First off, if you don't care much for The Boondocks, the Aaron McGruder comic strip/TV show, you'll want to skip this post entirely.

But The Boondocks features great takes at race relations in America, smart humor, and in the case of the TV show, features fantastic homages to some of the greats in Japanese animation.

But unfortunately for those who enjoyed both the strip and the show, McGruder quit working on both some time ago (though a fourth season of The Boondocks is set to air on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim at some point in the near future) to follow other pursuits, including a screenwriting treatment of the upcoming film Red Tails, which tells the story of the Tuskegee Airmen.

But earlier this month, McGruder posted a project on Kickstarter, looking to tell the tale of Uncle Ruckus, a widly offensive, self-hating black man introduced in the TV show, in a live-action movie that would feature Ruckus's voice actor, heavily made-up, in the title role.

The project ends in 14 days, and it looks like it's just ridiculous enough for me to throw my money at because, while I'm not wild about the Ruckus character (I'm a bit too MexicAnglo to feel too okay with laughing at a fool hating his own race and praising "the white man" in the ways he does), I'm all about more Aaron McGruder projects.

For a look at the Kickstarter's intro movie, and a bit of Ruckus from the TV show, check below the jump.

Film adaptations of popular novels all too often crash and burn, but some manage to be held in a higher esteem than their literary counterparts. This century-old debate will be tested over the course of this year as the Loft Cinema Book Club screens seven classic films, followed by moderated discussions of the books they’re based on.

Here’s the 2013 lineup for the Book Club, courtesy of the Loft website:

February
ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST
Milos Foreman, director (1975)
Novel by Ken Kesey

April
THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER
Robert Ellis Miller, director (1968)
Novel by Carson McCullers

June
SLAUGHTER HOUSE FIVE
George Roy Hill, director (1972)
Novel by Kurt Vonnegut

August
LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE
Alfonso Arau, director (1992)
Novel by Laura Esquivel

Special September Anti Censorship Month screening
LORD OF THE FLIES
Peter Brook, director (1963)
Novel by William Golding

October
IN COLD BLOOD
Richard Brooks, director (1967)
Novel by Truman Capote

December
LITTLE WOMEN
George Cukor, director (1933)
Novel by Louisa May Alcott

Anne Hathaway might need to watch her back at her next casting call.

Hathaway’s Oscar-nominated turn as downtrodden prostitute Fantine in Les Misérables prompted moviegoers everywhere to dig out their tissues (the Weekly’s Bob Grimm included), but a viral video parodying the actress’ rendition of “I Dreamed a Dream” skips the heartstrings and goes straight for the funny bone.

“For Your Consideration” is meant to be a good-humored nod to the actress as she rounds the final lap of awards season to the Academy Awards. (She’s already taken home a Golden Globe, Critics' Choice Award and Screen Actors Guild Award for the role). This spoof would fall flat if actress Emma Fitzpatrick wasn’t sporting a voice practically on par with Hathaway’s, and her delivery of lines like, “I already have my speech, ‘Oh God, is this really happening?!’” are so spot-on of Hathaway’s irritating over-eagerness on the podium as of late.

The Out in the Desert LGBT film festival is over and here are the 2013 Crystal Cactus Award winners. Congratulations filmmakers, and of course, Out in the Desert:

Out in the Desert 2013 Festival Director's Choice Award
Fallen Comrade

Out in the Desert 2013 Program Director's Choice Award
Slant

Best Youth Related Film
Steam is Steam

Thanks to the relentless Loft Cinema crew, Tucson gets a little taste of the Sundance Film Festival every year.

Tonight, the Loft screens one of the best-received films at Sundance this year. The Spectacular Now, starring The Descendents’ Shailene Woodley and newcomer Miles Teller, generated a lot of buzz at the festival for filling an all-too-familiar void in the film world: substance in a high school-set romance. The pair took home the Special Jury Prize for Acting at the festival, while the film was picked up by A24 after outbidding the Weinstein Co. for distribution rights.

Fellow intern Kyle Mittan previewed the screening in last week’s edition of City Week:

If you couldn't make the trip up to north to catch this year's Sundance Film Festival, The Loft Cinema is bringing a piece of it to Tucson.

The Lesbian Looks film series celebrates its 20th anniversary next month with three screenings at the Loft Cinema, a visit from award-winning filmmakers Greta Schiller and Andrea Weiss, and a new collection of Virtual Lesbian Looks webseries linked directly from lesbianlooks.org.

First screening is the acclaimed Mosquita y Mari at the Loft at 7 p.m. on on Wednesday, Feb. 13. From the press release:

Opening night features MOSQUITA Y MARI, an exquisitely-crafted coming of age tale that follows a pair of Latina teens who gradually fall in love against the backdrop of East LA. Studious, sweet-natured 15-year-old Yolanda feels the pressure to succeed under the eyes of her hard-working immigrant parents. When she meets her new neighbor, the feisty and alluring, BMX-riding Mari, Yolanda's humdrum high school routine gets a jolt. The two girls don't have much in common on the surface, but they become fast friends and their deep bond develops into a tension that neither one expected nor quite knows how to handle. Director Aurora Guerrero’s impressive feature film debut (which premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival) features two breakout lead performances by Fenessa Pineda and Venecia Troncoso, who perfectly embody the awkwardness and cautious desire of two teenage girls experiencing love and desire for the first time.

Which means that we all need to go out and get blazed as f—k on some catnip, obviously.

Tucsonan Jason Willis, maker of the retro-educational short film, had this to say on the film's Facebook page:

Whoa! Totally amazing!

The Sundance Film Festival has just announced (via the live streaming awards ceremony) that Catnip: Egress to Oblivion? has won the Short Film Audience Award for 2013! I'm completely dumbstruck and amazed!

Even more awesome: I won this based on the traffic and hits sent to YouTube, so honestly it's totally because of all of you guys — the links that you shared completely made this happen. Fucking madness!

Seriously, great work, folks.

• Entertainment Weekly

Sometimes a film I genuinely want to like leaves a bad taste in my mouth before it’s even released. If things get really regrettable, I try and convince myself that I must’ve accidentally watched some pirated spoof trailer made by a 10-year-old overseas on iMovie, or that I need to stop coercing myself into reading movie news from Huffington Post because nothing good can ever come of that.

No, I’m not talking about J.J. Abrams directing the new Star Wars (that’s a whole ‘nother story, and I’m hardly an expert). Instead, I’m a little skeptical of Hollywood’s attempt to exhume a different American legend, Steve Jobs.

We live in an age where the moment a dramatic event unfolds on our Twitter feeds, some film execs are already in a boardroom trying to hammer out a working title and a release date. Lance Armstrong hadn’t even admitted to doping before Paramount had Bradley Cooper on the phone in hopes that he doesn’t mind shaving his head for a role and already owns a Livestrong jersey. Likewise, it seemed Jobs had hardly been dead a week before news of multiple biopics based on the Apple founder began to circulate the web.

The upcoming year seems to look pretty promising in terms of film; The Great Gatsby, The Reluctant Fundamentalist and The Spectacular Now (just to name a few) all seem rather promising as far as I'm concerned.

But it wouldn't be a well-rounded year without at least one flick with a bizarre storyline and even stranger cast. Enter Spring Breakers. In case you missed the trailer and don't have two minutes to waste, here's a brief synopsis:

Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens, Ashley Benson and Rachel Korine are four women in college who apparently like to spend most of their time sitting around in bikinis, hitting up saunas and calling each other derogatory names. When spring break rolls around, the four of them, all strapped for cash, end up being the only ones still on campus. Insistent on getting a change of scenery, they come up with a plan to earn a few bucks and get out of town for a while. Host a car wash? Nope. Get jobs like normal people? Not a chance.

They rob a restaurant.

Surviving 2012 did nothing to quench America’s obsession with the apocalypse, and this year’s pop culture lineup looks as morbid as ever.

The studios - big surprise - aren’t looking to prioritize creativity in their quest to profit from stories of humanity’s demise, because at this point, what threat have we not had to rally from in order to avert extinction in the movies? Increasingly disfigured-looking aliens? Crippling disease? Trees? It’s all been covered, guys.

At first look, a Google sweep of upcoming films that could qualify as “apocalyptic” is ghastly if we’re talking sheer numbers: just shy of ten films, if you count The Fast and the Furious 6, because if that’s not a sign that the end is near, then I don’t know what is. Some of these films, though, look promising, and are definitely worth a look if not the full price of an admission ticket.