Day: March 26, 2014

Hollywood’s four biggest YA franchise properties of the last few years are, of course, The Hunger Games, Fifty Shades of Grey, Divergent and the over-and-done-with Twilight. All are trilogies in book and (presumably in the case of Divergent and Fifty Shades) movie form. Their authors, respectively, are Suzanne Collins, EL James, Veronica Roth and Stephenie Meyer. What do these women have in common? Not age — Collins and James are 51, Meyer is 40, Roth is 25. Their trilogies are, of course, romantic fantasies (dystopian, urban, fantastical) about young women who possess or command great power. The guys in these novels are, of course, intensely devoted to and in love with the heroines — The Hunger Games‘ Katniss Everdeen, Fifty Shades‘ Anastasia Steele, Divergent‘s Beatrice Prior and Twilight‘s Bella Swan. What else do the authors have in common? A German exhibition guy I was speaking to at Cinemacon said they’re all kind of…uhm, plus-sized. But that’s not apparently true in the case of Collins and Roth. They’re not Angelina Jolie but c’mon…writers are never as attractive as movie stars. This is partly, I’m sure, what led them to write these books. All fiction writers are creators of alternate worlds that they very much prefer to the real one.

(l.) Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy author EL James (a.k.a. Erica Leonard); (r.) Hunger Games trilogy author Suzanne Collins.

(l.) Twilight series author Stephanie Meyer; (r.) Divergent trilogy author Veronica Roth.

I was hot to see Craig Gillespie‘s Million Dollar Arm at Cinecom this morning, but I was also feeling a bit anxious about the time frame. I knew I had to leave Las Vegas by 11:30 am to get back to Los Angeles by 3:30 pm to prepare for a 5:15 pm appointment on the 20th Century Fox lot. I also knew the film wouldn’t begin until at least 10 am, if not later. But I was determined to see most of it. I checked out of the spartan fleabag motel at 8:40 am and drove south down Las Vegas Blvd. and then turned left on Flamingo Road. I had done a Google search last night about Ceasar’s Palace self-parking and believed the best approach was via Frank Sinatra Drive, behind the hotel. I tried twice to find Sinatra Drive and both times was diverted elsewhere or blocked. Valet was out because I knew I’d have to leave in a hurry after the screening and that valet would slow me down by a good 15 minutes if not longer. I was reminded for the 179th time why I hate Las Vegas. I also realized and accepted that God didn’t want me to see Million Dollar Arm in Vegas and that I’d be catching it in April or early May instead. (Disney is opening it on May 16th.) So I got the hell out of Dodge. I’m writing this from a Greek diner in Baker, California. Excellent wifi!

Jon Hamm in Million Dollar Arm (Disney, 5.16).

MCN’s David Poland presented several contentious, spoiler-ish observations in a two-day-old Hot Blog review of Darren Aronofsky‘s Noah. I’m not going to do a point-for-point ten minutes before a Ceasar’s Palace screening of Million Dollar Arm, but I can say without hesitation that Poland’s complaint about Noah not constituting a vigorous “challenge” is highly questionable. At every step and juncture this movie feels like a fever dream — like it was put on raw, virgin canvas with fresh paint. It never, for me, felt tired or humdrum. Yes, Aronofsky throws in action elements with conventional-seeming evil expressed by the mad-dog villagers and particularly Ray Winstone‘s Tubal-cain, but I understood the why of it (the movie has to reach the idiots to some extent) and this tactic didn’t get in the way. McWeeny’s thumbs-up Hitfix review is…well, read it.

Yesterday Latino Review‘s Kellvin Chavez reported that Disney, which purchased distribution and marketing rights to the Indiana Jones franchise last December, is technically open to making a new Jones film with the somewhat creaky and weathered Harrison Ford (who, at 71, is now 13 years older than Sean Connery was when he portrayed Professor Henry Jones in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade) but they’re quite naturally looking to re-cast the role with a younger, studlier guy. Chavez, quoting “ever reliable sources,” is also reporting that Bradley Cooper is at the top of the list of potential replacements. “Let’s get it straight — Cooper doesn’t have the role [and hasn’t] signed the deal,” Chavez writes. [He’s] just someone they’re looking at to play the role.” Looking at? That’s it? They’re “looking” at him in the same sense that LexG could theoretically take a walk in a municipal park somewhere in the San Fernando Valley, sit down on a bench and “look” at a squirrel who happens to be scampering by?

Anyone who’s read HE for any length of time knows I genuinely admire comedies that I call no-laugh funny — i.e., consistently clever, amusing and witty but never quite eliciting actual laughter. Nicholas Stoller‘s Neighbors (Universal, 5.9.14) is not that — it’s heh-heh funny. I was never that giddy or tickled but I never felt bored or irritated or disengaged. I got ten or twelve heh-hehs out of it, and the rest is at least fast, punchy and lewd. It’s not exactly a routine culture clash comedy but the basic set-up — a 30ish couple with a baby (Seth Rogen, Rose Byrne) vs. a party-animal college fraternity (Zac Efron, Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse) that moves in next door — is familiar. But Neighbors is agreeably tight and vigorous and scattershot, and Andrew J. Cohen and Brendan O’Brien‘s script (augmented, I’m sure, by nonstop improv) is a cut or two above. A likely hit.

During tonight’s Neighbors after-party inside Ceasar’s Palace.

For the honor of eating pizza in a Caesar’s Palace food court, you pay at least 30% or 40% more per slice than anywhere else. Wait…nine bucks a slice? That’s at least double what any NY pizzeria charges. I was on the verge of breaking the cockatoo diet but those prices turned me off.

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