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Exclusive: Title Track for 'The Road' Soundtrack
Filed under: Drama, Music & Musicals, New Releases, Fandom, Home Entertainment
Cinematical has just received the following title track for Nick Cave and Warren Ellis' original and haunting film score for The Road. It's simple and chilling -- just as any accompaniment to a post-apocalyptic world should be -- full of violin and piano tunes, some wind instruments and sound loops. The soundtrack is being released digitally today over at Amazon, with further digital retailers tomorrow and a CD release to follow on January 12, 2010.We first alerted you to the score back in March, and then to the duo's Soundtrack Collection in September. As you might have gathered, some of us are big Cave & Ellis fans. And rightly so. They provided an award-winning score for John Hillcoat's earlier feature The Proposition (which Cave also wrote), and also scored The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. And of course, that's besides their work in Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, which has memorable cinematic ties to Wings of Desire (before Ellis teamed up with Cave).
Too often these days it's easy to get pulled out of movies due to overly imposing and grandoise film scores desperately trying to yank at emotions, rather than just lightly coaxing the right feel for a particular scene, and Cave and Ellis definitely know how to let simplicity reign. Check out the clip and track list after the jump and grab it over here at Amazon.
Phew! 'New Moon' Fails to Clinch Opening Weekend Record
Filed under: Box Office, Fandom, Newsstand
According to estimates over at Variety, The Twilight Saga: New Moon failed to top The Dark Knight's three-day opening weekend record of $158 million, bringing what I'm sure will be a huge sigh of relief to all those folks (and there's lots of them) who felt the film was in no way deserving of these historic milestones. Instead, after clinching the Best Midnight Opening record and Best Opening Day record, New Moon will have to settle for third on the Best Opening Weekend list after walking away with a pretty astonishing
If that number holds up (and it should), the film will replace Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End for third place on the list of all-time best opening weekends (domestic), and will settle in behind only Spider-Man 3 (second) and The Dark Knight (first). Still, with
Movie Popcorn is Bad for You? Who Knew?
Filed under: Fandom, Exhibition, Newsstand
In a report that will shock anyone that doesn't go to the movies, an advocacy group claims that movie theater popcorn is not a very good nutritional snack. In a press release, the Center for Science in the Public Interest says they commissioned laboratory analyses indicating a medium-size popcorn and medium-size soda purchased at a Regal theater, the country's largest movie theater chain, contains the nutritional equivalent of three McDonald's Quarter Pounders with 12 pats of butter. "Sitting through a two-hour movie isn't exactly like climbing Mt. Everest," a senior nutritionist for the Center said. "Why do theaters think they need to feed us like it is?"
Ah, but that comment betrays an ignorance of the current cinema. When I caught 2012 on opening day, for example, I watched it with a tub of popcorn by my side, as our reviewer Peter Hall suggested ($7.50 for a large popcorn at AMC). It gave me something to do during the non-disaster scenes. On a more serious note, the Center points out the high amount of saturated fat results from movie theater chains Regal and AMC using coconut oil to pop their popcorn. The Cinemark chain uses canola oil, which results in much less "artery-clogging" saturated fat.
For their part, the chains aren't talking, reports The Los Angeles Times, though Regal falls back on the MPAA's statistic that says the average American only attends six movies a year and thus: "Theater popcorn and movie snacks are viewed as a treat and not intended to be part of a regular diet." I know our readers watch up to six movies in a single weekend, so I ask you: Do you skip popcorn entirely? Do you buy anything from movie concession stands? If theaters offered healthier fare, would you buy it?
Making The (Up) Grade: Rocky
Filed under: United Artists, Fandom, 20th Century Fox, Home Entertainment
While new Blu-rays of old movies are sometimes dubious replacements for prior editions (hence the need for this column), box sets released in the high-definition format have thus far been fairly helpful, at least in terms of shelf space: many or most of them forego a lot of the frills and flourishes of their standard-definition iterations in favor of more streamlined packaging. Unfortunately, that's also sometimes extended to their extras, thanks in no small part to the legal entanglements of transferring commentaries and bonus content from one format to another.
Both Warner Brothers and Fox have faced this challenge a couple of times thanks to their ownership/ adoption of the libraries of MGM and United Artists, which until a few years ago issued their own releases. Rocky, which is one of United Artists' premier franchises, was recently released on Blu-ray in The Undisputed Collection, a set that contains all six of the films in the series, but it remains to be seen whether complete also means comprehensive in this particular case.
What's Already Available:
'Avatar' Watch: Running Time Announced and New Featurettes
Filed under: Action, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Fandom, 20th Century Fox, Newsstand
Though early rumors suggested the film was going to clock in at over three hours, 20th Century Fox claims James Cameron's Avatar will instead clock in at 150 minutes (or 2.5 hours), or about 156 minutes if you count the credits. The main reason why the film will run under three hours is because of the IMAX showings. Avatar will open in about 180 domestic IMAX theaters on December 18th, and because of the way the IMAX system is set up, the theaters that aren't converted over to digital projection can only hold about 170 minutes worth of film. But while Cameron's final edit came in significantly under 170 minutes, there's no saying whether there will be a cut on the DVD that will run over 170 minutes. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Avatar will open on a minimum of 5,500 screens, with almost half of those screens equipped to show the film in 3D.
In other Avatar news, two new featurettes were released online toward the latter part of the week. IGN UK unveiled one behind-the-scenes video focused primarily on the realistic sci-fi equipment created for the film, and Coke Zero released a video that introduces Stephen Ling's character, Col. Quaritch, and reveals a whole bunch of new footage. You can watch both videos over at SciFi Squad.
'New Moon' Smashes 'Dark Knight's' Opening Day Record!
Filed under: Drama, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Box Office, Fandom, Newsstand
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According to ERC, The Twilight Saga: New Moon sold roughly $71 million (Variety is reporting $72.7 million) worth of tickets on its opening day -- a number that, if correct, far surpasses the current opening day box office record of $67 million set by The Dark Knight back in 2008. With its $26 million take in midnight showings, that gives the second installment in the Twilight franchise two pretty giant records: Best Midnight Opening and Best Single Day Opening. Next up for the franchise is the three-day opening weekend record, also held by The Dark Knight with $158 million.
So what does this say about us? Well, while it's not as critically acclaimed as, say, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (previous midnight opening record holder) or The Dark Knight, these numbers do show just how much of an impact the female audience can have on a box office take. Sure, when The Dark Knight broke records everyone wanted to single out the teenage male audience as having won that film its titles, but polls showed females were responsible for upwards of 50% of that film's opening box office too. And now, with New Moon breaking records attracting a younger female audience, here's hoping studios wake up and realize that, yeah, the female audience is a damn powerful force.
So kudos to all you Twi-hards for showing up to support the property you love. Is the film truly worthy of its new records? Probably not. Will another film break those records within the next year? Yeah, most likely. But dammit if the folks at Summit Entertainment aren't partying their asses off this weekend. They just won the World Series at the box office. Congrats!
Interview: Judd Apatow (Part One)
Filed under: Universal, Fandom, Home Entertainment, Interviews
Funny People was the latest in Judd Apatow's ongoing series of summer comedies, but it was anything but a typical summer comedy: following a successful comedian (played by Apatow's longtime friend Adam Sandler) who reflects on his life after discovering he's going to die, the film offered lots of humor but with decidedly heavier themes lurking beneath the yuks. The film debuts on Blu-ray in a 2-Disc Collector's Edition next week, and the contents are amazing, showing how Apatow combined lighthearted fare with more serious ideas in the service of exploring something substantive.
Cinematical was lucky enough to catch up with Apatow via telephone one recent morning to discuss the process of putting together the film's home video iteration. In addition to discussing the bonus materials, extras, featurettes, and a documentary that's the most thorough and thoughtful ever produced about a comedy production, Apatow talked about finding the right ending for his magnum opus, discovering and deconstructing the process of producing laughs, and front-loading the film's universe with outside content about the supporting characters.
Cinematical: One of the ideas highlighted in the Blu-ray bonus materials was the fact that you knew this was going in a different direction than your previous films. Even knowing that while you were making it, were you surprised by the reactions of audiences and critics when it was released? Or does it matter?
Serious Scores: 'Aguirre: The Wrath of God'
Filed under: Music & Musicals, Fandom
We're doing something crazy, and launching another little series here on Cinematical: Serious Scores. You're a smart bunch, so I imagine you've already figured out that the goal isn't to highlight our favorite bank heists, but to praise the creme de la creme of cinema's soundtracks. Hopefully, you'll find something new for your iPod, rediscover a lost favorite, or appreciate a piece along with us. Technically, Werner Herzog's Aguirre: The Wrath of God doesn't have an official soundtrack. The entire score was recorded by the German progressive band Popol Vuh (the first of many collaborations they did with Herzog), and was released as an album in 1975, with a 2004 re-release. Only two tracks were actually used in the film: Aguirre I and Aguirre II. If you disdain the rest of their Krautrock, the magic of iTunes and Amazon allows you to buy them individually. Now you can put them on a playlist, set them to repeat, and go as mad as Aguirre himself.
Hints of madness aside, Aguirre I and II are pretty incredible pieces of music and were raved about in the 1970s. I think the music is just as powerful today, even if Moog synthesizers seem to have fallen out of favor. It's hypnotic and eerie, and so very evocative of that torpid jungle journey. Never have native panpipes sounded as frantic and terrified. I've embedded Aguirre I below the jump, but I highly recommend spending the $0.99 so you can download it to something hand-held and listen to it in the dark.
The Last Word(s) on 'Twilight' Belong to Kevin Smith
Filed under: Fandom, NSFW, Trailers and Clips
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You've read all the reviews and interviews, and watched all the spoof videos. Most of you reading this have probably already watched the film, too. Today, as The Twilight Saga: New Moon finally reaches theaters, it sorta feels like the day after Christmas -- all this hype, work and constant coverage building up to the release of just one film ... and then it's over. Now the "real" fans will begin their endless geeked-out debates on their own fansites, and the rest of us will talk about the film's boffo box office while preparing for three weeks worth of nonstop promo for JAMES F*CKING CAMERON'S AVATAR! ROAR!
So while you drink the last of your blood energy drink, and begin breaking down the Bella and Edward Nativity Scene that's currently on your front lawn, why not let our good buddy Kevin Smith have the last word on all things Twilight. During his panel at this past San Diego Comic-Con, Smith went off for about four minutes on the Twilight Phenomenon, and took us through the experience of watching a clip from New Moon while thousands of young girls screamed their silly little heads off. It's a very amusing clip (that's homemade, so excuse the jerky camera movements), and if it's the last thing you watch before folks begin ramping up their Eclipse coverage, you'll find yourself a happier and more well-adjusted human being because of it.
Watch the clip after the jump, though be warned that it comes with plenty of foul language.
Fun or Lame: Fox's 'Bones' Becomes One Big 'Avatar' Promo
Filed under: Action, Sci-Fi & Fantasy, Fandom, 20th Century Fox, Movie Marketing, Fan Rant
I'm pretty easygoing when it comes to marketing and product placement. It's so ubiquitous that I tune it out, or laugh along when it shows up on 30 Rock. I can never really muster up the rage some viewers do when Pizza Hut, Ford, or the iPhone is prominently placed in a movie or television show. The most I'll do is roll my eyes and joke about it later on ("Did you notice that? Lame!"), because I find the big picture to be more important than some high-priced props. That is, I didn't care until Fox proudly announced that Bones will return in two weeks with an Avatar themed episode. (The promo is embedded below the jump for the curious and eager.)
Look, I get why Fox would think this was a slamdunk. It's on their network, and one of Bones' recurring cast members, Joel Moore, is actually in Avatar. I understand that the combination makes the December 3 episode of Bones prime advertising real estate. But come on! Can't you just run some flashy commercials, a new trailer, or "a special behind-the-scenes look" like you did with films back during the good old days? Doesn't anyone at 20th Century Fox wonder if it doesn't look a little desperate to coerce an entire show into the PR game? After all, Avatar was supposed to sell itself purely on the photo-real effects, the world of Pandora, and the name of James Cameron. Why do they need Bones?
Exclusive: Title Track for 'The Road' Soundtrack
Movie Popcorn is Bad for You? Who Knew?_thumbnail.jpg)
'New Moon' Smashes 'Dark Knight's' Opening Day Record!
Black Friday Movie Deals: Best Buy
Sex and Nudity Don't Draw You to the Movies?
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