Week Ending 12th August, 2001 Page 3 2 1
Which is Funnier: Teen Voyeurism Or Cross-Dressing ? posted 9 Aug 2001
The Guardian today published the results of two surveys conducted by the American Film Institute in an effort to determine the funniest movies of all time. In the first survey, they asked 'leaders of the American film community', and in the second, they sought the opinions of the general public... As you could probably guess, the film community 'leaders' opted for respectable 'classics', like Some Like It Hot and Tootsie. Joe Public, on the other hand, gave the nod to Porky's and Dumb And Dumber. (Everyone, however, was able to agree that Blazing Saddles was a complete cack.)
Danger Island... The Next Generation of Reality TV posted 8 Aug 2001
What's the bet that the producers of this show have seen Series 7 and Battle Royale?... The idea behind Danger Island is to maroon 12 real-life convicted felons on a desert island, then have 'Manhunters' track them down. This is not a 'low brow descent into schlock television', but rather an 'incredible mythological display of evil competing with evil for the exceedingly rare opportunity to compensate victims for past crimes committed against them'... A prize of $1,000,000 gets donated to the real-life victim of the winning felon. What does the felon get? A $50,000 college fund for their children 'designed to help break the cycle of crime and provide them with options their parent may not have had'.
What Makes A Movie TRULY BAD !!! posted 8 Aug 2001
According to Franz Lidz and Steve Rushin: 'To be really bad, a film should be pretentious and sententious. It should seek to change your life. (Anti- genius is 1 percent perspiration and 99 percent aspiration.) It should be, above all, humorless.'
What do you think? And what films would you class as truly bad?
(NB: This article may have been archived by now, so you'll need to set up an account with the New York Times to access it. If you couldn't be bothered doing this, just use mine. Subscriber ID : filmcement Password : burton)
Film Scripts - The Best, Most Over-Rated & Most Under-Rated posted 8 Aug 2001
The publishing house Library of America recently asked the members of the Writer's Guild of America to name their picks for the best, most over-rated, and most under-rated film scripts ever. Unsurprisingly, the 175 screenwriters who responded placed Citizen Kane and Casablanca at the top of the 'best' list. Interestingly though, they also placed them in the top 5 of the 'over-rated' list. (Pulp Fiction topped that one.) And the most under-rated script?... Groundhog Day. Your thoughts? What scripts would you nominate?
Simpsons To Bring Shorts Back To The Multiplex ? posted 8 Aug 2001
It looks like The Simpsons are finally going to make it to the big screen, but not in the form that you might immediately expect... Rather than opt for a feature, Fox is toying with the idea of a series of shorts that can be played before other Fox features... If this does get off the ground, maybe it might even usher in a return of the short film as an expected part of any movie-going experience...
Attack of The Zombie Star Wars Fans posted 8 Aug 2001
I wasn't going to bother posting anything about this because, apart from its potential as a source of ridicule for the fark.com regulars, who cares what the next Star Wars 'epic' is called?... Well, a couple of very sad people do, as this 'heartfelt' petition to Mr Lucas asking him to reconsider the chosen title, indicates... Get a life, boys!... (Oh, it's called Attack of The Clones, by the way.)
Stoner Movie Stars of The Past... Where Are They Now ? posted 8 Aug 2001
Tommy Chong of Cheech And Chong fame has found a burgeoning new career marketing 'Urine Luck' - a urine additive which 'contains proprietary ingredients which are specifically formulated for removal of unwanted substances' (ie it helps you pass drug tests)... Well, what else did you expect?
'Exposing Censorship', Todd Solondz Style posted 7 Aug 2001
Mild-mannered indie 'bad boy' Todd Solodnz (Welcome to the Dollhouse, Happiness) was recently told by his exec producer to tone down the graphic nature of a scene in his new movie Storytelling. (The scene depicted a college professor having sex with a student.) Rather than 'camouflaging the offending bits digitally', Solondz decided to superimpose a large red box over the scene. According to Solondz, he was taking censorship 'by the cajones'; according to his producer, Jeff Lipsky, he was just breaking a contract.
Battlefield Clearwater posted 7 Aug 2001
Now, here's a film premiere I'm really looking forward to... A former Scientologist has just completed a film about a science fiction writer called L. Conrad Powers, who founds a religion... Hmm, I wonder what that's a reference to? The film, entitled The Profit, is due to open in three weeks time in Clearwater, Florida, where thousands of Scientologists gather each year for spiritual auditing...
(As an amusing aside: if the film makes it into a second week of screening, it will be playing alongside Swordfish, starring that eminent disciple of L. Ron Hubbard, John Travolta.)
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