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Archive for May, 2007
Sunday, May 13th, 2007
 In the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, director of Swedish descent Lasse Hallström, proved he was capable of more than just directing a bunch of ABBA music videos, when he delivered some successful Swedish dramas and the intense What’s Eating Gilbert Grape. His 1999 film, The Cider House Rules, based on a John Irving novel was a decent drama with similar acting performances. However, the film starring Tobey Maguire, Charlize Theron and Michael Caine, also set in motion Hallström’s newly found tendency to direct tame and prudent dramas, usually based on novels akin. His An Unfinished Life was kept on the shelves for over two years (usually the best thing to do with a film starring J-Lo anyway) and Hallströms previous endeavour, Casanova, was just not enticing and funny enough to really enthral an audience. (more…)
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Sunday, May 13th, 2007
 Spider-Man 3, which shattered box office records last weekend with over $150 million in weekend sales over three days, almost broke another, far-less-honorable box office record this weekend: the biggest drop-off of any blockbuster. The other two Spider-Man films have been especially good with weekend holdover, but both those films had excellent word-of-mouth and repeat viewing capabilities. Spider-Man 3, which a sluggish pace and a mess of a screenplay, does not have the luxury of the same glowing reviews and the potential for fan boys to run back to the theater to watch it a second or third time.
Spider-Man 3 made $60 million over the weekend, a great take for most films. Just not the Spider-Man franchise. From $150 to $60 million is a 60% drop, a nasty number by anyone's imagination. It beat out previous weekend box office record holder Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (54%) and luckily for it avoided the crushing defeat another Marvel master franchise took at the hands of X-Men United, which fell 67% in its second weekend after an amazing opening.
So we are starting to see a trend here... Studios have long ignored critical demands for good films during the summer months, but with openings getting bigger and bigger, blockbusters are getting more and more front loaded. If a studio can make $150 million in a weekend based on marketing efforts alone, then there's no need to make a good movie, right? WRONG! Had Spider-Man 3 been as good as Spider-Man 2, we'd probably be looking at $20 million more in the bank right now for the film, on the weekend alone - not to mention the day-by-day numbers during the week. The fumbling of Spider-Man 3 will cost its studio and Marvel tens of millions of dollars, which is a lot of zeros that add up quickly.
And looking at the previously mentioned films in this article, neither X-Men United nor Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest were especially good (though sadly I must say X-Men United was the most entertaining of the three). Had X-Men United been as good of a film as X-Men 2, it wouldn't have suffered bad word-of-mouth and bad reviews. Dead Man's Chest was just the same.
Bottom line: In the summer, movie reviews may not matter much on opening weekend, but all of those people who didn't want to see the movie enough to see the film on opening weekend are listening, both to movie reviews and, more importantly, word-of-mouth. Studios, get a clue!
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Saturday, May 12th, 2007
Filed under: Action & Adventure, Warner Brothers, Fandom, Movie Marketing, Comic/Superhero/Geek, Remakes and Sequels .jpg) There's not a whole lot to see, but Warner Bros. has thrown up a teaser page for next summer's The Dark Knight; a sequel to Christopher Nolan's very awesome Batman Begins. So far, all we're getting is what looks to be the Batman symbol going through warp speed; it's a cool image -- one that's definitely a tease -- and you can't help but wish they gave us a little bit more. A release date, perhaps? Or how about a nifty tagline that went something like, "Bats eat spiders for breakfast?"
Thankfully, it appears all that commotion surrounding The Dark Knight's Chicago production has calmed down; there was a time not long ago when every day brought new spy photos from the set -- some of which (like those pics of Heath Ledger as Joker) were fake. Since then, however, things have remained fairly quiet. A little too quiet if you know what I mean. Some reports claim Warner Bros. will release their own photo of Ledger as Joker at some point this summer in order to beat out the eventual set leaks. Since The Dark Knight is set to be released on July 18, 2008, maybe they'll give us something on July 18th of this year? Who knows. But anyway, this time around Batman (Christian Bale) helps LT. Gordon (Gary Oldman) and newly appointed DA Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart) track down a crazed killer who goes by the name of Joker (Ledger). Meanwhile, the very cute Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal) is lingering around, while Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman) returns to help Bruce Wayne collect cool gadgets and, of course, Alfred (Michael Caine) will be there to put him to bed each night.
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Saturday, May 12th, 2007
Filed under: Comedy, Documentary, Drama, Independent, Celebrities and Controversy, The Weinstein Co., Movie Marketing, Politics, Michael Moore  Following Thursday's seemingly impulsive, and rather premature response from Sicko producer Meghan O'Hara, I was hoping that Michael Moore himself would issue a more intelligent statement regarding his being investigated by the U.S. Treasury Department because of a controversial trip he took to Cuba in March. Nope. After at least a day to think about it, he has written an open letter that is pretty much as unrestrained and immature as O'Hara's, but it is much longer. And it is addressed to (and probably already sent to) Secretary Henry Paulson of the Treasury Dept. Oops.
In the letter, Moore accuses the investigation of being a personal attack from the Bush Administration, and basically the document is just a long rant against the President, his ties to the health care industry, his abuse of the government and his mistreatment of 9/11 heroes. He also mentions Presidential candidate Fred Thompson and the New York Post as having triggered the investigation with their misleading information regarding the Cuba trip. He does use the opportunity to defend his case a little, though, and he has a few childish points. One is that the Administration knew of his plans to go to Cuba, but waited until a time nearer to SiCKO's release date to begin the investigation. Another is that he has broken no laws and has nothing to hide because it is not illegal to help your fellow man.
Well, I think he might be wrong about that last statement, especially if helping your fellow man includes supplying him with goods or services from Cuba. But, whatever, this is a movie blog, so I'll let the political sites discuss his guilt or innocence. I just find it interesting how Moore can be so public with his business, especially as it regards one of his films. Considering most movie companies have legal teams to protect them from such controversy, it is always a wonder if Moore really thinks this kind of move is a good marketing strategy. After all, didn't The Weinstein Co. just hire him two spin doctors for this sort of ordeal? Or is this incident more personally related to Moore than the film, so they won't be coming to his defense. Somebody needs to rescue Moore from himself sometimes.
For more on Sicko, check out some recently released art and photos.
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Friday, May 11th, 2007
 Nicolas Cage is reuniting with his Snake Eyes director, Brian DePalma, for The Untouchables: Capone Rising, where he will play a younger version of the character made famous by Robert DeNiro. Capone Rising is a prequel to DePalma's 1987 classic The Untouchables, and will revolve around the early dealings between Capone and Irish cop Jimmy Malone, a role that garnered an Oscar for Sean Connery.
Principal photography on the high-profile flick will begin in October, some 21 years after its predecessor was filmed. No word yet on whether the temporary Capone Rising title will be scrapped, following the chilly response audiences gave to February's Hannibal Rising prequel.
Based on the classic 50's/60's TV drama, The Untouchables was a box-office and critical smash that announced Kevin Costner as a leading man, re-launched the career of Connery, and solidified DeNiro's on-screen tough-guy persona.
According to MTV, rumors continue to swirl that Sean Penn or Colin Farrell will be cast as the younger Connery.
So... DePalma is doing a film that will have no satisfying ending? Leave The Untouchables alone! And can Nicolas Cage match Robert DeNiro? Hell no.
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Friday, May 11th, 2007
 Linda Cardellini, best known for a starring role on "E.R." and as Velma in Scooby Doo, will star opposite Paul Walker in Heaven Project, an indie drama being directed by John Glenn (assuming The Hollywood Reporter can be trusted).
The story follows an ex-con who is sentenced to death and wakes up from his lethal injection in a small Oregon town. Working as a groundskeeper for a mental hospital, he is told he was given a second chance by God but questions whether he ever really died. Cardellini will play the hospital's administrator and Walker's love interest.
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Friday, May 11th, 2007
I'm not a big fan of the MPAA. They call their rating system a guide for parents, but I see it as a way to censor material and block potentially legitimate viewers from seeing certain films. Why can't a mature 15-year old see an R-rated movie without his parents? A movie that is sexually explicit will end up with an NC-17 rating, which will cause the movie to either be edited (censorship) or not be played in most movie theaters (censorship - but more just business). The rating system is stupid.
That being said, the MPAA isn't going anywhere anytime soon, and so it's nice to see them do something good for a change. They have added smoking to their list of criteria that could cause a movie to get an R rating.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the MPAA ratings board "will now consider smoking as a factor among many other factors, including violence, sexual situations and language, in the rating of films," MPAA chairman and CEO Dan Glickman said.
"Clearly, smoking is increasingly an unacceptable behavior in our society. There is broad awareness of smoking as a unique public health concern due to nicotine's highly addictive nature, and no parent wants their child to take up the habit. The appropriate response of the rating system is to give more information to parents on this issue."
Thankfully, smoking will not be an instant kiss of death. While I agree smoking should be a cause of concern in movies, some people wanted movies containing smoking to immediately receive R ratings. This would mean that films set in a historical time where smoking was prevalent would be R-rated no matter what, etc. etc. The MPAA, however, will look at a few rules:
Is the smoking pervasive?
Does the film glamorize smoking?
Is there a historic or other mitigating context?
I think this is a good movie, but we'll see how it's enforced...
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Friday, May 11th, 2007
 The sequel to the widely successful indie horror film 28 Days Later… could have been written off as a sequel in name only. Anyone expecting anybody to return from the first film might be slightly disappointed. Given what happens in the follow up, maybe it’s a good thing the characters from the previous film didn’t show up. It’s not that Weeks is a bad film, it isn’t. But rest assured, the onscreen body count is upped, the blood spits out more, neighborhoods get gassed, streets are set on fire and many characters come to bad ends. (more…)
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Friday, May 11th, 2007
Filed under: Celebrities and Controversy, Newsstand, Brad Pitt  Ok, imagine for a moment that you're superstar actor and recent father Brad Pitt. You've starred in some of the best and most successful films of the last ten years, you're married to one of the hottest women in the world and, let's face it, you're regarded in most circles as pretty darn handsome. You've got all this going for you and it all adds up to a pretty great life, right? So, with all that great stuff in your life, what do you do next? Well, if you are Brad Pitt and you're concerned about the environment, the Katrina disaster in New Orleans and you want to do something really good for people who need it, you do what Yahoo reports the actor and philanthropist is doing right now. According to the article, construction began today on homes in New Orleans devastated 9th ward that will eventually provide residences for about a half-dozen single-families, 18 apartments, a community center, play area and a park for the neighborhood to enjoy. Also according to the article, this project will be made using recycled components and other "green" technologies including energy-saving materials such as metal roofing and recycled textiles. Pitt, who's contributed $200,000 to the project so far, including money to underwrite the contest to pick the design for the structures as well as a cash award for the winners. Said Pitt about the project's importance: "I'm crying out for one of our leaders to really make this a priority," he said. Good for you Mr. Pitt I say. Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Friday, May 11th, 2007
Filed under: Drama, Thrillers, Mystery & Suspense, Movie Marketing, Images  It's been 35 years since the original film hit theaters, but don't tell Michael Caine that -- it might make him feel old. Empire Online has our first look at the much talked-about Sleuth remake, starring Jude Law (in the role Michael Caine took on all those years ago) and Michael Caine (in the role Laurence Olivier played opposite a much younger version of himself). Say all you want about how overrated Jude Law is, the guy worked hard to put this project together; single-handedly nabbing Caine and director Kenneth Branagh for what, I hope, turns out to be one of the better remakes to hit theaters in some time.
In the film (which was based on the Tony Award winning play by Anthony Shaffer), Law will play an aspiring actor who's summoned to the sprawling country estate of an author (Caine) whose wife has been fooling around with the younger, more attractive thesp. Once together, the two men engage in an assortment of mindgames which may or may not turn deadly. With a script from the great Nobel Prize-winning Harold Pinter (who, funnily enough, was awarded the Laurence Olivier Theatre Award in 1996, and also took park in an extra-marital affair in the early 1960s), this one is sure to entertain. Heck, if it were up to me, I'd give Caine an award for playing both roles in different versions of the same film 35 years apart. That's gotta be worth something. No word yet on a release date, though I'd expect it to arrive sometime next year. Permalink | Email this | Comments
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