Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol trailer

When Pixar's resident genius (as far as this blogger is concerned) decided to depart momentarily from animation and segue into action films, I was nervous.  When it turned out said action film was going to be the fourth installment of the somehow popular Mission: Impossible franchise, I was still nervous.  With story by Tom Cruise and J.J. Abrams, the film becomes ever more curious.  Each film since the first one has seemed sort of...useless, even with the addition of Phillip Seymour Hoffman.  However, in this we have both Tom Cruise and the heir apparent Jeremy Renner, who curiously doesn't get his name mentioned in the trailer, which is below.  Don't expect much Oscar love from this film though, not even in the technical categories.

Also co-starring Precious's Paula Patton, Lost's Josh Holloway, and Hot Fuzz's Simon Pegg.

First Image of Pixar's "Brave"

The first image of Pixar's Brave has shown up over at Pixar Times.  Looks cool, huh?  And I should say, isn't this quite the brave move by Pixar?  From what I understand, Brave is going to be Pixar's first female-led animated film.  I'm not trying to create some feminist debate here, but Buzz, Woody, WALL-E, Remy, Carl, Marlin, Mike Wazowski, etc. were all men and all the stars of some of Pixar's biggest hits.  The closest the studio ever came to giving a female co-lead billing was Mrs. Incredible, who (by the good graces of Holly Hunter) carries the film.  But seriously...look at her awesome hair.

But nevermind that.  I'm very excited for this film.  Pixar hasn't released much information regarding this 2012 film, but what we do know is that it's being directed by another new-to-helming director, Mark Andrews.  Andrews was Oscar-nominated for the animated short One Man Band, and marks Pixar's third newbie director since the trifecta of Andrew Stanton, Brad Bird, and John Lasseter helmed most of their 00s films.  But on board for the first time are two female scribes, in the duo of Emmy-nominee Irene Mecchi and Brenda Chapman, who became the first American female to direct an animated picture back in 1998 with The Prince of Egypt. 

As a rule, Pixar never let's me down at the movies.  I don't expect them to start here. Looking  good.  What do you think?


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