The Hot Blog Archive for February, 2007
Hmmmm…
Did you see the Number 23, DP? Seven percent at Rotten Tomatoes right now, which is bad even for Joel Schumacher.
Posted by: MASON
I haven’t seen Number 23… but I do find it interesting how many more – disagree if you wish, because it may just be my perception – movies are getting under 20% on RT than ever before.
The movies are not that much worse. But is criticism getting a more singular voice?
It
One of the irritants of Oscar every year, but especially this year, is that a desperate press core, all forced to write as many Oscar stories as their pages can hold, will take any single idea and turn it into a trend. In this, The Year Of The Former Journo Turned Gossip, it is becoming a trend unto itself.
Last year, the big one was one Academy member saying he wouldn
The Daily David – Feb 23, 2007
The iKlipz Version
There’s nothing much worth reviewing at the movie theaters… there has to be something cable, right
20 Weeks 20 – Auld Lang Syne
“All last night, Fox ran promos for “Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader?” and for those of us who are still revving our engines on this, the answer is not a nice one. A 5th grader knows he/she wants ice cream, cake, no bath, and an open bedtime. We have such an abundance of likeable films and likeable people that we don’t know what we want.
I gotta say, I am looking forward to the Independent Spirit Awards more than the Oscars for the first time in a long while. And it’s not just because Yerxa and Berger will get their awards along with the other producers at that event. (Oh
Oscar Pitch Of The Day
Yes, ladies, pour some beer in your hair before you go to the Oscars. Malt, Vitamin B, and Sugar.
And for more on the value of adding semen to the beer for the ultimate male fantasy beauty regimen, see the special Oscar issue of Maxim. For the latest tips in Oscar undergarments, read Defamer. And for the Who’s Who of who really needs their photo taken, please see Vanity Fair.
Curtist Taylor, Jr. Gets His Way… A Day After Voting Closes
The Daily David – Feb 22, 2007
A Look At The Oscars On The Thursday Before The Show
The YouTube version
Hypocrisy, Thy Name Is
Today
Losers
The Oscar bloggers: You’d think after the millions of words they wrote pontificating about the Oscars they could’ve come up with a better pick for best picture winner than “Dreamgirls.”
Dec 5
Favorites
“Dreamgirls.” 4-1: A faithful adaptation of the 1981 stage play not-so-loosely based on the rise of the Supremes, this lavish Condon-directed all-black musical is handsome as entertainment can be, loaded with infectious music and accomplished performances, especially from supporting actress favorite Hudson, who earns the right to any comparisons with the role’s originator, Jennifer Holliday. The film’s craft will earn it a boatload of nominations. Its chances of a best picture victory depend on whether the academy, which has a soft spot for showbiz stories, will embrace a crowd-pleaser that isn’t daring or original. In other words: Does the soul outweigh the schmaltz?
Also of Note –
Winners
Paramount Vantage’s John Lesher: It’s a big leap from being an agent to a studio chief, but when your first release (“Babel”) becomes a best picture nominee, you’ve done a great job of putting your company on the map.
Please make note… the film was greenlit and produced before Lesher came to the studio. It was handed to him by Brad Grey (also a “loser”). And the film will lose tens of millions.
Losers
David Geffen: You patiently wait 20 years until the right filmmaker comes along, assemble an all-star cast, carefully woo the media, earn plenty of admiring reviews, win a Golden Globe and then
Say It Loud, He's For Barack And He's Proud
The fact that Geffen is actually going public on this – even after people sought to blur the obvious signals of the SKG Obama event last night as not necessarily putting them in Obama’s camp – is what makes it news. The use of Maureen Down to do it is what makes it a classic Geffen controlling move.
I believe that Hollywood has had a lot to with the Democrats losing the last two elections, insisting on an anti-Bush focus rather than putting a new, strong face of the future on the party.
David Geffen is looking to cast the next president:
What's It All (De)Mean?
Jackie Gleason once said “The Flintstones” was just “The Honeymooners” in disguise. He said it was the greatest honor of his life that they thought enough of him to demean his image.
and
“I’m fascinated by the movie business. It’s the only absolutely essential intersection in the history of mankind between art and commerce.”
More from Mamet…
The Daily David – Feb 21
iKlipz Version
YouTube version
Who says Ryan Gosling doesn’t do interviews?
What's Worth Fighting Over?
Yes.. ball’s in your collective court today… got anything good?
17 Comments »MCN Seems To Be Down
Trying to find out why… apparently our serve company is having some sort of problem… apologies….
6:39 – A Blackout in Atlanta is responsible… apparently, the generators didn’t kick in… servers are being rebooted by hand… back soon…
7:00 – The site is back up, but we can’t update yet. Thanks for your patience.
Asking For It
I certainly draw my share of accusations regarding my coverage of The Los Angeles Times and New York Times and their coverage of the film business. But I am sensitive to the fact that there are human beings behind them thar stories. One of them is Patrick Goldstein.
Nice guy. Used to be a supporter of my work, before my snarky headlines. Now a sniper. But c’est la vie (c’est la guerre).
But what can one say when the LA Times, desperately trying to not only remain relevant to the film business but to recapture a bigger piece of the pie (both in advertising and editorial), runs his Berger & Yerxa Got Screwed story a couple of months after the story has been examined every way from Sunday (next Sunday).
Pedophile Priest Doc Lands In Dublin
From The Irish Times…
Film festival gets down to grave business
The first weekend of the D ublin International Film Festival featured an award for Gabriel Byrne and a harrowing documentary about an Irish child sex abuser, writes Donald Clarke.
…The next morning the festival returned to the most serious of matters with a screening of Amy Berg’s already hugely controversial documentary Deliver Us from Evil. Detailing the American Catholic Church’s apparent failure to deal with the crimes of a former priest, Oliver O’Grady, a convicted child abuser, currently resident in Ireland, the film has been accused (by, to a great extent, those who haven’t seen it) of offering the offender a platform to justify his nauseating atrocities. As it happens, Berg’s film, which has been nominated for an Oscar, turns out to be a responsible, sober piece of work that finds O’Grady further damning himself with perverse evasions and bewildering delusions. Following the film, Mannix Flynn, the veteran writer and actor, dryly urged Amy Berg, who had flown in for the weekend, to enlist the help of Bono in getting the current Pope to act on the scandal. “He’s a pal of your man over there,” Flynn noted.
Also… of The Lives of Others, Clarke writes, “The bittersweet end rendered this correspondent so pathetically teary he had to have a stiff drink before gearing up for the festival’s second week.”
The whole article after the jump…