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Making The (Up) Grade: Rocky
Filed under: United Artists, Fandom, 20th Century Fox, Home Entertainment
While new Blu-rays of old movies are sometimes dubious replacements for prior editions (hence the need for this column), box sets released in the high-definition format have thus far been fairly helpful, at least in terms of shelf space: many or most of them forego a lot of the frills and flourishes of their standard-definition iterations in favor of more streamlined packaging. Unfortunately, that's also sometimes extended to their extras, thanks in no small part to the legal entanglements of transferring commentaries and bonus content from one format to another.
Both Warner Brothers and Fox have faced this challenge a couple of times thanks to their ownership/ adoption of the libraries of MGM and United Artists, which until a few years ago issued their own releases. Rocky, which is one of United Artists' premier franchises, was recently released on Blu-ray in The Undisputed Collection, a set that contains all six of the films in the series, but it remains to be seen whether complete also means comprehensive in this particular case.
What's Already Available:
'Avatar' Watch: Running Time Announced and New Featurettes
Filed under: Action, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Fandom, 20th Century Fox, Newsstand
Though early rumors suggested the film was going to clock in at over three hours, 20th Century Fox claims James Cameron's Avatar will instead clock in at 150 minutes (or 2.5 hours), or about 156 minutes if you count the credits. The main reason why the film will run under three hours is because of the IMAX showings. Avatar will open in about 180 domestic IMAX theaters on December 18th, and because of the way the IMAX system is set up, the theaters that aren't converted over to digital projection can only hold about 170 minutes worth of film. But while Cameron's final edit came in significantly under 170 minutes, there's no saying whether there will be a cut on the DVD that will run over 170 minutes. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Avatar will open on a minimum of 5,500 screens, with almost half of those screens equipped to show the film in 3D.
In other Avatar news, two new featurettes were released online toward the latter part of the week. IGN UK unveiled one behind-the-scenes video focused primarily on the realistic sci-fi equipment created for the film, and Coke Zero released a video that introduces Stephen Ling's character, Col. Quaritch, and reveals a whole bunch of new footage. You can watch both videos over at SciFi Squad.
Fun or Lame: Fox's 'Bones' Becomes One Big 'Avatar' Promo
Filed under: Action, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Fandom, 20th Century Fox, Movie Marketing, Fan Rant
I'm pretty easygoing when it comes to marketing and product placement. It's so ubiquitous that I tune it out, or laugh along when it shows up on 30 Rock. I can never really muster up the rage some viewers do when Pizza Hut, Ford, or the iPhone is prominently placed in a movie or television show. The most I'll do is roll my eyes and joke about it later on ("Did you notice that? Lame!"), because I find the big picture to be more important than some high-priced props. That is, I didn't care until Fox proudly announced that Bones will return in two weeks with an Avatar themed episode. (The promo is embedded below the jump for the curious and eager.)
Look, I get why Fox would think this was a slamdunk. It's on their network, and one of Bones' recurring cast members, Joel Moore, is actually in Avatar. I understand that the combination makes the December 3 episode of Bones prime advertising real estate. But come on! Can't you just run some flashy commercials, a new trailer, or "a special behind-the-scenes look" like you did with films back during the good old days? Doesn't anyone at 20th Century Fox wonder if it doesn't look a little desperate to coerce an entire show into the PR game? After all, Avatar was supposed to sell itself purely on the photo-real effects, the world of Pandora, and the name of James Cameron. Why do they need Bones?
New 'Percy Jackson' Trailer Reveals Uma Thurman's Snake Head
Filed under: Sci-Fi & Fantasy, 20th Century Fox, Trailers and Clips
There is a new trailer out for Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, 20th Century Fox' bid to get in on the financial treasures to be mined from film adaptation of young-adult fantasy novels, and for most people it should serve as the first real glimpse into what kind of an imaginary world Chris Columbus, after having ushered in the first two Harry Potter films, is bringing to life on the big screen. I know little about the series of fantasy-adventure novels by Rick Riordan, so it's nice to now have some clarification beyond the film's early teasers, which were merely announcing the title.In this feature trailer you'll actually get a cursory look into the life of the titular Percy Jackson (Logan Lerman, who played Christian Bale's eldest son in 3:10 to Yuma), a teen who is unknowingly a descendant of the Greek God Poseidon, as well as glimpses of the film's nice array of adult actors countering the mostly young cast. We've got a look at Pierce Brosnan as Percy's guide to Greek mythology, as well as glimpses of Rosario Dawson as Persephone and Uma Thurman sporting an unhealthy amount of snakes around her head as Medusa, one of the several antagonists Percy will have to cross in order to recover a lightning bolt he is accused of having stolen from Zeus.
The film will be making its bow on February 10th, which means that between this and Clash of the Titans, Greek mythology is going to be undergoing a welcome, mini-resurgence in the first quarter of next year. So if you thought the trailer for the latter, which features plenty of big budget action and CGI beasties wasn't up your fantasy alley, give this trailer, embedded below, for Percy Jackson & the Olympians a try.
Review: Fantastic Mr. Fox
Filed under: Animation, Comedy, Theatrical Reviews, 20th Century Fox, Family Films
By Todd Gilchrist (reprint from 11/3/09 -- AFI Film Festival)
It's not hard to like any movie that uses the Beach Boys' music, but Wes Anderson makes it especially easy. As Hollywood's foremost purveyor of hipster drama, his pedigree as a reliable selector of appropriately wistful, poignant and all-around unforgettable songs is virtually unrivaled, but Fantastic Mr. Fox exceeds even the work of his earlier films, using "Heroes and Villains," and later, "I Get Around" as populist punctuation that manages to be both specifically relevant and substantively rousing.
As an animated opus, the film is by necessity his most controlled to date, a painstakingly-designed dollhouse where he no longer controls just the music, sets, and costumes, but the performers themselves. Ironically, however, it feels like his loosest as well - a gloriously unwieldy comedy of manners submerged in the minutiae of Anderson's madcap creativity. All of which makes Fantastic Mr. Fox a celebration both of its stop-motion medium and Anderson's aesthetic, while still managing to fully document the spectacular fun in original author Roald Dahl's daffy, distinctive imagination.
Cinematical Seven: Silliest Disaster Scenarios
Filed under: Action, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Thrillers, New Line, Paramount, 20th Century Fox, Cinematical Seven, Lists
We both know that I could probably fill all seven slots of this list with just scenes from Roland Emmerich's disaster-tastic 2012, but in the interests of letting everyone else get a chance to see it, let's stick with films that have already come and gone. Some of these titles qualify because of the uniquely ridiculous nature of their disasters, while others count for what ridiculous plots unfold amidst otherwise ordinarily perilous acts of nature.
There will be a couple of spoilers to go along with our picks, but since most of these have been out for a couple of years, it's not like it's the end of the world...
Original A-Team Making Cameos in New Movie?
Filed under: Action, Casting, 20th Century Fox
I'm not going to pretend like I had any kind of a reaction to the initial news that Joe Carnahan was remaking The A-Team. I have no sentimental attachment to the original show from the '80s, nor do I have much affection for Carnahan's filmography. That said, once the film cast Liam Neeson, 'Rampage' Jackson, Bradley Cooper and Sharlto Copley as its crew of wrong war vets doing good while on the run, I was in. However, those who weren't too fond of the news of yet another pop culture staple getting re-manufactured by Hollywood might like to know that the original "A-Team" will be popping up in the reboot.
Well, at least one of them will. The Official Dwight Schultz Fansite is reporting the actor, who played the original 'Howling Mad' Murdock, has been on location in Vancouver filming his undisclosed role in the picture, which will be out in June of 2010. They're giving no hints as to who Schultz is playing this time around, but they have relayed his take on the District 9 star filling the same shoes he once did, "Sharlto Copely, the South African actor who plays Murdock, is according to Dwight: 'brilliant beyond words'. Dwight has seen his screen test and he stated: that honestly, if Sharlto is given an opportunity to do what I saw in that test, "Murdock" will be better than ever!"
That should be a sigh of relief to fans who were worried about the handling of their beloved characters. There's no mention if any of the other originals will pop-up in the new A-Team. George Peppard, who first played Liam Neeson's Hannibal, passed away in 1994, but Dirk Benedict and Mr. T could still join Schultz on screen. What say you fans of "The A-Team"? Would you like to see the remaining crew cameo or are they better left confined to '80s nostalgia?
Is the 'Avatar' Budget Approaching $500 Million?
Filed under: Action, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Fandom, Distribution, Exhibition, 20th Century Fox
Talking about film budgets is a tricky thing. Talking about the budget for Avatar is an even trickier thing. I recently mused about how Fox's huge gamble had caused four highly-anticipated films in China to flee from its shadow, poising the film on the precipice of a perfect storm of box office success in China that no previous film had been privy to. In doing so I invoked the ire of a good number of commenters, all of whom felt my budget-returning extrapolation from the news that Avatar is set to dominate in 80% of China's screens during its biggest blockbuster season wasn't just a wrong hypothetical, but downright ignorant.
While I still stand by the point of that post - that the hitherto unseen convergence of all the elements behind Avatar's release is going to see unprecedented box office in China - I'll concede that there is no chance that the film makes its budget back from China alone; not with the New York Times now claiming that the film's price tag is breaching the half-billion mark. As with all things budget, however, this number isn't as simple as it looks.
The $500 million is NYT's combination of the estimated $300 million it cost to actually produce the film, the approximately $150 million Fox plans to spend on global marketing alone, with the remaining $50 million being a cushion for the cumulative costs some of the film's partners have already ponied up (such as Avatar Day, whose bill was footed mostly by IMAX). However, even if their newly estimated number is accurate, that doesn't mean that Fox is on the line for the full half-billion.
Roland Emmerich May or May Not Blow Up the World Again
Filed under: Action, Drama, Thrillers, New Releases, Sony, 20th Century Fox, Movie Marketing, Remakes and Sequels
At a press junket earlier this summer for 2012, Roland Emmerich told reporters he's not doing any more blow-'em-up flicks. "I would not know how to top this... It's just one of these things, you know. I had a hard time deciding to do another disaster movie, but... you cannot make a disaster movie if there's not something --- an idea in this disaster which elevates it to something more than a disaster. And so it was this idea, you know, that there will be a global flood and it's a retelling of Noah's Arc." Later he added, "It's not my last film, it's my last disaster film. And that's because I wouldn't know what else to do. It's just, you know what, I really didn't want to do this movie at first... But when I decided that the idea was too good to not do it for the reason I had done before, I said, okay, if I do it, I will do it in such a spectacular manner that nobody can top it for a long time. I have that pride in my work."
'Avatar' Could Earn Back Its Budget From China Alone
Filed under: Action, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Distribution, 20th Century Fox
I don't know how many moons orbit Cameron's fantasy planet Pandora, but I'm just going to assume they're currently all heading for alignment. Screen Daily tells us that Avatar's two-months away release in China has caused no less than four of its own would-be blockbusters to hide from the giant shadow the blue cat-people will inevitably cast when they debut there January 1st. Zhang Yimou's remake of the Coen Brother's 1984 directorial debut Blood Simple has now decided to bow closer towards the beginning of December. Same goes for the road movie Wu Ren Qu, The Pang brother's fantasy/action sequel The Storm Warriors, and the sci-fi western Treasure Hunter (starring Jay Chou, who America will soon know as Kato in The Green Hornet).
Now I understand that few people who read Cinematical are going to be affected by the release date shift of those four films, but what makes this news worth paying attention to is the fact that these changes slot Avatar into a position in which it could conceivably earn its budget back from Chinese cinemas alone. The biggest time of the year for the Chinese box office is the three month window that covers Christmas, New Year, and the Chinese Lunar New Year and now that these four domestic films have made way for an international usurper, it means Avatar will be taking over a whopping 80% of China's screens during its most crucial box office season.
Peter Jackson Says Spielberg's 'Tintin' is Done Filming, but...
Interracial Harmony: 'Ninja Assassin' vs. 'Blind Side'
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Exclusive 'Nine' Poster Premiere!
Exclusive: Title Track for 'The Road' Soundtrack
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