Saw IVtopped
the box office this past weekend, making an estimated $32,110,000. That probably ensures the joyous arrival of Saw IV next Halloween. Joy. In second place was Steve Carrell in Dan in Real Life, which made $12,081,000 with a very nice per theater take of $6,288. In third place was 30 Days of Night which made another $6,700,000, bringing its cumulative total to $27,318,000.
In fourth place was The Game Plan, which made another $6,257,000. The film has now grossed $77,067,000 domestically, which is very good news for The Rock. In fifth place is Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married, which made another $5,740,000, bringing its domestic take to $47,300,000.
In sixth place was George Clooney in Michael Clayton, which made another $5,030,000. That brings the film's total take to date to $28,774,000. And in seventh place was Gone Baby Gone, starring Casey Affleck and directed by Ben Affleck. In its second week, the film took another $3,900,000, which brings its cumulative to $11,310,000.
Fans of the hit show Friday Night Lights are
hopping mad at the screenwriters for the show. In fact, they're so mad that rumors are going around that the show could be ruined for good. What's everyone so mad about? Well, in the season opener, funny, nerdy sidekick teen Landry Clarke killed a man who was threatening Tyra Collette, who Landry has a crush on. After the deed was done, the duo dumped the body. Viewers were horrified at the macabre turn of events that didn't exactly fit in with the show's themes.
"I hated, hated, hated the murder scene," wrote a poster named Tom on the website of Alan Sepinwall, the critic for the Newark (N.J.) Star-Ledger. " 'FNL' has always struck me as a production that shows the drama in a real town. . . . The murder scene felt, well, desperate."
Some television critics who have championed the NBC show were equally upset.
"Absurdly melodramatic and unbelievable," wrote the New Yorker's Nancy Franklin. "The plot thread could easily overwhelm the show and kill it."
"Friday Night Lights," which is set in a small Texas town and shot in a documentary style, has earned a cult following and need-to-improve ratings. Most fans were drawn less by the football scenes than by the realistic nature of the multifaceted characters: the Panthers' coach, his high school counselor wife, their daughter, the paralyzed quarterback, his two-timing girlfriend, the new quarterback, and so on.
Although viewers might relate to characters who cheated, drank too much or fought, they didn't know any 16-year-olds who had killed someone.
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But fans not only complained that murder was out of character for Landry -- a comic relief sidekick to star football player Matt Saracen last season -- they also picked nits over the details: Why did Tyra's once-failed rapist become a stalker would-be rapist? Why after Landry fended him off, did he walk away saying, "I'll get back to you later"? Why did Landry deal the fatal blow after that? Why did he use a lead pipe? How would this affect his defense?
Further clouding the issue was that the rough cut version of the episode released on the Internet showed a different scene of the murder in which Landry was clearly defending himself and killed the attacker with a bottle. "We reshot the scene with a pipe," Plemons said. "They wanted no question whether it was possible to kill someone with a bottle. And it makes more sense why they would cover it up with him walking away."
We think what happened was this: showrunner Jason Katims has been pulling double duty lately; he is also the showrunner for The Bionic Woman. Clearly, when the showrunner is away, the screenwriters will play. But Jason is leaving The Bionic Woman and coming back to focus full-time on Friday Night Lights.
We have two suggestions for the writers to dig themselves out of this fan-infuriating pit: 1) Just pretend it never happened, and never mention it again or 2) pull a Dallas and have the entire plotline be only a dream. Hey, they've got to do something. People are not happy.
Writers' Strike Would Cause Major TV Programming Changes
With the Writers Guild poised to go on strike on November 1st if they don't reach a deal with the producers, things are looking a bit grim for television viewers. If the writers go on strike, there won't be anyone to work on new episodes of The Bionic Woman, My Name is Earl or any comedy, thriller or drama. That means lots of reality TV and news programs in our future. But it also may mean some Sci Fi channel favorites like Battlestar Galactica will air from the beginning on NBC.
[I]t's a different world in television than it was in 1988 when writers struck for 22 weeks, causing many shows to bring down their tents midway through the season. Even "Star Trek: The Next Generation" tried to get around it all by digging up old scripts from "Star Trek: Phase II," but most shows don't have those kinds of luxuries.
Today, however, many networks own multiple cable channels, and nearly all of those have some kind of original programming or another. So don't be surprised if "Heroes" gets replaced by NBCU's SciFi Channel programming like "Battlestar Galactica," or even a watered down "Nip/Tuck" joining reality programming on Fox.
NBC Universal probably has the biggest library of cable programming to pull from thanks to owning both SciFi Channel and USA Network where they could easily start adding previously aired shows like "Psych," "Monk" and "The 4400" to the main network schedule. TNT isn't owned by a company that also owns a major network, but Time Warner officials reportedly are offering "The Closer" to networks ... for a price, of course.
"Battlestar Galactica" could be the biggest beneficiary. Although it's clear that a strike would delay production on the show's final season (and likely ensuring that the last 10 episodes will air in 2009), NBC could opt to start the entire show from the beginning or even start picking and choosing episodes it feels will draw viewers when they run out of existing scripted programs. "The 4400" -- which is possibly facing cancellation after a not-so-stellar fourth season -- may get new life with a run on NBC as well.
A writers' strike will be a disaster for everyone, including the writers who mostly live from paycheck to paycheck. Everyone's rushing to get scripts locked down for upcoming features films, as well. But if the writers do strike, look for the worst film year ever in 2008.
After only two episodes, Hugh Jackman's musical drama, Viva Laughlin has been cancelled
Viva Laughlin, the musical-drama hybrid that starred Hugh Jackman as a casino owner and was lambasted by critics, has been canceled by CBS after only two episodes.
The Amazing Race will replace Viva Laughlin in the Sunday at 8 p.m. time slot beginning Nov. 4. (A CSI repeat will be broadcast this Sunday.) The Hollywood Reporter calls Viva Laughlin the first major casualty of the 2007-08 season.
When Viva Laughlin debuted on Oct. 18 in a special time slot after CSI the program shed more than half of its valuable lead-in and averaged 8.8 million viewers. It then moved to its normal time slot on Sunday, following 60 Minutes, but its second episode, on Oct. 21, drew an average of 6.8 million viewers, placing CBS in fourth place for the hour.
Viva Laughlin featured a character named Lloyd Owen, a man who dreams about having a casino of his own in Laughlin, Nevada. Hugh Jackman and Melanie Griffith starred. The reviews were unbelievably bad, with one reviewer calling it the worst show on television. It was a remake of a very popular British show. We never saw it, but still --- pulling a show that had almost 7 million viewers after only two episodes? That's harsh.
Sony's 30 Days of Nighttopped the box office this past weekend, making an estimated $15,951,902. The vampire flick stars Josh Hartnett and Melissa George. In second place was Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married which made another $12,186,011. That brings its gross to $38,950,821. In third place was The Game Plan which made an estimated $8,178,646, bringing its gross to date to a mind-boggling $69,206,626. This means lots more movies for The Rock.
In fourth place was George Clooney in the well-reviewed Michael Clayton, which made another $6,677,272, putting its gross at $21,563,586. In fifth place was The Comebacks, which made an estimated $5,554,594. The Ben Affleck-directed Gone Baby Gone opened in fifth place, with an estimated take of $5,501,406. The excellently-reviewed film opened in only 1,713 theaters and had a per theater take of $3,211.
Rendition, starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Reese Witherspoon, really tanked at the box office. It opened in ninth place, with an estimated take of $4,060,012.
Coppola Criticizes Lazy Pacino, Nicholson and De Niro
Legendary filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola royally dissed
actors Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Jack Nicholson, saying they had all gotten lazy and no longer took challenging roles. In a new interview in GQ magazine, he also says that Jack Nicholson is mean, which is not exactly a surprise to anyone who follows celebrity gossip over the years.
"I met both Pacino and De Niro when they were really on the come," Coppola tells GQ's Nate Penn. "They were young and insecure. Now Pacino is very rich, maybe because he never spends any money; he just puts it in his mattress. De Niro was deeply inspired by (Coppola's studio American) Zoetrope and created an empire and is wealthy and powerful.
"Nicholson was - when I met him and worked with him - he was always kind of a joker. He's got a little bit of a mean streak. He's intelligent, always wired in with the big guys and the big bosses of the studios.
"I don't know what any of them want anymore. I don't know that they want the same things. Pacino always wanted to do theater ... (He) will say, 'Oh, I was raised next to a furnace in New York, and I'm never going to go to L.A.,' but they all live off the fat of the land."
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"I think if there was a role that De Niro was hungry for, he would come after it. I don't think Jack would. Jack has money and influence and girls, and I think he's a little bit like (Marlon) Brando, except Brando went through some tough times. I guess they don't want to do it anymore.
"You know, even in those days, after 'The Godfather,' I didn't feel that those actors were ready to say, 'Let's do something else really ambitious.'
Pacino and DeNiro both refused to respond to the quotes, perhaps realizing that their old friend was just blowing off steam.
Mika and ABC did this song and music video for Ugly Betty. It's a special Ugly Betty remix of Mika's "Big Girl (You are Beautiful)" single. You can hear the original song on Mika's website.
Saw IV
topped
the box office this past weekend, making an estimated $32,110,000. That probably ensures the joyous arrival of Saw IV next Halloween. Joy. In second place was Steve Carrell in Dan in Real Life, which made $12,081,000 with a very nice per theater take of $6,288. In third place was 30 Days of Night which made another $6,700,000, bringing its cumulative total to $27,318,000.
Fans of the hit show Friday Night Lights are
hopping mad at the screenwriters for the show. In fact, they're so mad that rumors are going around that the show could be ruined for good. What's everyone so mad about? Well, in the season opener, funny, nerdy sidekick teen Landry Clarke killed a man who was threatening Tyra Collette, who Landry has a crush on. After the deed was done, the duo dumped the body. Viewers were horrified at the macabre turn of events that didn't exactly fit in with the show's themes.
After only two episodes, Hugh Jackman's musical drama, Viva Laughlin has been cancelled
Sony's 30 Days of Night topped the box office this past weekend, making an estimated $15,951,902. The vampire flick stars Josh Hartnett and Melissa George. In second place was Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married which made another $12,186,011. That brings its gross to $38,950,821. In third place was The Game Plan which made an estimated $8,178,646, bringing its gross to date to a mind-boggling $69,206,626. This means lots more movies for The Rock.
