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March 31, 2006

what will your movie weekend look like?

Posted by poland at 04:17 PM | Comments (47)

March 30, 2006

Too Soon? Too Much?

Some people have said that some of the materials involving Universal’s United 93 are insensitive or inappropriate.

Take, for instance, the “Look Inside” being offered on the Apple trailer site. Is this an exploitation of the families or an important offering to the public that the families of the dead don’t feel that the story is exploitive?

Today, there was an announcement that the studio would give 10% of the opening weekend gross to the charitable organization that is building a monument to those lose on that flight.

Personally, I think Universal is doing good, doing right, and doing the best they can. Either you stay away from the story completely or you move forward and bring the families in. If they weren’t involved, people would accuse the studio of going around them and not showing enough respect. Since they are, the opposite accusation is afoot. But I think it’s a bit unfair.

It may be too for any 9/11 films in the eyes of New Yorkers who lived through the day in the city. I respect that feeling. But I don’t think taking swipes at Universal on this one is fair.

What do you think?

Posted by poland at 04:51 PM | Comments (31)

Horror Porn Is... A Response To 9/11!!!

Dallas/Ft Worh Star-telegram's Christopher Kelly makes the argument for Horror Porn here... you see, the adults just don't get it!

It would be laughable if it wasn't so tragically deluded.

Teenagers have been consuming massive amounts of crap forever... and adults have always winced.

Comparing Wolf Creek to Hitchcock... or Eli Roth to someone who can direct?!?!? Come on!!!

Horror films, like most of cinema, is cyclical. Scream marked the end of slasher horror in 1996. In a few years, someone will come up with an all-out satire of Saw and the others. And horror will be dead. And five or six years later, it will come back again. And so on and so on and so on.

The current trend is similar to tattoos... faster pussycat, kill, kill. How can you rebel against a generation that grew up smoking pot and getting laid? Tattoos, random oral sex, and more realistic movies about killing people.

For me, Roger Ebert has been the front man for "the adults," which is to say, if its the emotionless cartoon violence of Tarantino and Rodriguez, great...if it is really disturbing, piss on it and set it on fire.

Me? I am okay with the cartoon stuff or with the realistic stuff. It's about how the experience connects with me. There has to be a reason why some people connect so well with Eli Roth. To me, he is an aesthetic con artist who is not as clever, funny, or dark as he and his followers claim. Hostel was not crap because it was too tough... but because it wasn't tough at all.

And throwing 9/11 into it? The horror of 9/11 is how short our memories are in this country, not how it is manifesting in our culture. New Yorkers do still live with that experience. For the rest of the country, it has already been reduced to jingoism. We are affected by the roll-off. Airports aren’t as friendly. There is more building security. Etcetera. But one gets the impression that the Bush Administration would have found a war anyway. We’ll never know. But I would argue that most of America is more engaged by American Idol than 9/11 at this date. And adults, like Wes Craven, David Cronenberg, and Joe Dante are still reflecting on a lifetime of insight, not just the events of five years ago.

But what do you think?

Posted by poland at 11:35 AM | Comments (47)

Topics On The Cyber Table

Things are quiet on the Westside front... so here are three odd stories that might be worth discussing...

Harrison For "hates the internet".. but if you really read this story, he is saying that he hates not being able to control his image and private life because of the 24/7 hunger of the web for info. Does he have a point?

Waldenbooks and Borders will not put a magazine on its shelves because it contains the cartoons of Muhammad that sparked riots overseas. Censorship or safety?

As a potential ticket buyer for Mission: Impossible 3, will it bother or distract you that a guy who got burns on 60% of his body on the set in an accident - though any fire on set is extremely specific in its calibrations - is not getting a few million thrown at him by Paramount to compensate or even, legally, overcompensate.

Posted by poland at 10:46 AM | Comments (27)

March 29, 2006

Boy Is It Quiet Out There

There is a lot of gossip floating around, but bottom line... we are in the pre-summer lull in a big way.

Anyone awake out there?

(Return Of The Blair Witch? The Leprchaun in Mobile, AL)

Posted by poland at 09:22 PM | Comments (24)

March 28, 2006

Why Doesn’t Patrick Goldstein Get It?

It’s an interesting turn of events that Patrick “Blogs Are Evil” Goldstein is also such a progressive thinker in terms of new delivery systems. But here’s the problem. His grasp of the facts is a classic case of Reverse Overanalysis.

His great uncle’s company, Wometco, was a major force in many entertainment spheres in Miami as Patrick and I both grew up. But either to make a point (inaccurately) or because he now really believes this, Patrick misleads his readers into thinking that the company got into television as an alternative to theatrical exhibition. Wometco launched their station in Miami, not in “the 50s,” but in 1949. They were the only station in Miami and one of fewer than 125 in the entire United States.

No question, Wometco was taking a big risk on TV and would reap massive rewards. But that was their history. The company, launched in 1926, also built theaters, bottled soda, owned vending machines, erected and rented billboards, invested in land, and eventually bought The Miami Seaquarium. One thing about television, unlike movie theaters, in which Wometco competed with other companies, was that they maintained the television monopoly on not only Miami, but in parts of neighboring Broward County until 1957.

Moreover, the two most significant events in movie history in 1949 were not about television. One was The Paramount Decision, which forced the studios to break up their monopolies controlling talent, production, distribution, and exhibition. The second was the release of Winchester ’73, the landmark for talent operating outside of a multi-year-exclusive studio contract and receiving a percentage of revenues. It was these two events, not television (which did decrease audience numbers), that would lead to the complete collapse of the old studio system over the next 20 years.

It is true that, as Patrick states in his piece, that the industry often withdraws from new technologies at their own peril. But what Patrick forgets is that the industry has also survived new technology repeatedly… and more than a few times has had to survive its excessive zeal to embrace new technology. That 3-D is where it’s at… or is it Todd-AOVision… or Cinerama… or the AMC multiplex tiny box theater…

Why is Patrick, dancing to the same tune as many film writers right now, so anxious to move into the future? My argument remains the same. They are people over 40, with demanding jobs and families, that want the convenience of day-n-date delivery… which is really the only issue, since no one – not Dan Glickman, not Sid Ganis, not theater owners, not me - is actually arguing against new technology, but really, only about when the new technology (and current Home Entertainment technology) becomes a part of the equation.

It is a 100% false argument to say that the MPAA or anyone other than true Luddites are being technophobic. Patrick is arguing, as loud as he can, for New Coke and many of us – more every day – are saying, “Let’s make sure we aren’t giving Pepsi (in this business, other forms of entertainment) a license to steal a significant percentage of ‘our’ business without being sure about what we are getting ourselves into.”

Patrick’s family did not abandon its theaters when it went into television anymore than it determined that television was going under as a medium when it sold out to KKR in 1984.

But none of this really seems to be about the industry. It seems to be quite personal. Patrick writes, “No institution has more fiercely protected its right to watch movies on DVD than the academy, whose members are treated to Oscar screeners every holiday season, while we get a lecture about how we should settle for endless pre-show ads and overpriced popcorn.”

Well… hmmm… do you remember The Academy suing the MPAA over screeners? No. Because they didn’t. Of course, Academy members have major entitlement issues. They pale in comparison to the entitlement issues of the HFPA. And it was independent producers, ironically the same group that now endlessly hums about day-n-date release as a savior, that sued the MPAA.

But that distinction aside, the part I love is, “…We get a lecture about how we should settle for endless pre-show ads and overpriced popcorn.” We. The Royal We? Nah. The Media Imperious We.

The fact is, Patrick is a columnist and entitled to be about himself. What chaps my ass is that he, as many do, pretends to be objective. We!

Damn those Miami Dolphins! They expect me to settle for a stadium with uncomfortable seats, no air conditioning, no instant replay, and a ticket price of between 36 and 86 dollars apiece. I can stay home and watch the game on my wide screen TV! I can’t even see the entire field clearly from a seat in the stadium. Are they crazy?!?! How can they insult me like this?

And here is my thought… stay home. Watch your DVDs on your $10,000 home entertainment system that you and less than 15% of America have afforded itself, and enjoy!

Nobody likes pre-show ads or high priced popcorn. We also don’t like paying $100 for a balcony seat on Broadway, $12 for a mediocre drink at bars, $2.75 for a gallon of gas, $4.50 for valet parking, etc, etc, etc. But oddly, the response has not been to shut down Broadway, temperance, abandonment of the SUV, or even walking three or four blocks to the restaurant.

The next 1500 words after the jump...

It is also a bad misread, which could only come from not listening to Dan Glickman and many others, to suggest that the industry is not aware of the concerns over theater pricing and ads, among other complaints, and serious about addressing them. But really, give up on theaters, because Patrick Goldstein wants to watch his DVDs at home and he wants to watch them now!

Patrick also has badly mistaken how the web works in his analysis of NBC’s handling of “Lazy Sunday,” from SNL. He writes, “Whether the NBC move was driven by uptight lawyers or a desire to force Web surfers to view the clip on the network's own site, it was yet another paranoid misreading of the Internet, whose ability to expose the clip to millions of connected computer users would give a much-needed boost to an aging TV comedy franchise.”

Uh, no. There is no indication of that. The internet and internet buzz is a powerful form of narrowcasting. But broadcast TV operates under different rules. (See: Snakes On A Plane) Success in broadcasting and in studio-budgeted movies is wider than any web niche.

And have you noticed, they didn’t advertise that Natalie Portman’s SNL Digital Short would be on her episode of SNL… and they placed the video in the last hour, where they normally (just for the last few decades) put the pieces they consider the weakest on the show. If there is so much value to the show because of these viral clips, why aren't they being advertised? And for that matter, why isn't the Natalie Portman rap on iTunes for $1.99.

The only place you can see the Portman video right now is on the NBC website. And on the page, it says, “Now, instead of searching the web for "borrowed" NBC highlights, you can go to the source! We've taken your viral favorites and gathered them into one convenient location. Watch. React. Tell a friend.” Get it?

The only reason this link is not on YouTube is that YouTube presumably doesn’t want to support NBC’s effort if it doesn’t point to YouTube’s bottom line. A link is a link is a link. And by the way, YouTube plays its own form of this game by running many of its clips in streaming video that can’t be downloaded. So when Defamer, for instance, runs the clip, YouTube is branding in a proprietary way, with its name and player, with source material that they do not own.

Then Patrick goes back to the idiotic OTX report which is based on self-selected interviewees who are asked questions about what they think they did and what they think they will do… which is hideous survey technique. If you look at the box office last summer, there is no indication at all that teenage boys are the soft spot in the box office. But Patrick and others seem to want to believe it… so believe it… just keep believing’…

Patrick then goes to the digital film argument… which is completely off the point. Digital photography, once it became comparable on the quality level and price competitive on the hardware level, was destined to kill film photography because only a small percentage of the public has the ability to distinguish on quality and the convenience of digital is an exponential improvement. This is also true of digital projection. But no one will ever go see a movie because it is digitally projected. No one chooses a camera for their vacation because it is digital. They choose it because they don’t have to pay to process every shot, the capacity is virtually limitless, and they don’t have to carry around or load film. But there is no comparative issue of quality between theatrical exhibition or Home Entertainment. They are very different experiences. And no matter how big your home TV gets, it will be a different experience.

For decades now, the vast majority of movie tickets have been sold to fewer than 20% of the potential audience. Going to the movies has not been “everyone’s choice” since the television entered our homes. And that is pretty easy math to figure out. If the only cheap entertainment is the movies, people are desperate to go. In those days, they showed up at any time and got hours of entertainment for the price of a ticket. Since the 60’s, we’ve gotten hours of entertainment from The Box and going to the movie was an alternate choice. Technology hasn’t changed that. What has changed is the quality (up), cost (down) and speed (faster pussycat, kill, kill) of delivery. Just because Patrick doesn’t want to go any more doesn’t mean that everyone wants to stay home and watch TV, no matter how hard he argues the point. And wanting to go out and to watch a film on a 60-foot screen instead of a $5000 60-inch screen doesn’t make moviegoers into deluded antiques.

Patrick even misreads Fox’s effort to sell High Def satellite… which their DirecTV division has not been terribly successful in selling… by using special access to some programs as bait, as a larger wave. Of course, if they were so sure of Home Entertainment, going day-n-date with The Hills Have Eyes would have been a good, relatively cheap test. Nope.

Only people who are selling or who don’t really understand the sociological imperative of technology show the kind of passion for shifting everything based on technology that isn’t actually an improvement, but only a time shifter. It is infinitely more complex than Patrick seems to understand… or wants to understand. He likes to say others are in denial, but his lack of acknowledgement of how well the film industry has already milked the public with DVD and other technologies that were brand new just 5 years ago, is breathtaking. He knows better. It seems that because he wants to watch his movies on his couch and he doesn’t want to wait 3 months or 4 months or 5 months, the industry is a fool not to service him. I’ve said it a million times now… Patrick is no longer the key demographic for this business. Neither am I.

And maybe he – and others who agree with him – can answer a few key questions. How much will you spend on day-n-date delivery in your home? How much more will you spend on movies if you have day-n-date than you spend now? If you have kids, are you not buying DVDs of the movies they want to watch again or for the first time because they come out three months (or if they came out 5 months) after release?

I know what you want. You want what you want when you want it. So does everyone.

One last example.

DirecTV has an exclusive right to sell NFL Sunday Ticket, which shows all the games that are not on broadcast or cablecast networks each Sunday. They would have a lot more NFL Sunday Ticket customers if it was available on all cable systems, but DirecTV pays billions to maintain the exclusive. That is business. For DirecTV, less is more.

Now… the NFL is trying to beef up the value of its TV package and also has launched their own cable network that they want every cable and satellite company to carry. So what do they do? Well, on opening week of 2006, they have a Thursday opener, a Sunday night game and a Monday night double header. Figuring my local station will play three games in my market, my payment for NFL Sunday Ticket is delivering only nine games that week instead of eleven. My premium purchase is lessening its value. On the other hand, the vast majority of football fans in America are getting the best free (basic cable) service from the NFL they have ever had in history, increasing the games in that week that they can actually watch from four to six. Progress or regress? It depends on your goal.

In recent years, the NFL has expanded its season to 18 weeks, even though no team plays more than 16 games. Viewers can see even more games. Progress or regress? It depends on your goal.

I pay $249 for the season of Sunday ticket games… just under $14 a week. Would it be smarter for them to offer a per-game rate of $10 per game? Would more people buy? Would people dump the Sunday Ticket?

What football fans want is any game, any time, for the price the vast majority is used to paying… zero dollars and zero cents. But what are the economics?

The technology exists for the NFL to do whatever they think they want to do with these games. They can deliver them any way they want to deliver them. But they make choices. And every year, the league grows.

They don’t shut down the stadiums because more than 90% of net revenues come from TV. They don’t give the audience everything the audience wants because the audience wants it. They don’t wire every player with a microphone or a camera because the technology exists. They sell out Chicago’s winter games and Phoenix’s September games without domes.

Fifteen of the league’s thirty-two teams had losing seasons last year, much like every year. Still, every year, TV pays more. Every year, ticket prices rise and stadiums keep selling out.

Those poor deluded bastards.

Posted by poland at 03:31 PM | Comments (30)

March 27, 2006

Not Thrilled With This One...

If you go to the front page of imdb in hopes of entering a name in the search engine, you have to wait a few seconds for King Kong to shake up the search slot.

There is no advertiser who has ever been benefited with me by interrupting the course of me trying to do my basic online functions.

Kong hanging out on the search slot? Cute. Slowing me down? If there was a way to punish imdb and Universal for it, I would.

Posted by poland at 04:51 PM | Comments (15)

Why Snakes On A Plane Changing Dates Makes No Sense

So. there is now this hum out there... "If I had Snakes On A Plane getting all this online buzz, I'd jump on it and put it out right away!"

The most obvious reason not to leap as though choices were free, specific to New Line, is called The Real Cancun. New Line got excited about the film after some strong early screenings. They rushed it into theaters, trying to catch a wave, and got slaughtered for their effort... more because they had to overspend on ads because there was no time for a proper publicity campaign. You can say, "But that film sucked" all you like. But for one thing, you have no idea of Snakes is any good. And second, test screening audiences really liked Cancun.

This is the arrogance of the media, on and off the web. If it's on our radar, it must be on everyone's radar. Well, it isn't. As I have always said, the internet geek audience is worth $5 million - $8 million. If you want more than that, you have to reach the rest of the audience. And the trend in youth oriented movies is great success with looooooong lead campaigns and not quick hits.

To go into the summer, May-July, would be idiotic on every level. It's incredibly expensive to get attention and if people are into Snakes On A Plane, they might also be the audience for, say.... I'm just guessing here... M:I3PoseidonX3NachoLibreClickSupermanPirates2. Those are 7 sure-fire MUST SEES in 10 weeks... all grounded in the same Snakes demographic... most reaching far beyond.

And besides the fact that New Line already is selling an April movie and has a May release on their schedule, ramping up a full campaign while still making changes in post is like throwing money into the garbage and then pulling the can into your living room, next to the drapes, before setting it on fire.

And where is the obvious argument for an August release of Snakes? A $16 million opening and a $58 million domestic gross for Red Eye. If New Line is lucky and good, they can improve on that opening. If they are good at selling and the movie is actually entertaining and they can find a way to get someone with a vagina in the door, they could take that better start and reach a similar 4x multiple.

But most importantly of all... and this speaks to much of what I feel about the media's rush to push this industry into fulfilling our whims with their hundreds of millions of dollars... the excitement of the film is not going away because some journalists just figured it out. Snakes will be a great media story in July, when the hard push starts. And it will be the change of pace movie after a steady diet of very expensive big action films (which incidentally, is also the strategy on Miami Vice).

When did very smart, very experienced people turn into hyperactive puppies licking the glass as soon as they get a whiff of dinner? As Samuel L. Jackson once said, by way of QT, "Come on, Yolanda! What's Fonzie like?" "Cool.." What? "Cool." "Correctamundo! And that's what we're gonna be - We're gonna be cool."

Posted by poland at 04:21 PM | Comments (56)

More Trouble For Traditional Media

It's just a small thing, but i is illuminating.

This morning, on my return to Los Angeles, the LA Times ran a TV spot touting a 125th Anniversary edition. And what were they selling? 125 years of images of great moments in sports.

What's wrong with this?

While I am sure the LAT package will be excellent, these are the kinds of events that used to be unique to Traditional Media. How else could the average person get access to decades and decades of cool images and memories?

But now, this kind of thing is endlessly available via the web. Moreover, there is the sense that the LAT is, in this ad, attaching themselves to these events as though the insititution naturally has something to do with them. What the LAT does own... what they are empowered by... are the words of their writers who analyzed those moments.

The notion that Traditional Media still owns the news is over. The new model is choice. Too much choice perhaps. But choice. And that choice is driven, as ever, by the offer of materials better or different than the rest of what has become everybody's bottomless slush pile.

Posted by poland at 09:21 AM | Comments (4)

March 25, 2006

Klady's Friday Estimates - 3/25/06

Okay... get this... the Friday estimate for Spike Lee’s Inside Man is more than any of his openings over an entire weekend, except Malcolm X ($9.87m) and The Original Kings of Comedy ($11.1m). Of course, this time he has real crossover with a story that doesn’t appear to be themed around being black, co-stars Jodie Foster and Clive Owens, and still, Denzel in the kind of role people always seem to want to see. By the end of its first weekend, Inside Man will probably be Spike’s fourth highest grossing film of his 17 film career. A win for everyone.

This looks to be the best ever opening for Denzel, even though he has had major co-stars before in films like The Pelican Brief, Philadelphia (which did open exclusive, but never had a weekend over $14 million), and in films with Gene Hackman, Whitney Houston (in her The Bodyguard follow-up), Meg Ryan (still unlip-puffed), young Angelina Jolie and Bruce Willis.

Stay Alive, Disney’s first real hard core sell of a horror film (they learned that Dark Water lesson), could get to $13 million if it peaks up on Saturday. Not terrible. ($4m more than Dark Water... and cheaper in both production and ads.)

V for Vendetta had a not-shocking, but not upticking Friday. We’ll see if Saturday jumps the way it did last weekend for this one. But $100 million seems well out of reach and the film was clearly outmuscled by Inside Man.

Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector will do minimally better than Waiting..., a title that didn’t have the media bump that Larry gets with his various outlets. Not bad. Not good. Disney had the Ernest franchise consistently delivering in the mid-20s over a decade ago. Perhaps Lions Gate needs Larry to be a bit more family friendly to match that kind of success.

Eight Below cracks $75 million. Impressive.

Title / Distributor / Gross* / Theaters / % Change / Cume
Inside Man / Uni / 9.8 / 2818 / New / 9.8
Stay Alive / BV / 4.1 / 2009 / New / 4.1
V for Vendetta / WB / 4 / 3365 / -54% / 37.9
Failure to Launch / Par / 3.6 / 3202 / -23% / 56.7
She's the Man / Par / 2.3 / 2631 / -37% / 15.4
Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector / Lions Gate / 2.2 / 1710 / New /
The Shaggy Dog / BV / 2.2 / 3421 / -36% / 41
The Hills Have Eyes / Fox Searchlight / 1.3 / 2461 / -42% / 32.7
Eight Below / BV / 0.75 / 2101 / -35% / 75.1
16 Blocks / WB / 0.65 / 2066 / -51% / 32.5

Posted by poland at 11:08 AM | Comments (19)

March 24, 2006

Ring? We Don't Need No Stinkin' Ring!

No, It’s Not Just You... He Does Look Like A Certain Web Columnist

“5 Gloogleschnorps, same as in town.”

"Double chocolate mocha frappe with whipped cream and an extra shot of evil."

The rest of the fun is at Worth1000.com

Posted by poland at 02:16 PM | Comments (0)

Randy Quaid: Futurist Or Fuck Up?

So word hit the street, via a website that Variety, of course, does not credit, that Randy Quaid is suing Focus Features for "tricking him" into taking what is likely scale to do Brokeback Mountain by representing the film as a low-budget indie.

Though the media sucker... uh, reporters reported on the "indies at the Oscars" over and over and over and over and over and over, anyone thinking straight always realized that $15 million - $20 million movies are not indies, no matter what division of a massive conglomerate is releasing them. Now that The Weisnteins are in bed with MPAA signatory MGM, Lionsgate is the only true indie still in this sbudget range. Fox's The Family Stone cost less than Brokeback... is it more, less or equally indie?

So with the line utterly blurred and the studios long using the "indie arms," their Dependents, as a negotiating tactic to get names to work for less than their normal price, is Randy Quaid striking a blow for actors' rights or is he just a guy past his money making prime trying to cash in and shooting himself in the foot while hoping to get a multi-million payday just to go away?

(Maybe someone needs to send him a BBM postcard. And maybe agents or SAG will soon be negotiating a price for this form of now-standard talent exploitation.)

Posted by poland at 01:40 PM | Comments (15)

New Look Michael Douglas In Newsweek

And you can vote for the new look...

Posted by poland at 08:06 AM | Comments (17)

March 23, 2006

The First Gay Superhero Movie?

Larry Gross writes in MCN...

What do you think?

Posted by poland at 01:31 PM | Comments (158)

Bits & Pieces

Just some things that may or may not be of interest...

*Warner Indy is waiting to find out from the production team that made March of the Penguins whether there will be a sequel. Apparently, they are going back to the same area where the original was spawned to try to shoot the part of the story where the female penguins leave the male penguins behind with the egg to thoroughly understand what happens then. If there is footage to get, it will be a sequel within 2 years. In the meanwhile, the National Georgraphic kinda-sequel, about a Polar Bear, a Walrus and some other such ice lovers, The White Planet, may not get into the summer action this year after John Lesher took over the project hatched by Vitale & Dinerstein.

*Roger Durling was just extended for another year running the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.

*One of the interesting aspects of the Shmuger/Linde hire at Universal is that it marks a directional shift for the studio towards the international, where both men have experience. Yes, they also have a lot of experience on the marketing side and there is an absolute acknowledgement that the marketing minds is a big part of how the movie business works now. But the vision at the studio (where as far as I know, neither man will work in Black Rock as reported in some TradMedia paper last week) is much more Mechanic or Giannopoulos than Dawn Steel.

*Don't know if you saw Criticker on MCN... I'm not sure I would be willing to spend enough time to give the thing enough info to make it work well, but it is interesting...

*Roger "Make Me Do Right Or Make Me Do Wrong, I'm Your Puppet" Friedman "reported" on Monday that "friends in Memphis" told him that Isaac Hayes didn't quit South Park and hinted that it was some sort of conspiracy. Does anyone buy that exretia?

Posted by poland at 11:45 AM | Comments (0)

March 22, 2006

Choppy Water On Bermudian Sea & On Fairmont Pool

Posted by poland at 08:16 PM | Comments (1)

March 21, 2006

More Bermudian Images

The Town Crier & The Town Squier

What’s On

You Say You've Never Seen A Bermudian Filmmaker? Here's A Table Full.

Lunch With Gunther..............................The View From The Table

Moon Over Bermuda

Posted by poland at 02:42 PM | Comments (4)

March 20, 2006

Spoilers

It has been suggested to be that spoilers be a specific topic about one particular hack out there... but I don't want to single anyone out and I do think it is a bigger question.

What do you do when a critic you like endlessly spoils movies?
Do you avoid some outlets because you expect spoilers?
Are spoiler warnings effective anymore... and how best can we in the media do them?
Who are the worst offenders?
And do the studios spoil more with ads than critics do with reviews?

Posted by poland at 11:41 AM | Comments (33)

March 18, 2006

Klady's Friday Estimates - 3/18/05

The V for Vendetta launch is a bit smaller than expected. Many will use the “they bought tickets to another film to sneak into the R rated Vendetta” excuse. But I don’t really see that as more than a single-digit issue. A $23 million-plus weekend is not crap, but word of mouth will be key here... and we’ll see how that goes.

She’s The Man, Paramount’s first DreamWorks release did okay for a Friday. The real test will be the Saturday numbers, when the teen and pre-teen girls arrive. I wouldn’t be surprised to see it jump past Failure To Launch for the weekend.

The Hills Have Eyes drop shows why shock films need massive first weekends... much as The Shaggy Dog’s tiny drop shows why they can still get to $50 million after a soft opening.

The first film released by the Yari Film Group’s releasing arm, Innovation, managed just $365 per screen for Find Me Guilty... painful. But even while able to get 439 screens for the effort, there just isn’t enough staffing to handle a quality release this way. A movie like Bloodrayne, which was also a softball, at least has a better chance because of the potential genre interest. The estimated Friday per screen was a little better than one Top 10 film, Aquamarine... a dud in its third crappy weekend.

Fox Searchlight’s Thank You For Smoking's word of mouth run on 5 screens is doing well, though The Producers did $25,765 over its first weekend on 6 screens back in December. Presumably, word of mouth on Smoking will be better. And the truth is, The Producers disastrous $19 million gross would be an okay end result for Thank You For Smoking... and if Smoking does 40% more than Producers, which is might do in comparison of first weekends, a $27 million total for Smoking would be a hit. (I expect a lot of release pattern arguments to come from this analogy... point taken.)

=============

Title / Distributor / Gross* / Theaters / % Change / Cume
V for Vendetta / WB / 8.4 / 3365 / New / 8.4
Failure to Launch / Par / 4.8 / 3117 / -44% / 37.5
She's the Man / Par / 3.9 / 2623 / New / 3.9
The Shaggy Dog / BV / 3.5 / 3501 / -15% / 25.8
The Hills Have Eyes / Fox Searchlight / 2.3 / 2621 / -60% / 23
16 Blocks / WB / 1.3 / 2666 / -40% / 26.7
Eight Below / BV / 1.1 / 2603 / -24% / 70.1
Medea's Family Reunion / Lions Gate / 0.82 / 1403 / -48% / 57.9
The Pink Panther / Sony / 0.69 / 1852 / -29% / 76.8
Aquamarine / Fox / 0.55 / 1869 / -47% / 14.2

Also Debuting
Find Me Guilty / Innovation / 0.16 / 439
Thank You for Smoking / Fox Searchlight / 61,000 / 5
Don't Come Knocking / Sony Classics / 7,500 / 6

Posted by poland at 01:03 PM | Comments (66)

March 17, 2006

Broken Dreamz

And I thought that Poseidon was going to be the first disaster movie of the year!

The Bermuda International Film Festival opened with Paul Weitz’ American Dreamz and you can expect a boatload of reviews tagging it, “American Nightmarez.”

At first it seems amazing that Universal is encouraging people to see this movie early and often. It is also closing SXSW and it is playing the Aspen Comedy Festival. But on second thought, you realize that this movie would have been an incredibly tough film to sell if it was good and that the only hope is that some critics will like it. And some will. And you might want to think twice about ever listening to them about a comedy again.

The problem with the film is not the directing or the performances... it’s all in the writing. Weitz attempts one of the most difficult film forms, the farce. But he makes a number of the big mistakes. First, he doesn’t commit to a tone. Almost no one can do a satirical comedy that jumps from the big, broad stuff to the intimate character comedy. Wilder never tried it. Sturges took the best shots at it. Payne is close, even though he doesn’t care for the Sturges comparison. But it is really, really hard. And it really, really doesn’t work in this film.

Second, the political humor, like much of the other humor in the film, stays so on the surface that it is an endless frustration. Wow... Willem Dafoe shaved his head like Dick Cheney. Wow... Dennis Quaid plays a dumb Texan president. This is a direct assault. And it never lands a hand on the real guys because the audience never believes that Chaney is that obvious or Bush really that dumb. Here’s the lesson... if you go for the obvious physical joke, make the material surprising. And if you want to do harsh satrire, be less on the nose with the physical joke.

Third, the American Idol satire is so much tamer than the real thing that it never takes hold. The joke that the extreme version of Simon Cowell that Hugh Grant plays comes about his harsh honesty because he really is a harshly honest person doesn’t even play strong through the first gag about it which opens the movie.

The whole movie, virtually, says “it’s as bad as you think” over and over and over again. But so what? If you want to satirize that vacuous nature of media today, you have to either be very sophisticated or wildly over the top. The sexual subtext of this film screams for some hard R action, because that is what is believable. You can do a wilder, funnier version of the very smart scene in Network with Faye Dunaway talking ratings on her way to orgasm... but the nudity and grinding in that scene wasn’t about seeing Ms Dunaway naked... it was about the truth... quality humor, no matter how broad, always tethers to human truths.

Even some of the potentially interesting ideas – like the Cowell character wanting an Arab and a Jew on the show – are just dropped in the film. You don’t have to pay off a joke like that with a long bit. But you can’t just set up the joke and drop it. Worse, the movie is so coy about stereotyping and then so often falls into 1950s kinds of stereotypical jokes (Arabs are watching American Idol in a cave... ha fucking ha) that it just seems Weitz’ temperature gauge was broken while making this movie.

Weitz seemed a little shy about going broad with In Good Company... perhaps too shy. A little more stereotyping and breaking of stereotypes might have made it better and more marketable. But still, that was a good movie. American Dreamz is a dog without fleas... they wouldn’t deem to take a bite. Aw the joys of self-preservation.

Posted by poland at 09:58 PM | Comments (38)

Late Arriving Photos From SXSW

The Best Burger In Austin?

The Hardest Working Man In indieWIRE Business

Celeb On The Web

The Alamo Drafthouse

Scott Wilson Enjoys The Introduction

Leslie Vernon Wants You To Have A Heart

Team Behind Behind The Mask... Dad, Heavenly, Bro, Director

But Who Will Buy The Film???

Posted by poland at 12:00 PM | Comments (8)

Why We BIFF

A Badly Merged View From The Porch...

Posted by poland at 11:44 AM | Comments (0)

D For Duh

Answering his own question, Mirror critic David Edwards, linked on the front of Drudge in a classic bit of unintended adverising, seems capable of understanding what is happening in V For Vendetta... but still doesn't seem to want to get it.

"But what are badly needed are tension and much more of an insight into what a horrific place England has become to ramp up the threatening atmosphere. Instead, the totalitarian state doesn’t seem that scary at all. Everyone still sits around watching telly, lives in nice houses and moans about the government. This isn't a society living in fear, it's one that's comfortably bored - a bit like our own, although maybe that's the point."

Yes! That is the point! Complacency = A Place In Which Fascism Thrives.

And yes, very talky in the middle. The torture an dexecution of minorities is just soooo boring!

(And now, an end to my rambling on this... at least until the next silly thing crosses my desktop.)

Posted by poland at 11:18 AM | Comments (14)

Good Morning From Bermuda

Hello all -

See what happens when I leave town for a minute? Hirings at Universal, DreamWorks' dramatically overpriced library announces that it has moved closer to a sale, George Clooney gives up his Oscar goodie bag... dear GOD!!!!

The battle of V has begun. The most fascinating thing continues to be how angry the film seems to make some critics. It's not "I don't get the mask." It's "THIS IS SHIT!!!" I count that as a win for the film, by the way. And I think about how much so many hated The Matrix when it first arrived... and for that matter, almost every Kubrick film. Thing is, V is not built to have the kind of resonance of either Matrix or Kubrick. There is the limitation of that mask. But I still think that kids who don't go to movies to think will end up thinking about some big issues when they walk out of the film... and ironically, considering that blowing shit up is at the heart of the film, the biggest issue is that violence has a place, but that it must be considered and be purposeful.

V is not a comic book hero. He is all of us. And I love that this makes so many people so uncomfortable. Like sticking your fingers in Palmolive, if you feel it when you stick your fingers in it, it's working!

Meanwhile, on a lighter note, I keep wonder what the hell they are talking about when they keep saying that distributing the DreamWorks library is a money win for Paramount. You mean the $3 million they might get in rentals to revival houses? I mean, really... I don't get it. There isn't a title in the library that isn't played out. I guess I just don't understand t he genius of the deal (except that they are getting a lot for the library... though that deal will demand scrutiny to see whether the $900 million is real money or "Weinstein money.")

And as for George's goodie bag... good for him... so why do we know about it and why should we care? Maybe I can get him to write a blog entry for The Hot Blog, written just for us and not just a misattributed amalgamation of quotes pieced together and sold as proprietary by a the world's finesrt media slut since Paris Hilton jumped the shark (or is that "fucked the shark" in her case?).

More on Universal later today...

Posted by poland at 10:52 AM | Comments (7)

March 15, 2006

Yes, Virginia... The FCC Intends To Censor Even The Suggestive

Janet Jackson's breast aside, the news that the FCC is fining CBS $3.6 million for an episode of the 10pm show Without A Trace for a scene in which they feel a child could get the idea that sex was taking place outside of the eye of the camera is more than a little shocking.

You can read the complete FCC Document for yourself, but here is an excerpt.

10. The Programming. The Commission received numerous complaints alleging that certain affiliates of CBS and CBS owned-and-operated stations (listed in Attachment A) broadcast indecent material during the Our Sons and Daughters episode of the CBS program “Without a Trace” on December 31, 2004, at 9:00 p.m. in the Central and Mountain Time Zones.

11. The December 31, 2004 episode at issue concerns an FBI investigation into the disappearance and possible rape of a high school student. During an interrogation, a witness recalls a party held at the home of a teenager. As she recounts the details of the party, the program cuts to a “flashback” scene. The scene -- which forms the basis of the viewer complaints -- consists of a series of shots of a number of teenagers engaged in various sexual activities, including sex between couples and among members of a group. Although the scene contains no nudity, it does depict male and female teenagers in various stages of undress. The scene also includes at least three shots depicting intercourse, two between couples and one “group sex” shot. In the culminating shot of the scene, the witness exclaims to the others in the party that the victim is a “porn star.” The action briefly returns to the present, as the witness pauses in her story, then the flashback resumes, as the victim is shown wearing bra and panties, straddled on top of one male character, while two other male characters kiss her breast near the bra strap. The lower portion of the panties is shaded, but she is shown moving up and down while the male teenager thrusts his hips into her crotch.

12. Indecency Analysis. We find that the material meets the first prong of the indecency test. While no nudity is shown, it is clear, as detailed above, that the scene depicts numerous sexual activities.

Wow. A 10pm show shows a girl in a bra thrusting her hips and the government bites hard.

I haven't seen the scene, so I don't know how close to the line it gets. But it doesn't sound like anything that wouldn't manage a PG-13 or even a PG via the MPAA.

And ironically, this is exactly why the industry, studio or indie, can't afford to dump the MPAA's rating system.

Pick your poison.

Posted by poland at 10:35 PM | Comments (36)

Want Movies?

I'm not feeling so great about the mockery (here's Mark Caro's) of Dan Glickman's suggestion yesterday that the movie exhibitors and studios get together to promote the joys of the theatrical experience. It is one of the great forms of denial that somehow movies are not sold like pork chops. This is the same naivety that argues that “better movies” would improve theatrical box office… as though the top grossing movies were not generally disliked by critics and other deep thinkers.

Business is business and artistry is artistry and everyone is happy if they don’t get in the way of one another too often. Plausible deniability.

Ironically, that is not Dan Glickman’s way. He is, essentially, a straight shooter. This is not to say that Jack Valenti was a natural liar or that Dan G. doesn’t spin sometimes. I was not privy to Jack’s private arguments with the studio execs and I have no way of knowing whether stories of his muscling various people and governments are accurate or apocryphal. But Dan Glickman is not Jack. And when he wants to move forward, he seems to be a man who points to the target and heads off to work.

The stories making fun of Glickman for wanting to promote the good things about moviegoing while working with exhibitors and studios to make some things better really define why such an effort is needed. The media loves the negative. When John Horn writes that “No matter how many panel discussions were presented on new digital cinemas or the booming Korean market, the convention inevitably was reduced to figuring out how to get more butts in U.S. theaters,” what he is really saying is that he was engaging in a conversation about the box office last year with every person he talked to and that they are still sore.

But of course they are. That’s what happens when allegedly fact-based outlets like the LA Times publish sentences like, “That marketplace is now filled with state-of-the-art home theater systems, DVDs that cost but a few dollars and are sometimes available just weeks after a film's theatrical debut, and any number of electronic devices grabbing the precious free time of Hollywood's most important audience, teenage boys.” Journalists like Horn, who is way too skilled to be reduced to hyperbolic games, seem to love the negative and the realities of wealthy people in Los Angeles and not the actual marketplace.

The facts are that if you consider less than 10% of the audience owning new, massive TV screens and sound systems to be a “marketplace filled with state-of-the-art home theater systems” then that is accurate. If you look at a DVD price point for new films of about $20 and a minimum 3-month window for studio releases to be “a few dollars” and “just weeks,” then that is accurate. If you read an online survey that can be shot through with holes quite easily, but decide its true, you might be worried about teenage boys’ film going habits… though you would have to disregard the enormous success of titles directed squarely at that demographic last year… then that is accurate.

This is not to say that there aren’t problems. It is to say that the firm embrace of the “sky is falling” attitude is unfortunate and based in some seriously lazy thinking... and more than a little willfulness.

The big issues facing Hollywood are the piracy, windows, how to maximize both theatrical and post-theatrical revenues, minimizing marketing costs, stabilizing production costs, and whether the industry is heading towards the window on the entire economic life span of 95% of movie product becoming less than a year after release.

Ha ha.

And the mockers might want to know that according to industry stats, the primary force in reducing the comfort zone for piracy by Average Joes (which has been reduced to a surprsing degree) has been education, much of it in the form of those over-the-top, "how can anyone take these seriously" Piracy Is Stealing PSAs that run before movies all over the country combined with lawsuits, which most of the media seems to take as silly fishing expeditions.

Ha ha ha.

Just promotion won't work. But if exhibitors and studios take making the moviegoing experience better seriously and that movement is well promoted, good things should happen all around... even if the media doesn't find it cool.

Posted by poland at 12:21 PM | Comments (11)

March 14, 2006

Travolta - Third Act or Car Crash?

News that John Travolta will follow his drag act in Hairspray with what is sure to be a satirical take on JR Ewing in Dallas: The Motion Picture (where rumors of Kevin Costner being up for the role make no sense since he is a natural “Bobby”) suggests that we could be witnessing the next reinvention of Travolta in the Robert DeNiro self-mocking stardom vein to great acclaim or the absolute destruction of a long and storied career, already best known for his one major career comeback.

Mockery of a sham of a mockery or suicidal bungee jump?

Self-deprecating or self-defecating?

Barbarino or Horshack?

What?!?!?

Posted by poland at 11:57 AM | Comments (31)

March 13, 2006

SXSW Finds A Non-Doc Hit

Midnight at SXSW is about half new stuff and half films with distributors and/or veteran filmmaking names attached. One of the two World Premieres at Midnight here premiered Sunday night and I am writing about it at 4:24am Austin time because I want to start the conversation before it sells... distributors are circling.

First time director Scott Glosserman was here with his entire family for the premiere of Behind The Mask: The Rise Of Leslie Vernon. Title sucks. Poster looks like a conventionally crappy cheapo horror film. The only two acting names you’re likely to recognize are Freddy Englund and Scott Wilson.

And yet, it is just a little short of the ingredients to be the next Scream. For that, a few young and upcoming actors and a few shots that this first-timer didn’t quite get would have helped. Still, this is a terrific little movie that deconstructs and reconstructs the horror film with humor, efficiency, great intelligence, and more than a few screams.

It’s a bit of a rough pitch. A college news crew follows around guy who claims to be the next Jason Vorhees in training. He explains the process, with completely identifiable explanations of all the slasher movie conventions. But is it all for real or is he just a big mouth? And if it is for real, what will this passive news crew do when the blood starts sloshing?

The home run find of the film is Nathan Baesal as the slasher wannabe, who apparently is on some TV show now. But this is my first time seeing him and he is charming and convincing enough to be a serious young (late 20s) male lead.

But it is the career of Scott Glosserman and screenwriter David Stieve that is sure to take off with this film. The film is smart and assured and while it doesn’t have the breathtaking flourishes, it never falls over the edge in any way. This is a strong debut for a guy who is looking to have a long career, after taking film at Penn when there was no film program and who worked the halls of CAA before escaping to the creative side.

This could easily be the first real commercial success to emerge out of SXSW. Like I said... it ain’t Scream. But it is yelp. And there is no reason why it can’t do $20 million or more theatrical and become a college classic on DVD.

Just needs the right person to buy it... someone willing to give Glosserman a few hundred thousand to add a couple "missing" kill shots (Glosserman and Stieve came up with a kill that I haven't seen before, but needs one more beat on camera) and another set of breasts (even if the actress is not prepared to play show and tell, that is what body doubles and inserts are for) and to change the name to something that is as clever as the movie itself, like “The Blair Slasher Project” or “How To Kill Teenagers.”

Posted by poland at 02:20 AM | Comments (13)

March 12, 2006

Confusing Opinion For Fact Again?

I'm not sure exactly when Jeff Giles took over David Ansen's role as critic at Newsweek, but he proclaims this week about V For Vendetta,

"In point of fact, though, "Vendetta" is not good."

Fact?

I guess it's going to be an interesting ride, this one. V For Vendetta joins Munich and Paradise Now in the land of examinations of moral ambiguity being confused for radicalism. It would be interesting to see how the media reacted to a film that leaned right and was ambiguous, but I know of none lately.

We live in a country that is gathered in the middle. And we have a media that obsessively demands that people take sides. Now, that is a fact. A really ugly and dangerous fact.

We will have a Democratic president when we have a nominee who is as inflexible as Bush is. But I wish it wasn't so. I wish we could elect leadership that understands that choices are complex, that there are winners and losers in all choices, and that we must be gracious whether we are winning or losing. Now, that is an opinion.

In my opinon, V for Vendetta no more confuses terrorism for revolution than it accurately reflects either the Blair or Bush governments. The explosions are not the message. The call to waking up, previously offered quite literally on film by Spike Lee, also by The Wachowskis, David Fincher/Chuck P, Alan Ball/Sam Mendes, etc, etc.

V blows things up because the government in the film has such complete control of the country that there is no other way to break through. Most of the terrorism involving Palestine and Israel right now is being generated by people who want to stop the peace process. There is no target defined. Likewise, al Quaida. Not only don't they have a single country, but their target is cultural, embodied first by the U.S., but it is not a traditional military targetting, except, at times, in execution.

Taking V for Vendetta as literal is as stupid as reading Hamlet as a history lesson.

But that's just my opinion.

(P.S. Note who is pushing the anti-V agenda... Matt Drudge. Right?)

Posted by poland at 07:30 PM | Comments (108)

Sunday Estimates by Klady

A huge congratulations is due Gerry Rich and the team at Paramount Pictures for turning a movie that was having some serious problems with interest among its core audience into a strong opener with a new campaign run over just a couple of weeks.

The big questions about the success of Failure To Launch are going to be about the value of Matthew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Parker, who is in her second theatrical hit in three months. Fox focused on Parker first and foremost throughout the campaign for The Family Stone. Here, Paramount ended up going away from Parker to focus on the parents in order to explain the horrible title. But one could argue that they laid the groundwork for her (and McConaghey’s) fan base and that once the title was explained, the early work filled the pot.

Disney did okay with The Shaggy Dog, but didn’t hit it out of the park. I don’t know that there was anything more they could have done, short of making a different movie. Still, kids legs are long.

Fox Searchlight didn’t quite find the sweet spot with The Hills Have Eyes either. It got nice reviews for the genre, especially amongst the geeks. Searchlight was a bit hamstrung by MPAA limitations of TV ads, but both Screen Gems and Lionsgate have managed to work around it and craft advertising and word-of-mouth publicity that brought out bigger numbers, particularly with teen girls on the Screen Gems side.

I’m not saying it was a terrible opening. It wasn’t. And if the film makes $40 million domestic for Searchlight, it will make a nice profit. But the transition of Searchlight from a small, smart, hands-on division to a bigger, faster, more ad-driven business is worth keeping an eye on.

3-Day Estimates / Weekend / % Change / Cume
Failure to Launch / 24.7 / - / 24.7
The Shaggy Dog / 16.1 / - / 16.1
The Hills Have Eyes / 15.6 / - / 15.6
16 Blocks / 7.2 / -39% / 22.7
Madea's Family Reunion / 5.6 / -56% / 55.5
Eight Below / 5.3 / -47% / 66.3
The Pink Panther / 3.7 / -46% / 74.7
Aquamarine / 3.5 / -53% / 12.0
Ulraviolet / 3.5 / -61% / 14.7
Date Movie / 2.4 / -53% / 44.2

Posted by poland at 06:35 PM | Comments (14)

I'm In Austin...

SXSW is going swimmingly.

More as it comes....

Posted by poland at 06:32 PM | Comments (0)

March 10, 2006

Internal Blog Business

Okay... so the list of names after the click through are all turning up on Movable Type as coming from the same IP address.

There has been no response from any of the addresses associated with the names, so this is the next step.

If you are a reader who is not interested in this, I don't blame you. Housekeeping.

If anyone has any issues with this, feel free to comment or to write me privately at poland@moviecitynews.com

Angelus21
bicycle bob
Bruce
Charly Baltimore
Fades To Black
joefitz84
Josh
LesterFreed
Mark Ziegler
PandaBear
quicksilver4u
Rufus Masters
Sanchez
Yodas Hangin Nut Sac
Yodas Right Nut Sac

Posted by poland at 08:04 PM | Comments (92)

The Ugliest Oscar Speech Ever

I don’t even know how to respond to Annie Proulx’ self-immolation in The Guardian. I checked twice… it isn’t in The Onion.

Is there anyone who can believe for a second that anything remotely like this would be written if Brokeback Mountain had won the Oscar for Best Picture? I’m sure there are those that will rationalize the rage involved as somehow appropriate given the believe that some hold that BBM is a movie of historic importance.

But I have to say, this is the kind of blind anger and myopia that has caused hatred of the gay, the black, the religious other, etc. Ms. Proulx has, in this moment, become that which she beheld. And the world is a little uglier for it.

To Quote….

If you are looking for smart judging based on merit, skip the Academy Awards next year and pay attention to the Independent Spirit choices.

Rumour has it that Lions Gate inundated the academy voters with DVD copies of Trash - excuse me - Crash a few weeks before the ballot deadline.

From the first there was an atmosphere of insufferable self-importance emanating from "the show" which, as the audience was reminded several times, was televised and being watched by billions of people all over the world. Those lucky watchers could get up any time they wished and do something worthwhile, like go to the bathroom.

The prize, as expected, went to Philip Seymour Hoff-man for his brilliant portrayal of Capote, but in the months preceding the awards thing, there has been little discussion of acting styles and various approaches to character development by this year's nominees. Hollywood loves mimicry, the conversion of a film actor into the spittin' image of a once-living celeb. But which takes more skill, acting a person who strolled the boulevard a few decades ago and who left behind tapes, film, photographs, voice recordings and friends with strong memories, or the construction of characters from imagination and a few cold words on the page? I don't know. The subject never comes up. Cheers to David Strathairn, Joaquin Phoenix and Hoffman, but what about actors who start in the dark?

Stewart maybe wondering what evil star had lighted his way to this labour.

There came an atrocious act from Hustle and Flow, Three 6 Mafia's violent rendition of "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp", a favourite with the audience who knew what it knew and liked. This was a big winner, a bushel of the magic gold-coated gelded godlings going to the rap group.

It was a safe pick of "controversial film" for the heffalumps.

The red carpet now had taken on a different hue, a purple tinge. The source of the colour was not far away. Down the street, spreading its baleful light everywhere, hung a gigantic, vertical, electric-blue neon sign spelling out S C I E N T O L O G Y.

For those who call this little piece a Sour Grapes Rant, play it as it lays.

Sour grapes doesn’t start to address the pained yelp of this screed… and all in the name of a statue that Ms. Proulx holds in such small esteem. Right?

Those people, who don’t appear to hate the film based on her short story, but made the choice to award another in a competition between five titles, are not to be taken seriously… unless, like the Independent Spirits Awards, which changed their rules to allow for Brokeback Mountain’s inclusion, and which are voted for in the finals by even more of the kinds of people for whom Ms. Proulx has such hatred, the vote goes her way.

There are many things in Ms Proulx's essay with which I agree. And if she had written this after winning the Best Picture Oscar, it would have been a fascinating perspective. Instead it is the capper to what has been, in many ways, an ugly awards season. But to date, never uglier than the place to which the author of a brilliant short story that launched a film loved by millions has taken us. Once again, she has taught us the overwhelming power of rage to destroy. She has made my worst feelings about what might happen after a Brokeback loss come true.

Posted by poland at 06:42 PM | Comments (93)

BBM Inspired Stamps From Conan O'Brien

(If you can't read the middle one, it's "The Lion, The Witch & the Perfectly Coordinated Wardrobe")

Posted by poland at 01:08 AM | Comments (44)

Interetsing Twist, Amidala

The digital revolution has already gotten too fast for NBC.

Early this week, NBC did a sweep of the web to remove the hysterically profane Natalie Portman rap, performed on Saturday night in an SNL Digital Short. This was well recorded in the media

But what exactly is going on? Unlike Lazy Sunday, which NBC swept for, the Portman Rap is not available on iTunes for the now requisite $1.99. It is still available for streaming on the NBC site.

One has to wonder whether Ms. Portman’s agent was smart enough to realize that giving NBC a chance to monetize her appearance on SNL with no return made no sense. If not, one has to wonder why not. SNL guest hosts are paid scale for their weeks work… nothing wrong with that. But if NBC could generate, say, 50,000 paid downloads of her rap, that’s $99,500 or more than 25 times what the guest host was paid.

Welcome to the harsh reality that is about to slow a revolution… and ultimately, make the studio look-a-new-profit-source drool drip a lot more slowly.

Posted by poland at 12:01 AM | Comments (12)

March 09, 2006

SXSW Preview

Here is a preview of what might end up being one of the most memorable pieces of motion entertainment to come out of the SXSW this year, though I have already seen a terrific doc called Jam! that will be very popular.

Anyway, here is the link to a small clip from Cox + Combes' Washington. (Parental Guidance Suggested... Especially for British Children)

Posted by poland at 11:50 PM | Comments (1)

Brokeback Miami?

I just saw this one-sheet for the first time and it struck me right away....

Posted by poland at 05:11 PM | Comments (33)

The Most Interesting Apres Oscar Story I've Seen

The Wall Street Journal's Brian Sternberg had a really important story kinda buried on Page 2 of Marketing on Tuesday...

It seems that Phillips tried to buy a 4-minute hunk of Screenvision’s pre-show package to run a 15 second, “We’re buying the time and getting you to your movie sooner” ad… but Screenvision said, “no.”

Why this is really important, in my opinion, is that Screenvision, which could be forced out of the ad business over time as studios and exhibitors try to find ways to make the moviegoing experience better than it has been in recent years, should be encouraging this idea and could become a very profitable middleman for the distribution of screen sponsorship, as in “This movie brought to you by Phillips Electronics.”

You can easily imagine a company like Mercedes Benz or American Express, always looking for a way to make the high end audience feel they are a part of their lifestyle, taking sponsorship of all the screens at The Grove (here in LA), for instance, and paying a significant amount of money to let audiences know before every show that they are paying for the ad slots so we can see movies in the luxury that they provide in all walks of life.

That is the kind of futurism that is win-win.

Posted by poland at 11:55 AM | Comments (10)

March 08, 2006

Are you enjoying the quiet?

Funky and unnecessarily provocative quote of the day

"For me, 'Brokeback' isn't rebellious at all. It's a very ordinary movie. People call it groundbreaking or what not. But I didn't feel this way. This is the way gays are."

Posted by poland at 10:48 PM | Comments (72)

March 07, 2006

More Break Back

There are two anguished cries of disappointment that stand out for me today. One is this deeply felt, terribly sad piece by Nathaniel R, who closes with:

“If you find yourself still in astonishment at the sorrow of many Oscar watchers...if you find yourself muttering "IT'S ONLY A MOVIE". Consider this. Repeat it: "It's Only a Movie". Is this really the response and fallback motto that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, that Hollywood itself should prompt us to embrace?

The point: It's not only a movie.”

And today, I received this letter by e-mail:

Really, David.

You lecture about lecturing and then expect to be taken seriously with a vainly dismissive "move along?"

Your gloss over the social divide that the Oscar controversy represents cannot begin to penetrate the deeper issues at work in the minds of film lovers and average Americans who are becoming more attuned to what this Oscar race meant in terms of real politics. We are beyond the cinema thing here. Beyond aesthetics or marketing. We are at the heart of a storm of cultural values, the old and new worlds, the secular and religious, the democratic principle and the fear and loathing that undermine it. Oscar Night '06 may not be 9/11, but it is as big as the 2000 elections in many people’s minds.

Brokeback's loss is so much bigger than its win would ever have been. It is a blessing in disguise, much like the Bush administration is, in that the covert hate that undermine the higher aspirations of Americans is being seen clearly for the first time in decades. Do you really expect our new vision to pass? Of course you don't. So why be defensive instead of realistic?

Maybe you weren't privilege to the whispers of homophobia that many Academy members are reported to have let fall from their lips prior to casting their votes, but some who were are telling about them have the columns and blogs that will keep the pundits and activists wired for confrontation. No one is trying to bring Crash down. We're trying to get the mainstream media to start reporting what lies beneath its zero-hour promotion. We want the world to see why a film that was only warmly received and was ignored during the awards buildup to the Oscars was resurrected in January for its liberal values as a cover for the derailing of Brokeback. Surely you see no one even tried to resurrect it until it became apparent that films far better than Crash couldn't stop the juggernaut that represented true human parity.

If you choose to shun the storm of criticism that will deluge Hollywood for its unreflexive regionalism and homophobia this year, you are deserving of respect for your desire to find safe haven. But for those of us who see Brokeback as a zeitgeist film much bigger than the experience of it itself -- those of us who believe that the internationally broadcast Academy Awards should embody universal good faith, standards of justice and humanity in the voting process itself, and not just marketing campaigns, local favoritism, and fear tactics -- well, we will remain here. And loudly so. Even when the storm quiets down, while we're relaxing and enjoying the view, we'll be here with our memories ready to remind people that politics and not just entertainment and money define Tinseltown's biggest moves.

We will not be moving along, thank you, David.

Regards,
G. Roger Denson (NYC art critic)

And now, I will try to be brief in responding to both gentlemen.

I am convinced of everyone’s sincerity in all of this. And I am sympathetic to it. However, both of these arguments, as so many arguments have today, have a fatal flaw. They are based on predeterminations by the people who feel this way. The importance of Brokeback Mountain - the idea of it as a landmark - is a matter of opinion.

Unfortunately, the drumbeat of importance that rose around Brokeback Mountain became the experience, more so than the movie itself. It was not unlike the last two elections. Eac time, only some sort of falseness, delusion, evil, or cheating could explain the vote. It could not simply be a choice with which a large percentage of us disagreed.

The response to Sunday's Oscars has been as though Vietnam veterans decided America hated them because Coming Home didn’t win or WW II veterans took the Saving Private Ryan loss as a left wing rebellion against the military.

The “older members won’t watch the film” story, which is certainly true in a very few cases, has become the most told tale since The Three Bears... an apocryphal. Today, everyone has a friend or family member who knows someone who knows some older male Academy member who said he refused to watch the film. A week ago, the film couldn’t lose. Today, the legendary older voter reigns supreme.

With due respect to Nathaniel’s passion, to throw out all explanations and to come up only with homophobia as the answer to why Crash won – and by the way, it was a Crash win, every bit as much as it can be called a Brokeback Mountain loss – is reductive in a way bordering self-loathing. No one can reasonably argue that there is not homophobia in this country and across the globe. But to argue that more than 50% of voting Academy members are homophobic and unwilling to vote for Brokeback Mountain on that basis is patently absurd.

This may seem to fly in the face of my initial reaction to BBM, which was to say, “Wait until older Academy members get to the flip, lick, and anal penetration.” But in the 35 years since Midnight Cowboy, how many movies with scenes involving anything overtly sexual below the waist of either sex have won the Oscar? Let’s see… Kramer vs Kramer had JoBeth Williams’ pubic hair, briefly, in the hallway, though with no contact… in Silence of The Lambs, Jamie Gumb danced with his penis tucked between his legs… and Kevin Spacey’s character masturbates under the covers and talks about it in American Beauty.

That’s it.

Jon Voight going down on Jane Fonda… 3 Oscars, no Best Picture. Overweight people having sex in Sideways… 1 Oscar, no Best Picture. Kelly Preston on top in Jerry Maguire… 1 Oscar, no Best Picture.

In fact, The Family Media Guide lists only four Best Picture winners in history as being in any way “graphic” sexually… Shakespeare In Love, The English Patient, Schindler’s List, and Midnight Cowboy.

But here is something to set the conspiracy buffs again. Perhaps the most graphic heterosexual sex in any Best Picture nominee ever also happened this year… in Munich, with two sex scenes between Avner and his wife, including Avner taking her from behind while seven months pregnant and full frontal nudity involving one of the killings.

It didn’t win either. The Academy apparently hates pregnant women who enjoy sex.

I will get deeper into this Reverse Overanalysis more in tomorrow’s Hot Button.

Posted by poland at 04:05 PM | Comments (108)

Subject: V for Vendetta E-Ticket

I have been invited to movie by e-mail before, but not by a major. This feels like another step on down the road. The logical next step, to me, is that they have a sign-up website and each of the people who are invited to studio events have a screen name and password for sign up.

Moreover, if the screening is on the lot, we should all have studio ID cards that function much like employee IDs. The publciists can indicate when we should have access and if we show up when we are not authorized, there are reasonable procedures. But how difficult can it be for studio IT to bring this all together?

(And the e-mail has been recreated because if you can convert the whole page to a graphic image, I don't know hwo to do it)

Posted by poland at 12:29 PM | Comments (35)

MGM-En-Stein

Reading Ron Grover’s BusinessWeek piece on Monday, anticipating tomorrow’s MGM press conference announcing the “rebirth” under Harry Sloan, was a little misleading because of the mixture of Weinstein hype and MGM hype and just what MGM is offering to producers.

Apparently, what MGM has to offer right now is access to an output deal to Showtime pay cable that was established when the studio was still under Kerkorian. The Weinsteins and others are “buying into” the deal much the way that The Weinsteins as Miramax took full advantage of Disney overall deal with Blockbuster. (The vigor with which The Weinsteins used and abused that deal led to a lawsuit.)

More with be revealed at the press conference tomorrow, though there is no indication that The Dentists (Providence Equity Partners and Texas Pacific Partners) are investing enough added capital to finance significant production at this point. Further, there is no indication that MGM will gain any ownership in any of these “output” deals.

Essentially, they are trying to do what MGM did under Kerkorian in the last incarnation… to tread water until some sucker came along and bought the company and library at a profit to The Dentists. The lack of an infrastructure is a benefit to The Weinsteins, who don’t wave to fight a lot of red tape and bureaucracy as they try to maneuver the MGM situation to their best advantage. But the bottom line is still money and existing assets, like the Showtime pay cable deal that survived the sale of the company and potentially, ongoing membership in the MPAA.

But keep in mind that the realistic price for entry for a major studio these days is about $2 billion… at least $1 billion in cash. This is not to degrade Lionsgate’s business model. And it doesn’t mean that you can’t win an Oscar with less than a $100 million investment. But let’s not get too excited about the return of Leo The Lion until we are sure that its not just smoke, mirrors, and superglue.

Posted by poland at 11:39 AM | Comments (5)

March 06, 2006

John Calley... Return To Brilliance

""Nobody likes to think of themselves as being from Los Angeles," Mr. Calley said. "I don't know anybody that wants to be buried here. I think it was less about that or any problem with 'Brokeback' than in the end, it comes down to a subconscious shuffling of the pecking order and you just go with the film that was most affecting to you personally."

From David Carr's unblogged Oscar story

Posted by poland at 06:05 PM | Comments (23)

And Oscar Residual...

I am pretty sure I had the last episode of Project Runway ruined for me when I ran into one of the finalists at Hollywood & Highland on Friday. One kinda figures that this person was here as a winner, not as a loser.

Oh well.

Posted by poland at 10:58 AM | Comments (6)

Why I Never Went All-In For Crash

For clarity’s sake, I will be specific.

I thought that Crash had missed by a little… even as I kept telling everyone that Crash was real. I thought it was that close… but to be excessively honest, the endless barrage of crap I ate from the BBM crowd made me overly cautious (in retrospect) about really making the Crash argument... especially being out there nearly alone. (David Carr jumping on the bandagon at the end was insignificant. Ebert coming out weeks ago was not.) I was not working all season against BBM, though I was accused of it. And I was never working for Crash... not even in an "anything but Brokeback" way. I was reporting what I saw. But this year, that was a basis for attack.

The funny thing it, we’ll never know what the vote was. Crash may have won by a lot… or 1 vote.

In the last week, everything started pointing towards Crash. And this made me more concerned about Crash’s possibility than anything else. I do not trust the echo chamber. It feeds on itself.

That said, my sense of the strong hum was that people were coming out of the Crash closet, emboldened by stories saying it could win and the fact that voting was over. The great irony of this season was that not loving Brokeback Mountain required closeting for fear of attack (see: this blog). And it was felt by the great and the small.

Last night, they came out.

And next year, I will try to be more brave.

Posted by poland at 10:48 AM | Comments (49)

How Bad Was The Oscar Telecast?

I’m sure that I am one of many writing this phrase, but…

That was the worst produced Oscar telecast ever.

Sorry.

The set design looked like Mel’s Diner from the Universal backlot. But worse, the giant TV screen on the top operated in direct opposition to the endless – and unnecessary – message that seeing movies in a theater was the best way. It really said, “Go to the movies and watch your iPod while the movie is going on.” And even worse, there were lights on the base of the set, down on the floor in front of the first row of seats, and the upward lighting made the actors look like vampires. Disasterous.

The camera finally stopped swooping, but there were more ugly, awkward, unmotivated angles in the first hour of the show than I have ever seen at a big awards show.

Jon Stewart finally stopped swooping as well, but I imagine it was too little, too late. What Stewart proved is that he belongs on The Daily Show. His material needed visual support, by its nature. On the show, the graphic over his shoulder is usually the set up for his sly joke. Here, the joke stood alone… as did the eight people in the room laughing. Have you ever seen that many reaction shots in which no one was even smiling?

But Stewart did warm up as he got to his two clip packages, which were funny. And to ad libs, which were better than any joke that was written by or for him all night. I’m sure they squelched any notion of it, but the truth is, the show would have been better if Stewart had his Daily Show news team out there with him. Imagine Stephen Colbert with Three 6 Mafia or Samantha Bean’s intro for the Oscar attack ads or Stewart doing what he does so well on the show, which is reacting to the reaction.

The comedy highlight of the night for me was Lily Tomlin and Meryl Streep. If Prairie Home Companion, which premieres at SXSW on Friday, is as good overall as that 2 minute bit, it will be a great capper for Altman’s career… until he caps it again.

The music underneath the every acceptance speech, from start to finish, was obnoxious, distracting, and the worst Oscar show innovation since Rob Lowe sang and danced.

And Crash needed a burning car on stage? Jesus. Could you be any more obvious and tasteless? They couldn’t let the drama of the performance of “It‘s Hard Out Here For A Pimp” speak for itself? If you want to see a show of Academy limitations… Dolly Parton stands alone. No dancing transsexuals in various stages of the transition! I wish they gave the other two songs the same respect.

The “we love genres” package were ok… but why were they there? Did the world really need a reminded that film noir exists? There was no apparent demand of the clips. Yet they were given these grand introductions while the Best Picture nominees were thrown up like bumpers for the commercials with nary a word. What the hell was up with that?

If they wanted to do great packages, why not do packages that show why today’s movies are great… leading to five very socially conscious movies as the Best Picture nominees. Someone can speak for big, dumb action films… someone has something good to say about the ditzy romantic comedy… how about the incredibly powerful family category? The only benefit of the packages they did was to give a lot of people a chance to go to the bathroom.

There was real tension behind the show last night with Crash vs Brokeback Mountain... and none of it turned up in the show.

The one truly great part of the show was the Best Score section with Perlman. Elegant... big screen... perfect.

They should start begging Steve Martin for next year now…

Posted by poland at 10:18 AM | Comments (86)

Ken Turan Embarrases Himself Again

Sometimes you lose by wriiting, and nothing has proved what a powerful, taboo-breaking, necessary medium New Media is than Turan's "they justdon't get it" piece after Crash won the Oscar best picture category.

Not only is it bad form to piss in the wnner's Corn Flakes, but it the presumptuous of this piece still strikes me as one of the real main reasons why Brokeback Mountain didn't make it all the way uphill.

And keep in mind.... I don't like Crash. If forced to vote between Crash and Brokeback Mountain, I would have voted BBM. But I do sitll understand, as an American, that others are alowed to have opinions. And if there is an important lesson in the Crash win, it is becoming that people with good intentions can be more McCarthy-like than the phantom censors in their heads.

It would also be all to easy to yet again explain why BBM is even more old fashioned than Crash, but tricked people inot thinking it meant a lot more than it really did by using the dramatic trick of restraint of emotion. But that would be unkind and petty.

This goes on the list of responses to the LAT next time they whine about New Media.

Posted by poland at 09:29 AM | Comments (76)

What Broke The Mountain's Back?

From The Hot Button

Really, it's quite sad that Brokeback Mountain could do the business it's done, win the awards and accolades its won, and Diana Ossana still looked like somebody kicked her dog to death in post-show interviews. Brokeback Mountain is a huge success story… as is Crash (the only true indie in the group and the cheapest made of the five nominees)… as is Capote… as is Good Night, And Good Luck. And I still believe that in the folds of time, Munich will be the best remembered of this quintet.

Posted by poland at 01:53 AM | Comments (40)

March 05, 2006

Let The Crashing Begin!

Love it, hate it... spill it!

Posted by poland at 09:56 PM | Comments (51)

Gotta Give It To 'Em...

Paramount knows they have a big problem with the title Failure To Launch, which is failing to catch on with the female audiences that were expected to drive the box office on the movie. Even with Sarah Jessica Parker, a dick joke for a title that she doesn't make fun of in the spots just isn't cutting it.

So a new TV campaign started this weekend featuring Kathy Bates and Terry Bradshaw, who play Matthew "Duh" McConaughey's parents, essentially explaining the title... over and over again.

It may not work, but action was demanded and action has been taken... and you have to give it to them for that.

Posted by poland at 01:29 PM | Comments (26)

Sunday Estimates by Klady - Oscar Weekend

/ 3-Day Estimates / Friday / % Change / Cume
1 / Madea's Family Reunion / 12.7m / -58% / 47.8m
2 / 16 Blocks / 11.6m / new / 11.6m
3 / Eight Below / 10.2m / -36% / 58.7m
4 / Ultraviolet / 8.9m / new / 8.9m
5 / Aquamarine / 7.5m / new / 7.5m
6 / The Pink Panther / 7m / -37% / 69.6m
7 / Chapelle's Block Party / 6.7m / new / 6.7m
8 / Date Movie / 5.2m / -43% / 40.8m
9 / Curious George / 4.4m / -38% / 49.2m
10 / Firewall / 3.6m / -46% / 42.5m
_
13 / Brokeback Mountain / 2.5m / -11% / 78.9m
15 / Capote / 1.6m / -55% / 25.5m
16 / Transamerica / 1.5m / +77% / 6.7m
22 / Good Night & Good Luck / .76m / +16% / 31.3m
26 / Munich / .53m / +6% / 46.8

Posted by poland at 10:56 AM | Comments (21)

March 04, 2006

Friday Estimates

It will be a bit of a black weekend for The Oscars… and not in a happily ethnic way like last weekend. 16 Blocks, Ultraviolet and Dave Chappelle’s Block Party combined might be able to match last weekend’s Madea Family Reunion opening. Might.

And these are the weekends that worry studios. A well-reviewed knock off of Die Hard with Bruce Willis and the up-n-coming Mos Def will do about the same business as Hostage did last year. Your basic Screen Gems action genre flick will be the worst such opener for the Sony division since 2003’s The Medallion and the worst such opener of a film made in English since 2001s Ghost of Mars. And Focus instincts for release dates failed them utterly with an opening of a raved street party movie the week after Madea made a meal out of the lovers of the chitlin’ circuit.

One thing is for sure. Despite good notices for two of the four new releases, they all seemed pretty much dumped. Aquamarine is the weak sister and a blip on the radar. But I just feel in my gut that Willis and Chappelle could have been bigger. And Ultraviolet is just a bit soft as an opener, regardless of the quality.

Still nothing close to Hitch. V for Vendetta is probably the spring’s last best box office hope.

Title / Distributor / Gross* / Theaters / % Change / Cume
16 Blocks / WB / 3.8 / 2706 / New / 3.8
Madea's Family Reunion / Lions Gate / 3.4 / 2194 / -67% / 38.5
Ultraviolet / Sony / 3.4 / 2558 / New / 3.4
Dave Chappelle's Block Party / Focus / 2.7 / 1200 / New / 2.7
Eight Below / BV / 2.5 / 3122 / -39% / 51
Aquamarine / Fox / 2 / 2512 / New / 2
The Pink Panther / Sony / 1.9 / 3024 / -37% / 62.7
Date Movie / Fox / 1.7 / 2603 / -46% / 37.3
Firewall / WB / 1.1 / 2212 / -42% / 40
Final Destination 3 / New Line / 0.95 / 2208 / -42% / 47.4
Curious George / Uni / 0.91 / 2590 / -44% / 45.7
Brokeback Mountain / Focus / 0.69 / 1272 / 11% / 77.1

Posted by poland at 10:59 PM | Comments (11)

The Independent Spirit Awards In 6 Photos Or Less

The Hollywood Reporter's Kirk Honeycutt Gets Parked in... Eventually Escaping His Own Car

A Look At The Mighty Mighty Red Carpet

Dan Futterman Before And After Winning A "Dawnie" - Note The Increased Height, Improved Lighting & Brilliantly Executed Surprise On His Face

Sarah Silverman Prepares To Discuss Her Vagina Endlessly In Public

The Afterparty. (Look familiar?)

Posted by poland at 09:37 PM | Comments (6)

March 03, 2006

It's Funny... Almost

When Traditional Media finds itself leaking readership, what does it do? It offers the same writers who aren't drawing a crowd even more space, polluting the web with more junk food in a format that none of them seems particualrly comfortable with.

Welcome to The Blogosphere, Nikki Finke!

You are officially DOMTTHOBCTNMTH(AF)SM* Blogger #274. Congratulations.

We have great hope for Nikki. She may be a wild woman, but that can be a lot of fun. She might want to check out Anne Thompson's sharp prose and David Carr's 3am-at-the-bar charming ramblings to find examples of escapees from your current standing.

*Desperate Old Media Trying To Hang On By Co-Opting The New Media They Hate (And Fear) So Much

Posted by poland at 05:05 PM | Comments (22)

March 02, 2006

Blog Readers Attack American Human Association

The AHA says that Brokeback Mountain was abusive. "Wonder how the filmmakers got the elk to lose its footing and crumple to the ground 'on cue' after being shot?"

Go get 'em!!!

Posted by poland at 05:23 PM | Comments (71)

Shatner... Oy!

There is some very intense William Shatner promoting going on out there. I get no less than two e-mails a week. This week, I will share this image with y'all...

Contact:
Joshua Silberstein
William Shatner DVD Club
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Revealed: Shatner’s Headshot Submissions to Brokeback, Walk the Line

Hollywood, California – March 1, 2006 -- Shocking photos of William Shatner revealed today show why many of his peers believe him to be one of the most versatile actors in Hollywood. Three Oscar nominated films, Brokeback Mountain, Capote, and Walk the Line, all announced that William Shatner was almost cast in the lead role for those movies. Apparently, the former Star Trek captain is too busy these days with his Emmy-winning role on Boston Legal, and his recently launched DVD Club to star in multiple major motion pictures simultaneously. These eye-grabbing headshots were what got Mr. Shatner the attention of the head honchos at Brokeback Mountain, Capote, and Walk the Line:

Posted by poland at 10:56 AM | Comments (12)

Anyone Interested in Paying 3 Bucks To See A TV Show A Few Days Early?

What do you think?

Posted by poland at 10:48 AM | Comments (20)

March 01, 2006

But What About The Kids???

Worried about how much sex is in your violence and how much profanity you have to hear while watching people smoking?

Thank goodness (don't take God's name in vain, you bastards!) for The Family Media Guide.

Posted by poland at 10:46 AM | Comments (31)