Le Film

The Razzies

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 20:34:00 +0000

This past weekend marked the thirty-second year of The Golden Raspberry Awards also known as The Razzies. The Razzies are a faux award show honoring the worst in film and cinema. For the first time in history one movie has swept the Razzies, winning every award of the night. That movie is Adam Sandler’s Jack And Jill. Adam Sandler also acquired a new record of being the first person to win both the worst male and female role in a film. Rounding out the winnings was Al Pacino winning worst supporting actor, playing himself. Adam Sandler being a co-writer received the award for worst screenplay. Of course the movie also took top honors of the night receiving the award for worst movie of the year.

The reason why Jack And Jill is such an extraordinary movie is due to its reception. Despite the fact that according to The Razzies was the worst film of the year, it did extremely well in theaters. Jack And Jill raked in 74.2 million dollars beating out The Artist which only received 43 million; one small difference is that The artist won 5 Oscars.

Here is a list of some other movies earnings this same year.

Jack And Jill- $74,158,157

The Artist- $43,037,870

The Ides of March- $40,962,534

50/50- $39,187,783

Drive- $35,054,909

It seems that audiences are growing more stagnant with their movie decisions. The common audience wants to see something that they know they are going to like, in this case an Adam Sandler comedy. Audiences are much less willing to invest their ten dollar admission on a movie they are not too sure if they will like. Due to audiences wanting more of the same Hollywood producers will make more of the same movies just to turn around a quick buck instead of striving for something new like 50/50 or Drive.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/02/adam-sandler-razzies-record-sweep_n_1395609.html

Viral

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 03:24:00 +0000

Movies today need something more than just a good storyline to make it in the industry. There is such a big market for movies that they must do something in order to stand out. Some movies decide to come out with viral campaigns in order to boost awareness of their movie. In today’s age of internet and computers a viral campaign is a great way to get the masses excited about a film. The first movie to come out with an elaborate viral campaign was Cloverfield. They decided to create websites and myspace pages for the companies and the main characters of the film. They updated the websites and the myspace pages the day leading up to the movie/monster attack. This type of marketing proved extremely effective. I for one went to go see the movie mainly because of the viral campaign.

The new Spiderman movie coming out decided to use a viral campaign as well. In six cities in the U.S. they scattered backpacks at certain coordinates at certain times. A handful of people discovered these backpacks, turns out they belonged to the films antagonist Peter Parker. The backpacks contained physics texts books, photography gear, and clues to the next event in the viral campaign. The clues turned to a website which revealed new coordinates at a predestined time. People raced to the next clue. It turns out it was people dressed in a Spiderman sweatshirt instructing people to graffiti a stencil of Spiderman’s logo. (All of this graffiti was done legally.) The contestants were then sent home with a Spiderman sweatshirt and a great experience. As of right now no one knows if they will continue with the viral campaign, but with a movie that does not come out for at least six months I can guarantee you that we will see more of this campaign and more like it.

Viral campaigns are a great way to get fans excited in future films. It seems that more and more films are involving their fans with viral campaigns.

The Future of Media

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 21:21:00 +0000

This past week apple released a new app where you can watch all of the latest trailers. It is called Itunes Movie Trailers. You can watch all of the latest trailers on your Iphone, Ipod, or Ipad. Companies are starting to bring more and more entertainment to the palms of your hands. A few months ago HBO unveiled HBO Go. Using their app you could watch all of your HBO programming from your mobile device. This allows you to keep up with your favorite shows while waiting for the bus or even at work. Just recently Showtime debuted an app that is very similar to HBO’s app; allowing you to keep up on your favorite Showtime shows anywhere you want.

This is an obvious sign of the future. Consumers want to be burdened with having to be in their house watching TV at an exact time every week just to keep up with their shows. People are on the go constantly, they want to consume their media on the go as well. Ever since I got an Iphone I have been using that to check the news much more than my computer. Just look at Netflix for instance. Ever since they incorporated streaming video to their service Netflix has increased revenue substantially. It is obvious that people like to watch their media when and where they want. They are tired of cable television; on demand was the original game changer. It gave the ability to be able to watch certain movies and television shows. Other companies have begun to realize all of this. Boxee is a great example, they stream movies and television shows right to your television through an external box on your shelf. Even Apple has a stake in streaming media with the Apple TV. I cannot wait to see what the future has in store for streaming media.

http://www.firstshowing.net/2011/apple-debuts-a-must-download-new-movie-trailer-app-on-ios-devices/
http://wallstcheatsheet.com/stocks/the-future-of-streaming-video.html/
http://gigaom.com/video/netflix-the-future-is-streaming/

The Decline and Rise of Hollywood

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 20:32:00 +0000

It seems that Hollywood is in a major decline these days. Looking at the numbers, it says the exact opposite but, originality wise Hollywood hasn’t just jumped the shark; they jumped the shark then used an old refrigerator to escape a nuclear blast. (It kind of makes sense; all of the nuclear fallout has affected their brains. Just look at the major blockbusters for this summer alone. Scream 4, Thor, Pirates of The Caribbean, The Hangover 2, Kung Fu Panda, Fast Five, Green Lantern, Cars 2, Transformers 3, Harry Potter, Captain America, Cowboys and Aliens, X-Men, Super 8, Rise of The Planet of The Apes, Conan The Barbarian, Final Destination 5, the list goes on and on. That is nine sequels, one prequel, five comic book adaptations, a reboot, and Super 8. (Thank you J.J. Abrams for giving us some kind of original content in the summer.) Hollywood is failing us right now. It is mostly because no one wants to take the risk of coming up with something new and losing money. Just looks at last summer with Inception. No one wanted to put money into it because they thought no one would be interested in watching it, it is obvious that the higher ups in Hollywood have no concern if a movie is original and good at all, they only care if a movie is profitable or not. That is why everything is a reboot, sequel, or adaptation. They figure people are already comfortable with the things they know.

I am very happy to see comic con this year the reason is that there is plenty of original content to go around this year. Let’s start off with a new alien invasion movie called The Darkest Hour starring Emile Hirsch. Apparently they are going to be using a type of alien invasion that has never been seen before. Up next is the Adventures of TinTin, all that is known about it is that it is directed by Spielberg and animated. Finally that brings us to Prometheus. No footage has been seen apart from a few screenshots, but nerds are already wetting their pants. It is supposed to be Alien mixed with 2001: A Space Odyssey. It is directed by the man who brought us Blade Runner and my personal favorite movie True Romance so you know it is going to be good.

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 05:41:00 +0000

Everything is completely ridiculous when it come to comic books and super heroes. From the storylines to the court cases that ensue the entire industry is bonkers. It gets even more bizarre now and within the upcoming few years. This storyline starts in 1938 when Superman first appeared in Action Comics issue number 1. Sometime after Superman was put under the DC entertainment label. Due to that in 2013 parts of Superman will be going to their respected parties. The original creators of Superman Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster will get parts of Superman such as his blue leotard, red cape and boots, and the ability to leap tall building in a single bound. DC will retain the rights to things such as villains like Lex Luthor and Superman’s ability to fly.

The thing that makes this crazy is that a brand new Superman movie is coming out. Warner brothers is hoping what Christopher Nolan did for Batman the same will happen to Superman. None of these rulings will affect the upcoming movie. What it will affect is any movie after that. Lets say the upcoming movie does not do too well, they will make a reboot. The thing that no one knows how will turn out is another origin story. If it is made with DC major parts of the story will not be able to make an appearance.

Sources
http://www.slashfilm.com/legal-red-tape-sever-superman-2013/
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118037679?categoryid=13&cs=1&cmpid=RSS|News|FilmNews
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/hollywood-heist-how-a-burglary-192768?page=2

The future of films

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 15:12:00 +0000

Just Recently James Camng eron sat down for some interviews and discussed the future of film making. After creating Avatar in 3D James Cameron explains that the next big breakthrough technology for cinema is fps. Fps stands for frames per second. It is how many frames are advanced In one second. The naked eye captures 24 frames per second that is why it was set as the standard for filming. Though, humans can tell the difference between 24 fps and 48 fps. The normal person would not be able to tell it would just make all movements on the screen look smoother than they did before. It will also make any slow motion shots seem more natural and life like. “When you author and project a movie at 48 or 60, it becomes a different movie,” he said. “The 3D shows you a window into reality; the higher frame rate takes the glass out of the window.” The only problem is that no theatre has the technology to actually play movies that were shot at 48 fps. James Cameron believes that the projectors that are used to project 3D would only need a software upgrade in order to project films at 48 frames per second.

Sex sells, sometimes

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 15:11:00 +0000

Sex sells there is no doubt about that, but sometimes it hurts a project rather than actually helping it. A great case of this is Miley Cyrus. The second those Vanity Fair pictures came out she was told by millions of people including her own advisors that the pictures were too racy for her Disney image. That has happened to countless young stars. Any young celebrity that is trying to get an audience with pre teens is subject to this. To keep their fans they have to have a squeaky clean image even though they are growing up and out of that stage.

The most recent case of this is with the new Wonder Woman. When it was released over a year ago that they would be making a Wonder Woman television show, fans and feminist groups were very excited to hear the news. Most people were happy that they were just finally doing something with the character. When they released the first images it was an entirely different story. People from all walks of life complained about the outfit of the new Wonder Woman. She is a super hero not a stripper seemed like the biggest concern facing the new television show.

The picture to the left is an early version of the costume. The picture came out months before general production even began, and good thing it did. First everyone complained that the costume was way too shiny. I know she could deflect anything with her bracelets, but just looking at her in the sun is enough to subdue any criminal. Many people say that the outfit looked more like a costume you would fins at a Halloween store. Another major concern was that she is supposedly fighting crime in that outfit. In the real world a normal person would have to stop every five seconds and adjust just so that there is not a wardrobe malfunction. If you look at the picture n the right, which is the revised version of the outfit you will see that she isn’t even wearing lipstick anymore.

What are your thoughts on this issue? Is sex hurting the industry or helping it

The Negotiator

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 01:11:00 +0000

Being in the entertainment industry is different than any other industry on the planet. Though it is like other industries in some ways. One of those ways is that negotiation is a vital part of the industry. There are negotiations between actors, directors, and producers. It just doesn’t stop there practically everyone in the entertainment industry is negotiating with someone. That is why learning to be a good negotiator will take you very far in this industry. The best way to learn something is talk to someone that is currently doing it. That is why I interviewed my father, William Weisblat. He invests money into small film projects. He has to negotiate how much money he is going to invest in the project. Most executive producers also have to negotiate parts of the film, though my father said he doesn’t care about any of that whatsoever. He merely cares if he is going to get his money back.

In retrospect interviewing my Father was not the best idea ever. He is a very in your face kind of guy. The only thing he negotiates with is low balling. All he does to negotiate is constantly low ball the person until he gets the price that he wants.

Robocop The Ambassador

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Wed, 16 Feb 2011 21:48:00 +0000

Recently there has been some crazy news coming out of Detroit. It is not the decaying state of the state but actually it is about Robocop. A Robocop statue might be built in the state with the worst economy in America. It all started on the Internet where suggestions were asked on how to clean up the city. Twitter user MT came up with the suggestion to erect a Robocop statue. If you don’t know anything about the movie Robocop, I can sum it up for you. Detroit, the future, crime is rampant in the city. The police force builds a robot that has three main objectives; serve the public trust, protect the innocent, and uphold the law. Well soon after the suggestion was put on the Internet it was taken down. They thought that was the end of it but, apparently it was seen by enough people and they thought it was a good idea so they brought the suggestion to the mayor of Detroit. I completely agree with the Internet users, I feel there should be a Robocop statue in Detroit. It is a major part of their pop culture. In Philadelphia there is a statue of Rocky Balboa in front of the Museum of Art. Mayor Bing foolishly answered back “NO”. Well if the city of Detroit will not make a Robocop statue then the people of Detroit will. The website DetroitNeedsRobocop is currently working with artists and other companies to make this a reality. They estimate that the total cost of the statue will be $50,000. As of right now they have recently just passed the $50,000 mark but are still taking donations.

Head over to detroitneedsrobocop.com to help them out with some donations.

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 04:38:00 +0000

The recent increase in 3D films has upset me over the past few years. As a kid 3D, was always used the same exact way in every movie. There would always be something popping out at you. The best genre 3D was being used for was horror movies. Even still today those types of scares are still widely used are a lot of the things that stand out in 3D cinema. Many people do not seem to care about the obvious fact that 3D takes the audience away from the movie. Walter Murch who is the editor for Apocalypse Now and The English Patient is neither a fan of 3D also.He says the 3D movies are one stop lower than it's 2D counterparts.That means that every part of the movie is darker, sometimes making it nearly impossible to pick out certain details He wrote a letter to Roger Ebert stating his opinion on 3D. He said that the biggest issue with the 3D scene is the focus and convergence issue. The way that 3D movies work is that it only shows you half of the screen at one time. They switch the focus from both sides of the screen one after the other. Your eyes converge in the middle of where you are focusing. When you are watching 3D your eyes have to converge on different points of the screen split seconds after each other. This is the reason why many people get headaches after just watching the movies for a mere twenty minutes. It is something that 60 million years of evolution is unwinding. This is a deep issue that is wrong with 3D. No matter how much the technology improves you can never make full 3D until you make a hologram.

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 06:20:00 +0000

One of the emerging factions in the film making industry are HD DSLR's. The biggest barrier to most emerging film makers is the price of all your gear. The prices could quickly escalate to tens of thousands of dollars. With a DSLR the top of the line camera costs around two thousand dollars, making the choice to switch to DSLR that much better. An interesting part of the DSLR scene is that these cameras are not made to shoot professional video but, if you take a stroll around youtube or vimeo the results will tell you otherwise.

The best part of the community is the community itself. Between the information sharing online and the power of innovation the DSLR scene is one of the best things to happen to filmmaking. One of the major companies that are really pushing their products to the next level of filmmaking is Canon. On vimeo they have a channel that would have film contests embracing filming with a DSLR. All this helps the film makers collaborate on bigger productions. There are also many user created groups on vimeo that are finally being looked at seriously by film makers.

The Game Has Changed

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 22:04:00 +0000

CES, the Consumer Electronics Show is always the place to be if you want to see the newest technologies coming out in the next few years. Who thought that the crown jewel of the convention would be film distribution. Sony is coming out with a new type of media called ultraviolet. In essence it is a cloud based system. They are saying that when you buy a DVD it will be able to watch it on almost any TV, computer, or game console from many manufacturer's regardless of where you bought it. Once this comes out you will not have to buy Abbey Road seventeen times anymore. Included in ultraviolet, besides just buying the DVD you will also receive the digital rights to the movie you bought and will be stored in a cloud type account. That means that once you buy the DVD (physical or digital copy) you never need them again as long as you have a running internet connection. As of right now Apple and Walt Disney are the only two major companies that have came out and said they will not be a part of ultraviolet. Practically every other company is siding with ultraviolet including Microsoft, Hewlett- Packard, and Panasonic to name a few. How this will work can possibly change the entire way that we watch TV and movies. Starting this summer companies will let you buy a movie with the ultraviolet logo on it. You take that DVD and you register it with ultraviolet. Once that is done you can stream that movie directly to your Xbox or your Blu ray player. This will even work when you go on vacation and you want to watch the first season of Glee in your hotel room.

The Horrific double standard

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 18:10:00 +0000

Horror, the red headed stepchild of the movie industry. Almost all horror movies contain a gargantuan killer wielding a sword/machete/hatchet/etc. slicing teens down the middle, though that is completely untrue. Don't let the Hollywood critics fool you, Danny Boyle’s 127 Hours in which an explorer literally gets stuck between a rock and a hard place is not an adventure or a drama, it is a straight up horror flick. Another recent film that has garnered much attention is Black Swan. The film follows the unraveling of a sweet and innocent dancer into a reckless world that threatens to destroy her. If that doesn’t sound like a horror film, then I don’t know what does. When a drama is good it is handed a plethora of awards, but when a horror movie is good it is a complete surprise. Compare the two previous films to a recent horror film, Let Me In. It follows an 8-year-old vampire that moves to a new town and befriends the boy next door. This was a generally fantastic movie but due to the fact that it had a vampire in it (thank you Twilight for ruining my childhood) it was given a pat on the head and sent to video rental hell. It is obvious that the film industry and community does not give the horror genre the respect it deserves.

Lets examine most horror movies. If there is not a monster or a maniac in a haunted house or a spaceship in is not a horror movie. That is why 127 Hours and Black Swan are such unique entries. A great horror film sets out to unnerve and upset it’s audience both of which succeed easily. James Franco has to sacrifice a part of his body in order to save the life that he never fully appreciated. Do you know what other movie has that same exact plot…Saw! Why is one treated as a drama and the other as torture porn (not saying that saw is a good movie) it is just plain ridiculous.

Nice guys finish first, sometimes....All the time.

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 14:57:00 +0000

In life many people say that nice guys finish last, but this time the nice guy finished first. Two weeks ago was Bear Creek music festival. It is a funk/blues/reggae music festival. It takes place every year at the Suwannee national park. It is one of the best venues for a music festival. The best part was that I got a job working the festival. It turns out that one of the kids in my under graduate knows the guy that does the filming for multiple music festivals like this one. The craziest part was that all the people working were from my old class. Talk about a small world. It was great to work with all my old friends on this project. The only problem with the entire weekend was that there was one kid we were working with that I never cared for. In my old degree program this kid was kind of an asshole. Anytime you had to work with him, it was his way or the high way. Due to this he earned a rotten reputation in our class. While working at the festival the boss that we were working for fell in love with most of us working. He really liked that we all we busting our asses so we could get every band on tape. There was only one person that our boss would never have work for him again. Could you guess who it is? That’s right my boss hated that same kid. After all the music stopped on the last night. My boss invited me and a couple of others to an after party that only staff and artists could get into. On our way to the after party it was just me and the boss in a golf cart, we were going to meet the rest of our crew at the party. On our way to the party my boss was telling me that he liked working with everyone except for one kid. I immediately said the kid that no one liked, and yes it turned out my boss was talking about him. This just reconfirms that I might be in the right industry.

What's the deal with Tron

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 04:05:00 +0000

With the release of Tron Legacy just one month away you would think that the original version of Tron would be everywhere, but it is the exact opposite. I really wanted to watch the original version of Tron a few weeks ago. I first went to Best Buy to get the DVD, to my surprise they did not carry the movie. I then went to Target, again no luck. Finally I decide to go to Wal-mart, they too do not carry it. I thought this was really weird, but then I just forgot about it. I decided to look online for the movie. On Amazon the cheapest used copy of the movie is fifty-two dollars. For a brand new copy it is a ridiculous ninety dollars. On ebay the cheapest copy is going for thirty-five. That price would be reasonable if it was the blu ray, but it isn’t it is the crappy looking standard definition version. Then I decided to look on Netflix, it was listed as availability unknown. Talking to a few of my friends, they said that Tron was on Netflix just six months ago.

So what is the deal Disney, you just re-released Toy Story 1 and 2 on blu ray why not re-release Tron. There are possibly many reasons for this. When the original Tron was released in 1982 the visual effects were ahead of its time. Looking at it now the effects look terrible; the entire movie is covered in crappy looking effects. With today’s youth they would watch it and think the movie is bad just for that reason. It is better for the younger audience to go into the movie not knowing the original. Disney does not want the old movie affecting the box office return of the new one. Another reason could possibly be that if the new version is a major success, then when they do release the original on blu ray every one who hasn’t seen it will definitely want to own it. This is possibly the smartest marketing plot ever or just really dumb.

Does Whatever A Spider Can

noreply@blogger.com (Jared Weisblat) — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 22:17:00 +0000

Some big news recently out of Hollywood concerns our favorite neighborhood Spiderman. It has recently been released that one of the biggest trilogies of the 2000’s is being rebooted. When it was released that the Sam Raimi’s trilogy was no more fans and non-fans alike spawned a massive debate. First I would like to say that I thought the entire series was miscast. I never really thought that Tobey Maguire’s portrayal of Peter Parker was that special. Kirsten Dunst was the worst part of the movies; in the comics she was never the damsel in distress. Mary Jane Watson was a tough woman that did not need the help of Spiderman. The best parts were William Dafoe playing The Green Goblin, though he was killed off in the first movie. (The first rule of fight club is, you do not kill off a super villain.) The second fantastic part was J. Jonah Jameson played by J.K. Simmons who was Peter Parkers boss. His role was so amazing that they casted him again for the reboot. We can all agree that Spiderman 3 was terrible. The use of one of the best villains, Venom was boring and not what fans wanted at all. Gwen Stacy in the comics is a monumental character in Peter Parkers life, but if you ask the people that saw the movie most don’t even remember her character being in it.

Though I am extremely excited for the new Spiderman. The script was written by James Vanderbilt, the writer of Zodiac. It is being directed by Marc Webb, who also directed The 500 Days Of Summer. I really enjoyed that movie and am excited to see what Webb has in store for Spiderman, though I am a little concerned with the fact that Marc Webb has never directed an action sequence. The reason why this whole thing is controversial is because of ownership. Sony still owns the Spiderman franchise and name for still a few years until it goes into ownership of Marvel Studios. Marvel Studios is currently having its entire biggest superhero movies tie in together, essentially they are making a universe of superheroes. This is what is so troubling to fans, Spiderman being one of the major stars in Marvel’s lineup and a big part of The Avengers. So when you have an entire universe with all the superheroes that you like, but you can’t have your favorite one; that just plain sucks. Though I completely agree with Sony they have several more years of ownership of Spiderman. They would not be doing their jobs if they didn’t push for a new release.