Red Storm: The Return of The Red Menace?

By Jason Apuzzo. There are a lot of independent film projects we’re hearing about all the time here at LFM.  Something we wanted to show you today, during this extended Fourth of July weekend, is a trailer for the forthcoming web series Red Storm.  We’ve embedded the trailer for this series above.

The filmmakers keep things mysterious, but the series appears to have as its premise a scenario that seems straight out of the new Red Dawn film, coming this fall from MGM.  Some sort of massive occupying force – Chinese communist? Russian fascist? – invades and occupies America, and a hearty band of freedom fighter-rebels fight back.

It’s interesting, of course, that this sort of invasion anxiety is reappearing in American filmmaking, as we’ve discussed previously.

The imagery used in the trailer is effective, ominous and compelling.  Marching armies (Chinese? North Korean?) … nuclear testing … the protestor stopping the tank in Tiananmen Square … the 9/11-style imagery of a crumbing building, shattered by explosions, raining debris on cars below … with those cars being passed by what look to be Chinese tanks. Continue reading Red Storm: The Return of The Red Menace?

DVD Review: The Princess and the Frog: The End of the Disney Dark Age?

From Disney's "The Princess and the Frog."

By David Ross. The Pixar-Disney partnership, about which I was initially skeptical, now seems all to the good. Pixar remains exuberantly creative, while Disney has absorbed some of the lessons of Pixar, the most basic of which is that kids have better instincts as well as worse instincts, and that there is plenty of money to be made by appealing to the former. My recent discussion of kids movies made no mention of Disney’s The Princess and the Frog (2009) because I had not yet seen it, but my little family had a rollicking time with it last night. I would call it Disney’s best film since The Fox and the Hound (1981), the last film to exhibit something, if only a shadow, of the old charm and simplicity. Coming on the heels of Bolt (2008) – Disney’s most successful Pixar rip-off attempt – The Princess and the Frog seems to signal that Disney has finally found the light at the end of its long tunnel of malaise, incompetence, condescension, and small-mindedness, otherwise known as the Eisner era.

The Princess and the Frog offers plenty to like. Instead of rounding up celebs to phone in the usual tired voice work (v. Mel Gibson in Pocahontas and Demi Moore in The Hunchback), Disney put together a low-profile but vibrant cast led by Anika Noni Rose as Tiana and Jenifer Lewis as Mama Odie. The acting is focused and energetic throughout, giving the entire film an air of personality and emotional engagement that recalls the films of Disney’s golden age (Ed Wynn as the Mad Hatter, etc.). Meanwhile, Randy Newman’s soundtrack, a pastiche of New Orleans jazz and zydeco, lends the film what all recent Disney films have lacked: bounce. While it is not going to convince anyone to throw away their old Clifton Chenier records, the soundtrack is a lark, and a welcome reprieve from the pop-Broadway syrup that dominated Disney’s dark age. Continue reading DVD Review: The Princess and the Frog: The End of the Disney Dark Age?

Flag Bikinis + The Fourth of July Weekend Continues

That's V for Victory, by the way.

By Jason Apuzzo. The Fourth of July weekend continues, at least here at LFM – the Fourth of July being, after all, far too important a holiday to celebrate merely over a single day …

America the beautiful.

Today LFM favorite Jessica Simpson (above) and Gisele Bundchen (right) are showing us their patriotic spirit.  I trust everyone’s patriotic zeal is suitably roused.

[Btw, do they have flag bikinis in Saudi Arabia?]

Ms. Bundchen has done a little better in her selection of all American quarterbacks (3-time champ Tom Brady, as opposed to Ms. Simpson’s perennially underperforming Tony Romo), but long-time Libertas readers know that every broken heart in Jessica Simpson’s life is just another pretext for a comeback as her colorful and uniquely American saga unfolds!

Happy Fourth of July weekend, everybody!

Posted on July 5th, 2010 at 11:26am.