Posted Aug 20th 2008 10:02AM by Elisabeth Rappe
Filed under: Action, RumorMonger, Celebrities and Controversy, 20th Century Fox, Comic/Superhero/Geek, Remakes and Sequels
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It seems my favorite superhero is about to enter the land of ugly rumors. According to
Hollywood Elsewhere, there's trouble on the set of
X-Men Origins: Wolverine. It seems that director
Gavin Hood and Fox co-chairman and CEO Tom Rothman are butting heads over the look and feel of the film.
Hood, being a smart man who knows his character, wants the film to be dark and gritty. Rothman wants a happier, friendlier,
Iron Man sort of film. Apparently, things came to a head at least once on set when Hood came to work to find one of his dingy and somber sets completely repainted into something brighter and more cheerful. (I bet they even put one of those "Hang in there!" kitten posters on the wall.) The set revamp had been done on Rothman's orders, who has a reputation for being stubborn and micromanaging. It's not clear from the second-hand story who won out on this particular battle, but if we see a chirpier set design on opening day, we'll know.
Word around town had production troubled for awhile (it's all anyone talked about prior to the footage screening at ComicCon, though it's all been very hush hush) -- and I'm also under the impression from ComicCon that the film
has finally wrapped, so all this set redecoration may be very old and irrelevant news. Perhaps Hood has already won out, as the teaser footage certainly suggested that it was a bit grittier than
Iron Man or the previous
X-Men films. Please, let that be the case. If I'm disappointed by
Wolverine (and I inevitably will be), I don't want it to be because my beloved Logan has a penchant for kitten posters.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine opens May 1st, 2009.
Posted Aug 19th 2008 3:02PM by Eugene Novikov
Filed under: Comedy, Celebrities and Controversy, Politics, Trailers and Clips
You may have heard that spoof veteran David Zucker's newest project,
An American Carol, is a takedown of Michael Moore. You can now have a look at the
trailer, online at
Yahoo!. And then you can riddle me this: Does
An American Carol look like a clever parody of Moore's documentaries, or just a partisan attack on the filmmaker? Or, put another way, is the clip of Bill O'Reilly slapping around
Kevin Farley's "Michael Malone" a commentary on the rivalry between the two, or right-wing wish fulfillment? One thing to note before answering is that O'Reilly appears in the film himself, while Moore does not.
Moore is obviously fair game; I've enjoyed his films, and sympathize with (some of) his politics, but I'd eagerly watch a skillful spoof of the pudgy, faux-working-class provocateur. I think parts of the trailer are pretty funny ("Here I am on the island paradise Cuba!"). But if the point is just to pile on the guy, with a rah-rah patriotic, stop-hating-America message at the end, then I'm significantly less interested.
The thing is, the trailer really doesn't make clear what's going on. On one hand, prominent conservatives like O'Reilly and
James Woods appear to deliver literal and figurative blows. On the other, "Michael Malone" gets accused of being a
slaveowner, which sounds more like a parody of conservative attacks on Moore than of Moore himself. And is Trace Adkins poking fun at his image here, or is he for real?
We know that
Zucker is himself conservative, and that the movie is
political -- which is fine. But is it political in an incisive, worthwhile way, or in the brainless beatdown mode of Ann Coulter et al? What do you think?
Posted Aug 18th 2008 10:02PM by Eric D. Snider
Filed under: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Warner Brothers, Celebrities and Controversy, Fandom, Distribution, Harry Potter
When Warner Bros.
announced last Thursday that
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince had been pushed back from Nov. 21 to next July, hardcore fans immediately entered the five stages of nerd grief. So far we've worked our way through denial, anger, semi-literate Internet ranting, and conspiracy-theorizing. All that's left is acceptance, where we go ahead and watch the movie when it comes out next summer and forget any of this ever happened.
In the meantime, several myths about the date change have popped up, and we'd like to help separate fact from fiction.
MYTH #1: Half-Blood Prince was moved because WB was scared of Twilight.According to
some people who are fans of the
Twilight novel and pre-fans of the
Twilight movie, WB got nervous about Harry Potter coming out just three weeks before the teen-vampire chick flick, fearing it would siphon off too much of Harry's audience.
Most observers believe
Twilight will indeed be a hit, but come on. The Harry Potter franchise the most lucrative in film history, with a total worldwide box-office gross so far of $4.5
billion. There's no reason for WB to fear any competition, no matter how formidable. Also, most of Harry Potter's income is from overseas, where
Twilight, still largely a U.S. phenomenon, cannot hope to compete.
Plus, if
Half-Blood Prince came out Nov. 21 and followed the usual pattern, it would have already made most of its projected income by the time
Twilight showed up on Dec. 12 anyway. Three weeks is a huge gap in our modern, front-loaded, it's-all-about-opening-weekend movie culture. If there had only been one week between them, then maybe you'd have something.
Continue reading Debunking the Myths Surrounding the Harry Potter Date Change
Posted Aug 18th 2008 8:03PM by Elisabeth Rappe
Filed under: Action, Drama, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Deals, Mystery & Suspense, Warner Brothers, Celebrities and Controversy, 20th Century Fox, Newsstand, Politics, Comic/Superhero/Geek
Things rarely go smoothly for costumed adventurers -- and the courtroom, it seems, is no exception. Nikke Finke
reports that a federal judge has denied to dismiss 20th Century Fox's legal claim on
Watchmen. You may remember that they filed a lawsuit back in February claiming that their rights to the DC property still held. They seek an injunction to prevent Warner Bros' adaptation of
Watchmen from being released at all.
And at this point, that federal judge agrees with them.
Warner Bros, obviously, cries foul. They point out that several studios have tried to develop the property for years, with Fox saying nary a word, and passed up the chance to properly reacquire the rights some time back. Their view of the lawsuit is that it's just an opportunistic grab on a movie that has been gaining more and more buzz. You can read the whole legal chronology over on
Deadline Hollywood (Finke's done a top-notch job of documenting the ins and outs) and see which side you come down on. It's exhausting -- isn't this what studios have lawyers for? To avoid this kind of last-minute litigation lunacy?
It's unlikely that the movie will really be delayed -- but it is possible that Warner Bros. will have to hand Fox a substantial chunk of change in order to release the film, as they had to do for
Dukes of Hazzard some years back. As one of Finke's readers noted, suddenly the
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince schedule shift makes a lot more sense. The studio's 2009 budget could be pretty tight.
Watchmen opens (hopefully) March 6th, 2009.
Posted Aug 18th 2008 11:32AM by Elisabeth Rappe
Filed under: Action, Thrillers, Lionsgate Films, RumorMonger, Celebrities and Controversy, Comic/Superhero/Geek, Remakes and Sequels
The silliness continues! Vic Holtreman at
ScreenRant has passed along a post (sent to them by a poster who's been a steady presence in the comment field on every
Punisher: War Zone story -- hi, Nomad) that cinematographer Steve Gainer made on
The Raw Board. Gainer is pretty fed up with all the rumors circulating, and insists that Lexi Alexander is not off the film, she's very much involved in the editing process, the film
will not be PG-13, and that she did get married. Gainer writes, "When I hear vicious unfounded troll rumors like the "film was unwatchable" or "a total mess" it makes my blood boil. I want to punish the corrupt. People sit on their fat asses trolling the internet, people that have never even looked through a motion picture camera, and make judgements [sic] on a work of art that they've never seen, it's like saying a baby will be ugly before it is born, I can't freaking wait for this film to come out and prove the nay-sayers wrong."
While it's nice to have a rebuttal from someone legitimately associated with the film, none of it makes any sense -- except that
someone seems to be fueling, and believing, the "any publicity is good publicity" angle. I still don't understand why, if everything is hunky dory behind the scenes, Alexander scrubbed all mention of the film from
her blog, and has been cryptic ever since. Why haven't we had an official statement from her or anyone at Lionsgate? It seems to me that claims that you dumped your director warrant a "No, that's absolutely unfounded!"
I'm still rooting for the film, but I won't be helping to fuel the rumor machine any longer. I won't write another word on
Punisher until it comes directly from Lionsgate or
Alexander.
[via
Ain't It Cool News]
Posted Aug 15th 2008 10:03AM by Elisabeth Rappe
Filed under: Action, Lionsgate Films, RumorMonger, Celebrities and Controversy, DIY/Filmmaking, Comic/Superhero/Geek, Remakes and Sequels
One of the privileges of being an adult is seeing R rated movies. Well, not me -- I was watching them before I was even in kindergarten, and I suspect most of the
Cinematical staff was too. But in general, adulthood brings unrestricted viewing access to copious amounts of sex and violence. Of course, that was back before Hollywood decided that R ratings didn't make enough money, and everything vaguely dark should be slashed to allow a 12 year old a ticket.
The latest flick to be marched to the chopping block is the troubled
Punisher: War Zone.
Latino Review was told by an insider that the latest fight is over cutting it down to a PG-13 rating. I imagine that this is the battle that saw
Lexi Alexander canned, and
not a disagreement over the film's soundtrack. (It's much easier to sell her as petty and difficult with that story than one over a rating -- but who knows what's true or not at this point.)
Apparently, Lionsgate isn't even listening to their own buzz, since what had everyone talking was the impressive level of violence in the red band trailer. (I've embedded it below since we never got a chance to post it.) They're likely looking at
The Dark Knight and how much money its PG-13 rating made and thinking they can copy its success, despite that their protagonist is known for his semi-automatics and bloody tactics, not his "I'll never kill or use guns" ethics.
Do you really want another PG-13
Punisher? I can't imagine you do. I know most of you are pretty lukewarm on the upcoming non-sequel, but if there was
one thing that would get you to see it, wouldn't it have been the table leg through the eye? I've been honest about
what was drawing me to the film, but if they neuter it, I'm not even sure
Ray Stevenson can lure me. It's being released at Christmas, for heaven's sake. How am I supposed to relax from battling Christmas shopping crowds without gratuitous bloodshed? Come on, Lionsgate. Keep the R.
Continue reading Another PG-13 'Punisher'?! Impossible!
Posted Aug 14th 2008 8:02AM by Monika Bartyzel
Filed under: Celebrities and Controversy, Exhibition
Both
Natalie Portman and
Scarlett Johansson leapt from the world of Henry VIII into city love with
New York, I Love You, but that's not all they're working on:
- When Portman joined the Big Apple film, it was said to be her directorial debut, but it looks like another film is sliding in front of it. The CBC reports that a 17-minute film she directed, titled Eve, will debut at the Venice Film Festival this month. Organizers are describing her film as a "civilized comedy" and expect the budding filmmaker to be at the opening. Nothing else is being said about the plot, but I imagine it could be quite interesting -- the film stars Ben Gazzara and the one and only Lauren Bacall.
- We've seen the many faces of ScarJo's acting. We've heard her tackle Tom Waits songs, we're on our way to seeing her directorial debut in New York, I Love You, she's apparently looking for a threesome and now she wants more. Showbiz Spy reports that she's itching to develop a film she can direct, and after that, she'd "love to do another album," citing how much she loved living with music and working with musicians. Oh Scarlett, do you really want to take that path again?
Posted Aug 13th 2008 9:02PM by Eugene Novikov
Filed under: Comedy, Paramount, Celebrities and Controversy
As is usually the case when people and groups make a lot of noise over a film's perceived offensiveness, I suspect all the ruckus over a
planned boycott of
Tropic Thunder over its perceived treatment of people with mental disabilities has only served to give it additional publicity. Nonetheless, organizations such as
The Arc are going ahead with plans to call for a boycott of the film.
Slate has found the organization's instruction sheet for putting together protests of
Tropic Thunder, a six-page bulletin suggesting techniques and talking points for mentally disabled self-advocates and supporters. Sample talking point: "Movies and media, like the movie
Tropic Thunder, encourage disrespect of people with intellectual disabilities. We want that to stop!"
The whole thing is an interesting read. Ordinarily I'd say they haven't seen the film, but the organization claims that its leaders have had a chance to watch it and have concluded that "the film's depiction of people with intellectual disabilities is derogatory and demeaning." In that case, they've missed the point spectacularly. As
others have argued, the film targets not the mentally disabled but Hollywood's infantile treatment of same.
Simple Jack is a clever, incisive parody. And I say that as someone who thinks
Tropic Thunder as a whole is pretty weak.
Posted Aug 13th 2008 8:23PM by Eugene Novikov
Filed under: MGM, Celebrities and Controversy, Distribution, Newsstand, Tom Cruise
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UPDATE:
Cinematical has been given this brand new still from the film, which shows Cruise without the eye patch.
MGM seems to be trying to reverse the effects of the
doomsaying that circulated about Tom Cruise and Bryan Singer's Hitler-assassination-attempt thriller
Valkyrie in the spring, culminating in the
announcement that the movie was moving from December 2008 to President's Day 2009. That was received as a surrender, a sure sign that the studio had no confidence in the film and was doing damage control by moving it out of harm's way. Now, following some successful test screenings, MGM has reversed itself and is moving
Valkyrie back into the heart of Oscar season: December 26, 2008. Apparently, though, the studio still doesn't think it has awards potential, and is making the move because it thinks
Valkyrie will do well in the Christmastime marketplace.
I'm sure positive test screenings did have a lot to do with MGM's decision, but I think it's a smart move because it's great spin control. The press loves to read the tea leaves of studio behavior, and will see this as a major vote of confidence. I suspect the buzz on
Valkyrie will seriously improve now that it is no longer the subject of what was perceived as a February dump.
For my part, I don't care about Tom Cruise or his silly eyepatch, but I have a lot of trust in
Bryan Singer. The man can make a good mainstream thriller, and I don't see why
Valkyrie should be any exception. I think a lot of the "bad buzz" (such as Roger Friedman
randomly attacking the film) is just Cruise-bashing, which may be justified but probably shouldn't extend to his movies.
Posted Aug 13th 2008 8:02PM by Eric Kohn
Filed under: Drama, Foreign Language, Independent, Awards, Casting, Deals, New Releases, Lionsgate Films, Sony, Warner Brothers, RumorMonger, Celebrities and Controversy, Distribution, Movie Marketing
As far as hustling movie producer archetypes go, I tend to prefer
Joel Silver over
Harvey Weinstein. Sure, Weinstein played a role in some of the great American independent films from the last decade of the twentieth century, but Silver's production credits have more spice to them --
The Matrix,
Predator, 48 Hrs. -- hinting at the zany force behind their existence. The movies he has produced don't always please everyone (consider those last two
Matrix movies), and sometimes his productions run into unforeseeable setbacks (Joss Whedon's troublesome
Wonder Woman script). But now, Silver's trying a radical maneuver that reaffirms his maverick abilities: He's shopping around
Guy Ritchie's
RocknRolla, which tells the story of a drama surrounding a stolen painting and stars
Gerard Butler, to other studios despite the plan to release it through Warner Bros. in October.
According to
Patrick Goldstein in The Los Angeles Times, Silver said he showed the movie to Lionsgate and Sony Pictures to get some advice on how to market the film. However, when Goldstein asked Warner Bros.' top executive Alan Horn about the situation, Horn called the movie "very English," not "broadly commercial," and said the studio "might not be willing to spend the marketing money he wants us to." So it follows that Silver probably wants to sell the movie to somebody else.
This kind of thing has happened before.
Jonathan Levine's teen horror flick
All the Boys Love Mandy Lane was set for a release through The Weinstein Company, but when it was determined that the distributor might not provide the best home for the film, it went to the more agreeable Senator Films (although Senator has yet to release it). What troubles me is Horn's assertion that
RocknRolla is "very English." Yeah ... so?
Posted Aug 13th 2008 6:32PM by Monika Bartyzel
Filed under: Comedy, Casting, Celebrities and Controversy
In the vast wasteland of crappy movies
Paris Hilton has popped up in is a little film called
Pledge This! If you follow bad movies, you might recognize the title, and if you peruse IMDb's Bottom 100, you would see that it's resting at #15.
But it seems that the poor movie's bad luck is at least partially due to Paris' lackadaisical promotion of the film, not the fact that out of those who bothered to watch and rate the film (almost 5,000), it gets a 1.6/10. The
AP reports that a lawsuit has been filed in Miami, claiming that she owes $75,000 for not making good on her promotional obligations. She was paid $1 million for her "acting services" as well as "reasonable promotion and publicity." So I guess she filled over 90% of her contractual obligations, but just slacked in that last 10. Bad worker Hilton.
This is an interesting scheme -- hire a rich celebrity with no cinematic discretion to star in a crappy film, and if the film tanks and she wasn't going wild publicizing it, blame her. Here's to hoping this keeps her from making another
Hottie film, at the very least.
Posted Aug 13th 2008 3:02PM by Kim Voynar
Filed under: Lionsgate Films, Celebrities and Controversy, Movie Marketing, Images, Posters
Yesterday, Jeff Wells over at Hollywood Elsewhere put up the poster for the new comedy My Best Friend's Girl, starring Kate Hudson, Dane Cook, Jason Biggs and Alec Baldwin. The poster (which premiered online earlier this summer) is boring in the extreme, making the film look like your typical snoozerific rom-com, and the digital altering on the photo makes everyone involved look rather ... freakish.
My first reaction on seeing the poster was, "Boy, somebody's screwing up the marketing on this film," quickly followed by "Hey, I don't remember Dane Cook's complexion looking quite so dewy-fresh ... "
I've seen the red-band trailer, which is actually pretty funny, if you can overlook the more misogynistic elements (or at least, in my own case, overcome the feminist tendency to be immediately annoyed by blow-job jokes) , and the film being marketed in that trailer and the film being promoted on this poster are not the same film. Not that it looks like something I'd choose to see over a good indie flick, but if I wanted a lightweight comedy film, and I'd already seen Tropic Thunder and Pineapple Express, and couldn't find anything else to do here in Seattle on a nice day, I'd maybe see this.
Continue reading Dane Cook Rants About the Lame Poster for 'My Best Friend's Girl'
Posted Aug 13th 2008 12:02PM by Erik Davis
Filed under: Action, Celebrities and Controversy, Fandom, Comic/Superhero/Geek, Remakes and Sequels
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Since it's shaping up that the two largest fan favorites of the summer will be
Iron Man and
The Dark Knight, it's only right to hear what one superhero has to say about the other. And when you're talking about
Robert Downey Jr., it means you're guaranteed a tremendous quote. Our friends over at
Moviehole sat down with the
Tropic Thunder/Iron Man star to shoot the sh*t and came away with one helluva quote from Downey Jr. on
The Dark Knight. So, did Iron Man like the Bat Man?
"My whole thing is that that I saw 'The Dark Knight'. I feel like I'm dumb because I feel like I don't get how many things that are so smart. It's like a Ferrari engine of storytelling and script writing and I'm like, 'That's not my idea of what I want to see in a movie.' I loved 'The Prestige' but didn't understand 'The Dark Knight'. Didn't get it, still can't tell you what happened in the movie, what happened to the character and in the end they need him to be a bad guy. I'm like, 'I get it. This is so high brow and so f--king smart, I clearly need a college education to understand this movie.' You know what? F-ck DC comics. That's all I have to say and that's where I'm really coming from."
God Bless that man. Sure, I get that
TDK was a tad confusing and complex at times, but so is the character and so is his universe. Personally, I enjoyed both films very much for different reasons, and think Downey Jr. is being a tad rough on his competition. Then again, maybe that's the point.
Posted Aug 13th 2008 10:33AM by Eric Kohn
Filed under: Comedy, Drama, Awards, Casting, New Releases, Paramount, Celebrities and Controversy, Box Office, Fandom, Images
Whether or not you're offended by the use of the word "retard" in
Tropic Thunder, it's hard to deny the difference between the intention of the humor and the ire of
the groups protesting it. When
Ben Stiller's character, Tugg Speedman, learns that he was mistaken in going "full-retard" with his miscalculated awards-bid performance as a mentally challenged man in
Simple Jack, you either laugh or you don't, but you definitely
get it. Stiller's point is that self-important actors often take crass or poorly formulated roles on the basis of subject matter simply so they can get a chance at the podium. At no point are we forced to laugh at a character meant to be taken as actually retarded; instead, we only get Tugg Speedman's really bad, really offensive interpretation of one.
At his
Scanners blog,
Jim Emerson gets this point, and smartly rails against complainers like the Special Olympics for making such a big deal out of a scene before even coming to terms with its purpose. He also brings up a brilliant historical parallel: In 1977, Randy Newman's single "Short People" was pulled from the air because it supposedly offended, uh, short people. "If you do satire or parody, you have to expect there will always be fools who will take it literally,"
writes Emerson. "Those people are called 'literalists.' And there ought to be a law against them."
Posted Aug 12th 2008 2:32PM by Monika Bartyzel
Filed under: Celebrities and Controversy
He was one of the Whassup?! guys in those Budweiser commercials. He played Haziz in
The 40-Year-Old Virgin. You're about to see him as D.B. Reddy in
Ping Pong Playa. But now
Shelley Malil also steeped in controversy.
CNN reports that the actor has been arrested "for investigation of attempted murder after his former girlfriend was stabbed more than 20 times, leaving her critically injured." It seems the two had been dating, but it recently ended. On Sunday night, police responded to reports of "screams for help and breaking glass," and found the woman with multiple stab wounds.
Malil then got a train from Los Angeles to Oceanside to meet with his attorney, "who along with family and friends had persuaded him to turn himself in." He was arrested as he left the train on counts of attempted murder, mayhem, and burglary.
Cinematical wishes the woman a safe and speedy recovery.
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