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May 11, 2009
Monday Clean Up
1. Village Roadshow Recovers - Last week, I wrote about this being a huge story. Later in the week, a WBer in a position to know expressed serious skepticism about whether VR would get its legs back under it as well as letting me know that WB knew about all this at almost the same time it became public. But just a few days later, The Hollywood Reporter reports that the tide of red ink has been stemmed and WB will have its partner back, at least for now.
Crisis averted. But still... treading cautiously...
2. Arlen Faber becomes The Answer Man - After a bit of a blah launch at Sundance in January, Magnolia is taking the film out under a new name... even playing festivals again, before release, under the new title. So if you are in Seattle and were at Sundance and that Jeff Daniels movie seems kinda familiar, it's not you.
3. Back In The Closet, You! - It is fascinating when a liberal news organization gets all conservative, as NPR is about Kirby Dick's doc, Outrage. As reported by indieWIRE, the radio network edited Nathan Lee's review of the film to take out the names of the men reported in the film to be gay... led by Larry Craig, whose bathroom exploits were headline news worldwide for weeks.
As noted in the IW piece, none of the men who are "outed" in the film haven't already been outed, over and over again, often on Fox News. I discuss this with Kirby Dick in our DP/30 interview. To me, it's well-reported old news. But as Kirby found, and this confirms, even though it seems like water under the bridge (or through the dyke) to anyone who pays attention to politics, it still seems to shock the hell out of people and organizations.
We spent the last week listening to Elizabeth Edwards discussing her husband's infidelity over and over again... to sell a book. And NPR is pulling Larry Craig's picture off a review of this movie. Oy.
Posted by dpoland at May 11, 2009 11:52 AM
Comments
Since this is sort of an open thread....
Was just looking at the latest foreign gross for Monsters vs. Aliens and it is really lagging. Just $159 million according to Variety. Won't get near $200 million. Way behind all other non-Shrek DWA films including Shark Tale which did $206 million. Mad 2 and KFP did over $400 million abroad. MAd 1 over $300 million.
Any thoughts? Was it the topic? Did 3-D hurt?
Posted by: Direwolf ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.mcnblogs.com/thehotblog/nav-commenters.gif)
at May 11, 2009 01:03 PM
http://www.mcnblogs.com/thehotblog/archives/2009/05/monday_clean_up.html#comments
Wow, NPR editing "Nathan Lee's review of the film to take out the names of the men reported in the film to be gay" is the liberal malapropism of FIND, Rich Radon and free speech.
See Dave, it's not so well reported -- as Kiby says, this is why he's filling the hole of reporting it.
On the other hand, he has to service the doc market place -- not an easy task.
I haven't seen Outrage yet, it's going to be really important.
Posted by: T. Holly at May 11, 2009 01:15 PM
Wrong thread. Direwolf threw me off.
Posted by: T. Holly at May 11, 2009 01:16 PM
Sorry, T. Holly :-)
Posted by: Direwolf at May 11, 2009 01:47 PM
Doesn't the captial JP Morgan floated Village Roadshow means the US tax payers bailed VR out and are now funding WB?
Posted by: Martin S at May 11, 2009 02:24 PM
Wrong thread, I suppose, but the others are already buried. Looks like Klady's estimates for Star Trek were significantly low:
http://boxofficemojo.com/weekend/chart/
It only dropped 23% from Sat-Sun, even though it was Mother's Day. That's impressive.
Posted by: gradystiles at May 11, 2009 02:29 PM
Martin S, they certainly aren't using that money to back mortgages. That's play money, they've got their own.
The HR article stated this: The company was forced to restructure the facility when an unnamed third party experienced difficulties last year."
Does anyone know who this was? Was that really the reason behind Roadshow's turbulent water?
Posted by: Triple Option at May 12, 2009 10:10 AM
NPR is no liberal network -- it maintains a blacklist just like their corporate-owned counterparts. Mumia Abu-Jamal and Noam Chomsky are on that blacklist.
Posted by: Chucky in Jersey at May 12, 2009 12:53 PM
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