Spending your summer on the beach is so overrated. Who needs tan lines and seaweed when you could be sitting in an air-conditioned theater, feasting on buttery popcorn, heart-stopping candy and a bucket of soda, ready to be wowed by the latest blockbusting piece of cinematic goodness? To enhance your summer movie-going experience, we’ve delved into six of this season’s biggest movies to deliver our behind-the-scenes preview...

THE DARK KNIGHT

Cast: Christian Bale, Heath Ledger, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Aaron Eckhart
Story: Batman joins forces with Gotham’s new DA, Harvey Dent, to take on a psycho criminal known as The Joker.

The current advertising campaign for Christopher Nolan’s Batman sequel may soon become as legendary as the Caped Crusader himself. From fake “Harvey Dent for District Attorney” billboards mysteriously popping up in major cities to staged political rallies, promotion for The Dark Knight has redefined what is commonly known as “viral marketing.”

Thus far, excitement has predominantly been generated by disclosing information on The Joker, played in the film by the late Heath Ledger. At the time of the actor’s death in January, the film was still in post-production and there was talk about whether the actor had completed all of his voiceover work. As it turned out Ledger’s efforts were entirely finished for the film, and the marketing campaign continued to focus upon his character as planned. Fortunately (or likely as a result of Ledger’s absence), advertising for the film has existed independently from any actor participation. The buzz started this past October after Warner Bros. released a teaser trailer in which only the Joker’s voice could be heard. What followed in the ensuing months was a veritable potpourri of promotional methods. Take for example fans who were allowed to remove only one pixel from a hidden image online. As each individual wanted to see the image but could remove just a single pixel, there was only one thing to do: spread the word to friends and get more users to participate. Within hours the image was revealed to be a close-up of the Joker’s hideous face. Herein lies the genius of the film’s viral marketing campaign.

Through underground and low-budget methods, The Dark Knight has been slow-cooking an audience of die-hard Batman geeks as well as attracting a whole slew of new fans. In the last few months two new trailers have been released and both The Joker and Harvey Dent have been clearly revealed. Fans in various cities have been led on scavenger hunts and those Harvey Dent billboards were concurrently “vandalized” by The Joker in every city over one night. By the time the film comes out in July, we’ll be as conditioned as any Gotham City resident.
By John Raynes

THE HAPPENING

Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel, John Leguizamo
Story: A teacher and his family fight to stay alive in the midst of a mysterious and deadly toxic outbreak.

Few people are more familiar with the fickle hand of Hollywood than writer/director M. Night Shyamalan. Back in 1999, The Sixth Sense made close to $300 million and was nominated for six Academy Awards. Shyamalan was instantly hailed as the next great movie director, the savior of modern cinema. But then came Unbreakable, Signs and The Village, which all made money but garnered the director harsh criticism from industry insiders and movie goers who became tired of his “trick” endings. While developing Lady in the Water in 2006, Shyamalan got into a public feud with execs at Disney, claiming they were holding the creative reins too tightly. In the subsequent media storm, Shyamalan’s reputation took a beating and stories circulated that he was not only a “one trick pony” but a creative megalomaniac. Lady in the Water was eventually made at Warner Brothers and earned only $42 million at the box office. Its budget was $75 milllion. Not surprisingly, it took Shyamalan a while to sell his next script, then titled "The Green Effect". After extensive re-writes, that movie became The Happening and upon its deliberate Friday the 13th release could deliver redemption or disaster for 37-year-old Shyamalan. The good news is that it’s his first R-rated movie so audiences will get to see payoff violence rather than bottomless suspense. The bad news is that the premise revolves around a mass suicide epidemic caused by, well, the environment. So will Mark Wahlberg be trying to outrun the wind? Shymalan explains that, “The movie is about what you do when you know for sure that there is no escape route from a danger at hand.” The movie’s distributor, 20th Century Fox, seem to be asking themselves that same question, delivering a somewhat low-key marketing campaign that features a haunting image of abandoned cars and a tagline that recalls Shyamalan’s biggest hits to date: The Sixth Sense and Signs. However, there is little doubt that the $57 million project will deliver some thrills at the box office and M. Night Shyamalan will continue to make his movies; he’s currently prepping a live-action movie of the animated Nickelodeon series, The Last Airbender.
By Carla Thorpe

WANTED

Cast: James McAvoy, Angelina Jolie, Morgan Freeman
Story: Average Joe Wesley Gibson is transformed into the perfect assassin in order to avenge his father’s death.


It will come as no surprise that action thriller Wanted will be sporting a full arsenal of car chases, shoot-outs and well, Angelina Jolie with a shotgun. What you might not know is that the movie is based on a graphic novel with the same name. Written by Mark Millar back in 2003, the six-issue comic series is set in a world where supervillains have banded together to eliminate the remaining superheroes and take control of the planet. It chronicles the journey of Wesley Gibson, a seemingly average white collar guy who gets recruited to the fraternity of super villains. While training with his super sexy partner, The Fox, Wesley discovers that he has inherited his super villain father’s deadly aim and skill. One major difference between the graphic novel and the movie is that the main characters are now assassins rather than supervillains. And while there will be an audience-pleasing amount of nekkidness from McAvoy and Jolie, one thing you won’t be seeing in the movie are the somewhat kinky outfits that artist J.G. Jones provided the comic book characters. So if you want to out-geek your friends before you see the movie, go pick up a copy of the graphic novel and brush up on your comic book mythology - Millar is said to have based most of his characters on villains and heroes from famous DC and Marvel Comics.
By Mavelyn Marcos

GET SMART

Cast: Steve Carell, Anne Hathaway, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson
Story: Bumbling Secret Agent, Maxwell Smart, battles the forces of KAOS with the help of his more competent sidekick, Agent 99.


In an age when everything is a sequel, a remake or a sequel of a remake, it’s refreshing to see that the cast and crew of Get Smart are truly determined to pay homage to the original material. Younger moviegoers might not know that the movie is based on the 1960s cult TV series of the same name, which was created by Mel Brooks as a satirical take on the secret agent genre. Think Inspector Gadget and you’ll get the idea. In fact, (trivia alert!) the actor who originally played
Maxwell Smart (the late Don Adams) also voiced Gadget in the cartoon series. With such high standards to live up to, director Peter Segal (50 First Dates) was thankful for some smart casting decisions. Firstly, he scored The Office’s Steve Carell and then let him off the leash in terms of improvisation. Carell aptly describes the movie as “a comedic Bourne Identity” and, as a fan of the original series, confesses that he felt the pressure when delivering Smart’s signature catchphrases. Both Rachel McAdams and Jennifer Love Hewitt were considered for the role of sexy, femme-fatale Agent 99 before it went to Anne Hathaway. Throwing in The Rock as overachieving Agent 23 might be a mistake, but we’ll let that fly due to the appearance of Bill Murray as Agent 13, who is frequently stationed in the most inconvenient, not to mention enclosed, places. Get ready for some not-so-smart new comedy.
By Carla Thorpe

TROPIC THUNDER

Cast: Ben Stiller, Jack Black, Robert Downey Jr.
Story: A group of Hollywood actors shooting a big budget war movie in the jungle are forced to become the soldiers they are portraying.


Whether you love him or hate him as an actor, Ben Stiller is generally a much safer cinematic bet when he plays director (see Zoolander, Reality Bites). With Tropic Thunder, he’s putting all his comedic cards on the table by stepping into the role of actor/writer/producer/director, as well as pulling favors from all his Hollywood pals. The concept is at least a funny one – a cast of high-maintenance actors filming a Vietman War epic are dumped in the jungle by their pissed-off director and soon realize that the people hunting them down aren’t acting. But at this point, any plot and Stiller himself have been overshadowed by the controversies surrounding the movie’s stars and cameo appearances. First of all, there’s Robert Downey Jr. in black face. Apparently it’s hilarious and testing well but is still causing a little hubbub around the Iron Man star. Owen Wilson was due to make an appearance but dropped out during filming due to his suicide attempt and was later replaced by Matthew McConaughey (although Wilson still briefly appears). And then there’s Tom Cruise. His surprise cameo was being kept under serious wraps until the paps got ahold of it and, much to the chagrin of the Cruise reps, splashed photos of him in a fat suit and a bald headpiece all over the tabloids. Still, such stories will no doubt add some jolt to Stiller’s Thunder.
By Mavelyn Marcos

PINEAPPLE EXPRESS

Cast: Seth Rogen, James Franco, Amber Heard
Story: A stoner and his dealer are forced to go on the run after they witness a cop commit a murder.

By John Raynes