Previews and Reviews that are Z's Views
Frank Miller recently shared his favorite things with the Wall Street Journal.
How cool is it that Frank’s favorite things are not expensive and extravagant? I was a bit surprised that nothing from Sin City made the cut… unless you count the model car.
This map takes a look at The Most Popular Fictional Characters from Every State. Click on the link to see a much bigger map.
There are a couple of surprises for sure, but the fact that Sylvester Stallone plays two of the characters shouldn’t be. Rocky and Rambo are THAT popular.
Source: Bits and Pieces.
Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 15 Fun Facts About City Slickers. Here are three of my favorites…
1. JACK PALANCE WAS BILLY CRYSTAL’S ORIGINAL CHOICE TO PLAY CURLY.
When Crystal first came up with the seed of the idea for City Slickers, he immediately thought of Jack Palance as the crusty bad guy with the heart of gold. He thought of him because the first movie he had ever seen was the 1953 movie Shane, where Palance played the bad guy. The actor left a lasting impression on Crystal, who was seven years old at the time of his first movie-going experience. Because his father produced jazz concerts, Billy saw Shane seated on Billie Holiday’s lap.
5. CHARLES BRONSON WAS ANGRY OVER BEING ASKED TO PLAY CURLY.
Jack Palance initially turned down the role of Curly, as he was committed to another project. So Crystal offered the part to Charles Bronson, who was not pleased. He cursed Crystal out because “I’m dead on page 64!” Palance, of course, ended up taking the role (and the rest is history).
6. PALANCE GOT INTO AN ARGUMENT WITH THE DIRECTOR ON THE FIRST DAY OF SHOOTING.
The veteran actor yelled at Ron Underwood over his first direction, but everything went smoothly after that. When Crystal asked what had happened, Palance explained that he always gets nervous on his first day of shooting. Sure enough, Tim Burton told a similar story about Palance snapping at him on his first day of shooting on Batman over how he was told to walk out of a bathroom, with Burton admitting that the incident scared him “to death—I literally saw white and left my body.”
A phobia is defined as…
…a type of anxiety disorder, usually defined as a persistent fear of an object or situation in which the sufferer commits to great lengths in avoiding, typically disproportional to the actual danger posed, often being recognized as irrational.
Common phobias are a fear of public speaking, spiders, snakes, heights, dogs, thunder or lightening, flying and so on.
Eddie Deezen takes a look a celebrity phobias in his piece, “Hey, What Are You Afraid Of” at Neatorama.
Eric D Snider and Mental_Floss present 14 Deep Facts About The Hunt for Red October. Here are three of my favorites…
1. Even though the novel had been a bestseller, nobody wanted to make the movie.
Tom Clancy’s book is a complicated story with a lot of technical jargon, which made Hollywood executives antsy. It also made the movie hard to summarize. “In Hollywood, because of time constraints, very few people in a position to say yes to a project like this read the book,” admitted producer Mace Neufeld. “They generally read the reader’s report. [And] this book doesn’t condense well into two or three pages.” Neufeld got the project off the ground by getting a Paramount executive to read the novel—not just the book report—and see for himself how cinematic it could be.
3. Sean Connery was a last-minute replacement.
The film had been under production for two weeks when word came that Klaus Maria Brandauer (Out of Africa), the Austrian actor who’d been signed to play the rogue Soviet sub commander Marko Ramius, couldn’t do it after all because of a prior commitment. Connery took the part instead, needing only one day for rehearsal. Coincidentally, he and Brandauer had acted together in 1983’s Never Say Never Again and would reunite again for 1990’s The Russia House, which was shot shortly after The Hunt for Red October.
9. Alec Baldwin wanted to return for the sequels but was edged out when Paramount learned they could get Harrison Ford.
It’s complicated, and there are at least two sides to every story, but here’s the gist: While negotiations with Baldwin were still ongoing, Paramount allegedly offered the part to Ford, who was a bigger box office draw and to whom the studio owed money anyway because of a previous project that had fallen through. Baldwin had been dithering over the specifics of his deal, and now a Paramount executive used that indecision to force his hand: either commit right now to an open-ended contract for Patriot Games and whatever came next, or the offer would be withdrawn. Not wanting to give up a chance to appear in A Streetcar Named Desire on Broadway, Baldwin left Jack Ryan behind.
Kristy Puchko and Mental_Floss present 15 Things You Should Know About The Last Supper. Here are three of my favorites…
2. The Last Supper captures a climactic moment.
Everyone knows the painting depicts Jesus’ last meal with his apostles before he was captured and crucified. But more specifically, da Vinci wanted to capture the instant just after Jesus reveals that one of his friends will betray him, complete with reactions of shock and rage from the apostles. In da Vinci’s interpretation, the moment also takes place just before the birth of the Eucharist, with Jesus reaching for the bread and a glass of wine that would be the key symbols of this Christian sacrament.
6. Very few of da Vinci’s original brushstrokes remain.
Although the painting itself was beloved, da Vinci’s tempera-on-stone experiment was a failure. By the early 16th century, the paint had started to flake and decay, and within 50 years, The Last Supper was a ruin of its former glory. Early restoration attempts only made it worse.
Vibrations from Allied bombings during World War II further contributed to the painting’s destruction. Finally, in 1980, a 19-year restoration effort began. The Last Supper was ultimately restored, but it lost much of its original paint along the way.
3. You won’t find it in a museum.
Although The Last Supper is easily one of the world’s most iconic paintings, its permanent home is a convent in Milan, Italy. And moving it would be tricky, to say the least. Da Vinci painted the religious work directly (and fittingly) on the dining hall wall of the Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie back in 1495.
Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 15 Fun Facts About Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Here are three of my favorites…
1. ANTHONY MICHAEL HALL BELIEVES THAT JOHN HUGHES WANTED HIM TO PLAY FERRIS.
Hall told Vanity Fair that his relationship with the director ended rather abruptly following their work together on Weird Science, and after Hall had begun working with other directors. But he believed that Hughes wrote the roles of Duckie in Pretty in Pink and Ferris Bueller for him. For his part, Hughes said Broderick was the actor he had in mind when writing the screenplay. Casting directors Janet Hirshenson and Jane Jenkins only seriously considered one other actor for the part: John Cusack.
6. LOVE WAS IN THE AIR.
Matthew Broderick and Jennifer Grey (who played Jeanie, Ferris’ sister) met and got engaged just before the movie’s release. Cindy Pickett and Lyman Ward, who played Ferris’ parents, met on the set of the movie and eventually got married and had two children.
7. BEN STEIN WAS INITIALLY SUPPOSED TO DO HIS LECTURE OFF-CAMERA.
The student extras laughed so hard that Hughes decided to put Stein in front of the camera for his speech on supply-side economics. Stein himself picked the topic after Hughes asked him to speak about something he knew a lot about. Before he became a familiar movie and television presence, Stein—who is also a lawyer—was a speechwriter for Presidents Nixon and Ford.
Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 19 Fun Facts About Married with Children. Here are three of my favorites…
5. THE SHOW WAS PITCHED WITH SAM KINISON AS AL AND ROSEANNE BARR AS PEGGY.
Both Kinison and Barr’s managers told Moye, Leavitt, and the other producers that their clients were shooting for the movies, not television.
9. THE SHOW BRIEFLY RUINED O’NEILL’S MOVIE CAREER.
O’Neill had to be recast long after the 1991 war film Flight of the Intruder had finished shooting because test audiences kept laughing whenever he appeared on screen, even though he was playing a Navy captain involved in a court-martial.
6. MICHAEL RICHARDS AUDITIONED TO PLAY AL.
Two years before he landed the career-making role of Kramer on Seinfeld, Richards auditioned to play the Bundy family patriarch. Moye estimated that out of the many people who auditioned for the role, “80 percent” played Al like Jackie Gleason as Ralph Cramden and “five percent” went the Jack Nicholson in The Shining route.
Roger Cormier and Mental_Floss present 15 Giant Facts About Shrek. Here are three of my favorites…
4. CHRIS FARLEY WAS THE ORIGINAL SHREK.
Farley was not only cast in the title role, but he had actually completed recording somewhere between 80 to 95 percent of his dialogue before he passed away in 1997. In the version of the film Farley worked on, Shrek was a teenage ogre who didn’t want to go into the family business and had aspirations of becoming a knight.
12. THE MOVIE WAS SCREENED BY DREAMWORKS AND DISNEY LAWYERS TO AVOID POSSIBLE LAWSUITS.
Shrek was considered by some to be a series of jabs at Disney, with its general cynicism toward the traditional fairy tales that Disney had presented in movie form since 1937, Farquaad’s castle resembling Disneyland, and Farquaad’s diminutive stature possibly a reference to an infamous quote by Katzenberg’s former Disney boss Michael Eisner about his hatred of the former employee in a lawsuit. While there was no legal action, some Radio Disney affiliates did not allow Dreamworks to buy ad time to promote Shrek.
5. NICOLAS CAGE TURNED DOWN THE LEAD ROLE BECAUSE HE DIDN’T WANT TO BE AN OGRE.
Dreamworks executives considered Tom Cruise and Leonard DiCaprio for Shrek, until Katzenberg offered Nicolas Cage the part. Cage told the Daily Mail that he turned the role down because “I just didn’t want to look like an ogre.” Though, upon reflection, Cage realized that “Maybe I should have done it looking back.”
By Jacob T. Swinney
Many filmmakers pay homage to other films, but Tarantino takes things a step further by replicating exact moments from a variety of genres and smashing them together to create his own distinct vision.
That’s a photo of some original cast member of the 60’s cult classic tv show, Gilligan’s Island. They [except for Skipper, Alan Hale] weren’t the only things that changed before the show hit our tv screens. Check out the original opening song below.
Sean Hutchinson and Mental_Floss present 25 Facts About Jaws for Its 40th Anniversary. Here are three of my favorites…
4. THERE’S NOT A LOT OF JAWS IN JAWS.
The shark doesn’t fully appear in a shot until one hour and 21 minutes into the two-hour film. The reason it isn’t shown is because the mechanical shark that was built rarely worked during filming, so Spielberg had to create inventive ways (like Quint’s yellow barrels) to shoot around the non-functional shark.
12. ROBERT SHAW WASN’T THE FIRST CHOICE TO PLAY QUINT.
When actors Lee Marvin and Sterling Hayden—the first and second choices to play the grizzled fisherman Quint, respectively—both turned Spielberg down, producers Zanuck and Brown recommended English actor Robert Shaw, whom they had previously worked with on 1973’s The Sting.
14. GREGORY PECK FORCED A SCENE TO BE CUT FROM THE MOVIE.
In early drafts of the screenplay, Quint was originally introduced while causing a disturbance in a movie theater while watching John Huston’s 1958 adaptation of Moby Dick. The scene was shot, but actor Gregory Peck—who plays Captain Ahab in that movie—owned the rights to the film version of Moby Dick and wouldn’t let the filmmakers on Jaws use the footage, so the sequence was cut.
Ben Rawson-Jones and Digital Spy present 9 Important Lessons from Cannon Films Documentary. Here are three of my favorites…
1. FAO Casting Directors – Beware ‘That Stone Woman’!
When looking for a lead actress to cast opposite Richard Chamberlain in the 1985 Indiana Jones knock-off King Solomon’s Mines, producer Menahem Golan proclaimed “I want that Stone woman!” So Sharon Stone was duly given the role. Beyond being hated and soaked in urine on set everything looked great for the future Basic Instinct leg-crosser… until Golan watched the movie and was horrified.
It turns out he was after Kathleen Turner from Romancing the Stone. Oops.
3. Danger! Dolph Dialog!“You gave that guy lines?”That was reportedly Sylvester Stallone‘s reaction when he paid a random visit to the Masters Of The Universe set and spotted his Rocky IV nemesis Dolph Lundgren playing the lead role of He-Man. Sly had a point – the movie bombed. Monologues were certainly kept to a minimum for Dolph when the Rambo legend signed him up for his Expendables franchise.
4. Sequels Require No Previous MovieSigning up iconic martial arts star Chuck Norris was seen as quite a coup by Cannon. They had enough faith to fund the production of two Missing In Action movies featuring Norris as an American prisoner of war in North Vietnam and shoot them back-to-back in 1984. However, they realized the first was an absolute dud. So what did Cannon do? They released the better second movie first to a still overwhelmingly negative critical reception, but found that audiences flocked to see it on the back of the similarly themed First Blood’s success. They then released the intended first film under the guise of a prequel a year later. Amazing.
Michael Arbeiter and Mental_Floss present 15 Things You Might Not Know About Total Recall. Here are three of my favorites…
5. THE QUAID/HAUSER CHARACTER WENT THROUGH AN IMAGE OVERHAUL.
Producer De Laurentiis’ initial vision of the film’s hero Douglas Quaid (originally named “Quail”)/Carl Hauser was decidedly more in line with Dick’s short story: A schlubby office drone who dreams of a more exciting life. With this characterization in mind, his first choice for the part was Richard Dreyfuss. Over time, the desired machismo of the film’s leading man increased, prompting suggestions like William Hurt (courtesy of Cronenberg) and Patrick Swayze.
7. TO GET THE PART, SCHWARZENEGGER LED ANOTHER COMPANY TO BUY THE MOVIE.
Schwarzenegger saw an opportunity when De Laurentiis’ production company, De Laurentiis Entertainment Group, went bankrupt. The actor convinced Carolco Pictures, with whom he had recently worked on Red Heat, to purchase the rights to Total Recall.
8. SCHWARZENEGGER HAD AN UNUSUAL AMOUNT OF CONTROL OVER PRODUCTION.
The coveted role of Quaid was not the only thing Schwarzenegger won in the transaction: In addition to being welcome to recruit the director of his choice (as a big fan of RoboCop, he picked Paul Verhoeven), Schwarzenegger maintained authority over all creative aspects of the film, script, production, and even elements of distribution.
For instance, Schwarzenegger took issue with the portrayal of the movie in its TriStar Pictures studio trailer, demanding that the company create and release a preview that better represented Total Recall. Furthermore, when the actor was dissatisfied with the middling public awareness conjured by the movie in the weeks leading up to release, he convinced Carolco to invest more and more money into marketing until virtually everyone had heard of Total Recall.
Eric D. Snider and Mental_Floss present 15 Things You Might Not Know About Con Air. Here are three of my favorites…
1. It was director Simon West’s first film, but you’d probably seen his work before.
In fact, you’ve probably seen at least one thing West directed against your will. The Englishman directed many TV commercials for A-list companies like McDonald’s and Pepsi. Before that, he made the video for Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up,” the first few seconds of which have been viewed by anyone who’s ever been Rickrolled.
2. The transport system the movie is about was pretty new at the time.
The Justice Prisoner and Alien Transportation System (or JPATS) was formed in 1995. It combined and simplified systems that were previously run by the U.S. Marshals Service and the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and was immediately nicknamed “Con Air.” Screenwriter Scott Rosenberg tagged along on a few flights for research purposes, and evidently survived the experience. Though he did note that “it was very unsettling, and a bit terrifying.”
12. The Las Vegas climax was originally set at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Bruckheimer said one version of the script had the plane crashing into the White House. “I said the guys would really rather crash into Las Vegas,” Bruckheimer said—which makes more sense anyway, as Vegas is much closer to the plane’s starting point of Oakland.
