releasing this week: Letters to Juliet and Brooklyn’s Finest

Unfortunately it’s one of those weeks where there isn’t much new stuff coming to the cinemas. There’s only four films this week and to be perfectly honest, none of them look particularly fantastic. I’ve seen one of them. It’s really not fantastic. I settled on Brooklyn’s Finest and Letters to Juliet. They’ll have to do really.

Brooklyn’s Finest is one of the various small action crime dramas that release throughout the year. You’ll hear about the big ones like The Expendables but smaller ones like From Paris with Love and The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call – New Orleans often pass without much notice. To be honest I don’t think many people will notice this one either but I think it’s worth talking about anyway.

The reason I noticed it was that it comes from Antoine Fuqua, director of 2001’s Training Day. I’m sure that’s something they’ll use on the publicity… oh wait, yes, there it is on the poster. Thing is, he’s done quite a few films since that. None of which I’ve heard of. Which is not to say they weren’t good, I’ve just never heard of them… Course, that makes me suspicious.

Usually when I’m not sure about the director I have a look at the writer. In this case we’ve got Michael C. Martin. His IMDb biog and CV is fairly sparse but it looks like this is some kind of rags to riches story. He was just some guy working a normal job when, goshdarn his luck, his screenplay got picked up.. Well maybe not rags, he was a transport worker… hmm… actually maybe rags after all, in a more literal sense. But basically, nothing to point at there…

So the main reason I’m going for this one is the cast. Don Cheadle, Ethan Hawke, Wesley Snipes – all good solid actors. Richard Gere I’m not so sure about… but that’s ok because they’ve got Vincent D’Onofrio! I love Vincent D’Onofrio. Back in 2005, when Wikipedia was young, I did a load of work on his page because I felt such a great actor wasn’t getting his fair due over there. Since then of course it’s been sigificantly updated… but I feel a bit like I started off the expansion… Well, I like to think it anyway.

Back to the film though and I’m gonna just say it. I have no idea if this will be a good film or not. Training Day was a decent flick but it was a good while ago and the writer is pretty untested, but I think it’s worth a shot in a week where there isn’t much going on.

Amanda Seyfried is back! Course she hasn’t actually been gone. Dear John was only out a couple of months ago and Chloe was out only a month before that… but that’s cool. I like Ms. Seyfried, I think she’s more interesting than your average young starlet these days. For a start I think she can actually act. Now I didn’t see Mamma Mia! so can’t comment on any problems there, but then again I didn’t hear that she was crap so I can only assume she was decent enough.

She’s back on Irish screens this week with Letters to Juliet. I mentioned earlier that there are a variety of small crime dramas out every year… well there are even more small romantic dramas. This is not one of them though, you should be able to catch this all over the place… well… everywhere where they haven’t filled all the screens with Sex and the City 2 anyway.

“What’s up with the title, this letters to Juliet malarky?” I hear you say.

Well, ok, you’re probably all familiar with it but for the benefit of people like me who had no idea of this tradition, the title refers to a curious practice in Verona, where Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet was set.

In Verona they have a house that claims the name of the Capulet house, there’s Juliet’s balcony and on Juliet wall people write the names of their loved one. The biggest thing though is probably the letters. Every year thousands of letters arrive in Verona addresses to Juliet and more are put in the cracks in the wall. The letters are read and replied to by volunteers. This tradition forms the basis for the film.

Letters to Juliet opened in the US a while ago and reports have been fairly so-so. Which isn’t really that bad for a romantic drama. Fairly or not, it’s a much maligned genre. Personally I’m always happy to give a romance drama a go. I like a good cry and, let’s be honest, that’s what they’re usually going for. We’ll take a quick peek at the “metrics” though… as some people like to call them. It’s doing a 6.3/10 on IMDb, middling, and it’s at 43% on Rottentomatoes.com. 43% ain’t fresh but when you consider the other romantic dramas this year – Dear John did 29%, Remember Me did 28% and When in Rome (coming out in Ireland on June 25th) is at 16% – the reports for Letters to Juliet seem positively glowing.

So, if I get a chance, I’m gonna give it chance. Why not. Besides, Gael Garcia Bernal is in it. Here’s another if that wasn’t enough…

Other films coming out this week…

Greenberg – Yawn. Gah, ok, This is the new film from indie favourite Noah Baumbach, director of the Oscar nominated The Squid and the Whale. It stars Ben Stiller in the titular role. This is the one I’ve seen this week. Like I said, it’s not fantastic.

But if you really want to know about it, it’s about a guy who busy doing nothing. Actually, you know what. I don’t want to say too much because some of you out there might actually like it. Let’s just say that it was a bit… no, no point in holding back. It was a bit too pretentious for my liking.

Black Death – Now this sounds a bit more like my kinda style. Set in medieval England during the time of the bubonic plague, Black Death is about a young monk who is sent to lead a knight and a team of mercenaries on an investigation into rumours of a village untouched by the creeping death. Their journey is filled with danger but what does more danger await for them in the village? I don’t know, but I definitely want to find out. Unfortunately for much of the country, you can only find out in Cineworld Dublin.

That’s all for this week. Let me know what you do decide to go see in the end!

Letters to Juliet, Brooklyn’s Finest, Greenberg and Black Death are all in Irish cinemas from Friday 4th June 2010.