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Rumblings that the WGA and AMPTP might finally reach a deal in their months' long stand-off are getting more and more pronounced.
Word is that informal negotiations have gone so well that lawyers for both organizations were taking time away from their busy Superbowl-watching schedules to draft paperwork putting a deal in place. Rumors are rampant that said deal may be signed and the strike may be up before the week is out.
We'll keep you posted!
Source: Variety
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Tween-age girls swarmed the Cineplex over the weekend, propelling Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour to victory at the box office with a whopping $29 million tally -- not bad for a flick that opened in less than 700 theaters.
Coming in a distant second with a $13 million take was Jessica Alba's supernatural thriller The Eye, followed by Katherine Heigl's surprisingly durable rom-com 27 Dresses, which took in $8.4 million. Rounding out the top five were newly-crowned Best Picture nominee Juno and last week's box office champ Meet the Spartans.
Source: boxofficemojo.com
Posted 02.04.08 by reelz -
ReelzChannel cosponsored the annual breakfast for the PGA Awards nominees this morning, where PGA president Marshall Herskovitz (Blood Diamond, The Last Samurai) spoke out about the strike. "Over the last few months this industry has basically been eating itself alive," Herskovitz said. "I--like everyone else in the Producer's Guild--have been asked a thousand times what is my position on the strike. And I wasn't allowed to say anything because I'm not in the leadership of the writers' guild and I'm not a member of the AMPTP," he continued."I finally decided...finally, you have to take a position."
And for Herskovitz, that position is suck it up and negotiate. "Neither the leadership of the writers' guild, nor the leadership of the AMPTP can say honestly that they've done eveyrthing they can to resolve this strike," he said. "They can say that they've done everything they can to support what's good for their organizations. But finally we as producers understand that you've got to think about the whole film."
Herskovitz went on to urge the WGA and the AMPTP to consider all the other industry people not directly participating in the strike who are suffering as a result--all the show and film staff who are losing their houses and their incomes--and to apply their energies to resolve their differences.
His words may in fact be more prescient than he knows, as there is chatter that the informal talks that have been going on between the WGA and the AMPTP for over a week now have been going well and a deal may be imminent.
Should it indeed be, we'll let you know!
Posted 02.02.08 by reelz -
Super Bowl counter-programming makes for one big estrogen party at the Cineplex this weekend, with Hannah Montana, Jessica Alba and Eva Longoria vehicles leading the pack of new releases. The lone exception is the Happy Madison comedy Strange Wilderness, which, shockingly, wasn't screened for critics.
A rundown of our reviews of this weekend's new releases:
The Eye 
"A paint-by-numbers facsimile of The Grudge, The Ring and countless other Asian-influenced, hot-chicks-in-peril supernatural thrillers." [Full The Eye Review]
Over Her Dead Body 
"The premise is not altogether unappealing; it's the clumsy execution that sinks this silly, forgettable comedy." [Full Over Her Dead Body Review]
Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour 
"If I were 12, I’d be in the audience singing right along with everyone else. That’s what you do as a young girl." [Full Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour Review]
Strange Wilderness 
Not screened for critics. Your guess is as good as ours. We're guessing it's pretty crappy. [Strange Wilderness Movie Page]
Also opening: Caramel
Posted 02.01.08 by reelz -
This weekend is Super Sunday and the Patriots are going for a season of perfection. To help you get in the spirit, we've gone though the annals of movie football history and picked the players we thought were worth remembering, for better or worse.
From there, we've compiled a list of the five best and five worst football movie performances. We're gauging each football movie character's reality level and then, to top it off, we've pitted them against Pats' strong safety Rodney Harrison (#37). Let's just say that some of them don't look so pretty afterwards...
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On the heels of director Mark Romanek's contentious departure from The Wolf Man, Universal is scrambling to find a replacement to helm the big-budget horror flick. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the short list of directors includes Frank Darabont (The Mist), James Mangold (3:10 to Yuma), Joe Johnston (Jurassic Park III), Bill Condon (Dreamgirls) and Brett Ratner (Rush Hour 3). Ratner is the odds-on favorite, having already served as an effective pinch-hitter on X-Men: The Last Stand, after director Matthew Vaughn departed the production weeks before shooting was set to begin.
Will Ratner be able to take time out of his famously busy party schedule to play second fiddle once again? We'll keep you posted.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
Posted 02.01.08 by reelz -
We were at the midnight showing of Hannah Montana / Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour and our crew (3) outnumbered the number of people in the theater (2). We're trying again this afternoon (after school) and will have First-ish Fan reaction posted later today.
Posted 02.01.08 by Dack -
Slate.com has an interesting article examining the impact of Heath Ledger's tragic death on Warner Bros.' promotional campaign for The Dark Knight, this summer's hotly anticipated sequel to 2005's blockbuster Batman Begins. Until now, Dark Knight's marketing focused mainly on Ledger's terrifying take on The Joker character, but the actor's untimely passing -- attributed in part to the stress he incurred while shooting the film -- abruptly changed all that.
According to Slate, look for Warner Bros. to shift the focus toward the flick's other villain, Two-Face, played by Aaron Eckhart, and his love triangle involving Bruce Wayne paramour Rachel Dawes (Maggie Gyllenhaal).
Source: Slate.com
Posted 01.31.08 by reelz