OK, they have cosmetic differences. Space Chimps, as the title suggests, depicts a trio of chimpanzees on an outer space rescue mission (complete with aliens) and opens July 18. Opening August 8, Fly Me to the Moon depicts three young houseflies who secretly stow away on the Apollo 11 mission and thus share in the first moon landing experience with Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin. I shudder to think of the puns based on his name.

Now, I can get how the arm’s race-style competition between Hollywood studios yields to suspiciously similar movies like Antz and A Bug’s Life, or Deep Impact and Armageddon, or Dante’s Peak and Volcano (I could go on and on), but does either of these look like a good enough idea to be made — let alone twice? I dare you to watch them:

Space Chimps

Fly Me to the Moon

Fly Me to the Moon may have the edge, since it’s in digital 3-D.

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Here’s the full press release, courtesy the Atlanta-based cable network’s media-relations department:

Golden Globe winner Scott Bakula (”Quantum Leap”) has signed to join Ray Romano and Andre Braugher in TNT’s new character-driven drama pilot “Men of a Certain Age” a wry look at what it means to be a guy approaching mid-life while also exploring the unique bonds of male friendship. The show follows three guys who have been best friends since college. Now in their 40s, they’re finding that life is indeed, as John Lennon once said, “what happens when you’re making other plans.”

Bakula will play Terry, a handsome, intelligent but struggling-to-make-it actor. His character rounds out the trio that also includes Joe (Romano), a slightly neurotic divorced father of two who had dreams of being a professional golfer but instead owns and runs a party store, and Owen (Braugher), an overstressed African-American husband and father who is a car salesman at his dad’s dealership.

Bakula’s long list of credits includes the acclaimed sci-fi series “Quantum Leap,” for which he won a Golden Globe, and “Enterprise,” the latest entry in the Star Trek universe. He has also played recurring characters on “Murphy Brown” and “The New Adventures of Old Christine.” Bakula’s films include American Beauty, Life as a House and Major League: Back to the Minors. An accomplished musical performer, he has starred in productions of Shenandoah, Three Men Naked from the Waist Down, Romance/Romance, earning a Tony nomination for the latter.

In addition, two-time Emmy winner Scott Winant has signed on to direct the pilot. Winant’s extensive credits include such series as “Huff,” “Canivale,” “Californication” and “thirtysomething.”

“Men of a Certain Age” comes to TNT from Emmy winners Romano and Mike Royce. Romano wrote the pilot script with Royce, who also serves as show runner. The pair are executive-producing the project with Rory Rosegarten and Cary Hoffman.

(Image courtesy Amazon.com)

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Airing on Atlanta’s Cartoon Network from 2003-2006, “Teen Titans” featured a theme song by perky Japanese twosome Puffy Ami Yumi and a peculiar but effective blend of serious, arcing episodes and zany comic relief. Funny scenes would draw on manga-style caricature: throbbing veins would appear on angry characters’ heads, hearts would bubble up for lovesick ones, and even odder exaggerations would appear that gave the show’s humor a fresh, funny attitude. The show’s fifth and final season is my favorite, as it pits the Teen Titans against an iconic supervillian team called The Brotherhood of Evil; pop references come even more quickly (including nods to Doctor Who’s Daleks and The Incredibles). Plus, it reinforces my theory that the show’s creators patterned the five Titans after the main characters of John Hughes’ beloved 1980s film, The Breakfast Club.

Both the teen crime fighters and the high school detention servers comprise a quintet sharply delineated “types,” each of which is familiar from high school experience (or movies and TV shows about teen life). Sometimes the comparisons fit perfectly, others are more of a stretch, but here they are. For convenience sake, I’ll use the Breakfast Club actor names rather than dig up their characters.

Raven = Ally Sheedy. This is the most obvious one. Although Sheedy’s character is not an extradimensional witch and Raven is not a “basket case,” they’re both Goth stereotypes to a T, with dark clothes, dark attitudes and deadpan wit. Plus they don’t say much and tend to keep to themselves. (Incidentally, Raven’s voice actress said she based her performance not on anyone you’d think of, but on Zelda Rubinstein’s diminutive paranormal investigator from Poltergeist — you can hear a similar quaver in the voice if you listen for it.)

Beast Boy = Anthony Michael Hall. OK, shape-changing, green-hued Beast Boy isn’t a “brain” like Hall’s Breakfast Club character, but they’re both the “geeks” of the group, and the characters have nearly identical nervous, self-deprecating senses of humor. Possibly he’s more like Hall’s “Farmer Ted” role from Sixteen Candles.

Cyborg = Emilio Estevez. Estevez was the jock; Cyborg had been a jock before the crippling accident that led to the mechanical replacement of much of his body. True, Cyborg’s personality is a little more confrontational, so you could make a case that he’s more like Judd Nelson in the movie. (Incidentally, I’ll bet if The Breakfast Club were remade today, the five students would be a little more diverse.)

Starfire = Molly Ringwald. Well, Starfire is an alien princess and Ringwald’s character is identified as the “princess” of the bunch, and Starfire is outgoing, apparently likes the mall and would probably be popular. Their personalities are kind of dissimilar, though. Since Starfire’s a alien and has kind of the comedic awkwardness of a foreign exchange student (she was apparently written that way for the show), she might be more accurately pegged as the Teen Titans’ equivalent to Sixteen Candles’ Long Duck Dong.

Robin = Judd Nelson. OK, this is might be a reach, since Robin doesn’t make an obvious “criminal.” But on the show, he’s not the wisecracking sidekick that he used to be with Batman (ceding the comic relief to the other characters). He’s actually got a pretty significant dark side: on the first season he masquerades as a thief to entrap the mystery evil-doer Slade, and later, Slade blackmails him into becoming his criminal apprentice. The Robin vs. Slade dynamic represents “teen independence vs. adult authority,” which is basically the same as Judd Nelson vs. Paul Gleason’s nasty school principal. Plus, Robin’s the leader of the Teen Titans, and Judd Nelson’s character, if not the stated leader, is the catalyst that spurs the Breakfast Club into action.

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Atlanta has a pretty impressive punk-rock heritage that was nurtured in the Little Five Points scene of the 1980s and beyond, so it will be interesting to see what happens when children of parent punk-rockers (should they attend) come together over the next week and show their stuff on Saturday, July 19.

Local founder and director Stacey Singer should know; the former bassist for My Siamese Self and publicist for Indigo Girl Amy Ray’s Daemon Records, Singer volunteered at Girls Rock! camps in Portland, Ore., and Murfreesboro, Tenn. She also wrote her master’s thesis on the subject. “You’d be surprised what girls can accomplish with a little encouragement. When you show them that they can, they believe it and go for it,” Singer said in a press release. “It’s an amazing experience to see little girls on stage playing instruments as big as they are. And they don’t suck. … Adult musicians could learn a thing or two from girls’ rock camp campers.”

Girls’ Rock Camp (ATL) hopes to build on next week’s finale, having applied for nonprofit status with future programs in development, including Ladies’ Rock weekend workshops and after-school rehearsal spaces and band mentoring.

(Photo by Nicole Weingart)

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In the comics, Mignola’s shadowy, Gothic-drenched artwork tends to be more stark and his dialogue more spare than their equivalent images in the Hellboy movies. There are two animated Hellboy films, but perhaps the best cartoon showcase for the tone and look of Mignola’s work is “The Amazing Screw-On Head.” This exceedingly odd 20-minute animated horror spoof features the voice of Paul Giamatti as a low-tech mechanical secret agent circa the Civil War called “The Screw-On Head.” (Yes, other characters, like Abraham Lincoln, address him as “Screw-On Head.”) David Hyde Pierce voices his arch-villain, the foppish ghoul Emperor Zombie. From Bryan Fuller, creator of “Pushing Daisies,” the 2006 pilot film looks exactly like what you’d get if the creators of Adult Swim made a Halloween-themed version of “Wild Wild West.” The introductory scheme perfectly captures Mignola’s penchant for occult action scenes and demented whimsy:

Speaking of Hellboy II, have you seen the viral videos of James Lipton interviewing Hellboy, as well as Hellboy’s public service announcement? Funny.

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Air Loaf is broadcast weekdays on 1690 WMLB-AM at approximately 8:10 a.m., 12:20 p.m. and 6:20 p.m.

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The film follows Robert “Fish” Fishman (Wilson) as he tries to recapture his cock-rock glory days via his nephew’s high school rock band, A.D.D.
MySpacers were allowed to vote throughout June on which U.S. cities deserved the screening. Atlanta made the cut along with Oklahoma City, Phoenix, Dallas and Kansas City. Here’s the lowdown on how to get in for free:

To attend the screening, individuals need to visit MySpace and add the SONIC Red profile to their MySpace page. Print out the MySpace page with the SONIC Red profile on it, and bring it to the theatre. There are a limited number of seats available.

Showtime is 7:30 p.m. this Thursday at the AMC North DeKalb Mall (2050 Lawrenceville Highway). The Rocker officially opens Wednesday, July 30.

(Photo courtesy 20th Century Fox)

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If the premise of a human being being “operated” from the inside by a band of controllers looks familiar, Woody Allen’s already done it in his 1972 anthology comedy Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex (But Were Afraid To Ask). In the last and best chapter, “What happens during ejaculation?” Allen depicts the internal “crew” of an unseen man on a date that goes, uh extremely well. Tony Randall and Burt Reynolds lead the crew that controls the brain, blue collar-type workers in the stomach labor to digest the incoming meal (”Italian food? Jesus CHRIST!”), etc. Allen plays one of numerous sperm, preparing to be deployed like parachutists: “What if he’s masturbating? We could end up on the ceiling!” You can watch it in its entirety on Youtube:

Meet Dave opens this Friday, July 11.

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With 18 features and 14 shorts at five venues over five days, the AUFF promises to be film-tastic, and other bad puns denoting cinematic fun.

The festival kicks off Aug. 20 at the Highland Inn Ballroom Lounge with Greg Kohs’ feature Song Sung Blue, a documentary about husband-and-wife Neil Diamond tribute artists Lightning & Thunder.

Other, uh, diamonds on the schedule include, among others, Dan Lamoureux’s geeky hip-hop-umentary Nerdcore for Life and the 2008 Local Shorts showcase.

The AUFF all-access pass is only $35. That gets you into all of the screenings, parties and whatnot for less than a meal for two at Applebee’s. For the schedule, a full list of films and locations or to purchase tickets, visit the AUFF website.

(Photo courtesy Waitwhat Productions)

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