Trailer Report: In the Valley of Elah, Into the Wild, Lust, Caution, Margot at the Wedding

These are the trailers I saw in front of Eastern Promises. I went to Milwaukee's premiere art-house theater, and one of the ten best in the country, so I got four artsy trailers this time.

In the Valley of Elah

Hey, this looks like the best movie of the year that I couldn't be less motivated to see. The situation in Iraq is depressing enough with seeing films about it all the time. Maybe if I keep hearing good things about Tommy Lee Jones' performance I'll make it this one.

But even though Paul Haggis is pretty humble about the whole Crash debacle in this interview, I'm still nonplussed on him in general. Hey everybody, Paul Haggis wants you to know that not only is racism bad, so is the war in Iraq! Way to go out on a limb there, buddy.

Also, they need to include a bit of dialogue in this trailer that explains the title, because I had too see this about eighteen different times this summer before I remembered what this movie was called.

Into the Wild

Spoiler Alert! If you've read the book, you know that this guy dies. The description on the back of the book says he dies. This Wikipedia entry says he dies. The book starts with his body being found, and works backwards from there. So why does the trailer for the movie not mention that he dies? We're heading for a The Perfect Storm style backlash on this one.

Also, Emile Hirsch looks like he's twelve, even with a beard.

Lust, Caution

Ang Lee? Tony Leung? Sign me up already.

Also, I love the trend of foreign film trailers with no dialogue in them. It's as if they want to trick all the douchebags whose first thought is "Subtitles? Queer!" into going. Because frankly, I don't want those people sitting next to me on October 12th (when this comes to Beer-town).

Margot at the Wedding

I really liked The Squid and the Whale, and I have Kicking and Screaming on my Netflix. So I was planning on seeing this either way, especially given Noah Baumbach's involvement with Wes Anderson.

And the trailer looks pretty good- I wasn't sure if Nicole Kidman's usually cool demeanor and Baumbach's cynicism were a good match, but color me intrigued. Also, it looks like Jack Black can act a little bit. Go figure.