  
The little denizens of Hobbiton are still
making a big splash at the North American box office as "The Lord
of the Rings" movie led the field for the third consecutive weekend.
With little new competition on the horizon,
"The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" grossed
$23 million in ticket sales for the three-day period beginning on Friday,
according to studio estimates issued on Sunday.
Since its Dec. 19 release, part one of New
Zealand director Peter Jackson's hobbit trilogy has grossed $205.5 million
in the United States and Canada. Updated foreign data will be issued on
Monday, but the worldwide total stood at $350 million as of Friday, said
a spokeswoman for the film's distributor, New Line Cinema.
The studio, a unit of AOL Time Warner Inc.,
will release the second and third installments of the ambitious $270 million
project over the next two Christmases.
The Harry Potter movie passed $800 million
worldwide over the weekend and set a record for Warner Bros. Pictures
in North America, said studio officials.
The family fantasy, known as "Harry Potter
and the Sorcerer's Stone" in the United States, has pulled in $300.6
million in North America since its Nov. 16 release, boosted by weekend
sales of $6.1 million -- good enough for No. 9. The studio's previous
record was $251 million for 1989's "Batman."
The film is known as "Harry Potter and
the Philosopher's Stone" in most international markets, where it
has surpassed $500 million, said WB spokeswoman Barbara Brogliatti. Warner
Bros. is also a unit of AOL Time Warner. A studio official had earlier
estimated the film's foreign tally at $400 million.
"MIND" IS SOMETHING TO CROWE ABOUT
The Russell Crowe mad genius drama "A
Beautiful Mind" (Universal) jumped six places to No. 2 with $17 million
after expanding nationally in its third weekend. The film, directed by
Ron Howard, has earned $38.2 million to date. It played in 1,853 theaters,
up from 525 last weekend, and its figures thrilled producer Brian Grazer.
"Ron was more shocked than I," he
told Reuters. "I kind of thought -- because it did pretty well in
the 500 theaters -- that it would hold on. Ron's just too nervous to even
go to that place."
Universal Pictures is a unit of Vivendi Universal
.
The dysfunctional family comedy "The
Royal Tenenbaums" (Touchstone) soared eight places to No. 5 with
$8.8 million in its fourth weekend, also following a successful expansion
to 751 theaters from 291 theaters.
It will add more markets next weekend, taking
its count to 900 theaters, said Chuck Viane, president of distribution
at Walt Disney Co., owner of the Touchstone Pictures banner.
With $21 million banked so far, "Tenenbaums"
set a record for director Wes Anderson. His 1998 film, "Rushmore,"
ended up with $17.1 million. Viane estimated "Tenenbaums" would
reach the $40 million mark.
The costly Muhammad Ali biopic "Ali"
(Columbia), starring Will Smith, fell two places to No. 6 with $7.6 million
in its second weekend. Its 48 percent drop was the steepest in the top
10. A spokesman for Sony Corp. -owned Columbia Pictures, which put up
half the $105 million budget in order to secure North American rights,
was confident the movie would hold up well as awards season gathers momentum.
The film's 13-day total stands at $50 million.
"IMPOSTOR" ESCAPES DETECTION
Overall sales predictably fell from last weekend's
holiday-boosted business. The top 12 films grossed $108.4 million, down
26 percent from last weekend, but up 3.8 percent from the year-ago period,
when "Cast Away" was tops with $22 million in its third weekend.
Only one new film bowed in wide release this
weekend, not that too many people noticed. "Impostor," a sci-fi
thriller starring Gary Sinise and Madeleine Stowe, opened at No. 13 with
$3.2 million. The movie, made over 18 months ago, was released through
Disney-owned Miramax Films' Dimension banner.
The all-star Vegas crime caper "Ocean's
Eleven" (Warner Bros.) fell one place to No. 3 with $11.8 million
in its fifth weekend, taking its 31-day total to $152.7 million.
"Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius," a cartoon
starring a well-coiffed child inventor, also fell one place, to No. 4,
with $9.2 million. The film, budgeted at $23 million, has earned $62.5
million after 17 days. It was released by Paramount Pictures, a unit of
Viacom Inc. .
In the limited release world, "Black
Hawk Down" (Columbia) grossed $200,000 from four theaters in New
York and Los Angeles. Director Ridley Scott's grim depiction of a U.S.
military operation in Somalia in 1993 will expand to about 15 runs in
those cities next weekend before opening nationally on Jan. 18. Its 10-day
total is $566,000.
"Monster's Ball" (Lions Gate), a
dramatic love story starring Billy Bob Thornton and Halle Berry, earned
$140,000 from eight screens in New York and Los Angeles. Its 12-day total
is $393,000.
Business was driven by word of mouth, since
Lions Gate had not run a TV spot for "Monster's Ball" since
it opened on Christmas Day, said Tom Ortenberg, president of distribution
at the Lions Gate Entertainment -owned studio.
- (1) The Lord of the Rings ... $23.0 million
- (8) A Beautiful Mind ........ $17.0 million
- (2) Ocean's Eleven .......... $11.8 million
- (3) Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius $ 9.2 million
- 13) The Royal Tenenbaums .... $ 8.8 million
- (4) Ali ..................... $ 7.6 million
- (5) Vanilla Sky ............. $ 7.4 million
- (7) Kate & Leopold .......... $ 6.7 million
- (6) Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone .... $ 6.1 million
- (9) Monsters, Inc. .......... $ 4.0 million
Alicia Witt is set to star alongside
Sandra Bullock and Hugh Grant in Castle Rock Entertainment's
untitled romantic comedy from writer Mark Lawrence, who is making
his directorial debut on the project.
Shooting is scheduled to begin Feb. 25 in
New York for a Christmas release by Warner Bros. Although the plot is
being kept under wraps, the project is said to explore the question of
whether it is ever too late to say "I love you." Bullock will
play Lucy Kelson, a brilliant but slightly neurotic attorney, with Grant
as her charming, irresponsible and fabulously wealthy client. Witt will
play June Carter, a beautiful Harvard graduate hired by Bullock to represent
Grant when she leaves the business.
Bullock is producing the project with executive
producers Lawrence and Mary McLaglen. Witt is repped by ICM, Brillstein-Grey
and attorney Geoffrey Oblath. She most recently appeared onscreen opposite
Tom Cruise in Paramount Pictures' "Vanilla Sky." Her other credits
include "Cecil B. Demented," "Playing Mona Lisa,"
1998's "Urban Legend" and the television series "The Sopranos"
and "Ally McBeal."
Controversial film-maker Leni Riefenstahl
is set to release her first film in 47 years, according to reports in
a German newspaper. She is famous for films used as Nazi propaganda in
the 1930s.
Die Welt newspaper reports that Riefenstahl,
now 99 years old, will release a film called Underwater Impressions in
time for her 100th birthday in August. The 45-minute film is a compilation
of footage from 2,000 scuba-dives she made in the Indian Ocean between
1974 and 2000.
Riefenstahl started out as an actress, but
soon found her talents lay behind the cameras. She won critical acclaim
for the striking visual style displayed in her Third Reich documentaries
Triumph of the Will (1934), about the Nuremberg rallies, and Olympia (1936),
about the Berlin Olympics. The films also brought her notoriety because
they were used by Hitler as propaganda.
Although she has always downplayed her involvement
with The Third Reich she found herself blacklisted after the Second World
War and unable to make films. Her last film, Teifland, was released in
1954.
Val Kilmer has signed with the William Morris
Agency; previously, he was represented by Creative Artists Agency.
Kilmer next stars in Castle Rock's "The
Salton Sea," set for release later this year. He's also slated to
appear in Intermedia's FBI thriller "Mindhunters," which begins
filming under the helm of Renny Harlin.
Other credits include "Red Planet,"
"Heat," "Batman Forever" and "The Doors."
Kilmer remains with attorney Skip Brittenham of Ziffren, Brittenham, Branca
and Fischer.
An attempt by Bertrand Tavernier, one of France's
most respected film directors, to rehabilitate the country's wartime collaborationist
cinema industry will be launched here this week in an atmosphere of scandal
after an accusation of 'treachery'.
A Paris court has decided that the producers
of Laissez-passer must rewrite the credits to ensure full acknowledgement
is given to help from its fictionalised hero, Jean Devaivre, who claimed
that Tavernier duped him for commercial reasons.
Perhaps it was asking for trouble to bill
the film as a true story and risk the wrath of Devaivre, 89, a wartime
director who has accused Tavernier, born in 1941, of twisting the truth.
Devaivre's secret resistance activities while working for a German-run
production company, Continental Films in Paris, are the subject of an
autobiography to appear in March.
Devaivre, who started his career in 1942 as
assistant to Michel Tourneur, is seeking damages for what amounts to alleged
plagiarism, which he described as 'treachery'.
Tavernier, head of Lyon's Lumière Institute
- the prestigious museum of cinema - includes the great postwar stars
among his childhood heroes, despite a record of collaboration that drew
in names such as Fernandel, Arletty, Maurice Chevalier, Edith Piaf and
Charles Trenet without harming their peacetime popularity.
Directors such as Sacha Guitry, Tourneur and
Claude Autant-Lara also survived accusations that they played into the
hands of Hitler by their acceptance of German censorship and finance,
and obeyed orders to boycott Jewish directors, actors and producers, who
were banned from the industry.
French cinema produced some 220 films between
1940 and 1944 and the subject of collaboration has been a highly sensitive
issue ever since the Liberation. But Tavernier, using the experiences
of Devaivre and scriptwriter Jean Aurenche, as his inspiration for Laissez-passer
, wanted to correct the image of a supine industry and show that resistance
started as soon as General de Gaulle made his call for rebellion from
London in June 1940.
What he did not count on was the character
of Devaivre who wanted the film to be withdrawn after claiming that Tavernier
'deceived, robbed and betrayed artistic creation and my friendship for
commercial reasons'.
Tavernier, who spent several years preparing
the £10 million film with Devaivre's help, implied in return that the
real quarrel was about money, rather than truth. The man whom he called
'my hero' had at first refused any payment, but his family later demanded
both recompense and acknowledgement that the work was inspired by the
autobiography.
'I am not a conspirator nor a vampire,' Tavernier
said. 'I have spent my life admiring other cineastes and making their
work known - Devaivre among them.'
Nonetheless, Judge Francis Delphin said that
Laissez-passer , already booked as the main event of the forthcoming Berlin
Festival, could not go on circuit without recognition of his contribution.
The controversy has at least revived interest
in Devaivre whose career as a director petered out after two films, La
Dame d'onze heures - The 11 o'clock Lady - and La Ferme des sept pêchés
- The Farm of Seven Sins.
What was once a fascinating exercise in winnowing
out the most memorable movies of the year has lately become a torture
test. It's no surprise that the "best" on some lists consistently
re-appear as the "worst" on others.
Having survived the onslaught of pre-Oscar
releases, one cannot escape the impression that Hollywood has opted out
of the Ten Best business.
That's not to say the studios are heartless
or malevolent, just that they've succumbed to certain ineluctable economic
forces. Their vertically integrated corporate parents demand "numbers,"
and the most risk-averse way to produce those numbers is to focus on sequels
and effects-laden tentpole pictures, not on edgy "people pictures."
For those newcomers to the scene, let me assure
you that it has not always been thus. Writing in the Arts & Leisure
section of the New York Times, film historian David Thomson last week
recalled the "dark excitements" of the Ten Best lists of 20
years ago.
Virtually all of the 1971 films he cited were
major studio releases -- films like "Klute," "McCabe and
Mrs. Miller," "The Last Picture Show," "The Hospital,"
"A Clockwork Orange," "The French Connection," "Carnal
Knowledge" and "Sunday Bloody Sunday."
And "The Godfather" would have been
released in 1971 except that Paramount postponed it to add 20 minutes
of memorable footage.
A lot of people in Hollywood would like to
put the studios back into the "Ten Best" business. Actors want
meaty parts. Directors, post 9/11, yearn for more meaningful scripts.
And some studio executives readily confess they're bored by their monochromatic
production slates.
So why does the town's product reflect such
a "sameness?" The fact that the studios have "gone corporate"
is not the only factor.
For one thing, the "new players"
representing overseas production financing seem bent at out-tentpoling
the studios. Intermedia, funded out of Germany, is the force behind "Terminator
III," and Australia's Village Roadshow is happily ensconced in the
"Matrix" business.
Twenty years ago, Hollywood looked to France
for bold new approaches to filmmaking. Today, French filmmakers are fearful
that Vivendi and Canal Plus will lavish all their money on sequels to
"The Mummy" and "American Pie."
Just as these "overseas partners"
have learned to play the studio game, so have the once-vaunted niche players.
Most of the leading arthouse labels now huddle under a studio banner and,
some argue, have themselves become pre-occupied by the numbers game.
The future of USA Studios, responsible for
"Traffic" and "Gosford Park," is now clouded by the
Vivendi-Barry Diller deal. If USA Films becomes subsumed within Universal
as another arthouse label, how could it create a new "directors company"
around Spike Jonze, Alexander Payne, Steven Soderbergh and David Fincher?
And then there's the evolution of Miramax
from a hardcore Ten Best player to a successful purveyor of genre product
like "Scary Movie" and "The Others."
Harvey Weinstein insists he plans an energetic
return to the foreign pick-up arena, but meanwhile he is understandably
focused on the release of mega-budget projects like "Gangs of New
York."
Given all this, where will future Ten Best
contenders come from? Surely someone will be tempted to dip a toe into
these very still waters. HBO has set about re-inventing TV series and
cable films, so will it now be tempted to venture boldly into theatrical
features as, say, Film Four did in London?
Similarly, if the Vivendi-USA deal shuts the
door on the projected director's company, it's likely these filmmakers
would look elsewhere in their quest for autonomy.
One abiding lesson of the '70s, after all,
was that innovative movies emanate from the passion of filmmakers, not
from the egos of superstars. The ambiguous reception accorded Tom Cruise
and Jim Carrey this December would seem to underscore that point.
Reinforcing all this, the extraordinary success
of "Harry Potter" and "Lord of the Rings" provided
a vivid reminder that the story remains the ultimate star, even in the
bold new world of tentpole cinema. It is hoped that precept may serve
to re-energize the Ten Best game before it's consigned to Hollywood's
attic.
The biggest winner was HBO, which nabbed six
of the seven TV trophies handed out Saturday night at the Beverly Hills
Hotel.
But while AFI praised "The Lord,"
there were a lot of people missing from the congregation. Winners were
present in only eight of the 19 categories, and most of those came from
the TV world; of the 12 film awards handed out, only three winners were
represented.
Aside from "Rings," Fox's "Moulin
Rouge" was the only film to garner more than one prize, winning for
Jill Bilcock's editing and Craig Armstrong's music. Otherwise, seven films
earned one win apiece.
While there were a few victories for populist
films ("Rings" and actor Denzel Washington for "Training
Day"), the vast majority of winners were from the arthouse world:
"Gosford Park" (for helmer Robert Altman), "In the Bedroom"
(actress Sissy Spacek), "The Man Who Wasn't There," "Memento,"
etc.
This may be an indication of the film year,
but it more likely reflects the American Film Institute's 100 judges,
a heavy dose of critics and academics mixed in with industry pros.
And while Columbia's "Black Hawk Down"
and "In the Bedroom" led the nominations with five apiece, "Down"
went down without a single win, as did four-time nominee "Mulholland
Dr."
Though the film nominations got more attention
due to the awards' timing -- at this time of year, all roads lead to Oscar
-- the evening's big surprise was in the TV wing, as HBO's second-season
"Curb Your Enthusiasm" took comedy series honors. The show hasn't
been saluted by other major awards shows before this.
And speaking of "Curb," several
people in Hollywood seemed to have curbed their enthusiasm for the American
Film Institute's awards.
"There are many people who have a lot
of good will in this town toward AFI," said one film executive after
the show, "but only 30% of them showed up."
Somewhat mysterious was the absence of such
A-list nominees as Tom Hanks and Russell Crowe. Aside from Dustin Hoffman
and Michelle Pfeiffer, few big-name stars were apparently available even
as presenters.
And while one of the show's highlights was
a montage of past AFI Lifetime Achievement Award rites, such recent honorees
as Barbra Streisand and Harrison Ford were also no-shows.
Backstage, media members who were waiting
to interview stars ended up twiddling their thumbs; one wag dubbed it
the AFI MIA awards.
All the 10 nominated films had reps on hand
and, aside from "Rings," Spacek and "Memento" scripter
Christopher Nolan were there. Those who did attend should get high marks
for their appearances. But presenters like Alan Cumming, Joe Mantegna
and Naomi Watts may not be names familiar enough to draw TV viewers to
the three-hour CBS telecast.
Some speculated that the turnout reflected
Hollywood's reluctance to embrace a new awards show; many feel that kudocasts
have reached the saturation point.
But a key factor may have been timing: The
AFI fete came soon after the holidays and too far in advance of the flood
of kudos events as the award season shifts into high gear. (The People's
Choice Awards are Jan. 13, the Golden Globes one week later, etc., culminating
in the March 24 Oscars.)
And sometimes the absence of winners was just
bad luck: in several categories, three out of the four nominees were present,
but it was the one absentee who happened to win.
"AFI Awards 2001" was the first
kudocast of the season, and many were curious if they might provide clues
to the Oscar race. But, as with every other announcement of awards and
nominations this season, AFI raised as many questions as it answered.
It's hard to predict their accuracy as an
Oscar bellwether, since this is the first year of the awards. New Line
co-chairman Bob Shaye told reporters backstage that he was too superstitious
to speculate if this gave "Lord" a leg-up in the Oscar race.
"But I'm a member of the Academy, and I'm gonna vote for it,"
he laughed.
Earlier, at the end of the televised show,
Shaye opened his mouth to give an acceptance speech but was cut off; producer
Barrie M. Osborne had taken up the "Rings" group's allotted
time.
Like most newborns, the AFI doesn't yet have
a fully definable personality. The red-carpet arrivals were subdued and
-- in contrast to the frenzy of the Oscars or the party feeling of the
Golden Globes -- the mood in the Beverly Hills Hotel Ballroom was more
of wait-and-see.
Still, the small room -- about 600 persons
were seated, so limited that some AFI judges could not be invited -- created
an intimate atmosphere, which was a positive.
Technically, the thoughtful three-hour show,
broadcast live (except in the West) on CBS, went off without a hitch --
which is more impressive than it sounds. It's been a long time since an
organization started from scratch a major awards show that included a
network deal. So AFI faced the daunting task of compiling judges, scheduling
viewings of the nominees, and arranging a TV telecast within a short period
of time.
AFI is still on a learning curve with this
one, and many of their headaches are easily fixed. The kudocast introduced
some innovations, such as the absence of comedy monologues or musical
numbers. (The closest they came to a song was Natalie Cole singing a line
from her father's hit "Nature Boy" as she introduced a "Moulin
Rouge" segment.)
Each of the 10 best picture nominees got a
montage that lasted several minutes, which included clips interspersed
with filmed sound bites of various judges extolling the picture's virtues.
(It was an interesting idea, though they had a limited pool of authorities;
AFI topper Tom Pollock seemed to opine on nearly every film.)
The show's other invention was a month-by-month
anthology of various mass-media moments, juxtaposing for one month such
clips as "American Pie 2," "A Place in the Sun" (its
50th anniversary) and "Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood."
Dan Rather hosted a segment on Sept. 11 and
its aftermath (though it seemed pretty CBS-self-congratulatory when he
listed David Letterman's return show as one of the key milestones in those
dark days). Thanks to the lack of acceptance speeches, the broadcast had
ample time for such filmed segments.
During the show, AFI director-CEO Jean Picker
Firstenberg took the stage to thank "friends and supporters like
you," and praised Target stores for funding scholarships at the AFI
Conservatory in the names of all the presenters and keynote speaker Hoffman.
Judy Davis' victory for ABC's "Life With
Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows" was the sole win that kept HBO from
a clean sweep in the TV races. "The Sopranos" scored a triple
win for drama series and stars James Gandolfini and Edie Falco.
Jeffrey Wright won for playing Martin Luther
King Jr. in the telepic "Boycott," and "Band of Brothers"
won as top miniseries.
But the biggest news was the win for "Curb
Your Enthusiasm." Backstage, creator-star Larry David was asked about
the importance of the new AFI awards. "It's very significant now!"
he laughed. Nominations were made by two 13-person panels, for film and
TV.
Berlin-based production
house Red Beat Pictures has announced an ambitious slate of ten feature
projects after almost two years dedicated to project development since
its launch in April 2000 by partners Herbert Gehr, Michael Helfrich and
Ali Eckert.
This year should
see a May start on production at locations in Berlin, Glasgow and Rotterdam
for writer-director Cynthia Beatt’s Euros 1.9m drama A House In Berlin,
which is to be co-produced by Heartbeatt Pictures, Scots production outfit
Freedonia Films and Rotterdam-based De Productie and already has commitments
from Tilda Swinton, Lars Rudolph (Run Lola Run) and Isy Metzstein (Late
Night Shopping).
Principal photography
is also scheduled to start in spring 2002 on the $5.5m mystery thriller
Too Tough To Die, about a Faustian pact set in the world of punk bands,
to be directed by JoAnn Jansen and Ali Eckert at locations in Los Angeles,
Utah and New York, with cameos already committed by such groups as Motorhead,
Pearl Jam, Die Toten Hosen and Bad Religion.
In addition, Red
Beat will serve as co-producer with LA-based Sideshow Inc. on the $4.8m
romantic noir thriller Cover By Night by writer-director Ramin Niami (Somewhere
In The City) which is set to star Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger, Hidden
Dragon) and Peter Stormare (Dancer In The Dark) at locations in New York
and Berlin from the autumn.
Other Red Beat
projects in development include: Charlotte Brandstrom’s thriller
Harry & Grace, based on a true story of a Swedish steelworker’s
custody battle for his Asian daughter, to be co-produced with Sweden’s
UnoFilm and Moviemakers; Rave Macbeth director Klaus Knoesel’s Euros
2.3m thriller X-Treme, to be shot at Icelandic locations with Stefan Jonas’
Framewerk; two feature projects by Angelika Moenning – the East European-set
thriller Jagdfieber and her New York-based love story Toxin; the adventure
drama CRACKs, based on a true story of a group of friends from Germany
settling in Costa Rica and falling victim to the drug crack with fatal
consequences; Heinz Emigholz’s "sarcastic, de-constructivist
road movie" Second Nature, to be shot on digital video at locations
around the globe; and the DV romantic comedy The Pogos by directorial
duo Daniel Acht and Ali Eckert; and an adaptation of Myra Cakan’s
scifi novel When The Music’s Over.
Navarre Corporation,
a US distributor of PC software, music and home video, has acquired domestic
rights to distribute three more action films made by the late HB Halicki
on DVD and VHS following its successful re-release of Gone In 60 Seconds
last year. The films are The Junkman, Deadline Auto Theft
and Gone In 60 Seconds 2 kicking off with The Junkman on
Feb 19.
DVD producers Denice Halicki and Michael Leone have restored and digitally
remastered The Junkman and included 25 minute documentary on the
making of the film hosted by the director himself.
Halicki wrote, produced, starred in and performed the stunts in all his
movies and during production of The Junkman in 1982 was seriously
injured in an accidental head-on collision between his car and a light
aircraft. Nicknamed “The Car Crash King”, Halicki died - in
an accident on the set of Gone In 60 Seconds 2 - in 1989
|
Monday, February
11, 2002
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