Gibson Departing

Entertainment weekly just posted their cover story Q&A with Mel Gibson. I haven't read the whole thing...you can be assured that I will once the mag comes out, but the quote below surprised me.

Mel Gibson on exorcising his demons: "Martin Scorsese sent me the script from the last film he did, The Departed. I thought it was fantastic. I was like, ''S---, how come you always give me the good script when I'm about to go into production?''"

Can you imagine Departed with Gibson? Even more fun to speculate is this question: How different would this fall had looked had Gibson done that project instead of going the route of the wreck loose with his own Apocalypto? His whole drunken affair could have been written off as an understandable side effect of prepping for a movie where violence and rage were required. Certainly the studio would have required Scorsese and the other principles in the film to rally around Gibson and defend him. With that type of A-list support in the press, perhaps instead of disqualifying him for the Oscar, Gibson would have been a front-runner like Nicholson currently is. It would have been safe to vote for Gibson as a make-up vote for not supporting the well-made Passion.

The Trailer to end all Trailers

Coming soon.

Protocols Of Zion

I'm watching a documentary based on a popular book and it is amazing! Supposedly there is a large number of people who think that Jews secretly run the world and were responsible for 9/11. People even go as far as thinking that all Jews who worked at the World Trade Center called in that day tragic Tuesday. Every single one!!! Anyway, there is a book, (I guess pretty popular) called The Protocols Of The Elders Of Zion which states how the Jews run the world and want to take it over. It has been around for a couple centuries and Adolph Hitler used to read it. Even Henry Ford (yes THAT Henry Ford) would give people a discount on their cars if they owned a copy of this book!!!! Crazy, crazy stuff. I'm only half way though with this movie, but I'm blown away. A definate Netflixer!

Why video stores should be out of business and turned into a Walgreens

On Valentine's Day of 2005, my husband and I drove to Blockbuster to get a movie. This was shortly after they started their no late fee promotion. Well, needless to say, they didn't have the movie we wanted because nobody HAD to return it! So, we went home without a flick. I called my younger brother the next day to gripe and he reminded me (for the millionth time) that I should get Netflix. I have been using Netflix for 21 months now. I'm the first to say I love it (besides my brother...who left it and went to Blockbuster's version only to return to Netflix). I have gotten many other people to love it too! But, today, I decided to see if it was worth it...money wise! Well, the answer is yes!! So for all you 'not so sure about Netflix' people maybe this will help persuade you. (Keep in mind, I am not promoting Blockbuster online or anything other than Netflix--they truly are the best and most efficient!)

Here's the run down:
21 months of membership
$18.91 per month (3 movies at a time...tax already included)

185 movies watched in that amount of time comes to
about 9 movies a month.

That's $2.10 a movie. I like it!

If I continued by usual trip to Blockbuster to get a movie I would have paid $4 per movie which comes to $740 for all of them. But, I didn't. I just went to my mailbox and ended up only spending $397. That means I have saved my family $343 in almost 2 years! Imagine what you could save???!!!

www.netflix.com

The Great Shakespeare What if

This is a fun report theorizing how Shakespeare may have managed his intellectual property and brands had he been alive today. Follow the link to hear the entire report.

NPR : Could Shakespeare Survive in Hollywood?: "If William Shakespeare were alive today, he might be in real estate.

Shakespeare made some money as a writer over the course of his career. But longtime Shakespearean actor Patrick Stewart notes that his real wealth seems to have come from owning shares in The Globe Theater, as well as a substantial amount of property.

'He was a capitalist, no doubt about that,' Stewart says.

Today, Shakespeare's works are in the public domain. But as a living playwright, he would be collecting thousands of dollars in royalties -- just as Neil Simon does -- from the hundreds of productions of his plays in the United States alone.

One theater director in Denver, for example, said that his company's five-week run of Measure for Measure produced ticket sales of $470,000. Shakespeare's royalty would have been about 10 percent, or $47,000. That's just one theater in a medium-sized market.

As for publishing, Shakespeare Incorporated would stand to sell several million books a year. Last year in the United States, Shakespeare titles sold more than 775,000 copies. Shakespeare is translated into more than 100 languages; publishing royalties would rake in at least $10 million a year.

Shakespeare would have been popular in Hollywood, too. Like Stephen King, the Bard has spawned a cottage industry of film and television"

Jennifer Hudson

Well, I haven't watch most seasons of American Idol, but according to David Poland, I caught the right one because I know who Jennifer Hudson is. Apparently, she's not only a great singer, but an Oscar-calibar actress. Poland tends to get excited and over state things...I can't imagine what it must be like to be a person with tendencies like that :-p ...but this is certainly very interesting.

Poland's Review:
There isn't a bad performance in the movie. But the powerful surprise is Jennifer Hudson, who will be winning an Oscar this year, no matter what category they run her in.

The studio long ago decided to go supporting, but the HFPA is considering moving her to lead and she is, indeed, the lead of this film. There is a fear of Dame Helen, but the reality is that this performance would win in any category, whether Actress, Supporting Actress, or Best Short Film. The reason to move her to lead would to make an opportunity available for another performance…

Beyonce absolutely deserves a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her role in Dreamgirls. But given the brutal fight for Best Actress slots, I don't believe she can be sure of even a nomination there. As you watch the early parts of the film, it's not real clear that she deserves Academy recognition, but she really soars in the third act with a number of sequences, particularly with her performance of a new Henry Krieger song, "Listen," done almost completely in close-up.

And again… Jennifer Hudson will have an Oscar before the end of February.

Casino Royale Reviews

I was optimistic when they brought Paul Haggis on board to write this thing, but I never, in my wildest dreams, imagined that I'd wake up the morning it opened to see a metacritic score of 80...that's more than Flag of Our Fathers and Babel!

Entertainment Weekly's Review: "That's the beauty of the movie. A Bond who doesn't give a damn, who's made affectless, even haunted, by what his job brings out in him, is a Bond we can all give more of a damn about. He speaks to an age of desperation, when the cosmetic barely holds sway over the cutthroat. In Casino Royale, Bond does many things he's done before — turns criminal pursuits into high-flying death stunts, plays world-class poker, faces worldclass torture. At one point, he engages in such a fierce battle inside a Venice palazzo that the building comes crumbling down (that's beyond spectacle — it's blasphemy). Yet Craig, speckled with facial cuts, plays Bond with an almost bruised virility, making each of these actions an expression of unruly will. Casino Royale, the most exciting Bond film since On Her Majesty's Secret Service, has everything you want in a pop entertainment: physical audacity, intrigue, romance, but also a charge of personality that stayed with me for days."

Open Letter to the Creators of "Stranger Than Fiction"

Dear Marc Forster and Zach Helm,

Thank you for making the movie I never knew could be made. I just saw Stranger than Fiction and am still recuperating.

I am a spiritual person who writes and loves movies. More specifically, I am a Christian, a technical writer, an amateur movie blogger. And I want to thank you for portraying writers with such accuracy and heart-felt love.

I know you're probably thinking, "Don't technical writers just write confusing software manuals and create those bad diagrams that actually hinder me from assembling my bookshelf quickly?" Yes, that is what being a technical writer means. But it can mean much more than that. It means that I have to intimately know my audience, not unlike Kay Eiffel does, and visualize you when your struggling to assemble your bookshelf. Only in this manner can I know how best to communicate what you need to know. But it also means that I have to think like Harold Crick, deciphering codes and diagrams from engineers, interpreting them into a common language that anyone can access.

Therefore, from the moment the first chalk drawing appeared with Emma Thompson's voice over, I was on the edge of my seat. I knew from that moment that you were speaking my language. I have not yet had the opportunity to speak to other writers about your film, but I suspect that many will be affected by it in a similar way. The passion and self-less love of Kay Eiffel is inspiring, while Harold Crick's journey to see and then participate in, and finally accept the world around him was so pertinent to so many people's lives.

Living north of Chicago I felt like your movie was playing out on familiar grounds. Married to a wonderful, lively woman who, like Ana Pascal, after years of exploring more technical fields found a calling in her life to be baking for others, I found yet another character I could intimately identify with. I have been taught by wonderfully caring, yet knowledgeable professors like Jules Hilbert. So at every turn your film connected with part of my life in a unique way.

And then for you to use these characters and experiences in a story that encourages others to find meaning in their lives and to trust that the fate set before them can be a beautiful great thing if we see the big picture still calls tears to my eyes, even though I saw the film 12 hours ago.

From now on, when people ask me what works of art inspire and speak to me most, your film will be on the short list. Many classic novels, great ballads, amazing portraits, and cinematic epics have intimately touched me before, but few, very few, in the way Stranger than Fiction did.

Thank you.
eric nelson

Gears of War - Amazing

Well, they didn't have the Spider-Man 3 trailer but I did get my first look at the apparently much anticipated Gears of War Xbox game. I still don't believe that the actual gameplay can possibly look this realistic. If it does, I want an Xbox.

That's a pretty impressive stuff, and the soundtrack is a nice touch.

Simpsons Trailer

Did you catch the Simpsons Movie trailer? If not check it out here. Gotta say, I was VERY disappointed. I've caught a couple bootlegged scenes from the movie online and they aren't much better. I mean, this film should be chalked full of dozens and dozens of great gags...you gotta think they could use something better than that one.

I don't think I've had more mixed feelings about a film. I'm going to see it because, well, it's the Simpsons and how can't I? But I'm not excited to see it at all. Man, I hope the Harry Potter 5 trailer doesn't disappoint...but then again, is it possible for Harry Potter 5 to have a bad trailer...I mean, it is possible, but it's hard to conceive of a situation where the producers allow Potter to fall very far from its Goblet heights. We'll see.

On a final trailer note, I gotta say, I thought trailer for Premonition was actually very good.

New Trailers

There are a couple good trailers out there.
First, there's the Bruce Almighty sequel: Evan Almighty. This one looks pretty good.

But even more promising is the Spider-Man 3 trailer. Man, I couldn't be more excited about this film.

So that's what we got until tomorrow when they release the Simpsons movie trailer and then next week when the Harry Potter 5 trailer's released.

Stranger Than Fiction

Ebert's back and he's got a review of Stranger Than Fiction which is exactly what I was hoping for. It sounds like it's the thoughtful fun movie I was looking forward to.

Roger Ebert: "What a thoughtful film this is, and how thought-stirring. Marc Forster's 'Stranger Than Fiction' comes advertised as a romance, a comedy, a fantasy, and it is a little of all three, but it's really a fable, a 'moral tale' like Eric Rohmer tells."

The Queen Review

Good:
1. The fact that it is based on relatively recent events and people who are currently alive and in power.
2. The usage of stock footage of Diana. In the little bit you see of her you can understand who the people of England felt such a loss for her.
3.Tony Blair. I really loved this character. He is caught in a very delicate situation between the public and the Royal Family. He seems to be played by a comedic actor which helped make him seem more like a common man and not a politician.
4. Not knowing which way you should feel about the Queen of England and the Royal Family. They are obviously out of touch with the common man, but is it their fault? Should we feel mad, annoyed or saddened by peaking into their lives?

The Bad:
1. Not knowing which way you should feel about the Queen of England and the Royal Family. I’m not sure if the film didn’t know how to portray them or left it up to the viewer to decide for themselves.
2. The first half of the film seemed to be filmed as a comedy that was disguising itself as a drama. It was actually quite annoying.


What’s funny about this movie is that it seems like a love it or hate it type. All the users on Metacritic either gave it a zero or a ten. There was really no one inbetween. I’m going to have to give it a six. If the movie took a more direct approach to what it was trying to convey it would have been easier to identify with the characters. The problem is that the movie’s central character is the Queen and you never know how to feel about her. Is she really cold and snotty or is she misunderstood by the general public? I still don’t know. I don’t like black and white type characters but the Queen was just too ambigious.

Wal-Mart: Setting the Expectations

Check this posting out over at my new site.

the Great Lemming Revival: "She’s providing a service that most people don’t have the time or the knowledge to do for themselves and therefore she should get paid at least, say, $20/hr. So, in a world where she got a fair American wage, she should sell her hats for $63. But she can’t? Why? Because no one is willing to pay $60 for a knit hat anymore when they can find a comparable one at Wal-Mart for $5. Sure they’re willing to spend $12 on a hat because they’re willing to pay extra for the quality yarn. But people are not willing to pay extra for the high-quality craftsmanship of an American knitter.

Without even knowing it, my knitter friend has to compete with Asians because Americans aren't willing to pay American wages anymore for garment construction. Wal-Mart and Asian manufacturers have set American expectations for prices and consequently, quality craftmanship gets the short end of the stick."

Boy did this guy get screwed!

http://lostpedia.com/wiki/Lloyd_Braun


I hope he's making a ton of money over at Yahoo.