I linked yesterday to a Robert Novak story about Steven Spielberg back-assing away from a perception that he’s more or less behind Sen. Barack Obama in order to sidestep into an open-minded posture about Hilary Clinton, etc. According to Slate‘s Kim Masters, a suspicion in the Obama faction is that the story (which Masters ridicules) “came from the Clinton camp, eager to put a stop to the ‘Hillary Hemorrhages Hollywood Support‘ stories.

“In a recent visit to town, Clinton campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe conveyed the notion that folks should pick sides now. Most aren’t. In fact, McAuliffe’s admonishment prompted Norman Lear, who, like many, is contributing to multiple candidates, to ask a Los Angeles Times reporter, ‘What’s Hillary going to do? Jail me?'”

I take a deep breath every time I click on a story on MTV.com, because I know what a groaning pain in the ass it is to wait for all the slick-ass visual razmatazz to load. But I did it anyway today because I wanted to read about Judd Apatow‘s (and Jake Kasdan‘s) Walk Hard, a put-on musical biopic in the vein of Ray, Walk the Line, Selena and Great Balls of Fire. It’s about a fake music-industry giant called Dewey Cox (John C. Reilly), and I’ll tell you right now it’s going to be obvious and arch and not terribly funny, and the songs aren’t going to be all that hot either.

The whole The Number 23 mystique goes right out the window if this all-media screening at the Grove starts at 7:26 or 7:28 pm. As far as the media people attending are concerned, that is. It has to start at exactly 7:23 pm or nothing.

It’s a four-day weekend coming up (i.e., President’s Day on Monday) so the figures will be that much higher. Mark Steven Johnson‘s Ghost Riders (Sony, 2.16), the Nic Cage-with-a-bad-wig fantasy-actioner, will be through the roof with roughly $40 million — 91 general awareness, 42 definite interest, 25 first choice. Music and Lyrics, a reasonably decent romance that’s opening tomorrow, will do modest to decent business ($15 million?) over the four days. Tyler Perry’s Daddy’s Little Girls is tracking okay for a film appealing to a niche audience (i.e., not expected to get across-the-board support) — 42,37 and 6.

Breach is at 30. 31 and 4….not so hot. Disney’s Bridge to Terabithia is tracking well for a famil film…63 general, 29 definite interest.

Paramount’s Zodiac opens on 3.2.07 (two weeks from this coming weekend), and is at 47, 27 and 3. It’s not looking like a disaster but nether is it expected to do better than fair-to-decent business. The expected rave reviews could help to change things somewhat. Paramount clearly doesn’t believe in it all that much — they’re looking for an opening-weekend fast-burn by lying to people that it’s the latest hot-stuff thriller from the Se7en/Panic Room/Fight Club guy, when the truth is that Zodiac is a richer, artier, much more high-level adult work than any of these films. Paramount has a gold-pedigree film on their hands and they’re looking to sell it as an amped-up popcorn thriller, which is a one-weekend-and-you’re-done strategy.

Joel Schumacher and Jim Carrey‘s Number 23 (opening 2.23, or the weekend after next) is at 55, 37 and 5.

Stax at IGN has “exclusively learned that J.J. Abrams is poised to direct The Dark Tower, based on the Stephen King literary series.” Imagine going ahead with a project that sounds so Tolkien-esque and not feeling the least bit chastened or embarassed about it. Remarkable. “Sources also added that Abrams is indeed only producing Star Trek XI,” Stax also reports. “It was recently reported that Abrams would not direct Trek XI, as many had assumed, but would instead turn his attention to a secret Paramount project titled Cloverfield.” Am I misreading things, or is Abrams looking to become like Joss Whedon II, i.e., a seemingly stuck-on-himself, cheeseball sci-fi/fantasy schlock whore?

I know when to leave well enough alone so I’m not posting this diseased music video out of an inability to restrain myself — Bilge Ebiri did and I’m merely linking to it. Nonetheless, I trust this won’t inhibit anyone from writing belittling responses in the direction of HE. And by all means, ignore what this video portends.

As Ebiri puts it, “The man is on his way to winning an Oscar and he’s got the Number 1 movie in America [i.e., Norbit]. So now’s as good a time as any to resurrect Eddie Murphy‘s bizarre Michael Jackson collaboration ‘Whatzupwitu.’ No, those aren’t shrooms you just ate. The video really is that weird.”

I realize there are haters out there, and I think we all need to hold hands and shut them out of our consciousness. It’s my earnest belief that any person who hangs, consorts and cross-promotes with Jackostein deserves the full respect and support of his entertainment-industry peers.

N.Y. Times “Screens” blogger Virginia Heffernan has offered a comparison between “the astringent story about Anna Nicole Smith‘s death that appeared in the paper on Friday with the Times‘s misty obit for Marilyn Monroe” that ran on August 6, 1962. What a difference.

“The only thing that separates me from being up here and living in my mother’s basement is Bill Weinstein,” Michael Arndt said after winning the the WGA award for Best Original Screenplay the night before last. The Little Miss Sunshine author noted Weinstein’s steady, early enthusiasm for LMS and his support through the four or five years of trying to get the movie made. (Note: this item was stolen from Anne Thompson‘s Riskybiz blog.]

With ’08 election fever starting to heat up, James D. Stern and Adam Del Deo‘s …So Goes The Nation, which is out on DVD today, might attract fresh interest. As I noted last fall, the doc “explains in the frankest terms imaginable how the John Kerry campaign blew it big-time with the middle American voting public, and how cagey and brilliant the Bushies were at almost every turn.”

Distributed/produced by IFC First Take and Genius Entertainment.

The two things that come through on the doc are the fact that (a) many millions of Americans out there are living in states of appalling ignorance and religious superstition and are therefore ripe for shrewd exploitation, and (b) the Kerry people made so many mistakes it’s hard to keep track of them all, even in a doc as lucid and well-organized as this one.”

On Monday, 2.26 (i.e., the day after the Oscars), Manhattan’s Museum of Television& Radio is presenting “The Unseen Dylan: Newly Restored Outtakes from Don’t Look Back,” with an introduction by Patti Smith and “rare footage” presented by the doc’s director D.A. Pennebaker. MTV exec vp Bill Flanagan and On The Road with Bob Dylan author Larry Sloman will also attend. (A NY staffer said there are no plans for this presentation to happen at MTR’s Beverly Hills location.) It’s all a promo for the Bob Dylan: Dont Look Back — 65 Tour Deluxe Edition DVD that “streets” the next day.

Patrick Goldstein‘s latest “Big Picture” L.A. Times column is about CNN talk-show host and whorish, suspender-wearing blurbmeister Larry King. Talk about shooting fish in a barrel, or is it more of a case of “give him enough rope…”?

Goldstein is, I feel, derelict by failing to mention a clearly understood fact: when a movie ad uses a Larry King rave, it’s an almost-certain tipoff that the movie has problems. Anyone with half a clue about the movie business understands this.

“King sometimes will even blurb a movie he didn’t like,” Goldstein observes. “At lunch, he told me of the time he and Shawn Southwick, his sixth wife, took their two boys to see Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. ‘I had no idea what was going on,’ he says. ‘I turned to my wife and said, what is this movie about? I don’t get it.'”

(I get it. POTC: DMC is basically about the sheer wondrousness of Gore Verbinksi‘s creative vision and relentless perfectionism, no matter how long the final cut runs, plus producer Jerry Bruckheimer‘s refusal to step in and argue for brevity or conciseness of any kind.)

“But when I dug up King’s old blurbs,” Goldstein writes, “guess who was at the top of the ad for the movie, enthusing: ‘Finally, a Movie Worth Seeing Over and Over Again!’ Larry! I thought you didn’t like the movie!

“‘I didn’t,’ he explained. ‘I told the CNN person to tell the studio, ‘I didn’t understand the damn movie at all. I’d have to see it over and over again to figure out what happened.’ And then they went and used it!’

The following five graphs, which appear at the end of Goldstein’s article are priceless:

“[King] still can’t get over the fact that All the King’s Men, his idea of an Oscar picture, was slammed by critics. ‘What was wrong with that movie?’ he asks. ‘I don’t get it. How could they knock Sean Penn, who is our best film actor today? The girls were great. Jeez, they even rapped Anthony Hopkins!”

King complains that critics would rather pan a movie than praise it. “That’s what I don’t get about ’em,” he says. “It’s like they don’t even want to like the movie. I have a confounding time with a guy like [The Wall Street Journal‘s] Joe Morgenstern. Sometimes I don’t even know what he’s looking at.” King is still upset that the critics bashed The Holiday, calling it corny and sentimental. ‘What — is sentimental such a bad word?’ he says. ‘If a movie makes you cry, it has to have moved you. I cried in Letters From Iwo Jima. Is that such a bad thing?’

“King makes no apologies for the way studios use his name to sell tickets. ‘Do you really think people think Larry King is a movie critic?’ he asks. ‘Come on! I’m the guy on CNN who liked the movie. I mean, after Roger Ebert, how many film critics could I even name? Joe Morgenstern. The guy with you. [The New York Post’s] Lou Lumenick. [The New York Times’] A.O. Scott. I mean, how many people in Dubuque, Iowa, know any of those guys?”

“You can’t even put King in a roomful of critics without all hell breaking loose. When I called Morgenstern Friday to let him respond to King’s gibes — he said he was ‘honored to be deplored by Larry King’ — he told me King had caused a scene that very morning, taking cell-phone calls in the middle of a screening of the upcoming film Breach. After a barrage of complaints, King went outside, only to have his phone go off again after he returned. ‘There was almost a brawl,’ reported Morgenstern.

“When I asked about the incident, King was apologetic. ‘But it was urgent. They were important calls, things I had to respond to. I didn’t talk on the phone for more than a minute or two.'”