The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is likely to win four weekends in a row at the box office. Also in Friday’s round-up of news, Ashton Kutcher’s Steve Jobs pic jOBS will head to theaters months after its Sundance debut; Kickstarter passes $100 million pledge mark; Michael Haneke withdraws Amour from an awards race; and a look at weekend expansions among the Specialties.
Box Office: Hobbit to Cut Down Texas Chainsaw
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is set to continue a month-long reign at the box office, outpacing newcomer Texas Chainsaw, which will open in 2,654 theaters. Hobbit has cumed $242 million domestically, Variety reports.
Ashton Kutcher’s Sundance Steve Jobs Film Heads to Theaters
jOBS, the film about the Apple mastermind Steve Jobs from 1971 – 2000, which will close the upcoming Sundance Film Festival will head out to theaters April 23rd. Open Road will distribute the film directed by Joshua Michael Stern, Deadline reports.
Kickstarter Pledges Pass $100 Million
Users of Kickstarter.com have pledged upward of $100 million to independent film projects. Together, 891,979 people have pledged $102.7 million to indies since April 2009 of which $85 million has been collected for 8,500 projects, THR reports.
Michael Haneke Withdraws Amour from Austrian Film Awards
Austrian filmmaker Michael Haneke has withdrawn his critically applauded Oscar hopeful Amour to give other local films a chance at recognition. The French-language film would have been ineligible for some categories. The film has already won Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actress at the European Film Awards and is Austria’s entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards, The Guardian reports.
Specialty Preview: The Impossible, Promised Land, Hyde Park On Hudson Hope to…
Full Story »
Over at the fantastic retro cinema celebration series that is Trailers From Hell!, Joe Dante is currently running a Kickstarter to back the next batch of webisodes, which feature Dante and his “Grindhouse Gurus” — Eli Roth, Guillermo Del Toro, and John Landis, among others — dissecting their favorite genre fare of olde. And while a top pledge will get you all sorts of one-of-a-kind rewards ranging from lunch with Dante to the arachnid jaw from Starship Troopers, one prize in particular offers an opportunity so rare, someone had better jump on it, fast: A script reading by screenwriter Josh Olson.
For $5,000 or more, an enterprising Kickstarter backer will get their script read and receive feedback from the History of Violence scribe who famously declared in the Village Voice editorial “I Will Not Read Your Fucking Script” that he — well, you know.
“For a better understanding as to why Josh reading your script is so remarkable, we refer you to his legendary rant in The Village Voice ‘I Will Not Read Your #@$%^%! Script,’ adds the Kickstarter page.
Only one such prize is available for claiming, so hop to it! The Kickstarter campaign has 26 days to go… and presumably if the goal is not met, the Olson offer is off the table.
Below, watch Olson’s Trailers from Hell guest spot, in which he goes deep on The Conversation:
[Trailers from Hell Kickstarter]
In 2007, a 19-year-old from Tennessee named Chris Crocker used YouTube to defend a mildly disturbed pop star named Britney Spears. His efforts didn’t quite sway her detractors, but the gargantuan amount of attention he received for yelling, “Leave Britney Alone” proved that YouTube was a startup starmaker — and you only needed a camera and a computer to plug yourself into its intergalactic Jumbotron. Now, a new documentary called Me At the Zoo about the platinum-topped viral phenom needs Kickstarter cash to finish production. Could your investment be worth it?
I love the idea of this movie. A patchwork of Internet clips and interstitial audio commentary? Sure, Kevin Macdonald and Ridley Scott’s recent documentary Life in a Day — composed entirely of user-submitted YouTube clips from around the world — poses as an au courant “film made by you,” but if we’re really going to chronicle the mania of YouTube, why not investigate the most memorable, incendiary figure in its history? The fact that Crocker’s story dovetails with the era of pop culture history in which he became popular is also ideal. When you think of Britney and her umbrella drama, you think of Chris Crocker. That’s an unprecedented type of connection in entertainment history, and it deserves a documentary.
Other things I love about this movie, so far:
1. The title Me at the Zoo. It refers to the first video ever uploaded to YouTube, but we can safely say that Chris Crocker is his own species of commentator.
2. OK, there was a kickass VH1 show once called FanClub where superfans of bands showed off their freakish collections of memorabilia and gathered together to watch their idols in concert. I…
Full Story » 
Less than a week after announcing work on All Things Must Pass — a splendid-sounding documentary about meteoric rise and precipitous fall of the Tower Records empire — actor/producer Colin Hanks confirmed today that he and his partners had fulfilled their $50,000 fundraising goal via the crowdsourcing hotspot Kickstarter.
Hanks and producing pal Sean Stuart passed the good news along today via Twitter: “In 5 Days, 2 Hours we reached our Fundraising Goal!!!” That doesn’t necessarily get them any closer to completing the film, however: According to a report Friday in the Wall Street Journal, Tower founder Russ Solomon has two storage units packed with company artifacts that the filmmakers have yet to browse, and more interviews remain to be shot. “”We don’t really know how long it will take,” Hanks told the paper’s Bankruptcy Beat blog (Tower was liquidated after going under in 2006). “We’ll just sort of make the movie as we make the movie.”
Anyway, FYI! This is really happening.
[Via @TowerRecordsDoc]
Full Story »
