Trailer Tracker: Underworld 4, Ghost Rider 2 and more

Two sequels to popular mythological-based action flicks will christen our docket this week on Player Affinity beginning with Underworld: Awakening, which marks the return of Kate Beckinsale and is the fourth entry in the popular vampire/werewolf franchise. Next, four years after Ghost Rider was met with lukewarm reception in 2007, Cage is back but with a whole new look thanks to Crank directors Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor behind the camera with Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance.

Elsewhere, Avatar’s Sam Worthington plays a homicide detective in a based-on-true-events story. He teams up with a New York City cop (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) to solve a series of unsolved murders in Texas Killing Fields. Finally, Gerard Butler goes the Blood Diamond route with the action/drama Machine Gun Preacher about a former career criminal who finds salvation helping young children in war-torn Sudan. Come forward my children and hear my sermon — it’s Trailer Tracker.

New clips this week:
Underworld: Awakening
Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance
Texas Killing Fields
Machine Gun Preacher

Underworld: Awakening

After Underworld and Underworld: Evolution became favorites among horror and action fans alike, the sensual female vampire lead, Seline, (played by Kate Beckinsale) unexpectedly departed for the prequel Underworld: Rise of the Licans. Popularity, it seems, is fleeting, and the English beauty starred in a string of low-key and ultimately forgettable fare. In this continuation of the original modern storyline, we find Seline awakening (heh, get it?) 12 years in the future to discover that werewolves and her blood-sucker kind now face a common foe: humans, who have found out about the existence of these creatures and seek to eradicate them forever. Scott Speedman, who played the love interest in the first two films, will be the absentee this time round, and with Michael Sheen and Bill Nighy long gone, let’s hope we can ride of the charms of Beckinsale alone for part four.

The “Underworld” series is a personal favorite of mine, thanks in no small part to aforementioned thesps Sheen and Nighy, but also do to the extensive interconnected lore and back-story that has been crafted over the duration of the franchise. Toss in gorgeous cinematography and crisp action and what’s not to like? “Awakening” seems to promise all the action we could want and then some in sheer throat-slitting, neck-snapping fashion. Obviously shot in 3D, the production values nevertheless look just as sleek as ever and with new directors Måns Mårlind and Björn Stein, perhaps we can get a bit of a twist on the style we were exposed to back in the Len Wiseman days of the tale. Underworld: Awakening will set off 2012’s action slate opposite Steven Soderbergh’s Haywire on Jan. 20.

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance

Both a surprise and not really a surprise essentially sums up the existence of another “Ghost Rider” film. The first was a minor success financially, but less of one with fans and critics who found the silliness smothering and the execution hokey, to be kind. But this is Hollywood, folks and with a slashed budget and new talent behind the camera with duo Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor (Crank, Crank 2, Gamer) Nicolas Cage is back as Johnny Blaze in what will be a darker, but still tongue-in-cheek, offering with a grindhouse spin. Everything about this movie looks grittier and — simply — better, with a first look at the infamous “peeing fire” scene that took Comic-Con by storm just a few months ago.  Neveldine and Taylor are crazy dudes and their manic, delirious style of filmmaking should blend will with Cage’s similarly twitchy mannerisms. If the trailer hints at only but a few things to come, bring on the vengeance. 

Texas Killing Fields

Loosely based on true events about the murder of women picked up along I-45 and dumped in an old oil field in southeast Texas, “Killing Fields” stars Sam Worthington amd Jeffrey Dean Morgan as partnered men of the law tasked with tracking down an elusive killer and a young runaway respectively. Danny Boyle was originally attached to direct, but his vision was too dark for studios to handle and he subsequently moved on, leaving the daughter of Michael Mann, Amy, to tackle the thriller. Cat-and-mouse whodunits are always a good time and with a look very much of the Se7en variety, this particular film could pack more of gritty punch. Texas Killing Fields will compete at the Venice Film Festival in September before making its way to a theater near you.

Machine Gun Preacher

Following up his foray into James Bond territory with Quantum of Solace, director Marc Forster tackles the real-life story of Sam Childers (Gerard Butler), a former drug-dealer biker who finds his faith and travels to Sudan where he takes up the cause of young child soldiers caught between the warring tribes. These real-life “message” films, when spliced with mainstream Hollywood action can water down both camps, especially when a bigger star takes the lead role. Forster did, however, prove he can handle touchy subject matter with care as we saw with The Kite Runner. "Preacher" will debut at this years TIFF, so there must be something there for which to be excited. I like Butler in the lead and the trailer looks fiery and professionally assembled. Plus, the title is cool. Maybe I’m too easily pleased.