Trailer Hitch
By Eric Hughes
July 8, 2009
BoxOfficeProphets.com

I give Jennifer's Body a B+.

Welcome to Trailer Hitch, BOP's look at the latest movie trailers to hit the Internet. This week: Patton Oswalt gets a black eye, Matt Damon packs on some weight and Megan Fox eats boys.

Big Fan – Opens August 28th

Robert D. Siegel set the bar awfully high last year with The Wrestler, my favorite movie of 2008 and comfortably lurking somewhere in my all-time top five. With that said, understand that I'm regrettably disappointed in the writer's third feature, Big Fan. The project marks the man's directorial debut.

In it, Patton Oswalt plays a hardcore New York Giants fan who gets beat up over a misunderstanding with his favorite football player. Following the incident, he struggles to deal with the consequences of getting drilled by the symbolic spokesman of his waking life.

Though the premise intrigues me, the actual product failed to deliver for me. Perhaps it's Oswalt, who customarily brings the funny to most everything he does.

Grade: C

The
Informant! – Opens September 2009

Matt Damon plays a little pudgster in Steven Soderbergh's The Informant!, based on the 2000 nonfiction book by journalist Kurt Eichenwald. For the part, where he works with the FBI to take down his company for fixing the price of a food additive, Damon upsized 20 to 30 pounds. It shows.

Having known very little about this project going in, I have to say I'm delighted at the result. It's a good thing too, considering my excitement in Soderbergh's projects constantly changes with new releases. I haven't had a film of his on my radar since Ocean's Twelve. And even that one disappointed.

Grade: A

Jennifer's Body – Opens September 18th

Call me crazy, but I'm under the impression that Jennifer's Body was made for the sole purpose of capturing Megan Fox's beautiful bod on the big screen. She's all kinds of wonderful in the trailer, rubbing up against men (and women), slowing undressing herself and swimming without anything really on. She's also possessed by a demon and feeds off little boys in a Minnesota farming town, so there's that whole thing as well. The movie, a dark comedy from the mind of Diablo Cody, is a far cry from the tamer (and award-winning) Juno, but it's ambitious – to say the least.

True Blood fans could dig this movie. In addition to copious amounts of blood loss – and a movie poster that completely rips off the one from the original HBO series - the movie, like the TV show, appears to play itself off as campy horror.

Grade: C+

Couples Retreat – Opens October 9th

Great cast... But terrible movie! Don't you hate it when that happens? Couples Retreat may have Vince Vaughn, Jason Bateman, Kristin Davis, Kristen Bell, et al., Yet I probably bellied a few more laughs while watching The English Patient than during the entirety of this movie's trailer.

Vaughn and Jon Favreau recently teamed up in Four Christmases – you know, that lame excuse of a holiday movie – so perhaps my expectations shouldn't have been so high. File this one under great concept (and effective, yet simple title to boot), but poor execution.

Here, four couples go on a vacation to a tropical locale for couples therapy when one pairing (Bateman and Bell) finds out that they're uber close to getting a divorce. Once on the island, the three other couples fail to realize that they, too, must participate in the activities instead of lounging by the poolside.

Grade: D

Amelia – Opens October 23rd

Amelia Earhart's troubled relationship with her husband, as well as her circumnavigational flight (and mysterious disappearance) are showcased here in Amelia, a 2009 biopic. Honestly I'm not overtly enthusiastic about this thing – I'm usually turned off by period pieces anyway – but enough positive reviews come October 23rd could change my mind. Plus, that bizarre Air France saga has me believing I've already hit my puzzling vanishings quota for the year.

Starring Hilary Swank, Richard Gere, Ewan McGregor and Virginia Madsen, Amelia comes from director Mira Nair, who hasn't helmed a feature since 2007's Migration (and more notably, The Namesake from the year previous).

Grade: B-