That was pretty much the high point. As the release date grew closer and closer, the bad vibes started to rise within me. The news of re-shoots were akin to huge warning bells ringing in my head.

Well, I’m happy to report it’s not as bad as I thought it was going to be.

However, it’s not great either. It’s just slightly better than my pessimistic mind was anticipating.

Hancock is about a lone superhero (also a drunkard bum) who does nothing but destroy millions of dollars worth of property while trying to fight crime. An early attempt to stifle a car chase results in $9 million in damages, a personal record for John Hancock.

Yes, John Hancock is his name, of which the origins you find out later in the movie.

Jason Bateman is a Public Relations guy trying to make his mark in the world. That becomes ironic later on, but I digress. He sees Hancock as a hopeless man, thought of by the rest of the world as an A-Hole.

From there, the movie progresses. I wont go into too much detail, because there is a big twisty-turny-thing in the middle and while I smelled it and saw it coming from a mile away, some of you may not.

The problem with the movie was that it wasn’t a comedy like I had hoped for. There were some funny parts, but I honestly only laughed a few times. It was partially intended to be a drama as well, because of Hancock’s self-loathing which stems from some long lost origin.

(let me say this though – there was a line during a dinner table scene which I thought was one of the funniest I’ve heard all year. I’ll let you find it.)

And even if it wasn’t a comedy, the dramatic part didn’t feel right. The story was actually very cool. When you get some questions answered about just WHO Hancock is, the explanation and idea is pretty awesome. I really dug it.

But the execution and delivery felt rushed and cheap. The special effects were really unspectacular.

I wanted to like this film, and I did actually ENJOY myself a bit, yet just felt something was missing. It reminded me of Jumper earlier this year. A noble effort with a pretty awesome story, but poorly done.

Mike’s Rating: 6.5 out of 10

I’ve been waiting and waiting for some sort of trailer or image to come from the studio and the first photo is finally here thanks to Row Three.

The picture has Viggo Mortensen and Kodi Smit-McPhee, who play the Father and Son in the story, both of which are never given names by author Cormac McCarthy who wrote the book. The cast has grown, and I had no idea Robert Duvall was involved with this now, but I guess it’s just a rumor according to IMDB. He joins Charlize Theron as the Wife and Guy Pearce as The Veteran, along with a bunch of other costars. Duvall would play the Old Man.

John Hillcoat is directing, and with his previous film being the critically acclaimed The Proposition, I have high hopes here.

I’m so excited for this movie. You have no idea how that book impacted me personally. It was so amazingly written, so bleak and dark, it was an inspiration to me as a writer. I wrote a short story and started a long novel because of it.

The photo below is fantastic, almost exactly how I would picture these two characters in this post-apocalyptic world.

With it arriving late in the year, I’m curious to see what kind of Oscar buzz it will receive.

Enjoy!

I’ve been following the production of the movie a bit, obviously from the first day I heard it was going to be made into a movie and that Viggo Mortensen would play the lead character of the father. I can’t tell you how fantastic a choice it was to pick Viggo for this movie…he’ll do an amazing job. He has that ability to play a tired, weary, hard-luck guy and that’s what is needed here.

It’s now being reported that Charlize Theron will be joining Viggo in the film, which is good news considering what a great actress she is, but also puzzling news in the way the book goes.

Without giving too much away, the story is mainly about a father and his son trying to survive in a world around 2-4 years after a nuclear holocaust in the United States. You never get their names and the story is bleak, dark and dreary. There is hardly any food left, nothing growing, no power, nothing but desolation. Yet while it sounds like a slow moving book, it’s really a page-turning masterpiece.

The fact of the matter is that the only woman who appears in the story of any significance is the father’s wife, but it’s only done in short flashbacks.

So either Theron will be in the film for just a few short flashbacks, or else they are changing the story a bit.

Some other interesting news on this is that according to IMDB.com, Guy Pearce is in talks to also be in the film, as well as Danny Huston. Again, it’s going to be weird to see how additional actors fare in this film because of the main focus being on just two people and a desolate landscape.

I can see some of these guys turning up along the way, sort of like cameo appearances while they journey towards hope.

And as far as the son goes, it looks like (according to Production Charts) that he’ll be played by Kodi Smit-McPhee.

If you haven’t read the book yet, I strongly suggest you pick up a copy today and make sure you are all set for the movie’s release sometime in September of 2008.