The Fourth Kind

I wrote this for Boxoffice.com but due to a bit of confusion, there were two Fourth Kind pieces, and the other one was already up before they figured it out. Since it's still a perfectly good piece, I figure I'll run it here instead.
---------------------------------------
In late September, the long-delayed independent horror film Paranormal Activity opened in 12 theaters with a low level of buzz among genre fans. Now, in the final days before Halloween weekend, the film is riding a massive wave of fan-generated hype that's earned the $15,000 film $65.1 million in the US so far and helped it shut out the long-standing Saw series at the box office last weekend. This week, Paramount announced that international releases are currently on the horizon, and extremely tentative plans for a sequel are being kicked around the studio.

However, at Universal, it's not the film's demonic possession plot that's sending chills down people's spines, it's the striking similarities between Activity and their upcoming thriller The Fourth Kind, which opens on November 5th. Both films play with the implication that the events depicted in the movies are either real or based on real events, both dabble in the characters' disbelief before building to some seriously scary phenomena (although Fourth Kind's creeps are aliens rather than demons), and it's possible that both even contain at least a little low-quality digital-camera tripod footage (a few chunks show up in The Fourth Kind's trailer, but it's unclear if it's actually in the movie).

It's also probably déjà vu for writer/director Olatunde Osunsanmi, whose 2005 feature directorial debut WIthIN (aka The Cavern) bears more than a few passing similarities to Neil Marshall's The Descent, which was making a stir in UK theaters just over a month before Osunsanmi's cave horror premiered in Los Angeles. In both cases, his competition was a similarly untested director, leaving Universal with very few marketing hooks to hang their hat on that Paranormal Activity hasn't already laid claim to. "I think The Fourth Kind marketing is top notch and they're selling the movie quite well, [but] now the audience will see right through their gimmick," says Bloody-Disgusting's Brad Miska (aka Mr. Disgusting). "[And] The Box also opens that weekend, which I expect to take a small piece of the cake."

Then again, despite movie star Milla Jovovich in the lead role, The Fourth Kind doesn't look like the kind of epic undertaking that would break Universal or producer Gold Circle's bank; even a flop could probably be counted on to earn $5 million on opening weekend and make the rest back in home video sales and rentals. However, Universal has struggled since the beginning of summer, releasing a string of box-office disappointments that, on paper, probably read like surefire blockbusters, including the Adam Sandler/Judd Apatow collaboration Funny People and the Borat follow-up Bruno. Given that Universal had a pretty good spring (bolstered by the hit reboot Fast & Furious) and started off fall on the right foot (thanks to their stake in Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds), the studio is no doubt hoping for at least an even theatrical return on The Fourth Kind to make their overall 2009 performance sound merely disappointing rather than lackluster.

What that actual magic number is remains a mystery. On IMDb, The Fourth Kind's production budget isn't listed -- perhaps a PR move on Universal's part -- but the film is being heavily advertised on The Discovery Channel between various ghost hunting and alien abduction programs, so it's clear that the studio has already sunk some money into the film. Had they not already pulled the trigger, it might not be a stretch to think Universal would have considered moving the film to January, where the extremely similar White Noise (based on the real-life phenomenon of E.V.P.) did very well back in 2005, racking up $55.8 million against a $10 million budget, and where the studio successfully released the $16 million PG-13 horror The Unborn earlier this year, to tune of $42.6 million.

Meanwhile, the Paranormal Activity hype train rolls on. Ain't It Cool News founder Harry Knowles Twitters a rumor that a 17-year-old girl had a heart attack at an Activity screening in Lowell, Massachussets, while Universal remains trapped between a rock and a hard place, unable to make a move. Even if Paranormal's box office peters out after Halloween, Universal can only hope that audiences are still looking to be scared. Miska is optimistic. "Fans of Paranormal will probably hate Fourth Kind, while Paranormal haters will find what they're looking for in Fourth Kind," he says. "Our readers are even sick of hearing about it. All of the people who have already seen Paranormal are excited for Fourth Kind. I almost think it's helped them. I'm sure Universal is pissed, but I think they should be thanking the Gods of movies."

Back from the dead

It's late, and I'm bored, so I'm making this post just for the hell of it, since I've been bad about updating the blog (although Matt Lingo will be posting some AFI coverage soon). For some reason, the recent DirecTV commercial featuring footage from Tommy Boy and some new material with David Spade has been getting flak for trampling on Chris Farley's legacy. I think the ads are kinda clever; they may be crassly commercial (which is probably what turns people off more than anything), but that's because they are f---ing commercials. Had the spot digitized Farley into shilling the service, then perhaps the complainers would have a case, but personally, I find it more startling to see David Spade's chin looking a shade bloated. Regardless, Spade has said he thought of it as a tribute and it was apparently Farley's family's idea in the first place, so if you hate it, I'm letting you know you're wrong.

For reference, here's all the DirecTV commercials of the same ilk that I could find on YouTube. I bet they could get Danny DeVito to do one of these. And Dan Aykroyd in Ghostbusters. Maybe Carrie Anne-Moss in The Matrix. Sam Jackson in Pulp Fiction. See? It's fun selling out your favorite films.

Aliens (1986)


American Pie (1999)


Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999)


Back to the Future (1985)


"Baywatch"


"Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?"


The Dukes of Hazzard (2005)


King Kong (2005)


Misery (1990)


National Lampoon's Vacation (1983)


Poltergeist (1982)


Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)


Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)


Tommy Boy (1996)


I mean, really, when all of this was said and done, it made me want to watch Tommy Boy (and Misery, for that matter), even if it didn't make me want DirecTV. In other words, quit whining, because I guess it sort of works.

Note to YouTube users: Apparently something being "banned" makes it more interesting, but 99% of commercials are not "banned". In fact, 99% of most things in the world aren't "banned". Stop making s--t up. I hope you guys get "banned" from YouTube.

In Defense of Saw

Yeah, yeah, my last post was about Saw as well, but hey, if it's Halloween, it must be Saw. Here's a lightly extended version of an already lengthy comment I wrote on Nikki Finke's Deadline Hollywood Daily post here about the series.

---------------------------------

Man, people really take the term “torture porn” literally. I don’t like it, but the term is simply implying that is as exploitative of horror movie torture/bloodletting as regular porn is of sex. It doesn’t mean that it necessarily has any actual sex or nudity in it, just that people go to get their “torture”-loving rocks off at the sight of some violent death sequences.

That said, like any Saw fan would tell you, the real reason I go each year is to see how the plot develops. It’s like a crappy cop show, just with splatter. People are always derisive of this kind of statement, as if I have to have some sort of high-minded attitude to claim the Saw films have a plot to follow, but usually those are the people who didn’t bother to see the film and don’t like that kind of movie anyway. It’s okay not to like the Saw franchise, but you don’t need to go and decry it as some sort of bane on humanity just because your cinematic sensibilities are different from mine, especially since you haven’t gotten into it and never would, even under the best, most unbiased circumstances. I'll probably never watch The English Patient, but you don't see me hanging around generalizing to the world that it and other Oscar-bait pictures are repulsive.

I also think it’s ridiculous to imply that it’s good that horror is moving in a PG-13 direction. Not everything needs to be a Saw or a Hostel, nor does everything need push the gore envelope farther than the last, but bloodletting is part of the territory. The original A Nightmare on Elm Street is pretty bloody, but it’s a pretty classic genre picture, and the idea that PG-13 is better would stomp all over several of its greatest, creepiest scenes (like Amanda Wyss getting lifted out of the bed and dragged up the wall or Johnny Depp getting sucked into his bed). To say that horror should be less violent as a blanket statement is like saying action movies should have less guns and explosions, or that romances should scale back on the intimacy. Some of these movies that have come out in the last few years probably are torture porn, but you can’t just ball everything up into a category because you don’t like it without examining it. Again, I don't want to sound like I'm overanalyzing this into artsy-fartsy territory, but films like Hostel were made by auteurs trying to create something compelling and interesting to like-minded people, which is the right idea, even if some people can’t stomach it, and series like Saw are too over-the-top, really, to worry about (I mean, come on, someone gets melted in the latest one!). It’s PG-13 films like the Prom Night and Stepfather remakes (which always end up Unrated on DVD, to try to entice in the very same Saw crowds), which are artistically empty, financially motivated and poorly made that deserve to get canned.

Lastly, it’s ridiculous that anyone not interested would be so burdened by the Saw movies anyway. It’s like the inverse of having your cake and eating it too: you don’t like it, so nobody should have it. Just make an effort to stay out of the discussion. Did anyone see the movie’s most recent theatrical trailer? It was only 50 seconds long! The films are playing to the faithful, and the faithful alone, so in the age of TiVo, can’t you just ignore it?

The Dr. Gordon Factor

I'm betting (but don't want to know for sure -- don't tell me, a friend and I are gonna play it) that the recently-released Saw: The Video Game, at long last, ties off the plot of Dr. Lawrence Gordon, originally played by Cary Elwes in the original Saw.

In 2004, Elwesm supposedly at the prodding of his lawyer, sued Twisted Pictures for some unpaid back end, which caused bad blood between the actor and the films' producers. He eventually retracted the lawsuit, citing the lawyer's insistence and publicly stating he regretted it, but the damage was already done. Despite references to Dr. Gordon in almost all of the subsequent sequels, the actor is never seen or heard from again -- in Saw III brief vocal snippets are voiced by someone else and the character's face is covered when we see his unconscious body in the infamous bathroom, and in all of the other sequels, the character is neither seen or heard, only mentioned by others in passing.

Having just returned from Saw VI, I wonder how different the films would be if Dr. Gordon had made some sort of return appearance. Would they dispatched him in just a few minutes, or taken the time to weave Dr. Gordon into the plotline of each new film? Admittedly, he looks pretty boned at the end of Saw, but the franchise has begun to make a point of overturning every rock the camera even glanced at in order to add more strands to an ever-growing web of connections and plot twists.

In the event that the book, shockingly, is not closed by the video game, I wonder if the producers will ever let bygones be bygones and allow Dr. Gordon to make a reappearance. Historically, he seemed to be at the front of fans' minds when it came to the series, and the producers are kicking over the last few rocks. If there's only one more Saw movie (something I wouldn't bet on), I'd like it to go out with a bang -- or perhaps, more fittingly, put its best foot forward.

I feel the $10 leaving my wallet already.

2012 has a really stupid premise. It's head-punchingly stupid. Before I saw the trailer, I only had a vague peripheral awareness of the "2012 Mayan calendar conspiracy", so I asked a friend of mine who is far more knowledgeable than me more about it, and he made a point so simple that it really f---ing blows my mind that anything less than everybody in the entire world doesn't realize this right off the bat: The Mayan calendar has to end somewhere. It cannot go on forever.

Now that this incredibly obvious statement has been made to me, every trailer and line of dialogue referencing the fact that the "Mayan calendar proclaims" the world will end in 2012 makes me want to stab myself in the head with a sharpened pencil.

I also know that this movie, by the director of The Day After Tomorrow and the 1998 American Godzilla, cannot possibly be good. It just can't.

All that said, this is 5 solid minutes of the most destructive money-shot images ever put on film, and it is amazing. I saw what was essentially this clip in a slightly more trailerized version before Zombieland (which is a blast, by the way) and I was in helpless, slightly ashamed awe. F--- you, Sony. F--- you, Roland Emmerich. You win. You win.

Also, John Cusack yells "Donut!".

Park Chan Wook's Vengeance Trilogy: 11/24/09

Press release from Palisades Tartan popped up in my mail today. I had originally thought that this release was just going to be the three 1-discs with a box set sleeve over it, but I guess not.





The Ultimate Park Chan-Wook Vengeance Trilogy Box-Set
Palisades Tartan’s 8-Disc VENGEANCE TRILOGY box-set available in stores November 24th

LOS ANGELES — September 28, 2009 — For Immediate Release — You’ve been asking, we’ve been planning and this November Palisades Tartan will release the most exciting, impressive and comprehensive VENGEANCE TRILOGY box-set the world has ever seen! Featuring 8-discs and more special features then any other set on the planet (including the Korean version), celebrity essays as well as a few surprises, Palisades Tartan will release Park Chan-Wook’s VENGEANCE TRILOGY November 24th in DVD stores across the country.

SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE is the first film in Park Chan-Wook’s acclaimed Vengeance trilogy. The sister of a simple and deaf factory worker, Ryu, falls ill and needs a kidney transplant, however he is not a match so he looks to the black market which he can’t afford. After being fired from his job, his rebel girlfriend suggests that he kidnap the child of his former boss, Park. When the girl accidentally dies, her father seeks vengeance for her death.

OLDBOY is Park Chan-Wook’s classic genre-defining revenge tale of a man who’s wrongly been imprisoned for 15 years and is then suddenly released. Given money and a cell phone, he’s challenged to discover who incarcerated him in the first place, but he only has five days to uncover the truth. Even with a mysterious young girl to help him, his tortures have just begun. Cannes-winner championed by Tarantino, OLDBOY regularly appeared in top ten best movie polls across the country and is listed as one of the all-time best films as rated by IMDB users.

LADY VENGEANCE, the final film in the trilogy was created by Chan-Wook for his daughter. After being wrongfully convicted of kidnapping and murdering a young child, a beautiful young woman (Lee Young-ae) is imprisoned for 13 years. While in prison she gains the respect and loyalty of her fellow cellmates, all the while plotting her vendetta on the man responsible (OLDBOY’s Choi Min-Sik). Upon her release she sets in motion an elaborate plan of retribution, but what she discovers is a truth so horrifying, even revenge doesn’t seem punishment enough.

Director Park Chan-Wook’s most recent film THIRST won the Jury Prize at Cannes (2009) and was released in the US earlier this year by Focus Features. All three films in his celebrated Vengeance trilogy collection have garnered an impressive 28 Film Festival wins at prestigious venues including Cannes, Venice, Chicago, Fantasia, Stockholm, Hong Kong and the Sitges International Film Festival to name a few.

Each film is recorded in their original language (Korean) and offer English and Spanish subtitles. Each title is presented in anamorphic widescreen, Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and DTS Surround Sound 5.1. Special features include an essay on each film by celebrated filmmakers, actors and writers, including Eli Roth. Additional features include but are not limited to: audio commentary by Park Chan-Wook and actor Ryoo Seung-wan, behind the scenes, “The Process of Mr. Vengeance”, “My Boksu Story”, storyboards, photo gallery, filmographies, film notes and crew interviews (SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE); three audio commentaries, five behind-the-scenes featurettes, “Le Grand Prix at Cannes” and deleted scenes with commentary (OLDBOY); regular and “Fade-To-White” versions, character interviews (Lee Geum Ja, Prof. Baek), “Prisoners”, “Families”, “Lady Vengeance at the 62nd Venice Film Festival”, trailer, film notes, making-of and deleted scenes (LADY VENGEANCE).

Tartan Films was originally founded in 1984 in the UK and is credited with bringing Asian Extreme film to the West as well as some of the most compelling art house films of the last quarter century. In May 2008, Palisades Pictures acquired Tartan Films US library assets and two months later, acquired a majority of Tartan Films UK’s 400+ film library assets. The new company Palisades Tartan has operations both nationally and internationally. Palisades Tartan will continue to expand an already distinctive and provocative slate of films by focusing on quality film acquisitions, thus significantly increasing the size of their overall library in both territories. Palisades Pictures and its parent company Palisades Media Corp is a prestigious financier of print & advertising for the independent film market. Together with its affiliate, Palisades Media Asset Fund, Palisades has securitized and financed more than 550 films.

www.palisadestartan.com

VENGEANCE TRILOGY Box Set - (SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE/ OLDBOY / LADY VENGEANCE)
Palisades Tartan Video
Genre: Thriller/Foreign
Rating: Not Rated (Special Features Not Rated/Subject to Change)
Language: Korean (English Subtitles)
Format: DVD Only / 8-disc (Box-set)
Running Time: Approximately 361 minutes (not including special features)

SYMPATHY FOR MR. VENGEANCE – 129 min (not including special features)
OLDBOY – 120 min (not including special features)
LADY VENGEANCE – 112 min (not including special features)

Suggested Retail Price: $49.99
Pre-Order Date: October 27th 2009
Street Date: November 24th 2009
Catalog #: TVD8307
UPC Code: # 842498000076

$50 for eight discs? That's a steal.

Remake Watch 2009: OLD NEWS and, yep, The Fly.

I know I open almost every post like this, but since I've started writing for Boxoffice.com I've become greatly distracted. Rest assured, content is coming. In the meantime, I have wheel-spinning link-lists to fall back on, like Remake Watch 2009. Here's a bunch of old news you've already heard about projects that are, except for one, not new to the Remake Watch 2009 count.

First up is 20th Century Fox's wonderfully moronic decision to reboot the Fantastic Four franchise, which they started in 2005. Yes, it's been FOUR WHOLE YEARS since the franchise started, and TWO WHOLE YEARS since the last entry, 2007's Rise of the Silver Surfer. Oh, the times, they are a-changin'. Via Variety.

Last time I reported on the live-action Akira remake, it was dying. I guess it's not so dead after all. Via Collider.

In actual good news, Joel and Ethan Coen have reunited with Big Lebowski star Jeff Bridges for their True Grit remake. They should actually make it a double remake and a sequel to Lebowski by retitling it The Dude Goes West. Via Variety.

The Highlander remake is runnin' on NOS! There can only be one Drift King when Fast & Furious director and would-be Oldboy remaker Justin Lin takes control of the project. ComingSoon.

Also, I read on my Twitter feed that David Cronenberg is rebooting The Fly. No confirmation yet, but I'll be sure to run back and edit this post if anything develops.

EDIT: The Hollywood Reporter's Risky Biz Blog is corroborating the Cronenberg remake story. I haven't yet figured out how to add this to the tally. Is this another remake of the original, or is Cronenberg remaking his 1986 version? I have no idea. It's kind of baffling, actually. THR mentions that Cronenberg can do new things with the visual effects, but the makeup work on the original, by Chris Walas (who directed The Fly II) and Stephan Dupuis, won an Oscar. I guess I'd like to think that Cronenberg has some crazy new idea for this one, and it won't actually be much like his Jeff Goldblum version other than the basic concept.

More importantly, where are they going to find someone as awesome and stunning as 1980's Geena Davis?





Remake Watch 2009:
28 film remakes announced
5 film remakes released
2 tv remakes released
2 reboots announced
2 reboots released
1 remakes announced/released direct-to-DVD
3 TV remakes announced

A "reboot" is defined by Remake Watch as a new attempt at a film series with new actors playing old characters (thus, X-Men Origins: Wolverine and Race to Witch Mountain are excluded). Sequels to remakes (The Pink Panther 2, Halloween II) are ignored.

Ow. Ow. Ow.

That's the sound of me punching myself in the skull, because Universal is making a live-action Barbie movie.

Ow.

Ow.

Ow.

[via The Hollywood Reporter]

An Interview with Comedian Patton Oswalt

This interview took place via email on September 22nd, 2009, to promote Big Fan. I also added in a couple of questions that were asked at a Q+A at the Landmark Egyptian in Seattle, WA on September 18th.

Tyler Foster: As both a celebrity and a self-proclaimed nerd, it seems like you have the unique standpoint of seeing both Paul and Quantrell's side of the conflict. While Quantrell Bishop is clearly in the wrong for physically assaulting Paul, don't you think there's something weird about these guys following him around?

Patton Oswalt: Of course there’s something weird. That’s another reason I liked the script — everyone feels justified in their viewpoints and actions.

Tyler Foster: Do you get fans hassling you? Do you have some sort of personal line that they'd have to cross before you'd stop talking to them or wouldn't want to talk to them?

Patton Oswalt: Most of the time, when my fans meet me, they’re polite and smart. The few that are rude, I just sort of tune out, right in front of them, and they tend to walk away. I think the rude ones get a lot of that from everyone they meet, so I don’t come off as arrogant or mean.

Tyler Foster: Do you follow sports?

Patton Oswalt: No. I...view sports the way an autistic child looks at love. I watch it, and I understand that other people are happy, and I like that they're happy, but I just don't get it. To me, it's like watching a bunch of superheroes with no powers.

Tyler Foster: Did you attempt to do any research for the movie, perhaps in vain?

Patton Oswalt: Nope!

Tyler Foster: At the Q&A in Seattle, someone brought up that you had said previously that you do movies so that you can do the stand-up. This is a similar question, but that makes me wonder, how much personal investment do you have in or how much joy do you get out of acting?

Patton Oswalt: I get a lot of joy out of acting and writing. Anything I do creatively I try to put my heart and soul into. But why not have an overall goal in life?

Tyler Foster: Along those lines, most of your movie and TV roles are either by someone I might guess you'd consider a friend in the comedy community, like Observe and Report with Seth Rogen and Jody Hill, or someone with obvious prestige, like Pixar, or Steven Soderbergh (and Big Fan is both, since Siegel edited The Onion and wrote The Wrestler), so if it weren't for these people, would you just not really seek out any acting work?

Patton Oswalt: No, I’ve done plenty of acting work with and for people I didn’t know personally, and ended up getting along with famously. That’s how most acting works. But I definitely get movie roles because people come looking for me. It's not like I call up Pixar and go "today's your lucky day!"

Tyler Foster: Did you know Kevin Corrigan, Michael Rapaport or Siegel before signing onto this?

Patton Oswalt: I knew of Siegel, but I didn’t meet him until he gave me the script. I met the other guys on the film.

Tyler Foster: If Martin Scorsese calls up and says "I'd love for you to be in my movie in a small part, and we shoot it on Sunday" and you have a show on Sunday, do you reschedule the show or do you have to pass?

Patton Oswalt: I’d totally re-schedule the show. I’ve done that before — they always understand. I’d help them find someone to replace me, as well.

Tyler Foster: On your CDs, you always talk about doing all of these scripts you wrote, and I was just wondering if any of them were inching closer to being produced?

Patton Oswalt: Writing a movie and getting a movie made are two totally different things. I just found out that a screenplay that I wrote was rewritten by two different guys, and now two other guys are rewriting that version to make it more like the version I did originally. But I still do punch-up, I did some material for Funny People, and I'm still...'the guy' at DreamWorks, they'll call me up and I'll say, "wait, so this is the story of a donut that wants to be a bagel...?"

Tyler Foster: Can you tell us about any of the movies you did drafts on?

Patton Oswalt: No.

Tyler Foster: Since doing punch-up is, presumably, uncredited work, do you ever feel like you're just giving away material? Do you ever wish you had credit for some of these things when they come out the other end?

Patton Oswalt: I’m not giving it away if they pay me the profane sums they pay me, am I?

Tyler Foster: The IMDb trivia page for Big Fan has an awesome piece of trivia: "Director Robert D. Siegel has said that between takes in the strip club, while other members of cast and crew were enjoying the company of dancers, actor Patton Oswalt was watching episodes of "John Adams" (2008) on his iPod in a private room." Do you have any comment on this?

Patton Oswalt: I was actually re-watching Season 4 of "The Wire".

Follow @bigfan_movie on Twitter, befriend Patton Oswalt on facebook and MySpace, and go see Big Fan, in theaters now.

Special thanks to Gary Rubin of First Independent Pictures for making this happen.

Thirst Contest

Updates to the blog have been intermittent since I started writing news for Boxoffice, and this isn't a particularly newsly news item, but it is pretty awesome. Palisades/Tartan is having a contest to win two tickets to fly to London and meet Oldboy/Thirst director Park Chan-wook! Two runners-up will also get a copy of The Vengeance Trilogy box set being released on November 24th, 2009.

You can enter the contest here and you are required to take me if you win. Yep.