text: Trailer Park: Racing Dreams, Essential Killing, The Concert - The Moviefone Blog
  News Reviews Interviews Sci Fi Horror Trailer Park: Racing Dreams, Essential Killing, The Concert
  Posted Jul 4th 2010 7:02PM
  Filed under: Animation, Documentary, Drama, Horror, Independent, Johnny Depp, Movie Marketing, Harry Potter, Trailers and Clips, Trailers and Clips, Movie News, Cinematical
  It comes as no surprise that Inception won last week's Trailer Park poll with 76% of your votes. After that, Green Hornet, Red and The Social Network duked it out for second place in the 6% range.
  My favorite trailer of this week is for a film I've been dying to see for a very long time. Marshall Curry's go-kart doc Racing Dreams premiered and won the Jury Prize for Best Documentary at the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival and has taken this long to be released in theaters. It has actually already opened in Indiana -- though apparently it screened on Sundays only -- and is currently playing in Oregon, but the film starts in NYC and LA this month. I don't really get the lack of proper distribution given that it's made by an Oscar-nominated filmmaker (Curry's prior film is the excellent Street Fight), was produced by Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and it involves kids, which always make for popular docs, and race cars, which are still a huge deal in most of America. And it appears to have some romantic element. If there's a film that could crossover demographics and reach people who don't usually watch documentaries, this looks like that film. Also, DreamWorks is remaking it. Actually, maybe that has something to do with the original's lack of exposure? Check out the trailer after the jump and see why it deserves to get a wider release. Also, the rest of this week's ranking and poll.
  1. Racing Dreams - You'll definitely want to check this out before the Hollywood dramatized version (produced by Transformers writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman) is made. [RacingDreamsFilm.com]
  2. Rango - In Fear and Loathing Johnny Depp thought he was surrounded by lizards. Now he is one, but he's still got a Hunter Thompson-esque Hawaiian shirt. Nice. The Gore Verbinski-directed animated film looks great and I'm sure Depp will provide some amusing bits by way of his vocals. For some reason I was a little bored with the vignette-ish first half of the trailer, though once it got into the surreal and western bits (the saloon remind anyone else of the Star Wars cantina?) I was sold completely. [iTunes Movie Trailers]
  3. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - In a summer as bland as this one as far as blockbusters go, it's good to at least see a trailer that promises something big and spectacular on the horizon. I don't know the last time we saw something presented as such an event movie as this. If only other franchises could be so momentous with their seventh/eighth parts. [Moviefone]
  4. New Jerusalem - Yep, looks like the kind of film Will Oldham would star in. [The Playlist]
  5. Essential Killing - This escape thriller from Polish filmmaker Jerzy Skolimowski looks like a cross between The Road to Guantanamo and Rescue Dawn, with Vincent Gallo as the potentially Taliban prisoner of war. I love that the trailer features no dialogue. [YouTube]
  6. Let Me In (International) - Yeah, yeah, it looks better than everyone expected. I'm on the side, however, that thinks it also unfortunately looks way too similar to the original Swedish adaptation. I'll just re-watch Let the Right One In. Especially if the remake has music as terrible as what's heard on this trailer's soundtrack. [YouTube]
  7. Paranormal Activity 2 (Teaser) - I don't know about it being scary enough to be pulled from Cinemark theaters, but the teaser is pretty good at setting us up for a follow-up to last year's surprise hit. I appreciate that it's still vid-cam-perspective, so maybe this won't be as bad as the Blair Witch sequel. And they've gone bigger by having multiple cameras! I just hope that baby ends up possessed at some point. Talking demonic babies are the best. Maybe it'll dance, too. (yes I'm being sarcastic). [YouTube]
  8. Charlie St. Cloud (Trailer #2) - I know the Zac Efron fans out there will appreciate this second trailer for this sappy drama. I think the only thing new is that we see Efron having to be a hero by saving his girlfriend. And a quick appearance from Donal Logue. [Yahoo! Movies]
  9. The Oxford Murders - This mystery, which looks like A Beautiful Mind meets The Da Vinci Code (if it weren't based on a novel, i'd say someone's a Ron Howard fan), seems kind of appealing for a few moments. And then Elijah Wood open his mouth and gives a wooden reading of some should-be-smart-sounding dialogue. Next time, if you want anyone to see your movie, don't put any of Frodo's lines in the marketing material, okay? [YouTube]
  10. The Concert - I don't doubt that this foreign comedy is good, especially with Inglourious Basterds' Melanie Laurent co-starring. But this trailer features such generic and pandering voice-over that it won't be the Weinstein Company's marketing department that gets me to see it (the poster is pretty awful too). I actually almost want to avoid the film because of this ad. [Moviefone]
  Tags: animation, charlie st. cloud, documentary, drama, essential killing, harry potter and the deathly hallows, harry+potter, horror, independent, johnny+depp, let me in, let the right one in, marshall curry, melanie laurent, new jerusalem, paranormal activity 2, racing dreams, rango, the concert, the oxford murders, trailer park, vincent gallo, will oldham, zac efron