KARATE KID Remake On The Way

It looks like producer Jerry Weintraub is going back to the mat, overseeing a remake of the 1984 coming-of-age-while-kickin’-ass film The Karate Kid. Weintraub, who produced the original as well as its three sequels, is teaming up with Will Smith and his production company Overlook Entertainment for the remake, according to a report at IGN.

In an entirely not-so-coincidental bit of casting, Smith’s 9-year old son (and Pursuit Of Happyness co-star) Jaden is attached to the project for the title role.

Normally, I'm not a fan of remakes, and am pleasantly surprised when my natural pessimissim towards them is proven wrong, such as in the case of the recent 3:10 To Yuma. But for this film, I'm strangely ambivelant, not being much of a fan of the original film. Still, I have reservations about Jaden Smith taking over the role from Ralph Macchio. Granted Macchio was 23 when he played the role of Daniel-san, but he was baby-faced enough to look like your average teenager. I think casting a pre-teen Smith is going to change a lot of the dynamic and drama of the film, not mention cut out the teenage love story.

This Week's Theatrical Releases.

1. The Kingdom (2,792 Theaters, Rated R): This is how I imagine a phone call during the planning stages of this movie went.

STUDIO EXEC: Hey! Is this my star writer!
WRITER: Yes, it's me.
EXEC: Great! I wanted to talk to you about that police procedural you wrote for me!
WRITER: What's wrong with it?
EXEC: Nothing's wrong with it. It's great. I love the characters, the pacing is dead on, I was on the edge of my seat.
WRITER: Good!
EXEC: ...but you have to change it.
WRITER: Why?
EXEC: What you have here, people can see for free on any of the 15 CSI's or 10 Law and Order's in the comfort of their own home. We need something to entice them to come out to the theaters. Something to separate this flick from the herd.
WRITER: Like what? Set it in a different country?
EXEC: I like the way you think, my boy!
WRITER: Which one?
EXEC: Who's the writer here? Me, or you. Do you want me to think of everything?
WRITER: Okay, you're right.
EXEC: But don't set it in England or France or anyplace else like that. Too boring. It's need to be someplace edgy and exotic.
WRITER: How about Iraq?
EXEC: No! Too edgy! Too exotic! But somewhere in the Middle East is good. What's that country next to Iraq...
WRITER: Kuwait? Saudi Arabia?
EXEC: That last one! Saudi Arabia! Set it there! Our heroes will have a hard time with the local bureaucracy. Maybe one of them gets kidnapped by terrorists...
WRITER: Is there kidnapping in Saudi Arabia? I didn't...
EXEC: It's the Middle East! Meat and potatoes America equates all of the Middle East with terrorism! It will work! Now get to writing!

At least that's the vibe I get off the movie.

2. The Game Plan (3,103 Theaters, Rated PG): The transition from actions star to comedy star sometimes goes well (Schwarzenegger inTwins) and sometimes it goes not so well (Stallone in Stop, or My Mom Will Shoot!). But it does serve to prolong their careers just a little bit.

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is still a viable action star. Sure, the last pure action movie he made was Doom, and that was a clunker but his career in that genre was far from over.

But he has been branching out. He recently stared in the drama Gridiron Gang and received fairly good notices for it. This film is another step in diversifying his career.

And if you are going to break into family films, having the Walt Disney name on the flick is a good idea. They are synonymous with family fare. However, they are not always known as for good family fare. And this film doesn't seem all that original.

It would seem the success of this movie will depend on how well The Rock's natural charm translates into this new film type.

3. Feast of Love (1,200 Theaters, Rated R): Slowly, almost completely unnoticed, and new film genre has snuck up on us. It is the "ensemble cast examining love in all of its forms" genre.

From Singles to Love Actually, it seems Hollywood has become enamored with this type of movie. And this film is just the latest entry in the burgeoning category.

The movie does have a pretty good cast going for it, with one Oscar winner (Morgan Freeman), and two Oscar nominees (Greg Kinnear and Jane Alexander) in the ensemble. And it is directed by Oscar Winner Robert Benton.

But, from what I've seen of the previews, I can't make out who is in a relationship with whom. It seems that the couples in the clips are different from the ones on the poster. Maybe the movie deals with mate swapping, which doesn't really lend itself to love. Or maybe I just need new glasses.

It does have kind of a soft opening compared to the other movies this week, lest than half the screens of The Kingdom. It will be hard for the movie to make any impact, even with the sterling cast and director.

Now, the Top 5 predictions. This is what I guessed for last week:

1. Resident Evil: Extinction
2. Good Luck Chuck
3. The Brave One
4. 3:10 to Yuma
5. Sydney White

And this is how it turned out:

1. Resident Evil: Extinction
2. Good Luck Chuck
3. The Brave One
4. 3:10 to Yuma
5. Eastern Promises

Sydney White just barely missed the top five by $462,753. I guess a fairy tale redux is no match for a naked male sauna fight. This makes me 23 for 35 over 7 weeks, and brings my accuracy percentage up to 65%.

But what about this week?

1. The Kingdom
2. The Game Plan
3. Resident Evil: Extinction
4. The Brave One
5. 3:10 to Yuma

We'll see how we do next week.

Bill

Robb Moves From TERABITHIA To WITCH MOUNTAIN

AnnaSophia Robb, last seen in the under-appreciated Bridge To Terabithia, will be joining Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson for the Disney film Witch Mountain, which director Andy Fickman is claiming isn't a remake of the 1975 classic.

"Not remake," Fickman told MTV Movies Blog. "We didn't want to come in and just simply do a remake of a movie that we all really liked growing-up. It's a new chapter within the world of Witch Mountain. I think that for people who have seen the original, they're going to be very happy with the direction were going. And with people who've never seen it, I think it'll be an exciting ride for them [as well]. The original book is a very cool dark thriller. We're pulling elements from that. It's a much darker movie than in the 70s when they did Escape to Witch Mountain.”

Robb will play one of two siblings with supernatural abilities on the run from an evil millionaire, trying to make their way to the titular mountain and home.

Washington And Scott Plan On TAKING PELHAM ONE TWO THREE

Denzel Washington and director Tony Scott are reportedly gearing up for their fourth collaboration, a remake of the 1974 thriller The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three, according to Entertainment Weekly.

Washington would star as a tough New York cop who has to free a subway car full of hostages from terrorists. Walter Matthau starred as the cop in the original.

The film is reportedly being developed for Sony Studios, though they declined to comment on the Entertainment Weekly report.

Trailer Park: SOUTHLAND TALES

Last week, we gave you a glimpse of Kevin Smith in Richard Kelly's near-future social satire Southland Tales. Today, we give you the film's trailer. If you don't know that much about the film's plot line, don't worry. The trailer doesn't really give away any of the story. In fact, even with a good working knowledge of the film's plot it's hard to see how all of these pieces will fit together.



I have to admit that seven years starring in Buffy, The Vampire Slayer is the only training that can prepare one to convincingly read the line "Scientists are saying that the future is going to be far more futuristic than they originally predicted."

Southland Tales hits theaters on November 9.

This Week's Theatrical Releases.

1. Resident Evil: Extinction (2,828 Theaters, Rated R): I am torn about the series. I love zombie movies. But I hate video game adaptations. And this franchise is both.

Some people must like it. This is the second sequel in the line. I, unfortunately, have not seen any of them. But apparently they have moved on from a Zombie Apocalypse to total Extinction in the span of 3 years. Funny, I wouldn't think that they would take that long.

I will always have a soft spot in my heart for Milla Jovovich after her starring in The Fifth Element, what I consider to be one of the most underrated sci-fi films of all time.

And it also stars Ali Later of Heroes fame. Funny that her role in the TV show was the first that popped to mind when I saw her in the trailer. It's not like she hasn't appeared in a movie before. She was in Varsity Blues and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.

The plot? Jovovich's character tries to lead a group of survivors through a very sandy Las Vegas on their way to Alaska. Oh, and to keep them from, well, extinction.



2. Good Luck Chuck (2,612 Theaters, Rated R): I was going to talk about the plot of this movie, which is Chuck (Dane Cook) must break his curse--that woman find their true love immediately after sleeping with him--in order to keep the woman he loves (Jessica Alba). Or about the short yet interesting career path Cook has taken in movies. Or the comparisons I find between this movie and Splash.

But instead I want to talk about this poster. For those of you born after 1980, it mimics the iconic last photograph of John Lennon and Yoko Ono taken by Annie Leibovitz.

But that's not what I wanted to talk about. I wanted to talk about the absolutely horrible photoshopping on the poster. Click the image to get a larger view of it. Look at their faces. I have a cheesy, budget version of photoshop I got when I bought my scanner. I could have done a better job with that poster.

I mean, really. At least make an effort to get the lighting to match! Spend more than just 10 minutes on it! This thing is going into theaters! People with see it! Come on!

3. Sydney White (2,102 Theaters, Rated PG-13): Amanda Bynes is carving out a little, unique cottage industry for herself. In addition to be one of the few tweener stars who have not been arrest for DUI or have had nude pictures on the internet, she has become the queen of the modern update of a classical piece of literature.

She starred in last year's She's the Man, which was revamped version of William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. This week, she has this movie, which is a 2007 version of the Snow White fairy tale.

Instead of Snow, her name is Sydney. Instead of woods, we have college. Instead of dwarves, we have dorks. Instead of an evil queen, we have evil sorority sisters. But there is a handsome prince and a romance which is another Bynes trademark.

I, for one, would be interested in seeing how the makers of the movie deal with the poisoned apple and Snow/Sydney's long nap. Well, it being set in college, I can think of a couple of ways it could go, but none would work in a teen friendly movie.

On to the predictions. This is how I thought last week's line up would look like:

1. The Brave One
2. 3:10 to Yuma
3. Halloween
4. Superbad
5. Mr. Woodcock

And this is how it ended up:

1. The Brave One
2. 3:10 to Yuma
3. Mr. Woodcock
4. Superbad
5. Dragon Wars

Both Mr. Woodcock and Dragon Wars did better than I thought they would. But I still got 3 out of 5 right. This makes me 19 for 30 over 6 weeks, and makes my "batting average" 63%.

Here is what I think this week will look like.

1. Resident Evil: Extinction
2. Good Luck Chuck
3. The Brave One
4. 3:10 to Yuma
5. Sydney White

What do you think?

Bill

Trailer Park: BEOWULF Final Trailer

Opening in just two months is Robert Zemeckis's new motion-capture animated film Beowulf. A couple of trailers have already been released, and here's the latest one to hit the net-

Unlike his last attempt at using motion-capture technology to drive the animation of the film, The Polar Express, the characters here are much more life-like, greatly improved over the rather creepy look that the characters in the first film had.

The only thing remains to be seen is how many high school students will fail English literature classes after writing thesises on the film rather than on the original poem.

THE WILD GEESE To Wing Their Way Back To Theaters

Variety is reporting that Hollywood Gang Productions has just signed a deal to remake the classic 1978 action film The Wild Geese, the story of a small band of British mercenaries who are hired to free a jailed African leader.

Rupert Sayers, who is in line to direct, was quoted as saying “It has it all- great characters, action, plot twists and revenge. We are making a tough film, taking ex-British soldiers from the murky London underworld to the battlefields in Africa.”

The original starred Roger Moore, Richard Burton and Richard Harris.

No script writer has been announced. The project’s producer, Gianni Nunnari, is currently in discussions with Warner Brothers to distribute the film.

English Lines Up All-Star Cast For THE WOMEN Remake

Writer/Director Diane English has lined up a steller cast for her remake of the 1939 comedy The Women.

Meg Ryan will take over Norma Shearer's role of Mary Haines, a wealthy woman who doesn't realize that her husband is having an affair with an attractive young shop girl. Eva Mendes will be playing the role of the shop girl played by Joan Crawford in the original. Once Mary discovers her husband's infidelities, she hopes a train to Reno for a quickie divorce and meets more women, some of whom are carrying on with the others’ husbands behind their backs.

Needless to say, English has probably updated the film's story a bit. Who goes to Reno for a divorce anymore? However, one aspect that English seems to have preserved is the original's lack of any male characters appearing.

The production, which is currently shooting in Boston, has just announced several new cast members. Joining the cast are Bette Midler, Cloris Leachman, Carrie Fisher, Lynn Whitfield, Joanna Gleason, Ana Gasteyer and Debi Mazur. They will be joining the previously announced Debra Messing, Annette Bening, Jada Pinkett Smith and Candace Bergen. (Bergen starred in English's hit television series Murphy Brown back in the 90s.)

The is set for release sometime next year.

Via Variety.

SOUTHLAND TALES Pic: Kevin Smith In Command

An older Silent Bob after a stint in the Army Rangers?

Nope, this is a shot of Kevin Smith in makeup for his role in Richard Kelly's Southland Tales due out November 9.

According to the studio, Southland Tales is an "an ensemble piece set in the futuristic landscape of Los Angeles on July 4, 2008, as it stands on the brink of social, economic and environmental disaster." Of course, the picture’s long post-production period - including a long period of re-editing following a less-than-favorable critical reception of a 160-minute version of the film at Cannes last year - have left some of us wondering if the film was going to be released before the date of its near-futuristic setting.

Reportedly, the film is, in part, a satire on Homeland Security and the military-industrial complex. How Smith’s millitary character fits into all of this should be interesting, to say the least.

Via SlashFilm.

Gyllenhaal And Maguire To Become BROTHERS

Jake Gyllenhaal and Tobey Maguire are in negotiations to star in an English-language remake of Susanne Bier's Danish 2004 war film Brothers according to a report in Variety.

Maguire would star as a man sent to Afghanistan by the United Nations, while his younger, black-sheep brother (Maguire) takes care of his brother’s wife and child. David Benioff is drafting the screenplay. Director Jim Sheridan hopes to have the film in front of cameras in November.

In the past there have been attempts to create a rivalry between the two actors. When Maguire hurt his back while working on the horseracing drama Seabiscuit (2003) and his participation in Spider-Man 2 (2004) was in doubt, Gyllenhaal’s name was the ine most mentioned in rumored possible replacements. It should be interesting to see them have a real rivalry, at least on screen.

Via Cinematical.

LOONEY TUNES, POPEYE DVD Collections To Remain Uncensored

Last week I expressed some concern over the news that Warners had censored the Tom And Jerry: Spotlight Collection, Volume 3 DVD release by the removal of two cartoons that contained racial humor, wondering what effect this might have on upcoming releases in their classic Looney Tunes series.

Fortunately, the answer comes from animation historian Jerry Beck- None at all.

According to a post at Beck’s CartoonBrew blog, Beck states that both the Looney Tunes and Popeye DVD collections, which he contributes to, will remain safe from the censor's scissors.

By example, Beck posted a frame (above left) from the Frank Tashlin's 1938 cartoon Porky At The Crocadero, in which the stuttering pig briefly imitates noted big band leader Cab Calloway. It is this one gag that many feel has kept the cartoon off television for years. It should be noted that no one seems to take offense to a similar joke in the short where Porky imitates another band leader, the appropriately-named Paul Whiteman.

Beck also posted another two frames from the final suicide gag from Bob Clampett's 1944 Hare Ribbin', another joke that had been cut from television screenings of the cartoon in recent years. Beck promises an alternate ending for the cartoon will also be on the disc where it’s Bugs Bunny who pulls the trigger on the pistol.

Some fans had expressed concern for the ongoing chronological Popeye DVD releases as the next volume enters into the early years of World War II, when less than politically correct depictions of the Japanese and Germans were often included as a way of building homefront morale.

Looney Tunes Golden Collection, Volume Five goes on sale on October 30.

The second volume of Popeye cartoons does not have an announced release date, but is expected before the end of the year.

Will THE BIRDS Be Flocking Again?

Those rumors that Naomi Watts is lined up to head a remake of the Alfred Hitchcock classic The Birds may just be true.

While interviewing Watts about her role in director David Cronenberg's upcoming crime drama Eastern Promises, ShockTillYouDrop squeezed in a question about the rumors circulating that she is going to take the lead role made famous by Tippi Hedron. Her response-

"It's happening, but I haven't read the script yet, but we're in talks, and I hope it works out. They're still working on it and making sure it's just right."

The script Watts references is currently being worked on by Juliet Snowden and Stiles White for producer Michael Bay. No director has been attached to the project yet.

'Unauthorized' FOUNTAIN Commentary Available

Disappointed that the DVD release of Darren Aronofsky's time-twisting love story The Fountain didn't have a director's commentary track like the releases for his other two films?

Don't worry. Aronofsky was too. It seems that in light of the film's poor box-office performance, the folks in charge decided that they didn't want to invest time or money into any special features for the DVD. It was thought that a commentary wouldn’t help sell more copies of the DVD.

Rather than fight them on their decision, Aronofsky embraced it. If a commentary track was not going to inspire folks to shell out their hard-earned cash, he might as well just give it away. And that's what he is doing over at his website. Just click on this link and synch up their audio track with your DVD player.

This is just the latest in a growing wave of directors making their own commentaries and releasing them via the internet. The idea seems to have started last summer when Clerks II director Kevin Smith announced plans for a downloadable commentary track that people could take with them to the theaters and listen to on an iPod while watching the film. Although the idea was scrapped and the commentary moved to the DVD release, it seems to have inspired some other filmmakers to do similar recordings. More recently, writer/producers Danny Bilson and Paul DeMeo have made available commentaries for various episodes of their old Flash and Sentinel tv series. Even former Mystery Science Theater 3000 star Mike Nelson has used the idea for his own series of RiffTrax.

Via Cinematical.

This Week's Theatrical Releases.

1. The Brave One (2,755 Theaters, Rated R): The Director? Neil Jordan (Mona Lisa, Crying Game, Interview with a Vampire). The Lead Actress? Two-time Academy Award Winner Jodie Foster (The Accused, Silence of the Lambs). Supporting Actor? Oscar Nominee Terrence Howard. The Plot? A warmed over version of Death Wish.

Is it just me, or do these creators deserve a better movie?

Okay. I'll grant you that the whole "person looking for revenge" story is a powerful one. But it has been used umpteen times before. Will The Brave One bring anything new to the table? Or has the topic been examined enough?

Yes, I know that it is Jodie Foster, looking and acting like a female Bernie Goetz. And I'm sure she'll act the heck out of it. But it's been done before. Does it really matter if she's a better actor than Charles Bronson when he did essentially the same role as she more than thirty years ago.

Hollywood gets a lot of flack for lack of originality. This case, I think it's deserved.




2. Dragon Wars (2,269 Theaters, Rated PG-13): I first saw ads for this a few weeks ago, and I wondered why I hadn't heard of it before. Something this big budget with this much CGI usually gets some press in the entertainment magazines or advance buzz on the internet.

One of the reasons why you might not have heard anything is because Dragon Wars (or, as it's alternately called, D-War) is a Korean movie, one of the most expensive Korean films ever made.

The plot basically involves dragons fighting in the skies of Los Angeles. There is some wacky mumbo jumbo about one of the dragons trying to get into Heaven, which adds a bizarre spin to the plot, but this movie should appeal to anybody who likes to see giant beasts trying to kill one another while destroying everything the come in contact with.

To be honest, I might go to see this if they promised me that Godzilla would show up somewhere in the movie. I mean, if it wasn't for him, this movie probably would have never made it over here.


3. Mr. Woodcock (2,231 Theaters, Rated PG-13): Finally, in what could quite possibly the most derivirative weekend of movies ever, we come to this one. Even the poster is unoriginal, apeing the poster for 1998's BASEketball.

The most obvious comparision you could make for this movie would be last year's School for Scoundrels. It also starred Billy Bob Thornton as a teacher whose adversarial relationship with a student kicks up when the teacher begins a romance with someone close to the student. Billy Bob better be careful, or else he might start getting typecast.

The modern dumb comedy has become so incestuous that they have even become quasi-cookie cutter. Take a "high concept" plot, take actor from dumb comedy A, add costar from dumb comedy B, add in an Oscar Winning actress for "What is she doing in this type of movie" shock value, shake and serve.

This is what we essentially have here. This movie essentially follows that formula. But that doesn't mean that it's going to be a success.


Now to the predictions. This is what I predicted for last week:

1. 3:10 to Yuma
2. Halloween
3. Shoot 'Em Up
4. Superbad
5. Balls of Fury

And this is how it turned out:

1. 3:10 to Yuma
2. Halloween
3. Superbad
4. Shoot 'Em Up
5. The Bourne Ultimatum

I flipped 3 and 4, and that Balls of Fury had more lasting power than it did. I am now 16 for 30 in 6 weeks, and have an accuracy percentage of 53%.

This is what a call for this week.

1. The Brave One
2. 3:10 to Yuma
3. Halloween
4. Superbad
5. Mr. Woodcock

What do you think?

Bill

Trailer Park: SLEUTH

If there is one remake that I find myself looking forward to, it is actor-turned-director Kenneth Branagh's new version of the 1972 thriller Sleuth.

In the original, Michale Caine stars as the young lover of Laurence Olivier's wife. This time around, Caine stars as the cuckolded husband opposite Jude Law. But in addition to this bit of stunt casting, we have Branagh in the director's chair, working with a script by Nobel Laureate Harold Pinter. All in all, a very good pedigree. And as the recently released remake of 3:10 To Yuma has shown us, remakes of good films can be good themselves.

The film hits theaters October 12. Until then, here's the film's trailer-

Jon Stewart To Host 2008 Oscars

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences have announced that comic Jon Stewart will be hosting this year’s Academy Awards. This marks Stewart's second time fronting the show, having first hosted back in 2006.

Frankly, I think this is great news. Sure, Ellen DeGeneres' turn this past year as host scored 1 million viewers more than Stewart's first time at the mic the previous year. But out of all the comics who have hosted over the past two decades – and that list includes Billy Crystal, Chris Rock, Steve Martin and Whoopi Goldberg – Stewart is the one who was consistently funny with both prepared and ad-libbed material. But then again I thought David Letterman's turn as host in 1995 was hysterical too. Uma… Oprah.

The Academy Awards will be presented on February 24, 2008.

TOM AND JERRY DVD Censored

It looks like the third and final volume of Warner Brothers's Tom And Jerry theatrical shorts collections will not be as complete as once thought as the label has decided to drop two cartoons -- Mouse Cleaning (1948) and Casanova Cat (1951) -- from the package due to "inappropriate racial stereotypes."

In a statement released to TVShowsOnDVD.com, the studio stated "Although [The Tom And Jerry Spotlight Collection, Volume 3] is intended for mature audiences and collectors (not for children), Warner Home Video made the decision to omit these two shorts because, regardless of their historical context and artistic value, the offensiveness of certain scenes containing inappropriate racial stereotypes would diminish the enjoyment of the Collection's 35 other classic cartoons for a large segment of the audience."

Mouse Cleaning features an appearance by a character known as Mammy Two-Shoes (seen at right in Mouse Cleaning). A recurring character in the Tom and Jerry series who was een only from the shoulders down, she was a heavy-set black woman whose instructions to Tom often inspire Jerry to mischief. Mammy Two-Shoes' character was inspired by Hattie McDaniel's portrayal of Mammy in Gone With The Wind and was voiced by Lillian Randolph. In the mid-1960s, an effort was made to alter many of the cartoons Mammy Two-Shoes appeared in, including Mouse Cleaning, by editing out her appearances and adding new animation of a white woman and/or replacing Randolph’s voice work with that of June Foray’s.

In Mouse Cleaning, Mammy Two-Shoes warns Tom that she has just finished cleaning the house and that he better not dirty things up. Needless to say, Jerry proceeds to try and create as big a mess as he can. The film ends with Jerry arranging for a coal delivery to be dumped into the house's living room, burying both Tom and Mammy Two-Shoes. Tom's head emerges from the coal, his face in blackface, and talks to Mammy Two-Shoes in a stereotypical black dialect. Although Mammy's appearance remained unchanged in this cartoon, her lines were re-recorded to eliminate her racially stereotypical accent. Most copies of the cartoon that have aired on television omit this last scene.

Casanova Cat finds Tom heading to the city to woo a rich and pretty female cat, with Jerry as a gift for her. Although Mammy Two-Legs is not in this cartoon, there is another blackface joke. In this case, Jerry's face is blackened with cigar smoke by Tom who then forces the mouse to do a minstrel-like dance. This scene has usually been cut from television airings.

I have to admit that I am more than a bit upset and insulted by this course of action from Warners. In their release, the studio clearly states their Tom And Jerry Spotlight Collections have been “intended for mature audiences and collectors (not for children).” Yet they still feel the need to protect us from this material, stating that they did not want to “diminish the enjoyment of [the set’s] other classic cartoons.”

I think Warners is severely underestimating the intelligence of its audience, or at least mine. I think that most adults can watch or read something that has racist overtones in it and can reject those racist notions but still admire the non-racist elements of the work. We’re not even talking about a film like Griffith's Birth Of A Nation (1915) or Riefenstahl's Triumph Of The Will, two films that are studied and admired for their technical achievements but not for the themes that permeate the works. These are cartoons, where the offensive, racial joke only adds up to a small fraction of the run time of the shorts.

How difficult would it have been to have the two cartoons mastered on the DVD with both an "original" and "edited" version using seemless branching? I’d hazard not difficult at all. Instead, Warners took the easy way out and decided that it is better to just chuck the two cartoons into the back of the archive and hope that everyone forgets about them in time. This is revisionist history at its worse.

Now I'm no big Tom and Jerry fan. I don't own any of the previous DVD releases, so I can't tell you if Warners has used any alternate edits of the cartoons that eliminate the Mammy Two-Shoes character. I do have to wonder though if this is some new policy at Warner Home Video. Will this effect the possibility of other cartoons held by Warners from being released, specifically Warner Brothers own "Censored Eleven" and the handful of other shorts that have been out of circulation for years due to their content? I hope not.

In their original form, these cartoons are important documents showing us where society was in terms of race relations at the time they were made. While the blackface gags in the Tom and Jerry shorts don't appear to be mean-spirited in anyway, they do illustrate the casual attitude towards such things nearly sixty years ago.

And you can't tell how far we've come if you don't have some sign posts in your rearview mirror.

Moore's SICKO: Third Highest Grossing Doc

Sicko, documentarian Michael Moore's look at the failings of the United States health care system, has just past Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth in box office receipts, to become the third highest-grossing documentary of all time.

Released by the Weinstein Company, the film has already earned $24.2 million domestically in its first nine weeks of release, placing it behind Moore's controversial Fahrenheit 9/11 and March Of the Penguins on the box office charts. In a break with his past, more partisian works, Sicko received positive notices from critics across the political spectrum including Fox News, whose Roger Friedman called the film “brilliant and uplifting,”

You can read the FilmBuffOnLine review here.

Weinstein Company co-chair Harvey Weinstein said in a press statement, “It’s an incredible achievement for Sicko to have become the third highest grossing film in the history of documentaries. We are going to keep the movie in theaters and plan to re-release it during the Fall so that audiences continue to have a chance to experience this entertaining and profound documentary.”

TRON 2 Boots Up Again

Hot on the heels of last week's announcement that Steve Lisberger - the director of the 1982 ground breaking film TRON - was going to be returning to the director's chair for the first time in nearly 20 years, the Hollywood Reporter is saying that Lisberger's on-again/off-again sequel to the cult classic appears now to be on again.

Commercial director Joseph Kosinski is reportedly in final negotiations with the Disney to develop and direct the as yet untitled TRON sequel. Kosinski will work with screenwriters Eddie Kitsis and Adam Horowitz, who have contributed to the television series Lost, on developing the sequel's storyline. In the original film, a computer programmer (Jeff Bridges) finds himself sucked into a virtual cyberspace world and forced to fight for his life in a series of deadly video games.

In much the same way that Lisberger shot a test reel of one of the original TRON's action sequences to show Disney executives what the film would look like, Kosinski is reportedly designing a sequence involving the original film’s "light cycles" as a way of demonstrating what his vision for the film will be.

Kosinski has already been announced last month as the most recent director tied to Warner Brothers' ongoing attempt to remake the 1976 science-fiction cult classic Logan's Run. The TRON sequel would go into production after Kosinski finishes up work on Logan's Run.

IRON MAN Trailer Online

The trailer for John Favreau's superhero adaptation Iron Man, premiered online today and for those who have seen the promotion reel that Favreau screened at the San Diego Comic Con in July, than it looks pretty familiar. With just a few tweaks and additions, the footage shown then is here, in a nice, cleaned-up format that will now make all the YouTube postings of phone camera recordings of the Comic Con presentation obsolete.

I have to admit as jazzed as the trailer gets me for the film, I hate the choice of using the old Black Sabbath tune "Iron Man." It strikes me as painfully obvious and trite. Hopefully it Favreau will show restraint and keep the song out of the movie proper.

For our breakdown on how the cast compares to their four-color counterparts, check out our article Casting Comics: Iron Man.

Iron Man is currently set for release on May 2, 2008.

They're baaaack! POLTERGEIST Screenings Next Month

Theaters are going to get a bit haunted for one night next month as Tobe Hooper's 1982 scare-classic Poltergeist gets a special screening at close to 300 screens around the country on October 4.

The film, which stars Craig T. Nelson and JoBeth Williams as suburbanites who find their home under attack from the spirit realm after their daughter (Heather O'Rourke) is sucked into their television, has been digitally restored for

The film is being distributed in digital form, having been restored for a new DVD release hitting shelves on October 9.

You can find a complete list of the theaters screening the movie here.

You can pre-order the Poltergeist: 25th Anniversary Edition DVD here.

It's hard for me to believe that it has been 25 years since I sat in the Colonial Park Trans-Lux Theatre outside of Harrisburg, PA with my friend Adam and had the wits scared out of me by the film. The theater had already been twinned from its original one Cinerama screen glory, but was just five years away from being demolished and having a department store built on the spot.

Makes me wonder if that department store has ever been haunted by the ghost of a former movie theater.

INDIANA JONES IV Has An Official Title And It Is --

Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull.

So it was announced by the film's young co-star Shia LaBeouf on M-TV's Video Music Awards telecast last night. The title was confirmed later on the film's official website.

The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull is one of the six titles that we reported last month had been for registration with the Motion Picture Association of America.

I have to say that I really like the title. It has a pulp flavor direct from the roots of the inspiration for the Indiana Jones series. Since the idea of Crystal Skulls ties in to some real artifacts which some believe contain great psychic energy, it should be a good fit with the other objects that Indy has quested for.

Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull will hit theaters May 22, 2008.

DVD Review: PING PONG

If you think that cinematic table tennis is only good for a few laughs like in the recently released Balls Of Fury, than you need to see Ping Pong. And luckily for you, this wildly inventive Japanese film hit DVD this week.

Set in a world of highly competitive high school table tennis, the film focuses on a pair of friends- Peco and Smile. Both are talented players, but not playing up to their full potential. Peco hustles other table tennis players for cash at a rundown ping pong dojo while Smile – so nicknamed as he never cracks his sullen expression – plays on the local high school team. When they both get beaten at a local competition, they question whether they want to go on playing the game, but are encouraged by separate coaches to put their all into their game in preparation for the next tournament.

Adapted from the manga by Taiya Matsumoto, Ping Pong balances complex character relationships between Smile, Peco, their coaches and the three main competitors the pair face. Unlike most sports movies, there’s no clear villain. The three major competitors Peco and Smile play against are drawn sympathetically, which helps build the tension during their matches. There is also a strong theme of having a responsibility to use one’s talents to the fullest and I have to wonder of Matsumoto intended this to be allegorical to the Japanese cultural drive to succeed.

Nominated for eight Japanese Academy Awards, Ping Pong is one of those films that, once you see it, you want to round up a bunch of your friends and share it with them. Half the joy of the film is discovering the stunning and kinetic visual work of director Sori Fumihiko, and the other half is in watching others discovering it for themselves. Sori, who worked as an effects supervisor on James Cameron’s Titanic, manages to find new and visually interesting ways to shoot each successive match. Combine with J-pop soundtrack and you have a film that captures the energy of its characters’ teen years.

VIZ Pictures has put together a great 2-disc package for the film. The first disc sports a sharp transfer on par with the Japanese Region 3 release. But where this release surpasses the Japanese disc is with its special features, which are spread across a second disc. The highlight of the special features is the nearly hour-long “Making Of” featurette which contains interviews with director Sori and the principal members of the cast as well as lifts the curtain on how some of the film’s ping pong matches were shot. There’s also a 16 minute mildly amusing parody of the film called Ting Pong, as well as another short feature on ping pong basics. The special features disc is rounded out with a collection of Japanese theatrical trailers and television commercials.

Stephen Chow's Next- CJ7

Having wowed audiences with the visual anarchy of Shaolin Soccer and Kung Fu Hustle, Stephen Chow's next film, title CJ7, certainly sounds as if it might be a more sedate affair. In it Chow plays a simple laborer who falls in love with his son's teacher (Kitty Zhang Yuqi), not knowing that she is an alien. And, since its a Stephen Chow movie, we don't mean alien as in resident of a foreign country. The below pictures from the film, found over at Asian Popcorn, certainly don't hint at any crazy comedy either. Still, considering the fact that Chow's son is being played by Xu Jiao, a 9-year-old girl, there is definitely a chance that things will take on Chow's unique comic sensibilities.