and of course, all about Avatar and its development. Dana Goodyear spent more than a year writing this profile and it's this kind of awe-inspiring film journalism that I admire more than anything.

Brandon's Word: Law Abiding Citizen is an Explosive Thrill

The grammar stickler in me has an immediate problem with Law Abiding Citizen. The words "law" and "abiding" are not supposed to be separate, but rather combined as a hyphenated adjective modifying the noun "citizen" like so: Law-Abiding Citizen. But when William Goss pointed out that, perhaps, the title's lack of a hyphen is intentional, my brain unfurled and drank in this radically tasty nectar. As Goss explained to me, it's not the citizen who is abiding the law, instead, it's the law that's abiding the citizen. And it's in this simple, innocuous distinction that the seed of my fondness for F. Gary Gray's film was planted.

Brandon's Word: Where the Wild Things Are is a Profound Adventure

This film, Where the Wild Things Are, directed and co-written by auteur Spike Jonze, based on the seminal children's book authored by Maurice Sendak, is not for you. Rather, its very existence and purpose is meant not for you as you are now, today. Its themes and breathtaking visuals and deep, inky explorations aren't for you, the twenty/thirty/forty-year-old. Where the Wild Things Are is, instead, for the angst-filled, confused, whimsical nine/ten/eleven/twelve-year-old inside us all. For the part of us that feels directionless. For the part of us that is without. That's yearning, learning. That's wayward and possibly even hopeless.