Above: Cinematical's Scott Weinberg with his celebrity stalker Jennifer Connelly.

Whenever there's an editorial change here at Cinematical headquarters, it's our tradition to announce it live on the site. That said (gets up on his tiny stool with a glass of sparkling apple cider), it is my pleasure to congratulate the new Managing Editor of Cinematical.com! You know him as "That guy who's always making fun of Jewish people", however his official birth certificate reads: Scary Spooky Spice Scott Weinberg (aka Scott Weinberg).

(Waits for loud roars from the crowd to subside ...)

Our former Managing Editor, Kim Voynar (whom we love, cherish, honor, adore, obsess over, crush on, etc ...) will remain with Cinematical, but segue into a Festival Editor role. That's right, our festival coverage kicks so much ass, we need someone with sharp skills and plenty of wit to run the entire show. In all seriousness, both Scott and Kim are tremendous assets to our team and have taken a huge part in our growth over the past three years. I'm ecstatic to be working with each so closely from here on out, and you should be happy because, with their help, this little movie site will become that much more enjoyable to read in the coming weeks and months.

We here at Cinematical wish you a wonderful, sun-drenched weekend, and, as always, we thank you for your continued support.

Cheers! Mazel Tov!

(Now who the hell brought the sparkling apple cider -- this stuff sucks!)

July 1 means that the year is officially half-over (figured that out all by myself), so I figure it might be fun to pick back over the past six months and offer a list of my very favorite flicks of the year. I've long since given up trying to differentiate between "the best films of the year" and "my favorite films of the year," but seeing as they'd both originate in the same brain, I figure they're pretty much the same thing. Some of my choices will be obvious, but (hopefully) some won't. And get this: Some of 'em are horror movies. (A film must have received a North American theatrical release prior to 7/1 in order to qualify.)

January -- Not many choices, really, but I'm an enthusiastic supporter of both Cloverfield and Teeth. I also enjoyed Cassandra's Dream a bit more than most folks seem to, but it's hardly among Woody Allen's best movies. Beyond that, January was as lame as ever. (Thanks for nothing: One Missed Call, First Sunday, Mad Money, Rambo, Untraceable, and the execrable Meet the Spartans.)

February -- Things certainly started getting a little better around groundhog time. I found In Bruges to be a stunningly unexpected treat; The Spiderwick Chronicles a very fun cross between Potter and Gremlins; Diary of the Dead a very welcome departure from zombie lord George Romero; The Signal a mico-budget mini-masterpiece, and Semi-Pro to be very funny and entirely forgettable. Special mention to the (surprise hit, but critically underrated) Vantage Point, which really deserves a second look. (Stinkers: The Eye, Strange Wilderness, and Jumper.)

I've already done an "official" top ten list and all that year-end movie-critic jazz, but since today's my birthday I figured I'd spend an hour or two on a piece I'll simply enjoy writing. Most of the solid horror sites have done their own top / bottom lists, so I thought it would make sense to try a different approach. So let's start waaaay back in January and just tiptoe through the year in horror together. And then at the end we'll figure out how the horror geeks were treated in 2007. (All links lead to my review of that particular film, be it from FEARnet, eFilmCritic, DVDTalk, DVD Clinic, or right here at good ol' Cinematical.)

January!

01/02 -- Snakes on a Plane arrives on DVD. "The internet" still refuses to make it a hit. (0)
01/12 -- Giant croc flick Primeval advertised as a serial killer film. Doesn't help the box office. (-1)
01/16 -- Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning arrives on DVD. Thousands give it a second shot and realize it still sucks. (-1)
01/19 -- A predictably horrible remake of The Hitcher arrives in theaters. Nobody cares. (-1)
01/23 -- Saw 3 hits DVD and sells a whole bunch of copies, despite the fact that all the horror fans know a double-dip is arriving in 11 months. Weird. (0)
01/26 -- Blood and Chocolate. Ew, no thanks. (-1)
01/30 -- Forgotten Ricci flick The Gathering (finally) arrives on DVD. Turns out it was shelved for good reason. (-1)

January Total: -5 horror points!

February!

02/02 -- J-horror knock-off latecomer The Messengers hits theaters. With a PG-13. (-1)
02/06 -- The Grudge 2 hits DVD. Thousands realize oh yeah, there was a sequel. (-1)
02/09 -- A well-shot but horribly unnecessary prequel arrives in the form of Hannibal Rising. Collective yawn. (-1)
02/13 -- The "so good it's gotta be remade because it's foreign" 13 (Tzameti) arrives on DVD. (+1)
02/16 -- The comics nerds get a little (very little) horror infusion with the very silly Ghost Rider. (-1)
02/20 -- Lionsgate slaps the words "Open Water 2" onto a movie called "Adrift." (-1)
02/23 -- After Dark (brilliantly) chooses their dullest flick (The Abandoned) for a solo theatrical release. (-1)
02/23 -- Jim Carrey tries to get grim (and ends up goofy) in The Number 23. (-1)
02/27 -- The Return arrives on DVD. Hundreds remember that the movie exists. (-1)

February Total: -7 horror points!!

Even at the end of the lamest movie years, this is always too hard. I'm supposed to take a list of over 200 movies and cramp it down into one 10-title list? No way. That's not to say that there were too many films jockeying for position on my "best" list, but hell, I spent a LOT of hours watching all these movies, and I'll be damned if I'm only gonna cover ten of 'em!

Last year I went a little insane and did ten different top ten lists, but I have a little more of a social life this year, so I'm just going to list my favorite films and trash the year's biggest stinkpiles (and then, in a separate post, recap the year in horror). Let's try and generate a little tension by starting at the end. (That's what she said!)

10. Juno, Knocked Up & Waitress -- I hate it when critics put multiple movies in one spot, but I just had to cheat on my number ten, because it's really weird how the three best comedies of the year ... all have to do with pregnant chicks. One movie per slot from here on out, I promise.

9. The Bourne Ultimatum -- The perfect capper to a stellar trilogy. Masterful action, fantastic performances, and an energy that just never lets up.

8. Zodiac -- I went in expecting Silence of the Lambs, but got a fantastic "newspaper" story instead. And even at 160 minutes, I was never bored.

7. Hot Fuzz -- Pegg, Frost and Wright strike again in this wonderfully clever action flick send-up. It took multiple viewings before the flick really clicked with me, but it's easily the funniest movie of the year that doesn't have any pregnant women in it. (Superbad being a close second.)

6. Sweeney Todd -- It's not exactly the sort of musical I'm used to (that Sondheim is pretty weird), but between the stellar leads, the grimly gorgeous look of the piece, and enough gallows humor to fill ten good flicks -- this just might be Tim Burton's best movie yet.

It's been awhile since we've had a little film blog group hugging action around here. Today it's cold and snowing here, so what better way to put off cleaning house and baking lasagna for our Boxing Day party than to cozy up under a quilt with a cup of hot tea and some of my favorite film bloggers? As 2007 wanes away and Sundance looms near, I thought I'd pop by some of my favorite film blogs to see who's doing any writing this holiday weekend.

Before taking a well-deserved break for the holidays, hard-working film blogger Karina Longworth at Spout Blog put up this thought-provoking piece on whether Disney wants to turn your daughter into a whore. As Karina points out, Barbara Ehrenreich's recycled rant on the evils of all things Disney is well past-due. I was getting into arguments about Disney back when I was doing time in mom's clubs when I did the stay-at-home-mom gig for a few years; the "We're raising our kids gender-neutral," granola-crunching, feminist hippy mamas in Seattle and parts elsewhere have had Disney in their crosshairs for years.

My favorite line from Ehrenreich's piece: "One's sexual inclinations--straightforward or kinky, active or passive, heterosexual or homosexual--should be free to develop without adult intervention or manipulation. " Riiiiiiiiight. If you raise your kids in a bubble unexposed to any society whatsover, perhaps. Kids are products of their social communities whether they grow up in the favelas of Brazil or in a high-rise overlooking Central Park, and trying to mold their little minds with the androgyny of gender-neutrality is no less manipulative than allowing your daughter to dress up like a pretty princess. Bratz, though, is another story. I hate those damn dolls with a passion previously reserved for Barney. If anyone's trying to shallow-fy and whore out our daughters, it's the evil geniuses behind those Bratz dolls. At least the Disney Princesses don't have lips that look like they had an unfortunate experience with a silicone injection. Anyhow.

More group hugs after the jump ...

"Turns out the movie version was exactly like an episode of the TV show, only longer." -- Millions of unimpressed moviegoers after wasting thirty bucks on yet another failed TV-to-movie experiment.

And those moviegoers are usually unimpressed because projects like these exist as little more than franchise exploitation. Seriously, was the universe actually demanding a movie version of Inspector Gadget or The Beverly Hillbillies? Most definitely not. But in certain (generally rare) cases, a successful TV show makes the leap to the silver screen in exceedingly fine form. Star Trek certainly did it. So did South Park, The Addams Family, The Fugitive and Firefly. But lately all the worlds' media attention has been focused on one specific series, a comedic juggernaut that's been chugging merrily along for the last 18 years. It's more than a classic, more than an institution. Heck, I hate to think of television without it. Yep, Springfield fans, it's (finally) time for The Simpsons Movie.

What an amusing novelty it is to see America's favorite yellow family up on the big screen -- doubly so because the magic of the series has translated quite excellently into cinematic form. Aside from a few editing gaffes (the DVD version will probably run 110 minutes!), The Simpsons Movie is quite a GOOD movie: a colorful little treat that's sly enough for the grown-ups, silly enough for the kids and funnier that just about anything found in the multiplexes these days. It's as if someone pulled a forgotten episode out of a vault marked "Simpsons Seasons 4 - 9," stretched the thing out into a tight 85-minute package, and gussied up some of the animation and special effects. So yes, The Simpsons Movie is exactly like a feature-length episode of the Sunday night staple. And in this case, that's a really big compliment.

Yep, there's actually a movie called Transmorphers, and it slides into "select" video stores just in time for the theatrical release of Transformers. Some call it copy-catting at its most shameless, some opt to call it fortuitous timing ... and most people will never even hear of Transmorphers, aside from the hardcore movie geeks and the curious 14-year-olds of the world. Produced by the outfit that gave you The Da Vinci Treasure, Pirates of Treasure Island and Snakes on a Train, Leigh Scott's low-low-budget Transmorphers is (of course) unquestionably, obviously and in all ways blatantly BAD ... but here's the key question: Is it any fun?

Everyone has several different definitions of "fun" and one of mine is this: A cheap knock-off turkey that mixes the giant robots of Transformers, the sexual politics (and uniforms) of Starship Troopers, the hero of Pitch Black, the subterranean existence of The Matrix, the post-apocalyptic struggle of The Terminator, a whole bunch of arbitrary emo angst borrowed from Battlestar Galactica, and about fifteen other components from sci-fi flicks as varied as Serenity and Jason X. It's a weird and grungy little concoction, but between the florid bouts of soap opera whatnot and the special effects that fondly remind one of Land of the Lost -- there's definitely enough here to warrant an 83-minute visit, but (seriously) only if you're well-versed in the art of bad cinema. There's enough bad acting, ripe writing and chintzy production design to fill three Uwe Boll movies, but like the works of that particular master, there's something brain-twistingly amusing about the whole goofy affair.

If Michael Bay's intention was to make a Transformers movie that would have the established fans peeing in their pants and clapping with nerdly glee, he's succeeded in fine form. If, however, Michael Bay's intention was to create an accessible sci-fi adventure movie that could bring in moviegoers who believe a "transformer" is something you stick into your fuse box ... he's failed pretty miserably. Hitting the screens with all the subtlety of a 50-piece drum set thrown down an eternal flight of stairs, Transformers should have been bankrolled by the fine people of Tylenol: Twelve random minutes of the flick are enough to give you a brain-bruising migraine.

But loud and mindless I can handle. Lord knows I'm a fan of enough empty vessels like Transformers. (Indeed, I'm even a Bay supporter sometimes. I adore The Rock, I consider Armageddon a blissfully guilty pleasure, and I'm one of the few who bothered to find some good things in The Island. The less said about Pearl Harbor and Bad Boys 2 ... the better.) The main problem (among many) with this massively moronic Transformers flick is that for all its sound and fury ... there's simply that nothing there. One can only sit through so many sequences in which giant animated dolls throw each other across the street before he wonders "Do I even care who wins this fight? And which one's the good guy again? I think he had blue stripes."

Love the guy or hate him, there's little denying that filmmaker Michael Moore is a pretty controversial figure. Plus the guy deserves credit for bothering to tackle issues that affect us all ... but very few people actually talk about. After earning supporters and detractors in equal measure with Roger & Me, Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 9/11, Mr. Moore is back with a documentary that takes a very close look at the problems plaguing the American health care system -- and frankly I can't think of a better target for Moore's particular brand of everyman wrath.

Although he has polarized audiences in the past, what with all his soapbox politics and arguments about liberal this and conservative that, Moore's latest film is also one of his most confident ... and most plainly dramatic. But there's a lot of great points to be found in Moore's Sicko -- especially if you've been wondering how America's health care "providers" have become so damn powerful. If there's a "Big Brother" out there, it's got to be the connection between U.S. government and our nation's shamelessly backwards health care system. And frankly I'm pretty thrilled to see that someone's taking these mega-corporations to task for their money-grubbing and astonishingly callous ways.

The German Defense Ministry has said "nein" to Tom Cruise, Bryan Singer and the entire Valkyrie crew. The original plan was to shoot on some German military locations, but apparently Mr. Cruise's connection to the Church of Scientology has shot that plan all to hell. Germany, you see, has a very low tolerance of the Hubbard religion (see Monika's post on the Stauffenberg family reaction to Cruise's participation). Variety explains it perfectly when they say the "decision was based on Germany's longstanding contention that Scientology is not a religion but an exploitative, profit-based business concern." Yowch. No hair-splittin' there, folks.

In years past certain German officials have called for boycotts on some of Cruise's films, plus they didn't let him shoot any of the third Mission: Impossible there -- even though he probably asked really nice. Personal opinions aside (yes, I think Scientology is mega-goofy), I think the German government is probably overreacting a little bit. But hey, points to the guys for sticking to their principles, right? Yet again, I don't see what one guy's religious beliefs have to do with the making of a movie... Oh, it's so frustrating to see both sides of an argument!

As far as Valkyrie goes, there are still plans to shoot in Germany, but apparently the military locations that the crew was after are strictly off limits. And it's all Scientology's fault. Production on the wartime thriller, which also stars Kenneth Branagh and Bill Nighy, is set to begin some time next month. (The flick's about a plot to kill Hitler, and even though we already know how the story ends (he lives) it still sounds like a pretty solid project.)