MCN Weekend Archive for November, 2011

Wilmington on Movies: Tower Heist

By Mike Wilmington - Sunday, November 6th, 2011

  Tower Heist (Two and a Half Stars) U. S.: Brett Ratner, 2011 　 Tower Heist. Wheww! That was one hell of a movie. Hell of a movie! Brett Ratner: Rush Hour! Rush Hour 2!!. Rush Hour 3!!! He‘s one moviemaker who can really make a movie move. Didn’t ya think?   Are you kidding me?…

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The Weekend Report: November 6, 2011

By Leonard Klady - Sunday, November 6th, 2011

Nobody knows nuttin! Both new entries and holdovers defied the wisdom of tracking reports that predicted … well, what didn’t happen.

Collectively it added up to an unexpectedly resilient hold for Puss in Boots that put the stereoscopic animation at the top of weekend viewing with an estimated $33.3 million. The frame’s anticipated chart topper – the caper hijinx of newcomer Tower Heist – arrived below a $30 million plus haul at, instead, $25.1 million. The sessions other new national release, A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas, also came up short with $13.2 million to slot third overall.

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Friday Estimates: November 5, 2011

By Leonard Klady - Saturday, November 5th, 2011

Two new films this weekend. One, a comedy caper flick and the other a prematurely 3Dinating Christmas comedy. Plus, a strong hold for last weekend’s champ, Puss in Boots.

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Critics Roundup — November 3

By Kim Voynar - Friday, November 4th, 2011

Tower Heist |Yellow||||Yellow A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas |||||Yellow The Last Rites of Joe May (limited) |||Yellow||Green Dragonslayer |||Green|| Young Goethe in Love (NY, LA) |||||

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Wilmington on DVDs: The Rest. Water for Elephants, The Last Mountain, Rare Exports/Santa Claus Conquers the Martians; Haunted Summer; Sands of the Kalahari; The Man in the Net

By Mike Wilmington - Friday, November 4th, 2011

Water for Elephants  (Three Stars) U.S.: Francis Lawrence, 2011 Water for Elephants is an old-fashioned romantic picture done in new-fangled ways, and it‘s so good for such a long time, that it seems a shame, at the end, to feel so let down by it. But that’s how it goes… Director Francis Lawrence’s show, co-starring…

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Box Office Hell — November 3

By Kim Voynar - Thursday, November 3rd, 2011

Our Players|Coming Soon|Box Office Prophets|Box Office Guru|EW|Box Office . com Tower Heist|30.3|36.5|29.0|31.0|29.0 Puss in Boots|22.0|20.2|22.0|23.0|26.0 A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas |17.5|16.4|16.0|17.0|15.5 Paranormal Activity 3|8.5|7.6|8.0|7.0|8.0 In Time|5.8|7.3|5.5|6.0|7.7

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The DVD Wrapup: Cars 2, Tabloid, Crazy Stupid Love, Water for Elephants, Snow Flower Trespass, Phantom of Opera …

By Gary Dretzka - Wednesday, November 2nd, 2011

Cars 2: Blu-ray If you loved the first “Cars,” which rolled off the Pixar production line in 2006, it’s better than even money that you’ll enjoy “Cars 2.” If not, the sequel probably won’t change your mind. You either dig anthropomorphic automobiles or you don’t. Neither am I’m sure kids will care to sit through…

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Wilmington on DVDs. Pick of the Week: Box Sets. Toy Story Ultimate Toy Box Collection;Toy Story 3D Trilogy

By Mike Wilmington - Wednesday, November 2nd, 2011

The Toy Story Ultimate Toy Box Collection (Blu-ray/Blu-ray 3D/DVD/Digital) (10 discs) (Four Stars) U.S.: John Lasseter/Lee Unkrich, 1995-2010 (Walt Disney Video) The Toy Story 3D Trilogy (Blu-ray 3D) (Three Discs) (Four Stars) U.S.: John Lasseter/Lee Unkrich, 1995-1999-2010 (Walt Disney Video)   The Great American Feature Cartoon Trilogy, The Godfather Trilogy of feature cartoons actually (see below),…

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Wilmington on DVDs. Pick of the Week: New. Crazy, Stupid, Love

By Mike Wilmington - Tuesday, November 1st, 2011

“Crazy, Stupid, Love.” (Three and a Half Stars) U.S.: Glenn Ficara & John Requa, 2011 1. Crazy, Crazy, Stupid, Love. That’s the name of the new Steve Carell-Ryan Gosling-Julianne Moore romantic comedy, from the directorial team of Glenn Ficarra and John Requa (I Love You, Phillip Morris), and the title actually does consist of those three…

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Wilmington on DVDs. Pick of the Week: Blu-ray. Cars 2

By Mike Wilmington - Tuesday, November 1st, 2011

Cars 2 (Also Blu-ray) (Three and a Half Stars) U. S.: John Lasseter (co-director Brad Lewis), 2011 (Walt Disney) Cars 2 is another Pixar feature cartoon for kids, adults, old people and everyone in between — especially if they have a crush on post-‘50s car culture. I don’t, but I could feel the curious, obsessive auto-loving…

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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon