Just forget the words and sing along

Wednesday, October 27, 2004

Damn! I've really been slaking on the show prep this week. The show's in an hour, let's see what I can get....

(Bush-Villain)

Readers of a British magazine see U-S President Bush as a bigger villain than Doc Ock.

They voted Bush the year's top movie villain for his appearance in ``Fahrenheit 9/11.''

He beat out Alfred Molina in ``Spider-Man 2,'' Leatherface for ``The Texas Chainsaw Massacre'' and Gollum for ``The Return of the Ring.''

In one category, Elvis Presley is still The King.

Presley tops the list of Forbes' top-earning dead celebrities.

His estate pulled in 40 (m) million dollars U-S last year.

``Peanuts'' creator Charles Schulz is next at 35 (m) million, followed by ``Lord of the Rings'' author J.R.R. Tolkein at 23 (m) million.

John Lennon was fourth, at 21 (m) million, and Theodore ``Dr. Suess'' Geisel fifth at 18 (million).

Heading down the list:

Marilyn Monroe, at eight million

George Harrison, Irving Berlin and Bob Marley, all at seven million.

Richard Rogers at 6.5 million.

And George and Ira Gershwin, Jimi Hendrix, Alan Lerner and Frederick Loewe, and Cole Porter all at six million.


----------------------------------------

George Lucas is getting going on Indiana Jones 4 again. Now, he's hired screenwriter Jeff Nathonson to work on it. Nathonson wrote the Spielberg movies "Catch Me If You Can" and "The Terminal," plus the "Rush Hour" movies. Nathanson will begin by re-writing the Frank Darabont script. You may remember that Darabont, who wrote and directed "The Shawshank Redemption" and "The Green Mile" wrote the first script, only to have George Lucas declare it crap.

The Grudge was such a surprise hit that plans for a "Grudge 2" have been announced. Hmmm.... It'll probably be original. I don't think there was a Ju-On 2.

The teaser for Episode III clocks in at 1:47. Posters and banners will start popping up in movie theatres next week. Don't forget, the teaser will be in front of "The Incredibles" coming out next Friday.

Sam Raimi has revealed that he's hard at work making a Spider-Man 2.5 DVD. Yup, a director's cut of Spidey 2. It's not going to be spectacular...Raimi himself said that we're only talking about making certain fight scenes 8-12 seconds longer. Says Raimi, "Sony said to me, ‘Oh, we want to release a 2.5, because they want to make more money. It’s not really that I had some scenes to put in. I mean, the movie really was the best I could make it. It’s not like I think I could make it better, but I said, ‘OK, well, if you want to spend money and really give the kids a few more action scenes, OK. That’s fine. It’s the kids’ choice if they want to spend that money."

Let's rattle off some of the new DVDs:

DAWN OF THE DEAD (Universal) Widescreen, Fullscreen and Unrated director’s cut editions of the hit 2004 remake. Like George Romero, I prefer zombies that are actual reanimated corpses to the plague-ridden psychos in vogue these days, but this one’s a scary, engaging thrill ride. Includes commentrak, featurettes, deleted scenes, and more. Unrated edition also includes some extra featurettes as well.

21 JUMP STREET: Season One (Anchor Bay) Early Fox series with Johnny Depp leading an undercover operation among inner city teens. 13 episodes on four discs, plus commentrak, interviews and booklet.

THAT ‘70s SHOW Season One (Fox) Sitcom shows exactly how it was to live in the Midwest during the 1970s. With promos, featurettes and more.

WHITE CHICKS (Columbia TriStar) Two black FBI agents disguise themselves as twin white teenage girls. Also available in an unrated edition and bundled with MO’ MONEY.

MULAN (Buena Vista) Disney’s take on the legendary Chinese hero, a girl who disguised herself as a man to enter the military and ended up a general, in a special edition that includes commentrak, alternate opening, storyboards, deleted song, music videos, Making-Of, and lots more.

And this one's just too cool...as you know, Peter Jackson, the man who made The Lord of the Rings films, is hard at work on doing his dream project: a re-make of King Kong. Well, it's just been announced that King Kong will get an IMAX release. That's...that's just cool. King Kong is coming out in December 2005.

Hopefully, that's enough.

Next Issue...Listen UP!!

No comments: