Weekend, 11-12 December 1999

NEWS BY THE NUMBERS

10. I'm Crushed: I am torn between mounting a defense of "crush" videos on the basis of battling for the First Amendment, being enraged that Congress and President Horn Dog are spending a moment legislating such things while they can't seem to get much else done lately, being disgusted by the idea of the videos themselves and just laughing my butt off at the whole damned thing. If you don't know what a "crush video" is, it's video of a woman in a high heel shoe crushing a rodent, made for the prurient interest of people with very specific tastes. I am sympathetic to the animal rights folks on this one and agree that mice deserve every bit as much respect as gerbils. (Insert cultural disgusting reference here.) On the other hand, take a look at the description of the law, as stated by the White House: H.R. 1887, a bill that would establish Federal criminal penalties for the "creation, sale, or possession" of "a depiction of animal cruelty" with the intent to distribute such a depiction in interstate or foreign commerce, except when the depiction has "serious religious, political, scientific, educational, journalistic, historical, or artistic value." This is what you call court bait. Expect animal right-ists to push prosecutors to go after old movies where animals were hurt in the process of making the picture. Or even movies in which they weren't actually hurt, but which don't give the politically correct message that hurting an animal is wrong. (A message I agree with, but were I to object to every movie that included abuse I don't think is morally right, we could start by burning the slaves of Gone With The Wind and stop when we finished roasting the racist atmosphere shown in The Green Mile.)

The Internet cuts both ways and hopefully, always will. Knowledge is not inherently evil. Ever. But then, I suppose you could argue that guns don't kill people. And that is, generally, true. And knowledge can be as dangerous as any gun. But it then reminds me of the 12-step program for sex addiction as opposed to Alcoholics Anonymous. To live a normal life, sex addicts will eventually have to start having sex again, the program's effort pushing towards "responsible and intimate" sex. But that is part of the nature of the human. An alcoholic can live without ever drinking again and remain human. This nation could live without private ownership of guns, at the very least without private ownership of handguns. Yes, criminals would have a greater advantage (very few civilians successfully ward off gun violence with gun violence of their own right now). But only for a brief time. But a nation cannot live without knowledge. Every heinous act of mass injustice in history was done under the cloak of secrecy. And why is a feminist argument that breast implants degrade the value of women in society any more valid than an animal right-ist complaining that "crush" videos are cruel and inappropriate? (Note that the legislation does not speak to the dead mouse, but to the depiction of cruelty without regard to the status of the animal.) Slippery slope, gang. Slippery slope.

9. Speaking of Porn: Young Traci Lords has won a suit against Cabellero Control Corporation, a leading porn distributor, for selling copies of Traci, I Love You, the porn tape that Ms. Lords made just after dropping the bomb that her massive porn career was all done as an underage child, forcing all her previous videos to be destroyed (or hidden really well). Lords made this one film as an adult (18) and owned all rights, thus cashing in on the vacuum she created in the market. Lords seems to be saying that Cabellero didn't have the rights to sell the video, though it is unclear whether she wants this video off the shelves or just wants to get paid. And this is the scary part. Lords was awarded just $128,753 in damages for the illegally sold movies and only $750 for the use of her name and likeness on a porn box. It costs more than that to pay her expenses to show up at a movie premiere. Hell, even I'd expect more than 750 bucks for having my face slammed on a porno box cover. I mean, the title of this column alone would sell a lot of copies.

8. More Awards: The European Film Festival gave All About My Mother the Best Film Award and gave Best Director to Pedro Almodovar. And The Straight Story, a personal favorite of mine, got Best Non-European Film. Were it only that the Academy was so broad-minded.

7. Poke' Me In The Eye: Just when you thought it was safe to breathe for a second (after you bought the latest Pokemon Gameboy games for the holidays), Toho has announced that their third Pokemon feature is going to be ready by summer. Pocket Monster: The Lord of the Unknown Tower is the name, which will likely be changed to Pokemon: The Lord of the Unknown Tower when it debuts here, I'm guessing, next November, as I expect Pokemon 2 to hit in late Spring/early Summer 2000. I bet you can't wait.

6. You Did What?!?: Not everyone has figured out that DVD has changed the world. When Peter Mullen, who gives an Award-caliber performance in Tim Roth's The War Zone, went to go build the DVD for an acclaimed film that he directed called Orphans, he found that his producing company had destroyed all the unused footage, much of which he wanted to include. And we all thought that didn't happen anymore. The film opens in America in February. Look for the simple DVD shortly thereafter.

5. Another $1 Million Deal: I'm thrilled to see more and more "they got $1 million" announcements. Gee, I remember when that was a lot of money. The latest is John Hannah, the fine Brit actor who played third banana on The Mummy, signed up for The Mummy 2 for a million bucks. That's good money, but not insane money. And that brings me joy. With all the screaming over star salaries, it is good to see solid character actors hitting seven figures and understandable, at least to this columnist, that certain actors will get paid based on financial success in opening films, with talent a secondary issue.

5a. Return Of The Momma: One actor who I recently noted for having his first $1 million payday is Ryan Phillippe, otherwise known as The Father of Resse Witherspoon's Child. And speaking of Ms. W, she's just signed for her first gig as a working mother, a 2-episode arc on NBC's "Friends" playing Jennifer Aniston's younger sister. Well, is it a guest shot or a shot across Aniston's "I'm not sure how much longer I want to do this" bow? Who knows? But it makes sense for Witherspoon to start out with a job that allows her to work fairly normal hours and to easily bring her baby to the set. I still won't be watching "Friends", even for you and what will surely be fine comedic work, but welcome back to work anyway, Mrs. P.

4. Shall We Bid: The Fox auction of stuff from the set of Anna & The King is well underway. The item with the highest bid, as of this writing, is: Gold Standing Figure 17"W x 47"H from "Anna and the King." Includes certificate of authenticity from 20th Century Fox Archives. All sales final. Some items may vary from actual picture. Shipping and Handling: $86.30 2nd Day Air or $46.30 Ground "Anna and the King" featured the largest set built from scratch since "Cleopatra" in the 1960s. All of the sets were painstakingly designed, using historical references whenever possible to recreate the Royal Palace of Siam as it appered in 1860. Many items were made especially for the film by the crew working with Thai and Malaysian artists. Other items were flown in from all over Asia specifically for use in the film." The bid stands at $355 and yes, the studio and/or Yahoo! misspelled "appear."

3. Never Assume Anything: Long ago and far away, I complained about an Ain't It Cool News story about Universal's marketing department and their concerns about their take on Man On The Moon, titled "A Letter To UNIVERSAL STUDIO EXECS about MAN ON THE MOON!" At the time, I suggested that the most obvious leakers to Harry Knowles were writers Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski. Cut to: The day of the publicity stunt junket for Man On The Moon, which only an idiot could believe wasn't staged if they were in that room and talking to people involved afterwards. In any case, here are Scott & Larry on Universal's marketing of the film. Larry: Bogus! Universal has been so great on this movie from Day One! On the creative end, on the marketing, it's just a bunch of anonymous people on the internet just typing up nonsense. Universal's been so supportive, it's just not fair to them." Scott: "I'll agree with that. And Universal has allowed us to make the movie we wanted to make." Larry: "They're running upside down ads. They have commercials running with roll bars. Scott: We're really happy. When they showed us the spots, I was just amazed. I had assumed they would try to sell it as a regular Jim Carrey comedy because you could make those spots very easily and when I saw that they were making Kaufmanesque advertisements for it, I was extremely impressed." Perspective, perspective, perspective.

2. The Fifth Sign Of The Apocalypse: Anyone worried about the world coming to an end later this month is probably a little more worried today. Kevin Costner and Kevin Reynolds, the director that close buddy Costner fired off both Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and Waterworld during post-production, are talking about re-teaming. Why? Well, Costner is in the groove with Reynolds by now. I assume Reynolds will use paper cups instead of bringing a mug to the editing room. And Reynolds, bless his soul, hasn't been able to make any money for anyone without Costner. Rapa Nui, 187 and The Beast all were box office losers, though many in the industry have respect for each a lot more than they have for the more commercial film she did with Costner. Nonetheless, one has to work. And even more so, Reynolds wants to work on a $80 million movie, so he needs a major movie star to get financing. And despite all the grousing from some, Costner can still open a movie.

1. Another Top Exec Exits: This time the exec is Lucy Fisher and she's leaving Sony's movie masthead. Some of these executive office buildings are becoming awfully familiar to the moving men. Lots of movement among the executive rank and file is no surprise. But there seems to be a lot of changes closer to the top of the food chains without actually toppling the highest leadership this year. Which begs the question, how strong is the bough? Because, baby, that cradle is already rocking at more than a few studios in town these days. Trouble is, there aren't too many big bad wolves around to gobble up what falls. And so, they keep on trying to secure the trees at ground level. Tick, tick, tick.

READER OF THE DAY: VC writes: "I think the Academy dropped the category because there would have been a 50-50 chance of South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut winning. I think they were afraid that people might just pick South Park to see what would happen (i.e. Roberto Benigni winning last year). That was my first thought, then I imagined Trey Parker as Cartman accepting the award. It might have been one of the more entertaining Oscar broadcasts in years."

E ME: What movies coming out this month are you looking forward to? What do you think about The Green Mile?