Seriously, who asked for a sequel to 1999's House on Haunted Hill. I saw that when I was 15 and didn't actually find it too bad - although I haven't watch it since so who knows - but, really? Return to House on Haunted Hill. The title isn't even grammatically correct.
But, if you are interested and want to know it stars, well you're in for a treat! They managed to rope in some pretty big names. Observe:
Amanda Righetti - She was in some episodes of The OC. She had the hots for Ryan, if memory serves!
Erik Palladino - He was in Road Kill! But not the surprisingly good Road Kill with Paul Walker, Steve Zahn and Helen Hunt Leelee Sobieski, so really what's the point?
Cerina Vincent - If I'm remember correctly, she played the chick who had an, erm, interesting moment with a leg razor in Cabin Fever. SHE'S PRACTICALLY A SUPERSTAR!
Tom Riley - I imagine this guy is hoping Return to House on Haunted Hill is his big break!
Andrew Lee Potts - There is nothing remotely interesting about this guy's resume. He was on an episode of Heartbeat once!
Steven Pacey - He was on an episode of a show called M.I.T. - Murder Investigation Team a show that was surely not even in the slightest inspired by C.S.I. - Crime Scene Investigation. Not at all. Not one tiny bit.
Jeffrey Combs - The one cast-member with the possibility of being known... BY NAME!!! He's been of shows like Enterprise, The 4400, Justice League and Deep Space Nine and was in movies like Re-Animator and I Still Know What You Did Last Summer. He even played Montgomery Clift in a TV movie called Norma Jean and Marilyn and was in the cast of the unfortunately-canned TV series of The Net - that fantastically ridiculous Sandra Bullock internet thriller.
It turns out that Combs' character appeared in the original movie as well, making him the only one from the 1999 film to return. No Geoffrey Rush, Famke Janssen, Ali Larter, Peter Gallagher or Taye Diggs in this one. Although some of the movies Ali Larter made in the time between bouts of fame look like dogs. She played "Fardart" in National Lampoon's Homo Erectus. Uh-huh. I have no doubt she's be up for another round of house hauntings if it weren't for her role on Heroes. They could easily come up with a ridiculous excuse to have her character return to the house, surely.
Okay, it's sort of sad that us Australian Idol watchers ever got sucked into judge Mark Holdon's ridiculous "TOUCHDOWN!" flimajimjamwoozoowazzleboobedeeboop that he started in season one of the show, but it has gotten to the stage where every touchdown is met with, mostly, curious bewilderment. I mean, two touchdowns for Jennifer Connolly in three episodes? And one for the Pirate (my guess is eventually he'll wear an eye patch and the illusion will be complete) for what amountd to nothing more than "I Was Made For Loving You" slowed down to within an inch of it's life.
BUT last night - the same night that Jennifer Connolly got possibly the worst and least deserving touchdown in the show's history for a vague performance of "Bittersweet Symphony" - there was a performance that tore the house (er, the studio) down and that thankfully received one of Holdon's touchdowns. As Scott over at Scott To Be Certain makes us aware (if you even casually watch Idol read that blog, it's freakin' hilarious honey dahling girlfriend) it was the only touchdown this year that could compare with the best (Cosima's "When the War is Over", Anthony's "The Prayer") and is one of the most blatantly emotional performances since Guy Sebastian's "Climb Every Mountain" or Casey Donovan's "Here's Where I Stand".
We all know Tarisai Vushe Williams Shaggy Dog Jackson Effie Hudson Honey Dahling Sister Girlfriend is basically channeling God whenever she performs at the worst of times (so much so that when she goes to speak normally she seems positively exhausted) but last night she was, quite frankly, eating the soul of Jesus on stage. If that's offensive or blasphemous to you then just watch the performance below.
To quote Mark Holdon (that's a rare thing, indeed), who last night outdid himself by wearing a diagonal zip-down martian funeral outfit: Yowza! Yowza! Yowza!
Also, Question of the Week: How many anal sex, blowjob, semen and penis jokes can the hosts James and Andrew get into their banter when it relates to ProActive Ben Mackenzie? Because, honey sister dahling girlfriend preacher baby love sweetiepie, the kid is 17 and it's icky and incredibly uncomfortable. Give it a rest and start picking on Jennifer Connolly and her beehive of a hairdo.
Justice has been served. Jacob Butler is no longer forcing his grotesque and ridiculously over-the-top singing and dancing style upon our horrified eyes and ears. I'm sure he's gonna go home and whinge about how nobody likes him and how people are big giant meanieheads blah blah blah. Now, if only his murdering of several quite good songs wasn't etched into my memory. Yikes.
So, the ABC and Chris Lilley (creator, writer and star of Summer Heights High) have to appolise because a joke on their show offended the parents of a girl who died from a drug overdose? A joke that was written and filmed before the girl overdosed? From NineMSN:
The ABC has been forced to make an embarrassing apology to the family of Annabel Catt — the woman who died from an drug overdose last year — after it aired a comedy with a similar storyline and character.
Comedian Chris Lilley's popular Summer Heights High this week featured a schoolgirl named Annabel who died of a drug overdose.
ABC Managing Director Mark Scott today apologised to the Catt family, saying the blunder was an "unfortunate coincidence" and not meant to make reference to real-life tragedy in any way.
"We apologise that this has caused further distress to the family," Mr Scott said in a statement.
"In hindsight, we feel we should have alerted the Catt family to the situation in advance of the broadcast."
Annabel Catt died in February after she took a lethal dose of paramethoxyamphetamine (PMA) at a music festival on the Gold Coast.
In an episode Summer Heights High screened on Wednesday night, a character named Annabel Dickson dies of an ecstasy overdose.
She is later referred to as a "slut" by a drama teacher Greg Gregson, played by Lilley.
Mr Scott said the decision to use the name 'Annabel' was made some time before the Catt tragedy occurred.
"Eleven days after the production had been completed Annabel Catt's tragic death occurred on February 18," he said.
Mr Scott has refused to pull the remaining episodes of Summer Heights High despite continuing references to the character.
Although I'm curious as to when this girl died. Was it "last year" or "February 18"? Because I doubt filming of the series has been finished since February 2006! I mean, it's sad for the family that this coincidence brings up memories, but jesus christ, if every network had to apologise to families for similaties in storylines then 90% of drama series on right now would be having to do it. It's why they have that disclaimer at the end. Ugh. If Lilley had named the character "Rebecca" I sure we'd have another family coming out of the woodworks saying the same thing.
By the way, Summer Heights High is amazing and brilliant (and most definitely not, to quote Mr G, a "bummer heights high").
The Emmys were, as usual, a waste of time. Thankfully channel 10 down here edited it down into a convenient one-and-a-half hour package as opposed to the usual three hour monstrosity. I used to like the Emmys, but not anymore. The main reason being, essentially, that I don't watch any of the shows nominated and the shows I do watch are almost routinely ignored - although Heroes and Ugly Betty were in the race this year and Kyra Sedgwick was nominated, but other than that? I don't watch The Sopranos, The Office, House, 30 Rock (it's not even screened down here), Entourage, Two and a Half Men (does anybody watch this? I can't fathom how it even gets nominated year after year), Lost and while I do watch Grey's Anatomy by the third season finale I had grown to sort of hate it and I'm not sure if I will continue watching it.
But, curious observation: The eight acting awards (two lead and two supporting categories for both comedy and drama) all went to people from eight different shows. And of the eight shows that won acting awards none of them won the Emmy top honour of Best Drama or Best Comedy - The Sopranos and 30 Rock didn't win any acting awards.
And then even curiouser and curiouser, if you check out the extremely incredibly incomprehensively long list of winners the Emmy for "Best Casting in a Drama Series" went to... Friday Night Lights! A show that was neither nominated for Best Drama Series, nor even nominated for any acting categories. Apparently Friday Night Lights is good? It's not screened in Australia, but I doubt I would watch it - I'm allergic to American football. At least Ugly Betty, which won Best Actress in a Comedy for America Ferrara, won Best Casting in a Comedy Series.
Speaking of the cast of Ugly Betty, doesn't it boggle your mind that an awards group who bestowed Emmy upon Emmy to the supporting casts of Will & Grace and Everybody Loves Raymond didn't fall absolutely head-over-heals for the supporting cast of Ugly Betty. Hello! Betty is, like, the least interesting part of that show - it's all about Mark, Amanda, Wilhemina, Hilda and Justin thank you very much. Two and a Half Men gets two Supporting Acress in a Comedy nominations and Ugly Betty only gets one(!!) Christ.
Also, way to go on Kathy Griffin winning an Emmy, and also to the South Park people, winning for Best Animated Program.
So, in conclusion, the Emmys are stupid and a waste of time. Bring on the Golden Globes and then the Academy Awards! eeeee!
His name is Jacob Butler and he is a contestant (read: he's there for the prizes, not the music) on the fifth and current season of Australian Idol. This man has previously disgraced our screens on the disaster that was Australia's version of X Factor. He's a serial talent show pest, having made the top 100 of Idol in 2005, the same year as his X Factor experience. He's obviously been trying to become a professional singer for quite some time (so much so that he aged five years in the two years since X Factor, hmmm). He's also worked overseas but, as his profile tells us, that fell flat on it's face.
So, obviously, his career has gone nowhere and so he just continues to enter these competitions hoping that his chubby cheeks will make him instantly famous. He's an attention seeking fame-hungry whore. His performances on Idol are so overdone that they actually split apart and form a parallel universe where they become good, but then they implode and form a blackhole that sucks inside everything that is good and right with the world because that's how much of a talent vacuum he is. He does these ridiculous faux-hardcore dancemoves (mid air scissor kicks! falling over on stage!) while wearing stupid outfits (a button-up wool jacket with a shirt and tie on rock night?) Dicko was entirely right when he said he'd be laughed off stage in the real world. I can't stand to watch him whenever he's on screen. He repulses me.
Also, his hair is gross.
He seems to at least have accepted that his mere modicum of talent won't make him famous and instead needs a television reality program to do it. He relishes the sound of applause, yet when a judge actually critises him he looks like he'll chuck a tanty - hi Courtney from season two! I hated you as well! So my wish is that people will realise all Jacob is is filling his desire for fame and fortune and doesn't deserve to be on there anymore.
Besides, you just know that if he does win Australian Idol he'll be forgotten about within a week because he's so unspectacular and hasn't got anything distinguishable about him whatsoever.
I didn't make this, my friend Jo did, but it's funny non?
Let it be forever known, Sunday the 17th of August was the worst night on Australian Idol ever. So very true. Scott to be Certain has the low down. The low, low, low, very low pathetically low down. Ugh. Tarisai to the rescue!
Awards Daily has the poster for Francis Ford Coppola's "comeback" Youth Without Youth, which you can view to the left there. The best thing about it is the title design. But, what's with all the roses lately?
Somebody tell Sarah Michelle Gellar to fire her agent, stat!
Apparently the Emmys were on yesterday? These are such a non-event these days in Australia (the programs rate even worse here than in America, The Sopranos and The Office are on at Midnight!) that the telecast is being edited to an hour and a half and being screened at some ridiculous time like 10.30pm after Californication. As long as they never do that for the Academy Awards and the Golden Globes then I won't give a hoot.
Somebody's decided to make a list of the Top 100 Actors who are still breathing and demanding bowls of green m&ms for their dressing room. It's to be updated yearly and whenever someone carks it and die they get booted off! How lovely. It's like Australian Idol or something. For the record #100 is Susan Sarandon. Whoever it is that has done this list has done the annoying thing of ranking upwards! Ugh. How silly. Still, it's sort of fascinating if not also an entire load of wank.
Lastly, the William Wyler blog-a-thon is on this coming weekend over at GoatDogBlog. I haven't seen enough Wyler movies if you ask me, but I do love lovelove the ones that I have.
Tonight is the night. In exactly seven hours Ja'mie King returns to Australian television screens in Summer Heights High, the latest documentary from Chris Lilley. King last appeared on We Can Be Heroes, which followed several Australians who were vying for the title Australian of the Year. In the two years since that documentary ended she has moved up to year 11 and is in a student exchange program with Summer Heights High. The documentary follows Ja'mie as she tries to bring her personal charm to the school. It also follows drama teacher Mr G, star of Tsunamarama - the tale of the Boxing Day tsunami set to the musical beats of Banarama - and Tongan trouble maker Jonah Takalua.
In the meantime let us experience the Ja'mie by viewing some of her finer moments from We Can Be Heroes including her wall of African sponsor kids, her school assembly dance for recognition, fugly lesbians, should make-up be allowed in school, her similarities to Jesus ("I'm a hot Jesus! Jesus was so ugly, seriously!") and her basic general hotness. Enjoy (because you will).
Hi folks, Glenn here. I thought I'd get back to doing group music posts like this instead of multiple entries about how awesome the new Sugababes/Girls Aloud/Robyn songs are (even though they totally deserve their own entries, but whatev).
First up on the agenda is Delta Goodrem. Delta and I have a troubled history. Could I hate "Born to Try" any more? Perhaps, but I do really dislike that song. I'm not that big a fan of stuff like "Almost Here" and such, but then she also has some amazing songs like "Mistaken Identity", "Out of the Blue", "Will You Fall For Me" and such. So it was with bated optimism that I listened to her new song "In This Life" on her MySpace profile and it's quite good. The chorus is particularly stunning. If this is an indication of her new album (which apparently has a fresher sound? You see she's not suffering from cancer anymore so she can be light and fun but definitely not when she had cancer. No way. cause "Out Of The Blue" was all doom and gloom?) Here's hoping the album is alright. Still, how will she ever beat "Mistaken Identity"?
Moving on to The Veronicas (we have a very Australian theme tonight, don't we gals and gents?) who had dumped the guitars from there quite great debut album The Secret Life Of... and have jumped onto the '80s synth bandwagon with their new track "Hook Me Up" (available on iTunes folks). It's really quite great. We know that Adem at I'm Always Right (a fellow Geelongian btw) loves it. It's no "4ever" or even "Revolution", but it's better than quite a few of the previous album's non-singles. I whole-heartedly nod my head in appreciation. Shame about the terrible single sleeve though.
Moving on to Australian Idol, which I have begrudgingly been watching this year because there is nothing else on television. There's seriously maybe two other shows I need to watch every week. So far this year's season has been sorta lame with a whole lot of acoustic guitar playing by solumb sensitive guys who wear scarves and skinny-leg jeans and a lot of acoustic guitar playing by solumb girls with straight hair and who wear cute white/off-white tops and sing in whispered tones and sound a little like Jewel. Standout Husni - who was like some weird extra terrestrial combination of Prince, George Michael, Madonna and Diana Ross (he's not camp at all) wasn't voted into the final 12, but that Corby kid has and he'll be there until the end because the teeny girls wanna lose their virginity to him (or they wanna pretend they still have their virginity so they can lose it to him) and Jacob fuckin' Butler who was a part of that other TV singing contest/biggest tv debacle ever X Factor. Yawn. Of the girls that featured last night I loved Tarasai and Cheray.
I won't be discussing Idol much (thankfully) because the best man for the job is already doing so. I speak of anagram-loving Scott at Scott to be Certain. He already has detailed/hilarious commentary on all the episodes as well as a top 20 Idol performances countdown and much more. He's amazing. Unlike Daniel Husnif.
Lastly, have we found the best music video of 2007? Perhaps we have in the form of "If You Keep Losing Sleep" by Silverchair (watch it below on MySpace video, I hope the code works!) It's like the opening scenes of Moulin Rouge! mixed with Rocky Horror Picture Show, some of Tod Browning's Freaks and Robert Palmer's "Addicted to Love". Sound great? It is. Plus, the song is pretty cool too!
Sorry for that incredibly blasphemous title, but that's the first thing that came outta my mouth when I viewed the below video. All you need to know is that it's directed by David Lynch (hence, "Jesus fucking Christ!") Enjoy... er, I guess.
INT. HOSPITAL - DAY HOUSE Whatever could be wrong with this man? Also, I'm grumpy.
NO-NAME DOCTOR #1 Perhaps it's something relatively common and can be treated with panadol.
HOUSE You're an idiot and I hate life.
NO-NAME DOCTOR #2 You've gone too far!
House grumbles to himself and takes two bottles of vicadin.
INT. PATIENT'S ROOM - NIGHT HOUSE I think you have a rare disease found only in the tropical jungles of Machu Pichu.
TEACHER Oh my god!
HOUSE You're delusional and I dislike you.
INT. HOUSE'S OFFICE - NIGHT House listens to opera while swallowing a bottle of pills. NO-NAME DOCTOR #3 enters the room.
NO-NAME DOCTOR #3 What on earth could be wrong with the teacher, House?
HOUSE It's simple, really! I've discovered that he was actually pregnant.
NO-NAME DOCTOR #3 Wow. You're amazing.
HOUSE I hate you.
NO-NAME DOCTOR #3 I quit.
HOUSE How will I ever get out this tricky situation?
House grumbles to himself.
NO-NAME DOCTOR #3 You need to quit the drugs and start being a man! Only then will I consider coming back to work.
House throws the pills in the trash.
NEXT WEEK ON HOUSE: House becomes a drug addict again and must try and solve the mystery illness discovered in a patient while also battling with his clearly idiot staff, but this time... HAS HOUSE GONE TOO FAR? And will be discover the mystery illness in time?! Why ask because you already know the outcome! And if you don't you are obviously a fuckin' moron!
This... thing over at Yahoo! is probably the oddest thing I've read all week (yes, I realise it's only Wednesday!). How can the former star of an axed television series - one that was, unfortunately, barely watched even when it was on air - that was on a network that nobody watched either and who is soon to appear as a narrator in a series, be named the most popular personality on TV? The link on Yahoo's front page (the default page my browser opens to) was all "Who is the Queen of TV?" and it turns out it's Veronica Mars, which is all well and good but Veronica Mars the show isn't on the air anymore.
I still need to see those last few episodes of Veronica Mars. Simon? My trusty provider of all things Veronica? Can you help?!
Also, I realise the reason she is the "Queen of TV" is because she's probably the sexiest woman ever, but that's neither here nor there, okay?
So, the ratings for this year's Australian Big Brother are down on previous years. It's not hard to see why if you've watched the show - It's shit. Pretty much all the girls are the exact same as each other and pretty much all the men are the same as each other. They'll never match those first few seasons where it was amazingly interesting to watch this new concept show. The thing is, if the producers took half as much time casting as they did coming up with new tasks each week the show would be better off for it.
It's not really surprising - but incredibly frustrating - that two of the best housemates throughout the entire seven years have been intruders. If they put the intruders into the house in the first place, instead of half way through the program to boost ratings, it would be so much better. Take this year's Zach. He is adorable! I hadn't watched a single episode of this season until Zach showed up and now I'm secretly watching it at 7pm, even though there's only a week to go and it's still terribly drab in that house. He's just so fun and energetic and hilarious. Plus, he entered the house wearing a corset. Compare that to the six or seven or eight or however many ocker blokes they through in there this year and for the last couple of years. Below is the only clip of Zach available on YouTube and it's of him discussing the great Aussie girlgroup from the early '90s Girlfriend which became GF4 when Robyn Laou left (remember them?!).
Still, Zach has nothing on not only the greatest Australian Big Brother contestant ever but, perhaps, the greatest contestant on Big Brother from any country anywhere on this planet: VESNA
Fuck. she was amazing! She was, naturally, an intruder in the fifth season. She was just twenty million different kinds of greatness. I loved her so much. Of course, she got evicted on the second last day and then the boring ocker twin went on to win. But, whatever, we'll always have Vesna. Below you can watch her discuss colonic irrigations. It's hilarious! And Adem over at I'm Always Right does the occasional "snatchcast" (aka, podcast) with her. Lucky!
So, for next year I may start watching Big Brother again if they have someone half as entertaining as Vesna or Zach. PLEASE! Another intruder I liked was from season 6. Max. He wasn't anything special but I had a bit of a crush on him.
Lastly, just for shits and giggles here is Girlfriend performing "Take It From Me" on Hey Hey It's Saturday. Teehee. Did they steal Blossom's wardrobe? So retro. Yes, that is an ostrich puppet.
Despite my dust up last year with Kris from InContention I still enjoy some of the features of his site. New writer Brian Kingsley has taken on the 'From Page to Screen' feature and the first one is Gone Baby Gone, the new film written and directed by Ben Affleck. I predicted Oscar glory for this movie, but the following quote doesn't exactly fill me with confidence:
As far as awards potential goes, I don’t think we’ll see much. It’ll deserve a lot I imagine, specifically for this script and, given the potential, Casey Affleck, but it’s not an Oscar picture. It’s brutal, it’s scary and it doesn’t scream Oscar (as many contenders this year do) more so than genre. However, this can certainly be a critic’s darling if it rouses the right amount of passion.
We'll see. Might be interesting to see Ben Affleck be a writing nominee again though, hey?
The Age has an article about writer/director Tom Kalin (Swoon) and his new film - the Julianne Moore-starring Savage Grace. I'm seeing this film on August 10 as part of MIFF and I'm excited. The Age also has a roundup of how the Aussies did with the Emmy voters. In one category - Best Supporting Actress in a TV Movie or Miniseries - three of the nominees are Australians! That'd be Judy David, Gretta Scacci, Toni Collette. Plus, Anna Paquin is from New Zealand. We stole Russell Crowe from them... Oh and Rachel Griffiths got nominated too, which was great!
I'm not gonna discuss the Emmy nods because many of the shows aren't even on down here (stuff like 30 Rock) but I'm happy about the multiple nods for Heroes and Ugly Betty - a show I am loving despite it's immense flaws - compared to Grey's Anatomy, which I am falling rapidly out of love with with each and every passing episode because of it's immense flaws. Hmmm. Seriously though, can they just give Kyra Sedgwick the Emmy right now? She owns it. Where was Brothers and Sisters though? I thought the Emmys would eat that show up for a breakfast!
MNPP has a quote of the day from Chris Evans. It's gold and it's all about him being shirtless all the time. Apparently some people think he's "too hairy"! Blasphemy! He's the perfect amount of hairy, thank you very much.
The Hot Blog has the poster for Wes Anderson's upcoming release The Darjeeling Limited. It has a very similar design to The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (below). I've had an up and down history with Wes Anderson. I'm in the minority of Rushmore in that I think it's not very good at all. But then I absolutely love loveloveThe Royal Tenenbaums. The Life Aquatic was somewhere in the middle there. I wonder where Darjeeling will fall when it's released later in 2007. Somebody makes a curious comment in the replies to the entry at The Hot Blog - all three of these actors have distinctive noses. Also, if you look in the credits it also has Anjelica Huston and the costumes are done by Milena Canonero. !!!
Electronic Cerebrectomy discusses the new plans for Michael Moore's possible next documentary - gay rights and the Christian left's inability to be rational. Tricky subject, but Moore can do it justice I think. We need someone like him to get it out there on CNN and not just have some obvious panel of "experts" or something on the sidelines at some fringe festival.
And lastly Dave at Victim of the Time discusses how amazing Six Feet Under is. It wouldn't be my favourite of all time (although it would be top 5 probably along with Twin Peaks, Seinfeld, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and with Sex and the City and Golden Girls battling it out for the final spot) but, those final ten minutes? AMAZING. A few weeks ago there was an interview, in the TV guide that comes with the Herald Sun on Wednesdays, with Rachel Griffiths in which she stated she thought the final ten minutes of Six Feet Under were the finest ten minutes of television in history. I pretty much can't argue with that.
So, naturally, here's the clip! Don't watch it if you intend to watch the entire series (six seasons) some day because it'll ruin everything. If you've seen it already then just... I dunno. Sit there in stunned silence and take it all in. It's stunning. Again - the finest ten minutes ever in the history of television. Don't even try to tell me it's not.
Today was quite a marvellous day for the Australian film industry with the Australian Film Commission's launch of Australian Screen Online, a database for Australian film and television, much like the Internet Movie Database but, obviously, focusing only on Australian product. At the current moment it features 564 titles, amongst them films, television programs, television films, documentaries, newsreel footage and shorts from over the past 100 years of Australian filmmaking with more being added at a regular basis.
Recent titles such as Clubland and Romulus My Father sit next to titles like Lantana (2001), Romper Stomper (1994), The Adventures of Barry McKenzie (1972), Northern Safari (1956) and The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906). The earliest title is, amazingly, a 6 minute short film documenting the 1896 Melbourne Cup horse race! This Clip shows men at the races posing for a photograph, not realising that they are being filmed, not photographed.
Alongside the regular features such as cast and crew lists, plot descriptions and rating information each title will have three clips that can be viewed in the imbedded video program. Some even feature study guides. It's all pretty nifty. Here is what they said at the launch.
The website contains more than 500 moving image clips gathered from the collections of the AFC's partners in australianscreenonline, including the National Film and Sound Archive, The National Archives of Australia, the ABC, SBS and AITSIS (Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies) and from the country's independent production sector.
That figure is expected to grow to more than 2,500 clips by July 2008 and will continue to expand.
Clips from recent Australian films Romulus, My Father and Clubland feature alongside a collection of historical footage that has previously never been freely available to the public.
Works by acclaimed directors Gillian Armstrong, Jane Campion and Phillip Noyce are sampled along with footage of the Snowy Mountain Scheme and film of the first nuclear explosion in Australia.
The aim is that by the time the site is completed it will be a complete resource for Australian films. Of course there are features on the IMDb that aren't on here such as awards, soundtracks and images. But, in the end, the website will prove to be incredibly resourceful. It's definitely a bookmark to keep!
I'm currently watching Victoria Beckham Comes to America and I think I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that it is simply the greatest television experience of all time. The Moon Landing has nothing on this. It's hysterical. I'm not sure why Posh never tried to become a comedian - she's a riot!
It's annoying that I was over David Beckham a couple of years ago and now he's everywhere, but I guess I'll have to be like Mandy Moore and learn how to deal.
Well, in that 1995 romantic comedy Something to Talk About and in things with "Closer" in the title, wouldn't you say? Roberts is good and all in Closer (in fact, she's quite good), but don't you think Kyra Sedgwick in her TV crime show The Closer is very amazing? The second season of The Closer arrived in the main yesterday and it was about bloody time! I think watching the first season for the third time in as many weeks was a bit too much. I just love this show so much.
I'm not too much a fan of procedural crime shows - after a while you can tell where it's going from the opening moments (and I'm sorry CSI fans, but forensic scientists aren't the ones who go out and solve the entire crime, especially interviewing suspects. That's just ludicrous). Even shows like House are like that. But, something about The Closer just reels me in everytime and it's because of the characters more than anything. Kyra's Brenda Leigh Johnson is one of those characters for the history books in my mind. And she is amazing in the role.
I am a fan of puzzle solving. I can't solve them to save my life, but I love seeing others doing it and having all the pieces fall into place and that's just what The Closer is all about. It's the most involving show on TV at the moment along with Heroes, and they both work on completely different levels. (BTW, The Heroes finale? Sort of good, but I think they were going for a Kill Bill, Vol. 2 type of ending, but it just came off as a tad anticlimactic, non?)
I dunno. I've already watched five episodes today. If I go at this pace I'll be done with the entire box set by Sunday.
I haven't discussed JJ Abram's Cloverfield project yet. I was waiting until I saw an official version of the teaser than played before American cinemas showing Transformers. We got jipped - we got trailers for Licence to Wed and Die Hard 4.0. YAWN. Anyway. I had seen it in an unofficial bootleg (as if there's ever an "official bootlet"?) of the teaser and thought it was amazing. Well, today's my (and some of you guys' as well) lucky day as an official teaser has gone up on Apple.
It's really quite incredible. In the bootleg copy I watched I hadn't even noticed all those wild roars off in the background. Nor did I notice the man saying "It's alive! It's huge!" Man, this is good. I love the idea of doing a monster movie completely in handheld camera format. And I also love that it's an original idea (from the sounds of it).
It does have three big cons against, though. First is JJ Abrams, the film's producer. JJ's three television programs, Felicity, Alias and Lost all showed no clear idea (to me, anyway) that he can't structure something beyong maybe 2 seasons. Until he manages to create a great premise (which he's done, three times) and make it work for year after year after year I will continue to see him as so incredibly overrated. Secondly, it's director is some guy called Matt Reeves. His only film directorial role was for that deplorably Ross Gellar movie The Pallbearer. Yikes. He has worked in TV a lot, but nevertheless. Thirdly, it's being released in January. This screams to me as an August release, but oh well. Surely it's got to be better than other January fare like Hostel or White Noise or those Madea movies or whatever they are. Surely. Right?
Also, check out Ja at My New Plaid Pants. He actually likes Lost (Maybe it's just because the show has died in Australia, but I'm shocked to read that many people still put themselves through that show) and he's already blogged a bit about this movie. It'll surely be another of the movies he blogs about obsessively, no?
Glenn is a twentysomething freelance writer from Melbourne, Australia. Apart from this blog he is the film editor for Onya Magazine and writes regularly for Trespass Magazine. His work has appeared in The Big Issue, Encore Magazine, Forte Magazine, The Film Experience Blog and was the film correspondent for The Outland Institute radio program on JOY 94.4.
Stale Popcorn, noun, 1. A veritable cornucopia of movie geekdom, celebrity worship, Australian film discussion and all with occasional musical interludes! All wrapped up in the salty buttery taste of movie popcorn that's been sitting in the box for too long. What's not to love?
Everything that is written on this webpage - Stale Popcorn and any tangents from it - is written by me, Glenn Dunks, unless otherwise stated. It is appreciated that if you wish to reproduce any of that you do so with an appropriate link (please do not copy it all because that gives your reader no reason to come by here and possibly increase my traffic).
If any pictures or music files are posted on Stale Popcorn that are owned by you and wish to be credited for or have removed please feel free to send me an email using one of the addresses at the top of the page. I will gladly oblige.
Jeffrey Combs - The one cast-member with the possibility of being known... BY NAME!!! He's been of shows like Enterprise, The 4400, Justice League and Deep Space Nine and was in movies like Re-Animator and I Still Know What You Did Last Summer. He even played Montgomery Clift in a TV movie called Norma Jean and Marilyn and was in the cast of the unfortunately-canned TV series of The Net - that fantastically ridiculous Sandra Bullock internet thriller.
It turns out that Combs' character appeared in the original movie as well, making him the only one from the 1999 film to return. No Geoffrey Rush, Famke Janssen, Ali Larter, Peter Gallagher or Taye Diggs in this one. Although some of the movies Ali Larter made in the time between bouts of fame look like dogs. She played "Fardart" in National Lampoon's Homo Erectus. Uh-huh. I have no doubt she's be up for another round of house hauntings if it weren't for her role on Heroes. They could easily come up with a ridiculous excuse to have her character return to the house, surely.
