Here are a bunch of little bites to satisfy your hunger for movie culture:

Vintage Summer Movie Preview of the Day:

Was 1982 the best summer for movies? It looks that way in retrospect looking at this sneak preview of the season’s offerings of 33 years ago, but let’s remember that a lot of these releases, such as Blade Runner and Tron were box office disappointments.

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Vintage Image of the Day:

Garrett Morris as Ant-Man in a Saturday Night LIve sketch beside Dan Aykroyd as The Flash. It’s because of this sketch (watch it here) that Morris got a cameo in the new Ant-Man movie.

Easter Eggs of the Day:

In addition to the Garrett Morris cameo in Ant-Man, Mr. Sunday Movies humorously points out all the Marvel, Disney and Star Wars Easter Eggs to be found in the new superhero movie (via Devour):

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Fan Art of the Day:

More Marvel! French artist Blule makes some incredible splatter paintings for various superheroes, including most of the Avengers (see Captain America below) and Batman, plus James Bond and Django. See more at Design Taxi.

Cosplay of the Day:

Speaking of The Avengers, here’s Ashlynne Dae doing a twist on the movie’s villain, Loki (via KamiKame):

Supercut of the Day:

Ever notice all the crucifixion posturing in the movies of Martin Scorsese? If not, Milad Tangshir has compiled them for you in this supercut (via Montage Creators):

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Filmmaker in Focus:

Lars von Trier is the latest focus of the auteur-centered video essay series Cinemasters (via Cinematic Montage Creators):

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Celebrity Cosplay of the Day:

Yes, we’ve got two different cosplays of the day today because this one is very different and special, more about who is doing the cosplay than how the costumes related to movies. Christopher Guest and Jamie Lee Curtis took their kids to the tournament-game convention Evo 15 and the whole family dressed up as Street Fighter characters. Curtis needed to go incognito as Vega, but apparently Guest isn’t famous enough to need a mask at a public event (via Fashionably Geek).

Star Wars Toy of the Day:

If you have the room to hold this 18ft by 12 ft Millennium Falcon from Hot Toys, you’ll presumably also have enough money for however much it will cost (via Geek Tyrant):

Classic Trailer of the Day:

30 years, Tom Hanks was riding on the breakout success of Splash and even Bachelor Party for the marketing of his subsequent release, The Man With One Red Shoe, which bombed when it opened this week in 1985. Watch the comedy’s original trailer, which looks pretty entertaining in retrospect:

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When Bryan Singer’s X-Men hit theaters in 2000, one of the big issues among fans was how the movie more or less abandoned all of the character costume designs from the comic books, trading their vibrant colors for shiny black costumes that were all the rage thanks to The Matrix. It’s not that Wolverine looked bad in black, he just didn’t look exactly like he did in the comics.

Now we’ve seemingly come full circle, with the next issue of Entertainment Weekly offering a first look at the new characters in Singer’s X-Men: Apocalypse. Their costumes aren’t afraid to be colorful and weird and, in some cases, remarkably faithful to their comic counterparts. And as a result, they may look a little, well, weird and colorful, but it’s cool because that’s kind of how the ’80s were, which is when Apocalypse takes place.

Above you’ll see Alexandra Shipp as Storm, Oscar Isaac as Apocalypse, and Olivia Munn as Psylocke. Apocalypse may not be the instantly intimidating badass fans are expecting, but we’re sure that’ll change as soon as you see him in the actual movie. But at least Shipp is rocking that Storm mohawk hard.

Not everyone is colorful, though. Here we’ve got a shot of Raven and Quicksilver wearing the fairly standard black designs, looking like they’re aboard the Blackbird.

And if you want to see a first look with some better coloring, here’s the actual EW cover.

X-Men: Apocalypse hits theaters on May 27, 2016.

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Here are a bunch of little bites to satisfy your hunger for movie culture:

Cosplay of the Day:

As long as Conan O’Brien is still putting out Comic-Con stuff, we will, too. Here are his prop master’s cheap cosplay ideas for those of us on a budget, including easy concepts for Magneto, Wolverine, Spider-Man and more:

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Fan Build of the Day:

You will be the cosplayer of the day when you follow instructions on how to make your own Ant-Man suit:

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Movie Comparison of the Day:

Also inspired by the release of Ant-Man, Couch Tomato looks at the similarities and differences between Antz and A Bugs Life:

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Star Wars of the Day:

Get a first-person POV of a Jedi Master in action against a bunch of Stormtroopers with this new fan film, Jedi With a GoPro (via Devour):

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Vintage Image of the Day:

To Kill a Mockingbird author Harper Lee with Gregory Peck, who played Atticus Finch in the movie adaptation, on the set in 1962. Presented in relation to the controversial sequel novel, Go Tell a Watchman, which hit stores this week.

Supercut of the Day:

Yesterday we shared a video fo the worst practical special effects. Today it’s World Wide Interweb’s supercut of the worst of any kind of special effects (via Film School Rejects):

Movie Mash-Up of the Day:

It’d be nice if there was a punchline to this mash-up of Jurassic World and Monty Python and the Holy Grail, but it’s still pretty amusing as is if you know both scenes (via Reddit):

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Filmmaker in Focus:

One again, here’s a video about the movies of Wes Anderson, this time looking at their connection to the works of master filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu (via Press Play):

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Video Essay of the Day:

Jorge Luengo shows what Requiem for a Dream looks like with only its close ups cut together:

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Classic Trailer of the Day:

With news of The Last Starfighter becoming a TV series, here’s a look at the 1984 movie with its original trailer:

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Get ready, Scott Lang fans – your time has arrived! Okay, sit down. Both of you.

Truth is, I am of two minds about Ant-Man. On the one hand, it is noticeably similar to Iron Man, with its tale of a scientist (Michael Douglas as Hank Pym) who uses his technology for part-time superheroics, fighting against the controlling interests (Corey Stoll as Darren Cross) at the company he founded, who would sell his tech to the highest bidder within the military industrial complex. Unlike Iron Man, Ant-Man is too often inert, stuffed with exposition and far more talking than doing. If you wanted your Marvel movies to feel smaller, well, here’s one.

But for some brief, and truly glorious moments, Ant-Man really comes alive. The shrinking effects are wonderfully realized by director Peyton Reed, along with cinematographer Russell Carpenter and effects supervisor Daniel Sudick. The 3-D is artful and has a clear purpose. The finale is something else – a symphony of comedy and action mayhem that outclasses every single second that comes before it. Nothing else in the movie even comes close.

This will either send you home happy or have you wondering why the first hour wasn’t as good as the final minutes. Paul Rudd plays our lead, Scott Lang, a petty thief enlisted by Pym to steal Cross’s “Yellowjacket” armor before a bad situation gets worse. Pym trains Lang with the help of his estranged daughter Hope (Evangeline Lilly). She’s also Cross’s confidant but falls more in line ethically with her father. The opportunity to be a superhero gives Lang a shot at redemption, which also means a shot at weekend visitation rights with his daughter.

Ant-Man settles on “Tell, Don’t Show” as its approach, and many of its scenes have an odd redundancy to them. We’re told repeatedly that Lang is an activist who only targets one-percenters, but we never see this from Lang himself. Not only does he not express his personal politics (though other characters do it for him), he easily allies himself with a one-percenter when the time comes to do the job. Similarly, other characters reference Darren Cross slowly going insane from exposure to his formula of shrinking particles, but we never actually see this happen. The film already opens with Cross as an opportunistic slimeball so there’s no discernible change, and we never see him use the particles on himself. Even if other characters are saying it, we’re simply not seeing it.

Rumors of Marvel’s heavy hand in the editing room are more apparent here as well, with a gore gag involving a shrinking lamb noticeably out of sequence with that scene’s obvious pay-off, which actually happens in a bathroom minutes before. Moments of the film are indistinguishable from Marvel’s TV product, directed too matter-of-factly, framed against blandly glossy sets, and scored to a irritatingly generic facsimile of what movie music should sound like. Characters have conversations shot in talking head medium close-ups; the better to edit with, since no one is talking to anyone who is visible in the frame with them. Your ability to forgive Ant-Man’s overall lack of polish, from script to screen, will vary.

The reason for that is that Ant-Man is very entertaining when, y’know, it’s being entertaining. Rudd is scrappy and confident, Douglas is always a welcome screen presence, and the core concept of a tiny guy who can control ants provides enough of a foundation for zany FX-driven action-adventure that it seems almost difficult to mess up. Peyton Reed snaps awake when he gets to play with moments like Ant-Man’s ant training montage or the way Ant-Man fights or how Ant-Man’s environment is shot depending on his size. Effects have come a long way since Honey, I Shrunk the Kids and so much of Ant-Man really does feel like we are seeing something we haven’t seen before. It’s CG done for the purpose of bringing scale to life and it works incredibly well.

Comic fans will enjoy seeing Lang brought to the screen faithfully. Pym isn’t quite the guy we know from the comics, but that’s primarily due to the actor’s age. Marvel, perhaps knowing this, gives us some specifically nerdy Pym-related Easter eggs and some direct Avengers nods to satisfy any feelings of comic book unfaithfulness. Yellowjacket, though a name associated with Pym in the comics, is very much his own thing here, and putting Darren Cross in the armor is similar all-around to Iron Man‘s Iron Monger. The design of his costume elevates him into something memorable, (even if the screenplay lets him down). He looks damn cool.

So, Ant-Man is “good but…” and not “great and…” Good but sloppy. Good but talky. Good but not great. It’s tinier than Age of Ultron, which is to be expected, but still beholden to setting up pieces for the next Marvel Studios event picture, if you’re curious. I can’t speak to the Edgar Wright situation, and I don’t know that his long-gestating version would’ve been better because it doesn’t exist. I can only speak to the film I saw and it’s going to make some Ant-Man fans for the very first time, which is Marvel’s modest goal despite the film’s immodest budget. See it in 3-D; see it for the fun of it, but decide for yourself if Marvel’s recent fare shows they might be getting too comfortable as the king of the box office anthill.

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Here are a bunch of little bites to satisfy your hunger for movie culture:

Movie Trivia of the Day:

In honor of Judd Apatow‘s Trainwreck and the Paul Rudd-starring Ant-Man both coming out this week, CineFix shares seven things you probably don’t know about The 40-Year-Old Virgin:

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Best Superhero Selfie of the Day:

Here’s that selfie taken at Comic-Con of Stan Lee with all of Fox’s superhero movie casts, from X-Men: Apocalypse, Deadpool, Wolverine, Gambit and Fantastic Four:

Short Film of the Day:

New Horizons is a film made Erik Wernquist for the National Space Society to promote today’s historic arrival at Pluto by the New Horizons space probe. Watch it below.

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Cosplay of the Day:

This group dressed as the Redneck Avengers is not from the Comic-Con but from the recent Minnesota CONvergence Convention (via Neatorama):

Fan Art of the Day:

French street artist OakOak specializes in clever pop culture grafitti, such as the following tributes to the classic films Yellow Submarine and King Kong (via Design Taxi):

Movie Scene Remix of the Day:

Someone took the acid trip scene from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and made it even trippier by running it through Google’s Deep Dream interface (via Press Play):

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Vintage Image of the Day:

Buster Keaton as a witch doctor in a promotional still for How to Stuff a Wild Bikini, which opened in theaters 50 years ago today. This was one of few beach party movies Keaton appeared in and one of the silent comedy legend’s final movies before he died.

Movie Ranking of the Day:

Given all the celebration at Comic-Con of Star Wars: The Force Awakens using mostly practical special effects, here’s a list from WatchMojo.com of the 10 all-time worst practical effects in movies, including The Terminator, Beetlejuice and Jaws 3D.

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Alternative Art of the Day:

In honor of its 30th anniversary this week, Explorers gets a cool new screen print from Francesco Francavilla and Grey Matter Art (via TheBlotSays.com).

Classic Trailer of the Day:

Possibly Bill Murray‘s most underrated comedy, Quick Change is a brilliant New York City odyssey, and it opened in theaters 25 years ago this week. Watch the original trailer and seek it out if you’ve never seen it.

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Our resident VOD expert tells you what’s new to rent and/or own this week via various Digital HD providers such as cable Movies On Demand, Amazon, iTunes, Vudu and, of course, Netflix.

Cable Movies On Demand: Same-day-as-disc releases, older titles and pretheatrical exclusives for rent, priced from $3-$10, in 24- or 48-hour periods

(thinking-man’s sci-fi/thriller; Oscar Isaac, Domhnall Gleeson, Alicia Vikander; rated R)

It Follows (soon-to-be horror classic; Maika Monroe, Keir Gilchrist; rated R)

Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 (comedy sequel; Kevin James, Raini Rodriguez; rated PG)

Clouds of Sils Maria (drama; Juliette Binoche, Kristen Stewart, Chloë Grace Moretz; rated R)

Dior and I (documentary; Anna Wintour, Jennifer Lawrence; rated R)

The Salt of the Earth (documentary; Sebastião Salgado, Wim Wenders; rated PG-13)

Lila & Eve (drama-thriller; Viola Davis, Jennifer Lopez; premieres 7/17 on MOD and in theaters; rated R)

Safelight (drama; Evan Peters, Juno Temple; premieres 7/17 on MOD and in theaters; rated R)

Digital HD: Rent from $4-$7 or own from $13-$20 (HD may cost more than SD)

Vudu

Offers the same movies as cable Movies On Demand for rent and/or download. Plus:

X-Men: Days of Future Past—The Rogue Cut (Bryan Singer-directed superhero sequel; Hugh Jackman, James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, Anna Paquin; available now on the same date as Blu-ray; rated PG-13)

Far from the Madding Crowd (romantic drama; Carey Mulligan, Thomas Vinterberg, Juno Temple; available 7/17 to download to own only; rated R)

Google Play

Offers the same movies as cable Movies On Demand for rent and/or download except for Lila & Eve and Safelight. Plus:

X-Men: Days of Future Past—The Rogue Cut, Far from the Madding Crowd

iTunes

Offers the same movies as cable Movies On Demand for rent and/or download except for Safelight. Plus:

X-Men: Days of Future Past—The Rogue Cut, Far from the Madding Crowd

Amazon

Offers the same movies as cable Movies On Demand for rent and/or download except for Lila & Eve and Safelight. Plus:

X-Men: Days of Future Past—The Rogue Cut

Netflix Watch Instantly: $8.99 per month for unlimited streaming

New This Week: Creep, Goodbye to All That, The Killer Speaks: Season Two, (7/15): Penguins of Madagascar: The Movie, (7/16): Changeling, (7/17): BoJack Horseman: Season Two, (7/18): Glee: Season Six

Follow Robert B. DeSalvo @zuulboy

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