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The Jennifer Lawrence casting seems odd to me. In the movie the couple has an adopted 12 year old son. From what I know about the ABSCAM project, she seems far too young for the part.

She was about ten years too young for her part in LININGS too; so par for the course.

It's being released in 2014.

I'll be thrilled if no movie title ever starts with American again.

Then it's time to spitball new titles for my movie American Funk: The mfunk9786 Story.

First trailer

In the "who wore it best" battle of minimal-dialogue trailers between this and the Walter Mitty trailer, who wins?

Walter Mitty, since everyone was already planning to see this, but that one came out of nowhere

This looks pretty good, even though I'm not a fan of David O. Russell's past films (Silver Linings = incredibly overrated).

criterion10 wrote:even though I'm not a fan of David O. Russell's past films

None of them? I would think at this point he's made a film to suit every taste.

Matt wrote:

criterion10 wrote:even though I'm not a fan of David O. Russell's past films

None of them? I would think at this point he's made a film to suit every taste.

To be fair, I still haven't seen I Heart Huckabees nor Three Kings, the latter of which actually looks very good. But, I thought both The Fighter and Silver Linings Playbook were just okay (I do prefer the former to the latter), and I did not care for Flirting with Disaster at all.

I find his films to be very cliched and without anything to really praise about his direction.

Huckabees actually is very good, and not clichéd in the least.

Remember when it was supposedly a big deal that Led Zeppelin allowed their recordings in 'Almost Famous'?

Maybe it's different for trailers. Or the floodgates opened and I never noticed.

It's true he's not much of a visual stylist, so if that's exclusively your thing, you're bound to be disappointed. He's a hell of a writer, though, and gets great performances from his actors (questionable methods or no).

Huckabee's is my absolute favorite, a glorious, brainy mess. But I absolutely hate Spanking the Monkey and thought Silver Linings Playbook was just okay.

And in reinforcement of the short-lived taste love affair with Matt, I think I Heart Huckabees could lay claim to being one of the worst films ever made by people who should know better. I agree that overall Russell's a negligible director but he does seem on the upswing with Silver Linings Playbook and this looks like a great pisstake, so I have cautious optimism for the film. I won't go so far as to say "With that cast, how can it be bad," because, you know, Huckabees, but still

Talk of David O Russell's career in general can stay here. Specific talk of I Heart Huckabees moving forward should be directed to its dedicated thread

Matt wrote:It's true he's not much of a visual stylist, so if that's exclusively your thing, you're bound to be disappointed. He's a hell of a writer, though, and gets great performances from his actors (questionable methods or no).

Well, visual style is certainly important to me, which is one of the reasons that my favorite directors include the likes of Kubrick, Lynch, and Ken Russell. Though, there are plenty of other directors that I do like who aren't necessarily visual stylists.

I can't say that O'Russell is one hell of a writer though. Flirting with Disaster I found to be cringe-worthy in some parts, and while some of the dialog in Silver Linings is decent (at best), the narrative arc is predictable and cliched. Considering he wrote the script, I think a large part of that blame falls on him. I honestly don't understand how that film managed to win critics and audiences over last year. I didn't hate it by any means, but it's absolutely disposable.

The only plus side of O'Russell is that he is able to get good performances out of his actors. I'll give him that.

salad wrote:Remember when it was supposedly a big deal that Led Zeppelin allowed their recordings in 'Almost Famous'?

Maybe it's different for trailers. Or the floodgates opened and I never noticed.

I'd say they've partially opened. An episode of True Blood just used "In The Evening". And of course there's the Cadillac commercial from several years back, too. I suspect recent uses are due to the fact that there's going to be a huge overhaul of their discography soon, box-set special editions of each album with unreleased material, and possibly surround-sound mixes.

...and specific discussion of Silver Linings Playbook should go in its thread

It's possible they've become more open to it simply because music sales are so abysmal now. They do better than most, true, but even for someone like the Beatles, revenue is sharply down from 10 years ago, so unless they're okay with making less money all around these days, I wouldn't be surprised if they've just changed their policy on licensing. Not completely, but enough that such usage isn't as rare as it used to be.

criterion10 wrote: To be fair, I still haven't seen I Heart Huckabees nor Three Kings, the latter of which actually looks very good. But, I thought both The Fighter and Silver Linings Playbook were just okay (I do prefer the former to the latter), and I did not care for Flirting with Disaster at all...

THREE KINGS is wonderful and might just be my favorite film of 1999...which is saying a lot since that was a stellar year for releases. Russell's other films impress me less, but before THE FIGHTER you could count on his work having an edge. THE FIGHTER is well-acted but straight formula as is SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK. AMERICAN HUSTLE, on the other hand, looks promising.

hearthesilence wrote:It's possible they've become more open to it simply because music sales are so abysmal now. They do better than most, true, but even for someone like the Beatles, revenue is sharply down from 10 years ago, so unless they're okay with making less money all around these days, I wouldn't be surprised if they've just changed their policy on licensing. Not completely, but enough that such usage isn't as rare as it used to be.

Of course. I don't have as much a problem with this when it comes to advertising for this reason, even less so for things like trailers and television. I'd much rather Zeppelin get that money from Sony, Cadillac and HBO than guys like the Eagles who don't license much at all and charge a ridiculous amount for tickets.

Roger Ryan wrote:THREE KINGS is wonderful and might just be my favorite film of 1999...which is saying a lot since that was a stellar year for releases. Russell's other films impress me less, but before THE FIGHTER you could count on his work having an edge. THE FIGHTER is well-acted but straight formula as is SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK.

I'm planning on seeing Three Kings soon. And I would clearly agree with you on The Fighter and SLP.

Despite all the complaining I've been doing about the O'Russell films I have seen, I don't think I've made it evident enough that American Hustle actually looks really good. Could easily end up being one of the best films of the year.