(Originally posted Tuesday, February 13th, 2007)
Read about a couple new films that have the green light, and I’d love to know your thoughts on these.
The Hardy Men
I guess the concept is that the Hardy Boys have grown up and are now at odds. It’s set to star Ben Stiller (hot off the surprise success of “Night at the Museum”) and Tom Cruise (comment withheld), and I’m thrilled that these two will share the same screen space. This is something I’ve been begging for since Stiller’s crazy good impersonation of Cruise at the MTV Movie Awards several years back. To put them as brothers is perfect. You may have forgotten, but Cruise is a pretty decent actor (and funny enough to hang with Ben) if you can get past the distractions. In fact, I’m still convinced MI3 was an amazing movie that didn’t get the credit it deserved because of Cruise’s sideshow.
The Sorcerer’s Apprentice
You may remember this as the finale from the original “Fantasia”. You know, where Mickey got the starry cap and directed anthropomorphic brooms to carry buckets of water until he had inadvertently filled the place with water. As a side note, I think our youngest son Ethan must have seen this lately, because he has taken to filling cups of water and just dumping them through the house. Thanks Disney. Anyhow, the new film will be feature length and be LIVE ACTION. Nicolas Cage is set to star as the sorcerer and I’m not sure who will play Mickey (another role for Dakota Fanning’s resume, perhaps?) I would be quick to judge this as one of the worst ideas ever, except that I did the same thing a few years ago when Disney announced they were making a movie about an old decrepit pirate ride.