Universal has released the first trailer for The Five-Year Engagement, which re-teams Jason Segel with Forgetting Sarah Marshall director Nicholas Stoller. The movie looks at what happens when an engaged couple (Jason Segel and Emily Blunt) keeps getting tripped up on the long walk down the aisle.

Watch the trailer below:

The script was written by both Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller, and is produced by Judd Apatow (Knocked Up, The 40-Year-Old Virgin). Universal will release The Five-Year Engagement on April 27th, 2012.

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Jason Segel has been passionate about getting the Muppets back together for a long time. Using his breakout film Forgetting Sarah Marshall as an audition of sorts (that film features a vampire puppet show), Segel teamed with Sarah Marshall director Nicholas Stoller and successfully pitched the concept to Disney. The result is one of the most heartwarming films of the year: an old school Muppet adventure for the modern world.

Gary (Segel) and his brother Walter have been best friends since childhood, but because Walter is a Muppet, he’s always been a bit of an outcast. When Walter discovers The Muppet Show on television, he becomes their biggest fan, obsessing over the famed Muppet Studios in Los Angeles and dreaming to visit one day. Years later, when Gary and his girlfriend Mary (Amy Adams) decide to celebrate their tenth anniversary by taking a vacation to Los Angeles, they leave Smalltown, USA – in keeping with the classic Muppet charm, “Smalltown” is actually the name of their town – and they bring Walter along for the ride. But they’re shocked to discover the Muppet Studios have been abandoned for years, about to be bought by oil baron Tex Richman (Chris Cooper). Walter overhears a secret plot to destroy the theater to dig for oil underneath, and the movie really gets started as our trio attempts to reunite the Muppets so they can rejuvenate their old act to make the $10 million necessary to save the theater.

It’s no coincidence that the only other film that’s given me this much pure joy in a theater this year is another one that’s related to Jim Henson: it’s called Being Elmo: A Puppeteer’s Journey, a documentary about Kevin Clash, the guy who voices and “plays” Elmo on Sesame Street. (Read my review of that film here.) I guess that means I’m a sucker for Muppets, and I’m OK with that label. We recorded a podcast a few months ago in which we discussed The Muppet Movie, The Great Muppet Caper, and The Muppets Take Manhattan (listen here), and Segel’s newest take on the material has elements from all three: it has a touch of the sadness found in Manhattan in the “everyone’s gone their separate ways” storyline, has a similar “brother” joke to the Fozzie/Kermit relationship in Caper, but overall it’s mostly reminiscent of The Muppet Movie (my favorite of the series). Segel and Stoller really nailed the tone, and they did a great job of bringing this brand of nostalgia back to the big screen in a way that makes us feel as if the Muppets should always be in the zeitgeist.

The comedy is pitch-perfect, from the celebrity cameos, to Fozzie’s awful-on-purpose one-liners, to the sight gags this series is known for. My favorite of these moments involves Kermit’s intro, in which he approaches our heroes bathed in light with a choir of angels singing in the background, and then the camera pans out to reveal Kermit was just in the headlights of a passing bus full of singing choir members. I don’t want to give away the best gags of the film, but if the promise of Academy Award winner Chris Cooper rapping isn’t enough to get you in the theater, I don’t know what is.

As is typically the case for Muppet productions, the music is fantastic. Flight of the Conchords’ Bret McKenzie wrote many of the songs, including the highlights “Life’s A Happy Song,” “Me Party,” and “Man or Muppet?” The dance numbers work wonderfully, and the song-and-dance aspects of it add to the timeless feel of the movie. With the exception of an unnecessary Cee Lo Green parody near the end, this could have been made any time in the past ten years.

If you’re even remotely interested in Henson’s loveable creatures, The Muppets is a must-see. Its unbridled enthusiasm and genuine heart provides a stark contrast to dark material like The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo coming up this holiday season, so if you’re looking for a family-friendly option that will please kids but has more jokes for adults, look no further than Kermit and Co. as they come back for one last hurrah. Let’s hope there’s more where that came from. Until next time…

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Sony has announced that Bad Teacher, starring Cameron Diaz, Justin Timerlake and Jason Segel, will be released on DVD and Blu-ray on October 18, 2011.

Bad Teacher continued the successful trend of R-rated comedies this summer by making $192 million worldwide on a budget of just $20 million. Cameron Diaz also joined the Bridesmaids gang in proving female-driven comedies can be funny, and people will turn out to watch.

The unrated version will have over 6 additional minutes of footage, but the theatrical version will also be available.

Special features include:

- Deleted scenes
- Outtakes
- Way Behind The Scenes with Jason and Justin featurette
- Raising More Than Funds featurette
- Gag reel (Blu-Ray only)
- JAMS Interactive Yearbook (Blu-Ray only)
- A Very Odd Blacksmith Story featurette (Blu-Ray only)
- Swimming With The Dolphins featurette (Blu-Ray only)
- Good Teacher featurette (Blu-Ray only)

The film follows a foul-mouthed, junior high teacher (Cameron) who, after being dumped by her sugar daddy, begins to woo a colleague.

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The plot may not be as clever as a Bad Santa per se; but the blunt, crude & heartless dialogue keeps this predictable romp from going limp.  And the timely placed fun bags, erections, drug use and dry-humping sequences served a purpose in providing the audience with a series of hearty chuckles.

Bad Teacher is exactly what you’d expect to be.  It’s 92 minutes of characters saying what they’ve always wanted to, set in a middle-school atmosphere, where every teacher has their own unique persona.  Cohesive storytelling & character development are tossed aside to make room for sudden bursts of F-bombs while degrading an innocent student.  Although the balance of all these elements is about as smooth as a fat kid trying to run on an inclining treadmill, the script – which is a more-or-less series of comedic bits – is the kind of light, immature thinking we all need every now and then.

Elizabeth Halsey (Cameron Diaz) somehow became a middle-school teacher in a suburban Chicago school.  She cares nothing about the students or staff; and the only reason she went for this gig is to land a rich guy to put a ring on her finger and spoil her self-imposed trophy-wife booty (sounds like my town).  Her plan seemed to be working just fine until she is kicked to the curb by her recent loaded fiancée.  Left with absolutely nothing, she has to move into a shanty apartment with some guy from Craigslist (Eric Stonestreet) – who still wears zumba pants – and crawls back to her teaching job that she recently ditched.

Completely miserable, she avoids dealing with the faculty and simply plays movies such as Dangerous Minds, for her students, all while taking shots of bourbon from her desk drawer and smoking some “medicinal” marijuana in her POS car.  She’s not completely unmotivated though, for her goal to land another sugar daddy revolves around earning roughly 10K to buy a new pair of tits (very resourceful).  And for whatever reason, she is cool sharing this with the other teachers: the naïve Lynn (Phyllis Smith from The Office); the secure down-to-earth, gym-teacher (Jason Segel); and the over-bubbly, star faculty member in Ms. Squirrel (Lucy Punch).

She begins to perk up a bit more at her duties when a new substitute – with family money – begins teaching in Mr. Delacorte (Justin Timberlake).  Trying to lure the sophisticated, sensitive, well-dressed guy becomes her main priority.  At this point, the plot shifts to seeing if Elizabeth will be able to keep up the charade – with Ms. Squirrel watching her every move – while trying to seduce the new teach.  And enhance her chest, of course.

Cameron Diaz doesn’t necessarily rock this stage as Billy Bob Thornton did as a drunken Santa.  (She does rock some sexy attire though).   She’s more of a solid riffing rhythm guitarist who compliments all the other players quite well, and even gets to do a few lead solos that will resonate with audience.  The supporting players are the ones that steal a lot of the show here.  Jason Segel is the drummer in this band.  He doesn’t have much stage presence, but whenever his “instrument” is featured, he brings the house down with his pitch perfect delivery.  Taking the helm as the closest thing to a front man, well, in this case, woman, is Lucy Punch.  Now a few “lyrics” do not get the reaction from the crowd the writers were hoping for.  That said, her spontaneous performance ignited every scene she was a part of.  (Think I just described Motley Crue by the way).

Since there’s a true musician in this cast, Justin Timberlake had the hardest challenge of all…looking so un-cool.  It’s tough to completely buy his character, because he naturally has a stigma that surrounds from his other endeavors.  The guy makes it work despite being overshadowed by all the other relatable performances.

A lot of the sequences – and some of the characters to a certain extent – were missed opportunities.  A butch teacher (Jillian Armenante) and the scantly used Principal (John Michael Higgins) could have been placed in more creative moments.  The fail-safe of this script was to just have these, and all the above mentioned performers, to enact a tourette’s-like episode and start cursing or struggle with Diaz‘s character‘s obnoxious antics.  It is funny, because it happens in the environment of a school.  But the viewer can kind of see it coming, so these actions aren’t all that shocking as they were intended to be.

This script isn’t clichéd as it could have been and the raucous dialogue made sure it wouldn’t falter in that respect.  Having said that, the intelligence of the scenarios Cameron Diaz is positioned in (no pun) is perhaps too fundamental and could have been better.  The reason they work is because her character doesn’t lose the R-rated edge even with the foreshadowed themes the flick is obviously building toward.  She still swears like a pirate and her unapologetic persona keeps the viewer casually waiting for what she’ll do next.  The one-liners hit more than they miss (barely), but there is an awkward silence on a few of them.  As in, not funny at all.  As in why were they left in the final cut?  Solution:  Quick, pan to hard-on or somebody swear.

Overall, Bad Teacher isn’t destined to be a comedy treasure as the trailer suggested.  The jagged, under-developed script sealed the deal on that.  The flick will find a place in people’s minds though, thanks to its desire to stay “Bad” the entire way through.

RATING: 3 out of 5

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Normally a movie starring Cameron Diaz and Justin Timberlake would cause me to gag a little bit. However, Bad Teacher also has Jason Segel (Forgetting Sarah Marshall and How I Met Your Mother), Lucy Punch (Hot Fuzz and Dinner For Shmucks), and Phyllis Smith from The Office. Despite the title, it’ll probably be a long way from Bad Santa, but hopefully more irreverent and funny than your average PG rom-com.

The film follows a foul-mouthed, junior high teacher who, after being dumped by her sugar daddy, begins to woo a colleague. Check out the trailer below:

See? I think there might be some potential. Bad Teacher is set to be released June 24th.

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This has been said in previous columns, but it needs to be put out there once more. When it comes to fam-friendly flicks, Twentieth Century Fox can do wrong according to audiences. And box office receipts solidify this. So no matter which path this review of Gulliver’s Travels takes, it really doesn’t have any influence when it comes to the above mentioned tag-team.

With that being said, we’re going to give it our best shot to guide you – the reader – down the right path in that quest for finding quality entertainment. Here’s how much one will get out of this 88 minute adaptation.

Lemuel Gulliver (Jack Black) is a dreamer with no dreams. He’s stuck working in the mailroom for the New York Tribune and has absolutely nothing on the horizon. The guy lacks the desire to put himself out there, as noted by his new boss (T.J. Miller), who was promoted over Gulliver after just one day on the job. Gulliver does have one desire in mind though. He fawns over travel editor Darcy Silverman (Amanda Peet). He lacks the courage to ask her out but comes up with a plan to grab her attention. After plagiarizing a bunch of travel related articles, Darcy becomes impressed and gives the grunge looking guy a chance. She sends him on assignment into the Bermuda Triangle. Spoiler alert, Gulliver disappears.

He ends up in a land where he is literally the big man on campus. In the kingdom of Lilliputian, Gulliver is a giant. He is eventually embraced by the King (Billy Connolly) and forms a strong friendship with a peasant Horatio (Jason Segel). The one person who becomes insanely jealous upon the big guy’s arrival is General Edward (Chris O’Dowd). Gulliver quickly becomes an idol of sorts, as he tells his new little friends about his past life. Which is essentially a bunch of lies taken from Star Wars and Titanic lore. The once popular General becomes enraged and it only gets worse when his reluctant bride to be in Princess Mary (Emily Blunt) also takes a liking to Gulliver and his pal Horatio. General Edwards resorts to a plan by siding with the sworn enemy of Lilliputian, in the hopes of ridding this world of the “beastly” Gulliver.

Although the story keeps the prevalent theme found in Jonathan Swift’s original 18^th century novel, the way it projects the meaning out to the viewer slightly misfires. It seems that director Rob Letterman realizes this toward the end of the flick, for they haphazardly piece together a cookie-cutter sequence – complete with half-hearted dialogue – in a poor attempt to project the intended message before the credits roll. There’s absolutely no feeling for any of the characters. Compassion is not on this menu. What is available for selection are a few pop-culture shenanigans/references. Don’t get me wrong, these are funny moments. Yet there are only a handful of them. If there were more “live guitar hero” sequences, then this might have ushered in fresh comedic vibe to an already fabled story. Instead, it becomes too commercialized and negligible.

Stories such as Shrek found the perfect blend of mixing pop culture into a fairy tale setting. The hip nature of the script landed precisely where it should have in Shrek. By doing so, it didn’t have to worry about overshadowing the escapism from the fairy tale angle. With Gulliver, the flick can’t make up its mind. Of course the script was geared toward working in a modern perspective with a game Jack Black. Just seems the creativity couldn’t reach a high enough level to continuously entertain an audience. It won’t bore you, but it fails to truly get the an audience involved.

There are moments though. Chris O’Dowd’s take on General Edward is the crowd pleaser. Think of his character as the Sherriff of Rottingham from Mel Brooks’ Men in Tights. Jack Black is doing the same shtick again, but he eventually gets one to smile. The guy gave it his all. Too bad the writers did not. Everyone else gets into their roles and perform well enough to keep the younger viewers engaged. Speaking of those younger viewers, do not succumb to the pressure of them wanting to see this flick in 3D. There is not one scene where the 3D enhances anything. Nothing flies at you and the environment can be thoroughly appreciated in a normal 2D setting.

Overall, Gulliver’s Travels will not offend anybody. It may not entertaining anyone unless this is their first introduction to a Jack Black movie. The atmosphere is fun to explore and the special effects (besides the 3D) are interesting to see. Younger crowds (single digits in age) will be all about exploring this. The rest of us will probably never visit this one again.

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

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Earlier this week we got the first official poster for Gulliver’s Travels, and now 20th Century Fox has released the first trailer. The film, directed by Monsters vs Aliens director Rob Letterman, stars Jack Black as Lemuel Gulliver, a travel writer who, on an assignment to the Bermuda Triangle, suddenly finds himself a giant among men when he washes ashore on the hidden island of Liliput, home to a population of tiny people.

It doesn’t look that good. Maybe it’s due to how the trailer is presented, with half of it just showing Jack Black in an office, although there are hardly any laughs to be had so it may just be the film. It’s a shame Emily Blunt had to make this due to contract obligations from her Devil Wears Prada days instead of playing Black Widow in Iron Man 2.

Gulliver’s Travels also stars Jason Segel as Horatio, and Billy Connolly as King of Lilliputia. It has a release date of December 22nd in 3D (for those interested).

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20th Century Fox has released the first official poster for their modern take on Gulliver’s Travels. The film is directed by Monsters vs Aliens director Rob Letterman and stars Jack Black as Lemuel Gulliver, a free-spirited travel writer who, on an assignment to the Bermuda Triangle, suddenly finds himself a giant among men when he washes ashore on the hidden island of Liliput, home to a population of tiny people.

Gulliver’s Travels also stars Jason Segel as Horatio, Emily Blunt as Princess of Lilliputia and Billy Connolly as King of Lilliputia, and will be released on December 22nd in 3D.

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This is more of a confirmation than a breaking story, but I still think it is relevant: Jason Segel, star of Forgetting Sarah Marshall and TV’s “How I Met Your Mother,” has been signed to play the lead human role in an upcoming Muppet film.

Segel co-wrote the film, called The Greatest Muppet Movie of All Time, with Sarah Marshall director Nicholas Stoller, and the project is set to be directed by James Bobin. While it’s long been assumed that the multi-talented actor would star in the project, we didn’t have official confirmation until The Hollywood Reporter’s Heat Vision blog received word.

Anyone who has seen Forgetting Sarah Marshall knows how passionate Segel is about this project: he basically used the final scene of that film (involving an elaborate Muppet vampire musical) to begin his campaign to make another Muppet film. Various versions of the script have been leaked around the web, so we won’t speculate about the plot of this film – Heat Vision says the plot is being kept “under wraps.”

There have also been rumors of high-profile cameos, including George Clooney, Alec Baldwin, Sean Penn, Chris Rock, Anne Hathaway, Emily Blunt, Mel Brooks, Matt Damon, Norah Jones, Sarah Jessica Parker and Ben Stiller. I’m not even a die-hard Muppet fan and I’m excited about this project. Segel’s passion for the project indicates a level of respect and care we rarely hear about in the industry these days, so I’m interested to see the final result.

What do you think? Are you excited about The Greatest Muppet Movie of All Time? More importantly, is the title misleading? How can they expect to top The Great Muppet Caper?

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Sources for Entertainment Weekly have given the site a list of three Academy Award-nominated directors who are in the running to direct the Twilight Saga finale; Breaking Dawn. Apparently, three of the “top-notch” directors in the running are: Sofia Coppola (The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation), Gus Van Sant (Good Will Hunting, Milk) and Bill Condon (Dreamgirls). It’s a strangely diverse selection, particularly for the franchise in question.

I’m not familiar with Bill Condon’s work, but Miss Coppola seems a more obvious choice than Van Sant, what with her kinda “dreamy” atmospheres. If you watch The Virgin Suicides, you can imagine her directing this. I’d just pray that Breaking Dawn would manage to be as good. I trust Coppola though, particularly after witnessing the brilliant Lost in Translation. Would Breaking Dawn be a mistake for her, or a salvation for the series? And will David Slade (30 Days of Night – another unexpected choice) turn the series round with Eclipse? We’ll have to stay tuned.

In other director-related news, Shock Till You Drop has also been contacted by their sources – in relation to Paranormal Activity 2. Akiva Goldsman is the man seemingly most likely to direct, in what would be his first helming of a feature film. He has previously produced films like I Am Legend and Constantine, and has written and directed for TV show Fringe. According to IMDb, he also played Vulcan Council Member #1 in Star Trek, which is always a good accolade to have. I don’t think he’s a terribly obvious choice for Paranormal, but someone who’s worked on Fringe might have the horror know-how…will they? I want more “scary” bits in this one than many, many minutes of the characters standing around talking about scary bits. Please.

EDIT: Deadline now tells us that Akiva Goldsman being pulled in to direct Paranormal 2 is an untrue rumour. He’s instead joined the project as an executive producer (but I think we may have known that before?). Ah well.

And finally, James Bobin has been confirmed as the director of The Cheapest Muppet Movie Ever Made, says The Hollywood Reporter. Very good news. He was in talks for this job back in January. Additionally, Jason Segel, who wrote the script, will play the “human lead” in the film. I hope he’s not in it too much – I’d rather it focused on the actual Muppets. Oh, and Segel needlessly felt the need to get his genitals out more than once in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Let’s hope Kermit, Gonzo and friends are safe from this kind of exposure.

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