The U.S. cinema box office continues its long decline. New release Tower Heist finished below expectations, coming in second behind returning champ Puss in Boots.
The Brett Ratner-directed Tower Heist got relatively good reviews—69 percent positive, according to Rotten Tomatoes—but the good reviews and star power of Ben Stiller and Eddie Murphy failed to propel it to the top spot, earning just $25 million while Puss brought in $33 mil.
Here’s a classic “humble brag” for you. What’s a humble brag, you ask? It’s a clever observation from the most recent episode of NCIS: Los Angeles, designating when a person compliments him- or herself by pretending to complain of a difficulty. The actor-filmmaker-politico-egomaniac George Clooney has just provided us with a classic, hilarious example of a humble brag in his interview with Newsweek magazine (h/t to USA Today), in explaining why he won’t run for political office: “I didn’t live my life in the right way for politics, you know,” he says. “I f–ed too many chicks and did too many drugs, and that’s the truth.” A smart campaigner, he believes, “would start from the beginning by saying, ‘I did it all. I drank the bong water. Now let’s talk about issues.’ That’s gonna be my campaign slogan: ‘I drank the bong water.’?” Perfect. By saying, “Poor me! I’ve lived such a thrilling, hedonistic, perversely enviable life that I just don’t know whether people will take me seriously as a statesman, which of course is what I really merit,” Clooney gets to brag about his cosmic coolness and superiority while pretending to be plagued with troubles like the rest of
By Mike D’Virgilio I’m not a big fan of reality TV, unless of course it’s “Sarah Palin’s Alaska.” Can’t get enough of that (that’s to tweak you lefty Palin haters and you righty elitist Palin haters). But my daughter seems to have a thing for “The Bachelor,” and since she’s home from college on break it’s being recorded on the DVR. Really annoys me. She offered, being the well raised-kid she is, to turn it off as I fixed dinner last night, knowing it annoys me. But I let her keep it on so I could revel in my annoyedness and implicit superiority to the ditzy broads and handsome vacuous guy on the show. But something struck me. Here are a bunch of attractive women doing whatever they can to lasso the attractive guy, and get hitched. I guess how it works is that they spend the show interacting in some way—I just saw them talking on a bench—and at the end the guy gives roses to the ones he will let stay and the others are out. Finally at the end just one gets the rose and Mr. And Mrs. Right get married. But I had thought marriage was
The son and I, actually one of them, the eight and very eager to be nine year old, saw “Unstoppable” a few days ago. I don’t go to many movies, time, popcorn and soda prices you know, but this got such great reviews for the kind of movie I would not expect such great reviews, that I had to check it out. It even got an 85% at Rotton Tomatoes, which I gather is pretty darn good. And it lived up to the hype. It was thrilling and moving in many ways. And Denzel Washington was his usual spectacular self. But one thing stood out to me in the hours after it ended. For a story where human mortality is a central character I would expect people would at some point acknowledge, in fear or hope or faith or anger, a supreme being, i.e. God. But the only time God was mentioned, or Jesus Christ, was as a curse. There was a good amount of cursing, it was PG13 after all, but how could that be the only mention of God or Jesus? I wonder about the writers. Are they so thoroughly secularized that they think nobody in the rural
You’ve spent hour after hour, day after day, week after week fashioning your contribution to the literary world. Deep down inside you not only hope it will wow book reviewers, but that Hollywood will also come knocking, seeking to translate your words into images. Then, one day, lightning is captured in a bottle and your book is optioned for a movie. What happens next? Novelist T. M. Wright’s experiences when his well-received novel A Manhattan Ghost Story was optioned for film shed some light on that question. In an interview with Apex Book Company, Wright describes what happened after Hollywood bought the rights to his book: Apex: A Manhattan Ghost Story is probably one of your best known novels, and has been in and out of development as a movie for years, where does that stand now? And can you talk a bit about the history of it being optioned? T.M. Wright: The novel, first published in 1984 by TOR Books, was optioned by Robert Lawrence Productions, through my agent at the time, Howard Morhaim, in 1991. That option was exercised by Lawrence in 1993, and the film was scheduled to begin production that year through Carolco Pictures (same studio
You Are What You See is a good introduction for Christians at their wits' end trying to figure out what to do about popular entertainment. You won't be given a hard-and-fast formula, but you'll come away with some maps and compasses to help you find your own way.
Hollywood Witches is a commendable effort, which will entertain readers with strong stomachs.
The internet has one more venue for conservative thinkers. It’s an interesting entrepreneurial experiment, in that visitors must pay-to-play. Reading the conversations is free for all, but if you want to contribute a comment, you must buy the site’s subscription service. Former Reagan speechwriter and Uncommon Knowledge host Peter Robinson joined with National Review contributor, Hollywood producer and screenwriter Rob Long to create Ricochet. The site debuted in late May and has attracted a solid following, among conservatives at least, during its first few weeks. According to its creators, Ricochet is “a place that’s built to fulfill the promise of banter at its best.” Those involved are engaged in “one big conversation, where anyone, anywhere, can chime in at any time. … At Ricochet, a good conversation is more than our interest. It’s our mission. We live for the collegial spirit, the taste for frankness, and the foundation of mutual respect that inspires the fastest-paced, widest-ranging, and most relevant of exchanges.” I discovered Ricochet while visiting Andrew Klavan’s internet digs. About the first 30 minutes of the Ricochet podcast, Klavan posted, includes a fascinating and wide ranging conversation between Klavan, Rob Long, Peter Robinson and Mark Steyn. Here are a
In a compelling interview with Patheos.com, a website designed “to engage in the global dialogue about religion and spirituality,” Barbara Nicolosi-Harrington shares opinions that Christians who want to affect the cultural influence professions should take very seriously. Barbara is a screenwriter, author, professor at Pepperdine University, and the founder of Act One, “an organization that seeks to nurture the next generation of Christian artists and media pioneers.” Concerning breaking into the cultural influence professions, Barbara notes that Hollywood is “the major league.” If you want to compete, her advice is simple: You shouldn’t seek to be the exception to the rule, if you’re going to make a profession out of something. You should do what everyone tells you to do. Work hard. Find the best education and training you can. This is a field like any other. The misperception is that because we make entertainment, people think it should be entertaining along the way. It isn’t. It’s grueling. But it is cool. Very cool. If you think Christian networks like EWTN or CBN will evangelize the culture, she advises you to think a second time. Dostoevsky said that man, in the end, will be saved by beauty — or nothing.
Bill Whittle is a clever, erudite and indefatigable proponent ofliberty and limited government. His latest PJTV video, entitled “Support Your Local Tea Party: Vigilance & The Siren Song of the State,” is a must-see, especially if you’re on the fence about attending a Tax Day Tea Party near you. Whittle’s video and the political movement it endorses are incredibly important. At the 2 minute 30 second mark, however, note his list of fields “the enemies of freedom have … taken over.” “Things have gotten this bad because we’ve allowed them to get this bad. We’ve been busy minding our own business for forty years, while the enemies of freedom have slowly and surely taken over academia, newspapers, movie studios, comedy, music, and politics. Now a huge slice of our own people long to escape the responsibilities brought on by the freedoms our forefathers gave their lives for. We can’t let that happen.” As usual, Whittle’s analysis is spot on, but one of those fields doesn’t quite jive with the rest. Everything that Whittle ticks off in his list influences that final item. Politics is a lagging indicator to these cultural influence professions. You can’t change Washington DC and
… at least on Fox come May after the conclusion of it’s eighth “day,” otherwise known as a season. From The Hollywood Reporter: Tick, tick, tick … and done. After eight seasons, Fox’s “24” is coming to an end. The groundbreaking action drama will air its final real-time episode in May, the victim of a confluence of circumstances: a swelling budget, declining ratings and creative fatigue. BOOOOO!!!!! Apparently, due to the fact that salaries spiral upward dramatically the longer a show is on television (especially after the fifth season), Fox was paying an incredible $5 million an episode for this year’s installments. Let’s see … 5 million times 24 episode equals …. A LOT! But Jack Bauer himself, as he’s proven countless times on “24″ is hard to kill: Yet for fans of Jack Bauer, there remains hope. Studio 20th TV is developing a theatrical film that takes Bauer to Europe, and showrunner and executive producer Howard Gordon says other possibilities are being explored as well. “There are other possible iterations of Jack Bauer and his world,” Gordon said. The producers of “24″ have long begged off shifting Jack Bauer to the big screen because it would screw up the
“Heterosexism” is becoming the term of choice among Leftists dominating the Entertainment Industrial Complex. The Writers Guild of America gave its imprimatur to a group of Leftist True Believers at a panel titled “Flipping the Script: Beyond Homophobia in Black Hollywood.” “Homophobia,” however, doesn’t properly capture the “institutional bias that affects jobs and advancement,” according to Jasmine Love, a writer on “Moesha,” “The Division,” and “The District.” Apparently “heterosexism” hasn’t hurt her advancement, but logic is not the strong point of this movement. Examining the list of panelists leads reinforces the idea that Leftists in Hollywood would rather score ideological points than tell good stories. Here are the people condemning the lack of black lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered characters on the large and small screens. Moderator: Sheryl Lee Ralph, one of Broadway’s original “Dream Girls” Quincy LeNear (writer-producer-director, The DL Chronicles) Deondray Gossett (writer-producer-director, The DL Chronicles) Maurice Jamal (writer-producer-director, Chappelle’s Show) Tim McNeal (vice president, talent development and diversity, Disney/ABC Television) Tajamika Paxton (GLAAD director of entertainment media) Wilson Cruz, a bisexual teenager on My So-Called Life and a recurring character on the gay-themed cable series Noah’s Arc How, exactly, has being black and homosexual damaged
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