When I first heard yesterday that Henry Gibson had died of cancer, I felt like I was alone in my mourning. But a day later, the film blogs have paid him due respect. And it being a slow news day, I’m devoting today’s Bloggery to this great character actor, despite the morbidity of having more than one obit/tribute roundup in one week.
I’m quite happy to see that many people appreciated the actor’s talent, though it makes me sad that he wasn’t given more and better work in his later years. Sure, he was still prolific in his TV and film appearances, but isn’t it a shame his role in Wedding Crashers is his most memorable of the past decade?
I remember the first time I saw and heard him in one of my now-favorite films Nashville. I couldn’t believe it was the same guy I primarily knew from Laugh-In and Joe Dante films. Maybe it was because I thought he resembled Teller of Penn & Teller, and so in spite of the villainous turns, I typically saw him as a sweet, cute, relatively silent and somewhat dopey-looking character actor. Also, his parts were usually pretty small.
In Nashville, though, he’s a central figure, one who feels far more real than any characters I’d seen him play before. Not that there’s anything wrong with his sillier roles. Check out this villain from an episode of Wonder Woman for why I truly love him. But the guy obviously had range, and I wish we could have seen more from him.
Check out some more memories of Gibson from other film blogs after the jump:
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Following the Disney acquisition of Marvel, and now seeming a response to that deal, Warner Bros. has announced a new company called DC Entertainment, which will apparently be an umbrella for DC Comics as well as, presumably, whatever film projects the WB plans to adapt from its publications. This may just be another false promise that the corporation is finally getting its shit together in order to compete with the more prolific Marvel Studios, but DC fans at least have a new hope until the next round of disappointments.
Really, there’s not even official word that the creation of DC Entertainment has anything to do with plans to get more comic book movies into gear. There’s some general implication, but no specific revelations. Regardless, the geeks are jumping on this as a sign of such, so if Warner Bros. is smart they will have something movie-related — something big and specific — to announce by the end of the week. Okay, I’ll give them until the end of next week since it’s DC we’re talking about.
Check out what the other film blogs are saying about and hoping for with this announcement after the jump:
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I’m historically not a DC Comics defender, but the company could really use some support today following the very weak reception of an announcement that DC and Warner Bros. have some new film ideas up their sleeves. Sure, the news isn’t that exciting, but that may be The Hollywood Reporter’s fault for making it sound like DC is “storming the film world.” Compared to Marvel, DC’s plans still seem more like a light breeze, and therefore it’s understandable that the geeks and fanboys are disappointedly bitching today.
But as much as I’d love to see a Flash or Aquaman movie, neither of which I’m expecting anytime soon, I have to continue giving DC & WB credit for having given us the first and last great superhero movies. Superman is still the film to which comic book adaptations are compared, and it’s more than 30 years old. And now we also have The Dark Knight to judge every other movie against. Marvel has more films to show for themselves, but they actually have fewer great adaptations and therefore fewer films I’d call classics. Even Iron Man, in my opinion, fails to hold up as well as a number of DC films.
So let’s just be patient. It might be worth it. Or, feel free to keep up the whining and ridiculing in the comments section below. First, check out what the film blogs have to say after the jump:
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I know what brings traffic to movie blogs: Megan Fox wearing as little as possible. Case in point: Movie Gab debuted some paparazzi pics of Fox on the set of Jonah Hex a few weeks ago, but she was wearing a robe, and not surprisingly I heard nothing of the photos. Today the same site presents more images, this time of Fox in an Old West Prostitute costume (i.e. corset, stockings, boots, gloves) and the internerds explode with posts. Sure, it’s also yet another slow news day in terms of stuff that excites the collective film bloggery, but I’m sure these shots would still have shown up on every movie and gossip site on a much busier day. Why? Because Megan Fox pays our bills, of course.
Not that I understand the attraction. I don’t mean to insult Fox, who is indeed an attractive woman. But I don’t get what she’s got that at least a thousand other hot young actresses don’t have. Aside from the fact that she’s sold on sex, be it through cleavage-exposing publicity photos or that recent Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen footage of her stripping, what is it about her that makes her the Clara Bow of the late 2000’s? (Confession: Bow never did “It” for me either, so maybe I’m just out of touch). Anyway, I am noticing that these new Fox photos are garnering some criticism for how skinny her corset makes her look, and I do appreciate that not everyone is positively spellbound by her.
Anyway, check out what other bloggers are saying about the images after the jump. Meanwhile, I’ll be checking out that sexier wet, tattooed back shot of Sandra Bullock that Mark Graham has posted over at Vulture.
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Forget Iron Man, Batman, Superman, and all the other average joe male superheroes. Comic-Con is all about the Barbie. Mattel’s booth has one glass display case tucked away in the corner, far away from their massive replica of Castle Grayskull, and it’s an entire homage to Barbie. You’ve got Barbie as Supergirl, Barbie as Wonder Woman, Barbie as Batgirl, Barbie as Catwoman, Barbie as Trixie from Speed Racer and… Barbie as Tippi Hedren from The Birds? Nothing really says “comic book fan” like a Barbie action figure dressed up as the star of a 1963 Hitchcock film, complete with a trio of attacking ravens. I totally want one. Photo evidence after the jump.
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Discussion of this summer’s heroine lack is in full throttle. Last friday, New York’s Vulture blog asked, “Where are the Roles for Superwomen?; Stu at Defamer jumped off from there, ultimately suggesting an X-Men spin-off for Ellen Page; John at The Movie Blog listed reasons “Why Most Female Lead Action Films Don’t Succeed” (shocker: men can’t identify with or believe in strong — and strong — female characters). Now, adding to the conversation in the least noble way possible, USA Weekend presents the appropriately titled “Girls Want to Have Fun, Too”, a cover story (with the least flattering photos I’ve ever seen) from its summer movie preview that spotlights Gwyneth Paltrow, Maggie Gyllenhaal and Liv Tyler as the “leading ladies” of the season’s three big comic book adaptations.
Of course, each of these three actresses are only secondary figures to their superhero counterparts (in Iron Man, The Dark Knight and The Incredible Hulk, respectively). But that’s not the worst of it: the women are asked what kind of super powers they would like to have in real life (how about in movie life, as in what superheroine they’d like to play?), and when questioned on the subject of women’s roles in superhero movies, each suggests that we’ve seen great progress:
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Nikki Finke has issued a response to Jeff Robinov’s response to her claim that three producers told her that Robinov is no longer putting films starring women into production. After meticulously detailing a couple of days worth of phone tag between her and Robinov, Finke writes:
Sources inside Warner’s tell me that, 1) Robinov doesn’t believe there’s an actress who can carry a movie worldwide since Julia Roberts, 2) Robinov has now gone so far as admitting to his studio colleagues that the decree I reported was made when he was “in the room”, 2) Robinov is acknowledging that the studio is reassessing the strategy of making action pictures starring women, 3) Robinov was inundated with calls on Monday and Tuesday from media and Hollywood types asking him about my posting, 4) Robinov has three pics currently in production and six in pre-production and not one stars a women as the main lead of the film, and 5) he’s nixed Wonder Woman as a stand-alone film, downgrading her to just one of four superhero characters in the proposed Justice League. Again, I stand by my story.
So, in other words, more of the same. Much more interesting, I think, is an excerpt from Lisa Chase’s interview with Finke in the latest issue of Elle, in which Finke explains why women in Hollywood “can’t get ahead.” More after the jump.
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