film

C and S and I arrived at a new-to-me hole-in-the-wall pub in Cambridge at around 11:30 and began to consume mass quantities. And nachos. When the rains came, we retreated from the patio into the bar and said "well, that settles it" and had another round. By the time we began to be a little sensitive about having outlasted multiple rounds of other patrons, the idea came up to go see the 4:15 of the new Angie Jolie shoot 'em up, Wanted.

This is the kind of movie that, upon seeing previews, prompts my ladyfriend and I to turn to each other and start a low, slowly accelerating chant of "brew and view, Brew and View, BREW and VIEW! BREW AND VIEW!!!" Ah, the Brew and View; another thing to miss about Chicago and wonder why exactly there's nothing like it in Boston (in fairness, the theater near my house serves beer, but it's no B&V). There are certain movies that lend themselves so well to this concept that I want to view them at the Brew and View, even though I wouldn't see them in any other circumstance (in a regular theater, at home, on a plane, at a friend's house...). Summer dreck fares especially well paired with beers, G&Ts, and cheap popcorn swiped off the abandoned table of the couple who are not staying for the second feature.

indieWIRE has an interesting article written by Brian Newman of NVR (National Video Resources, media granting arm of the Rockefeller Foundation) on the reasons behind the decline of nonprofit membership organizations for independent film and media. A lot of the points, taken separately, seem like pretty common sense stuff, but taken as a whole they present a very cogent picture of where and why certain strategies fail and others work. Don't miss the comments, either. They're all really insightful, and will give you an idea of the bigger picture behind the support structure for the independent film community. A compellingly odd take on why people are choosing DIY.

http://www.indiewire.com/biz/2006/03/first_person_br.html

Russ! (decaf) wrote,
@ 2006-07-02 16:41:00

Current mood: aggravated
Current music: "I Ain't Got No Home" by Woody Guthrie

Superman Flops (Spoilers Ahoy, Mateys)
A month and a half or so ago, my friend Zach came to see me. He brought with him a can of the new Sobe Superman energy drink; I don't remember exactly what it's supposed to have inside it, but it had a big Superman Returns S-insignia on the front of it, and Zach thought that, as the comic book guru of our circle of friends, I ought to at lesat give the Super-drink a try.

It was awful.

Warner Brothers, who are both the parent company of Superman's owners DC Comics and also the distributors and producers of Superman Returns, are notoriously protective of their more lucrative properties. Lawsuits are filed all the time defending the trademarks of things like Harry Potter, and within the comics industry, I once had a writer tell me that DC will let you get away with "pretty much anything if you want to screw with Black Canary or The Enlongated Man. But if you want to do a story that involves Superman or Batman, everything has to be vetted through Warner." That being the case, I thought, how in the world could DC/Warner/Bryan Singer/whoever have allowed such a poor-quality, destined-to-fail product to be released to the market with a big Superman logo slammed all over the front? I wondered about this for a while, and then eventually let it go. Having seen Superman Returns, though, I finally have my answer. Apparently they're going for the "steaming pile of crap" theme with this film.