With the Fall festival season now kicking into full gear, we are beginning to see more and more from a cavalcade of films looking to make a splash this Fall.

One of these films happens to be the new project from director Derick Martini, Hick.

MTV has a new clip from the film, which stars Chloe Moretz and Blake Lively, and follows the story of a 13-year-old dealing with her drunken parents. The film premieres at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, and is one of many smaller indie dramas that will be looking to make some big waves this Fall.

As far as mindless summer diversions go, Green Lantern isn’t that bad.

Had to pause before writing anything else because “isn’t that bad” is about as enthusiastic there is to get about Green Lantern. It’s a satisfactorily entertaining adaptation and one of the few movies whose FX are actually worth the gouge in price for a 3D viewing. In a world where 3D-ocrity rules, the visuals are such that it almost makes up for the substandard, bordering on generic, origin story. The most acutely negative thing I can write about the Green Lantern experience is that X-Men: First Class and Thor were released before it, perhaps setting the bar too high so that “adequate” is merely…adequate. At least you won’t be wondering why you bothered to pay for those worthless 3D glasses.

Time for some SPOILER TALK! Below are SPOILERS for Green Lantern. Feel free to add your thoughts in the Comments section.

Green Lantern
Directed by Martin Campbell
Starring Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively, Mark Strong, Peter Sarsgaard
Release date: June 17, 2011

I went into Green Lantern expecting a solid summer action movie and that’s exactly what I got. Therefore, I don’t get a lot of the hatred directed towards this film. Critics have been giving this long-gestating DC comic book adaptation a regular blanket party and for most of the same reasons that those same critics spazzed out over Thor. Personally I’ve never been a fan of the character and outside of some episodes of Super Friends and the occasional glance at an issue of the comic, I don’t even know that much about the Green Lantern. After seeing the movie, it’s evident I have some catching up to do. Good thing I have access to some of his recent appearances in animated DTV movie form.

The marketing campaign for the upcoming Green Lantern movie started off sluggish late last year with an interesting but frustratingly earthbound teaser trailer. Now of course raising awareness of the Emerald Avenger’s big screen debut was always going to be a difficult task; the Green Lantern is one of the most iconic characters in all of the DC Universe, but he’s not on the same level of instant recognizability as his fellow DCU stalwarts Superman and Batman. A lot of lower-tiered DCU heroes and heroines have always had that problem, as the negative fan reaction to David E. Kelley’s failed Wonder Woman TV pilot most recently proved.

Not much is known about the plot of the Green Lantern movie except that it’s an origin story focusing on Hal Jordan (played by Ryan Reynolds, barely edging out Bradley Cooper for the coveted role) and it concerns an intergalactic threat known only as Parallax. Somehow it involves Blake Lively looking hot, a very David Crosby-looking Peter Sarsgaard turning into something that resembles the veiny-headed mutants from Beneath the Planet of the Apes, and lots and lots of aliens bearing power rings. Any studio would be understandably nervous.

Star of the upcoming Green Lantern film Ryan Reynolds said he was pretty damn impressed with the footage showed off at this year’s WonderCon after being in a skin tight blue suit that didn’t breath well in Louisiana. [For details on that footage, read: WonderCon 2011: Ryan Reynolds Shows Off New “˜Green Lantern’ Footage and Watch Now: 4 Minutes Of New “˜Green Lantern’ Footage]

It was a fun panel filled with lots of banter between Reynolds and the audience. He joked with the fans about reading Green Lantern comics for inspiration, saying if he hadn’t at this point the fans would have run him out of the convention center in an angry mob — and then seemed disappointed that the crowd was slow to chant the Green Lantern oath with him, stopping midway through to reveal that the “front row just bombed it.”

“I was going to come out here and tell everyone I was cast a the lead in a new Flash movie since it’s April Fools Day,” Reynolds said, adding that he’d likely “be systematically murdered” if he played another super-character. And since he wouldn’t be playing Barry Allen, he suggested the role for Bradley Cooper, which got a mixed reaction from the crowd.