Monika Bartyzel
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Robert Downey Jr. Wants to Retire?
Filed under: Celebrities and Controversy, Fandom, Newsstand
Retire. I am starting to hate that word in Hollywood. Most of the time it doesn't mean what it suggests. Retirement means ending work, maybe taking on a side gig if you really need to or are really bored, but for the most part, it's ending life in the workforce and enjoying a life of leisure. In cinema, however, it seems to be anyone who is taking a break from the biz. Luc Besson's "retired," as is Sean Connery. Now ... Robert Downey Jr.?The ever popular actor has told Entertainment Weekly that he might quit acting. "I've never had it this good -- this is my day in the sun -- and I certainly don't want to look a gift horse in the molars. But [my wife] Susan and I want to begin to be in our lives as much as we are in our jobs. I'd love just to sit here and say, 'What movie's playing tonight?' I'd love to finish the new book about D-day I'm reading. I love painting, I love music." And if you can get through that without your gut falling out in dread: "But here's the thing: I can only be a guy on a call sheet probably, I don't know, maybe a couple more times. It's something I'm so grateful to have in my palm, and yet I already see its inevitable decay."
He does leave room for hope by saying: "If Sherlock Holmes performs well, I could be busy for the next 5 or 7 or 10 years." But who knows whether that's just him appeasing potential fan backlash, dread at the thought of never catching a break, feeling uncertain in his career, or some other reason altogether. But if it's true and does happen, I shudder to think of Hollywood without his talent.
Get Ready to See 'Agora' Early Next Year
Filed under: Deals, Distribution
There's nothing better than the times when you get to blog about good news, and I hope this is just another spoke in a continual cycle: Variety reports that Newmarket Films -- the peeps who handled The Passion of the Christ -- has scored the U.S. rights to Alejandro Amenabar's Agora, and plan to release the film during the first half of next year. This is the second '09 TIFF film they've nabbed, the first being Creation, although I have no idea what would lead them to the much chastised Darwin pick before Rachel Weisz and Hypatia.As I mentioned in October, the film was a big, expensive risk, but seemed to be paying off. In four days, it earned the best opening weekend for 2009, over $10 million, and the second best opening in Spain ever. Now, it still holds onto the number one spot, and according to Box Office Mojo, has earned a healthy $16,698,345.
But it cost roughly $73 million, so there's still work to be done, which shouldn't be very hard for the U.S. market. $55 mil? We can do that! Really. Start planning now. It's well worth your time, whether you love historical epics, truly gorgeous filmmaking, cerebral cinema, or smart girls on the big screen. Go see it! Pretty please?
'Guardians of Ga'hoole' Gets a Killer Cast
Filed under: Animation, Casting
As much as I love a good animated film, sometime I have to sigh and wonder what would be if the same cast was in a live action feature. This is one of those times. Zack Snyder's Guardians of Ga'hoole has found its official cast, and it's a little different from earlier reports in January. Hugo Weaving and Ryan Kwanten are still in, Hugh Jackman is not, and there are a whole bunch of new folks. The Hollywood Reporter posts that the cast will be headlined by Sam Neill, Geoffrey Rush, David Wenham, and Weaving. (Mucho props to Elisabeth for guessing right on Wenham in April '08!) These guys will be joined by the likes of Aussie folks Emily Barclay, Abbie Cornish, Emilie de Ravin, Jay Laga'aia, and Kwanten. PLUS -- three Brit actors with Miriam Margolyes, Helen Mirren, and Jim Sturgess. Unfortunately, there's no cast rundown of who will voice who, and with that many names, I'm not even going to try guessing. Check out IMDb for a few casting names, but I'm not so sure on their accuracy since they list Sturgess as Soren, and THR lists him last, rather than naming him as a headliner.
Holy crap! Is it terrible that this news makes me sad and wishes this cast wasn't wasted on owls? Many of these actors could offer so much visually, and oh, how I'd love to see them play off of each other -- especially Wenham, Weaving, and Mirren. At the very least, it's got me itching to watch the story of the young owl Soren and his enthrallment with stories of the winged warrior Guardians of Ga'Hoole. How 'bout you?
For the Real Vampire Lovers: A 'Daybreakers' PSA
Filed under: Action, Comedy, Horror, Trailers and Clips
It's time for a brief reprieve from the romantic battles between painted-on vampiric pecs and CG fur. As you might know, the Spierig Brothers have whipped up an excellently dark vampiric flick called Daybreakers, which William Goss reviewed last month. The film is gearing up to hit screens on January 8, 2010, and in the midst of all the other vampire chatter out there, Lionsgate has whipped up a rather excellent public service announcement which you can see after the jump.If you have any questions or concerns about the movie, this PSA should answer them because it's a dead-on representation of the feature. It explains the film while also managing to describe the tone and style of the pic: dark, sleek, modern, and scary with a healthy dose of ridiculousness and comedy mixed in. These things might sound like they clash -- and to be honest, they do a little bit -- but not in any way that ruins the movie.
You know that whoever made this clip had a perfect understanding of the film and could sum everything up with delivery rather than unnecessary exposition. (Yes, there's a voiceover in this, but it's different than saying: "Daybreakers serves chills and laughs.") If only we could get this with all the trailers and marketing that floods our way...
Does the PSA tantalize you into seeing Daybreakers?
[via CHUD]
Discuss: Are You Tired of the Happy Comedic Ending?
Filed under: Comedy, Fandom, Fan Rant
Comedies are, by definition, doomed to a certain, set existence. Quoting Oxford's Concise Dictionary of Literary Terms: "Its ending will usually be happy for the leading characters. In another sense, the term was applied in the Middle Ages to narrative poems that end happily." This was compounded by the advent of New Comedy, which "abandoned topical satire in favour of fictional plots based on contemporary life: these portrayed the tribulations of young lovers caught up among stock characters such as the miserly father and the boastful soldier." So here we sit, doomed to repeat ourselves over and over because some dudes from way back when made laughs of a certain path. There will be an outbreak of shenanigans, some goofy stock characters along the way, and then the almost inevitable happy ending with cheek-pinching smiles, swelling music, and feel-good moments. A lot of the time, it works. We giggle, the credits roll, and we leave the theater feeling happy and refreshed.
But just as often, I find myself dreading the second half and that inevitable tonal shift. The film will begin to swell into a picture-perfect happy ending, characters softening and getting just what they need for the desired conclusion, whether that be saccharine sweetness, uncharacteristic responsibility, or Meet the Parents type chaos. The personalities and paths of the characters become second-fiddle to the need to wrap up the story. Rather than simply enjoying the world that's been set up, soon we must watch it wrap into a pretty bow.
'Precious' Director Circles 'Selma' & Antoine Fuqua's Life of Crime
Filed under: Drama, Deals, Scripts, Comic/Superhero/Geek
The men behind Precious and Shooter are going back in time, according to Variety:Having had wild success with Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire, Lee Daniels is itching to go historical for his next feature. He's in "advanced negotiations" to helm Selma, a big-buzz Civil Rights-era drama penned by Paul Webb (Lincoln). The film, which would team him with Slumdog Millionaire producer Christian Colson, focuses on the marches between Selma and Montgomery in 1965, which were the peak of the Civil Rights movement. This means that while prospects of a Martin Luther King Jr. film might be hazy, he will get some time here, one would assume -- he was one of the leaders drawn to the area where marches quickly turned to "Bloody Sunday" with force from local and state police.
And in a wholly different historic affair, it seems Antoine Fuqua and Spike Lee are getting ready for a pimp-n-ho crime spree. Fuqua will direct John Ridley's adaptation of the graphic novel Miss: Better Living Through Crime, with Lee executive producing. Set in 1900s New York, the project focuses on Sola and Slim, "a poor white girl who has learned to survive by hook or by crook since being expelled from the orphanage," and the "black pimp with an uncertain past, trying to keep one foot out of the grave." But, it's not as you might think -- the pair team up to become killers for hire.
Along with Jennifer Hudson as Winnie Mandella, it's refreshing to see a whole slew of projects in the works free of African-American crossdressers-for-laughs.
Fan Rant: The Ridiculous, Disgusting Photoshopping Must End!
Filed under: Celebrities and Controversy, Newsstand, Images, Posters
I love image editors like Photoshop. They've allowed me to make boring pictures funky, wipe the years off old and worn memories, and even get rid of the errant hair or blemish to make that nice photo truly shine. But I would give it all up and wipe my hands of them if it meant that the programs would be pulled out of the hands of Hollywood and the image-fixing machine.
We're getting bombarded by all sides. It's bad enough that lazy frakking poster creators actually shovel out horse poop like the embarrassingly terrible poster for The Takers, one that doesn't even bother trying to match the skin tones of the stars' heads with the stunt bodies, or thinks Paul Walker has massive Science of Sleep-like hands.
But we're also getting a never-ending onslaught of body de-hancements. I really can think of no better word for the folks like Ralph Lauren who are Photoshopping their models into sick, skeletal bodies. Adding to the pack is W Magazine, as BoingBoing shares. They scored an interview with Demi Moore and threw her up on the cover. While she may have discussed her dislike of being called a cougar, methinks she'd have more of an issue with what they did to her body. She's already ridiculously thin, but still, they edit. It looks like they tried to give her an "hourglass" shape (I use that term begrudgingly because it really doesn't apply when we're talking about skinny women who are Photoshopped to look curvy.), but worst of all -- they wiped out part of her already pencil-thin legs and were too lazy to make sure it matched. You can see part in the image above, look at the hip on the right, or in its full glory after the jump.
Stars in Rewind: Ken Ober & 'Remote Control'
Filed under: Obits, Trailers and Clips, Stars in Rewind
Attention children of the '80s: If you haven't already heard, television's Ken Ober died at the age of 52. The cause of death is not yet determined, although his agent noted that Ober "complained of headaches and flu-like symptoms on Saturday night." While he produced shows like Mind of Mencia and The New Adventures of Old Christine, he's probably best known for his time as the host of MTV's '80s quiz show: Remote Control.Remember it? Three players would get strapped into arm chairs, answer questions about television and film (basically anything that could be found on TV), find food raining down on their heads, and get entertained by the likes of Colin Quinn, Kari Wuhrer, Denis Leary, and Adam Sandler. It was part classic MTV ridiculousness, and part media junky geek party.
In memory of the host and show, I thought I'd take us back in time for a few movie-centric bits after the jump. First, there will be Adam Sandler as the awkward "Stud Boy" while Ober doesn't think about the innuendo before saying "I'd love to give it to her." After that, scribe Zak Penn, who wrote flicks like PCU, Elektra, and X-Men: The Last Stand, pops up as a contestant. Now the latter is a little confusing, since the Zachary on the show says he's a biochem major at USC, and bios have him graduating from Wesleyan, but one look at the vid and this pic should quell confusion.
Ken Ober, you're missed already.
'Sex and the City 2' Spoilers Reveal a Whole Different World?
Filed under: Comedy, Drama, Romance, RumorMonger
When Sex and the City was on television, they tried to balance opulence with frugal flavah. Charlotte was buying a share in the Hamptons, but it meant that she couldn't buy shoes from the likes of James Urbaniak. Samantha had a great job, but still had to shop around for a home she could afford. Miranda had to move to Brooklyn to buy enough space for her family. And Carrie, she had all sorts of financial woes from credit cards cut in front of her to almost losing her apartment when the building went co-op. But when they hit the big screen, all fiscal responsibility flew out the window. On the cusp of the economic collapse, the Sex and the City ladies were reveling in lavish lifestyles, spending thousands on this or that, not seeming to have a money-related care in the world. But with tighter times, it looks like the sequel might be going overboard in the other direction.
Hit the jump for the latest spoilers hitting the rounds.
'Twilight' Makes Abstinence Popular?
Filed under: Fandom
Following in the footsteps of Buffy, Twilight is now getting its round of academic writing, and it's kicking things off with a little abstinence. As research for a new book called Bitten by Twilight: Youth Culture, Media, and the Vampire Franchise, researchers talked to fans about their obsession with the books, and, they, say, "what really surprised us was the obvious abstinence message in the book and that teens were responding favorably to this message. Many of the young women that we interviewed had felt pressure to perform sexually by their peers, but now they have a desire to find their own 'Edward,' who will be interested in them for nonsexual reasons."
BINGO.
Indie Roundup: 'Sweetgrass,' 'Clarkworld,' 'Broken Embraces'
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Watch: Famous 'Matrix' Scene Re-Created with LEGOs
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