themovielord's Blog

This Film is not Yet Rated... does it need to be?
(Thu 05/17/2007 09:52pm)

"This Film is not Yet Rated", so these words are said quickly at the end of a trailer on TV. Or at the theater we see the green logo that reads, "This film is not yet rated". Then the preview for Shrek 3 comes up or perhaps Spider-Man 3. Better yet, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest yo ho ho's onto the screen. Seriously, does the movie going public honestly believe that these films would be rated anything other than PG-13? McDonald's and Burger King have already been gearing up their marketing campaigns to sell us giant fries and a toy way cooler than the one we bought our kids back in April when the action figures hit the shelves. So I have to ask what is the point of the rating system for films such as these? The big 6 (Disney, Paramount, Sony, Fox, Universal, and Warner Bros.) need the largest audience possible to see these film to make their money back and on top of that make even more money.

I understand that the MPAA probably hasn't seen the film yet to give it its rating. It seems foolish to me to spend the money on rating these films. Yes, it costs money for the MPAA to rate your film, but I am sure the big 6 doesn't pay anything. However the aspiring film makers have to pay. Yet films like Shrek, Spider-Man, and Pirates and Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl are made for the PG-13 audience. These films and the 2 (each) that came after it are made with PG-13 in mind. So again what's the point for an obviously PG-13 movie?

I know they have to get it rated because of union$ and the $y$tem of check$ and balance$ in Hollywood. Do they honestly believe they are protecting us with their rating system? There is someone checking your driver’s license when you buy your ticket, but no one checking again when you walk in the door (that's where they check at bars). Is there any actual punishment for selling a ticket to some one under thirteen? What’s the punishment for the young person who walks into a different film instead of the one they bought the ticket for and sees 300 instead? There are all kinds of fines and jail time for serving minors alcohol, but what about theaters that don't enforce the rating systems? Do the theater owners care? They barely make anything off the ticket anyway. They concentrate more on selling 20 minutes of commercials before the movie and selling liter plastic cups of soda for seven dollars. Yet no one is checking the tickets or the patron’s age when they walk into the actual theater.

Off my tirade and back to the question, "What's the point of the rating films that are obviously made and marketed to be the big family (yes, family is PG-13) summer block buster?”

Your thoughts?

 

Fix 28 Weeks Later? Here is one way...
(Sat 05/12/2007 01:19am)
Spoiler Spoilers Spoilers

Read my review of "28 Weeks Later" or if you have seen the film let me know what you think...

Tammy sees her brother is infected in the Tube (subway). The Rage virus swirls around in his eye. So she knows that her brother is not all right that something is wrong with him. So when get to the end of the film she gets her brother away to safety and well guess what, 28 days later, Infection continues...

So here is how I would have saved the film and gave the audience a great scare and made everything hit home, hard.

At the end when Tammy and Andy are riding in the back of the helicopter over the White Cliffs of Dover there is this brief moment where Tammy reaches over and touches her brothers hair. For a split second I thought she was going to push him out the door. Why didn't she do that? That was are final scare, that she had gotten to the point where she couldn't see the world tear itself apart like her family tore itself apart. All we got was a shot of the Eiffel Tower and the word (subliminally) sequel.

Boo Fox Atomic. Boo Juan Carlos Fresnadillo. I hope that was the studio ending and not yours. It was disappointing.

Update on Monster Squad DVD
(Thu 05/10/2007 08:08pm)
When I ventured to New Jersey for Monster Mania 7 back in February, I was looking forward to my first Horror Convention. Having visited numerous Sci-Fi and Comic book conventions, I thought this would be an interesting departure.

The main lure or hook was that the Monster Squad was going to be there. Now the film has long escaped a re-release on DVD and survives only as a bootleg on EBay or as a battered VHS copy. So with a recent screening in Austin Texas at the Draft House which had a small reunion of the Monster Squad (the kids only) a resurgence of the film began to grow. The creators and planners of Monster Mania stepped it up a notch bringing together many of the kids once again but this time they brought: Dracula (Duncan Regehr), Frankenstein (Tom Noonan), and the Gillman (Tom Woodruff Jr.) to the convention scene.

The first question out of the gate at the Q&A panel was to director Fred Dekker, “When are we going to see a DVD?”, Fred happily responded that Lions Gate has picked up the film and will distribute it with a special edition to be released in October (The film is now slated for July 24, 2007 and can be preodered all ready on various sites). Fred later informed the extremely crowded room that they were all now being filmed for a special part of the DVD known as the Monster Squad at Monster Mania. 

What an incredible Halloween treat to look forward to. Now a whole new generation of fans that were raised on Harry Potter and the Goosebumps can discover this classic film.

-The Movie Lord reporting...

Spider-Man 3 is a sure thing. Do you really need ads everywhere and on everything on a sure thing?
(Tue 05/01/2007 02:52pm)
So on Sunday the daily news shows up and low and behold there is a story about the summer block busters. “Déjà vu” is their main point, lots of sequels this summer, Spider-Man, Shrek, Pirates of the Caribbean, Die Hard, Halloween, 28 Days Later (now weeks later), Fantastic Four, Ocean 11 (now 13), the Bourne Identity (now Ultimatum), Rush Hour, and of course Harry Potter. Summer likes this usually have more hits than misses but I am sure there will be at least one film that tank big time, my bet is on the Halloween (sorry Rob but your track record is not stellar).

As I read the rest of the article they state that Spider-Man 3 hopes to recoup their $500 million production/ marketing price tag. Okay, I can see how Raimi and Sony pictures could spend a couple of 100 million dollars on the following: Special effects, returning actors who always want more money, and a huge cast of some high caliber actors. But how much did they spend on marketing? This is Spider-Man after all. The first two made oodles of money and were both critically successful and loved by the masses. So no damage control is needed to bring the fans back. Spider-Man is still one of the best selling comic books on the planet and has at least 5 different comic books a month all with the words Spider-Man some where in the title, in short the world still knows about Spider-Man. So when I open my Netflix and see an ad for Spider-Man 3 I have to ask, why? Better yet how much did that cost? Did Netflix pay them to advertise Sony’s movie? Or did Sony pay to put that ad in the Netflix envelope?

As I glance at the rest of the Sunday paper I notice Best Buy has their flyer covered with Spider-Man on each and every TV. This is funny to me because the movie is coming out in the theater not on DVD. So why are they bombarding me with the web slinger? Now they are selling the original Spidey for $5.99, but who doesn’t own that already? All the pictures on the TVs are from Spider-Man 3 not the original. So what are you advertising Best Buy?

I guess my point that I am getting to is does Spider-Man 3 need all that advertising? There are at least 5 different posters already. The trailer has been on the website, Youtube, and iTunes for over a year. Wal-Mart and Toy ‘R’ Us both had their Spider-Man toy premiere parties well over a month ago. Every magazine will have something about Spider-Man and its stars on it (from Entertainment Weekly to Jane). The film is critic proof and will defiantly set box office records. So how and why is Sony spending all this money on a film that is a 100% money maker for at least three weeks (which is all Hollywood cares about anyway)?

That money could be spent on anything else, preferably making another film. A film of Spider-Man nature needs one trailer and one TV ad for 30 seconds, tops. So is Hollywood afraid that Spider-Man will bomb? Do they know something we don’t? Is Hollywood just following the sequel/ trilogy game plan? It seems to me that if they really wanna brag about how much they make (the only real stature in Hollywood that anyone really cares about). Then why not rethink how, what, and why they are spending their money on. Spider-Man 3 is a sure thing. Do you really need ads everywhere and on everything on a sure thing?