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Disney’s exclusive Princess Festival

South East Queensland Birch Carroll & Coyle and Event Cinemas are gearing up to enthral and entertain little princesses and princes at the Disney Princess Animation Festival with only one week to go until showtime!

Kicking off with Aladdin next Saturday and Sunday, families can relive the enchanting stories of their favourite Disney Princesses this February & March at the exclusive Disney Princess Animation Festival. The beloved Disney Princess films will be gracing the big screen for a limited time only.

Moviegoers are encouraged to arrive early as all cinemas have their own free princess themed foyer activities planned for the little ones before each session, including mini princess makeovers, tiara decorating and appearances from special princess friends.

Exclusive screening sessions will start at 10 am or 10:30am each Saturday and Sunday from February 9 until March 17 . For only $8 per ticket you will experience a magical family day filled with activities, prizes, and the joy of Disney Princess special cinematic experience.

Aladdin (G) – 9 and 10 February

Mulan (G) – 16th and 17th February

Pocahontas (G) – 23rd and 24th February

Tangled (G) – 2nd and 3rd March

The Princess & the Frog (G) – 9th and 10th March

Cinderella (G) – 16th and 17th of March

The exclusive Disney Princess Animation Festival will screen from February 9 until March 17 for a strictly limited time only, to book now visit eventcinemas.com.au.

SHOWING AT THE FOLLOWING SEQ LOCATIONS:

Birch Carroll & Coyle Browns Plains
Birch Carroll & Coyle Australia Fair
Birch Carroll & Coyle Ipswich
Event Cinemas Robina
Event Cinemas Garden City
Toombul Cinemas Powered By Event
Birch Carroll & Coyle Capalaba
Birch Carroll & Coyle Coolangatta
Birch Carroll & Coyle Morayfield
Event Cinemas Carindale
Event Cinemas Indooroopilly
Birch Carroll & Coyle Pacific Fair
Event Cinemas Chermside
Strathpine Cinemas Powered By Event

 

Top 25 Teen Flicks of All Time

The final Twilight film is out, and everyone is happy. The fans get the final chapter, and people like me get the knowledge that there won’t be any more. Sorry, but I got 10 minutes into the first film and had to walk out. The pouting, the angst, the pouting. I had my share of teen movies when I was a teenager.

Which made me think – every generation has the chance to create the greatest teen movie of all time. Before they do so, they need to see what’s reached that pinnacle so they can stand on the shoulders of giants.

That said, open the curtains, roll the ads for the candy bar, dim the lights, and prepare to tell me where I got it totally wrong …

Top 25 Teen Flicks of All Time

  1. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off – no explanation needed. The ultimate teen film
  2. Kick Ass – because Chloë Grace Moretz KICKS ASS
  3. Grease – it’s a shame no one can be stranded at a drive-in anymore
  4. To Sir With Love – groundbreaking for its time, and still has the power to break your heart
  5. Rebel Without A Cause – the textbook on how to be a troubled teen
  6. Stand By Me – story by Stephen King, directed by Rob Reiner, cast included River Phoenix & Wil Wheaton. Hard to beat this calibre.
  7. Romeo + Juliet – Shakespeare rocketed into the 20th Century with some chap called Leonardo
  8. The Breakfast Club – high school is hell … welcome to purgatory
  9. The Wild One – Brando was so bad the film was banned in the UK
  10. Back to the Future – Doc! DeLorean! Making sure your parents pash!
  11. Fast Times at Ridgemont High – keeping in real in the 80’s
  12. Footloose – something the red states of the US should watch again ASAP
  13. Wayne’s World – Bohemian Rhapsody head banging … Schwing!
  14. Ghost World – awkward, outcast teens & geeks in the noughties
  15. Heathers – because nothing says “I love you” than murdering the cool kids who make fun of you
  16. Edward Scissorhands – because a best-of movie list without Johnny Depp isn’t a list
  17. Dead Poet’s Society – be inspired and jump on your desk before Robin Williams starts doing silly voices again
  18. Donnie Darko – I wasn’t sure if this should make the list, but there’s this rabbit sitting next to me who is very convincing
  19. Pump Up The Volume – before the internet, there was pirate radio. Talk hard!
  20. Romy & Michele’s High School Reunion – OMG, like, you know?
  21. American Pie – flautists were never looked at the same way again
  22. The Harry Potter Series – some films plod, but just watching the trio growing up (oh, those magical pains of puberty) warrants a mention
  23. Risky Business – Tom Cruise in underwear. Before he became a nut-job (allegedly)
  24. American Graffiti – yes kids, George Lucas made films aside from Star Wars
  25. Mean Girls – Heathers without the murders but balanced out with Lindsay Lohan
Honourable Mentions:
  • Superbad – McLovin’
  • Bend it Like Beckham – Keira Knightly playing football
  • I Know What You Did Last Summer – teenagers being murdered for fun
  • Fame – remember my name
  • Clueless – it’s Jane Austin, bitch!
  • 10 Things I Hate About You – it’s Shakespeare, bitch!
  • Easy A – it’s The Scarlet Letter, bitch!
  • Sixteen Candles – it sucks when everyone forgets your birthday
  • Scott Pilgrim vs. the World – who knew dating could be this dangerous?
  • Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead – because Christina Applegate
  • Zombieland – because Bill Murray. because zombies
  • Juno – the sobering side to teen sex
  • Teen Wolf – Michael’s a Fox appears again with some harmless fluff
Dishonourable Mentions:
  • Twilight – setting the image of the modern woman back 50 years
  • Crossroads – because Britney, bitch!
  • Porky’s – good idea, poorly made. American Pie got it right
  • Return to the Blue Lagoon – you’d think Hollywood would have learnt from their mistakes, wouldn’t you?
  • Step Up 1, 2 & 3 – speaking of mistakes … you really think a reason needs to be made?
C’mon. You’re dying to let me know what’s wrong here. The comments box is right there. I dare you.

Why There Will Never Be Another Doctor Who Movie

Why there will never be another Doctor Who movieHollywood loves rehashing successful franchises to generate more cash. Charlie’s Angels, Transformers, and the Bourne series are just some of the TV shows, toys or books that have recently been rehashed.

Television shows in particular have been getting a good run recently: Star Trek was spectacularly rebooted with a new cast and new parallel universe (nice touch); Tom Cruise’s Mission: Impossible series doesn’t seem to want to end; and the recent relaunch of The Muppets shows that a weekly TV program can create memorable movie characters.

But for every hit, there is a miss: Bewitched, The Dukes of Hazzard and Lost in Space are proof of that.

Which is precisely why there should never, nay, will never be another Doctor Who movie. At least in the foreseeable future.

No matter what storyline or actors are chosen, it will end up being another Dark Shadows: a film that polarised the audience with fans feeling cheated and newbies to the franchise being baffled with boredom.

The recent pitch for new Who by David Yates stated it wouldn’t feature the existing Doctor (Matt Smith), essentially making it a reboot. This is pointless as the TV show has had 11 major reboots over its 49 year history.

Doctor Who is unparalleled in this aspect – with each new regeneration, and even with the departure and arrival of new companions, the show changes. Sometimes minimally, sometimes going in a brand new direction.

Colin Baker’s 6th Doctor harked back to the original William Hartnell – snippy, aggressive, cantankerous … essentially a loveable pain-in-the-arse. The 10th Doctor became a sci-fi love story with Billie Piper’s Rose and Freema Agyeman’s Martha harping over the devilishly good-looking and increasingly power-mad David Tennant.

Whom would the film version be based on? Definitely not the Peter Davison soppy wet fish Doctor, nor the clownish Patrick Troughton, or the maniacal Tom Baker.

No, we’d end up with a Hollywood version: a Frankenstein’s monster mash-up of the last three Doctors. Brooding, good-looking, and (naturally) insanely brilliant. And of course not angry or conflicted or potentially vengeful – a big screen Doctor would have to be easily accessible for the masses.

The problem is, fans have seen this all before. The Doctor’s personality must be different for each regeneration – that’s what makes the concept work. Having a slightly watered-down Doctor harks back to the original two Peter Cushing films. While the first was a hit, the second crashed and burned, leaving the franchise to continue solely on the small screen.

It would be a mistake to alienate the existing fanbase, the largest potential audience, with a celluloid Doctor they are highly likely to reject. For this reason alone, the BBC would be hesitant to proceed back to the big screen.

Then there is the companion: the ‘everyman’ who juxtaposes the Gallifreyan’s alien nature by injecting humanity and awe. Like a dumbed-down Dr Watson, the companion is essential to Doctor Who, they are not only our eyes, but our key to this universe. Without the ability to grow a character over time, a film version would become a cheap, one-dimensional side-kick, similar to Dr Holloway in the one-off TV movie.

Most importantly to a movie reboot is the MacGuffin. Popularity dictates it would probably be the Daleks or the Master, but with recent stories brilliantly told with these villains, and even the introduction of new adversaries that stand up well alongside their predecessors (the Weeping Angels, the Silence, and the Vashta Nerada), a new movie would either have to portray an existing villain in a new and exciting way, or debut a new opponent – one worthy of the pantheon of the Whoniverse.

While it’s exciting to think of the possibilities, history proves that this is highly unlikely.

The final nail in the coffin of a new movie is Steven Moffat’s innovative approach to season 7, where every episode itself feels like a movie. In his own words, every Doctor Who episode for 2012-2013 was created with “slutty titles and movie poster plots … big pictures and straplines”. He even said that one episode he wrote would “feel a bit like Die Hard”.

What’s the point of making a Doctor Who movie when we’ve just had five absolute classics, with another seven to come in 2013 … including a second episode penned by the extraordinary Neil Gaiman, and an episode tentatively titled “Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS”?

Perhaps there will be another Doctor Who movie, but not until the current series is rested to allow demand to grow again. Which hopefully won’t be for quite a few years yet.

Movies taught me how to talk

There’s no doubt that I talk a lot. And the only time I’m ever quiet is when I sit down to watch a movie. Even then however, I somehow become the annoying impersonator – the one who mimics the actors playing on screen, trying to do as they do, be as they are. Let’s face it, you know my type. You feed my type popcorn, because it will get you half way through the show in silence. But there’s something I’ve noticed that’s affected me. Every line I recite becomes a line of my own. Like glue, it sticks and no matter what I do to shake these lines off, they stay.

When faced with indifference I don’t say “I don’t care”. No, instead I say “frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn”. I often declare myself the king of the world (gender notwithstanding) and the first time I set foot in the alien world of Ipswich I looked around and actually uttered “I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore”.

It’s true – movies have shaped my entire vocabulary.

This obsession started at an early age. With a keen attitude towards being a doctor, Kindergarten Cop taught me all about health. If I had a headache, well the symptoms might just be a bit more serious than that. But wait… ‘It’s not a tumour!’ Not to mention, I learnt the anatomy of boys and girls pretty fast and would advise others as such.

Cartoons paved a potential career in home economics. Shrek helped me understand that the best activity one could do was ‘stay up late, swapping manly stories and in the morning, I’m making waffles.’ However with a short attention span, I was easily distracted by other things. ‘I like that boulder. That is a nice boulder.’ Chicken Run further educated me about crime and the difference between holidays and solitary confinement. I knew that I had to make an impact in my life. Some could say I had an epiphany where ‘my life flashed before my eyes and it was really boring.’

Therefore, I gathered that to be employable I needed to refine my skills. ‘Like my nun chuck skills, bow hunting skills and computer hacking skills.’ Napoleon Dynamite encouraged my interest in politics and I learnt that ‘if you vote for me, I’d make all your wildest dreams come true.’ On a side note, this quote actually made its way into my Year 12 captaincy speech. I can vouch for its ability to work as I landed the position I was after.

Entering adolescence, some could say that I became a bit of a Mean Girl. If you didn’t wear the right clothing on some days then I shouted you ‘can’t sit with us.’ I prided myself in looking fabulous and people knew that my hair was so big ‘because it’s full of secrets.’ And I didn’t calm people down with hugs or soothing words, preferring to simply yell “there’s no crying in baseball!”

It took me awhile to realise ‘houston, we have a problem’. It’s true: without knowing it, I’d almost joined the dark side and become a walking quoting machine. The force was VERY strong within this one.

Ultimately, I realised how negative ‘mean’ was and stopped fantasising about jumping over tables and clawing other girls. Instead I wished ‘that I could bake a cake made out of rainbows and smiles and we’d all eat it and be happy.’

My love for all things creative provided a welcome distraction and fellow bombshells Kath and Kim reminded me that ‘it’s noice, it’s different and it’s unusual.’ And I revelled in the knowledge that nobody could put baby in the corner. But in all honesty I couldn’t handle the competitiveness of this business. There were only A Few Good Men in show business and I couldn’t handle the truth they gave me.

I also discovered that in the performing arts, screaming “show me the money” only gets you a reputation as a prima donna princess.

Finally, I settled on Journalism as a career choice and set about improving my grammar by watching Clueless. I learnt the essence of inserting rather big words into my sentences, though this didn’t happen ‘sporadically’ or ‘spontaneously’. I learnt other lingo as well ensuring I was mature with my chosen language. Despite this, I knew that at the same time I could always chill and ‘roll with my homies.’

Though to this day I meet confrontation with a steely gaze and ask them if they feel lucky.

And these are just some of the movies that form the crux of my everyday sayings. Spend any amount of time with me and you’ll start questioning whether I have any original dialogue (I do by the way – but you’re really not giving me enough credit for my ability to communicate via movie-speak).

I had no need to look any of these up as I wrote this. They are deeply entrenched in my brain, taking up valuable space that was meant for university study notes. Oh well. I’m sure you have the same problem, right?

Hasta la vista baby.

 

Do you have any quotes you use in everyday life?

The Greatest Sporting movies – 20 to 11


Anthony Sherratt takes a look at some of the best sporting flicks of all time and shares his top 20. We actually think he was just looking for an excuse to re-watch a bunch of movies.

Sporting movies: the films that make us cheer, mentally relive our youths and go outside for a throw/hit of the ball. They’re usually about aspirations and overcoming obstacles to win the championships and are mightily popular with the masses. But in a genre all about competition, which are the best of the best?

As both a sports fan and movie enthusiast I thought compiling a list would be relatively easy but it turned out to be anything but. Even compiling a short-list became a nightmare as friends and colleagues happily chimed in with suggestions. The ‘short’ list of 20 suddenly became 50 and arguments broke out about what even constitutes a sports movie let alone which were subjectively better.

Even now we’re still split on whether BMX Bandits should have been considered.

Life imitated art as passions grew and people argued, everyone determined that their choice triumph in the inevitable climax. In the end I was forced to take my bat and ball (in this case the list and my iPad) and go home. Away from the roaring crowds, lest their frothing mouths leave me thinking zombies rather than mexican waves.

After an intense montage of angst, DVD lifting and Tim Tams I finally called correct weight and declared the winners.

 

20. Rollerball (1975)
A dystopian film set in the near future, Rollerball turned out to be quite prescient with its themes of corporations running sport and manipulating the masses for profit. It questioned what part of sport passes for entertainment and passed some not-so-subtle judgement on the bloodthirsty nature of supporters.

James Caan played the superstar of an incredibly violent sport in which outcomes and results were being decided by a corporation. It’s Gladiator meets Big Brother with a sport with brutal rules.

Even the ending is bittersweet and confronting with the crowd chanting for a modern Spartacus as he skates around a track strewn with bodies, blood and gore. The impact of the many layers means this 1975 movie (not the recent remake) still has a lot to say many years later.

My most memorable moment: When one of the stars becomes a potato. Intense.

 

19. Major League
In contrast, Major League is a celebration of sport, determination and cliché. Throw in some likeable rogues and this almost by-the-numbers piece could have tanked but somehow it spoke to us. We loved the underdogs, booed the bad girl – as two-dimensional as she was – and basked in the climactic ending.

Tell me you didn’t feel your heart lift when Wild Thing started blaring out. If you’re a sports fan you’ll always remember that scene when the bespectacled Charlie Sheen strode forward with youthful energy (rather than tiger blood).

At its heart it’s a light-weight comedy but it combined well with the tribal emotion of sport to deliver a piece that resonates with athletes and sports fan everywhere.

My most memorable moment: When Taylor calls the shot! No one’s done that since Babe Ruth in the 1932 World Series…

 

18. The Club
Not widely known outside of Australia, The Club is a wonderful sporting story with very little actual sport in it. It follows the fortunes of a high-profile Australian Rules club who recruit a star player at a time when the game was only just starting to deal with paying players.

It focuses on the interactions between the coach, star player and chairman and the differing perceptions and expectations. Featuring cheeky Australian humour and an amazing cast you’d be forgiven for not knowing the movie was based on a David Williamson play.

With both passion and good characterisation, The Club is must-see for all sporting enthusiasts.

My most memorable moment: The song. Quite simply if you were bought up in the 70s or 80s in Australia you knew Up There Cazaly. Even if you didn’t support Australian Rules (or the VFL as it was back then) your heart soared with that tune.

 

17. Big Wednesday
Telling a story over 15 years is always difficult but tying a coming-of-age movie to surfing when the chosen time period contains things such as the Vietnam War makes it even more challenging.

But the background material truly allows some wonderful characterisation as we follow three close friends and their changing lives in troubling times. The film is told in five acts, each of which coincides with the ‘big surf’ surfers dream of (the South Swell 1962, the West Swell ’65, the North Swell ’68, the Great Swell ’74 and of course Big Wednesday in 1977).

With some awesome surfing scenes and realistic characters that display both the good and dark side of humanity, it’s a film about obsession and ideals that transcend the daily routines of life. The quality of the cast only adds to a surfing bible.

My most memorable moment: The very poignant scene where one of the characters has a final surf before being shipped off to the war. The emotional mix is simultaneously subtle and intense.

 

16. The Bad News Bears (1976)
A movies that encompasses multiple genres – it’s a sporting, kids comedy – The Bad New Years Bears was an unflinching look at the ugly side of both children’s sport and America’s addiction to win-at-all-costs competition.

Walter Matthau played a foul-mouthed smoking, drinking former ballplayer who is recruited to coach a team of… well, let’s say they’re not the very best players and they too may have some bad habits that mirror their new coach.

Cue the obligatory laughs at kids using adult language and losing very badly. But of course our ‘hero’ turns it around and the underdogs work their way to the championship game.

It’s a movie that probably defined a genre (you’d be forgiven for thinking I’d just described The Mighty Ducks or a dozen other movies) but it was both endearing and confronting in the 70s.

My most memorably moment: I simply cannot hear the classical piece ‘The Toreador Song’ (Votre Toast from Carmen) without thinking of these ragtag kids and baseball.

 

15. The Hustler (1961)
A sometimes bleak story about a very talented pool player whose desire to be seen as the best over-rides anything else, often to his detriment. He doesn’t play smart, he doesn’t even play to win: he plays to force the other player to concede. Essentially it was really about Fast Eddie playing not pool opponents but himself and his ego.

Eddie spends the whole movie searching for ‘character’ and his journey amongst a motley crew exposes the varied and often conflicting definitions of the sought-after commodity.

An amazing examination of the internal struggle of an elite athlete, The Hustler, looks at motivation, reaction and the affect the ‘real world’ can have on your game.

My favourite thing: The bit of trivia that although a talented pool player named Minnesota Fats actually existed, he adopted his name from the character rather than the character being based on him.

 

14. Slap Shot (1977)
An extremely cynical look at professional sport, Slapshot looks to strip away the sentiment and romanticism that we so love to embrace, especially in movies. It’s down and dirty and takes us back to a time before sports administrators felt the need to maintain the image and integrity of sport because it was a commercial product itself.

Forget CEOs and commissioners speaking out against acts that will turn families and kids away from the game: at one point in this film the coach (Paul Newman again) actually publicly declares a “bounty” of $100 for the first of his players to nail an opposing player. And the quote: “Broome County [the opposing fans] is just visibly upset by this disgusting display … so come on down and get your seats for the next home game! Bring the kids! We got entertainment for the whole family!”

It almost demonstrates that sport is just a bunch of guys running around hitting each other for no other reason than a bit of entertainment.

My favourite thing: Despite the excessive profanity, nudity and violence (for the time) it was actually written by a woman. The cheerfully violent Hanson brothers rate a mention here too.

 

13. Tin Cup
It’s hard to say what draws us to Tin Cup. In fact a lot of people either hated it or were ambiguous about it on first viewing. After all the main character isn’t fully likeable, some of the narrative is disjointed, the love component is odd at best and even the ending is anything but heartwarming.

And yet somehow it works.

And perhaps it’s because of those things: it’s actually all quite human. Despite the lead character’s philosophies not sitting well with most of us, his conviction probably did.

My most memorable moment: A toss-up between the imploding ending and the quote: “Sex and golf are the two things you can enjoy even if you’re not good at them”.

 

12. Escape To Victory
Combining The Great Escape with soccer (football) seems risky enough but throwing Sylvester Stallone into the mix truly threatens to stretch credibility beyond breaking. And yet this cheesy 1981 flick actually manages to work. A team of POWs are assembled to play a Nazi XI for propaganda purposes but of course the prisoners have their own agenda and are planning to use the spectacle as an opportunity to escape.

It’s a light film but Michael Caine combines well with real-life soccer superstars Pele, Bobby Moore and Osie Ardiles and provide football fans with the first quality movie offering of their sport. Though some of the goofs will grate a little on diehard fans, there’s enough emotional manipulation to keep you watching till the end.

My most memorable moment: Pele’s overhead kick (apparently filmed in one take). While ‘bicycle kicks’ are common nowadays, back then only the truly talented and audacious would even attempt them so, at the time, it was stunning.

 

11. Raging Bull
Based on a real-life story, Raging Bull is almost the Anti-Rocky. Following the life of stubborn and unlovable boxer Jake La Motta, the film follows his disintegration from the heights rather than the usual cinderella story. Essentially it’s the decline of a champion although the film subtly questions exactly what that word actually means. In fact it’s less about boxing and more about what the sport can do to some people.

A Scorsese triumph, it of course comes complete with truly vicious violence and a darker psychological edge. But whereas most of Scorsese’s characters are a product and victim of their environment La Motta is multi-dimensional in his simplistic machismo and brute force that masks inadequacies and insecurity.

Intense and not for the squeamish, Raging Bull is a no-holds barred piece that qualifies as great despite the fact you may not want to watch it ever again.

My most memorable moment: We all think of The Elephant Man with the quote “I am not an animal” but whereas John Merrick’s line was a plea for acceptance, La Motta’s use of the same words is actually a horrific realisation of what he is and captures the desperation of a man unsure of what to do next.

 

Are you happy with the movies so far?  Seen any of these and hated them? Which movies do you expect to see in the Top Ten? Let us know below and then join us next week when Anthony gives us his Top Ten thereby inciting a football-derby-level riot.

The terrible trailers today

Anthony Sherratt has a problem with the modern marketing of movies today. Have we lost the art of making a quality trailer?

What is wrong with people making movie trailers nowadays? They appear to have lost sight of the fact that their job is to entice people to the screening of that film.

Instead of teasing us or piquing our interest, the trailers of the past few years seem intent on summarising the movie for us.

I used to love being early to the cinema and sitting back to enjoy tantalising glimpses of pleasures to come. It was storytelling foreplay.

But now I’m finding myself with my fingers in my ears singing “lalala I can’t hear you” as trailer after trailer shows what’s going to happen. Or the best lines. Or the best stunts.

And don’t even start me on trailers that show things that don’t end up in the movie (that’s a rant for another day).

It’s not a difficult concept guys – the trailer should show us the general concept (ie what the film is about) in an interesting way. Not give us an entire summary. Not give away the twists. Not show us things close to the ending.

It’s not rocket science.

The best trailer of recent times? And perhaps ever? Easy. Taken (2008). Trailer. Alternate trailer.

Why is so good? They show you the concept – young girl being abducted while the father listens on the phone. Then the father provides a chilling monologue to one of the kidnappers in which we discover he’s a man of “special skills” (black ops is implied). His monologue ends with an ultimatum of “I will find you. I will kill you.” The kidnapper wishes him good luck.

The second I saw this trailer I was excited. I couldn’t wait for the movie to come out. I knew what it was about but knew nothing past the early stages of the film. My anticipation was through the roof.

THAT’S what good trailers are about.

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