D-Rock is on vacation and won’t be delivering this week’s Franchise Fight Club column. Therefore, to make sure you all get your weekly column fix, I am reviving his WMD column for this week only – but adding my own touch to it. This is similar to the same aspects I used in my old-school Alternate Takes articles back in the day over at 411mania.com, so here we go…
This week, The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones comes out. While this is a movie my wife wants to see, based on the books, most people who read Renegade Cinema might not consider it their thing. So, if someone you know suggests seeing the movie, here are five other options you can offer them in exchange that you can watch from the comfort of your own home.
I am Number Four
Let’s start off with the source material. The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones is based on the young adult fantasy novel by Cassandra Clare about young people fighting in a world where they are special and that few others know about. Another similar movie in this style is I am Number Four, a movie that many critics crapped on, but I actually enjoyed. That movie even shares an actor with this one in Kevin Durand. I am Number Four follows a group of aliens sent to earth for safeguarding – the last remnants of a planet that was destroyed. When the killers learn there are survivors on earth, they come here to finish the job.
Sweeney Todd
Let’s take a look at our leads for The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones, Lily Collins and Jamie Campbell Bower. While there is nothing I have to recommend for you to watch with Collins, I will throw up a movie that Bower was in – and don’t worry, it isn’t Twilight (by the way – start flooding D-Rock with Facebook messages asking for the Twilight reviews he promised all of you). Bower first caught my attention when Tim Burton adapted the stage play Sweeney Todd, as a musical, with Johnny Depp as the demon barber. Bower, of course, played the naïve young man who stumbled upon the craziness on Fleet Street.
Miami Vice
While I can’t recommend anything that Lily Collins starred in, I will use this as a chance to pimp out a movie I will always love – and that is Michael Mann’s Miami Vice, a movie that gets nowhere near the love it deserves. Why does this tie in with Lily Collins? Well, she is the spawn of Phil Collins, and his amazing In the Air Tonight played a large role in the movie, much like it did in the original television show it is based on. Honestly, this movie is as cool as the TV show was and deserves more people to praise it.
Dredd
Look down the cast list for The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones and you will see the name Lena Headey in the cast. A lot of people have discovered her as Cersei in Game of Thrones, while others know her from Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles as Sarah Connor. However, I want to once again talk about how amazingly awesome the movie Dredd was in 2012, where Headey played the villain. The fact that no one watched this movie, and it failed at the box office is a crime and I still blame Sylvester Stallone. However, the movie continues to do well on DVD and Blu-ray, so I implore you to watch it on home video and continue to support one of the better non-Marvel comic book movies of recent memory. Maybe if they sell enough DVDs, we can get a sequel.
Pretty much any Harry Potter movie starting with Prisoner of Azkaban
However, if you really, really, really want to watch a movie based on a young adult novel – just watch a Harry Potter movie. Start with Prisoner of Azkaban and work your way from there to the end. That is one young adult movie series that actually got it right.
That’s it for this edition of WMD. Now, go watch a movie you haven’t seen before.
