Marshall and the Movies

January is always an interesting month at the movies.  It is usually filled with trash, so it is usually best spent making sure you see everything that came out in December.  With this post, I hope to steer you away from what I perceive to be the month’s garbage and towards what could be a surprise hit.

January 8

Is it just me or does the trailer do all the explanation and then some for “Leap Year?”  Amy Adams will be welcome face in barren January, and if there is a breakout hit in this month, my bet is on this.

Wait – Michael Cera and teen angst?  Never seen this before!  So excited for “Youth in Revolt” that I can barely see straight!

And just in case the latest vampire movie has left your local theater by January, Hollywood has “Daybreakers” for you. This seems to have a lot less shirtlessness and a lot more blood and gore, so that might limit its appeal a tad.

January 15

“The Book of Eli” will provide the answer to a question that has me curious: how much apocalypse can moviegoers take?  2009 saw “2012,” “Knowing,” and “Zombieland,” just to name a few.  This looks like a more mainstream, BA-version of “The Road.”  Denzel Washington is a star that all respect, but “The Taking of Pelham 123” in June 2009 showed that he can’t always draw in a large audience.  Will this be the movie to get him back on track?

“The Lovely Bones” plans to open wide this weekend.  Oh, and don’t get me started on how awful “The Spy Next Door” looks.

January 22

Dwayne Johnson (The Rock) usually chooses his movies well.  His latest, “The Tooth Fairy,” looks like it could continue a tradition of success with younger audiences.  He plays a hockey player condemned for his disbelief and forced to be a tooth fairy.  The whole “big personality learning to be modest” is something that Johnson does fairly well, and with a supporting cast including the likes of Ashley Judd and the legendary Julie Andrews, this could score big with families.

Looks like this year’s winner for “Most Likely to Be Condemned by the Vatican” comes early this year with “Legion.” Expect that invitation on Facebook to the group “We Do Not Support ‘Legion’ and the Message It Sends” any day now.

Don’t put those tissues away – “Extraordinary Measures” seems to be a tearjerker of great magnitude. The trailer almost made it seem like “My Sister’s Keeper” for kids. The trailer leaves fairly nebulous whether this will be a heartwarmer or a heartbreaker. It is based on a true story, so who knows?

January 29

Mel Gibson goes back to kicking butt and taking name in “Edge of Darkness,” something we haven’t really seen him do in over a decade (“Payback” in 1999).  After his character’s daughter is murdered, he mercilessly hunts for an answer and her killer.  Sounds a bit like “Taken,” right?  Funny, that opened in the United States this exact weekend in 2009.  Maybe the same people that made “Taken” a surprise success will return to do the same for “Edge of Darkness.”

Could Kristen Bell become a breakout romantic comedy star with “When in Rome?”  She plays an unlucky in love girl who is trying to figure out if the guy she likes (Josh Duhamel) is in love with her for who she is.  Doubts are raised because she could have stolen his coin out of the Fontana d’Amore in Rome, which would cause him to become smitten with her.  Several other guys go after her too, including characters played by Dax Shepard, Will Arnett, and Danny DeVito.  I have a feeling that this could surprise people and a new star could be born.

So, what do you think?  How good or bad is the garbage this year?  There has to be at least one movie that you want to see here, so let me know what it is by taking the poll.