31 July 2000

THE UGLY: The L.A. Times' Sunday Metro section column, "The Court Files," should be one of every entertainment journalist's must-reads. Why? Because the legal system is always loaded with interesting stuff. This Sunday, it was the case between Louis Prima's estate and Disney over royalties for his singing as King of the Apes in The Jungle Book. "I'm the king of the swingers, oh, the jungle V.I.P." You know it. Well, Disney decided that their deal with Prima, which promised recording royalties, doesn't include DVD or video. And so, a lawsuit. Everyone else on the film--or their estates--have done private deals with the studio to deal with the disparity. Not so Madame Prima. And one must simply say, "Boo Hiss" in this kind of case, where Disney looks like they are earning the often-unfair moniker, the Evil Empire. How much can it really cost them. And doesn't their talent deserve the money? When Robin Williams started mocking the company for being cheap on Aladdin, they hit him with a million dollar check and he shut up. But dead men tell no tales. But their wives do.

GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY: I'm heading out of Dodge for a few weeks, but make plans now to go to American Cinematheque's Politics in Film series, from August 11-13. From The Manchurian Candidate to The War Room to Mr. Smith Goes To Washington to The Candidate, every film is a gem. Meanwhile, in NYC, Film Forum has a brand new 35mm print of Raging Bull running from August 4-10. That, I'd love to see.

BAD AD WATCH: I was going to point out that anyone who would quote for Loser (John Monaghan, Johnny Steele and Grant Stiff) scared me. But, then some thumbs caught my eye. No Klump thumbs. None for X-Men or What Lies Beneath or Me, Myself & Irene, Pokémon 2000, Big Momma's House or Loser. And just one (not Roger's) for Gladiator. And where are the thumbs blossoming? Wonderland, Blood Simple, Sunshine, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, But I'm A Cheerleader, Paradise Lost 2 and The Five Senses. The only "big" movies that get positive thumbage are The Perfect Storm, The Patriot, Chicken Run, The Kid and one (Roger's) for Scary Movie. By my count, that's 12 upturned thumbs out of a possible 40 for last weekend's top 20 movies (which includes such specialty titles as Michael Jordan to the Max, Croupier and Sunshine. Only 2 up thumbs up between the three of those titles.) I'm not sure what this means. It caught my eye because virtually every arthouse ad on one page of the paper had thumbs up and none of the big ads seemed to have the imprimatur. As we all know, popularity does not equal quality. But does it equal failure almost exclusively these days?

READER OF THE DAY: MP, NO AA writes: "I just had to write because of the audience reactions to trailers of two upcoming films. The first trailer is for Charlie's Angels (a.k.a. "the debacle waiting to happen on November 3rd"); the audience members that I saw it with either laughed nervously or were silent. My question is who is the audience for this movie? Will the fans of Scary Movie show up because of the M: I-2 parody jokes? Will Matrix fans show up for the ridiculous fight clips with Drew Barrymore, Cameron Diaz & Lucy Liu? Will males in the 18-34 age group show up for Cameron Diaz's cleavage and Barrymore's "nakedness"? This movie is DOA and seems ready to join the TV movie trash heap of The Beverly Hillbillies and The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas.

The other movie that may be DOA is Blair Witch 2. I have seen this teaser about five times; every time I have heard audience members boo and scream at the screen. There just seems to be a lot of hostility towards Blair Witch and I would be surprised if the sequel breaks past $50 million in the fall."

E ME: Uh. If BW2 makes $50 million, you can be sure that it will be in profit. There are no dummies at Artisan. They know a wave when they watch it hit the beach. So, how much should Disney pay the Primas, how silly is "Survivor," could X-Men have made more and do you like to watch journalistic cat fights?