In this morning’s roundup of movie news ‘n’ notes from around the web, movies go bad in an instant, and Michael Cera repeats himself … or does he?
Apparently, there’s now a Michael Cera problem – but exactly why has the audience turned on him? Is it as simple as the fact that we think he plays the same character in every movie? And does he really do that? Kyle Buchanan attempts to answer the question – or at least to get some entertainment out of it – by creating a chart that documents the essential Cera-ness of the actor’s roles. He takes seven Cera movies and six common characteristics of the guys he plays: “Loves Girl Who Rebuffs Him,” “Wears Hoodie,” “Loses His Virginity,” that kind of thing. And the results are … inconclusive. Of the six factors, Buchanan says, Cera averages almost three of them per role. You could probably do the same thing and get similar results with, say, Will Ferrell and Jennifer Aniston, I’d guess. (Movieline)
Here’s another question: can one scene destroy a movie franchise? Toby McCasker thinks it can, and he’s got 10 examples (with video clips) to prove it. They include a CGI Arnold Schwarzenegger’s cameo in “Terminator Salvation,” Tobey Maguire turning into a dark disco prince in “Spider-Man 3,” Jean-Claude Van Damme’s emotional soliloquoy in “JCVD,” and Indiana Jones surviving a nuclear blast by hiding in a refrigerator in “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.” I don’t have a problem with putting this last scene in the number one slot, but the link is worth clicking just to watch that unbelievable “Spider-Man” thing. I mean, that scene alone justified taking the franchise away from Maguire and Sam Raimi. (AskMen.com)
Rob Reiner’s film “Flipped” got some of the most positive reviews the director has received in many years, but that hasn’t helped it any at the boxoffice. Now Warner Bros. is scaling back the film’s release for the second straight week, reports Carl DiOrio: it went from 45 theaters in its first week to 29 in its second, and on Friday it will go down to a mere eight theaters. But six of the eight are new markets, which means that hope springs eternal … (The Hollywood Reporter via Yahoo! News)
Jeff Wells is doing what a lot of us are doing these days – trying to figure out what to see at the Toronto International Film Festival. At the moment, he’s got a list of 44 films, which is knows is unrealistic. For some reason, his list does not include the festival’s opening-night film, “Score: A Hockey Musical,” though he does find room for his second viewing of Alex Gibney’s documentary “Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer,” and his third of Charles Ferguson’s “Inside Job.” (Hollywood Elsewhere)
