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summer is over , and 2013 was a yr in which films in release were arguably overshadowed by the announcement offutureblockbuster deed , such as theBatman / Superman sequel toMan of SteeltheAvengerssequel let on itsAge of Ultronsubtitle and villain ; or even the debut of racoon with guns , as shown in the footage from Marvel ’s 2014 tentpole , Guardians of the Galaxy .
However , 2013 did deliver a Modern Superman to the world ; revitalized theWolverinecharacter and disco biscuit - Men enfranchisement , and kicked off " Phase Two " of Marvel ’s Movie Universe - just to name the superhero highlights . The sci - fi , comedy and horror genres had their own summertime hit -Elysium , This Is the End , The Conjuring- so there is plenty of opportunity for accolades to be handed out in this , our second annualScreen Rant Summer Movie Awards .
WARNING!!! MAJOR SPOILERS FOLLOW!!!
Undoubtedly the biggest success story of the summertime ( in terms of box office , at least ) would have to be Marvel’sIron Man 3 . There was legitimate question as to whether Marvel Studios could sustain the same stratum of accomplishment with its solo films as it didThe Avengers . solution : Yes .
The motion picture itself was divisive and played fast and loose with characters and mythos - and the behind the scenes shenanigans with starRobert Downey Jr. ’s contract re - negotiationhad Marvel fans on peg and needles - but none of those detractions were enough to lay off RDJ and Marvel ’s continue box agency barrage . Iron Man 3walked away with 1.2 billion at the worldwide box office staff .
WillThor : The Dark WorldandCaptain America : The Winter Soldiersee net spikes for their several Phase One heroes ? clock time will tell .
It ’s always the most immanent category on our award inclination , and this class the badge for " Most Disappointing Summer Movie " will in all probability be awarded to a variety of films , depending on who you ask . While some the great unwashed might desire to nominateMan of SteelorIron Man 3 , I call back we can ALL agree thatR.I.P.D.was a massive disappointment for just about any and everybody .
… Then again , you belike never had high hopes for this ' Ghostbusters meetsMen In Black ' mashup , so maybe " letdown " is n’t so accurate a term as " validate " would be . in person , our disappointment come from the fact that director Robert Schwentke was coming off a big profits with a different adaptation of an obscure amusing Quran ( RED ) , and stars Ryan Reynolds and Jeff Bridges are more often than not serious guys - certainly better than what this celluloid shows them to be .
RUNNER UP : The Mortal Instruments : City of finger cymbals
Despite a factious receipt , the loge post earnings were pretty good ( approx $ 650 million worldwide on a $ 225 million budget ) ; however , the genuine " winner " ofMan of Steelwas its ability to re - introduce the Superman character and pic franchise to a new hearing , while also launch DC Comics and Warner Bros. ' shared movie macrocosm . So really , " Best Universe launching " would be a more exact term than " Franchise Launch . "
Need further proof?Man of Steel’sreception has breed what is by all odds the braggart comic book pic event yet : The annunciation thatMan of Steel 2will feature aSuperman / Batman team - up ! Sure , citizenry are lose their minds right now because thatBatman is Ben Affleck , but once we start to see footage from this film , the entire universe will likely be lining up to buy tickets . ThankMan of Steelfor getting us here .
( WATCH : Superman / Batmanfan trailer )
While Warner Bros. rolled the $ 200 + million die on their reboot of Superman , Disney figured it would be a good theme to roll their $ 200 + million dice on a reboot ofThe Lone Ranger . And the result was pretty much what a stack of multitude expected : a major letdown that nobody is begging to see extend into further sequels or spinoffs .
If you mind to ourLone RangerPodcastthen you ’ve try tell of the conflicted half of director Gore Verbinski ’s film : it set forth off as a supernatural - themed thoughtfulness on the sure-enough west , and ends as a mundane heist story boast an malevolent big businessman , a raft of expensive trains , and nothing supernatural about it . Despite their respective personal magnetism , the conjugation of Armie Hammer and Johnny Depp ( playing another inexplicably uncanny Depp caricature ) was n’t enough to save this pic - or the possible dealership wait in the wings .
Meet this year’sJohn Carter .
The criticisms ofMan of Steelare overly familiar by now - the end fight , written material , tempo , performances , etc . - but there is one point of consensus in this whole debate : director Zack Snyder create some of the best superhero action realize on film , and " The Battle of Smallville " was plausibly the crown achievement .
Not only is the chronological sequence a fantastic duel and a great showcase of major power pull in in real - world context , it ’s also a wonderful character reference moment , as Superman ’s defense of the men and women of the armed forcefulness finally earns him the preeminence of being a sub .
Man of Steelmay have circumvented actually saying the classical Superman melodic phrase about " Truth , Justice and the American Way " , but this prospect certainly catch it in life .
RUNNER UP : TIE - Tokyo Battle inPacific Rim & Bathroom Battle inThe World ’s End .
Wolverine(Hugh Jackman ) show up in a remote Japanese hamlet to save his Lady sexual love , Mariko ( Tao Okamoto ) , only to be confronted by an entire town full of ninjas . Now , one would think that an epic Wolverine vs. The Crazy 88 - case sequence would result ( and for a second it does ) but then , all of a sudden , we get Logan pushing forwards on some doomed march towards his target , while ninja arrows fill his back . Shockingly enough ( irony ) , not even Wolverine can shrug off that kind of assault , and he eventually passes out cold .
The symbolism ( Wolverine ’s unbending will and intensity level ) was perceivable , even poetical - but the sequence was still jolly lame as far as fights go . Worse yet is the fact that we experience from ourvisit to theWolverinesetthat this sequence was originally much more extensive and violent than what we got in dramatics .
RUNNER UP : Wolverine vs. Silver Samurai
Star Trek Into Darknessmay not have changed lives or create a thick , permanent effect , but in this timber - deficient summer , it render something that was painfully ask : good old - fashioned summertime blockbuster Zea mays everta entertainment .
This time the hardened pieces and action sequences were bigger , the banter between the hurl was crisp , and the villain actually got some time for development .
Yes , the wholeKhan " twist"was something of a beguilement for a lot of fans - as was the question of how the Enterprise could possibly officiate as a submarine . But Trekkie nitpicks aside , Into Darknesswas yet another well - fill out distance adventure from music director J.J. Abrams .
On toStar Wars 7 .
RUNNER UP : Fast & Furious 6
Nobody I know was begging for it , or hop for it , or even wanting it - yet the $ 271 million corner power catch of the first pic dictated that this sequel be made . Money talk in Hollywood - and lately it has been saying a lot of wrong thing .
We ’re not break to get to trench into this - It ’s bare to see how and why former overstrung comedians - turn - mature adult like Adam Sandler , Chris Rock , David Spade and ( to lesser extent ) Kevin James would do a film like this at this point in their career$. What is rightfully gravel is that this was ever a successful " franchise " at all .
Hopefully , the monumental cliff - off in box billet lucre that the continuation see ( $ 100 million less than its predecessor ) will prove that this trematode worm of stunt - casted mediocrity should be appreciated for what it did , before being hit the hay for good .
Henry Cavill is now Superman . ' Nuff said , really . Despite criticism , Cavill has cemented himself as the new Superman for a new multiplication , joining an esteemed ( and small ) circle of actors who have had the honor of play the role in characteristic - film . Cavill also harbor the honor ( ? ) of being the first non - American worker to be grant the Superman flick mantle , so props for that .
And what is Cavill doing for his next turn ? Well , he ’ll star inSherlock Holmesdirector Guy Ritchie ’s next enfranchisement reboot , The Man from U.N.C.L.E.(along side Armie Hammer ) ; after that , Cavill will suit - up as Superman again for a little celluloid tentatively titledBatman vs. Superman , alongside a little - known pic maven named Ben Affleck .
So , you lie with , he ’s got just a few little reasons to be this year ’s " Rising Star " winner …
Ryan Reynolds had three pic out in 2013 -The Croods , Turbo , R.I.P.D.- with onlyThe Croodsscoring major boxwood office success - and most people probably did n’t even recognise Reynolds from the back up voice role he had in that invigorate plastic film .
R.I.P.D.tanked hard , turn out once again that comic leger movie / natural process hero achiever may not be in the cards for Reynolds ( unless it ’s thatDeadpoolmovie ) . Meanwhile , Turbomanaged to be the one animated movie of Summer 2013 that could n’t top its production budget at the domesticated box office ; it was also headline by Reynolds , and debuted in theaters in the same hebdomad asR.I.P.D.Talk about double the blow …
The future of Ryan Reynolds ' career is changeable , but there ’s no doubt that he ’s in a drop-off correctly now . Maybe he should go away smash hit leading man biography behind and go back to doing what made him a wizard in the first position : witty vulgarism - clowning . ( And no , The Change - Updoesn’t tally . We said " witty . " )
2 gun for hire : yet another dark mirthful book property adapt into a average action film , but what set it apart - both in the minds of viewer and at the box government agency - was the teaming of leading men Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg .
The photographic film itself was another B - movie criminal offense - thriller fromContrabanddirector Baltasar Kormakur , but watching Washington and Wahlberg trade verbal ( at times physical ) jab made all the difference . As two surreptitious investigators masquerade as partner in offense ( while not knowing the other humans is also on the side of the jurisprudence ) , the dynamic between these icons of action badassery catch to take on several forms - each of them entertaining in their own right .
Without a suitable romance to set our hearts on fire during the summertime 2013 movie season , this longtime - coming bromance will have to do .
Okay , so we ’re getting a little tongue - in - cheek with this one , but it still ( sorta ) counts .
Frank ( Elijah Wood ) has some … unequaled issues with women , thanks to traumas fostered by an amoral and whorish mother . Frank is a sick puppy driven to do some pretty sick things - all of which we get to see through his optic , as director Frank Khalfoun forces us into the skin of a maniacal grampus .
As for the award ? Well , sit throughManiacand you too will probably agree that the relationships Frank has with his female victim - alive or recreated as fashion model top in bloody scalp - is not what any reasonable mortal would define as " good interpersonal chemistry " between lover .
And clear there was difficulty in nirvana : after all , by the end , all of Frank ’s ladies plow on him and ( symbolically ) rip him to shreds . You do it your mojo is no longer working when that happens , infant - yeah !
The view was pretty hilarious : Hollywood actors James Franco , Seth Rogen , Jonah Hill , Jay Baruchel , Danny McBride and Craig Robinson are trying to ride out the Apocalypse in James Franco ’s house with a disheveled Emma Watson . Being the gentlemen that they are , the boys proceed to discuss proper protocol for keep a female child feeling safe and comfort - without coming off " too rapey . "
take care , the subject of rape can be a gunpowder kegful of disceptation and poor mouthful when it is used in comedic setting - but something about Franco and Co. ’s conversation rang a gaudy and funny chord of truth about the quality of a human being ’s character . Do n’t be surprised if you start pick up the full term " rapey " with increase frequence in the street ; for better or worse , This Is the Endhas wangle to deflate the zeitgeist and add a new term to our already sordid vernacular .
The Conjuringwas hands - down the scarey movie of summer ( which we predicted long ago ) , but of all the freaky little instant in the film - the hand clap plot , the trace - sheet in the wind - the one present moment that probably had people dump their aspect into their hands was when the ghost beldam literally swoop off the top of an armoire onto a sleepwalking little girl .
Director James Wan ’s strength in the horror genre has always been creative sequencing using old school filmmaking techniques over CGI , and this moment in theConjuringwas one of the good examples . The scare is so good because of upright one-time - fashioned misdirection : you expect the threat to come OUT of the armoire and are caught off - guard when witch - dame hops down on little Cindy like she owes her money .
I now glint over the top of my own armoire every night before I go in to get my pajamas . No ghost Wiccan lady is gon na get the drib on me …
( Artwork by Jared S. Marantz )
Nicolas Winding Refn’sOnly God Forgivesis probably the mostcontroversially divisive pic of the yearso far - a strange mellow - art conflation of both Oedipal theory and religious moralism . However , that sophisticated blend of cinema does n’t write it from carry one of the most worrying scenes we ’ve seen recently .
After inviting her baby - boy Julian ( Ryan Gosling ) and his prostitute girl Mai ( Yayaying Rhatha Phongam ) to a posh dinner , drug lord matriarch Crystal ( English thespian Kristin Scott Thomas ) greets her guest with a verbal fulmination that no doubt sent more than a few Sundance attendees steer for the outlet .
We ’ll save you the full repulsion , but let ’s just say that when a mother decide to climb philosophic about what make water one of her Son better than the other , eroticized and vulgar comparisons about the size of their detritus should never , ever , be the crux of that argument . But in the world of Refn …
We allsaw it in the trailers , and even then it sparked a strong ( even visceral ) worked up response in citizenry : after saving a bus full of his classmates from drown , the the great unwashed of Smallville verbalise concern about Clark Kent ’s strange power . While present his adopted Word about the need for keeping his force a mystery , Jonathan Kent ( Kevin Costner ) is strike with the hard question of whether Clark should do nothing and watch as people kick the bucket .
Jonathan ’s answer , " Maybe , " was at once infuriating , grievous and cerebration - provoking in its implications . In a humanity of increasing moral complexness , that moment inMan of Steelnot only challenge the core value of the tiptop fighter mythos , it finally gave the humans what it had been need : a Superman movie that was n’t afraid to confront the Man of Steel ’s new place in a much more complicated macrocosm .
After two films that arguably had lustreless antagonists , we were getting the main event : Tony Stark ( Robert Downey Jr. ) vs. his comic leger nemesis , The Mandarin - with the villain set to be play by none other than Oscar - succeeder Sir Ben Kingsley . Questions of ethnicity away , most of us were excited to see how the opposing force of RDJ and SBK would clash on screen .
… And then we discovered it was all a big joke . There would be noDark Knight - style epic competition ; no breathtaking baddie performance from Kingsley ( as we were promised ) ; all the hype was shattered asKingsley ’s characterwas let on to be an actor / freak named Trevor Slattery , who had been lease to portray The Mandarin .
Whether youloved or hat the " twist,“the setting where Tony Stark ruin into an enemy stronghold and discovers Slattery ’s lawful nature had moviegoers the human beings over all allege " WTF ? ! ? ! ? ! ? ! "
What is a ' Frankenstein Job?‘you may be asking yourself : well , it ’s a nice niggling ego - styled terminal figure I use to refer to a picture that was intended to be one thing , but somewhere in production the filmmaker had to take a drastic change in coming . The end result is a motion picture that does n’t seem to have matching halves , or has bits and pieces that do n’t seem to properly fit together - andWorld War Zis this year ’s shining example .
Director Marc Foster had another notable " Frankenstein Film " with the James Bond entryQuantum of Solace , so mayhap this form of matter is his touch ? Either way , World War Zwas understandably a collection of natural action set pieces broadly speaking touch base by a flimsy " pursuance for a cure " tarradiddle - and the third act of the film is pretty much an indie repugnance movie " Frankensteined " onto the ending of a tentpole blockbuster .
Inthe original ending , an epical warfare succession coda was project ( involving Brad Pitt save his family ) , but instead we got a slow creep through the zombie - infest halls of a World Health Organization facility . Then again , afterso many yield issues , the vainglorious miracle of all is thatWorld War Zever worked as well as it did : Frankenstein walk away with half a billion dollars at the box berth .
Sometimes marry twins do n’t develop correctly in the womb , and one duplicate wind up fundamentally dominating gestative ontogenesis while the other withers away and is sometimes " have a bun in the oven " as a gross vestigial process seize to the surviving twin . In movie land , the condition applies to when " copycat motion-picture show " ( Like These Films ) are relinquish in close law of proximity , and only one celluloid flourishes while the other flounders .
This year we had two " give way Hardin The White House " movies : Antoine Fuqua’sOlympus Has Fallenin the bounce , and Roland Emmerich’sWhite House Downin the summertime . The former doubled its production budget , while the latter failed to unwrap even , despite the combined star power of Jamie Foxx and Channing Tatum - AND a less restrictive PG-13 rating .
Since nobody is holding either of these films up as astounding kit and boodle of artistic production , perhaps there ’s a strong case to be made for get your copycat into theater first ( even at the disbursal of choice optic event ) . In the end , White House Downcame out looking like the immaterial leftovers of a film we already see - which is why it is the perfect recipient role of our inaugural " Parasitic Twin Award . "
So . Many . Superman . Memes .
And now thatBen Affleck is Batman , andMan of Steel2is going head - to - head withAvengers 2 in summer of 2015 , the meme involve the Last Son of Krypton are proceed to be add up at us much more frequently and fiercely .
Which meme is your favorite ( so far ) ?
RUNNER UP : Benedict Cumberbatch ’s Khan inStar Trek Into Darkness .
Once again it ’s been an average , monumental , disappointingly funny action at law - compact adventure at the picture show in summertime 2013 , with plenty left to front fore to in the Fall .
If you have n’t done so yet , be trusted to have a look at our upcoming Fall 2013 Movie Preview , for all the latest trailer , release dates and info about the upcoming crop of fall cinema .
Otherwise , rise to the commentary incision and apportion your favorite movie moments of summertime 2012 - and/or your best summertime movie honour categories ( and winners )
