CONGRATULATIONS to the late Heath Ledger and Slumdog Millionaire for winning the top Oscars tonight. I guess the Academy Awards aren’t complete crap...this year...

TF2 Update... The official High-Definition teaser trailer for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was released on Monday, and you can check it out on Yahoo!. The highlights of this new clip include protoforms crashing in Paris, near the Egyptian pyramids and into a U.S. aircraft carrier, the return of Scorponok, a partial glimpse of Jetfire (in that shot of Scorponok jumping towards a robot holding a cane... That’s Jetfire), better views of Demolisher (the Constructicon who drives through and obliterates that bridge just as Optimus Prime leaps onto him) and The Fallen himself (shown above). Judging from the shot shown in the trailer, The Fallen apparently teleports! Hopefully that’s true. A teleporting Decepticon is more badass than anything that Starscream, Bonecrusher or Megatron did in the first film. Not that what those three Decepticons did weren’t cool. Starscream taking out those F-22’s... Bonecrusher ramming through that bus... Megatron ripping Jazz in half... Those moments rocked.



The next trailer should be released with J.J. Abrams' Star Trek in May. Hopefully.





All images courtesy of Paramount / Dreamworks

GRAN TORINO... Two days ago, I finally got around to seeing the much-acclaimed Clint Eastwood film. While it definitely didn’t deserve the Oscar nominations that some people thought it got robbed of (though Eastwood probably could’ve gotten a Best Actor nom), it was still an exceptional film. It was interesting to see Eastwood pretty much play a bigoted version of Dirty Harry ("swamprats", "zipperhead", "gook" and "nip"... Just a few of a couple of racist terms that Eastwood’s character constantly spouted out with hilarity. And yes, I’m Asian). The biggest highlight of the movie, for me, was the finale. Gran Torino has been out since last Christmas, so I guess I can talk about the ending now. The film could’ve concluded through one of two ways: 1.) Eastwood does go all-out as Dirty Harry and blasts away those Hmong gangmembers, or 2.) He dies of lung cancer. Fortunately, it was Number 3... A nice little twist where Eastwood ultimately sacrifices himself so an Asian family can live normally, despite the fact Eastwood’s character took the lives of many Asians when he served in the Korean War. Eastwood and screenwriters Nick Schenk and Dave Johannson definitely deserves kudos for finding a way to make Gran Torino end on an unpredictable and satisfying note.

In terms of negative critique, a big minus for the film was the acting by pretty much everyone else in Gran Torino...particularly the Asian cast. Unlike Dev Patel in Slumdog Millionaire, Bee Vang (who played Thao Vang Lor) doesn’t exactly deserve an award for his performance...especially for the scene where Eastwood locks him up inside his basement. Ahney Her (who played Thao’s sister, Sue) was also kinda flat in her performance. While it was an emotional scene when she walked into that front door bruised-up and bloodied, her line delivery in other parts of the movie could’ve been better. Other than this, Gran Torino was a fine film.

No wait— One more critique: What was up with Clint Eastwood singing at the beginning of the end credits?? Please...don’t be like Joaquin Phoenix and decide to become a music artist, Eastwood. Stick to acting. That’s all.

REVENGE OF THE FALLEN Update... This has been a good week for Transformers fans, what with the title character known as The Fallen being confirmed for the movie with leaked images of its toy figure, as well as a CGI concept shown above. Also, the new teaser trailer that will be shown in front of Friday the 13th (out in theaters today) was leaked onto the web last night. Obviously can’t wait till the official version gets released. Michael Bay said a few weeks back that the teaser will be released online a week from now, but I read from other sites—too lazy to link to them here—that it will get released this Monday (the 16th). I’m hoping it’s the latter. Bay did say before he started production on the film that he’s gonna spread misinformation about Transformers 2...




Watch the new trailer before it um, gets taken down by Paramount/Dreamworks:



Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen comes out in theaters on June 24...not June 26.

(I know... If this were a term paper for school, I'd totally have gotten an 'F' for complete lack of citations here. Oh well.)

G.I. JOE: THE RISE OF COBRA... Just thought I’d post up screenshots from the Super Bowl ad for this upcoming, um, blockbuster. I was originally gonna post these on Sunday, but the teaser for Transformers 2 itself accidentally(?) leaked online Saturday night and, well, if it was a choice between posting images of Sienna Miller appearing hot as the black-leathered Baroness or Megan Fox appearing hot just looking scared (here and here), I’d choose Megan first.

G.I. Joe gets released in theaters on August 7.





Images courtesy of Paramount

SUPER BOWL 43... In case you didn’t know yet ‘cause you’re a non-sports-loving Yank or you live in Afghanistan, today is the Big Game between the Pittsburg Steelers and the Arizona Cardinals. For once, I’m rooting for the underdogs in a sports championship game: GO CARDINALS! The Game starts at 3:28 PM, Pacific Time, on NBC. (Yes, that’s the official time.)

UPDATE (8:37 PM, PST): Steelers: 27, Cardinals: 23. Darn it.



If you’re not a football (that is, the one that involves using a ball made out of pigskin—actually, it’s cowhide leather—and not the one that has the announcer yelling, "GOOOOOOOAAAAAL!") fan, but a die-hard movie buff, TV spots for a couple of anticipated summer blockbusters will be shown during the Game. Star Trek, Angels & Demons, Up, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen will have ads shown. In terms of Transformers 2, this will be the first time that the public will actually get an official glimpse at footage from the upcoming film. The ad for Transformers 2 will be shown a couple of minutes into the 3rd quarter, according to TF2 director Michael Bay.



Of course, if you can't wait for the 3rd quarter of the Game to see the TF2 trailer, then by all means, click above! I like making screenshots...





Images courtesy of Paramount / Dreamworks