After making just $30 in its initial limited release theatrical run in 2006, Leo Grillo's indie noir Zyzzyx Road -- which starred an on-the-cusp Katherine Heigl and an in-decline Tom Sizemore and also managed to misspell the California desert locale it was named for, unless that was intentional -- will be released digitally this summer by the intrepid folks at GoDigital. "We love the story behind this film and are thrilled to be part of what we believe will be a happy ending, I am confident it will make us more than $30," said GoDigital Director of Marketing Barry Daffurn of the distribution coup. Ba-dum ching!
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Since Will Ferrell dropped the late-night bombshell that Anchorman 2 was a go the other week, the world's been wondering: What has Ron Burgundy been up to since 2004's Anchorman? Speaking with AM760/Salon, co-writer/director Adam McKay dropped a few hints about the sequel, which is currently being scripted. "I don’t want to give away too much, but I’ll just give a couple pieces of ideas that we’ve kicked around. Keep in mind we’re still writing the story, but I’ll say one phrase for you: custody battle. I’ll give you that. I’ll give you one other one: bowling for dollars." So... any guesses?
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I hesitate to even pass along word of the luxury fashion purveyor's ongoing litigiousness lest this site land in its hungry crosshairs, but: Have you heard about the lengths to which Louis Vuitton is going to keep its brand safe from the grubby likes of The Hangover Part II? Or how another, recently resolved court victory has possibly shored up its case against the film's studio Warner Bros.? Memo to Hollywood: Either get your clearances up front or do not even think of messing with these guys.
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Where does Martin Scorsese stand on the enduring cultural clash between vampires and zombies? Where else? "I happen to like vampires more than zombies. A vampire, quite honestly, you could have a conversation with. He has a sexuality. [...] I mean the undead thing... Zombies, what are you going to do with them? Just keep chopping them up, shooting at them, shooting at them. It's a whole other thing that apparently means a great deal to our culture and our society. There are many, many books written about it and many movies. I saw one in London when I was doing Hugo. I saw one late at night one weekend. It was called Colin, by a young filmmaker [Marc Price]. He shot it, I think, digitally by himself, edited it himself. It was savage. It had an energy that took the zombie idea to another level. Really interesting filmmaking. Disturbing." Also: He gets Raging Bull II just about as much as you and I do. [GQ via /film]
The off-Broadway musical adaptation of Stephen King's Carrie may have outlasted its 1988 stage predecessor by four times the stage run, but it died nonetheless last weekend -- two weeks early! The NYT has the post-mortem: "Several theater producers contacted recently said that Carrie, no matter how well acted and sung, presented far more than the usual share of difficulties, the most insurmountable being that nearly every character is dead at the end....Several reviewers complained about certain songs and a one-note blandness in the high school scenes, but the sharpest criticism was that Carrie had been de-camped to the point of dullness." Chloe Moretz, you're our last hope! [NYT via Movie City News]
On this day in the year 1990, Kristen Jaymes Stewart was born in Los Angeles to a script supervisor mother and father who works in television. Who'd have guessed that she'd grow up to become the highest earning actress in Hollywood before she was old enough to drink? Thanks to the Twilight films, Stewart's star rose in the blink of an eye (okay, four years and soon to be five movies), but she also deserves credit for racking up indie cred between bouts of vampire swooning. On the occasion of her 22nd birthday -- and with 22 features to her name to date -- let's name Stewart's finest onscreen moment.
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An eagle-eyed reader of Warner Bros.' exhibitors site passes along word today that The Dark Knight Rises has earned — wait for it — a PG-13 from the MPAA ratings board for "intense sequences of violence and action, some sensuality, and language." Sensuality! I knew Batman and Bane were going to get close, but not that close. [Nolanfans via Collider]
Despite last week's report to the contrary, it's not especially surprising to hear that Gary Ross is not quite out as the director of the Hunger Games sequel Catching Fire: Various sources have followed up initial word of Ross's franchise departure with news of predictable-enough salary disputes over ridiculously large sums of money that would push any spin machine into overdrive. UPDATE 4/10: Ross is officially out of the running to direct the Hunger Games sequel.
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Maybe this is the 3-D revival Hollywood should foist on holiday moviegoers: "ABC's traditional Easter-weekend broadcast of The Ten Commandments was the highest-rated program of the night with a 1.6 rating among adults 18-49 and 6.9 million total viewers." That would make 2012 the fifth year out of the last six that Cecil B. DeMille's epic swan song claimed the top ratings spot the night before Easter. Holy Moses, etc... [TV By the Numbers via Big Hollywood]
Even laundromats are scary to children's author-turned-crime novelist Simon Pegg in the intriguing British indie A Fantastic Fear of Everything, which is just about the most promising new trailer I've seen all week, and delightful to boot. Enjoy Pegg's litany of neuroses (and a stop-motion hedgehog!) in this first look at the film, directed by Kula Shaker frontman Crispian Mills.
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Legendary auteurs, they're just like us! When iconic filmmaker Ingmar Bergman passed away in 2007, he left behind one of the greatest bodies of work known to cinema -- and a vast, meticulously catalogued VHS collection, the subject of the upcoming Swedish documentary Bergman's Video. Among his tapes, somewhere between the Bunuel and the Tarkovsky: Jurassic Park, Ghostbusters, and The Blues Brothers, which at least partially explains the ghosts and Jake/Elwood-esque sibling dynamic in Fanny and Alexander. The dinosaurs, not so much. [Cineuropa via Movie City News]
Maybe it's because I've been obsessing more than usual over Joel Kinnaman since rolling through all of Season 1 of AMC's The Killing in a matter of days (I know, late to the party), but I dare any other Kinnaman-lover out there to watch the new trailer for Lola Versus and not fixate on the future RoboCop's 10 seconds of trailer screen time. Phew. That said, it's quite winning on its own, thanks to Greta Gerwig's charm and the hazy-golden gleam of the New York City streets she's traipsing along as she tries to figure out what to do after fiance Kinnaman calls off their engagement.
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Now here's a biopic I can get excited about: Blaxploitation icon Pam Grier is set to see her 2010 autobiography Foxy, My Life in Three Acts, adapted for the screen with Fresh Prince of Bel-Air/Living Single TV vet Eunetta Boone to script. Grier's story is full of sensational events -- just imagine that one Richard Pryor story, reenacted -- but also marks a turning point in the portrayal of strong, sexually-empowered women in Hollywood. That said, what young actresses out there can fill Grier's foxy shoes?
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If you wanted to remain completely spoiler-free going into this summer's modest little art pic The Avengers, too bad! Disney has gone ahead and ruined the surprise. So, fine. Captain America apparently does not perish at the end of The Avengers, but will indeed live on to deal with his personal issues in Captain America 2, due to hit theaters on April 14, 2014. Find the official word and a new image after the jump.
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The inspiring if short-lived "Linsanity" that orbited breakout NY Knicks point guard Jeremy Lin in February — which ultimately culminated in a battle of teammate egos that found head coach Mike D'Antoni on the unemployment line within a month — is finally getting the closer documentary look it deserves.
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