THE HUNTING IN CONNECTICUT (2009)

"Some things cannot be explained."

The astounding, well-documented story of a family forced to relocate near a clinic where their son was being treated for cancer.
Strained financially and emotionally, the family discovers their recently renovated home was a former mortuary with a dark history.
When the Campbell family moves to upstate Connecticut, they soon learn that their charming Victorian home has a disturbing history: not only was the house a transformed funeral parlor where inconceivable acts occurred, but the owner’s clairvoyant son Jonah served as a demonic messenger, providing a gateway for spiritual entities to crossover.
Now, unspeakable terror awaits when Jonah, the boy who communicated with the dead, returns to unleash a new kind of horror on the innocent and unsuspecting family.
After experiencing violent supernatural events both inside and out of the house, the family seeks the help of ghost hunters and the Catholic Church, which performs an exorcism.

Fact : Based on a chilling true story, “The Haunting in Connecticut” charts one family’s terrifying, real-life encounter with the dark forces of the supernatural.

Note : One of the hottest stars of the mid-1980s, Virginia Madsen is one of Hollywood’s most talented actresses. Voted as one of the most beautiful actresses in 1986, Virginia has had several excellent performances in her career thus far.

Star(s) to watch : Amanda Crew (”She’s the Man”, “John Tucker Must Die”, “Final Destination 3″) as Wendy, & Virginia Madsen (”Firewall”) as Sara Campbell.

Director(s) : Peter Cornwell.
Producer(s) : Steve Whitney, Norm Waitt, Scott Niemeyer, Paul Brooks, Andrew Trapani, Wendy Rhoads, & Daniel Farrands.
Genre : Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Thriller, Horror.
Release date : March 27, 2009
Official website : http://www.HauntingInConnecticut.com

ADVENTURELAND (2009)

"It was the worst job they ever imagined... and the best time of their lives."

It’s the summer of 1987, and James Brennan (Jesse Eisenberg), an uptight recent college grad, can’t wait to embark on his dream tour of Europe.

But when his parents (Wendie Malick and Jack Gilpin) announce they can no longer subsidize his trip, James has little choice but to take a lowly job at a local amusement park.

Forget about German beer, world-famous museums and cute French girls-James’ summer will now be populated by belligerent dads, stuffed pandas, and screaming kids high on cotton candy.

Lucky for James, what should have been his worst summer ever turns into quite an adventure as he discovers love in the most unlikely place with his captivating co-worker Em (Kristen Stewart), and learns to loosen up.

Fact : Written and directed by Greg Mottola, a protege of Steven Soderbergh.

Note : Ryan Reynolds has expressed great interest in portraying the DC Comics character the Flash, should Warner Bros ever decide to do a film adaptation of the comic book.

Star(s) to watch : Ryan Reynolds (”Smokin’ Aces”, “Blade: Trinity”, “Van Wilder”, “Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle”) as Connell, & Kristen Stewart (”Jumper”, “Zathura”, “Cold Creek Manor”, “Panic Room”, “Twilight”) as Em.

Director(s) : Greg Mottola.
Producer(s) : Bruce Toll, William Horberg, Ted Hope, Anne Carey, & Sidney Kimmel.
Genre : Comedy, Drama.
Release date : March 27, 2009
Official website : http://www.AdventureLandTheFilm.com

MONSTERS VS ALIENS (2009)

"When aliens attack, these guys got your back."

When California girl Susan Murphy is unexpectedly clobbered by a meteor full of outer space gunk, she mysteriously grows to 49-feet-11-inches tall and is instantly labeled a “monster” named Ginormica.

The military jumps into action, and she is captured and held in a secret government compound.

The world learns that the military has been quietly rounding up other monsters over the years.

This ragtag group consists of the brilliant but insect-headed Dr. Cockroach, Ph.D.; the macho half-ape, half-fish The Missing Link; the gelatinous and indestructible B.O.B.; and the 350-foot grub called Insectosaurus.

Their confinement time is cut short however, when a mysterious alien robot lands on Earth and begins storming the country.

As a last resort, under the guidance of General W.R. Monger (on a desperate order from The President), the motley crew of Monsters is called into action to combat the aliens and save the world from imminent destruction.

Fact : Featuring the voices of Kiefer Sutherland (as the voice of General W.R. Monger), Paul Rudd (as the voice of Derek), Hugh Laurie (as the voice of Dr. Cockroach Ph.D.), Rainn Wilson (as the voice of Gallaxhar), & Seth Rogen (as the voice of B.O.B.).

Director(s) : Conrad Vernon & Rob Letterman.
Producer(s) : Lisa Stewart, Jill Hopper, & Latifa Ouaou.
Note : Also known as “Monsters and Aliens” and “Rex Havoc”.
Genre : Action, Adventure, Comedy, Animation.
Release date : March 27, 2009
Official website : http://www.monstersvsaliens.com/

12 ROUNDS (2009)

“A brilliant killer with a score to settle is putting Detective Danny Fisher to the ultimate test."

Detective Danny Fisher (John Cena) discovers his girlfriend (Ashley Scott) has been kidnapped by a ex-con tied to Fisher’s past, and he’ll have to successfully complete 12 challenges in order to secure her safe release.

Fact : Italian descent John Felix Anthony Cena, or better known as John Cena, is a very successful superstar in the WWE.

Note : Renny Harlin is a producer and action movie director of the 1990s, who directed many blockbuster movies, such as “Die Hard 2″ (1990), “Cliffhanger” (1993), “Deep Blue Sea” (1999), and “The Covenant” (2006).


Star(s) to watch : Taylor Cole (”April Fool’s Day”) as Erica Kessen, John Cena (”The Marine”) as Detective Danny Fisher, & Ashley Scott (”Into the Blue”, “Walking Tall”) as Molly Porter.
Director(s) : Renny Harlin.
Producer(s) : Vince McMahon, Becki Trujillo, Mark R. Gordon, Josh McLaughlin, & Michael Lake.
Genre : Action, Adventure, Crime, Gangster.
Release date : March 27, 2009
Rating : Coming soon.
Official website : http://www.12Rounds-Movie.com

DUPLICITY (2009)

“Two expert spies. Two rival corporations. One perfect plan.”

CIA officer Claire Stenwick (Julia Roberts) and MI6 agent Ray Koval (Clive Owen) have left the world of government intelligence to cash in on the highly profitable cold war raging between two rival multinational corporations.

Their mission?

Secure the formula for a product that will bring a fortune to the company that patents it first.

For their employers-industry titan Howard Tully (Tom Wilkinson) and buccaneer CEO Dick Garsik (Paul Giamatti) - nothing is out of bounds.

But as the stakes rise, the mystery deepens and the tactics get dirtier, the trickiest secret for Claire and Ray is their growing attraction.

And as they each try to stay one double-cross ahead, two career loners find their schemes endangered by the only thing they cant cheat their way out of: love.

Fact : Written and directed by Tony Gilroy, the man behind the entire “Bourne” trilogy of action-espionage films.

Note : This movie reunites Clive Owen and Paul Giamatti following their blockbuster must-see movie “Shoot ‘Em Up” in 2007.


Star(s) to watch : Clive Owen (”Sin City”, “Shoot ‘Em Up”, “Hostage”, “The Bourne Identity”, “The Rich Man’s Wife”) as Ray Koval, Paul Giamatti (”The Negotiator”) as Dick Garsik, & Tom Wilkinson (”The Patriot”, “Batman Begins”) as Howard Tully.

Director(s) : Tony Gilroy.
Producer(s) : Laura Bickford & Jennifer Fox.
Genre : Drama, Thriller.
Release date : March 20, 2009
Official website : http://www.duplicitymovie.net/

KNOWING (2009)

"Knowing is Everything."

In 1958, as part of the dedication ceremony for a new elementary school, a group of students is asked to draw pictures to be stored in a time capsule.

But one of the students, a mysterious girl who seems to hear whispered voices, fills her sheet of paper with rows of apparently random numbers instead.

Fast forward 50 years to the present: A new generation of students examines the contents of the time capsule and the girl’s cryptic message ends up in the hands of young Caleb.

But it is Caleb’s father, professor Ted Myles, who makes the startling discovery that the encoded message predicts with pinpoint accuracy the dates, death tolls and coordinates of every major disaster of the past 50 years.

As Ted further unravels the document’s secrets, he realizes it foretells three additional events—the last of which hints at destruction on a global scale and seems to somehow involve Ted and his son.

Fact : Though haunted by cries of nepotism early in his career, engaging, sleepy-eyed American star Nicolas Cage, nephew of director Francis Ford Coppola, led anything but a charmed existence growing up amidst the placid suburban comfort of Long Beach, California. The son of comparative literature professor August Coppola (a brother of director Francis Ford Coppola) half German, half Italian Nicolas Cage changed his name early in his career to make his own reputation, succeeding brilliantly with a host of classic, quirky roles by the late 1980s.

Note : Like David Fincher and Michael Bay, Alex Proyas has moved effortlessly between helming TV commercials and music videos to feature films. To date, he has specialized in visually stunning action thrillers which utilize myth and iconography in compensation for any shortcomings in the script and/or acting. “Dark City” (1998) and “The Crow” (1994) are the examples of some movies under his directing act.

Star(s) to watch : Rose Byrne (”Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones”, “Troy”, “Wicker Park”, “Sunshine”) as Diana Whelan, & Nicolas Cage (”Face/Off”, “Con Air”, “The Rock”, “National Treasure”, “Gone in Sixty Seconds”, “Next”, “Ghost Rider”, “Bangkok Dangerous”) as Ted Myles.

Director(s) : Alex Proyas.
Producer(s) : Norm Golightly.
Genre : Thriller, Drama.
Release date : March 20, 2009
Official website : http://www.knowing-themovie.com/

RACE TO WITCH MOUNTAIN (2009)

“The race is on”

For years, stories have circulated about a secret place in the middle of the Nevada desert, known for unexplained phenomena and strange sightings.

It is called Witch Mountain, and when a Las Vegas cab driver (Dwayne Johnson) finds two teens with supernatural powers in his cab, he suddenly finds himself in the middle of an adventure he can’t explain.

When they discover that the only chance to save the world lies in unraveling the secrets of Witch Mountain, the race begins, as the government, mobsters and even extraterrestrials try to stop them.

Fact : Based on source material from novel “Escape to Witch Mountain” by Alexander Key.

Note : Also known as “Escape To Witch Mounain".

Director(s) : Andy Fickman.
Producer(s) : Ann Marie Sanderlin & Andrew Gunn.
Genre : Kids, Family, Thriller, Remake, Adventure, Comedy, Sci-Fi.
Release date : March 13, 2009
Official website : http://disney.com/witchmountain

THE LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT (2009)

"If bad people hurt someone you love, how far would you go to hurt them back?"

A pair of teenage girls are brutally raped and terrorized by a vicious gang of psychopaths, who subsequently find their cruelty returned tenfold when they seek sanctuary in the home of one of the victim’s parents in this contemporary reworking of Wes Craven’s controversial 1972 shocker.

Shortly after arriving at her family’s secluded lakehouse, Mari Collingwood (Sara Paxton) and her best friend are abducted by a sadistic prison escapee and his violent crew.

Left for dead and nearly in shock after suffering unspeakable abuse at the hands of her captors, Mari realizes that her only hope for survival is to find her way back home.

Unfortunately for Mari, her attackers have unwittingly arrived at her parents’ home seeking shelter from the authorities.

There, Mari’s concerned parents John (Tony Goldwyn) and Emma (Monica Potter) realize to their horror just what grim fate has befallen their beloved daughter.

Suppressing their rage in order to lure the killers into a deadly trap, John and Emma quietly hatch a plan to make the three strangers suffer for their grisly transgressions.

Fact : A former humanities professor turned brand name fright-master, producer, writer, director Craven is clearly an intellectual artist trapped in a disreputable genre. He entered filmmaking as an editor and assistant producer to exploitation producer Sean Cunningham (who would later create Jason for the “Friday the 13th” movies) on several low-budget comedies and skin flicks before graduating to the position of writer-director with a modestly budgeted ($87,000), feature “Last House on the Left” (1972). Wes Craven also produced many blockbuster movies such as “Shocker” (1989), “Dracula 2000″ (2000), and “The Hills Have Eyes” (2006).

Note : Sara Paxton was a model. She was ranked #44 on interview magazines Hollywood faces to watch “future stars of tomorrow”. Her father is very distantly related to actor Bill Paxton.

Star(s) to watch : Sara Paxton (”Liar Liar”, “Superhero Movie”) as Mari Collingwood.

Director(s) : Dennis Iliadis.
Producer(s) : Wes Craven, Jonathan Craven, Marianne Maddalena, Sean Cunningham, & Cody Zwieg.
Genre : Suspense, Horror, Remake, Thriller.
Release date : March 13, 2009
Official website : http://www.thelasthouseontheleft.com/

WATCHMEN (2009)

"Justice is coming to all of us. No matter what we do."

Set in an alternate 1985 America in which costumed superheroes are part of the fabric of everyday society and the ‘Doomsday Clock’ - which charts the USA’s tension with the Soviet Union - is permanently set at five minutes to midnight.

When one of his former colleagues is murdered, the washed-up but no less determined masked vigilante Rorschach sets out to uncover a plot to kill and discredit all past and present superheroes.

As he reconnects with his former crime-fighting legion - a ragtag group of retired superheroes, only one of whom has true powers - Rorschach glimpses a wide-ranging and disturbing conspiracy with links to their shared past and catastrophic consequences for the future.

Their mission is to watch over humanity … but who is watching the Watchmen?


Fact : “Watchmen” is a 2009 film adaptation of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ comic book limited series of the same name, directed by Zack Snyder. Set in 1985, the film follows a group of former vigilantes as war begins to break out between the United States and the Soviet Union. Like his previous film “300″, Snyder closely modeled his storyboards on the comic, but unlike “300″, he chose not to shoot all of “Watchmen” using chroma key.

Note : Zack Snyder took Frank Miller’s graphic novel “300″ and turned it into a visually stunning blockbuster. Now Snyder’s “Watchmen” is considered the best graphic novel ever written that goes into another much-anticipated movie. The story is set in an alternate 1985 where superheroes exist, Richard Nixon is still president, and tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union are at an all-time high. The vigilante Rorschach is investigating the murder of a former hero, the Comedian, and uncovers a plot to discredit and murder various heroes. Rorschach discovers a far wider-ranging conspiracy involving his colleagues’ past which could completely change the course of history.

Star(s) to watch : Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Edward Blake/The Comedian, Carla Gugino (”Sin City”, “The One”, “Night at the Museum”) as Sally Jupiter/Silk Spectre, & Malin Akerman (”Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle”, “The Heartbreak Kid”) as Laurie Juspeczyk/Silk Spectre II.
Director(s) : Zack Snyder.
Producer(s) : Deborah Snyder, Herb Gains, Lloyd Levin, Lawrence Gordon, & Eric Watson.
Genre : Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Thriller, Crime, Gangster, Adaptation, Drama.
Release date : March 6, 2009
Official website : http://watchmenmovie.warnerbros.com/

ACE VENTURA Jr. (2009)

"He's the burping, farting, snorting, spitting image of his dad."

Allrighty-then.
After his African adventure in “Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls,” Ace returned to Florida, married girlfriend Melissa and became the doting father of a baby boy.
Never one to sit still, Ace’s curious nature took him on another remote case.
The goofball gumshoe was never to be seen or heard from again.
Single mom Melissa couldn’t fully put the past behind her.
Now a zookeeper, she and Ace Jr. have made a life carrying on without her husband.
Much to Melissa’s chagrin, however, 12-year-old Ace Jr. has begun to follow in his father’s comic footsteps.
He has recently become a pet detective for the 7th grade set, often trying to recover classmates’ missing pets, and always with big mishaps.
But when a master animal thief abducts a baby panda and his mom is wrongly arrested of the crime, Ace Jr. must jump into action.
Now, with the help of pals Laura and tech wizard A-Plus, young Ace must bring the thief to justice and do his inane and lovable dad’s memory justice.
“I will try to be normal”, 12-year-old Ace Ventura Jr. promises.
Thats cool, except whats normal for him is finding missing mutts, kidnapped kitties or gone gators and creating hilarious chaos every step of the way.
Like father, like son, its in his nature to be a pet defective detective!
And when a zoos baby panda is stolen and Aces mom is Suspect #1, our young hero sets out to clear the family name.
Its a new generation of family fun and goof-brained comedy panda-monium as Ace Ventura Jr. teams with adventurous girl-next-door Laura and nerdish gizmo-wiz A-Plus to chase down leads and laughs.
Ready for fun?
Allriiiighty-then.

Ace Jr. is on the case!

Star(s) to watch : Josh Flitter (”Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind”) as Ace Ventura Jr., & Emma Lockhart (”Batman Begins”, “The Seeker: The Dark Is Rising”) as Laura

Director(s) : David M. Evans.
Producer(s) : Guy McElwaine, Wayne Morris, David C. Robinson, & James G. Robinson.
Fact : Also known as “Ace Ventura 3″ and “Ace Ventura Jr: Pet Detective”.

Note : After “ACE VENTURA” and its sequel, the adventures of the Ventura family continue with this comedy. Ace Ventura Sr. disappeared while he was on the case, but his pint-sized progeny takes over where his father left off. With the help of his friends, the 12-year-old detective searches for missing pets, but he gets his biggest case yet when a baby panda goes missing from the zoo.

Genre : Action, Adventure, Comedy, Mystery.

Release date : March 3, 2009