The Hollywood Machine

Southland Tales Finally on it's way

The new movie by Donnie Darko director Richard Kelly, Southland Tales, seems to be finally on the way to theaters. The movie was booed when it was first shown at the Cannes movie festival, which got it into some trouble with it's distributor, which in turn got the future of the movie in doubt, but Richard Kelly now writes on his weblog that the movie is as good as done, and coming our way. The movie has been made half an hour shorter, and more understandable, though I hope there will still be plenty of guessing for viewers. Movies shouldn't always be too easy after all.

How well is Eragon going to do?

The release of Eragon is finally here, and the question is now: how well is it going to do? Is it going to be the Lord of the Rings size hit that Fox no doubt hopes it will be? Or will it flunk out into Dungeons and Dragons territory? To be honest, it's hard to call. Fox has thrown out everything they had in order to make people aware of this movie. You couldn't surf the web for five minutes without running into some banner ad for the movie, or for some site running a competition which let you win all sorts of Eragon goodies. The TV-ads have been running for a long time now, and the trailer has been doing some heavy rounds in theaters.

Still, there is an early indication that there might be trouble.

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Why American Dog might become the best animated movie in years

With all those different animated movies coming out nowadays, it's getting to be increasingly difficult keeping them apart. Most of them are either of the 'cute animals fight human evil' type, or try to spoof fairy tales for the umpteenth time, so you'd almost say it shouldn't be too difficult to come up with a movie that stands out. Disney will unleash a movie like that in 2008. Yes, it features animals, but they're not singing with high pitched voices or trying to get rid of hunters. No, this is American Dog, created and directed by Chris Sanders, the man behind the most original animated movie of the last ten years, Lilo and Stitch, and here you will read why it's going to be the animated movie to watch.

Continue reading "Why American Dog might become the best animated movie in years" »

With all those different animated movies coming out nowadays, it's getting to be increasingly difficult keeping them apart. Most of them are either of the 'cute animals fight human evil' type, or try to spoof fairy tales for the umpteenth time, so you'd almost say it shouldn't be too difficult to come up with a movie that stands out. Disney will unleash a movie like that in 2008. Yes, it features animals, but they're not singing with high pitched voices or trying to get rid of hunters. No, this is American Dog, created and directed by Chris Sanders, the man behind the most original animated movie of the last ten years, Lilo and Stitch, and here you will read why it's going to be the animated movie to watch.

Studio confident about Golden Compass movie

The Chief Operating Officer of Time Warner, Jeff Bewkes, has spoken out on the movies his studios (Warner, New Line) are releasing next year, and he expressed confidence in The Golden Compass. ""It won't be another Lord of the Rings," he said, "but it could be a nice solid thing. And if it is, we have three of them." I'm not sure if the comparison with Lord of the Rings was really necessary, since the books are hard to compare in my opinion, but at least it's a good thing that the head of the studio responsible for making the money has confidence that it will be a success. Although it does sting a little bit to see that Bewkes is minimalizing these wonderful books to nothing more than money machines.

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Awards season has started!

The time has started where movie news sites everywhere are flooded with posts about movies and people winning certain awards. The first awards handed out are the awards from the National Board of Review, which has named Clint Eastwood-directed Letters From Iwo Jima as it's Best Movie. Best Director went to Martin Scorcese for The Departed (will this be the year he finally gets his Oscar?). Best Actor went to Forest Whitaker for his role in The Last King of Scotland, Best Actress went to Helen Mirren (The Queen). Cars was the movie that won the award for Best Animated movie of the year. The Board of Review is an organisation made up of Film Educators and other people professionally involved with movies, who don't have any connections to the actual people making the movies.

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Ooh, pretty Transformers pics!

While we have seen plenty of unofficial pictures from the new Transformers movie, there hasn't been very much official to get excited about yet. This stops today however, with these great shots op both Optimus Prime and Bumblebee. I'll admit that I think Prime looks maybe a little bit too flashy, like a pimped up version of the Prime we know from the cartoons, but Bumblebee looks just like any fan would want him. Click on the link to see the shots!

Luc Besson: The Return

His planned retirement didn't last very long: Luc Besson has told Production Weekly that he is willing to return to the director's chair if his upcoming movie Arthur and the Invisibles is a success: Besson wants to film the sequel, Arthur and the Forbidden City as well. Even if the movie is not a rousing success, Besson is still not planning on leaving the moviegame altogether. He has signed on as a producer for Hitman, the movie based on the popular videogame, and plans on writing and producing Taxi 4, the newest movie in one of his most popular franchises. Of course we know that Besson already said that his departure from directing was not definite, but I did not expect him to eat his words again this soon!

Dreamworks thinks animated movies are too much alike

Dreamworks Animation CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg admitted on tuesday that animated movies nowadays are too much alike, which is the reason why several of the movies that were released this year did not do as well as they should have. "The thing I did not anticipate that was more problematic than the volume of product was the sameness of product," Katzenberg said at an investors meeting. "That is what has created a bit of animation fatigue." Hm, didn't somebody else say something in the same vein last week? Anyway, Katzenberg hit the nail on the head, now let's hope that he will do something about it. I'm not sure how long it will take before Dreamworks makes some changes in their animation strategy, since they already have their slate planned out all the way until 2010. Katzenberg also mentioned that Aardman is almost definitely out ("We have agreed to sit down after the first of the year and look at future prospects. Having said that: We're only going to continue in a business where we make money and feel confident about that."), and that he has great confidence in his upcoming movies, particularly Shrek 3 and Madagascar 2, and new property Kung Fu Panda ("It's getting the most enthusiasm of any property we have seen to date").

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Just say no, Eddie

Now here's a headscratcher: Eddie Murphy is going to reprise his role of Axel F. for a fourth Beverly Hills Cop movie. Now correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the third one fail miserably at the box office? I guess things like this happen when your career has more or less got stuck in one family movie after another, and crowds don't seem to love you as much anymore as they did back in the days when you were still 'hip'. And with Stallone making some waves with his new Rocky and Rambo movies, maybe Murphy thought going back to his most successful role would be a good idea.

And you know, maybe he's right. But for that to happen, the people making this movie need a fresh script, a director who can pull something like this off (Shane Black perhaps?) and a new spin on the original concept, so that this movie does not mirror the first ones completely anymore. Give Murphy back his edge and don't dumb it down so you can please his family audience. Murphy can still be funny, he just needs the right material to show his skills. And if you can come up with a trailer that is off-beat, and not just a collage of action sequences and bad jokes, maybe you can even convince the audience that this is a movie they have to see.

Of course, this movie can suck immensely and die a terrible death, but I don't think Murphy would risk his career in this way.

What do those box office numbers really mean?

Every weekend, life in Hollywood more or less freezes. Sure, people go on living, but everybody is waiting to hear the new box office numbers. Which big new movie is a smash hit? And which one tanked? All over the world even the regular newspaper mention the latest box office numbers, frequently telling us that this or that movie has broken a certain record. But what do those figures really mean? And are there really records being broken, or is it all marketing hoopla?