Neither of the two firings getting a rise out of film bloggers this week appears to be of any concern. According to Movieline, Andrew Sarris will still be contributing, as a freelancer, to the movies section of the New York Observer, and Stephen Sommers will still be contributing, as a director, to the shittiness of G.I. Joe: Rise of the Cobra. While the first of these supposed dismissals probably isn’t (unfortunately) of interest to most readers out there, I’m going to take a look at the progression of commentary related to the latter story. I’d actually prefer to ignore the rumor-turned-non-story the way that Kris Tapley at In Contention has chosen to, but despite this being one of those “*chirp* *chirp*” slow news days, I have to devote this post to some hot film story of the day.

So here goes:

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Yesterday I attended a special Star Trek event at Paramount Studios where they showed us 20 minutes of footage from J.J. Abrams’ upcoming reboot of the classic sci fi series, much like Warner Bros. did with Watchmen recently. While the footage was already screened in London and New York, this was the first time I’ve had a chance to see it, and I didn’t read any of the other reports so I could go in fresh with my somewhat jaded fanboy eyes and ears.

While it looks fairly slick and high-tech (and yes, the bridge of the Enterprise does indeed look like the inside of an Apple Store), I was more interested with how they treated the development of characters that have been around since 1966. It’s hard to judge the film based on the four scenes we saw; it’s a bit like reading four random chapters of a book and being asked to write a report about it. But, with that in mind, I definitely have some thoughts about it. One thing is for sure: it looks a lot better than the scenes we saw from The Spirit at Comic-Con.

Check out the breakdown below of the scenes from a Star Trek movie that will probably draw a line right down the middle of hardcore Trek fans, but will draw a lot of people who have never seen the TV shows or the previous films into theaters. And just as a note, Abrams sides with the Trekkers in the “Trekkies vs. Trekkers” debate.

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• The weekend box office went just as expected with Beverly Hills Chihuahua unfortunately coming out on top with $29 million and Rachel Getting Married earning the best per-screen average ($33,667) with an impressive $303,000 gross from only 9 locations. Also, with so many new films debuting, Flash of Genius, Blindness and How to Lose Friends and Alienate People couldn’t even open in the top ten — the latter placed as low as #19 — and An American Carol and Religilous only placed ninth and tenth, respectively. Still, for a documentary, Religilous‘ $3.5 million debut and $6,972 per-screen average are both honorable achievements. The film had the highest non-fiction debut of 2008, and it’s sure to be the highest-grossing non-concert doc of the year.
• Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist also debuted relatively well this past weekend, which made it a perfect time for Mandate Pictures to annouce that the film’s screenwriter, Lorene Scafaria, will make her directorial debut with the romantic comedy Seeking a Friend for the End of the World.
• For awhile now I’ve noticed the headlines about Mamma Mia!’s incredible overseas business, but I’ve so far ignored them. Well, here’s the latest off-balanced tally: compared to its already hit-qualifying $143 million domestic gross, the musical has taken in close to $400 million extra from international markets. That’s nearly three-fourths of its total take, for those who like fractions.
• 200 projects developed by DreamWorks while living under Paramount’s roof will be divided up rather fairly between the two studios now that they’re separating. About one-fifth of those will remain joint efforts, of which one-half will be primarily developed by DreamWorks with Paramount having an option to co-finance and co-distribute. While some of these special-circumstance projects are rumored to be Spielberg’s directing and producing gigs, there’s still no news on what’s going on with the Tintin trilogy.

• Brad Pitt has officially signed on to play the lead role in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Bastards. Other stars who have deals in the works: Nastassja Kinski, Simon Pegg, David Krumholtz.
• Electronic Arts is producing a video game based on The Godfather II. The game will loosely follow the plot of the movie, but will omit the flashbacks to the life of young Vito Corleone. Robert Duvall is doing voice work, and all the stars of the original film except for Al Pacino have signed off on the use of their likenesses.
• Paramount will release a two-disc Iron Man DVD on September 30. The set will include Robert Downey Jr’s screen test (they made him test? Ouch.), “a seven-part making-of documentary and a six-part feature on the origins of the Marvel superhero.”

Last year’s 2007 Comic-Con featured a massive Paramount Pictures panel, which did everything from give us a live broadcast from the set of Indiana Jones (where we found out Marion Ravenwood was in the picture), to introduce both Leonard Nimoy and Zachary Quinto as Spock in the new Trek film. However, Paramount’s only presence this year was a Tropic Thunder screening outside the Con, and some freebie Trek posters on the show floor. Where was the most cinematic representation of the Comic-Con audience to be found?

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Seriously, with a title like Tropic Thunder, I wonder how many storm-related movie headlines will be out there. Stuff like “Tropic Thunder blows into town this weekend!” or “Tropic Thunder hopes for box office lightning!” Is there anywhere you can apply for a job putting really bad puns to work? If so, I want it. (Ed: Yes)

So I caught a screening of Tropic Thunder during Comic-Con, and I have mixed feelings about it. Sure, there were some pretty funny moments in it, and as expected, Robert Downey Jr. stole most of movie. Right now the guy could do a one-man show making fun of every ethnic group in the world and probably win a Tony for it. But is the over-hyped Tom Cruise role as funny as people has been saying? Find out after the jump.

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• Questions: Why are both The Love Guru and Get Smart––broad comedies that should have mainstream appeal, if they actually appeal to anyone––opening on the same day, and how is the competition going to impact each film’s box office? Answers: either because Paramount locked in a bunch of promo deals for The Love Guru before realizing how much wider Get Smart was tracking, or because Mike Myers didn’t want to change the release date; and badly.
• First Run Pictures has picked up film critic Godfrey Cheshire’s personal documentary, Moving Midway. The film, through which Cheshire examines race relations and his own family’s plantation, will open in New York and then make the unusual move of going straight to a platform release in the South.
• What Just Happened?, which just got its U.S. release date via Magnolia, will open the Karlovy Vary Film Festival on July 4.

• Paramount doesn’t seem to be completely shutting down indie arm Paramount Vantage––they don’t seem to have given up on producing smaller-ticket prestige films, unlike Warner Brothers––but they are “folding the marketing, distribution and physical production departments of Paramount Vantage into the larger studio,” and eliminating three jobs in the process.
• Legendary 70s exploitation film I Spit On Your Grave is getting a remake. The producer of the remake cites the continuing meaninglessness of the rating system as the remake’s commercial imperative: “After seeing what was done with an R rating on films like ‘Saw’ and ‘Hostel,’ we think we can modernize this story, be competitive with what this marketplace expects and not have to aim for an NC-17 or X rating.”
• Independently produced films are expected to “dominate activity in the late summer and early fall,” as SAG continues to issue waivers to producers not affiliated with studios as strike talks drag on. Also: Werner Herzog’s Bad Lieutenant has a July 8 start date!
• Brian DePalma will make a film about The Boston Strangler. Yawn.

We have less than three weeks until Iron Man opens in theaters, but the way people are talking about the film today, that might be too long. Regardless of how subversive the comic book adaptation may be (check out Paul’s thoughts from yesterday), or otherwise how intelligent a blockbuster it is (according to an exhibitor, quoted here by Anne Thompson), or how “pretty darn amazing!!!!!” it is to a more mainstream, don’t-care-if-it’s-intelligent-as-long-as-it’s-awesome crowd (such as includes those who send reactions to AICN), the fact of the matter is that we may have already accepted the movie as all these things well before even seeing the whole thing. The big, hairy guy from Ireland, Karl Hungus, sums up his feelings of saturation, sparked by this latest hero-becomes-familiar-with-his-powers clip, on his blog (via IMDb):

The problem is, with all this cool stuff being flung at us, is there going to be any cool left to blow us away when the film finally hits? I know, this isn’t the first time I’ve said this, but there’s just so many new promo shots and trailers/TV spots being published, the main villain being revealed, the clips with the tank, battles being shown and now a lot of the development of the armour as well, my worry is growing that the final product will be ruined.

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You have to wonder how a story like this generates at the Wall Street Journal. Basically, Tom Cruise and Sumner Redstone––the Paramount chief who very noisily severed Cruise’s deal with that studio––had lunch. Cruise wouldn’t comment. Redstone did, rather extensively. So are we to assume that Sumner Redstone got home from lunch and started calling reporters? Because he really thinks it’s in his best interest to go around talking about how he accepted a lunch invitation from the movie star he previously declared to be too insane to work with?

I’m running out the door, but discuss among yourselves.

There’s an LA Times story this morning about how Paramount has promoted Apatow-com Drillbit Taylor around the fact that star Owen Wilson has done no interviews, in fear of having to answer questions about last summer’s suicide attempt. Instead of talking to reporters, Wilson taped “Drillbit-themed introductions to Fox’s Sunday-night prime-time lineup.” If there are three steps to managing a celebrity scandal––denial, confirmation, confession––the Wilson camp has chosen to remain mired in Step 1 for going on seven months, a stunning and curious feat in the era of confession as commodity.

After enumerating a number of projects fatally wounded by the unsavory off-hours activity of their stars, LAT writers John Horn and Gina Piccalo note in the last paragraph that Nine Months, the Hugh Grant film that was released just two weeks after the star was caught with a prostitute, grossed $70 million––according to this chart, more than Dumb and Dumber, Bad Boys or Babe, all of which spawned sequels.  The Hugh Grant scandal seems to represent a turning point in spin: by appearing on any show that would have him the day before his movie’s premiere and talking about the hooker incident directly and self-mockingly,  Grant was able to completely deflate the issue, successfully turning confession into commercial.

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• Paramount has reshuffled its 2008-2009 release calendar, and the big headline is the move of JJ Abrams’ Star Trek from December 2008 to Spring 2009, in order to position the film as a summer tentpole instead of a Christmas/awards offering. Which seems like a no-brainer, but this project has been so slow getting off the ground that we’re sure SOMEONE will cry red flag. But really, isn’t the bigger red flag the bumping of Eddie Murphy’s Nowhereland from Sept. 26, 2008, to June 12, 2009? I guess the fate of Eddie Murphy projects is not at the top of the list of nerd concerns.
• The middling-to-good post-strike news: most writers whose deals were terminated by the strike will now find themselves “free agents,” and the spec script market is apparently expected to shortly be on fire. The bad news: TV networks and studios are planning to be extremely frugal about pushing projects into development and signing long-term deals.
• Major stars like George Clooney and Tom Haks pitched in on an a full-page ad in today’s Variety, encouraging SAG to come to the negotiation table as soon as possible before the actors’ contracts run out on June 30.
• In a think piece on actors who “thrive on the ambiguity of their multiethnic heritage,” Peter DeBruge informs us that “there’s a new kind of hero in town”––typified by none other than Vin Diesel. Is he even still in town?

Chris Thilk passes along word that Paramount’s Iron Man website saw its traffic spike by 800 percent after a new ad for the film was unveiled during the Super Bowl. This is interesting for two reasons. First, it would give the indication that there’s still a sizable segment of the audience that learns about movies first via TV advertising.

Second: I’m so not the target audience for this movie, and I never get hardons for trailers, but the Iron Man trailer almost makes me understand what it feels like to be a 16 year-old boy (almost). It seems so clear to me that the full Iron Man trailer, which I believe had been online for a couple of weeks before the game, is far superior than the Super Bowl ad in terms of selling the movie as a narrative experience, but it was the TV ad that apparently got the job done, and it did it by getting down to basics. He builds a suit, he puts it on, he makes out with Gwyneth Paltrow, and he wins. This is what the people want. I can’t begrudge them that.

• How to craft a Variety box office trend story: line up your greatest hits of disingenuous statements from past stories (Juno–the little movie that could! Cloverfield dropped 68% in its second weekend, but that’s not so bad–even if it was really 72%!); find either wildly optimistic or severely apocalyptic structuring rubric to make these old chestnuts seem, uh, less old; repeat.
• Speaking of Cloverfield, Paramount, apparently turning a blind eye to the film’s lack of staying power, has offered director Matt Reeves two new jobs, including a Cloverfield sequel. He’ll also direct The Invisible Woman, “a Hitchcock-style thriller that probes the mind of a former beauty queen who turns to a life of crime to protect her family,” from his own script.
• Paul Haggis is setting up a production shingle at Tom Cruise’s Scientology rec center studio, United Artists.