The Hot Blog

Great Photoshop, Batman!!!

Worth 1000 delivers another terrific photoshop contest.  This one is called "Director's Cut."   I picked my four favorites to show you, but you should check out the big load of them on the site.

Sad...

It's kind of amazing how sad it is to hear about a guy who you worked for... 20 years ago and way, way, way down the food chain... getting into a plane accident and surviving, but apparenly losing his14 year old son.

My thoughts are with Dick Ebersol, Susan St. James and their entire family tonight, as well as with those involved who I do not know, including the pilot and co-pilot of the private aircraft that they were killed in yesterday morning. 

Losing a teenaged child, especially in an accident of leisure, is nothing that anyone should ever have to experience.

BLECH!!!

The new musical version of A Christmas Carol on NBC... that is what I see as the crap film that people who despise the film of The Phantom of the Opera seem to be talking about.  Banal, horrid lyrics with no wit and performers with no apparent soul, though most of them have proven to be of value in other venues in the past.

Where is the Albert Finney Scrooge when you need it???

Todd McCarthy's Fascinating Aviator Review

I read Todd McCarthy's review of The Aviator and found it remarkable.

I agree with 90% of what he has to say.  But what struck me funny was that he only seemed to review 50% of the movie. 

The film will or will not be a Best Picture nominee.  It's no Alexander... not even a Gangs of New York.  But what will inhibit it is not all the great stuff about Hughes as a hard-driving aviator.  It is the going nuts part... which is a large percentage of the movie. 

Miramax's advertising is brilliant, as it really emphasizes what works so well in the film.  As I have written before, these are some of the best flying sequences ever put on film.  And Todd seems to have focused only on those parts and just conveniently forgotten the rest of the movie. .. which is almost a harsher indictment of the rest of the film than giving it a complete review.  If it can't take up any review space, it must be pretty terrible or meaningless in his view.  But dang... it's at least half of the movie.

Box Office Sunday

Well, Alexander turned out to be far uglier than the first few days of the weekend suggested.  Word of mouth travels fast.  An estimated $21.7 million five-day suggests strongly that this film is going to have a very hard time getting to $50 million domestic.

I mean, we’re looking at The Siege, Men of Honor and The 6^th Day as the precursors of this ugliness, though Alexander cost more than twice what any of those films cost.  Scrooged, which got to $60 million, is the upside of this equation… but that film had the advantage of a Christmas theme that brought an upturn on Christmas week.  I don’t expect Alexander to be on more than 800 screens by Christmas week.

On the flip side, The Polar Express is holding better than expected.  The film got very tough review from a lot of critics, but the film was the only film not going wide this weekend that actually had an uptick in viewing.  I still say, see it in IMAX 3-D… but someone out there is really liking this movie and talking about it.  And this weekend’s success will encourage exhibitors to have the film on a large number of screens on Christmas week, even if they start going to matinee-only plays for the next couple of weeks as they await the next wave.

As usual, expectations determine how one sees the success or weakness of the box office results for limited release movies.  MCN’s Len Klady sees the results for Finding Neverland, Sideways, and Kinsey to be “solid.”  I see them as a bit underwhelming. 

Kinsey’s position is very reminiscent of the distribution of The Motorcycle Diaries, a film that has now stalled at around $14 million.  Of course, that number is great for a film like Swimming Pool… but not for a hard charging Oscar wannabe.

Miramax has done an excellent job of parlaying an early entry into the season and the power of Johnny Depp to move Finding Neverland along.   They’ve gotten some separation from Sideways, which is doing okay, but feels like it is a long way – perhaps an Oscar nod will be required - from a $20 million total.  Finding Neverland feels like it could go to 2000 screens next week and do $10 million.  Remember, Johnny Depp + Secret Window = $48 million domestic. 

The film that Finding Neverland probably will most emulate fiscally is Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, which hit $35 million in its run last March.  For Neverland, that should be enough to make a legitimate Oscar run.  There are two huge differences between the Neverland and Eternal Sunshine as far as the awards race goes.  First is timing.  It is very difficult to rev things back up for a March title in December.  Second is that eternal Sunshine is hip and smart and young (just try to get an Academy member to recall the title accurately) while Finding Neverland is an old fashioned weepie.  Which do you think Oscar voters prefer?

Million Dollar Trailer

I got a note from a reader about the new trailer for Million Dollar Baby, now in theaters and posted at MCN, worried that it gave away too much.  So I watched the thing this morning and was not only pleased that WB and Mr. Eastwood kept it close to the vest, but  I found myself tearing up a bit seeing that footage again. 

I really did like the movie when I saw it, but it is staying with me more strongly than expected. The simplicity and power of Eastwood's music for the film is remarkable.  And it's interesting to see the intense shadows of Tom Stern's cinematography in the commercial format.

Anyway, just wanted to put it out there that the trailer is not Disney, circa 1990... it is safe to view.

Yes, The New Yorker

There are three absolute movie must-reads in the November 22 edition of The New Yorker.

Malcolm Gladwell’s piece about what constitutes plagiarism and just what is theft of intellectual content and what is not is one of the most important pieces I’ve read in a long time.  Gladwell and the New Yorker were perhaps-victims of a perhaps-theft by the author of the Broadway play, Frozen.  Yet, he manages to offer both his personal perspective and a journalistic one.  Tremendous piece.

David Denby’s long piece on Almodovar gets Almodovar better and more completely than anything else I have read on the filmmaker.  It was time for perspective on Almodovar’s career and Denby hits it out of the park.

And Anthony Lane, who generally pisses me off for having more interest in being clever than in discussing film, examines the story behind Finding Neverland.  And much like Gladwell, he offers both an excellent piece of reporting as well as some personal perspective on J.M. Barrie’s history.  He does take sides, but there is more than enough in the piece for you to decide how you feel for yourself. 

It’s the issue with the Barbara Bush-looking woman in an elevator, staring up at “Floor 4, Men’s Dresses.”  I think the cartoon edition has replaced this one on newsstands.  But it would be worth the effort to track it down.  Sorry I didn’t offer this up earlier…

UPDATE SUNDAY:  Thanks to Marc Weisblott for pointing us to Greg.org's New Yorker database with links to each of the stories above.

Star Whores?

Have you noticed that LucasFilm has once again started its marketing effort for the next and last Star Wars movie by bringing their “stars” into high profile spots for mass market companies?

Darth Vader appears as a punch line for both Target and ESPN.  Both spots feature a Storm Trooper and the ESPN spot also features C3PO, R2-D2 and Chewbacca. 

Every time I see one of these spots… and they’ve done this at 9 months out or so on all three of the new movies… I wonder why they are bastardizing their brand.  But I guess that showing themselves as having a sense of humor about the franchise and reasserting the iconic nature of these characters is a higher priority. 

It’s a very daring move.  William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy making fun of themselves for money is one thing, but these characters are expected to generate a billion dollars at the box office next summer.  Perhaps it is the ultimate show of power… Lucas can afford to do what others don’t dare. 

Pre- Weekend Box Office

The big ugly story of the weekend to come… from the two days that came… is Alexander and its projectable $25 - $32 million five-day opening on the way to a domestic cume of under $100 million.  And that projection isn’t even severe.  End of Days and Spy Game both started over Thanksgiving weekend with over $30 million and ended up with less than $70 million domestic. 

The smaller ugly story is not nearly as ugly.  Christmas With The Kranks, which opened Wednesday in sixth place, leapt to second place and what looks like its own $30 million range opening and what seems likely to be status as the biggest new movie of the weekend.  And the good news for Revolution is that the equally horribly reviewed comedy, The Haunted Mansion, got to $75 million domestic.  In fact, no comedy opening this time of year with a number anywhere near where Cranks projects to land has done worse than that. 

In the happy column is National Treasure, which had as strong a Thanksgiving Wed/Thur as all but a handful of films (Toy Story 2, Harry Potter 2) has ever had.  That includes movies opening on the holiday weekend.  That should translate to another strong weekend of sales, leaving the title at around $85 million for 10 days, well ahead where Elf was at the 10-day mark last year and a little ahead of Disney’s highest November grosser ever, The Waterboy.

On the dark side again, Finding Neverland, Sideways and Kinsey all widened out and all disappointed heading into the weekend, averaging between 40 and 75 people per show in each of the cases in spite of the widest release of the trio being 513 screens.  As all three films head into awards season, the critical importance of the critics groups to these three titles is now blatantly apparent.

More as the weekend progresses….

Happy Post Turkey

Gobble Gobble Hey, Mecha Heimy Hey.