Upcoming
June 11
June 12
Call of the Wild 3D
Youssou N'Dour: I Bring What I Love
June 16
June 19
Dead Snow
Whatever Works
June 24
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
June 26
Cheri
Fireflies in the Garden
July 1
Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
July 3
The Girl from Monaco
I Hate Valentine's Day
July 10
July 15
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
July 17
July 24
All Good Things
The Answer Man
In the Loop
July 29
July 31
The Cove
August 7
When in Rome
August 14
A Perfect Getaway
District 9
The Goods: The Don Ready Story
Ponyo
Pool Boys
Spread
The Time Traveler's Wife
August 21
Five Minutes of Heaven
Goose on the Loose!
It Might Get Loud
World's Greatest Dad
August 28
The Boat that Rocked
September 4
Amreeka
Carriers
Citizen Game
Shanghai
September 9
September 11
The Red Canvas
Tyler Perrys: I Can Do It All Myself
September 17
The Burning Plain
September 18
Brand New Day
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Jennifer's Body
Splice
September 25
October 2
A Serious Man
Toy Story/Toy Story 2
Sunday, July 31, 2005
0 comment
I've completely updated the Oscar
I've completely updated the Oscar Balloon, and I pledge to not let it fall behind ever again. Sometime today (Monday, 8.1), Oscar Balloon will be moving to the right-hand side of the column and out of the bottom of the column space. On top of this portions of it (i.e, one category at a time) will be excerpted in the news ticker. There will also be a tiny link under the HE logo that'll take you right there.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:36 PM on Sunday, July 31, 2005
0 comment
Which is the more intriguing
Which is the more intriguing Grizzly Man one-sheet? This version is sitting on the IMDB page for the film, and this one, if you ask me, is the slightly cooler concept.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:19 PM on Sunday, July 31, 2005
0 comment
Let's face it, let's be
Let's face it, let's be really honest -- there's a lot of us out there who want to hear the audio track of that videotape that was recording when that grizzly bear killed and ate Timothy Treadwell and his girlfriend, Amie Huguenard, in October 2003 up in the wilds of Alaska. This ghastly event isn't heard in Werner Herzog's Grizzly Man (Lions Gate, 8.12), a doc about Treadwell's devotion to communing with grizzlies, but we do see Herzog listening to it and grimacing and then telling a woman from Treadwell's family that the tape should be burned. I respect Herzog's decision...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:58 PM on Sunday, July 31, 2005
0 comment
Wait a minute...Hustle & Flow
Wait a minute...Hustle & Flow dropped 50% in its second weekend for a $4 million haul? The big hit of Sundance...one of the very best films of the year so far with a vibe that leaves you in a very spiritual place went down 50%? Don't misunderstand -- Craig Brewer's film will turn out to be one of Paramount Classics' biggest hits (figure $25 million domestic when all is said and done) but Hustle should have dropped 25% or 30% this weekend, at most. A 50% drop means people out there are telling their friends, "Yeah, sorta...but not altogether." And they're dead wrong...they're...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:20 PM on Sunday, July 31, 2005
0 comment
Downfall's Oliver Hirschbiegel doing Body
Downfall's Oliver Hirschbiegel doing Body Snatchers (or Invasion of...), a remake of a '70s Phil Kaufman film that was a remake of a landmark '50s Don Siegel film that was also reworked by Abel Ferrara in '93....really terrible idea! Even with (or do I mean particularly with?) Nicole Kidman in whatever the lead role will amount to this time. Shooting is apparently set to begin in October.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:13 PM on Sunday, July 31, 2005
Saturday, July 30, 2005
0 comment
I had this horrible idea
I had this horrible idea for a movie this evening...horrible but oddly unshakable. Nobody would ever have the courage to push this with anyone else, but it's basically Oliver Stone's 9/11 movie meets Wedding Crashers. Remember Will Ferrell's character telling Owen Wilson's character that funerals are better than weddings for scoring? Okay...now remember that brief phenomenon that happened in New York City right after 9/11 called "terror-fucking," which was about a lot of guys (fireman in particular) going home with a lot of women because everyone wanted to obliterate the horror of what had happened with sex...almost any kind of available sex they...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:04 PM on Saturday, July 30, 2005
0 comment
Lynn Hirschberg's Jim Jarmusch profile
Lynn Hirschberg's Jim Jarmusch profile in Sunday's New York Times Magazine is awfully well-written...it gets Jarmusch like an arrow through the heart. His latest film, Broken Flowers (Focus Features, 8.5), "moves beyond hipster cool to something more like maturity, but the film still maintains Jarmusch's outsider stance: it is stripped down, closely observed, with an almost dreamlike aura," Hirschberg remarks early on. "''It's all so...independent," Jarmusch comments. 'I'm so sick of that word. I reach for my revolver when I hear the word 'quirky.' Or 'edgy.' Those words are now becoming labels that are slapped on products to sell them. Anyone...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:55 PM on Saturday, July 30, 2005
0 comment
Everyone knew Rob Cohen's Stealth
Everyone knew Rob Cohen's Stealth would crap out on opening weekend, and now it's more or less done that with a $5 million take on Friday. Wedding Crashers topped the $100 million mark while finally beating out Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, $6 million to $5.2 million. And exhibitors saw John Singleton's Four Brothers (Paramount, 8.12) a few days ago and are said to be high on it because "it's commercial." That's a code term for "it's not going to win any Oscars but it'll probably sell tickets."
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:29 AM on Saturday, July 30, 2005
0 comment
My beloved news ticker has
My beloved news ticker has been up and running for a few days now, but it needs to be rewritten in a Flash format. Flash, I've been told, isn't as laborious or cumbersome to load and read on an average slightly-older computer. I don't know jack about any of this, but if anybody out there is a Flash-head and could lend some insight...
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:01 AM on Saturday, July 30, 2005
Friday, July 29, 2005
4 comments
Oscar Countdown Begins
And So It Begins
Once August is here the summer is basically over. Any marketer will tell you August isn't the summer -- it's "August." And that means contending with the likes of Must Love Dogs, Red Eye, The Dukes of Hazzard, Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo, Four Brothers, Pretty Persuasion and The 40 Year-Old Virgin already.
And this means that out of lethargy or some kind of psychological avoidance pattern people like myself are shifting into a September frame of mind (Toronto Film Festival!), which will quickly feed into October and the dawning of Oscar season. And none too soon.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:46 PM on Friday, July 29, 2005
0 comment
Maggie Gyllenhaal and Maria Bello
Maggie Gyllenhaal and Maria Bello have been cast in Oliver Stone's 9/11 flick as the wives of the two Port Authority guys, Sgt. John McLoughlin and Officer William J. Jimeno, who were the last to be pulled from the wreckage of the World Trade Center. Nicolas Cage and Michael Pena (last in Million Dollar Baby) are playing McLouglin and Jimeno, respectively. I know this sounds cold, but I still don't get what the big human-interest angle is in this thing. Being the last guy to be pulled out of the rubble on that horrible day is more dramatic or emotionally meaningful than, say,...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:49 AM on Friday, July 29, 2005
Thursday, July 28, 2005
0 comment
Chris Columbus's Rent (Columbia, 11.11)
Chris Columbus's Rent (Columbia, 11.11) is already being dismissed as damaged goods. In a recent Oscar prediction chart David Poland asks, "How can something less than a decade old feel so passe already?" (Uhhm, because it deals with one or two characters dying from AIDS and because medical breakthroughs since the mid '90s have made AIDS a survivable affliction?) Plus in a recent Entertainment Weekly Oscar forecast piece, Dave Karger warned than Rent might not get awards traction if it winds up feeling like a "dated" stage show. Now, maybe Rent works and maybe it doesn't, but the early dissing...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 1:08 PM on Thursday, July 28, 2005
0 comment
So the reason the '06
So the reason the '06 Oscar schedule is a week later than last year's -- the Oscar show is happening on 3.5.06 rather than late February -- is because the Academy didn't want to compete with the closing ceremonies of the 2006 Winter Olympics, which is set for 2.26? Does anyone apart from the families of the Olympic athletes really care that much about a closing ceremony? I really don't get this.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 11:14 AM on Thursday, July 28, 2005
0 comment
I listed my Aristocrats favorites
I listed my Aristocrats favorites in Wednesday's lead piece -- Gilbert Gottfried, Kevin Pollak-as-Walken, Martin Mull-kiki, and the South Park telling. But I just realized I totally forgot to mention the bit when Andy Dick explains the meaning of "rusty trombone." I never knew what it meant before -- now I can't think about it without smirking. This film is truly diseased.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:52 AM on Thursday, July 28, 2005
0 comment
Some people have been writing
Some people have been writing and tell me that the news ticker, which just went up last Friday, has been gumming up and/or freezing their computers. This is because the original program driving the ticker was slow and clunky and from Romania. We've just installed a new all-American version that may be easier and smoother to contend with....I hope. We're also looking around for ways to rewrite this news-ticker program with Flash, which may be even easier for everyone to process. Anyone out there know about writing Flash programs who'd be willing to help out?
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:45 AM on Thursday, July 28, 2005
0 comment
Listen to these sound clips
Listen to these sound clips from The Aristocrats (ThinkFilm, 7.29 limited)...a nice taste. No, that's putting it wrong. The word "taste" is distasteful given the repeated mentions of...forget it, I won't go there. But listen to the Gilbert Gottfried and Kevin Pollak clips.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:11 AM on Thursday, July 28, 2005
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
0 comment
Gilbert Stood Tall
Gilbert Stood Tall
There are two things you need to know about Penn Gillette and Paul Provenza's The Aristocrats (ThinkFilm, 7.29 limited). One, it's quite funny but not in the usual way -- it makes you laugh and also say at the same time, "Am I really laughing at this?" And two, you need to see it not just for the humor, but for the journey it takes you on.
There's a quote made famous by the late Michael O'Donoghue that says "making people laugh is the lowest form of humor." This is one of the few films I've seen that...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 11:33 AM on Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Tuesday, July 26, 2005
0 comment
There's a movie -- a
There's a movie -- a Showtime or an HBO movie, I'm thinking -- in the story of Silvia Johnson, an indiscreet Colorado woman of 40 who just pled guilty to various charges for having schtupped a bunch of local teenage boys. A news story says she threw a series of weekly parties between October '03 and October '04 in which she gave drugs and alcohol to eight of the boys and had sex with five of them. Enabling young guys to get high is stupid and irresponsible for any adult, but what's wrong with a little sexual healing? If only I'd known...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 11:23 AM on Tuesday, July 26, 2005
0 comment
It's 97 blazing degrees on
It's 97 blazing degrees on the streets of Manhattan today. We might as well be in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. It's so hot you can break an egg and spill it on the sidewalk and it would sizzle, I swear. The air on some of the subway platforms feels like something out of a blast furnace. At least it's better than last week's climate, which was muggy like a rain forest's. There was a soppy thickness to the air...you needed a machete to cut through it.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:23 AM on Tuesday, July 26, 2005
0 comment
The just-up trailer for Rob
The just-up trailer for Rob Reiner's Rumor Has it (Warner Bros., 12.9) looks like a typically conservative big-studio soother. It feels smart (i.e., alert), inviting, easy-going. The content, it suggests, will be that of a politely randy sex-and relationships comedy. And I have to admit it looks like the film will be fairly funny in the usual-usual sense....maybe.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:11 AM on Tuesday, July 26, 2005
0 comment
One of the main reasons
One of the main reasons big-studio movies always feel appealing is because of the way they've been shot, or, more precisely, the way they've been lighted. The dp for Rumor Has It is Peter Deming (The Jacket, I Heart Huckabees), and he has totally followed the standard drill by making all the actors in this trailer (Jennifer Aniston, Kevin Costner, Mark Ruffalo, Shirley MacLaine, etc.) look movie-star exquisite. Perfectly dressed, just the right hint of a golden-amber glow on their skin, every hair follicle arranged just so, etc. Nobody ever talks about this, but the superficially sensual composition in these films is why...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:52 AM on Tuesday, July 26, 2005
Monday, July 25, 2005
0 comment
Slamdance co-founder Dan Mirvish, a
Slamdance co-founder Dan Mirvish, a good guy and the director of the indie musical Open House, "recently" fell and broke his leg and busted his shoulder, according to a story on Film Threat. Does "recently" mean he had the accident a week ago...in early July...what? Sorry Dan's going through this -- I don't like to hear about anyone wincing in pain. There are addresses in the Film Threat story for sending Mirvish a get-well note or a can of sliced pineapples or whatever.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 3:33 PM on Monday, July 25, 2005
0 comment
The Hollywood Elsewhere news ticker
The Hollywood Elsewhere news ticker went "live" as of roughly 4:30 pm today, and is now up and running! Congratulations and deepest thanks to the great Jim Stanley for hanging in there and making it work the way it was always supposed to. Thanks also to the creator of the software, a guy from Romania named Adamus Capuano. The speed of the copy is slightly faster on Internet Explorer than on Firefox (which I abruptly switched to last night) or Netscape, and the copy prematurely stops feeding on these two browsers as well as Safari, but we'll be refining things and...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:27 PM on Monday, July 25, 2005
0 comment
Sorry to jump into this
Sorry to jump into this so late, but The Island's lousy opening weekend wasn't a "disaster" ($12.1 million at theatres...a pathetic $3876 per site) as much as totally pre-ordained. It was never really alive and in the game, and everyone knew this all along. Tracking figures were never very good, and once the word got around after the 7.13 nationwide sneak that it was more or less another THX 1138 or Logan's Run...forget it. Everything was tried, loads of TV ad money was spent, and the dogs just didn't want to eat the dog food.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 1:28 PM on Monday, July 25, 2005
Sunday, July 24, 2005
0 comment
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory's
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory's second-weekend take was $27.5 million, a 51% dip from its opening weekend total. That means more than a few who've seen it came out of the theatre in a moderately unhappy frame of mind. The second-weekend total of Wedding Crashers, however, was down a mere 24% for a fresh haul of $25.7 million...a lot higher than I predicted on Friday. Happening!
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:01 PM on Sunday, July 24, 2005
0 comment
What's the rumble about Must
What's the rumble about Must Love Dogs, the John Cusack-Diane Lane romance that snuck last night? Variety's Justin Chang praised Cusack's performance but called the film "middling." His lead graph begins, "To properly appreciate Must Love Dogs, one must first love John Cusack...thesp's maverick turn steals the show." James Watson, non-pro from Tallahassee, wrote in this afternoon and said pic "wasn't half bad. The theatre sold out with mostly 30 to 40 year-old women in the audience, and it played extremely well with them. I found it mildly diverting, although it did have a few laugh-out-loud moments. Lane and Cusack have reasonably good...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 11:53 AM on Sunday, July 24, 2005
0 comment
Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott...together
Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott...together again? That's what I hear, but that's all I've heard.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 11:43 AM on Sunday, July 24, 2005
0 comment
You've got to keep on
You've got to keep on your toes if you're doing an online anything, and especially a gossip column. Take Radar's "Paris Review", which is written by Julie Bloom and Derek De Koff. In Friday's 7.22 posting they ran a multiple-choice quiz that led with a question about Paris Latsis' obsession with fiance Paris Hilton, and which included a photo of the couple calling them "the future Mr. and Mrs. Latsis." Very soon afterwards the Star's website ran a story saying the wedding's off and Paris has flown home from Greece, etc. I don't know if the Star has it...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:07 AM on Sunday, July 24, 2005
0 comment
So the Hollywood Elsewhere team
So the Hollywood Elsewhere team is trying to install a travelling news-ticker thing at the very top of the column, but we're having trouble with a software that looked very cool at first but has since developed some problems. Are there any software designers out there with a solid reliable news-ticker software that can handle RSS feeds from different sites, maintain the same look and speed on different browsers, and generally be steady and consistent all the way around the block? If you can fill the bill, I'll not only buy it from you -- I'll tell everyone else how good it is...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:26 AM on Sunday, July 24, 2005
0 comment
Variety's Michael Fleming is reporting
Variety's Michael Fleming is reporting that the "official" title of Steven Spielberg's currently-rolling feature about Israel's revenge on the Palestinians behind the 1972 Munich killing of Israeli athletes is Munich...or at least that the cover page of Tony Kushner's script "starts" with this word. Fleming repeats the general concern about the film leaning too heavily on a book about the Israeli operation called "Vengeance," because the book's veracity "has been widely questioned." Look...I figured this whole thing out in a piece than ran on March 9th. Read it over and tell me if it doesn't make sense. The bottom...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:50 AM on Sunday, July 24, 2005
0 comment
In Sunday's N.Y. Daily News,
In Sunday's N.Y. Daily News, Elizabeth Weitzman asks if Ben McKenzie, whom she calls The O.C.'s "resident hunk," is about to make his mark in the forthcoming Junebug (Sony Classics, 8.5). I've seen Junebug and yes, McKenzie's performance shows "he can do more than brood beautifully," as Weitzman puts it -- it shows he's extremely convincing at playing a pathetic jerk. Junebug is a nicely handled family relationship drama, but McKenzie's "Johnny" character is an uneducated, emotionally immature blue-collar dork who treats his wife with callous disregard. (The wife, a very pregnant woman named Ashley, who's a bit too angelic and...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:13 AM on Sunday, July 24, 2005
0 comment
So there's Page Six's account
So there's Page Six's account of the circumstances surrounding the canning of publicist Jasmine Madatian at Paramount Pictures, and there's David Poland's...the latter having been posted Saturday night after Poland looked into it (he was the first to report Madatian's sacking) and was told the Page Six version was wrong. I haven't called around about this myself, but I'm presuming Poland probably has it right. His version is a lot more specific and I know he's got good sources on the lot.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:18 AM on Sunday, July 24, 2005
0 comment
It's funny how this always
It's funny how this always seems to play out, but there's always been a regional/geographical tendency when it comes to print and online journos reporting stories about Hollywood. London journos are the toughest (the tabs can be merciless and sometimes insane, but London's serious critics, essayists and documentary filmmakers have frequently been the most candid and piercing and on-target). New York journos are almost as tough and lacerating as the Londoners but somewhat less so because their editors sometimes "play the game," meaning there's a now-and-then, depending-on-the-shot tendency to sand down the edges and perhaps be a tad more circumspect. And L.A. journos...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:57 AM on Sunday, July 24, 2005
Saturday, July 23, 2005
0 comment
Obliquely racist labelling of Hustle
Obliquely racist labelling of Hustle & Flow is an irritant and a real problem. The always thoughtful and frequently fair-minded David Poland says the Paramount Classics film "still hasn't made a strong move to crossing outside of being an 'urban' success" and that "the international market for black dramas is not strong." The universal humanist chord struck by Hustle & Flow is so obvious and pervasive that calling it an urban black film is like saying Melissa Etheridge is first and foremost a blue-state lesbian singer, Nelson Mandella is first and foremost a black politician and Jesus of Nazareth was first and...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 12:26 PM on Saturday, July 23, 2005
0 comment
No joy in Mudville over
No joy in Mudville over Friday's figures. I was hoping Charlie and the Chocolate Factory would suffer a heavy drop this weekend (for his own good, Tim Burton needs to be bitch-slapped but good), but it took in $9 million on Friday and will probably end up with $25 million or so for the weekend. There's really no accounting for taste, especially when it comes to the family trade. Wedding Crashers is holding quite nicely, on track to earn a bit more than $20 million for the weekend. Hustle & Flow took in $2.7 million on Friday -- you do the math...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:59 AM on Saturday, July 23, 2005
0 comment
Reporting for the New York
Reporting for the New York Times, David Carr is the latest journalist to visit the St. Paul, Minnesota, set of Robert Altman's Prairie Home Companion. He differs, however, with reports about Paul Thomas Anderson acting as some kind of de facto co-director. [See below] Referring to Anderson as "a thin young man [who] kept popping up on Mr. Altman's shoulder during shooting recently," Carr says Anderson "is ostensibly on the set for insurance purposes; Mr. Altman is 80, so a backup director is part of the package." He also quotes Anderson as saying, "Whatever chef is going to take credit for it,...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:37 AM on Saturday, July 23, 2005
0 comment
To many, Carr explains later
To many, Carr explains later in the same New York Times piece, A Prairie Home Companion" is "a kind of secular religion." Robert Altman, the film's director, offers the following assessment: "Garrison [Keillor]'s audience is like the Mel Gibson Jesus audience. This movie is going to play for two weeks in places like Chicken Switch, Arizona, because the program has such strong rural appeal. The cast and myself will have our own audience to draw on. I think given that we have Meryl Streep and Lindsay Lohan, a lot of different people will be curious to see what this movie is about."...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:34 AM on Saturday, July 23, 2005
0 comment
I'm looking to extend my
I'm looking to extend my stay in New York until October or thereabouts, and am therefore looking for another swap arrangement (Manhattanite or Brooklynite takes my place, I take his/hers) starting around 8.25...but Craig's List is going to sleep on me, so I thought I'd post it here. I also posted on this other Craig's List-type website for under-30s called Tribe.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:14 AM on Saturday, July 23, 2005
Friday, July 22, 2005
0 comment
Jim Sheridan's Get Rich or
Jim Sheridan's Get Rich or Die Tryin', the true story of how 50 Cent got out of crime and into a successful rappin' career, is suddenly coming out November 11? Didn't it just finish shooting in Manhattan? Whatever. Here's the trailer. The Paramount release costars 50 Cent, Joy Bryant, Viola Davis, Terrence Howard, Bill Duke and Rhyon Nicole Brown.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 5:54 PM on Friday, July 22, 2005
0 comment
Billy Wilder's Ace in the
Billy Wilder's Ace in the Hole is coming out on DVD through Paramount Home Video sometime in the fall, although the precise date is a little vague. DVD Newsletter's Doug Pratt passed along a date of September 9th, while Paramount's international DVD guy Martin Blythe says he's heard it's "been pushed back" from that date.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 5:49 PM on Friday, July 22, 2005
0 comment
Still The Shit -- High-Fivin' "Hustle & Flow"
Still The Shit
I've written so much about Hustle & Flow I'm starting to bore myself, but this is the weekend and now's the time. I saw it with my son and a couple of his friends at the sneak last Saturday night, and I felt the same satisfied vibe from the people walking out...the same one I've been feeling since last January.
This movie sells ideas about life and creativity that may not be true, but people sure as hell want to believe them...I know that. We've all got pain in our hearts and poetry in our souls and it's never...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 4:39 PM on Friday, July 22, 2005
0 comment
James Mangold's Walk the Line
James Mangold's Walk the Line (20th Century Fox, 11.18) is thought to be primarily a one-man show -- a Johnny Cash biopic with Joaquin Pheonix supposedly giving an ace performance as the famed country singer and...you know, delivering the same kind of panache that Jamie Foxx brought to his portrayal of Ray Charles in Ray. What the film really is, I'm hearing, is more of double-header love story groove about the relationship between Cash and wife June Carter (Reese Witherspoon). I hear that Pheonix and Witherspoon tear it up equally, that Witherspoon gives as good as she gets...and they both do...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 1:05 PM on Friday, July 22, 2005
0 comment
It's looking like Robert Altman's
It's looking like Robert Altman's A Prairie Home Companion, based on a script by Garrison Keillor about various eccentrics taking part in the final broadcast of Keillor's radio show, isn't entirely a Robert Altman film. A 7.20 report by St.Paul Pioneer Press's Chris Hewitt suggests that the still-rolling production is some kind of collaboration between a somewhat weakened Altman and "ghost director" Paul Thomas Anderson. The director of Magnolia and Boogie Nights and a longtime Altman admirer and friend "has no official title, but he works mostly with Altman and the actors, and his director's chair is labeled 'Pinch Hitter,'"...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 12:25 PM on Friday, July 22, 2005
0 comment
Here, in my humble judgment,
Here, in my humble judgment, is the fairest, most fully considered, best-written review of Gus Van Sant's Last Days that's turned up anywhere...except, maybe, for the thing I wrote in Wednesday's column.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:50 AM on Friday, July 22, 2005
Thursday, July 21, 2005
0 comment
Inquisitive, bored-with-the-usual Manhattan filmgoers, take
Inquisitive, bored-with-the-usual Manhattan filmgoers, take note: The Century of the Self, a totally riveting BBC-produced documentary by Adam Curtis (The Power of Nightmares), will begin a run at the Cinema Village on 8.12, and it really must be seen. I've no qualms in calling it the most intriguing, audacious, and insightful study of publicity, mass psychology and Orwellian mind control ever put together. I'm going to re-run a May 2003 piece about it in next Wednesday's (7.27) column -- here's the link for now. It's the third story down...
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 12:33 PM on Thursday, July 21, 2005
0 comment
In a 7.17 WIRED item
In a 7.17 WIRED item [see below] I ran a list of the year's best films so far (the total came to 22), but I should have included one more: Jon Gunn, Brian Herzlinger and Brett Winn's My Date With Drew (DEJ, 8.5), a spritzy, surprisingly spiritual doc about Herzlinger, a struggling schlub in a one-bedroom apartment when the film was shot, trying to somehow arrange a date with Drew Barrymore. I first saw it at the Vail Film Festival in April '04 and wrote about it as follows: "This hand-held camcorder movie plays like a frothy distraction...at first. Then it...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:38 AM on Thursday, July 21, 2005
0 comment
No question that Vanessa Grigoriadis'
No question that Vanessa Grigoriadis' excellent piece in the current New York magazine about unbalanced, seemingly unhinged celebrity behavior ("Celebrity and Its Discontents: A Diagnosis") is going to sell a lot of copies and get talked about all over...especially due to that hilarious cover showing Tomkat in straightjackets. But somewhere in the piece, shouldn't Grigoriadis have acknowledged Andrew Breitbart and Mark Ebner's Hollywood Interrupted, which was the first published diatribe about the trend of celebrities melting down and wacking out? Published in the spring of '04, the book was lively and punchy, but also taken to task here and there...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:41 AM on Thursday, July 21, 2005
0 comment
Kelefa Sanneh has written a
Kelefa Sanneh has written a dissection of Jessica Simpson's "These Boots Are Made For Walkin'" video in a New York Times piece ("These Musical Genres Are Made for Mashing"). The verdict is that this musical Dukes of Hazzard promo is an "odd" collision of musical genres and performers with country fiddles "sawing away over that electronic beat [and a] honky-tonk chorus giving way to a rap section that evokes Gwen Stefani." Sanneh compares Simpson's cut to the Nancy Sinatra/Lee Hazelwood hit single from '65 or thereabouts, and notes that Simpson's "has new verses that turn a scorned woman's vow into...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:33 AM on Thursday, July 21, 2005
Wednesday, July 20, 2005
0 comment
Serious DVD fanatics with the
Serious DVD fanatics with the ability to write concisely and with style should drop a line to HE's Discland editor Jonathan Doyle at jd@storefrontdemme.com. My apologies to Jon for not getting this announcement up sooner.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:16 PM on Wednesday, July 20, 2005
0 comment
Michael Pitt (l.) as the Kurt Cobain-like Blake, with Kim Gordon (wife-partner of Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore) in...Read More
Kurt's Eclipse
Kurt's Eclipse
It took me a while, but I've finally come to see that Gus Van Sant's Last Days (Picturehouse, 7.22) is some kind of great film, and maybe even a masterpiece.
About five weeks before I first saw Last Days at the Cannes Film Festival, I showed Michelangelo Antonioni's L'eclisse (The Eclipse), a stylishly profound piece about alienation and spiritual drainage among the aspiring classes in 1962 Rome, to some UCLA students in a class I was teaching.
Michael Pitt (l.) as the Kurt Cobain-like Blake, with Kim Gordon (wife-partner of Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore) in...
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:12 PM on Wednesday, July 20, 2005
Monday, July 18, 2005
0 comment
It's strange that an eagle-eyed
It's strange that an eagle-eyed New York Times writer like Caryn James would write a piece about how it's totally common these days for journalists to be depicted as slimeballs in movies these days (Cronicas, Paparazzi, Cinderella Man). And note that the last time journalists were shown as heroic or even respectable was nearly 30 years ago in All The President's Men. And yet fail to mention that a fairly major film called Good Night. And, Good Luck (Warner Bros.), due in November, will tell a stirring story of a very noble and moralistic journalist by the name of Edward R. Murrow...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:11 PM on Monday, July 18, 2005
0 comment
Johnny Depp is saying he
Johnny Depp is saying he didn't base his Willy Wonka character on Michael Jackson. "It never entered my mind," Depp allegedly told an interviewer. "Michael Jackson loves children but Willy Wonka doesn't." The actual inspirations, he said, were kiddie TV hosts Captain Kangaroo, Mr. Rogers and Uncle Al. To which I say, trust the art but never the artist.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:00 PM on Monday, July 18, 2005
0 comment
Check out this Hustle &
Check out this Hustle & Flow pay-attention promo thing. Not a trailer -- it just lays out what Craig Brewer's film (Paramount Classics, 7.22) is from an inward thematic perspective. Sums it up, gets it all. But Anthony Anderson, man...cat's gotta get on that treadmill and cut down on whatever he's eatin' 'cause there's a surplus.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 1:39 PM on Monday, July 18, 2005
0 comment
Here's Lewis Beale's assessment in
Here's Lewis Beale's assessment in today's issue of Newsday about the summer slump. He agrees that admissions have been down since '02 (how can he not agree to a fact?) and acknowledges that exhibitors are getting hurt the most, but he also explains how moneybags Hollywood is doing fine. I'm quoted saying the following: "The issue isn't that movie attendance is soft this summer. The issue is that the fundamental idea of 'going out to the movies' is losing its hold on the moviegoing public. Seeing movies in theaters is being slowly depopularized and retired by different groups for different reasons."
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 11:56 AM on Monday, July 18, 2005
0 comment
In the 7.18 New York
In the 7.18 New York Times, reporter Sharon Waxman has an interesting piece about Hollywood trying to tailor its movie content and adapt selling techniques to reach the thriving Christian demo -- i.e., the audience primarily responsibly for turning The Passion of the Christ into a gargantuan hit last year. In paragraph #2, she quotes Mr. and Mrs. Smith director Doug Liman using the term "hip, young cool Christians." Whoa...stop right there. It's all well and good for Hollywood to try and make money any way it can, but can there be such a thing as Christians who are truly "hip and...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:06 AM on Monday, July 18, 2005
Sunday, July 17, 2005
0 comment
Warner Bros. is "fine" with
Warner Bros. is "fine" with the $55 million earned by Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, David Poland wrote today on The Hot Blog, but "they are probably a little put off by a $20 million take on a Friday and not getting to triple that with a family movie." A "little" put off? Then Poland rhetorically inquires, "Will Charlie get a whole new wave of kids who spend the [coming] week talking about the film and from parents of younger kids who hear that the darkness has a strong positive message?" What...he's serious?
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:00 PM on Sunday, July 17, 2005
0 comment
Okay, I was a bit
Okay, I was a bit off. Charlie and the Choclate Factory didn't make $60 million this weekend -- it only hit $55.4 million. Whoa, wait a minute...isn't an 8% Friday-to-Saturday business falloff a tad unusual for a kid-friendly film? I hear thunder clouds. I see Charlie stepping into...good God, quicksand! Oh, and Wedding Crashers hit $32.2 million...excellent start.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 1:16 PM on Sunday, July 17, 2005
0 comment
If anyone knows how to
If anyone knows how to assemble a professional-looking flash ad (taking already created elements within four frames and making them appear in sequence, ad infinitum), please get in touch. I don't know jack about any of this...thanks.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:59 AM on Sunday, July 17, 2005
0 comment
Words from the Flick Filosopher
Words from the Flick Filosopher about Johnny Depp, Michael Jackson and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: "Is Tim Burton going soft in the sentiment lobe? How did a cautionary tale about the bad things that happen to obnoxious little kids turn into a celebration of [tyke obnoxiousness]? How did a celebration of the exuberant spirit of a conscious nonconformity turn into a cautionary tale about the psychosis of reclusive oddballism? Depp's Wonka, with his pale, pasty face and neurotic standoffishness, scarily invokes the Michael Jackson example of social deviance: this is our new idea of unconventionality, as debased and corrupt and possibly...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:35 AM on Sunday, July 17, 2005
0 comment
When I first saw the
When I first saw the photo of former New York cop Lou Eppolito and his partner after their arrest for alleged involvement in mob hits, I knew I'd seen him before. It hit me this morning...it was that five-second quickie cameo in which Eppolito played "Fat Andy" in Goodfellas. Remember that long elaborate steadicam shot in which the camera, assuming Ray Liotta's travelling POV, goes from one wiseguy to the next inside that bamboo-decorated mob hangout? Eppolito is one of the patrons who waves slightly at Liotta and says, in a relaxed and unforced way, "What's up, guy?" Eppolito has played Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:47 AM on Sunday, July 17, 2005
0 comment
Craig Modderno's New York Times
Craig Modderno's New York Times story points out that Chris Mulkey is this year's Jude Law -- '05's most ubiquitous actor who will have "as many as" eight films coming out this year. (I've seen one so far -- Mysterious Skin -- and have't even heard of the other seven.) Nice little IMDB story, fine...even if Modderno fails to mention the one performance that Mulkey will almost certainly be remembered for a hundred or two hundred years from now, the one role that should and in all likelihood will be chiselled into his tombstone: Jack DeVries, the alien-inhabited, roadblock-defying driver of...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:21 AM on Sunday, July 17, 2005
0 comment
People keep telling me at
People keep telling me at parties that "nothing all that good has opened so far this year." They're wrong, they're lazy and they need to wake up. Some of the following picks are about to open or have only shown at festivals, okay, but enough with the talk about this being a dry year. There's been (or will be soon) Gus Van Sant's Last Days, Jacques Audiard's The Beat That My Heart Skipped, Jim Jarmusch's Broken Flowers, David Cronenberg's A History of Violence, the first two-thirds of Wedding Crashers, Fernando Meirelles' The Constant Gardener, Paul Haggis's Crash, Ridley Scott's entirely decent Kingdom of...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 5:28 AM on Sunday, July 17, 2005
Saturday, July 16, 2005
0 comment
The Friday figures suggest Charlie
The Friday figures suggest Charlie and the Chocolate Factory will end up with someting like $60 million for the weekend...probably. And The Wedding Crashers will come across the Sunday night finish line with $28 to $30 million...fine. Any bets about which film is going to experience the heavier dropoff next weekend? Or which will have the longer legs?
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 3:00 PM on Saturday, July 16, 2005
0 comment
In John Horn's July 17th
In John Horn's July 17th L.A. Times piece about Michael Bay's various struggles in the making and marketing of The Island (DreamWorks, 7.22), he describes an early meeting between Bay and the film's producers, Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald, in which Bay "didn't want to discuss cinematography [or] outline stunts...he wanted to argue plot." And then Parkes says, "I was expecting Michael to start talking about shots and cranes and camera rigs, but he was focused on the story and its moral questions. That really surprised me." In other words, Parkes didn't expect Bay to have a single exploratory thought in his...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:34 PM on Saturday, July 16, 2005
Friday, July 15, 2005
92 comments
Johnny Knoxville, Jessica Simpson, Sean William Scott in The Dukes of Hazzard.
Never Got 'Em: Don't Want No "Dukes"
Never Got `Em
The Dukes of Hazzard (Warner Bros., 8.5), a '70s retro redneck fast-car thrillbillie movie that looks like a lotta fun...the kind of fun that comes from sticking needles in your eyes...will be upon us three weeks from today.
I think it's entirely fair to assume the worst with films of this type. I mean, look at the trailer already. Get out the chewing tobacco and clothes pins.
Johnny Knoxville, Jessica Simpson, Sean William Scott in The Dukes of Hazzard.
Does anyone see any indications that this might be Starsky...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 5:46 PM on Friday, July 15, 2005
0 comment
In today's Wall Street Journal,
In today's Wall Street Journal, John Lippman reports that about three and a half weeks ago Warner Bros. agreed to pay $17.5 million to a group of people "who held rights related" to the Dukes of Hazzard TV series. The payout involved a collossal mistake: Warner Bros. and the producers of the upcoming Dukes of Hazzard feature (opening August 5th) never secured the movie rights. The Hazzard TV series itself "was based on a 1975 United Artists film called Moonrunners," Lippman recounts. "Producer Bob Clark acquired [the Moonrunners] script by Gy Waldron, which Waldron also directed. In 1978, Warner Bros. acquired the...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:29 AM on Friday, July 15, 2005
0 comment
Saw The Aristocrats (ThinkFilm, 7.29)
Saw The Aristocrats (ThinkFilm, 7.29) for the second time last night (the first viewing was at Sundance), and it was no less fascinating, subversive or howlingly funny. Take your mother to see this film! Here's a link to my five month old "Wallow In It" Sundance review (scroll down a ways) and here's the trailer. My favorite highlights, in this order, are (a) Kevin Pollak doing Chris Walken telling the Aristocrats joke ("It's...crazy!"); (b) Gilbert Gottfried doing the joke just after 9.11 at a Manhattan Friar's Club roast (also a bit in which Gottfried explains why a...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:24 AM on Friday, July 15, 2005
0 comment
I'm looking for readers to
I'm looking for readers to send in some tight 75 to 100-word reactions to Hustle & Flow, which is sneaking tomorrow night (Saturday, 7.16) in, I'm guessing, mostly urban areas. I'm wondering how "ethnic" everyone thinks this film actually is. I think Hustle & Flow is basically a feel-good formula thing that anyone can get into...it's about finding your groove, spiritual discovery, emotional openings and happy endings. And please share how it seems to play with whatever kind of audience (ethnicity, presumed income levels, etc.) you happen to see it with...thanks.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:03 AM on Friday, July 15, 2005
0 comment
"As Jeremy Klein, a cad
"As Jeremy Klein, a cad who crashes weddings for those available, single women, [Vince Vaughn] is a cad and a half. And he can motormouth like a machine gun, spraying men, women and children with manic, rat-a-tat outbursts of toxic insincerity. It's often dirty, yes. But it's also manic and inspired." -- Washington Post critic Desson Thomson on Vaughn's phenomenal performance in The Wedding Crashers.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 5:50 AM on Friday, July 15, 2005
Thursday, July 14, 2005
0 comment
DreamWork's The Island still isn't
DreamWork's The Island still isn't tracking -- the hoped-for boost from last Saturday night's nationwide sneak simply didn't happen. Everything has been tried, loads of TV ad money has been spent trying to get it off the runway and it's just not taking. Awareness and interest is also on the low side for Rob Cohen's Stealth (Columbia, 7.29), according to recent data...despite Jamie Foxx (a costar along with Josh Lucas) being front-and-center in the trailer. Opening tracking figures on Warner Bros.' The Dukes of Hazzard showed a 72% general awareness, a 36% definite interest and 5% first-choice...which is pretty good for a movie...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 12:03 PM on Thursday, July 14, 2005
0 comment
I'm repeating myself but I
I'm repeating myself but I want to be clear that a source in Laura Kim's office at Warner Independent didn't tell me when I spoke to her on Wednesday that Douglas McGrath's Truman Capote biopic, which isn't being released until September '06, has been retitled Have You Heard? and is therefore no longer being called Every Word is True.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 11:31 AM on Thursday, July 14, 2005
0 comment
Former Dukes of Hazzard costar
Former Dukes of Hazzard costar Ben Jones (a.k.a., "Crazy Cooter") can tut-tut all he wants about the upcoming Warner Bros. film version having too much sex and profanity and trashing the legacy of the TV series...nobody's listening. The first taste of tracking data on The Dukes of Hazzard (8.5) will be available later today, but I can smell the wanna-see from here. For me, it's the latest Al Qeada recruitment film disguised as the Return of the Stupid Redneck Movie. Burt Reynolds starred in nearly all of these dumb-ass things (in fact, making too many of them is what killed his...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:19 AM on Thursday, July 14, 2005
0 comment
All of those '70s Burt
All of those '70s Burt Reynolds redneck movies and their relations were shit, of course...and of course no one remembers or would dare to think about remaking a certain Lamont Johnson flick that did it first and best and pretty much inspired the blue-collar, wild-ass, hot-babe-riding-shotgun, moonshine-in-the-trunk, outrunning-the-local-fuzz genre. I'm speaking of a quality film about a scrappy southern guy with an appetite for speed and souped-up cars -- a dude who makes a semblance of a living smuggling moonshine before becoming a famous stock-car racer -- called The Last American Hero ('73). It starred Jeff Bridges, Valerie Perrine, Ned Beatty, Gary Busey...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:19 AM on Thursday, July 14, 2005
0 comment
The inspiration for Lamont Johnson's
The inspiration for Lamont Johnson's film was, of course, Tom Wolfe's legendary 1965 Esquire article about famed stockcar racer Junior Johnson ("The Last American Hero is Junior Johnson. Yes!"). It's a great piece and the whole article is right here. Please read it...it's fantastic. Articles like this one and films like The Last American Hero make me momentarily forget about red-state attitudes and even inspire admiration for the vitality of working-class types and blue-collar culture. They make me briefly ashamed of having used terms like "redneck." It's not genuine Americana that I hate -- it's the degraded, stupid-ass, hee-haw stuff peddled...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:30 AM on Thursday, July 14, 2005
0 comment
It's a good thing, of
It's a good thing, of course, that AMC Theatres has decided not to show Thinkfilm's The Aristocrats in Atlanta and Chicago, as stories about this will up the want-to-see among people who otherwise might not have paid any attention. Everyone needs to see this thing. It's not what I would call hugely funny at first, but it gets funnier and skankier and more creative as it goes along, and gradually you just succumb. Not a movie that enobles the human experience, exactly, and yet it is that in a certain way...it's a celebration of particularity most perverse.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 5:52 AM on Thursday, July 14, 2005
Wednesday, July 13, 2005
0 comment
Is "Charlie" The Beginning of End for Burton?
Groaning with Charlie
I have a very strong if fragmented opinion of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. That's because I saw only the opening 35 minutes last Thursday evening, so take these words with a grain of salt and read someone else for an in-depth review.
But I know what I know, darn it, and I've always been able to spot problematic movies in ten minutes or less (just like I can tell if a script is any good or not after reading the first ten pages), and for whatever this method or impression may be worth to readers, I despised this...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 3:22 PM on Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Tuesday, July 12, 2005
0 comment
This is just an industry
This is just an industry thing, but the other shoe finally dropped at Paramount today when it was announced that Rob Friedman is leaving his job as Paramount's COO and vice chairman "to pursue other interests," which basically means he's been shown the door. The reason, I'm told, is because Tom Freston, the Viacom president and COO who hired Brad Grey as Parammount's chairman and CEO and who basically calls the shots, has a "history" with Freidman from the era when he ran the Viacom-owned MTV Networks. "When Freston was running MTV and he was trying to get stuff done under Sherry Lansing,"...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 1:01 PM on Tuesday, July 12, 2005
0 comment
Warner Home Video deserves a
Warner Home Video deserves a hearty thanks for making Arthur Penn's Night Moves available and looking spiffy on DVD starting today. WHV made another excellent move last Tuesday (7.5) when they released a first-rate DVD of John Boorman's highly-respected noir Point Blank. It's truly an excellent thing that these long-absent classics are finally out and gettable...even if I was told "sorry, we don't have it" seven times last weekend during a painstaking search to find and buy the Point Blank DVD. (More about this in a piece running Wednesday, 7.13.)
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:36 AM on Tuesday, July 12, 2005
0 comment
Let me get this straight:
Let me get this straight: the perfectly dreadful Fantastic Four, a film so awful it makes you briefly toy with the idea of never going to a movie again, made $56.1 million last weekend and because people just blindly paid to see to this piece of shit despite overwhelming indications they were in for a bad time...this means the slump is over? The forces driving The Big Fade are not going to turn on the fortunes of a single crappy movie, trust me. I'll say it again -- it's not the money, it's the attendance. '05 theater admissions are down about 10.4%...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:21 AM on Tuesday, July 12, 2005
Monday, July 11, 2005
0 comment
For the first time since
For the first time since this site launched last August, I'm posting two new hot links sections -- "Essentials" (around 50 of the usual-usuals) and "Eye-Openers" (striking, different, noteworthy...whatever) on the lower-right margin, below the fold. They'll be up in the early evening. I'm open to any suggestions from anyone about any new links I should be posting, etc.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 3:05 PM on Monday, July 11, 2005
0 comment
Would anyone besides myself be
Would anyone besides myself be pleasantly startled if Paramount Classics' Hustle & Flow out-performs Michael Bay's The Island (DreamWorks) and Richard Linklater's The Bad News Bears when all three open the weekend after next? Not a higher national gross but a much higher per-screen average, I mean. I'm not saying the Bay or the Linklater film won't be #1 (either one could surge over the next eleven days), but the statistical fact is that The Island didn't get that much of a benefit out of last Saturday's nationwide sneak (60% general awarness, 25% definite interest and 2% first choice as of Sunday, 7.10)....Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:51 PM on Monday, July 11, 2005
0 comment
No change in tracking for
No change in tracking for the coming weekend. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Warner Bros., 7.15), the first choice of 27% of likely moviegoers, will be the easy victor. And yet the numbers for Wedding Crashers have risen (definite interest is 17%) since last week, and the prognosis is for an opening in the mid $20 million range. It's odd how many people have weighed in against this flawed but hugely funny film since...well, since I ran that qualified rave (first two thirds terrific, last third not-so-hot but it bounces back at the finish) last Friday. This thing is funny...what's everyone being so...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 1:35 PM on Monday, July 11, 2005
Sunday, July 10, 2005
0 comment
If something like this had
If something like this had been in March of the Penguins, soreheads like me wouldn't have disliked it so much. And I don't care if it was originally posted by Movie City News columnist Ray Pride...
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:01 PM on Sunday, July 10, 2005
0 comment
You can tell from reading
You can tell from reading Zach Helm's script of Stranger Than Fiction that the movie, being directed by Marc Forster, will probably be a good score for everyone involved, including star Will Ferrell, when Columbia releases it next year. And Ferrell will kick ass in The Producers: The Movie Musical (Universal, 12.23) in the Franz Leibkind role -- i.e., the one played by Kenneth Mars in Mel Brooks' 1968 original. But it must be said right now that Ferrell is in trouble. Partly due to over-exposure (appearances in five films in '05 not counting the un-released Winter Passing and The Wendell Baker Story)....Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:26 PM on Sunday, July 10, 2005
0 comment
Pithy observation here from New
Pithy observation here from New York Times critic Tony Scott in a piece about the differences in the way films are sold, absorbed and processed between the '70s and now. "The window between the theatrical and DVD release is now shorter than a successful first run used to be," he writes. "Even the term 'first run' has a ring of almost vaudevillian antiquity. There is now a pre-release sprint that leaves audiences (and journalists and publicists) winded by opening day. Three weeks later, the picture is a fading memory. Here I am still going on about War of the Worlds, which...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:14 PM on Sunday, July 10, 2005
0 comment
Wedding Crashers costar Owen Wilson
Wedding Crashers costar Owen Wilson is asked by Hollywood Hitlist columnist Gregory Ellwood about his "Butterscotch Stallion" nickname in this recently-posted interview on MSN. Owen's reply: "I love that. It has to be one of the most ridiculous, insane nicknames, but some of my friends have really picked up on it. I think they know it's kind of humiliating to me."
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:07 PM on Sunday, July 10, 2005
0 comment
Apologies for the Saturday screw-up,
Apologies for the Saturday screw-up, i.e., accidentially posting Jett's reaction to The Beat That My Heart Skipped in WIRED...stupid. I did it through a dial-up in connection from Connecticut and tried right away to remove it...obviously the effort failed.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:02 PM on Sunday, July 10, 2005
Friday, July 8, 2005
0 comment
Immaculate deception: Owen Wilson and Vince Vaugh in David Dobkin's Wedding Crashers
Here They Come....Wedding Crashers!
Here They Come...
That Vince Vaughn profile in the current Newsweek doesn't lie. His performance as a motor-mouthed, totally scheming hound in Wedding Crashers -- a very sharp, at times inspired comic romp -- is so hilarious at times that it feels off the earth.
I was saying to myself during last night's press screening, "This is astounding...the great dialogue just keeps blasting away and Vaughn isn't missing a beat."
Immaculate deception: Owen Wilson and Vince Vaugh in David Dobkin's Wedding Crashers
It's not just Vaughn, of course, but...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:50 AM on Friday, July 8, 2005
Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
The reason Michael Bay's The
The reason Michael Bay's The Island (DreamWorks, 7.22) is sneaking nationwide this Saturday (7.9) is because it's not tracking very well, partly because Ewan MacGregor and Scarlett Johansson are "industry stars" who don't put butts in seats. I hear it's not quite the greatest film of the 21st Century, but it must be doing fairly well with Average-Joe audiences or they wouldn't sneak it to begin with.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 12:26 PM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
On the other end there's
On the other end there's Wedding Crashers (New Line, 7.15), a comedy that's tracking decently but not tremendously (i.e., it's more or less where Monster-in-Law was a week before its release) and could probably use the exposure of a nationwide sneak....but it's not getting one. This despite the fact it's opening only eight days from now and has been getting great word of mouth. I guess New Line is figuring they're going to get whipped next weekend by Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Warner Bros., 7.15) anyway, so why go nuts trying to be the #1 film when the word-of-mouth is going to...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 12:22 PM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
I'm presuming Ryan Phillipe got
I'm presuming Ryan Phillipe got cast in Cint Eastwood's Flags of Our Fathers because he was exceptional in Paul Haggis's Crash (as Matt Dillon's rookie-cop partner), and that particular attention was paid because Haggis wrote Million Dollar Baby, etc. And I'm figuring Jesse Bradford was also brought aboard because of his performance in Chris Terrio's Heights . I have to say I detected modest intelligence levels, at best, and a very low energy reading from Bradford's acting in that recent, relatively unsuccessful New York drama. Look deep into Bradford's dark eyes and there's nobody home....blanko.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:40 AM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
What's with the comma in
What's with the comma in George Clooney's Good Night and, Good Luck, the Edward R. Murrow vs. Joseph McCarthy drama that I've blurbed a couple of times? The comma after the "and" is there to suggest the pause that Murrow used before saying "good luck" on the air, but wouldn't an ellipses be better? And is it "Goodnight" or "Good Night"? Pic is a Warner Independent release, having been deemed too indie-ish and dialogue-driven for regular-ass Warner Bros. It's due in November (a friendly lady in Laura Kim's office just told me this) and you've gotta figure it'll play the Toronto Film Festival.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:24 AM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
Here's the best rundown I've
Here's the best rundown I've read about the story and the meaning of Craig Brewer's Black Snake Moan. It's from Brewer himself in a long response to a question from Black Film correspondent Wilson Morales. The IMDB says the Paramount Classics film, due in '06 with Samuel L. Jackson and Christina Ricci in the leads, is about "a white nymphomaniac" being "cured of her disorder by an older black bluesman." Like everyone else I had interpreted the title in sexual terms (remember that actor in Full Metal Jacket exhibiting his appendage to a Vietnamese prostitute and calling it a specimen of "Alabama...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:06 AM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
Leonardo DiCaprio's Appian Way wants
Leonardo DiCaprio's Appian Way wants to produce a movie of Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle...cool. I have had the image of an Ice-Nine catastrophe -- all of the world's oceans, rivers and great lakes suddenly freezing solid in a massive chain-reaction -- sitting in my head since reading Vonnegut's novel 30-something years ago. Claude Brodesser's Variety story describes the plot as being about "a race to recover the world's most dangerous substance, Ice-Nine, a new form of ice that freezes at room temperature." Vonnegut's book explains that Ice-Nine, created by a character named Felix Hoenikker, is capable of creating a chain reaction that...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:43 AM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
Speaking of DiCaprio, what's happening
Speaking of DiCaprio, what's happening with his intention to produce a film about (and perhaps play) LSD guru Dr. Timothy Leary? Work on a script was begun late last year by L.M. Kit Carson. I know because Kit told me, and because I urged Carson to research it by wading into a book by Jay Stevens called Storming Heaven: LSD and the American Dream, which is by far the most comprehensive and fascinating account of the '60s psychedelic movement I've ever read. I mentioned it to DiCaprio when I saw him at a party last February in Santa Barbara, and was...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:29 AM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
Don't believe that David Poland
Don't believe that David Poland clique saying there's no box-office slump. There is a slump, there is a slump...the average gross per movie has been on a decline since '03 and average attendance per film has been dropping steadily since '01. It's the attendance, stupid -- the actual number of people showing up at theatres is dropping year after year.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:06 AM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
Plexes should extend that satisfaction-or-your-money-back
Plexes should extend that satisfaction-or-your-money-back offer for all films, all the time...except for big crowd-pleasers like Fantastic Four, Bewitched, etc. Nobody will lose any money (it's been reported that only a relative handful have asked AMC and Cinemark theatre staffers for their money back after seeing Cinderella Man) and it might goose things up a bit.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:16 AM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
0 comment
Another way of boosting theatre
Another way of boosting theatre biz would be to adopt my idea of selling time-passes to plexes, in which the patron buys a ticket to a particular film but also, for an extra two or three bucks, buys a pass permitting him/her to wander around from theatre to theatre free and clear in order to sample the various attractions or simply see another film. I do this all the time under the ushers' noses. If I don't like something, I slip out and try some other film...or I see pieces of two or three films, just to get an idea of how they...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:07 AM on Thursday, July 7, 2005
Wednesday, July 6, 2005
725 comments
End of Something
End of Something
There's more than a sense of unease in theatres across the land this summer. It's something like mild panic, and is based upon fears that the "slump" affecting ticket sales this summer isn't a slump but something more fundamental.
I'm not saying anything new here, but stories about the months-long slump keep coming and the authors keep missing the overall picture. The issue isn't that movie attendance is "soft" this summer. The issue is that the fundamental idea of going out to the movies is losing its hold on the film-going populace. And I may be way behind the curve...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 3:43 PM on Wednesday, July 6, 2005
0 comment
Forget the talk that Cruise's
Forget the talk that Cruise's cultish orgasms of late have sabotaged War of the Worlds. The real reason it's underperforming is the putrid word of mouth. I've had no less than SIX friends call me immediately after seeing it, pissed at the typical Spielberg tacked-on ending. And when I say pissed, I mean incensed. His hackneyed amending of A.I. was legendarily bad, and the buzz is that this is on par with that. Kubrick is nodding vigorously in his grave.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:51 PM on Wednesday, July 6, 2005
Tuesday, July 5, 2005
0 comment
Nine years after I saw
Nine years after I saw Swingers and right after wrote a Mr. Showbiz piece insisting that this then-svelte, 77-inch-tall actor was the hot new guy, Vince Vaughn has been toasted with his very own Newsweek profile by Devin Gordon, who calls him an attitude comedian who's finally come into his own. The story is basically a tribute to Vaughn's allegedly very cool performance in The Wedding Crashers (which nearly every journo and media person in Manhattan will finally get to see this Thursday evening), but why do I have this feeling that the Newsweek editors decided to okay the piece only...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 3:16 PM on Tuesday, July 5, 2005
0 comment
Does everyone understand what happened
Does everyone understand what happened last weekend to poor George Romero? On its second weekend Romero's Land of the Dead nose-dived 73.4% and ended up with a $16,209,660 cume. This doesn't just mean that younger audiences didn't care for Romero's film, but also that his zombie visions are out-of-synch with the times. The old-fogey, slow-shuffling zombies who made their legendary debut in Romero's Night of the Living Dead 37 years ago are done for -- the fast-sprinting zombies in Danny Doyle's 28 Days Later and the ones in Zack Snyder's Dawn of the Dead remake obviously have struck more of a chord....Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 2:44 PM on Tuesday, July 5, 2005
0 comment
I've gotta jump into this
I've gotta jump into this reporters-going-to-jail thing for a second. It's too bad that special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald is being a total prick and urging that Time reporter Matthew Cooper and the New York Times reporter Judith Miller be sent to the slammer for refusing to cooperate with a grand jury investigating the outing of Valerie Plame as a covert C.I.A. operative. It's a little bit wimpy for Cooper and Miller to ask to be sent to a couple of summer-camp prisons, but it's still incredibly shitty of Fitzgerald to say no, fuck you, do your time with hard-core cons in a...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 1:55 PM on Tuesday, July 5, 2005
0 comment
A survey of moviegoer response
A survey of moviegoer response to War of the Worlds done last week (or weekend) is coming up "fair," which is roughly equivalent to a CinemaScore rating of about 70. This means it's going to see a fairly steep drop in business next weekend -- not catastrophic but precipitous.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 12:10 PM on Tuesday, July 5, 2005
0 comment
In Sharon Waxman's latest box-office-slump
In Sharon Waxman's latest box-office-slump story in the N.Y. Times, she reports that Paramount executives are seeing no evidence of any War of the Worlds revenue slippage due to Tom Cruise's eccentric behavior on the promo circuit. "[Cruise's] audience came out in greater numbers than ever before" for this film, Paramount vice-chairman Rob Friedman tells Waxman. "I think the world separates the star and celebrity from a movie actor and the performance on screen, and this shows that completely." I'm hearing this is precisely what Par execs are not discerning in the tea leaves. I'm told there's been some muttering in...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:56 AM on Tuesday, July 5, 2005
0 comment
"Like the rivets popping off
"Like the rivets popping off the wing of an airliner"....good one! The Tom Wolfe-ian wordsmith is D.J. LaChapelle, webmaster for TomCruiseIsNuts.com. The quote was given to Daily News "Lowdown" columnist Lloyd Grove: "What really inspired us was Tom's appearance on the Today show. His body language, the way he got in Matt Lauer's face -- it was all pretty amazing. Watching one of America's best actors coming unglued -- like the rivets popping off the wing of an airliner -- there's a kind of fascination."
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:53 AM on Tuesday, July 5, 2005
Monday, July 4, 2005
0 comment
That $113.3 million that War
That $113.3 million that War of the Worlds earned over the last six days since opening last Wednesday (6.29) may sound good in the trade stories, but believe me, Paramount distribution execs are disappointed. "They're crying about this," a marketing veteran is telling me, because "they didn't make the $150 million they were hoping for over the first six days." And now they're probably looking at only $200 million or a bit more domestically. (They'll have $150 or $160 million by the end of next weekend, and then the fall-off will kick in more severely.) Add in video and foreign and they're looking...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 12:37 PM on Monday, July 4, 2005
0 comment
I'm hearing "no," "forget it,"
I'm hearing "no," "forget it," "terrible," etc. on Fantastic Four (20th Century Fox, 7.8), which I never wanted to see anyway, and a friend of a close relation is saying Walter Salles' Dark Water (Disney, 7.8) doesn't make it. (How could that be? The hand of Walter Salles has been nothing if not assured in his past films.) I'd normally wait and make my own calls in the proper time frame, but there haven't been any Manhattan screening invites in my inbox. The downbeat Dark Water word will probably translate into a weak box-office showing, but Fantastic Four is expected to debut hugely.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:40 AM on Monday, July 4, 2005
0 comment
That concern I expressed about
That concern I expressed about Cameron Crowe possibly allowing for a Walter Parkes-styled pruning of Elizabethtown (Paramount, 10.14) is, I'm told, not a concern. The panic spasms began with Crowe telling Benjamin Wagner of MTV News that "the movie's still a little long" and that test screeners are asking what parts can be cut out, etc. (See 7.2 Word item about the "long and important" version.) But just after that Word item ran I heard Crowe recently threw together "an experimental short cut" for his team to consider, and that after this screening it "[they] all looked at each...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:51 AM on Monday, July 4, 2005
0 comment
"Making people laugh is the
"Making people laugh is the lowest form of humor." -- the late and very wise Michael O'Donoghue.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 6:14 AM on Monday, July 4, 2005
0 comment
Yesterday's Sunday New York Times
Yesterday's Sunday New York Times piece by Jake Tapper about the continuing pattern of degradation for the National Lampoon "brand" had, of course, a familiar ring. The dumbing down of Lampoon-provided humor began 27 years ago with the success of National Lampoon's Animal House (1978) and, at the command of thick-fingered-vulgarian publisher Matty Simmons, changing the long-since-disappeared magazine's orientation from something to be savored by witty hipsters to one that was basically about hormones and getting laid. Tapper's article starts by mentioning one of those celebrate-the-inner-gorilla recreational events for spring-breakers on South Padre Island, Texas, called the National Lampoon Greek Games. "Greek...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 5:11 AM on Monday, July 4, 2005
Saturday, July 2, 2005
0 comment
All day yesterday I was
All day yesterday I was chipping away at a lead piece about Jacques Audiard's The Beat That My Heart Skipped but it never quie got there. One of the hang-ups was trying to explain in plain terms the half-feral, curiously charismatic quality that Romain Duris brings to his lead role. I guess I'll post next Wednesday (7.6), but in the meantime know that this reimagining of James Toback's Fingers is truly one of the year's best. (Along with Hustle & Flow, Cinderella Man, Grizzly Man, Mad Hot Ballroom Crash, Cronicas, The Beautiful Country and ...I'm a little surprised I'm including this...Last...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 8:09 AM on Saturday, July 2, 2005
0 comment
In an interview with MTV
In an interview with MTV News' Benjamin Wagner, Elzabethtown director-writer Cameron Crowe says "the movie's still a little long." Wagner goes "no!" and Crowe says, "The guy who runs the focus group asks, 'What would you cut out?' And the group immediately starts arguing. One person says, 'Well you can cut this' and someone else says, 'Are you crazy? You can't cut that!' Then this girl says, 'Well, you know, it's really hard to know where to cut 'cause it's long and important.' So we've been joking about that. We called the cut 'long and important.' But it can't be...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:15 AM on Saturday, July 2, 2005
Friday, July 1, 2005
0 comment
Didn't Quentin Tarantino speak about writing...Read More
Russell "Surfer" Story is Bullshit
Will Russell Surf?
Would you believe David O. Russell as the director of a big pandering Silver Surfer flick? Does this play even as a radical idea? Can anyone envision an impassioned eccentric like Russell working for a nuts-and-bolts type like Avi Arad?
Consider this interview with Arad, chairman and CEO of Marvel Studios, that ran on MTV.com about ten days ago. In the piece, written by Larry Carroll, Arad is asked who might direct the Surfer flick, which will apparently begin shooting either later this year or early next.
Didn't Quentin Tarantino speak about writing...
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 4:00 PM on Friday, July 1, 2005
0 comment
Research-screening numbers for The Wedding
Research-screening numbers for The Wedding Crashers (New Line, 7.15) have always been fairly high but yesterday's (6.30) tracking report says that awareness levels are just okay...not any better than they were for Monster-in-Law two weeks out. Since it's playing well, the obvious solution would be to sneak it next weekend.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:22 AM on Friday, July 1, 2005
0 comment
Tim Burton's Charlie and the
Tim Burton's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Warner Bros., 7.15) is tracking very big. The trailer makes it groaningly clear this is one of those heavily painted, what-you-see-is-what-you-get films...which American audiences have alway tended to wet themselves over. I guess I'm different because it definitely gave me pause. Is Burton over? Is it fair to ask if he has another Ed Wood, Edward Scissorhands or Beetlejice in him? I wonder.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 10:07 AM on Friday, July 1, 2005
0 comment
Jett says he's sick to
Jett says he's sick to death of superhero team-spirit movies and that Tim Story's Fantastic Four flick (20th Century Fox, 7.8) is therefore going to suck it next weekend. The tracking says he's wrong -- it'll end up somewhere in the mid $30 million range....maybe higher. Jett's age group isn't the target audience anyway; this is more of a family-trade film for the not-very-hip.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 9:23 AM on Friday, July 1, 2005
0 comment
Okay, all right...the Butterscotch Stallion,
Okay, all right...the Butterscotch Stallion, the Butterscotch Stallion, the Butterscotch Stallion...the whirlwind holy-hell Butterscotch Stallion! It's like one of those songs that get into your head and you can't flush out to save your life. I paid no attention to the original "Page Six" item when it ran a week ago last Tuesday (6.21) but now it's stuck in my head and it won't go away. And here comes The Wedding Crashers (New Line, 7.15) to keep it all going.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 7:45 AM on Friday, July 1, 2005
0 comment
Those Tom O'Neil calls about
Those Tom O'Neil calls about the lead Oscar ponies are way early, obviously, but they sound reasonable. It's cool that O'Neil shares my excitement about George Clooney's Goodnight, and Good Luck (Warner Bros., October) as something that might warrant excitement. It may sound presumptuous to speculate that David Straitharn's portrayal of Edward R. Murrow during his ethical showdown against Sen. Joseph McCarthy might (who knows?) punch through on its own terms...but when has Straitharn ever dropped the ball? I've only one concern: Murrow's mystique was very dependent upon the sound of that soothingly authoritative voice of his and I'm wondering...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 5:19 AM on Friday, July 1, 2005
0 comment
It needs to be clearly
It needs to be clearly understood as far in advance as possible that The Legend of Zorro, the Antonio Banderas-Catherine Zeta-Jones movie called coming out on 10.18, should not expect and won't in fact get any support from this corner. Pay no attention to that earnestly-reported here-comes-Zorro piece by Lewis Beale that ran in the L.A. Times Calendar section on 6.28. The original Martin Campbell Zorro movie was self-consciously flamboyant crap and a creative embarassment all around, and it gave rise to the money-grubbing, T-Mobile-hawking career of Catherine Zeta Jones, certainly one of the biggest capitalist-pig actresses of our time. One...Read More
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 4:52 AM on Friday, July 1, 2005
0 comment
Architecture doesn't make me tear
Architecture doesn't make me tear up like movies do, but I can't suppress this, can't keep it down any longer: I feel crestfallen when I look at the new Freedom Tower design. The building itself is okay, but that pointy, top-of-the-building thing looks inelegant...like a hypodermic needle drawn by a nine year-old. That off-center, see-through beacon thing that sat on top of the old Freedom Tower design (i.e., the one announced on 12.20.03) was much more striking for its delicacy and unusualness....it really had something. The newly designed one feels too square and so-whatty.
posted by Jeffrey Wells at 4:31 AM on Friday, July 1, 2005