Friday, July 20, 2007

You've received a B.O. card from Harry Potter!

I should've known. The cutting edge of spam. ...Ah, good! It's still relevant Yahoo! news. The town of Brattleboro, VT is planning on stomping out its ancient traditions of public nudity like a cigarette butt. That's Brattleboro, VT, or as Norm likes to call it, Nazi Germany. The timing couldn't be more unfortunate, seeing as how the town of Springfield, VT has been selected as the official home of the world premiere of the Simpsons movie, featuring a buff Bart Simpson skateboarding downtown. And they say it's only going to make 112 million. Hah! I'll bet they're working on a sequel already: the Simpsons are evicted, move into Otto's school bus, and drive across the country entering in karaoke contests, til they finally get to the World Karaoke Championships in Branson, Missouri. Guest voices will include Wayne Newton... and that's it for the sequel. Wayne insisted that it be in the contract that he's the only guest voice. Hey, Grendel gets what Weldon wants.

Which brings us to this week's big weiner, Harry Potter 5! And while Mr. Equus himself only gets half of Tom Cruise's WOW paycheck, a paltry 50 million, the other stars are up to big things too. Rupert Grint's doing his version of Little Miss Sunshine, and who isn't drooling over Emma Watson, am I right? Next stop, the cover of FHM Magazine! As for J.K. herself, well, the next book will be about a successful novelist, but with a twist: in this novel their initials are K.J.!

Transformers slips to #2, but is still doing quite well. It's almost recouped its catering costs! And more importantly, the latest cover of Psychology Today asks the all-too timely question: "Are you an Autobot or a Decepticon?" And normally I wouldn't say it, but Shia's character name is freaking me out as it's dangerously close to my own name! That, and Colin Farrell from Minority Report. Sorry, but I don't see these things too often.

Boy, I tell ya, the web is a dangerous place. If you don't keep your head, you end up going off on wild tangents like reading about Posh Spice and that new Geico Cavemen TV show. Which is why I'm glad to get back to #3, Ratatouille, the biggest inter-species buddy movie since Clint worked with that orangutan. Only at #52 in the Top 250? Brad must be disappointed.

Die Hard 4 is at ... what else? #4! And, as if you needed further evidence of the re-Christ-ification of America, the tagline of the movie apparently includes the phrase "John 6:27", in honor of its release date. A little less God-y than, say, John 3:16. Incidentally, the text of John 6:27 is "Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him.” " Which was also the rules that the caterers had to follow. Bruce gets a little picky sometimes, but that's how it is when you're a big star. There's gotta be rules!

And rounding out the top 5 as they like to say on the news, it's License to Wed. Maybe I haven't been watching closely enough, but Mandy's been keeping a low profile. She's obviously got a bad agent. If I were her agent, I'd tell her! You gotta go extra-curricular to publicize a movie like this. Publicity stunts! That's what sells pictures. Just ask Don Swayze!

------------------------------------------------
And now to the dregs. #6 brings us 1408, still going strong for a month. Why the staying power? Well, I attribute it to the geniuses behind the scenes. There's genius on the screen, of course, with Cusack and Jackson finally together on screen after so many movies they were almost in together, but the screenwriting! That's where the magic happened on this one. Those Golden Globe-winning wordsmiths of note, Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski, who went from problem children to rejuvenating the biopic as we now know it (biopics of problem children, if you will) , have stumbled a little in these 2000s here, but they've learned from the mistakes of the past and have been born anew amidst the adversity and the slings and arrows, metaphorical and physical. You know, Lowell and Babaloo, you could take a page from these guys!

At #7 it's Evan Almighty. You know, it's the rare sequel without the Roman numeral. But let's face it, America. Hollywood is looking to the rest of the world for the real money. This is the #1 movie in Antarctica right now. India has embraced E.A. like gangbusters. In fact, it's been re-cut for India so it's more like the end credits. China is gearing up big time, filling our dollar stores with plastic arks and plastic animal playsets. You get the idea. And that's why talks are already underway for the third chapter in this story: God Almighty, about Morgan Freeman climbing Mount Olympus, on his way to the big Karaoke championship. This is for the coveted Mr. Karaoke Universe title, and I think I know who will be the Mrs.!

Well, the honeymoon's just about over for Knocked Up. It's done better than anyone hoped, of course. Still, it's not Wedding Crashers numbers. But it did cost a little less to make. Hmm! Too many variables to juggle. Better re-install Microsoft Excel here. Scuse me a second...
Sicko is still boffo at #9. Of course, it's not on 10,000 screens this time; otherwise it'd probably be doing better. But the main thing is that Congress is now re-thinking its doing nothing on health care. Meantime, I've got my new DGS Health Plan, which stands for: Don't Get Sick!
And finally, O13 rounds out the top 10. Seems like only yesterday it was out. What's it been, six weeks? Hard to say if its success justifies a fourth installment, but of course that's not a factor these days. Hey! Maybe they can somehow combine Pirates 4 and Ocean's 14: make Johnny Depp the 14th member of the Ocean gang. After all, AvP2 is coming out soon. Who doesn't like the latest fresh bandwagon, even the jaded Hollywood jetset?


Well, that's about all the damage I can do this week. Tune in next week! Peace out...

No comments: