OCTOBER, 29
‘It was another October. The year: 2006. CMP announced the release of its first three movies: a comedy titled ‘Entertaining Mrs. Sullivan’, starred by Jason Biggs and Sharon Stone; a comedy adventure titled ‘T.Y.M.’, starred by Tobey Maguire and Jessica Alba; and the tearjerker drama ‘The Clown Smile’, with Jennifer Aniston. The three of them were written by Joey Stark, as there was no other screenwriter working for the Studio yet. It was exciting, although I had no idea at that point how long would CMP last. One thing is for sure: I would have never imagined those days that four years later CMP would still be around and more alive than ever!
When I announced the opening of Crazy Moon Pictures at the Hollywood Mogul’s message board I wrote that the Studio would go on ‘at least, while I still get fun out of it’. Well, four years later and after 427 movies released, the best thing I can say about the experience is that I still get a lot of fun out of it!
Happy 4th Anniversary, CMP!
Are you ready for at least four more years?’
Harry Stark
President of Crazy Moon Pictures
OTTO RAHN
Biopic / Drama
The Cast: David Strathairn, Vincent Cassel, Franka Potente, Jamie Bell, Kevin Spacey
The Director: Werner Herzog
The Producer: Steven Spielberg
The Screenwriter: Matt Kubrick
The Plot:
Ever since he was a child Otto Rahn (D.Strathairn) has been fascinated with tales about the holy grail. The images of religious imagery fascinated him. As he grew up he would turn his eye to adventure and becoming an archeologist. He strove to uncover things long lost to time and history. Eventually he would become good friends with a french historian and mystic by the name of Antonin Gadal (V.Cassel). Otto meets him in France and becomes fascinated when he learns of the Cathars, a christian religious sect. Over several years Otto and Antonin team up and write a book about the Cathars. When he learns of the ancient castle once owned by the Cathar sect he makes the long journey there to explore it he hires a young man from a small village by the name of Alfonso. He starts to believe that this is the place where the Holy Grail can be found he will find it. But after long days of searching the crumbling castle his expedition turns up nothing and is soon forced to leave empty handed. Over the years Otto continues more research and more small time expeditions.
In the 30s Otto's research is soon comes under the eyes of the Nazi regime. Heinrich Himmler (K.Spacey) is fascinated with the occult learns of Otto's books and his search for the holy grail. Soon the two meet up first Otto signs on as a non Junior officer but eventually makes his way to becoming a full member of the SS. But he is secretly worried that his collegues will discover that he is gay and has had many male lovers. He soon begins a relationship with a german man named Claudias (J.Bell). It's around this time we see long scenes of Otto doing research and going on long expeditions to different parts of the world with members of the SS. They make long searches of Germany, Iceland, France and Italy but nothing ever turns up. Slowly Otto begins falling out of favor with the Nazi party when his expeditions turn up nothing and things get worse when he comes out as openly gay. Himmler believing that he can be cured arranges a marriage for Otto with a woman named Anja (F.Potente), a beautiful blonde haired woman, but Otto always goes back to Claudias.
Soon Otto himself becomes increasingly disenfranchised with his government. He is there in Germany when the Germans begin fire bombing Jewish owned business and is horrified with what his country has become. He is sent by Himmler to work in a concentration camp called Dachau. But he can't take it anymore. He writes this letter to Himmler himself. ‘’There is much sorrow in my country. Impossible for a tolerant, liberal man like me to live in the nation that my native country has become." On March 13th 1939 Otto Rahn's frozen body is found Söll (Kufstein, Tyrol) in Austria with a single gunshot to the head.
Stark’s Comment:
For the good: A quality movie any way you look at it. It’s not the kind of movie to become a blockbuster but I think that, considering the talents involved, it will be appealing enough to work decently in box office.
For the bad: Movies oriented to adult audiences always have it harder than those looking for younger moviegoers.
Behind The Scenes:
-Steve Spielberg has won in a row the Best Picture and the best Director GMA with his two latest works for the Studio, ‘The Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier and Clay’ and ‘Metropolis’.
-Jamie Bell also worked with Spielberg in ‘Kavalier & Clay’. As a curiosity, he also played a gay character in that one.
-The movie has been shot in locations in Germany, Austria and Asia.
-Speilberg has always stated that Otto Rahn was one of his inspirations when he created Indiana Jones.
SON OF THE BRIDE
Comedy / Adult
The Cast: Ben Stiller, Lauren Bacall, Christopher Plummer, Paul Giamatti, Abbie Cornish, Emma Stone
The Director: Ben Stiller
The Screenwriter: James Bradley
The Plot:
Kevin (B.Stiller), 43 years old, is the only son of Jacob (C.Plummer) and Angela (L.Bacall). Kevin runs a little restaurant in Bronx that has been owned by his family for decades. His father Jacob managed it for more than 40 years and now that he’s retired, he stills drops out at the restaurant, more to interfere in Kevin’s work than to really help. Father and son have never had the best of the relationships.
Kevin is divorced. He has a daughter, Vicky (E.Stone), with whom he has the usual father / daughter conflicts, specially about Vicky’s goth boyfriend. He has a love relationship with Anne (A.Cornish), a very nice art student much younger than him. Anne wants a bigger commitment from him but he always tells her that he is too old for her and that she should leave him and to look for somebody younger.
Kevin’s mother, Angela, suffers from Alzheimer’s disease and she is at a mental institution. Kevin visits her regularly and they have these surreal and funny conversations where there’s no connection between what Kevin says and what she replies. (The story does not laugh at Alzheimer’s disease: Angela is presented as a sweet and funny character in a sweet and tender way).
Kevic has such a hectic life. And he often dreams on changing things. He always wanted for himself something different than just running his father’s old restaurant. He feels time is running away fast and he should do something about it. So one night, after all the clients are gone, he tells Jacob that he wants to sell the restaurant. It’s a tense conversation.
During the conversation, Jacob tells his son something he doesn’t know. Kevin knows that the relationship between Jacob and Angela when they were young was highly problematic for their respective families. Jacob is Jew and Angela is catholic so their families were opposed to their relationship as both families were very conservative and religious. But Jacob and Angela loved each other so much that they broke with their families, opened the restaurant and went on with life by themselves. What Kevin does not know is that Jacob and Angela never really got married, as he had always thought.
So Jacob tells Kevin that he has a last dream in his life: he wants to marry Angela. Kevin considers that absurd and impossible, as her mother would never realize what is going on due to her disease. But Jacob tells him he wants to do it anyway because he always promised Angela that someday they’d marry.
Jacob offers Kevin a deal. Kevin will help his father to marry her mother and, then, he will sell the restaurant without his father’s opposition.
That same night, when Kevin arrives to his apartment, he suffers a heart attack.
As he is staying at the intensive care unit, Kevin has time to think about his life and decide what he wants to do with it before it’s too late. He takes some decisions…
First day out of the hospital, Kevin sees Anne and breaks up with her. He tells Anna that he is tired of their relationship and that he wants more freedom. But it’s not true. He just wants to force Anna to forget about him and find someone of her age. Kevin leaves Anne crying heart-broken.
He also sees his daughter, Vicky. And he tells her that she can go on with her gothic boyfriend and even bring him home for dinner (what she does, in a very comedic sequence where Kevin tries to connect with the strange boy).
And he also tells his father that he will help him to marry his mother.
In those days, somebody reappears in Kevin’s life. A client at the restaurant identifies himself as Bob (P.Giamatti), Kevin’s best friend during childhood days. Bob has returned to the neighborhood after more than 20 years away. Bob is a professional actor. He has been working on tv series in Hollywood always playing minor comedic characters. Bob is a funny, always cheerful and humoristic person. Kevin and Bob retake their old friendship and spend time together.
Kevin soon realizes that the Church is being unsupportive with the wedding plans. No priest will accept to marry an elder woman with Alzheimer’s disease that cannot even recognize Jacob or Kevin.
One night, Kevin and Bob have drunk too much. And, in the most natural way, Bob tells Kevin his real story: he has returned to the old neighborhood and abandoned his acting career right after his loving wife and only daughter both died in a car accident. ‘Then, why do you always look in such a happy mood?’, asks him Kevin, so shocked. ‘Well’, says Bob, ‘Life is a big shit so the best thing I can do is just laugh at it while time passes...’
At that moment, Kevin has an idea…
The beautiful wedding ceremony between Jacob and Angela takes place at the institution where she is. Patients are the guests. Vicky and her strange boyfriend are there too. Angela does not know what’s going on but she looks great in her wedding dress. And Jacob is so happy. And who is the priest? No other than Bob, making his best and last acting work.
Kevin will never tell his father that Bob wasn’t a real priest. After all, Jacob’s dream has come true.
After the wedding, we know that Kevin has finally sold the restaurant. He is moving to New Mexico, where he plans to begin a new life, buying a farm and raising horses.
He visits Anne. And he tells her that he lied to her. He loves her. He wants her to move with him to New Mexico. Anna says: ‘You are crazy…’ both crying and laughing. And she finally accepts.
Last time we see Kevin he is having a farewell dinner at the restaurant with his father, Bob, Vicky and her boyfriend and Anne… Bob makes a toast: ‘To life and all the surprises hidden in it!’, he says. ‘To life!’, answer all, rising their glasses of wine.
Stark’s Comment:
For the good: James Bradley is simply a master writing these adult comedies full of intelligent sense of humor. His fans have always support them. And it will be interesting watching Stiller playing a more serious and adult character than usual.
For the bad: Dialogues-based movies – no matter how clever or ingenious those dialogues may be - always have difficulties at CMP.
Behind The Scenes:
-This is the second time that Ben Stiller directs a movie in CMP. The first movie, the comedy ‘Eureka!’, was a box office’s disaster back in Season 4.
-Paul Giamatti works in a Bradley’s story for the sixth time. Giamatti has won two Golden Moon Awards thanks to his works with Bradley.
-Bradley has stated that he chose Abbie Cornish to play Stiller’s girlfriend after watching ‘Sunshine On Lonely Street’. He had never heard of Cornish before he saw her in that movie.
-Emma Stone shot all his sequences in the movie in a row because she had to join the shootage of the upcoming ‘Housatlantavegas’.
MEGA MAN
Action / Sci-Fi
The Cast: Taylor Lautner, Christopher Walken, Jean Reno, Jesse Eisenberg, Saoirse Ronan
The Director: Renny Harlin
The Screenwriter: Josh Collins
The Plot:
Mega Man follows the adventure of a young robot, Rock (T.Lautner), originally built by Dr. Light (J. Reno) to be a house cleaning robot. but when Dr. Light's lab and the world is threatened by the evil mad scientist Dr. Wiley (C. Walken) and his army of robots, Dr. Light can't help but feel responsible for the havoc. Wiley and Light were once partners working on projects to build robots that would make their scientific research easier by doing things a human scientist wouldn't be able to do without help. The Prototype, Protoman (J. Eisenberg) was their first successful bot. Rock was the second and Roll (S. Ronan), Rock's sister was the third. Protoman displayed human characteristics and intelligence that led him to escape the laboratory and wander the world on his own.
Dr. Light dismissed Dr. Wiley from his lab, fearing Wiley had become mad with jealousy about Light getting all the credit for building the next several robots, even getting a Nobel Prize.
Wiley broke into the lab and reprogrammed the machines and stole them all (Cut Man, Ice Man, Guts Man, Bomb Man, Fire Man, Elec Man) he also build other small armies of evil robots to carry out his dastardly deeds.
Dr. Light programmed Rock to fend off Dr. Wiley's attacks on the world, dubbing Rock as Mega Man aka the Blue Bomber. While Rock takes out the bad guys, Dr. Light remains in the lab with Roll and the two build things that would aid Rock.
It all comes to the showdown in Dr. Wiley's skull castle, where he uses his biggest robotic achievement. It is apparent that Rock can't stop Wiley alone and just when all hope is lost, Protoman makes a rescue and helps take out Wiley, but before any major damage is done, Wiley escapes and before Rock can speak to the mysterious savior, Protoman disappears. The world is safe.....for now.
Stark’s Comment:
For the good: Another game adaptation from Collins after the amazing success of ‘Metroid’. This one is more oriented to children than that one. But if ‘Metroid’ broke records, why not this one?
For the bad: Children are always unpredictable. They may love a movie or ignore it without any specific reason.
Behind The Scenes:
-This movie was planned as another reunion of Emile Hirsh and Jamie Bell after ‘The Beatles’ and ‘Kavalier & Clay’. But both stars refused the offer as they were not interested in making this kind of movie at this point of their careers in CMP. Taylor Lautner and Jesse Eisenberg replaced them.
-Josh Collins wanted Bryan Singer to direct the movie. But Singer was busy working on the pre-production of the new Silver Sable’s movie and refused the offer.
-Taylor Lautner makes his debut in CMP with this movie.
DRAGONLANCE: DRAGONS OF WINTER NIGHT: Most of the members of the cast from the
first Dragonlance movie are back in this second installment of the saga directed again by Guillermo Del Toro. Among them, we will see familiar faces like Ewan McGregor, Brendan Fraser, Chris Evans or Dakota Fanning, returning to CMP after being nominated as Best Supporting Actress past Season for her work in ‘Prison Letters’.
NEW WORLD II: HEROES OF THE REBELLION: Dakota was also seen past Season in the first movie of this saga. But she is not returning in this second episode. Some stars who will return are Patrick Stewart and Gary Oldman. And also, as he usually does in most of his movies, John Daws will make again a cameo in this sequel the same way he did in the first one.
IT’S JUST NOT WORKING OUT: Merryl Streep, seen past Season playing a minor role in ‘The
Orphanage’, will also play a supporting role in this romantic comedy being directed by James L. Brooks. She will play Cameron Diaz’s mother. And Vince Vaughn will play the guy that may marry Cameron if Jason Bateman doesn’t make something to avoid it. Vaughn’s voice could be heard this Season in the controversial animated feature ‘Toons’.
PINOCCHIO’S TERROR: The secret is finally revealed. Yes, Pinocchio is the classic animated character chosen by Matt Kubrick to completely change our view of him, same way he did with Peter Pan in ‘Cursed Neverland’. Kubrick’s friend, Alexander Aja, is going to direct this horror movie that will turn poor Pinocchio into an evil killer. This is the fourth time that Kubrick and Aja team up under the ‘Midnight Movies’ label after ‘Wild Cards: Ace In The Hole’, ‘Silent Night, Deadly Night’ and ‘Bedtime Stories’.
SALINTOLOGY: This project was also announced at CMP’s blog some weeks ago. Josh Collins
has decided to take to the big screen the popular Tina Fey’s parodic impression of Sarah Palin. Fey will play Para Salin (so we have here ‘salintology’ instead of ‘palintology’), a woman that accidentally becomes US President. Kevin Smith has accepted to direct this political satire in what will be his second work for CMP after the disappointing experience of ‘Crime Stoppers’.
MOUSE GUARD: First members of the cast of voices of this animated feature written by Dawson Edwards and directed by Joe Carnahan known: Dominic West (who has worked before with Edwards in ‘Aquaman’ and ‘Ms. Jordon’); Hugh Laurie (also seen in Edwards’ movies like ‘The Killing Run’ and ‘The Secret People’); Anton Yelchin (recently seen in Edwards’ ‘Packing Up London’); and Kiefer Sutherland, whose voice was already heard this Season in the megahit ‘Metroid’.
DARK THEY WERE, AND GOLDEN EYED: Two young stars play Mathew Fox’s kids in this
adaptation of a Ray Bradbury’s short story written by Chad Taylor and being directed by Jack Bender: Jake T. Austin, who made his debut in CMP with the successful comedy ‘Being Ben Stiller’; and Chloe Moretz, seen past Season in the Josh Collins’ drama ‘Fictitious Images’. Maria Bello will play their mother. Bello had only been seen before in CMP playing Jim Carrey’s wife in the drama directed by Robert Redford, ‘A Standing Eight’.
HOUSTATLANTAVEGAS: Two veterans play supporting roles in this wild comedy starred by Adam Brody and Emma Stone and being directed by Todd Philips: Thomas Haden Church, not seen in CMP since ‘Bedtime Stories 2’; and John C. McGinley, whose only previous work for the Studio was in ‘Yogi Bear’.
MALCOLM MANBOOBS: Green light for one of the first releases of Season 16. Josh Collins has
written this most peculiar comedy about a boy with… let’s say, a ‘generous’ size of chest. Jared Hess, better known as the director of ‘Napoleon Dynamite’, will be behind the cameras. And Malcolm will be played by Spencer Breslin, Abigail’s brother, who also starred for CMP the peculiar and successful comedy ‘Borgel’, among other works.
JUSTICE LEAGUE 2: Mark Strong, only seen before in the flopped ‘Kingdom: The Dark And The Light’, will have another chance to find room for him at CMP’s world playing here the villainous mastermind Sinestro, who used to be the mentor of Green Lantern, one of the bunch of villains to be seen in this movie.
JAMES BRADLEY – ‘SON OF THE BRIDE’
After the disappointing experience of ‘Game Of Truth’, James Bradley returns this week with another one of his adult comedies. ‘Son Of The Bride’, a remake of a movie made in Argentina, tells the story of a man that has to come true his own parents’ last wish: getting married. A sentimental movie starred and directed by Ben Stiller.
1.Past Season, you wrote a remake of an Spanish movie, ‘The Orphanage’. Now it’s the turn for an Argentinian movie… It seems like you are a big fan of non-American movies.
Not really. The best movies usually come from Hollywood. But there are hidden gems made in other places that should be discovered by American audiences and a remake is a good way to help some great stories reaching wider audiences. The original ‘Son Of The Bride’ is a wonderful comedy, a very intelligent and tremendously funny movie full of brilliant dialogues. It fought for the Best Foreign Film at the Academy Awards back in 2001. It tells a universal story about family relationships and how we should commit with the people we love that can be easily placed in any society. So I just decided to take that story to the US.
2.Why did you choose Ben Stiller to star this adult comedy?
I think Stiller can be both a goofy comedian but also a mature comedy actor playing more adult and serious characters. We know him better for his wild comedies but from time to time he shows that other and more mature side and I wanted him to explore those acting skills in this movie. He got so involved in the project that he also decided to direct it. He makes a great work playing that man in his 40s trying to decide what he wants to do with the rest of his life after suffering a heart attack.
3.How was it working with Lauren Bacall?
Just great! You don’t have the chance to work with a Hollywood’s legend too often… Lauren’s character was such a challenge. She is a woman suffering Alzheimer’s disease. She has lost contact with reality. But she is a very funny character, not a sad one. So she had to be funny and to make audiences laugh but, at the same time, it couldn’t be as if we were laughing at her. Audiences are expected to laugh ‘with’ her and not ‘at’ her. To make that possible, we needed a wonderful actress and Lauren Bacall is. She is one of the very few icons of the golden days of Hollywood still alive and it was such a honor to have her in the movie.
4.You are a specialist in creating female characters in CMP. Not this time, but usually, it seems like you prefer stories starred by women than by men.
As I always say, I love women, yes… *laughs* Well, I think that all CMP’s authors have a tendency to specialized in something after being some Seasons around. We have great writers of sci-fi, superheroes movies, game adaptations, drama, horror… So I had to look for my own niche. I don’t know anything about superheroes or comics and I don’t play console games… so what could I do to be a bit different from the rest? Female characters! I like writing comedies and dramas and those are genres where you have the chance to create good female characters. I feel very comfortable working with actresses and trying to build up good stories starred by women.
5.What stories can we expect from you in the near future?
I have a good story about future movies and those coincidences that happen
from time to time with CMP’s movies. I’ve been working on an adaptation of ‘Pride and Prejudice and Zombies’, the very peculiar novel by Seth Grahame-Smith. Once I had written the screenplay, I was looking for the right actress to star it. First, I thought of Scarlet Johansson. But then I decided that Natalie Portman would be a better choice. Well, you know what? Right after I decided that, I was looking at internet. I was absolutely shocked when I found this news: Natalie Portman had been planning to star a big screen version of the novel. But finally it seemed like Scarlet Johansson was going to replace her. I had no idea of that when I considered both! I told Harry Stark about the coincidence and he told me to go on with my pitch anyway. Isn’t it an amazing coincidence?
CMP’s MOST MEMORABLE SEQUENCES
History of cinema is not only made of movies but also of specific sequences. After 4 years and more than 425 movies released, CMP has left quite a bunch of memorable moments in the memory of moviegoers. To celebrate CMP’s fourth anniversary, this week we take a look at some of those sequences from CMP’s movies that have directly entered in the history of cinema. This is not a list of the best CMP’s movies but just of those sequences that, months or even years after the release of the movie, are still alive in our memory.
HITMAN: TWO WAYS TO DIE
Season 3
Tony Scott / John Daws
The sequence:
Hitman (Colin Farrell) finds her beloved Lisa (Keira Knightley) after she has been wildly tortured by Gary Oldman. To avoid her more suffering, Hitman decides to shoot her and kill her.
The comment:
Probably, the most brutal sequence ever seen in a CMP’s movie. Never before, we had seen the hero of a movie killing his own lover. It was the most terrible act of love ever seen on a movie screen.
FEAR THE DARKNESS
Season 1
Wes Craven / Matt Kubrick
The sequence:
Darkman (Benicio Del Toro) appears on screen for the first time. He looks with his bloody eyes to a scared Dakota Fanning and he whispers at her ‘I am not your friend’.
The comment:
This sequence meant the birth of a horror icon in CMP, Darkman, seen later in quite a few sequels. A pioneer and icon of CMP’s horror movies. His words – ‘I am not your friend’ – became the tagline that identifies the Darkman’s saga.
DREAM OF A KING
Season 6
Spike Lee / Josh Collins
The sequence:
All the final montage of images at the end of the movie, mixing Luther King’s ‘I’ve been to the mountain top’ speech with the images of his assassination.
The comment:
An epic, dramatic and highly emotional sequence masterly edited, mixing different moments of MLK’s life to end up with his assassination.
MAN IN THE MIRROR
Season 6
Wes Anderson / James Bradley
The sequence:
Amy (Kate Winslet) is so obsessed with the problems that Jack (Paul Giamatti) is creating her that she comes out of the changing room of her gym and walks through the exercise room without noticing she is naked.
The comment:
One of the funniest sequences in CMP’s history. Everybody at the gym is looking at Kate Winslet naked and she keeps walking wondering why everyone is looking at her.
STAR WARS: BALANCE OF THE FORCE
Season 5
Lawrence Kasdan / Marcus Trax
The sequence:
Darvin Skywalker (Tobey Maguire) has a final duel with his sister Lana (Catherine Z. Jones) trying to bring her back from the Dark Side of the Force.
The comment:
This duel between the Skywalker siblings has become as iconic in the Star Wars universe as the duel in which Darth Vader told Luke he was his father in ‘The Empire Strikes Back’.
WESTWORLD
Season 3
Michael Bay / Steve Connors
The sequence:
David Duchovny meets for the first time the clone of Lara Croft (Angelina Jolie) in the futuristic theme park full of clones of iconic movie characters. We see a short cut of Angelina’s eyes opening. As soon as she looks at the camera, we realize there’s something wrong: that Lara Croft is not a heroine but a villain.
The comment:
A powerful short cut of Angelina’s eyes. And a wonderful look from her. Her eyes tell everything about the character not needing words to explain anything else.
SECRET SINS
Season 14
Joey Stark / Joey Stark
The sequence:
Emily (Natalie Portman) is at the changing room of a clothes store. A masked man comes in and they have wild sex. She thinks that the man is her lover, Ed (Jude Law). Later, she will discover the man was an unknown.
The comment:
This is probably the wildest sex sequence ever seen in a CMP’s movie. It was highly controversial as some critics considered immoral that Natalie seemed to be enjoying a rape.
MS. JORDON
Season 13
Tom Hanks / Dawson Edwards
The sequence:
Cleveland (Edward Norton) and Thelma (Cameron Diaz) have sex in a car the first night they’ve met.
The comment:
Another one of the best sex sequences seen in a CMP’s movie. This one is not controversial. It is simply (and extremely) hot.
HAIGHT-ASHBURY
Season 9
Oliver Stone / Richard Franzwa
The sequence:
Jeremy Sumpter leaves San Francisco at the end of the movie while we see how his girlfriend Emma Roberts is left behind turned into a drug addict. ‘The Beat Goes On’, by Sonny and Cher, begins to play.
The comment:
That final sequence perfectly summarizes what the 60s meant in a most melancholy and sentimental way.
JOHN AND TOMMIE
Season 12
Will Smith / Chad Taylor
The sequence:
John (Anthony McKie) and Tommie (Derek Luke) are on the podium at the Olympics and both rise their fists.
The comment:
All the meaning of what they did is understood just watching this powerful sequence when we see in a short cut how their fists rise at a slight slow motion.
Ben Stiller showed up with a different look at the premiere of his newest movie, ‘Son Of The Bride’. And he had a wonderful company: the two beautiful young talents of the cast, Abbie Cornish and Emma Stone. In the movie, Abbie plays Stiller’s girlfriend and Stone plays his daughter.
Vorhees will be back. Some of you may still remember the two movies based on the ‘Friday, the 13th’ character developed by Matt Kubrick during the first CMP’s seasons. ‘Vorhees: The Early Years’ made a pretty good box office. The flop of its sequel, ‘Vorhees: The Bloody Years’, interrupted this revamp of Jason Vorhees’ evil adventures. Well, it seems like now Kubrick will give good old Jason another chance soon. But this time he won’t be coming alone. Another icon of the horror genre will share the screen with Jason in this upcoming production.
And another duel is coming up soon too. The third installment of ‘The Resurrected’, the trilogy starred by Joseph Gordon-Levitt following the saga that begun with ‘The Heirs’, will also hit the screens soon. Chad Taylor has got personally involved in the marketing campaign of this third movie. He has asked the people from CMP’s Marketing Department to design the promotion of this movie with a very specific message: the story has to be presented as a kind of final duel between the characters played by Gordon-Levitt and Robert Pattinson.
Do you remember ‘Daughters Of The Dragon’? It was a comic adaptation directed by McG in
Season 12, written by Joey Stark and starred by Cameron Diaz and Halle Berry. The movie was ripped off by critics but it made an outstanding box office of 183 millions. For so long, Joey Stark had kept stating that he was not interested in writing a sequel of it. But it seems like he has finally changed his mind (or maybe his greedy big brother has obliged him to change it considering that a sequel would make again nice profits). The fact is that Joey has announced that he has started working in a sequel ‘to put an end to the plotlines that remained open at the end of the first movie’.
Past week, Steve Connors mentioned at his ‘5 Questions’ interview that he has already sent to Harry Stark a couple of drafts of screenplay for the sequel of his blockbuster ‘Invasion’. Well, according to my CMP’s deep throats, things are being much worse than that. Harry Stark is pretty worried as Connors keeps sending changes in the screenplay although the Studio is planning to green light the movie during the first weeks of Season 16. If Connors does not decide to stop introducing new changes in the story, the whole release schedule of the next Season should have to be changed. And that can make Mr. Stark really mad…
And I end up with a curiosity… Who are the most demanded talents lately by CMP’s authors to be
in their movies? Well, four names can be placed on top of the list. And you may be surprised. Emma Stone, Cobie Smulders, James Franco and Ryan Reynolds are the four talents that have had to reject some offers lately because their busy agendas didn’t allow them to be in all the projects they were offered. It seems like a new generation of stars is beginning to rule CMP’s world lately.
‘It was another October. The year: 2006. CMP announced the release of its first three movies: a comedy titled ‘Entertaining Mrs. Sullivan’, starred by Jason Biggs and Sharon Stone; a comedy adventure titled ‘T.Y.M.’, starred by Tobey Maguire and Jessica Alba; and the tearjerker drama ‘The Clown Smile’, with Jennifer Aniston. The three of them were written by Joey Stark, as there was no other screenwriter working for the Studio yet. It was exciting, although I had no idea at that point how long would CMP last. One thing is for sure: I would have never imagined those days that four years later CMP would still be around and more alive than ever!
When I announced the opening of Crazy Moon Pictures at the Hollywood Mogul’s message board I wrote that the Studio would go on ‘at least, while I still get fun out of it’. Well, four years later and after 427 movies released, the best thing I can say about the experience is that I still get a lot of fun out of it!
Happy 4th Anniversary, CMP!
Are you ready for at least four more years?’
Harry Stark
President of Crazy Moon Pictures
OTTO RAHN
Biopic / Drama
The Cast: David Strathairn, Vincent Cassel, Franka Potente, Jamie Bell, Kevin Spacey
The Director: Werner Herzog
The Producer: Steven Spielberg
The Screenwriter: Matt Kubrick
The Plot:
Ever since he was a child Otto Rahn (D.Strathairn) has been fascinated with tales about the holy grail. The images of religious imagery fascinated him. As he grew up he would turn his eye to adventure and becoming an archeologist. He strove to uncover things long lost to time and history. Eventually he would become good friends with a french historian and mystic by the name of Antonin Gadal (V.Cassel). Otto meets him in France and becomes fascinated when he learns of the Cathars, a christian religious sect. Over several years Otto and Antonin team up and write a book about the Cathars. When he learns of the ancient castle once owned by the Cathar sect he makes the long journey there to explore it he hires a young man from a small village by the name of Alfonso. He starts to believe that this is the place where the Holy Grail can be found he will find it. But after long days of searching the crumbling castle his expedition turns up nothing and is soon forced to leave empty handed. Over the years Otto continues more research and more small time expeditions.
In the 30s Otto's research is soon comes under the eyes of the Nazi regime. Heinrich Himmler (K.Spacey) is fascinated with the occult learns of Otto's books and his search for the holy grail. Soon the two meet up first Otto signs on as a non Junior officer but eventually makes his way to becoming a full member of the SS. But he is secretly worried that his collegues will discover that he is gay and has had many male lovers. He soon begins a relationship with a german man named Claudias (J.Bell). It's around this time we see long scenes of Otto doing research and going on long expeditions to different parts of the world with members of the SS. They make long searches of Germany, Iceland, France and Italy but nothing ever turns up. Slowly Otto begins falling out of favor with the Nazi party when his expeditions turn up nothing and things get worse when he comes out as openly gay. Himmler believing that he can be cured arranges a marriage for Otto with a woman named Anja (F.Potente), a beautiful blonde haired woman, but Otto always goes back to Claudias.
Soon Otto himself becomes increasingly disenfranchised with his government. He is there in Germany when the Germans begin fire bombing Jewish owned business and is horrified with what his country has become. He is sent by Himmler to work in a concentration camp called Dachau. But he can't take it anymore. He writes this letter to Himmler himself. ‘’There is much sorrow in my country. Impossible for a tolerant, liberal man like me to live in the nation that my native country has become." On March 13th 1939 Otto Rahn's frozen body is found Söll (Kufstein, Tyrol) in Austria with a single gunshot to the head.
Stark’s Comment:
For the good: A quality movie any way you look at it. It’s not the kind of movie to become a blockbuster but I think that, considering the talents involved, it will be appealing enough to work decently in box office.
For the bad: Movies oriented to adult audiences always have it harder than those looking for younger moviegoers.
Behind The Scenes:
-Steve Spielberg has won in a row the Best Picture and the best Director GMA with his two latest works for the Studio, ‘The Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier and Clay’ and ‘Metropolis’.
-Jamie Bell also worked with Spielberg in ‘Kavalier & Clay’. As a curiosity, he also played a gay character in that one.
-The movie has been shot in locations in Germany, Austria and Asia.
-Speilberg has always stated that Otto Rahn was one of his inspirations when he created Indiana Jones.
SON OF THE BRIDE
Comedy / Adult
The Cast: Ben Stiller, Lauren Bacall, Christopher Plummer, Paul Giamatti, Abbie Cornish, Emma Stone
The Director: Ben Stiller
The Screenwriter: James Bradley
The Plot:
Kevin (B.Stiller), 43 years old, is the only son of Jacob (C.Plummer) and Angela (L.Bacall). Kevin runs a little restaurant in Bronx that has been owned by his family for decades. His father Jacob managed it for more than 40 years and now that he’s retired, he stills drops out at the restaurant, more to interfere in Kevin’s work than to really help. Father and son have never had the best of the relationships.
Kevin is divorced. He has a daughter, Vicky (E.Stone), with whom he has the usual father / daughter conflicts, specially about Vicky’s goth boyfriend. He has a love relationship with Anne (A.Cornish), a very nice art student much younger than him. Anne wants a bigger commitment from him but he always tells her that he is too old for her and that she should leave him and to look for somebody younger.
Kevin’s mother, Angela, suffers from Alzheimer’s disease and she is at a mental institution. Kevin visits her regularly and they have these surreal and funny conversations where there’s no connection between what Kevin says and what she replies. (The story does not laugh at Alzheimer’s disease: Angela is presented as a sweet and funny character in a sweet and tender way).
Kevic has such a hectic life. And he often dreams on changing things. He always wanted for himself something different than just running his father’s old restaurant. He feels time is running away fast and he should do something about it. So one night, after all the clients are gone, he tells Jacob that he wants to sell the restaurant. It’s a tense conversation.
During the conversation, Jacob tells his son something he doesn’t know. Kevin knows that the relationship between Jacob and Angela when they were young was highly problematic for their respective families. Jacob is Jew and Angela is catholic so their families were opposed to their relationship as both families were very conservative and religious. But Jacob and Angela loved each other so much that they broke with their families, opened the restaurant and went on with life by themselves. What Kevin does not know is that Jacob and Angela never really got married, as he had always thought.
So Jacob tells Kevin that he has a last dream in his life: he wants to marry Angela. Kevin considers that absurd and impossible, as her mother would never realize what is going on due to her disease. But Jacob tells him he wants to do it anyway because he always promised Angela that someday they’d marry.
Jacob offers Kevin a deal. Kevin will help his father to marry her mother and, then, he will sell the restaurant without his father’s opposition.
That same night, when Kevin arrives to his apartment, he suffers a heart attack.
As he is staying at the intensive care unit, Kevin has time to think about his life and decide what he wants to do with it before it’s too late. He takes some decisions…
First day out of the hospital, Kevin sees Anne and breaks up with her. He tells Anna that he is tired of their relationship and that he wants more freedom. But it’s not true. He just wants to force Anna to forget about him and find someone of her age. Kevin leaves Anne crying heart-broken.
He also sees his daughter, Vicky. And he tells her that she can go on with her gothic boyfriend and even bring him home for dinner (what she does, in a very comedic sequence where Kevin tries to connect with the strange boy).
And he also tells his father that he will help him to marry his mother.
In those days, somebody reappears in Kevin’s life. A client at the restaurant identifies himself as Bob (P.Giamatti), Kevin’s best friend during childhood days. Bob has returned to the neighborhood after more than 20 years away. Bob is a professional actor. He has been working on tv series in Hollywood always playing minor comedic characters. Bob is a funny, always cheerful and humoristic person. Kevin and Bob retake their old friendship and spend time together.
Kevin soon realizes that the Church is being unsupportive with the wedding plans. No priest will accept to marry an elder woman with Alzheimer’s disease that cannot even recognize Jacob or Kevin.
One night, Kevin and Bob have drunk too much. And, in the most natural way, Bob tells Kevin his real story: he has returned to the old neighborhood and abandoned his acting career right after his loving wife and only daughter both died in a car accident. ‘Then, why do you always look in such a happy mood?’, asks him Kevin, so shocked. ‘Well’, says Bob, ‘Life is a big shit so the best thing I can do is just laugh at it while time passes...’
At that moment, Kevin has an idea…
The beautiful wedding ceremony between Jacob and Angela takes place at the institution where she is. Patients are the guests. Vicky and her strange boyfriend are there too. Angela does not know what’s going on but she looks great in her wedding dress. And Jacob is so happy. And who is the priest? No other than Bob, making his best and last acting work.
Kevin will never tell his father that Bob wasn’t a real priest. After all, Jacob’s dream has come true.
After the wedding, we know that Kevin has finally sold the restaurant. He is moving to New Mexico, where he plans to begin a new life, buying a farm and raising horses.
He visits Anne. And he tells her that he lied to her. He loves her. He wants her to move with him to New Mexico. Anna says: ‘You are crazy…’ both crying and laughing. And she finally accepts.
Last time we see Kevin he is having a farewell dinner at the restaurant with his father, Bob, Vicky and her boyfriend and Anne… Bob makes a toast: ‘To life and all the surprises hidden in it!’, he says. ‘To life!’, answer all, rising their glasses of wine.
Stark’s Comment:
For the good: James Bradley is simply a master writing these adult comedies full of intelligent sense of humor. His fans have always support them. And it will be interesting watching Stiller playing a more serious and adult character than usual.
For the bad: Dialogues-based movies – no matter how clever or ingenious those dialogues may be - always have difficulties at CMP.
Behind The Scenes:
-This is the second time that Ben Stiller directs a movie in CMP. The first movie, the comedy ‘Eureka!’, was a box office’s disaster back in Season 4.
-Paul Giamatti works in a Bradley’s story for the sixth time. Giamatti has won two Golden Moon Awards thanks to his works with Bradley.
-Bradley has stated that he chose Abbie Cornish to play Stiller’s girlfriend after watching ‘Sunshine On Lonely Street’. He had never heard of Cornish before he saw her in that movie.
-Emma Stone shot all his sequences in the movie in a row because she had to join the shootage of the upcoming ‘Housatlantavegas’.
MEGA MAN
Action / Sci-Fi
The Cast: Taylor Lautner, Christopher Walken, Jean Reno, Jesse Eisenberg, Saoirse Ronan
The Director: Renny Harlin
The Screenwriter: Josh Collins
The Plot:
Mega Man follows the adventure of a young robot, Rock (T.Lautner), originally built by Dr. Light (J. Reno) to be a house cleaning robot. but when Dr. Light's lab and the world is threatened by the evil mad scientist Dr. Wiley (C. Walken) and his army of robots, Dr. Light can't help but feel responsible for the havoc. Wiley and Light were once partners working on projects to build robots that would make their scientific research easier by doing things a human scientist wouldn't be able to do without help. The Prototype, Protoman (J. Eisenberg) was their first successful bot. Rock was the second and Roll (S. Ronan), Rock's sister was the third. Protoman displayed human characteristics and intelligence that led him to escape the laboratory and wander the world on his own.
Dr. Light dismissed Dr. Wiley from his lab, fearing Wiley had become mad with jealousy about Light getting all the credit for building the next several robots, even getting a Nobel Prize.
Wiley broke into the lab and reprogrammed the machines and stole them all (Cut Man, Ice Man, Guts Man, Bomb Man, Fire Man, Elec Man) he also build other small armies of evil robots to carry out his dastardly deeds.
Dr. Light programmed Rock to fend off Dr. Wiley's attacks on the world, dubbing Rock as Mega Man aka the Blue Bomber. While Rock takes out the bad guys, Dr. Light remains in the lab with Roll and the two build things that would aid Rock.
It all comes to the showdown in Dr. Wiley's skull castle, where he uses his biggest robotic achievement. It is apparent that Rock can't stop Wiley alone and just when all hope is lost, Protoman makes a rescue and helps take out Wiley, but before any major damage is done, Wiley escapes and before Rock can speak to the mysterious savior, Protoman disappears. The world is safe.....for now.
Stark’s Comment:
For the good: Another game adaptation from Collins after the amazing success of ‘Metroid’. This one is more oriented to children than that one. But if ‘Metroid’ broke records, why not this one?
For the bad: Children are always unpredictable. They may love a movie or ignore it without any specific reason.
Behind The Scenes:
-This movie was planned as another reunion of Emile Hirsh and Jamie Bell after ‘The Beatles’ and ‘Kavalier & Clay’. But both stars refused the offer as they were not interested in making this kind of movie at this point of their careers in CMP. Taylor Lautner and Jesse Eisenberg replaced them.
-Josh Collins wanted Bryan Singer to direct the movie. But Singer was busy working on the pre-production of the new Silver Sable’s movie and refused the offer.
-Taylor Lautner makes his debut in CMP with this movie.
DRAGONLANCE: DRAGONS OF WINTER NIGHT: Most of the members of the cast from the
first Dragonlance movie are back in this second installment of the saga directed again by Guillermo Del Toro. Among them, we will see familiar faces like Ewan McGregor, Brendan Fraser, Chris Evans or Dakota Fanning, returning to CMP after being nominated as Best Supporting Actress past Season for her work in ‘Prison Letters’.NEW WORLD II: HEROES OF THE REBELLION: Dakota was also seen past Season in the first movie of this saga. But she is not returning in this second episode. Some stars who will return are Patrick Stewart and Gary Oldman. And also, as he usually does in most of his movies, John Daws will make again a cameo in this sequel the same way he did in the first one.
IT’S JUST NOT WORKING OUT: Merryl Streep, seen past Season playing a minor role in ‘The
Orphanage’, will also play a supporting role in this romantic comedy being directed by James L. Brooks. She will play Cameron Diaz’s mother. And Vince Vaughn will play the guy that may marry Cameron if Jason Bateman doesn’t make something to avoid it. Vaughn’s voice could be heard this Season in the controversial animated feature ‘Toons’.PINOCCHIO’S TERROR: The secret is finally revealed. Yes, Pinocchio is the classic animated character chosen by Matt Kubrick to completely change our view of him, same way he did with Peter Pan in ‘Cursed Neverland’. Kubrick’s friend, Alexander Aja, is going to direct this horror movie that will turn poor Pinocchio into an evil killer. This is the fourth time that Kubrick and Aja team up under the ‘Midnight Movies’ label after ‘Wild Cards: Ace In The Hole’, ‘Silent Night, Deadly Night’ and ‘Bedtime Stories’.
SALINTOLOGY: This project was also announced at CMP’s blog some weeks ago. Josh Collins
has decided to take to the big screen the popular Tina Fey’s parodic impression of Sarah Palin. Fey will play Para Salin (so we have here ‘salintology’ instead of ‘palintology’), a woman that accidentally becomes US President. Kevin Smith has accepted to direct this political satire in what will be his second work for CMP after the disappointing experience of ‘Crime Stoppers’.MOUSE GUARD: First members of the cast of voices of this animated feature written by Dawson Edwards and directed by Joe Carnahan known: Dominic West (who has worked before with Edwards in ‘Aquaman’ and ‘Ms. Jordon’); Hugh Laurie (also seen in Edwards’ movies like ‘The Killing Run’ and ‘The Secret People’); Anton Yelchin (recently seen in Edwards’ ‘Packing Up London’); and Kiefer Sutherland, whose voice was already heard this Season in the megahit ‘Metroid’.
DARK THEY WERE, AND GOLDEN EYED: Two young stars play Mathew Fox’s kids in this
adaptation of a Ray Bradbury’s short story written by Chad Taylor and being directed by Jack Bender: Jake T. Austin, who made his debut in CMP with the successful comedy ‘Being Ben Stiller’; and Chloe Moretz, seen past Season in the Josh Collins’ drama ‘Fictitious Images’. Maria Bello will play their mother. Bello had only been seen before in CMP playing Jim Carrey’s wife in the drama directed by Robert Redford, ‘A Standing Eight’.HOUSTATLANTAVEGAS: Two veterans play supporting roles in this wild comedy starred by Adam Brody and Emma Stone and being directed by Todd Philips: Thomas Haden Church, not seen in CMP since ‘Bedtime Stories 2’; and John C. McGinley, whose only previous work for the Studio was in ‘Yogi Bear’.
MALCOLM MANBOOBS: Green light for one of the first releases of Season 16. Josh Collins has
written this most peculiar comedy about a boy with… let’s say, a ‘generous’ size of chest. Jared Hess, better known as the director of ‘Napoleon Dynamite’, will be behind the cameras. And Malcolm will be played by Spencer Breslin, Abigail’s brother, who also starred for CMP the peculiar and successful comedy ‘Borgel’, among other works.JUSTICE LEAGUE 2: Mark Strong, only seen before in the flopped ‘Kingdom: The Dark And The Light’, will have another chance to find room for him at CMP’s world playing here the villainous mastermind Sinestro, who used to be the mentor of Green Lantern, one of the bunch of villains to be seen in this movie.
JAMES BRADLEY – ‘SON OF THE BRIDE’
After the disappointing experience of ‘Game Of Truth’, James Bradley returns this week with another one of his adult comedies. ‘Son Of The Bride’, a remake of a movie made in Argentina, tells the story of a man that has to come true his own parents’ last wish: getting married. A sentimental movie starred and directed by Ben Stiller.
1.Past Season, you wrote a remake of an Spanish movie, ‘The Orphanage’. Now it’s the turn for an Argentinian movie… It seems like you are a big fan of non-American movies.
Not really. The best movies usually come from Hollywood. But there are hidden gems made in other places that should be discovered by American audiences and a remake is a good way to help some great stories reaching wider audiences. The original ‘Son Of The Bride’ is a wonderful comedy, a very intelligent and tremendously funny movie full of brilliant dialogues. It fought for the Best Foreign Film at the Academy Awards back in 2001. It tells a universal story about family relationships and how we should commit with the people we love that can be easily placed in any society. So I just decided to take that story to the US.
2.Why did you choose Ben Stiller to star this adult comedy?
I think Stiller can be both a goofy comedian but also a mature comedy actor playing more adult and serious characters. We know him better for his wild comedies but from time to time he shows that other and more mature side and I wanted him to explore those acting skills in this movie. He got so involved in the project that he also decided to direct it. He makes a great work playing that man in his 40s trying to decide what he wants to do with the rest of his life after suffering a heart attack.
3.How was it working with Lauren Bacall?
Just great! You don’t have the chance to work with a Hollywood’s legend too often… Lauren’s character was such a challenge. She is a woman suffering Alzheimer’s disease. She has lost contact with reality. But she is a very funny character, not a sad one. So she had to be funny and to make audiences laugh but, at the same time, it couldn’t be as if we were laughing at her. Audiences are expected to laugh ‘with’ her and not ‘at’ her. To make that possible, we needed a wonderful actress and Lauren Bacall is. She is one of the very few icons of the golden days of Hollywood still alive and it was such a honor to have her in the movie.
4.You are a specialist in creating female characters in CMP. Not this time, but usually, it seems like you prefer stories starred by women than by men.
As I always say, I love women, yes… *laughs* Well, I think that all CMP’s authors have a tendency to specialized in something after being some Seasons around. We have great writers of sci-fi, superheroes movies, game adaptations, drama, horror… So I had to look for my own niche. I don’t know anything about superheroes or comics and I don’t play console games… so what could I do to be a bit different from the rest? Female characters! I like writing comedies and dramas and those are genres where you have the chance to create good female characters. I feel very comfortable working with actresses and trying to build up good stories starred by women.
5.What stories can we expect from you in the near future?
I have a good story about future movies and those coincidences that happen
from time to time with CMP’s movies. I’ve been working on an adaptation of ‘Pride and Prejudice and Zombies’, the very peculiar novel by Seth Grahame-Smith. Once I had written the screenplay, I was looking for the right actress to star it. First, I thought of Scarlet Johansson. But then I decided that Natalie Portman would be a better choice. Well, you know what? Right after I decided that, I was looking at internet. I was absolutely shocked when I found this news: Natalie Portman had been planning to star a big screen version of the novel. But finally it seemed like Scarlet Johansson was going to replace her. I had no idea of that when I considered both! I told Harry Stark about the coincidence and he told me to go on with my pitch anyway. Isn’t it an amazing coincidence?CMP’s MOST MEMORABLE SEQUENCES
History of cinema is not only made of movies but also of specific sequences. After 4 years and more than 425 movies released, CMP has left quite a bunch of memorable moments in the memory of moviegoers. To celebrate CMP’s fourth anniversary, this week we take a look at some of those sequences from CMP’s movies that have directly entered in the history of cinema. This is not a list of the best CMP’s movies but just of those sequences that, months or even years after the release of the movie, are still alive in our memory.
HITMAN: TWO WAYS TO DIE
Season 3
Tony Scott / John Daws
The sequence:
Hitman (Colin Farrell) finds her beloved Lisa (Keira Knightley) after she has been wildly tortured by Gary Oldman. To avoid her more suffering, Hitman decides to shoot her and kill her.
The comment:
Probably, the most brutal sequence ever seen in a CMP’s movie. Never before, we had seen the hero of a movie killing his own lover. It was the most terrible act of love ever seen on a movie screen.
FEAR THE DARKNESS
Season 1
Wes Craven / Matt Kubrick
The sequence:
Darkman (Benicio Del Toro) appears on screen for the first time. He looks with his bloody eyes to a scared Dakota Fanning and he whispers at her ‘I am not your friend’.
The comment:
This sequence meant the birth of a horror icon in CMP, Darkman, seen later in quite a few sequels. A pioneer and icon of CMP’s horror movies. His words – ‘I am not your friend’ – became the tagline that identifies the Darkman’s saga.
DREAM OF A KING
Season 6
Spike Lee / Josh Collins
The sequence:
All the final montage of images at the end of the movie, mixing Luther King’s ‘I’ve been to the mountain top’ speech with the images of his assassination.
The comment:
An epic, dramatic and highly emotional sequence masterly edited, mixing different moments of MLK’s life to end up with his assassination.
MAN IN THE MIRROR
Season 6
Wes Anderson / James Bradley
The sequence:
Amy (Kate Winslet) is so obsessed with the problems that Jack (Paul Giamatti) is creating her that she comes out of the changing room of her gym and walks through the exercise room without noticing she is naked.
The comment:
One of the funniest sequences in CMP’s history. Everybody at the gym is looking at Kate Winslet naked and she keeps walking wondering why everyone is looking at her.
STAR WARS: BALANCE OF THE FORCE
Season 5
Lawrence Kasdan / Marcus Trax
The sequence:
Darvin Skywalker (Tobey Maguire) has a final duel with his sister Lana (Catherine Z. Jones) trying to bring her back from the Dark Side of the Force.
The comment:
This duel between the Skywalker siblings has become as iconic in the Star Wars universe as the duel in which Darth Vader told Luke he was his father in ‘The Empire Strikes Back’.
WESTWORLD
Season 3
Michael Bay / Steve Connors
The sequence:
David Duchovny meets for the first time the clone of Lara Croft (Angelina Jolie) in the futuristic theme park full of clones of iconic movie characters. We see a short cut of Angelina’s eyes opening. As soon as she looks at the camera, we realize there’s something wrong: that Lara Croft is not a heroine but a villain.
The comment:
A powerful short cut of Angelina’s eyes. And a wonderful look from her. Her eyes tell everything about the character not needing words to explain anything else.
SECRET SINS
Season 14
Joey Stark / Joey Stark
The sequence:
Emily (Natalie Portman) is at the changing room of a clothes store. A masked man comes in and they have wild sex. She thinks that the man is her lover, Ed (Jude Law). Later, she will discover the man was an unknown.
The comment:
This is probably the wildest sex sequence ever seen in a CMP’s movie. It was highly controversial as some critics considered immoral that Natalie seemed to be enjoying a rape.
MS. JORDON
Season 13
Tom Hanks / Dawson Edwards
The sequence:
Cleveland (Edward Norton) and Thelma (Cameron Diaz) have sex in a car the first night they’ve met.
The comment:
Another one of the best sex sequences seen in a CMP’s movie. This one is not controversial. It is simply (and extremely) hot.
HAIGHT-ASHBURY
Season 9
Oliver Stone / Richard Franzwa
The sequence:
Jeremy Sumpter leaves San Francisco at the end of the movie while we see how his girlfriend Emma Roberts is left behind turned into a drug addict. ‘The Beat Goes On’, by Sonny and Cher, begins to play.
The comment:
That final sequence perfectly summarizes what the 60s meant in a most melancholy and sentimental way.
JOHN AND TOMMIE
Season 12
Will Smith / Chad Taylor
The sequence:
John (Anthony McKie) and Tommie (Derek Luke) are on the podium at the Olympics and both rise their fists.
The comment:
All the meaning of what they did is understood just watching this powerful sequence when we see in a short cut how their fists rise at a slight slow motion.
Ben Stiller showed up with a different look at the premiere of his newest movie, ‘Son Of The Bride’. And he had a wonderful company: the two beautiful young talents of the cast, Abbie Cornish and Emma Stone. In the movie, Abbie plays Stiller’s girlfriend and Stone plays his daughter.
Vorhees will be back. Some of you may still remember the two movies based on the ‘Friday, the 13th’ character developed by Matt Kubrick during the first CMP’s seasons. ‘Vorhees: The Early Years’ made a pretty good box office. The flop of its sequel, ‘Vorhees: The Bloody Years’, interrupted this revamp of Jason Vorhees’ evil adventures. Well, it seems like now Kubrick will give good old Jason another chance soon. But this time he won’t be coming alone. Another icon of the horror genre will share the screen with Jason in this upcoming production.And another duel is coming up soon too. The third installment of ‘The Resurrected’, the trilogy starred by Joseph Gordon-Levitt following the saga that begun with ‘The Heirs’, will also hit the screens soon. Chad Taylor has got personally involved in the marketing campaign of this third movie. He has asked the people from CMP’s Marketing Department to design the promotion of this movie with a very specific message: the story has to be presented as a kind of final duel between the characters played by Gordon-Levitt and Robert Pattinson.
Do you remember ‘Daughters Of The Dragon’? It was a comic adaptation directed by McG in
Season 12, written by Joey Stark and starred by Cameron Diaz and Halle Berry. The movie was ripped off by critics but it made an outstanding box office of 183 millions. For so long, Joey Stark had kept stating that he was not interested in writing a sequel of it. But it seems like he has finally changed his mind (or maybe his greedy big brother has obliged him to change it considering that a sequel would make again nice profits). The fact is that Joey has announced that he has started working in a sequel ‘to put an end to the plotlines that remained open at the end of the first movie’.Past week, Steve Connors mentioned at his ‘5 Questions’ interview that he has already sent to Harry Stark a couple of drafts of screenplay for the sequel of his blockbuster ‘Invasion’. Well, according to my CMP’s deep throats, things are being much worse than that. Harry Stark is pretty worried as Connors keeps sending changes in the screenplay although the Studio is planning to green light the movie during the first weeks of Season 16. If Connors does not decide to stop introducing new changes in the story, the whole release schedule of the next Season should have to be changed. And that can make Mr. Stark really mad…
And I end up with a curiosity… Who are the most demanded talents lately by CMP’s authors to be
in their movies? Well, four names can be placed on top of the list. And you may be surprised. Emma Stone, Cobie Smulders, James Franco and Ryan Reynolds are the four talents that have had to reject some offers lately because their busy agendas didn’t allow them to be in all the projects they were offered. It seems like a new generation of stars is beginning to rule CMP’s world lately.
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