The Pulpmovies Trailer Park

Now here’s an interesting looking outing from director Andrew Niccol - whose previous outings included Gattaca and S1m0ne - and starring the ever versatile Nicolas Cage.

After escaping the USSR for the land of opportunity, young hustler Yuri (Nicolas Cage) seizes the opportunity to make a buck by selling a key to the UN armory and realizing his calling as an arms dealer.

Driven by the lure of easy money and the heady cocktail of glamour and danger, Yuri and his brother Vitaly claw their way up through the world of international arms dealing, all the while staying one step ahead of the law, ruthless competitors and treacherous clients by wit and cunning.

With private jets and a beauty queen at his side, Yuri savors the high life in the fast lane, even after being forced to kill in cold blood and learning the brutal personal cost of his profession.

But when Vitaly encounters the innocent victims of their unholy trade and is killed making a moral stand, Yuri’s world begins to cave in…

Lord of War is released in the US on September 16th and starts working its way around Europe from October 14th.

The Trailer

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The God Who Wasn’t There is a film that has been generating a fair bit of controversy in the US, and now it’s available on DVD, so you can see for yourself what all the fuss is about.

Bowling for Columbine did it to the gun culture.
Super Size Me did it to fast food.
Now The God Who Wasn’t There does it to religion.

Holding modern Christianity up to a bright spotlight, this bold new film demands answers to the questions few dare to ask. Your guide through the world of Christendom is former fundamentalist Brian Flemming , who unflinchingly examines believers and the origins of their beliefs. He gets help from such luminaries as esteemed folklorist Alan Dundes ( Holy Writ as Oral Lit ), Jesus Seminar fellow Robert M. Price ( Deconstructing Jesus ) and neuroscientist Sam Harris ( The End of Faith ).

Along with Brian, you will discover:

• The early founders of Christianity seem wholly unaware of the idea of a human Jesus
• The Jesus passed down to us in the gospels bears a striking resemblance to other ancient heros and the figureheads of pagan savior cults
• Contemporary Christians are largely ignorant of the origins of their religion
• Christianity is as obsessed with blood and violence now as it was in the 1 st century
• Fundamentalism is as strong today as it ever has been, with an alarming 44% of Americans believing Jesus will return to Earth within the next 50 years
• And God simply isn’t there

Brian Flemming also explores his own experiences within fundamentalist Christianity at a cult-like school that taught him how how and what to believe. Ultimately, he confronts the man in charge of educating the school’s 1800 students, and this superintendent’s inability to justify what he teaches is revealing and distressing.

“Dazzling motion graphics and a sweeping soundtrack by DJ Madson help tell this tale of one person’s journey from the darkness of first- century thinking to the enlightenment of reason.”

The Trailetr

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Beautiful Boxer, a film based on famed transsexual kickboxer Nong Toom, has been a huge success in its native Thailand and is now set to be released in the UK on 2nd September.

He fights like a man so he can become a woman

Based on the true story of Thailand’s famed transvestite kickboxer, Beautiful Boxer is a poignant action drama that punches straight into the heart and mind of a boy who fights like a man can become a woman.

Believing he’s a girl trapped in a boy’s body since childhood, Parinya Charoenphol (affectionately known as Nong Toom in Thailand) sets out to master the most masculine and lethal sport of Muay Thai (Thai boxing) to earn a living and to achieve his ultimate goal of total femininity. Touching, funny and packed with breathtaking Thai kickboxing sequences, Beautiful Boxer traces Nong Toom’s childhood, teenage life as a traveling monk and grueling days in boxing camps. Shot in 9 provinces across Thailand and in Tokyo, the film also features a series of explosive matches where Nong Toom knocks out most of his opponents in Thailand and Japan.

Directed and produced by Ekachai Uekrongtham, the film stars Asanee Suwan, a real-life kickboxing champ as Nong Toom. The role earned him the 2004 Supannahongsa Award (Thailand’s equivalent to the Oscar) for Best Actor. Beautiful Boxer also features compelling performances by Thailand’s award-winning actor Sorapong Chatree in the role of Nong Toom’s coach and former Miss Thailand Orn-Anong Panyawong as Nong Toom’s mother.

Kyoko Inoue, one of Japan’s top female wrestlers plays herself in the film. She has fought with Nong Toom in real life back in 1988. That historical match was reenacted for the film in a dramatic sequence shot at Toyko Dome. Nearly all of Nong Toom’s opponents in the film are also professional kickboxers in real life.

Beautiful Boxer has been officially selected for the Panorama Section of the 2004 Berlin International Film Festival. It’s the only Thai film in the 2004 Panorama.

Teaser #1

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Teaser #2

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Trailer #1

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Trailer #2

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This British outing from Canadian director, John Fawcett and starring Sean Bean looks like it may well give the Japanese a run for their horror money.

In mourning over the tragic drowning of their daughter Sarah (Stuckey), James (Bean) and Adèle (Bello) are visited by Ebrill (Stone), a young girl who claims she died 60 years ago … and bares a startling resemblance to Sarah.

The Dark is released in October.

The Trailer

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We’ve seen the poster and now, not only is the trailer for Terry Gilliam’s The Brothers Grimm online, but there are also three downloadable clips for the film out there as well.

From acclaimed director Terry Gilliam (The Fisher King, Twelve Monkeys), comes The Brothers Grimm, the adventure of legendary fairytale scribes, Will and Jake Grimm (Matt Damon and Heath Ledger), two brothers who travel around the Napoleonic countryside vanquishing monsters and demons in exchange for quick money. But when the French authorities figure out their scheme, the con men are forced to contend with a real magical curse when they enter an enchanted forest where young maidens keep disappearing under mysterious circumstances. Many of their renowned fairytales including Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood and Hansel and Gretel are masterfully woven into the story, as the Brothers Grimm are forced to confront all that their imaginations have brought to life in this epic battle between fantasy and reality.

I am more hyped about this film than I was for the last Gilliam outing.

The Trailer

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The Clips

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Here’s a very spooky looking Norwegian entry into the Blair Witch, lost in the woods genre of horror films found via European Films.

Villmark, which has been translated as ‘Dark Woods’ in English, is a very effective genre-film. It takes it time to acquaint us with the characters and succeeds in giving each one their distinct personality a couple of broad brush-strokes. Once all hell breaks loose this film does not forget about its characters, though. The characters still interact and talk about their fears and expectations in what are pauses between one assault and the next. The pacing of this film is excellent and the story as credible as they come for this type of film.

All the five main actors do an excellent job of portraying their characters. These are people you and I could know and relate to. This is what makes ‘Villmark’ so much better than many others in the thriller/horror genre. What they go through is an extraordinary experience ordinary people we can relate to go through, and that makes everything they go through so much scarier.

The Trailer

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This is the second of two trailers from Substance Productions that I head about through the forum.

The film revolves around Dicky, a retail vteran who just got ditched by his gal. Attempting to reconcile his feelings for lost love and sex with some beer banter, skewed philosphizing, and a few grins, Dicky and his buds have one memorable weekend. Alive and Lubricated offers an unsentimental portrait of guys interacting in their own environment, where one-upmanship is as common as thinking they have the answers.

Alive and Lubricated was shot over 10 days in Toronto with a volunteer cast and crew and the help of the Liason of Independent Filmmakers of Toronto (LIFT).

The Trailer

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This is the first of two trailers from Substance Productions that I head about through the forum.

A day in the life comedy, Bums follows the lives of six friends as their relationships blur together to produce love, laughs, lethargy and a loose canon. Bums is an insightful and provocative look at life neither here nor there, on a day like any other day, when you don’t know what you’re doing and all the time in the world to do it.

Bums was shot over 4 weekends in and around Toronto.

The Trailer

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This looks interesting…

Set in 1950s England, Asylum, tells the story of Stella Raphael (Natasha Richardson), a restless beautiful woman who desperately desires to find in romantic love the one thing that will change everything.

When her husband, Max (Hugh Bonneville), an ambitious forensic psychiatrist, is appointed Deputy Superintendent at a high-security psychiatric hospital for the criminally insane, Stella and her young son come to live with him on the grounds. Being in the proximity of madness has a dangerous attraction for this woman; with its eerie gothic beauty and endless echoing corridors, the institution itself seems to draw Stella in.

Stella ends up as the centre of attention for three men - her husband, her (insane) lover and a doctor - all of whom want to posess her. Then Edgar Stark (Marton Csokas), the lover, escapes which leads to the secret affair being revealed.

Stella determines to continue on with her new lover, no matter what the cost. What began as a fierce brave step towards freedom now threatens to bring Stella to other, even more intense forms of confinement. Having taken the risk, there is no turning back.

The Trailer

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Another day, another remake. But, from the trailer, The Fog may well be worth catching.

According to the IMDb…

Exactly one hundred years ago, off the rocky shore of an isolated Northern California town, a ship of lepers was horribly wrecked in an eerie fog when the founders of the town purposefully misguided the ship, dooming everyone aboard. Now, tonight, the ghosts of the long-dead mariners have returned from their watery graves to exact revenge. Shrouded within a supernatural fog, the ghosts trap the residents of the remote community, intent on seeking out the descendents of those who founded the town…and killing anyone who stands in their murderous path.

Check out the trailer and see for yourself.

The Trailer

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