Father Geek, safely entrenched behind the barbed wire of the AICN Geek Headquarters Compound in the midst of all the beautiful greenery and wildflowers of ol' Austin Texas, once again reporting in with our regular (mostly) weekly column from Latauro who is typing away dutifully in his new offices somewhere recently relocated deep below the Great Barrier Reef safe from the Plague of Locusts that is rapidly devouring The Outback (not that chain of over-rated steak-houses, but the once bush covered real thing). The thick swarms of wrath-of-god vermin have been reported to "Blackout the Sun" on their 300+ mile-a-day flights to lay waste Matacumba style every living thing in their path. Luckily our editor/reporter had access to our AICN "offshore" vaults... once he moved all that cash around a bit...

Play it cool boy, real cool.

AICN-DOWNUNDER...

Greetings,

You don’t know me, but a mutual friend told me you were very trustworthy and honest.

I come from a land far away, known as Aintitcoolnews. It’s a lovely land, though very orange. Sometimes, during peak traffic times, it’s very hard to get to where you want to go. And many of the people are rude and freely exchange insults directed towards our leader.

But I digress.

The province of Downunder recently came into a lot of money by selling small patches of white jump suits that were once worn by Peter Jackson. All of this would be fine, were it not for the fact that our dictatorial leader (Commissar Knowles) is insisting we send him 100% of our net gain in taxes, or else he’ll bombard us with reviews comparing superhero films to methods of cunnilingus.

This is where you come in. We would like to deposit all profits in your bank account, then retrieve them once we are safely out of the country. You will be allowed a generous 10% commission for your troubles.

Please write back soon – our defenses will only hold out until BLADE: TRINITY gets released.

Sincerely, Latauro

NEWS

* Recently, there was an effort made by Reverend Fred Nile to ban the film IRREVERSIBLE (check out his arguments at http://www.cdp.org.au/fed/mr/040219f.asp). It’s just been announced that his efforts have failed, and the film will retain its R rating. Recently, both BAISE MOI and KEN PARK were banned, and there’s no sign that either of those will have their standings, er, reversed.

* CLANCY OF THE OVERFLOW is to THE MAN FROM SNOWY RIVER what RAINBOX SIX is to SUM OF ALL FEARS. Faulty metaphor? Perhaps, but I’ve just been reading about Clancy’s shit and it’s fresh in my mind. Simon Wincer, Australian director behind Big Animal Movies PHAR LAP and FREE WILLY will helm the CLANCY adaptation (taken from the poem by Australian legend Banjo Patterson) in Autumn next year.

* With many local productions balking at the cost of renting space in Melbourne’s new Docklands stadium, a small number have been wooed. Most recently, HATING ALISON ASHLEY (with Delta Lataur-- er, Goodrem) has announced it will use the Docklands site for its April shoot.

* Nicole Kidman (nose girl), Russell Crowe (toga dude), Naomi Watts (ring lady) and Mel Gibson (Jesus freak) are amongst thirty-four actors and directors signing up to be ambassadors for a non-profit organisation Australians in Film. Their aim is to promote local product in Hollywood, and possibly fight crime.

* AICN-D sends our condolences out to the family and friends of James Wulf Simmonds, who passed away in Queensland on March 21. Wulf worked on many local TV programs, including “Homicide” and “Prisoner”, as well as the 1989 feature film SWORD OF BUSHIDO. It won’t be the last we see of his work, though. His latest screenplay, the heist-themed DOWN AND DIRTY, will begin production in a few weeks under the eye of helmer Geoff Cox.

AWARDS AND FESTIVALS

AUSTRALIAN SCREEN DIRECTOR’S ASSOCIATION AWARDS

This May 31, Ray Lawrence will collect the ASDA’s top honour when the association holds its annual awards. (If you’re reading this, Ray, sorry to spoil it. Try to look surprised, okay?) Lawrence directed the lauded LANTANA, and is currently working on next project JINDABYNE.

UPOVERDOWNUNDER FILM FESTIVAL

Let’s try that again with lower case... London’s UpOverDownUnder Film Festival is looking for entries for its September start. They’re looking, specifically, for films from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and the Pacific Islands (including the disputed Indonesian province of Aceh, I’m guessing). If your film qualifies for the Up, the Over, the Down, or, in a stretch, the Under, send it London-ways and pause for kudos.

BOX OFFICE

HAUNTED MANSION is only there because it’s just opened, don’t fret everyone. Next week it’ll be surely displaced by... shudder... THE CAT IN THE HAT. Remind me, how long ’til THE INCREDIBLES?

Here's this week's winning entries...

• 1. 50 FIRST DATES
• 2. THE HAUNTED MANSION
• 3. THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST
• 4. THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT
• 5. MONSTER

RELEASED THIS WEEK

Nick Broomfield makes what could be the first ever documentary sequel (prove me wrong, talkbackers, I dares ya), Mike Myers silences critics who said that films couldn’t get much worse than SHREK, Adam Goldberg stars in what could be the first ever Jewsploitation flick (prove me wrong, Gibson, I dares ya), an American stars in an Australian film about Italians, and... I don’t know, some IMAX thing about a horse.

Sooo here they be...

• AILEEN: LIFE AND DEATH OF A SERIAL KILLER
• THE CAT IN THE HAT
• THE HEBREW HAMMER
• LOVE’S BROTHER
• THE YOUNG BLACK STALLION

REVIEWS

Nothing from me this week (again). Latauro’s life is actually the lives of about four different people crammed into one, and none of them seem to go to the movies much. So, while I wile away my time turning down preview screenings to cool films because of work commitments (grumble grumble naughty word grumble), here is AICN’s PapaWereSmurf with his review of the new BATMAN film. Papa himself resides in the great land of Oz (the prison colony, not the magical land or the, er, prison), so get ready for an Aussie’s take on the script...

BATMAN: BEGINS

Reviewed by PapaWereSmurf

Hola boys, girls and asexual internet geeks alike! This be yer harty mate Weresmurf! Not so long ago I was privvy to a copy of the new Nolan movie script........ BATMAN BEGINS!

Now lets see what do I think of this movie script? I fuckin LOVED IT... LOVED LOVED LOVED it to death. PLANT you scream, PLANT! FICUS! BIRCH! ROSEBUSH! But alas no, Im an aicn chatter, which means I must be of the lower class of working man... ok I work in a carpark... happy? ANYHOW, back to the review...

Weighing in at a hefty 130 pages, Batman Begins is a definite improvement on ANY Batman movie before it.... bar Mask of the Phantasm but I suppose that doesnt count seeing as it was animated...

How many villains do we have? Well we have Eddie Falcone as a minor villain, Ducard and Rha's Al Ghul and Jonathan Crane as the main villains, Crane being more upfront to the screen than anyone else really. But something I gathered from the script is theres another villain noone seems to have picked out yet?

That villain as such, is Bruce Wayne himself. You see, through the movie we see Wayne a number of times almost, to quote Stabbing Westward 'Become the thing I hate'. In fact, Bruce learns through a series of events the difference between revenge and justice, and which ultimately will serve him better and I suppose leave him with the better feeling in his tummy. In plain english, he wont be kicking himself in the morning if he captures rather than snaps necks. Bruce in this movie is first and foremost, this isnt your Keaton Batman or Clooney or Val... where Bruce was just screen filler time til Batman appeared again... this is Bruce Wayne BECOMING Batman, this is Nolan pointing out 'Hey, youre watching that tormented Bruce Wayne trying to find redemption here by finding justice for others!!! Finding a reason for being him, finding a nescessity to be him, and realising it can only be him who can do the job properly, this is a quest Bruce leads himself through for the whole movie. Now where does Bruce get this fancy stuff? His Grapnel, his Batmobile! The cape! OH THE DAMNED CAPE! Its not just for show or looking cool any more... in a day and age where we have shape memorising polymers, we have Bruce being able to have a cape made out of such stuff... this leads to a cape that can do a couple of nice tricks... becoming a pair of gliding 'wings' for one thing. SPAWN you might think, but no, tis nothing like Spawn me laddie.

But what else? The Batmobile? We've seen the pics on the WB site, and yes this bitch really IS a rolling tank. You might look at it and say 'Meh... average.' but in the script where it describes the car rolling OVER something and crushing it flat, it now makes sense... where it describes it bursting through a wall, shattering pylons, I can buy it, and where it describes this sumbitch launching itself into a giant jump, I believe it... next summer... you will believe a bat can fly... or drive a car, whichever.

I've kept spoiler free up til now, and I'm not revealing anything at all due to the fact that this script is very very intense... but I will say this. Jonathan Crane is one sadistic bastard in this movie, Ducard and Rha's, probably not around as much as I'd like but when they are its uber pivotal and intense, Falcone serves his purpose pretty well and surprisingly, Katie Holmes character is written very well... but the standouts for me were Gordon and Alfred. Bruce is written perfectly, but Gordon and Alfred transcend everyone else. For the love of me this is Gordon finally done right on screen. He isnt commissioner yet, but its showing the beginning, the start of the story of Batman, when Gordon was a Sergeant.

The ending? NOT A FUCKING HOPE IN HELL am I giving this away, lest to say its perfect. A perfect way to tie up what I believe to be a near perfect comic book movie. If I could do that Paycheck thing and erase my memory of this ending to make the effect maximum...? Not to mention the memory of my last 5 girlfriends...*shudder* I would for sure. All I can say is it'll leave everyone smiling. And screaming at Nolan for not making a trilogy at once... Anyhow, thats my review, spoiler free, just how I felt about the movie, and you can call me YOUR LORD AND SMURFINESS (Cmon talkbackers... flame me... )or Papa_Weresmurf for short. Ciao bambinos!

NEXT WEEK

You know what? This is something I’ve been wanting to do for a while, so here it is: I want to see the best ‘NEXT WEEK’s you can come up with. You think you can do better than Latauro and his brilliant realisations than some words sound like other words? Send your best efforts to AICNDownunder@hotmail.com, along with a desired name or nick (for proper credit, of course), and you will win a brand new bucket of nothing. But you’ll have the glory. Write in!

Peace out,

Latauro

AICNDownunder@hotmail.com