Some camped out in tents while others flew in from across the country to wait in line for hours for access into Hall H of the San Diego Convention Center. The first full day of Comic-Con included many events such as a 3D Showcase of Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, The Hole and The Final Destination. Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs seems to be a playful animated film. The multi-dimensional spaghetti tornadoes were a plus. The footage for The Hole, however, didn’t leave me feeling as optimistic. The horror film had thousands of Comic-Con viewers laughing at certain scenes including one, in particular, which involved a young boy running from dolls in an attic. However, there are times when fun and horror can, in fact, go together. This seems to be the case with the 3-D version of The Final Destination. The gore is seemingly limitless. Let’s just say there was no holding back in the making of this multi-dimensional journey.
Summit Entertainment also presented a sneak peek of exclusive footage of some of its upcoming major film releases such as Astro Boy, Sorority Row and the Comic-Con crowd favorite, The Twilight Saga: New Moon. Astro Boy is set in a futuristic word where a young robot searches for his destiny. Although the footage wasn’t bad, it was nothing to write home, or tweet about. The cast of Sorority Row spoke about their horror sorority sister characters in a panel before presenting debut footage from the upcoming film. Both Astro Boy and Sorority Row were blown away by the crowd’s adoration for the cast of the second film in the Twilight series. The actors spoke about how the chaos of the huge fan base changed the way they felt while filming by giving them more confidence and reassurance. The clips included Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner shirtless, which of course, met the fan’s standards.
After a generous quantity of dazzling 3-D footage from Avatar, which premieres December 18, an announcement was made that August 21st will be “Avatar Day.” This means 15 minutes of free footage will be shown in IMax theaters throughout the world. After being part of the first public screening of footage in 3-D from the action/adventure/fantasy and listening to James Cameron, Jon Landau and cast members talk about the spectacular new world of Pandora, Avatar will be worth the ten bucks. Conceived 14 years ago and over four years in the making, Avatar should live up to all expectations and break new ground in movie making.
Heath Ledger’s final film, Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus, is yet another film worth waiting in line for. Gilliam himself introduced footage from his new film starring Christopher Plummer, Johnny Depp, Heath Ledger, Colin Farrell, Jude Law, Verne Troyer, Tom Waits and Lily Cole. So far, the dialogue and scenery lives up to the hype.
As evening approached, world premiere footage from Kick Ass, based on Mark Millar’s bestselling comic series was presented by director Matthew Vaughn (Stardust). The footage earned a standing ovation by some, and an animated reaction from an exhausted crowd. Christopher Mintz-Plasse (Superbad), Clark Duke (Clark and Michael), ad comic co-creators Mark Millar and John Romita Jr. A crowd favorite was surprise guest Chloe Moretz, a young star in the film. Some of the first to experience this gritty, brash and funny actioner literally gave the preview a thumbs up. Hopefully this will help the film land a distributor.
Focus Features and Comic-Con presented a rare U.S. appearance by acclaimed Korean filmmaker Park Chan-Wook, whose “scandalous vampire melodrama,” Thirst, won the Prix du Jury (Jury Prize) at the 2009 Cannes International Film Festival. In the time of Twilight, Thirst’s thoughtful narrative may just give more cerebral vampire fans something to thirst for.
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