I’m going with a continuation of yesterday’s Bloggery, because the death of John Hugheshas hit my generation very hard, and on the day after we’re getting more lists and more memories, including one particularly popular eulogy from the filmmaker’s pen pal, which is shedding some light onto Hughes’ reasons for leaving Hollywood.
One thing that I’m finding interesting about the reactions to Hughes’ death is that he’s yet another example of how, as David Poland wrote back in June, “death is the ultimate disinfectant.” Not that many people stopped loving his ’80s teen movies after the man stopped directing, but the world didn’t quite respect him as much after he focused on writing and producing such family fare as Baby’s Day Out, the Beethovenmovies and some unnecessaryremakes for Disney.
Hughes’ death may not be the huge media story that Michael Jackson’s was, but given his contribution toward the definition of the ’80s, his decline in the ’90s and his association with Macauley Culkin, it’s not a huge stretch for all those “first MJ, now…” comments going around. When you think of ’80s music, you likely think of MJ. Likewise, when you think of ’80s movies, you think of JH. At least we still have the most important ’80s TV icon. But we might want to say our prayers for Bill Cosby…
Check out the further tributes and such from the film blogosphere after the jump:
John Hughes was probably my first favorite filmmaker, or at least the first I really knew by name and reputation. So I’m especially saddened by his death from heart attack today, at age 59. Ferris Bueller’s Day Offmay no longer be my favorite movie of all time — actually attending high school somewhat ruined the teen mythology that exists in Hughes’ films for me — but it forever remains in my top ten list of titles I enjoy watching over and over again (even if I am critical of the musical number).
Because many of us film bloggers grew up religiously watching his movies, including those he scripted but did not direct, there’s a lot of shared memories and tributes popping up around the web this evening. Check out what people are saying about the legacy of the iconic filmmaker after the jump:
Years after it was first announced that a Straw Dogs remake is in the works, X-Menactor James Marsden has been cast in the lead role, which was originated on film by Dustin Hoffman in Sam Peckinpah’s 1971 version. While many complainers are focusing on Marsden’s involvement, others are taking this opportunity to whine more generally about the film being remade in the first place. When I first responded to the idea two years ago, I was mostly worried that writer-director Rod Lurie would try to one-up the original in terms of the violence, since torture porn was still kind of hot at the time. But apparently Lurie’s film won’t actually be as much of a gratuitous spectacle of rape and defense killings as is the controversial first film.
Personally, I never need to rewatch Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs anymore than I need to see Haneke’s Funny Games(either version), Alexandre Aja’s remake of The Hills Have Eyesor any other such film that’s so violent towards women. It’s certainly not a sacred film in my mind, so I couldn’t care less if anyone wants to recycle or reimagine the material. I do wonder, though, why Lurie doesn’t just title his version differently if it is indeed going to be unlike Peckinpah’s film. Why not go with the title of the source novel, “The Siege of Trencher’s Farm”? Or simply work from scratch. There have been so many other unrelated home-invader thrillers since Straw Dogs anyway.
Check out other bloggers’ complaints or defenses of Lurie’s plans after the jump:
I saw Christmas decorations in a storefront Sunday, so I guess it’s already time to break out the holiday movies. And it’s evidently time for distributors to release holiday fare to theaters, even if Desplechin’s A Christmas Tale (Un conte de Noël), which hits theaters this Friday, isn’t exactly the latest crowd-pleasing installment of the Santa Clausefranchise. In fact, with such ingredients as estrangement, mental illness, alcoholism and cancer, it doesn’t seem like a very happy holidays kind of film. Even if it is actually a comedy.
But then how many holiday movies are completely void of depressing themes and scenes? I’m sure to have grown up thinking more about the homeless, suicide and family dysfunction from films set at Christmas and Thanksgiving than I did thinking about the happiness that comes with these holidays. One of the most tearjerking moments for me as a kid was certainly seeing Mickey Mouse crying over his dead son in Mickey’s Christmas Carol. It’s no wonder so many people get sad this time of year. Movies are influential, and for every bit of slapstick we see this season, there’s potentially room for thoughts of abandoned children to go along with it.
Worse for our tearducts are the films that aren’t necessarily thought of as “holiday movies,” which are typically more honest about how much of a bummer holidays can truly be. So get out your hanky and check out our list of ten most depressing holidays in movies:
It’s been awhile since I put the spotlight on a trailer mash-up, but I haven’t seen too many good ones lately. Have they gone out of fashion? Are internerds tired of watching such and such drama made to look like a comedy and such and such comedy made to look like a thriller? I don’t know, but this fake promo for Home Alone,recut to ape the I Am Legendtrailer, is a evidence that the art of the mash-up should not be lost just yet.
I have one problem with it, though. While it’s as good an idea as the Kill Yoda spot from earlier this year, and it’s initially executed rather successfully with the captions and voice-over, it kinda loses me when Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern show up. And the shot of Kevin where there’s a bunch of people in the background completely ruins the whole idea. Some of the image/audio match-ups are perfect, at least, like the iconic aftershave gag.
The third part in Universal’s rebooted Mummyfranchise takes the series in a new direction. Rather than set in Egypt and dealing again with the same old villain, Imhotep, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperorbrings us to China and gives us a different sort of preserved corpse baddie. And it looks like the change could actually add some freshness to the franchise.
Of course, history would hint that such a move for the Mummy movies is a bad idea. While it seems beneficial in theory to redirect the focus of a series with the third installment, especially if the first sequel was too much a repetition of the original (a la The Mummy Returns), in practice many threequels mistakenly alter things for the worse. These aren’t necessarily the worst threequels ever made (*cough* X-Men: The Last Stand); they’re just some movies that took their series in a completely wrong turn.
Halloween III: Season of the Witch- Now viewed as an unfortunate detour in a long series involving the slasher Michael Myers, this misstep can apparently be blamed on John Carpenter and co-writer/producer Debra Hill, who agreed to a second sequel to Halloweenonly if it didn’t involve Myers. But what was the point? Sure, a franchise can work with unrelated sequels, but after two movies dealing with the same villain, it seems odd to switch it up so late in the game. Still, if this wasn’t such a terrible movie in general, it’s possible Halloween III could have worked as an intended beginning to an anthology franchise. …Read more
This being a federal holiday and all, I figured there wouldn’t be much to report on from the trades. However, I was very, very wrong. Check out this doozy of an announcement: Oliver Stone is to direct a biopic about George W. Bush, which will be titled Bush and star Josh Brolin in the lead. Obviously, Stone had thought he was making a biopic about America’s worst President twelve years ago with Nixon, but then of course came along Bush the Second. And since he used an actor (Anthony Hopkins) for that film who looked nothing like the subject, this time he’s doing to the same. I only hope that James Brolin gets to play George H.W. Bush.
The boys won the box office battle of the sexes as Cloverfieldopened with $41 million, the best weekend bow ever for January. That’s almost as much money as Roland Emmerich’s Godzilladebuted with ten years ago. The difference is that it cost $130 million to make while Cloverfield cost only $25 million. And yet with all the crap given to the monster from the 1998 Godzilla, it still looked cooler than the monster in Cloverfield. In fact, 27 Dresses (#2 this weekend with $22.4 million) probably had a scarier monster than Cloverfield — not that I would have seen that movie to find out.
Wait, I thought the Bush biopic was the oddest movie talked about in the trades today. Instead that honor should go to Cirque du Freak, to which Oscar nominee Ken Watanabe has just signed on. His role as a circus “barker” doesn’t sound that interesting, though, when compared to John C. Reilly as a vampire and Salma Hayek as … wait for it … a bearded lady.
Meanwhile, another movie tries to be today’s strangest, and fails miserably. Tim Meadows has been cast in the Ashley Tisdale-starrer They Came From Upstairs, which is basically like Home Aloneif Daniel Stern and Joe Pesci were aliens.
I’m swooning this morning over a 16-page PDF, advertising the fall programming schedule for Los Angeles’ Silent Movie Theater, which has recently been remade as a full-service rep house. Growing up in Los Angeles, the old Silent Movie was a key constellation on the moviegoing map, along with the New Beverly, the Nuart, the Music Hall, that shitty discount Cineplex Odeon on Fairfax and Beverly, and the (recently-shuttered) Rialto in Pasadena. Now that I’ve been spoiled by New York theaters like Film Forum and the Pioneer, I understand that none of these places were all that adventurously programmed when I was frequenting them in the mid-to-late 90s, but within Los Angeles’ oppressive strip mall non-culture, there was something exciting about watching something like King Kong with live organ accompaniment at the Silent, or even just getting a car full of people to drive out to Pasadena to see a print of Ghostbusters that actually had scratches on it.
But with the new Silent Movie, Los Angeles finally has the rep house that it probably doesn’t deserve. The program for the remainder of 2007 is wildly exciting. I’ve listed some highlights after the jump; you can download the gorgeous PDF program here.
We’ve had a bit of trouble getting this episode to go through the iTunes feed, so we hope this re-post will fix the problem. The original post, with episode description and embedded player, is here.
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I’m going with a continuation of 
John Hughes was probably my first favorite filmmaker, or at least the first I really knew by name and reputation. So I’m especially saddened by his death from heart attack today, at age 59. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off may no longer be my favorite movie of all time — actually attending high school somewhat ruined the teen mythology that exists in Hughes’ films for me — but it forever remains in my top ten list of titles I enjoy watching over and over again (even if I am critical of the musical number).
Years after it was first announced that a 
