Craig's MovieBlog

10 Best Picture Nominees?

What the flagnod?!?

I haven’t written anything in almost 3 months (oh, and how great was The Hangover?), but this news is enough to temporarily get me out of retirement.

This year’s Academy Awards will have 10 Best Picture nominees.

Craig’s theory:  Typically, when you only have 5 nominees, you are choosing high-end art films that might be the best films of the year, but are generally films that didn’t do as well at the box office.  So, if fewer people have seen the films, fewer people care who wins.

With 10 nominees, there’s more of an opportunity for films like Wall-E or The Dark Knight to make the cut (or this year, Up, Star Trek, or even, yes, The Hangover) to get in the race.  That means more people watching, which means higher ad rates and more money for the Academy.

Read about it at The Hot Blog, or In Contention.  I’m sure there will be more to come.

Public Enemies Trailer

It’s like Heat, with Michael Mann and everything… only about 100 years ago, and Depp and Bale could certainly be the new generation’s DeNiro and Pacino, right?  ;)

Poking My Head Up Before Watchmen Comes Out

I know.  Nothing on the Globes, nothing on the Oscars.  That’s right – the inspiration just isn’t there.  I’ll just say this:  I loved the Oscars this year and what they did with the show.  They could have killed the second musical act (with Beyonce and Zac Efron) to save time, but the show finished ahead of schedule anyway.  They also could have done some more thinking about who was giving the speeches to the various nominees.  DeNiro to Penn was awesome, but Cotillard to Kate Winslet?  How was that not Emma Thompson?  Adrien Brody to Richard Jenkins?  Cuba Gooding Jr.?!?!?

And with that, let’s move on.

Watchmen is coming out this week and David Poland has pointed out some interesting commentary from one of the cast members. 

Matthew Goode plays Andrew Veidt/Ozymandias in the movie, expected to be one of the biggest hits of 2009.

But the 30-year-old actor – who has previously appeared in Match Point and Brideshead Revisited – went on the offensive after learning hardcore fans are saying he doesn’t suit the character before even watching the film.

He said: “The negative feedback is relayed by my friends. I think the fanboys aren’t particularly happy – there are a load of people they’d have rather had in before me.

“It’s already being slated before they’ve seeing anything.

“But if fanboys still hate the film after going and seeing it, they can all line up and s*** my d***.

“I don’t give a f***.”

Matthew added: “I’m having a child and that’s more important to me – so I don’t give a f***. Grow a d***.”

Is it bad that I think that he actually has the proper perspective here?

Now, there are people that have seen the film, like David Edelstein of New York Magazine, who says, it is an “awe-inspiring corpse: huge, noisy, gaseously distended by its own dystopia.”

Good times.

Blogging Drought and Mad Men

I’m not sure why I haven’t been posting here.  Sure... busy at work, but whatever.  I think it just comes down to the fact that I have been inspired by absolutely nothing in the movie business lately.  Nothing.  Okay, yeah... I want to see the new Bond flick, but I'm hearing mixed things (especially from David Poland) but I just can't seem to get excited by anything that's coming our way.  Can't tell if the problem is me or them - I guess that's the tricky part.

The other issue is that when I'm writing about movies, I feel like I'm cheating on my new love: Mad Men.  So, in honor of my deep deep love affair with that show, here are a bunch of Mad Men links that I've been saving up:

• The Simpsons spoof the Mad Men title sequence
• Truthful TV title cards - check out the one for Mad Men.  Heroes is funny too.
• Mad Men Fan Fiction - weird, but... No, just plain weird.
• Great interview with creator Matthew Weiner
• How to discuss Mad Men properly
• How to get Don Draper hair

Thanks to Fimoculous.com and kottke.org for these links, and for just plain being absolutely awesome.

David Poland, Batman, and Titanic at the Box Office

I know this is old in internet time, but it’s still goodness.

The Dark Knight is currently at $342 million after just 13 days.

Titanic is the all time biggest grossing film at $600.8 million.

David Poland isn’t sure whether The Dark Knight will pass Titanic in total domestic box office (probably not), but he once again changes the discussion and says that we’re all looking at the wrong race.  The worldwide box office is the real game, and there’s no way Titanic is beaten by Batman this year.  Why?  Well, just start with the fact that while “no Batman film has ever even matched the level internationally that it reached at home,” Titanic made twice as much around the world as it did here in the states. 

Wa-wa-wait, what? 

That’s right – not only did Titanic break all records domestically by making $600 million here, it made $1.2 billion more overseas for a $1.84 billion total.

Put another way, Titanic made more money just overseas alone than any other movie has ever grossed in total worldwide.

That’s a big iceberg.

Craigslist

• David Poland says Hancock “is easily the most ambitious action script of the summer to date.”
• It’s Brad Pitt’s world.  We’re all just living in it.  Check out the trailers for Burn After Reading and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, directed by The Coen Brothers and David Fincher, respectively.
• So best.  Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull: The Abridged Script.  Go read it and remind yourself how truly disappointing that film was.  I wonder if George Lucas is gonna just go and destroy all my childhood dreams.  Maybe he can remake Fletch, Ghostbusters, and Ferris Bueller next.
• This is old, but I still don’t get it.  Blockbuster is “testing in-store kiosks allowing consumers to download movies onto their portable devices.”  Wow.  Too bad I actually have to go to Blockbuster to do this… you know, the place where all the DVDs are anyway?  Gosh, if there was only a device in the home that was connected to the Internet, could download a movie the same way, and could sync content to my portable devices. Schmucks…
• If Film Studios Developed Videogames.  John August is brilliant.

Thank Goodness Someone Is Paying Attention

Hats off to Nathaniel R over at Film Experience Blog who beat me to the punch today.  I mean, I know math and stuff is hard since we’re all so busy watching The Hills and Living Lohan, but why is everyone in the industry so happy that the new Hulk film opened to $55 million with a $150 budget, while the so-called Ang Lee bomb from a few years ago opened to $62 million with a lower ($137 million) budget?

To recap, here’s a handy table:

	The Incredible Hulk	Hulk
Year	2008	2003
Director	Louis Leterrier	Ang Lee
Stars	Ed Norton, Liv Tyler, Tim Roth	Eric Bana, Jennifer Connelly
Production Budget	$150 million	$137 million
Opening Weekend	$55.4 million	$62.1 million
Per Screen Average	$15,810	$16,974
Industry Buzz	Yay!	Boo!

Yes, opening weekend is just one measure of success, as the 2003 Hulk suffered a severe drop off and bad word of mouth, but can we all stop salivating and crying a sigh of relief when the numbers are clearly worse? 

Expectations must have been god awful to celebrate this way…

Oh, and as David Poland rightfully points out, the new Hulk film “faces Wall-E, Wanted, and Hancock while Hulk faced Charlie’s Angels 2, Legally Blonde 2, and Terminator 3.”

Let’s not break our arms patting ourselves on the back, shall we?

Craigslist

• "Speed Racer is just barely going to beat out Harold & Kumar II at the domestic box office.  Brutal." - David Poland.  Yes, that would be the Harold & Kumar that cost $12 million versus the Speed Racer that cost $120 million.
• Brett Ratner wants to make movies based on video games.  I don't have a joke here.  Just ponder that for a while... and then try to stop yourself from crying.
• Motley Crue's new single sold 10,000 copies on iTunes, but 47,000 copies through Rock Band on the Xbox 360.  Very interesting to think about new distribution patterns...
• I can't believe how bored I was during Indiana Jones IV.  It's not that the film was bad... it was just "meh."  The ultimate sin - just plain boring.  After seeing how Bourne and the latest Bond film (Casino Royale) reinvented the action/adventure franchise, and reset audience expectations, why would Spielberg and Lucas deliver this?  Anyway, here's a good review  :)

Life Does Go On

The loss of Sydney Pollack is incredibly sad.  The world has chimed in with their loving thoughts: Roger Ebert, Ray Pride, David Poland, Jeff Wells, Anne Thompson, the LA Times, the New York Times, and so on.  The world is worse off without him.  Even if I just thought of his recent roles in The Sopranos, Entourage, and Michael Clayton, I'd feel that the entertainment world would have lost someone special.  Fortunately for us, Sydney Pollack gave us so much more, directing Tootsie, The Way We Were, Three Days of the Condor, Out of Africa... and even producing The Fabulous Baker Boys, Sense and Sensibility, The Talented Mr. Ripley, Iris, Cold Mountain, and on and on.  He was a powerhouse.

I had the opportunity to meet him a few years ago at the annual Allen & Co. conference in Sun Valley.  I was a measly peon, there to support a non-entertainment executive, but I felt that I just had to go speak to Mr. Pollack during a down moment.  As you would expect, he was warm, generous, friendly, funny, engaging, and a good listener, even to a person who was clearly the least important person in the room.

I liked these quotes from his friends and colleagues:

George Clooney: "Sydney made the world a little better, movies a little better and even dinner a little better.  A tip of the hat to a class act. He’ll be missed terribly."

Robert Redford: "Sydney’s and my relationship, both professionally and personally, covers 40 years.  It’s too personal to express in a sound bite."

I'm selfishly using this opportunity with the loss of Sydney, to also express why I stopped writing for a few weeks.  My heart truly wasn't in it, due to my family's own recent loss, making the entertainment world seem appropriately insignificant.  A few weeks ago, we received some tragic news.  In a horribly shocking, violent, awful moment, we lost our friend and family member, Kevin - a husband and father of two beautiful little girls, and my brother-in-law.  My heart hurts every day with the thought of Kevin, his wife, his girls growing up without him, and my kids not being able to play with "Dodo" anymore.

We are incredibly lucky though, in that Kevin's family is surrounded by hundreds of family and friends who love them and will support them through whatever it takes, whatever they need.

This is beginning to sound cliche and tacky.  I think I now understand Mr. Redford's hesitancy to put his true thoughts about Mr. Pollack in a sound bite.  At times like this, I wish I was a more elegant author.

We miss you, Kevin. 

We miss you, Sydney. 

And for me, it's in ways that are so different, I just don't have the words...

Craigslist

• I don't love Noah's writing, but his Summer Movie Preview is pretty complete, if nothing else.  I find myself looking forward to Iron Man, Speed Racer, Indiana Jones, Get Smart (why open this on the same day as another huge comedy, The Love Guru?), Wall-E, Wanted, Hancock (could be Will Smith's first misfire in some time), The Dark Knight, Step Brothers, The X-Files sequel, Choke, Pineapple Express, Tropic Thunder, The International, Towelhead, Hamlet 2, and finally, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 (no, not really).
• David Poland handicaps and predicts the box office of the summer hits.  If Hancock hits $250 million, I'll be stunned.  Also, I think he's underestimating the geek quotient on Wanted.  I mean, if 300 can hit a massive opening weekend, then don't you think Wanted will gross more than $62 million all up?  Finally, if Sex and the City only makes $60 million, someone's getting fired at New Line Cinema.  Oh, wait - nevermind.  See David's full box office chart here.
• Dilbert author Scott Adams hated No Country for Old Men and proposes a new system for reviewing movies.
• The first full-length movie has been launched on YouTube, and the creators have an interesting business model behind it.  And by interesting, I mean "no way in hell will this work."
• David Poland again, talking about the Juno Blu-ray DVD.  It comes with a "bonus digital copy" that you can put on your iPod, PC, etc, etc.  This is brilliant, and I'd love to see every DVD come with this.  I mean, if I buy the DVD, and I want to put it on a different platform - can the studios save me some frustration and do the extra work for me?  I don't want to go find special ripping software, potentially breaking several laws... I want to put 17 Curious George episodes on my laptop or iPod for the airplane trip with my kids, but there's no convenient way to do this today.

David Poland Hated Cloverfield

David Poland hated Cloverfield:

"I'm never going to waste the time to review this magical marketing scam because it isn't even worthy of the blog-umn inches. Besides, I will be in Sundance when this one drops... into the toilet bowl of movie history. That said, it will open to over $40 million, breaking the record for January openings."

Craigslist

Lots going on out there while I was traveling, so I thought I'd just throw them onto the pile for you:

• The critics awards have begun in a big way, and while MCN has their page, I'll probably find time to pull my annual recap together also. 
• Jim Hill creates an AMAZING list of cameos and cross-references throughout Pixar's film history.  For someone like myself who has been forced to watch Cars several hundred times, these are incredible.  But... he didn't call out the cameo from the Apple car in the first race.  It's just black and white, it wears the number 84, and it's only onscreen for a second or two. 
• David Poland calls Nikki Finke "a piece of shit."  Hee hee... 
• Anne Thompson reminds us that George Clooney is brilliant:  Why were films like Syriana and Good Night and Good Luck embraced by audiences while the more recent rash of political films have not been? "People like ambiguity," Clooney suggested, admitting that he had not seen all the films. "They don't want to be told what they should think."

Independent Spirit Award Nominations

...and Award Season is here!

If you've got a budget under $20 million, then you too can be an Independent Spirit Nominee.  I've cut-and-paste a few of the categories below, and you can read David Poland's analysis here.  By the way, look at all the amazing films that were first-time screenwriters (Juno, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, etc.)

Best feature
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
I'm Not There
Juno
A Mighty Heart
Paranoid Park

Best director
Todd Haynes, I'm Not There
Tamara Jenkins, The Savages
Jason Reitman, Juno
Julian Schnabel, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Gus Van Sant, Paranoid Park

Best screenplay
Ronald Harwood, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Tamara Jenkins, The Savages
Fred Parnes & Andrew Wagner, Starting Out in the Evening
Adrienne Shelly, Waitress
Mike White, Year of the Dog

Best first screenplay
Jeffrey Blitz, Rocket Science
Zoe Cassavetes, Broken English
Diablo Cody, Juno
Kelly Masterson, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
John Orloff, A Mighty Heart

Best female lead
Angelina Jolie, A Mighty Heart
Sienna Miller, Interview
Ellen Page, Juno
Parker Posey, Broken English
Tang Wei, Lust, Caution

Best male lead
Pedro Castaneda, August Evening
Don Cheadle, Talk to Me
Philip Seymour Hoffman, The Savages
Frank Langella, Starting Out in the Evening
Tony Leung, Lust, Caution

Best supporting female
Cate Blanchett, I'm Not There
Anna Kendrick, Rocket Science
Jennifer Jason Leigh, Margot at the Wedding
Tamara Podemski, Four Sheets to the Wind
Marisa Tomei, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead

Best supporting male
Chiwetel Ejiofor, Talk to Me
Marcus Carl Franklin, I'm Not There
Kene Holliday, Great World of Sound
Irrfan Khan, The Namesake
Steve Zahn, Rescue Dawn

No Country For Old Men Debates

I mentioned a few days ago (twice) how much I loved No Country For Old Men, until the ending just kind of took me out of the whole fantasy, leaving me with a big, "huh?"

Well, I don't want to go so far as to say that the film blogosphere elite has labeled me a "dullard" for not understanding what the Coen brothers were trying to do (well, they wouldn't be the first), but there is a spirited debate about the ending of the film going on at a variety of sites.  You can find people arguing over on Glenn Kenny's blog (from Premiere Magazine), David Poland's site, and Jeff Wells' Hollywood Elsewhere

If you saw No Country and were completely fulfilled by the ending, or if you were left wanting, there's definitely something to be learned from these conversations happening as we speak.

Oh, and if you haven't seen the film yet, don't you dare read these pages, as they are chock full of spoilerific goodness.

Charlie Wilson's War Finally Previewed

Universal finally showed Charlie Wilson's War to the press last night, and you can read what Jeff Wells, David Poland, and Kris Tapley thought of it.  The words "abridged," "cut and re-cut, "good but not great," "likeable," "terrific," and "Phillip Seymour Hoffman is a God... can do no wrong" keep coming up.  Sounds like a mixed bag but net-positive in the end.  I'm just wondering, when was the last time we had Oscar bait that was only 97 minutes long?