Posts Tagged ‘Walt Disney Studios’

CTV NEWSCHANNEL: Richard & Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 2 star Michael Rooker.

“Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 2” surpassed expectations after posting $146.5 million on its opening weekend. Richard spoke with one of the film’s stars Michael Rooker. Check out the interview now!

Watch the whole thing HERE!

CTVNEWS.CA: “THE CROUSE REVIEW FOR ‘GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 2’ & MORE!”

A new feature from from ctvnews.ca! The Crouse Review is a quick, hot take on the weekend’s biggest movies! This week Richard looks at the giddy “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” the delicious documentary “Jeremiah Tower: The Last Magnificent” and the bruising “First Round Down.”

Watch the whole thing HERE!

RICHARD’S WEEKEND MOVIE REVIEWS FROM CP24! FRIDAY MAY 05, 2017.

Richard joins CP24 to have a look at the weekend’s new movies, the giddy “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” the delicious documentary “Jeremiah Tower: The Last Magnificent,” the bruising “First Round Down” and the grim and grimy “I, Daniel Blake.”

Watch the whole thing HERE!

RICHARD’S CTV NEWSCHANNEL WEEKEND MOVIE REVIEWS & MORE FOR APR 28.

Richard sits in with CTV NewsChannel anchor Jennifer Burke to have a look at the big weekend movies, the giddy “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2,” the delicious documentary “Jeremiah Tower: The Last Magnificent,” the bruising “First Round Down” and the grim and grimy “I, Daniel Blake.”

Watch the whole thing HERE!

Metro In Focus: Guardians’ return is even more fun than the first.

By Richard Crouse – Metro In Focus

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 opens with a battle scene that would not be out of place in almost any other superhero movie.

The set-up has the Guardians — Peter Quill /Star-Lord (Chris Pratt), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista) and Rocket (Bradley Cooper) — working for the Sovereigns, a thin-skinned race of aliens who have hired the heroes to protect valuable batteries from an inter-dimensional monster.

The action is as wild and woolly as we’ve come to expect from these big CGI extravaganzas, but the thing that sets the scene apart from all other superhero movies is the sheer, unbridled joy brought to the screen by Baby Groot (Vin Diesel), a tree-like being too small to take part in the fight. Instead he blissfully dances throughout to Mr. Blue Sky, the lush, Beatles-esque ELO song that underscores the sequence.

The scene and the movie brim with the missing element of so many other big superhero movies — fun.

“That’s what we hoped to do,” says star Michael Rooker, “bring back the fun. It was fun as hell doing it.”

Rooker reprises his role as blue-skinned, red-finned mercenary Yondu. The former Walking Dead actor — he played Daryl’s older brother Merle Dixon — jokes that his normal look, his handsomely craggy face, is actually make-up, and the Blue Man Group style we see in the movie is the face he was born with. “It takes four or five hours to get this on,” he says, pulling at his cheek. “The real problem is getting the fin off.”

Yondu’s weapon of choice is a flying arrow made of special sound-sensitive metal he controls through whistling.

“Dude,” he says, “everyone is digging that weapon.” It’s the character’s trademark and Rooker laughs when remembering talking to director James Gunn about the role. “Man, I was glad I was able to whistle.”

“The first time I got to whistle I did the melodic whistle… I hypnotized one of the aliens and then I shot out a piercing whistle. Yondu has different whistles.”

One wild action sequence with Yondu’s deadly arrow and set to ’70s pop ditty Come a Little Bit Closer is a showstopper, an imaginatively staged set piece with a huge body count and just as many laughs.

“That whole sequence is very much like a western gun fight if you think about it,” Rooker says. “You go out, and jacket pulled back, methodical, not fast. It is a total tribute.”

In the scene he is accompanied by two computer-generated characters, Baby Groot and Rocket, a genetically engineered raccoon-based bounty hunter. Neither actually appeared on set while shooting, but Rooker says they were there in spirit.

“Because these movies use a lot of CGI they require your imagination to be fertile and open and ripe for seeding,” he says. “I’m like, ‘There is Baby Groot. He’s over there and he’s sopping wet…What have they done to him?’ I talk to them like they were any other two characters.”

Yondu may be a vicious, arrow-wielding mercenary but he’s also the film’s emotional core and James Gunn says people will be “surprised by Michael Rooker’s performance. He deserves an Academy Award nomination. No joke.”

What does Rooker think? “We’ll see about that bro. I’m up for anything.”

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 2: 4 STARS. “a mix of high-tech and lowbrow.”

“Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” opens with a battle scene that would not be out of place in almost any other superhero movie. The set-up has the Guardians—Peter Quill / Star-Lord (Chris Pratt), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista) and Rocket (Bradley Cooper)—working for the Sovereigns, a thin skinned race of aliens who have hired the heroes to protect valuable batteries from an inter-dimensional monster called the Abilisk. In exchange they will receive Gamora’s estranged sister Nebula (Karen Gillan).

It’s a lot of names and intrigue to keep straight right off the top. The action is as wild and woolly as we’ve come to expect from these big CGI extravaganzas, but the thing that sets the scene apart from all other superhero movies is the sheer, unbridled joy brought to the screen by Baby Groot (Vin Diesel), a tree-like being too small to take part in the fight. Instead he blissfully dances throughout to “Mr. Blue Sky,” the lush, Beatlesque ELO song that underscores the sequence.

The scene and the movie brims with the missing element of so many other big superhero movies—fun.

Anchoring the rock ‘em sock ‘em action is a subtext about family; you can choose your friends but you can’t choose your family. Gamora is bound by blood to a sister with an extreme case of sibling rivalry while Peter must choose between his birth father, a small ‘g’ god named Ego the Living Planet (Kurt Russell), his adopted dad Yondu (Michael Rooker) and his Guardian posse.

Set to a soundtrack of 70s radio hits and a cavalcade of pop culture references “Vol 2” is less story driven than the first film. With the origin tale out of the way it focuses on the characters and their relationships. Director James Gunn doesn’t allow the characters to become overwhelmed by the computer generated imagery. From Rocket’s wisecracks to Peter the semi-inept action hero and Gamora’s pragmatism—“If he does turn out to be evil will just kill him.”—the characters are front and center. Like the true scavengers they are, Drax—with Bautista’s deadpan delivery—and Baby Groot—“He’s too adorable to kill,” says Taserface (Chris Sullivan)—steal the show.

Fans will get what they expect—loads of goofy, gross and gooey cartoon action and cool Day-Glo creatures—but it’s the characters that make it so enjoyable. They spend as much time laughing as they do in action, bringing with them an infectious joyfulness. The movie is at it’s best when the characters are hanging out, when Peter finally gets to play catch with his dad with a ball made of pure energy, when Drax is ribbing Mantis (Pom Klementieff) or when Baby Groot is perched on the shoulders of his Guardian pals.

But Gunn also stages interesting action. The “Come a Little Bit Closer” sequence with Yondu’s deadly arrow is a showstopper, an imaginatively staged set piece with a huge body count and just as many laughs.

“Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2” is a mix of high-tech and lowbrow that breaks the sequel curse. It’s a tad too long, succumbs to CGI overload in its final moments and the not so subtle anti-bullying and free to be you and me messaging feels tacked on but is so much fun (there’s that word again) you’ll forgive its transgressions.

There will be a time when the “Guardian of the Galaxy’s” formula of 70s kitsch and wisecracks won’t work but we’re not there yet.

RICHARD’S WEEKEND MOVIE REVIEWS FROM CP24! FRIDAY NOV 04, 2016.

screen-shot-2016-11-04-at-4-29-02-pmRichard and CP24 anchor George Lagogianes have a look at the weekend’s new movies, “Doctor Strange,” the fourteenth film in the Marvel Universe, “Trolls,” the return of a 1970s pop culture phenomenon, Andrew Garfield as real-life WWII hero and pacifist Desmond Doss in “Hacksaw Ridge” and the Iggy and the Stooges documentary “Gimme Danger.”

Watch the whole thing HERE!

RICHARD’S CTV NEWSCHANNEL WEEKEND MOVIE REVIEWS & MORE FOR NOV 04.

screen-shot-2016-11-04-at-4-28-18-pmRichard sits in with Marcia MacMillan to have a look at the weekend’s new movies, Benedict Cumberbatch in “Doctor Strange,” the fourteenth film in the Marvel Universe, “Trolls,” the return of a 1970s pop culture phenomenon with Justin Timberlake and Anna Kendrick, Andrew Garfield as real-life WWII hero and pacifist Desmond Doss in “Hacksaw Ridge” and the Iggy and the Stooges documentary “Gimme Danger.”

Watch the whole thing HERE!

Metro In Focus: Not So Strange for Doctor McAdams in “Doctor Strange.”

screen-shot-2016-10-25-at-10-22-22-amBy Richard Crouse – Metro In Focus

In an unconscious way Rachel McAdams has been preparing to play Dr. Christine Palmer in Doctor Strange her whole life.

“My mother is a nurse,” says the London, Ontario born actress. “She is a very compassionate kind of nurse and Christine is sort of that way as a doctor. She has excellent bedside manner as opposed to Doctor Strange. I took a page from my mom.

“I’ve been talking to her about it for my whole life. She brought her job home sometimes. I picked it up over the years.”

Doctor Strange, the fourteenth film in the Marvel Universe aims to introduce you to the neurosurgeon, played by Benedict Cumberbatch, who goes from saving lives to saving planets. Trauma surgeon Dr. Palmer is his ex-girlfriend but still a constant in his life, and later, when things get mystical, his anchor to the real world.

“It’s a much less typical love trajectory,” she says of their connection. “I think because we had so few scenes to establish our relationship it was a better jumping off point. We had a lot more subterranean life and a much richer history for the characters.”

In the comic books Christine Palmer is a very different person than the one McAdams brings to life on the screen.

“She is an amalgamation of a couple of characters,” she says. “It gave us a lot of creative freedom. We were inventing something. I kind of looked at the comic books more for the flavour of the world and Doctor Strange himself and less so for my character.”

McAdams’s nurse mother may have helped the actress access the emotional side of playing a doctor, but what about the practical stuff, like tying a suture?

“This great neurosurgeon we had on set with us taught us how to sew up a raw turkey breast,” she laughs. “I guess it’s the closest thing to a real live human being, Poor turkey. Then I used oranges, which were easier to carry in my purse. Better smell too. I also had a fake head to practice on. It was kind of like knitting. I would take the suture stuff around, put it on a light stand while we were shooting and practice. I still have sutures on my doorknobs. Haven’t gotten around to cutting them off yet.

“I was really nervous about it because I thought it was going to take forever but it is just one of those thing that one you get the hang of it it’s kind of fun to do.”

The result of all her work is a movie she calls “an ambitious film on the page that I think ticks a lot of those boxes for people are hoping for when they go see a big, blow-out Marvel film. There’s also a quiet deep emotion that runs through it that may catch people off guard.

“I find it hard to get swept away by a film I am in,” she adds, “because I look at it differently, but I actually jumped at one point in my own scene. My friends were laughing. ‘You knew that was coming!’ I know, but I was wrapped up in it.”