Welcome back to Movieline Attractions, your regular guide to everything new, noteworthy and/or siblingcentric at the movies. This week, Jake and Tobey star in Voltaggios: The Movie, De Niro feigns copacetic, and a man called Nimród could end up being the biggest winner of all.
Roman Polanski has made bail, is out of jail, and is now in his three-story Swiss chalet at the Gstaad ski resort -- and with five days to spare until the Glee finale! This is going to be the best viewing party ever! [TMZ]
If you weren't paying attention when James Franco's artistic collaborator Carter explained to Movieline that the actor's General Hospital stint was performance art, then you might be surprised by Franco's op-ed in the Wall Street Journal today, where he states the very same thing. "I disrupted the audience's suspension of disbelief," writes Franco, "because no matter how far I got into the character, I was going to be perceived as something that doesn't belong to the incredibly stylized world of soap operas." Perhaps, but for maximum cognitive dissonance, shouldn't this editorial have appeared in Cat Fancy? [WSJ, Movieline]
· So it looks like Harvey, Steven Spielberg's snorey mcsnorefest remake of the 1950 Jimmy Stewart-as-dude-with-invisible-giant-rabbit-for-a-friend film, is getting tossed into a big vat of boiling water and being turned into bunny soup. Variety says Tom Hanks passed, then next choice Robert Downey Jr. demanded rewrites; by the time the director started looking at third choices, the thought of Will Smith pitching "'Sup Rabbit? (The Harvey Rap)" for the closing credits rendered the project utterly unbearable to even Spielberg. We suppose it bears mentioning we completely saw this coming. [Variety]
Next in Ink: An Entourage movie; the Sexiest Man Alive makes his next move; Gun, With Occasional Music.
· The greatest actor of our generation finally succumbs to the easy paycheck of voiceover work for Dreamworks Animation's The Guardians. Watch out, Bonnie Hunt and John Ratzenberger!
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Beware, all ye Twihards thinking of snatching a piece o' Taylor Lautner's treasure trail with yar smartphones: Thar be dire consquences te yer piratey actions. Samantha "Team Me" Tumpach, 22, of Rosemont, IL. was thrown in jail for two nights when an usher discovered her shooting video of New Moon with a digital camera. Tumpach is now facing three years in prison, reports the Chicago Sun-Times.
Here's how it went down:
· Yahoo Movies has the second photo from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part I. No, Harry's not naked in it. Be patient!
· Glee hits its season high last night, while Steven Seagal Lawman became A&E's highest series launch ever.
· Marilyn Manson is back together with Evan Rachel Wood, says the shock rocker. Someone's angling for a True Blood guest spot.
· Who did Penelope Cruz channel for her sexy dance number in Nine? "Thinking about the Pink Panther would help get me in the mood," she told Interview. "When I was climbing the ropes to the ceiling, all I could think about was the Pink Panther."
· "Cookie Monster Mistakes Tyra Banks' Butt for a Cookie." Well, sure.
Adam Yauch's Tribeca-based baby, Oscilloscope Laboratories, has had what any small, independently financed distribution company should consider a banner year. Since we last checked in with them in April, they managed not only to survive in a pretty devastating climate, but to flourish, putting out a steady stream of eclectic, always interesting indie releases. Now, Oscilloscope is trying something interesting: The Circle of Trust is their answer to the Dessert of the Month club, its $150 membership fee getting you one moist and delicious DVD per month, before they hit stores.
"It's just kind of an experiment we thought we'd try to see if people were interested in it," Yauch told Movieline today from Hawaii, where he's vacationing. "Basically, if you sign up you get the next 10 DVDs we're putting out, a week before the street date. Once people have signed up, they can buy our back catalogue for half-price."
The video game, that is. Several times during its making, director James Cameron spoke at length about how involved he was in the home console version of his upcoming film Avatar, but he'd better hope that the movie earns better reviews. "It's not a bad game, and portions of it are competent, if not quite remarkable," says Gamespot, echoing most critics. "But Avatar wears thin quickly, and the story is too fragile to compensate for the deficiencies." Clearly, developers are ruing the day they decided to cut Sigourney Weaver's closing credits rap. [Gamespot]
Yesterday's 2010 Sundance Film Festival lineup announcement came bundled with one major change, and that's that they'd forgo the tradition of an opening night gala screening, to "instead focus on launching the total program: one narrative film, one documentary and one shorts program will play the first Thursday (January 21), beginning the roll out of the competitions," according to the press release.
The original plan, however, may not have been to break with tradition. Talking yesterday to first-time director Scott Cooper -- whose Crazy Heart was rushed into release by Fox Searchlight to qualify it for an Oscar run -- Movieline learned that the film was originally slated to be this year's Sundance curtain raiser.
If it's felt like there's been something missing from awards season -- or 2009 in general -- it's probably because there's been no Mickey Rourke, our crown prince of comebacks, our potentate of purse dogs. Luckily, Nerdist (by way of Vulture) pointed us to this little gem guaranteed to tide us over until Rourke's whip-wielding Iron Man 2 turn: the end credits of video game Rogue Warrior 2, which perfectly set the NSFW musings of Rourke (who voiced one of the game's characters) to an ambient beat. How could he have spent so much time pursuing boxing as a second career when music was his true vocation? The clip, after the jump:
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The Awl points us to A Single Man director/style fascist Tom Ford's icky, fussy profile in the NY Times Styles section ("He smelled like vanilla bean...He purred hello..." etc.), and in particular, a bizarre exchange towards the end with Up in the Air director Jason Reitman.
AS if on cue, Jason Reitman, the Academy Award-nominated director of "Juno," approached Mr. Ford's table at the Beverly Hills Hotel. He had seen the film in Toronto and wanted to say how much he loved it.
Adam Lambert has tweeted that ABC has canned two more scheduled appearances: Jimmy Kimmel Live, and his performance on Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve: "Yes, sadly friends, ABC has cancelled my appearances on Kimmel and NYE. 🙁 don't blame them. It's the FCC heat." Great. I thought I'd be ringing in 2010 with the long-awaited reunion of Ryan Seacrest's face and Lambert's crotch. Guess it's Chinese takeout and bed by 11:45 once again. [PopEater]
· Paul Thomas Anderson's next film is a period drama in which Philip Seymour Hoffman will play The Master -- a "charismatic intellectual who hatches a faith-based organization that begins to catch on in America in 1952."(But it's NOT the L. Ron Hubbard story.) Universal won't greenlight the film, budgeted at $35 million, until he delivers a finished script, which is basically something they're now required to say in these Tough Economic Times. Now here's the part in the blurb where I put the hacky blogger joke about milkshake-drinking. LOLZ! Priceless! Shazam! [Variety]
Next up, on Ink: Gwynnie's got a song in her heart (and a cleanse in her GOOP).
Well, it's not quite the $35 billion number thrown around in late September, but cable giant Comcast -- the one whose logo never fails to remind me of Pac-Man's red cousin munching delicious Alpha-Bits -- has itself gobbled up the disgraced fourth-place network and its various media holdings for $13.75 billion, half of it in cash. That sum gives them a 51% controlling interest in NBC Universal, while General Electric retains 49% and relinquishes boardroom power; Vivendi dumped its 20% stake. A newly minted division -- the Comcast Entertainment Group -- will oversee Comcast's interests.
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