Category: Film and TV

If I were Ron Howard and the folks at SONY, I’d be nervous right now.

Why?

Because we just witnessed the underperformance of Mission Impossible III, which is a summer-release movie that is build on a popular, pre-existing franchise. If that’s a signal for what the rest of the summer holds (and it goes along with the trend of underperforming blockbusters that we’ve been having the last few years) then it may speak ill for The Da Vinci Code movie.

Also, there as been a chorus of cardinals at the Vatican dissing the film. Sure, controversy sells, but there is such a thing as too much controversy.

Also, the studio has been WAY cagey with advance screenings–which is a sign of lack of confidence in a film since holding more screenings and having them earlier would let more negative word about a film get out there. (It’s not like this is Episode III, where Lucas was trying to keep spoilers from getting out. Everyone already knows what the spoilers for The Da Vinci Code are.)

And then there’s this Barbara Nicolosi comment over at Amy’s, which one reader helpfully pointed out down yonder:

The buzz on the streets here in Hollywood is that the film is embarrassingly bad. The studio has stirctly limied the MPAA screening – usually about 500-800 people – to only 100 people. No one is getting in to advance screenings which has everybody saying things like, "The only time studios act this way is when they have a Class A Dud on their hands."

The script is a dud. The ultra-weird transitions from people running from long-winded seminars on ecclesiastical history to murderous Opus Dei assassins to Biblical period flashbacks of Jesus and Mary Magdalen looking tenderly at each other made me laugh at loud.

Sony knows they will only have devastating word of mouth on this one. So they have to get everybody in the first weekend.

On her own blog, Barbara says that

RON HOWARD SURE LOOKS NERVOUS.

Sounds like it’s with good reason.

There are few things I’d like more going into Memorial Day Weekend (a traditional blockbuster time) than a flameout at the box office for The Da Vinci Code.

The movie version of The Da Vinci Code is scheduled to be released this Friday and, though I’m not at all happy about it, I’ll need to go see the thing for professional reasons. (I expect that I may come out of the theater so mad I could spit.)

One of the questions I have about the movie is whether the filmmakers will have done anything to ameliorate the anti-Christian elements in the book. For a while, some have been hopeful that they would do so–perhaps even changing central elements of the book in the way that Hollywood films often do.

But if a (non-committal) review carried in The Telegraph is accurate, not only does the film closely follow the book but it may actually be worse than the book:

Although the movie closely follows the book’s storyline, Howard delivers something Dan Brown doesn’t – dramatic recreations of events relating to the book’s central inflammatory theory that for 2,000 years the Catholic Church has been covering up the fact that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and fathered a daughter, whose bloodline has survived into present-day Europe.

As well as scenes of the Inquisition and of women being tortured, burned and drowned, Howard shows Mary Magdalene fleeing the Holy Land for France and giving birth there.

GET THE STORY.
(CHT to the reader who e-mailed.)

WOO-HOO!!!

Back in 1966 there was a TV show that lasted only a season (30 episodes, back then) called The Time Tunnel.

It was about two guys who worked for a secret government time travel project who get lost in time and spend each week jumping from one time period to another.

I was too young to see (or at least to remember) the series when it was first on, but it replayed irregularly on Saturday afternoons on local channels in the 1970s, and I got to see a number of episodes.

I LOVED IT!

But I could never count on seeing it from week to week because of the irregularly with which it played (around ball games or something, I suppose).

BUT NOW I CAN SEE THE WHOLE THING!

Yes, it’s coming out on DVD. In fact, the first half of the series is already out, and the second half will come out next month.

Unfortunately, some of the episodes I remember the best are in the second half (like the one where they went a million years in the future and mankind had evolved into a kind of bee-like society. . .  .Creepy!), but it’s less than a month to wait.

YEE-HAW!

A boyhood ambition (seeing the whole series) is about to be fulfilled!

MORE ON THE TIME TUNNEL.

YEE-HAW!!!

A big, TEXAS-SIZED CHT to the readers who e-mailed the following story:

SCI FI Channel announced the development of Caprica, a spinoff prequel of its hit Battlestar Galactica, in presentations to advertisers in New York on April 26. Caprica would come from Galactica executive producers Ronald D. Moore and David Eick, writer Remi Aubuchon (24) and NBC Universal Television Studio.

Caprica would take place more than half a century before the events that play out in Battlestar Galactica. The people of the Twelve Colonies are at peace and living in a society not unlike our own, but where high technology has changed the lives of virtually everyone for the better.

But a startling breakthrough in robotics is about to occur, one that will bring to life the age-old dream of marrying artificial intelligence with a mechanical body to create the first living robot: a Cylon. Following the lives of two families, the Graystones and the Adamas (the family of William Adama, who will one day become the commander of the Battlestar Galactica), Caprica will weave together corporate intrigue, techno-action and sexual politics into television’s first science fiction family saga, the channel announced [SOURCE].

SWEET!

(Except for that sexual politics thing. Let’s hope that gets minimized quickly, the way it did in BSG.)

Incidentally, this may explain why the third season of BSG is being delayed by a few months–so they can get the new series up and running.

Tim J here.

You know… this is just a hair-brained possibility (or is it hare-brained?), and something that I guess is one of the inevitable cultural mutations of the DaVinci Code phenomenon, but it strikes me as plausible, and so though I have no evidence for it, I wanted to run it past y’all.

Heck, Dan Brown works without evidence all the time.

I watched one of the longer DVC trailers on TV this past weekend, and it struck me as oddly… innocuous. I mean, it depicted all these supposedly mind-wrenching, earth-shattering events, but it came off as rather… frothy – like one of those old Hollywood action serials, where you were supposed to get all worked up about the hero’s predicament, but all the time you knew it was really no big deal.

I haven’t seen the DVC film (and plan to go see Over The Hedge instead, on May 19th), but what I saw of the trailer left me with the impression that the acting is so over-the-top, and the direction so florrid that the film may come off about as plausible as The League of Extrordinary Gentlemen, and about as serious as Young Frankenstein.

I admit, it could be because I already think of the film’s raw material as ridiculous, and so I’m predisposed to laugh.

Except I wasn’t really expecting to laugh. I was expecting that a full-length DVC trailer would leave me irritated, concerned and maybe a little demoralized. It didn’t.

So, is it possible that little Opie Cunningham has directed the DaVinci Code as a farce? Might he have given the subject the cinematic treatment it truly warrants? Is he that good?

Part of me would like to think so, given that he grew up on the set of the Andy Griffith Show, singing hymns during breaks in shooting with Andy, Don Knotts and everybody. Wouldn’t it be great if he snapped up the DVC movie gig so he could give it the subtle lampooning it deserves?

Like I said, I have no evidence except for my own reaction to the trailer… I’m just sayin’, that’s all.

Grist for the continually grinding mill.

Christians may have just gotten an unexpected ally against Ron Howard’s latest monsterpiece, The Da Vinci Code.

Oh, sure. Lots of Christian groups have been picking at the book’s and film’s inaccuracies–but they’re focused on matters of fact rather than style.

They may have just gotten an ally who would love to see the film fail at the boxoffice and who couldn’t care less about the fact and will go after the film on grounds of style–even at the pettiest level.

So who is the mysterious ally willing to take on Hollywood?

Hollywood itself.

GET THE STORY.

MEMO TO HOLLYWOOD:

A house divided itself cannot stand.

P.S. Burn, baby, burn!

American Papist has an interesting piece up about the upcoming A&E reality show "God or the Girl?", which focuses on young Catholic men discerning possible vocations to the priesthood.

Will this be a good, serious look at the question or will it be evil, Hollywood anti-Catholicism?

GET THE BUZZ.

Well, we’re now well and truly into the gap between Galatica season 2 and season 3, so pretty much everybody who wants to see the season 2 finale has done so.

(If you haven’t, you can download it from iTunes and watch it in iTunes, even if you don’t have a video iPod.)

This gives me a chance to speculate on what we’re going to see in season 3.

One of my favorite things to do when watching or reading a story is to predict where it’s going and then seeing if I’m right or not.

So let’s see how I do with my predictions for BSG season 3. . . .

Continue reading “Galactica Season Three”

Got plans for May 19, the day that the movie The DaVinci Code is slated to open? If not, go to the movies. If so, then go to the movies sometime that weekend before May 21. Just don’t go to The DaVinci Code.

That’s the advice being given to Christians by Christians who know how Hollywood works and know the best way to get the bean-counters in Hollywood to listen:

"May 19th is the date the Da Vinci Code movie opens. A movie based on a book that wears its heresy and blasphemy as a badge of honor.

"What can we as Christians do in response to the release of this movie? I’m going to offer you the usual choices — and a new one.

"Here are the usual suspects:

"A) We can ignore the movie.

"The problem with this option: The box office is a ballot box. The only people whose votes are counted are those who buy tickets. And the ballot box closes on the Sunday of opening weekend. If you stay home, you have lost your chance to make your vote heard. You have thrown your vote away, and from Hollywood’s point of view, you don’t count. By staying home, you do nothing to shape the decision-making process regarding what movies will make it to the big screen.

"B) We can protest.

"The problem with this option: It doesn’t work. Any publicity is good publicity. Protests not only fuel the box office, they make all Christians look like idiots. And again, protests and boycotts do nothing to help shape the decisions being made right now about what movies Hollywood will make in the next few years. (Or they convince Hollywood to make *more* movies that will provoke Christians to protest, which will drive the box office up.)

"C) We can discuss the movie. We can be rational and be ready with study guides and workshops and point-by-point refutations of the lies promulgated by the movie.

"The problem with this option: No one’s listening. They think they know what we’re going to say already. We’ll lose most of these discussions anyway, no matter how prepared we are, because the power of story always trumps the power of facts (why do you think Jesus taught in parables?!). And once again: rational discussion of history does nothing to affect Hollywood’s choices regarding what movies to make.

"But there’s a fourth choice.

"On May 19th, you should go to the movies.

"Just go to another movie.

"Save the date now. May 19th, or May 20th. No later than Sunday, May 21st — that’s the day the ballot box closes. You’ll get a vote, the only vote Hollywood recognizes: The power of cold hard cash laid down on a box office window on opening weekend.

"Use your vote. Don’t throw it away. Vote for a movie other than DVC. If enough people do it, the powers that be will notice. They won’t have a choice.

"The major studio movie scheduled for release against DVC is the DreamWorks animated feature Over the Hedge. The trailers look fun, and you can take your kids. And your friends. And their friends. In fact, let’s all go see it.

"Let’s rock the box office in a way no one expects — without protests, without boycotts, without arguments, without rancor. Let’s show up at the box office ballot box and cast our votes. And buy some popcorn, too.

"May 19th. Mark your calendars now: Over the Hedge‘s opening weekend. Buy a ticket.

"And spread the word. Forward this e-mail to all the Christians in your address book. Post it on your blogs. Talk about it to your churches. And let’s all go to the movies."

Spread the word. And go to the movies on May 19.

(Credit note: I received notice from an email forward originally sent by Barbara Nicolosi of Act One. The campaign was originally started by Quoth the Maven.)

Okay, now that Battlestar Galactica is on break until next season, Sci-Fi is now airing the new series of Dr. Who on Fridays.

I caught the first two episodes of it last Friday, and so far I’m pleased.

The series seems to be a tad darker and more serious than the original series, which went off the air in the 1980s, but that’s because it’s being written more for adults than kids (now that the original Dr. Who fans have grown up).

It still has a lot of goofy fun in it, though.

I also like how the Doctor’s new assistant (Rose) is much more confrontational with him than many previous assistants have been, demanding to know things (like just who he is) and challenging him when he says things, bringing a more real-life perspective.

My favorite exchange was this:

ROSE (upon meeting a bunch of aliens socially for the first time): They’re so alien. . . . The aliens are . . . so alien. You look at ’em . . . and they’re alien.

THE DOCTOR: Good thing I didn’t take you to the Deep South!

ROSE: Where are you from?

THE DOCTOR: All over the place!

ROSE (still thinking about the aliens): They all speak English?

THE DOCTOR: No, you’re just hearing it. It’s a gift of the TARDIS. A telepathic field gets inside your brain–translates.

ROSE: It’s inside my brain?

THE DOCTOR: Well, in a good way.

ROSE: Your machine gets inside my head. It gets inside and it changes my mind and you didn’t even ask!

THE DOCTOR: I didn’t think about it like that.

ROSE (outraged): No! You were too busy thinking up cheap shots about the Deep South!

BA-BOOM!

As a native of the Deep South, I approve!

I gave ’em a couple of points for the first Deep South/alien joke, but the rejoinder scored ’em an extra TEN!

MORE ON DR. WHO.