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Obama and McCain to Empty Cinemas. Trade Roughage 09/26/08

By Christopher Campbell posted 1 year ago

Scheduling the first major presidential debate on a Friday initially seemed like a mistake to me, as I figured most Americans would rather go out tonight than spend the eve of their weekend thinking about politics. Yet now I’m hearing about debate-watching parties, and Variety expects the event to curb moviegoing tonight — that is if the debate even happens. But even if it wasn’t going to be only teens populating the multiplex tonight, Eagle Eye would still rule the weekend, as is currently predicted.
Continuing the studio’s push of The Dark Knight for Oscar, Warner Bros. is giving Academy members the option of being shipped a Blu-Ray screener, which will showcase the film’s Imax-friendly ratio changes, in order for voters to have “the best possible chance to see what we did technically.” Or members could actually go see films as they’re meant to be seen on the big screen. Fortunately, TDK is also being rereleased in January.
Helen Mirren will star as a retired Mossad agent who must return to the job in John Madden’s The Debt, a remake of the 2007 Israeli film Ha-Hov. Though it’s probably more Munich than 007, as long as Mirren’s playing a role reminding me of Daniel Craig, I’m hoping there’ll be a gratuitous scene featuring a bikini-clad Mirren ascending from the sea.
Nick Nolte will guide a pair of newly orphaned vacationing children in the indie Arcadia Lost, which sounds to me like a Greek-set Walkabout meets The Earthling, a film that most made me cry as a child due to the way Ricky Shroder’s parents die in a terrible Winnebago accident.

Captain Jack Returns. Trade Roughage 09/25/08

By Christopher Campbell posted 1 year ago

Johnny Depp has officially confirmed he’ll be returning as Captain Jack in a fourth Pirates of the Caribbean installment. Additionally, at a special Disney event, in which the studio showcased it’s slate for exhibitors, Depp confirmed his role as the Mad Hatter in Tim Burton’s 3-D performance capture Alice in Wonderland and announced that he’ll play Tonto in Disney/Bruckheimer’s The Lone Ranger. Hopefully he’ll still have some room for more mature roles throughout his commitment to the Mouse House.
Other announcements at the Disney event included the moving up of Cars 2 from 2012 to 2011, at which time “Cars Land” will open in part of Disney’s California Adventure amusement park. Also, Nic Cage is on board for National Treasure 3 and Oprah Winfrey is voicing the mother of “the first black Disney princess” in The Princess and the Frog.
More returning franchises: Warner Bros. has officially announced the I Am Legend prequel, which will detail the “last days of humanity” section that you wished had just been in the first film.
I’m beginning to think Guillermo Del Toro has cloned himself. In additon to having literally a million film projects on his slate, he’s also found time to co-write a trilogy of vampire novels for HarperCollins.
At least Del Toro’s not also signed on to write and direct the remake of Tomas Alfredson’s new Swedish vampire pic Let the Right One In for returning horror producers Hammer Films. That would be Cloverfield’s Matt Reeves. By the way, Hollywood: can we take a break from the bloodsuckers soon? Vampires are starting to seem more over-employed than superheroes.
Oh, and finally, speaking of overdoing things, Steven Spielberg will possibly direct another movie about a boy and his alien friend. This one will be based on the 1968 sci-fi novel Chocky and sounds more Drop Dead Fred than E.T.

Sing Off the Summer. Trade Roughage 09/02/08g

By Christopher Campbell posted 1 year ago

Earning $14.3 million in its third weekend, Tropic Thunder retained its top placement on the box office chart over the holiday, yet it’s total gross still hasn’t reached the movie’s reported $90 million budget. Meanwhile, five new wide releases (Babylon A.D., Traitor, Disaster Movie, College and Hamlet 2, which expanded this week) performed badly enough to place this year’s Labor Day total at 17% below last year’s. In the end, the slow four-day weekend may have contributed to Summer 2008’s inability to top the box office of Summer 2007, despite The Dark Knight’s now more than $500 mill. take.
The most interesting box office news from the weekend is Mamma Mia!’s 34% increase over its previous weekend take — despite having lost more than 350 screens — due to Universal’s releasing a special sing-a-long version of the musical to 299 locations. I’d say something about the film being on its way to Rocky Horror-like cult hit status, but at $132.9 million and climbing, it’s already earned more than Rocky Horror has in 35 years and should anyway be considered an actual hit.
As for limited releases, Variety and The Hollywood Reporter failed to mention that Takashi Miike’s Sukiyaki Western Django earned $13,106 on a single screen in NYC this past weekend. Meanwhile, one of my favorite films of the year, Jirí Menzel’s I Served the King of England, earned a terrific per-screen average of $8,488 to gross almost $68,000.
I’ve always thought Nastassja Kinski was one of the most boring actresses in the world, but at least she would have given Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Bastards that usual casting from the ’70s cred. Unfortunately, Diane Kruger, who’s just plain boring, has instead been cast in the part originally offered to Kinski.

Trade Roughage 11/15/07

By Paul Moore posted 1 year ago

In spite of writers forcing primetime repeats as most of the country settles into winter (I recommend knitting as an alternative), the public seems to be siding against “The Corporations.” How American.
Marketing guru behind Sweeney Todd–Tim Burton’s musical about a serial killing barber–struggles with “many niche audiences that need to be dealt with.” Solution: Promote it as Saw meets Dreamgirls.
Jesse Eisenberg (Squid and the Whale) and Justin Bartha (Failure to Launch) will add to the “burgeoning ‘Jewsploitation’ genre” with a *comedy* about Hassidic drug mules. How does “sploitation” get added to an ethnicity? Case in point: Maria Full of Grace is sad, but if it had a Hassidic Jew cast? Oy vey! I just spit out my Schmaltz!