On the surface, Nikki Finke's Autopsy Report on the recent failure of I Don't Know How She Does It is a good hoot of a read. It offers some stinging observations on the largely stalled career of Sarah Jessica Parker while allowing Harvey Weinstein plenty...
A couple of years ago, when Moneyball was about to start filming and Sony pulled the plug on the production, I predicted that it would end up as a George Clooney flick like Leatherheads. OK, the smart-aleck who wrote that was wrong, and I will...
Sometime back, I suggested that one can learn more from a movie that has failed than from any ten flicks that were hits. At the time, I used the disastrous British opening of Motherhood as the prime example. But to be honest, that movie was...
As we all know, Betamax was better than VHS. Vinyl records were superior to a CD. Personally, I suspect it is safer to take a printed book to the bathroom than a Kindle (OK, I haven't been quite the same since I was caught sitting...
Recent box office may be slow, but it was a hot summer for the Feds. In June a series of major arrests were made against fraudulent film companies. In each case, the federal indictments read like a primer on boiler room flimflam. The cases are...
Making a movie is often compared to crawling through broken glass. Trying to exhibit a movie is the same only worse. Often, it feels as if you are on your hands and knees in an exploded glass factory and it’s a long way to the...
The 3rd quarter reports are coming in, and it has been a great year for the major studios. Too bad they're all still stuck making movies, because that has been the consistent downer to the biz. Disney had a net income rise of 11 percent thanks...
As Ronald Reagan once said, facts are stupid things. In light of this, the impending release of the faux documentary Apollo 18 and the viral advertising campaign surrounding it is a pretty good reminder about the slippery post-modernist nature of facts in the virtual universe. Much like...
There are two ways to raise money for a movie. Dumb luck is one way. It is certainly preferable to the other method, which involves lots of hard work and a high tolerance for failure. A wistful hope for dumb luck can be found in...
What do Sarah Palin, Ayn Rand and David Zucker have in common? They have all given us proof that political posturing often translates into box office poison. The spectacular no-go of the recent release of the documentary The Undefeated may not have an effect on Palin's...