Trailer Time: Machine Gun Preacher, starring Gerard Butler and Michelle Monaghan

Uh oh.  The talk surrounding Marc Forster's hell's angel turned humanitarian flick, Machine Gun Preacher, has focused on Gerard Butler and his viability as a Best Actor candidate. Certainly the studio is making a strong push, which only promises to get even greater as we draw closer to the end of the year. However, one look at this trailer and I have a nagging feeling it'll end up in the category of other obvious Oscar bait flicks that ultimately died on the vine, like All the King's Men and Invictus.

The true story centers on Sam Childers, an ex-Hell's Angel and drug dealer who experiences a change of heart. He finds God, gives up the drugs, and builds an orphanage in the Sudan. He then takes up arms(including a bazooka apparently) to help protect the children from being snatched up as child soldiers for the militia.  Based in fact or not, this trailer makes Childers look like a modern day Rambo, and certainly I'm not seeing any reason why Butler would be considered for any award other than a Razzie. Here's hoping I'm wrong and we just haven't seen the juicy stuff yet...




Look, I'll be totally honest here. Part of me thinks this looks like the very "mighty Whitey to the rescue" stuff I tend to hate about films dealing with race. But I initially thought the same thing about The Help', and I couldn't have been more wrong there.

Michelle Monaghan, Kathy Baker, and Michael Shannon co-star. There's a chance I'll be seeing this film later on this afternoon, just a few weeks before it hits theaters on September 23rd.