This new book looks intriguing: A long list of writers talk about their craft and their faith.
It features entries from Luci Shaw, Frederick Buechner, Anne Lamott, David James Duncan, Madeleine L’Engle, Brett Lott, Paul Schrader, Kathleen Norris, and others.
Was just going to send an email asking why you hadn’t linked to this yet, actually.
I’m sold. I wasn’t a bit Marvel fan, but the new costume/venom era of Spiderman was brilliant, back before McFarlane let fame go to his head (and what did that get us? Spawn. I mean, seriously.).
I’m so looking forward to this one. Which usually means that I’ll be disappointed.
Jeff: Deal. Write a bad review of this, at least until I manage to get to a theatre to see it, because I find that if you and Pete say a movie isn’t great, my expectations are lowered and I come out pleasantly surprised, a la Narnia and X3. I’m not saying that the latter was a great movie, but because I wasn’t expecting much, I enjoyed it more than I might have otherwise.
I heard that critics are already starting to post their reviews of Spider Man 3. It’s a little early, but they need to get it out of the way so they can return to speculating about the 2008 presidential race and whatever “inconvenient candidate” might emerge.
I’m not sure I’d say that Superman Returns is part of a trend of disappointing superhero movies. Ignore your own review for a minute, and you’ll see that — at the moment at least — the movie has a 79% rating at Rotten Tomatoes and a 72% rating at Metacritic.
X-Men 3 rates at 56%/58%, and here are the ratings for the big three recent critical successes of mainstream comic book adaptations:
Spider-man 2: 93%/83%
X2: X-Men United: 87%/68%
Batman Begins: 83%/70%
I’d say that Batman Begins is a superior film to the Spiderman and X-Men sequels, and I’m quite willing to bet that the film better stands the test of time; its comparatively lower rating stems from the fact that it challenges the audience.
Nevertheless, Superman Returns at the moment rates at the low end of the curve of solid superhero flicks; it has not (or at least, not yet) been seen as the disappointment that was X-Men: The Last Stand.
…but speaking of potentially disappointing franchise films, the first trailer is out for Casino Royale.
I am always so impressed with how good a job they do with movie trailers. A movie can be completely terrible but the trailer can still be amazing! Let’s hope this awesome trailer leads to an awesome movie as well!
Adam,
Not to mention just the opposite. Have you seen the latest Lady in the Water trailer? It’s even worse than the teaser…
That Lady in the Water trailer actually kind-of excited me for the film. Not because it was such a good trailer (it was awful) but because it seems like studio doesn’t know how to market it. Films that don’t fall into any specific category are always interesting.