Ted Nugent: I Will Be Dead Or In Jail If Obama Is Re-elected Rocker and noted gun enthusiast Ted Nugent is stirring up attention over comments he made about President Obama and his administration at a National Rifle Association conference in St. Louis over the weekend. As the website Right Wing Watch reports, Nugent called Obama a criminal and denounced his “vile, evil, America-hating administration” which is “wiping its ass with the Constitution.” He went on to say, “If Barack Obama becomes the President in November again, I will either be dead or in jail by this time next year.” Nugent, who has already endorsed Mitt Romney for president, urged each person to get a “couple of thousand” people to cast their ballot for the presumptive Republican challenger. “If you can’t galvanize and promote and recruit people to vote for Mitt Romney, we’re done,” Nugent said. “We’ll be a suburb of Indonesia next year. Our president, attorney general, our vice president, Hillary Clinton — they’re criminals, they’re criminals.” Do you agree with this guy or is he just flat out crazy? Source More On Bossip! Mariah Carey And Nick Cannon Bring “Dem Babies” Roc & Roe On Playdate With Alicia Keys And Swizzy’s Son Egypt Hoy En Mi Gente News: Happy Birthday Selena Quintanilla Perez! (April 16, 1971 – March 31, 1995) Bald And The…Beautiful? Did These Celebrities Look Better Or Worse Without Their Hair? PDA With The Parentals: Jay-Z And BeyBey Coupled Up For Knicks Game And Dinner Date
There’s a peculiar kind of pleasure to be found in watching Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill, in 21 Jump Street , horsing around and generally acting like doofuses for our amusement. As rookie cops assigned to patrol — by bicycle — a city park, they’re more than ready to prove their tough-guy status: When they spot a bunch of biker guys experiencing the joys of cannabis beneath a tree, they strut toward the gang in their shorts and bike helmets, but not before flipping their kickstands down with a mighty thwack . Later, Hill says a fervent prayer in the Catholic church that serves as headquarters for the undercover unit to which the duo has been assigned, its sign outside reading, in mistranslated Korean, “Aroma of Christ Church.” Hill kneels in front of the crucifix, beginning his urgent plea with the words, “Hey, Korean Jesus…” That irreverent riff captures the tone of the whole picture — it’s a ramshackle thing, a goof on the idea that anyone might actually care about a movie based on an old TV show, or that anyone might actually care about a movie at all. For the first half, at least, 21 Jump Street gives us reason to care. In recent years, the mania for turning old TV shows into movies has waned — a good thing, particularly given the ungodly mess known as The Green Hornet . Still, movies inspired by TV shows are coming back with a tiny vengeance — we have Tim Burton’s Dark Shadows , to name just one, to look forward to later this spring. And for now, 21 Jump Street is a small puff of fresh air simply because it’s not, like umpteen other releases coming down the pike, based on a comic-book series. Instead, its inspiration is a show that made its debut on the then-fledgling Fox Network in 1987 (and also helped launch the career of Johnny Depp, long before he became buried under Burton’s makeup or obscured by pirate-y facial hair), although this 21 Jump Street has its own distinct, goofy flavor. The movie opens in 2005, when Schmidt (Hill) and Jenko (Tatum) are still high school students. Schmidt is the smart, shlubby, unpopular one — he’s an Eminem nut with a crop of bottle-blond hair, which could be sort of cool if his braces didn’t ruin the whole effect. Jenko is the dumb, sleepy-eyed jock with lank, shaggy hair. When the school principal informs him that he can’t go to the prom and that it’s “time to pay the piper,” he squints at her dimly and murmurs, “I should pay who?” Fast-forward a few years, and these two have become first police academy buddies (Jenko, recognizing he could use some help in the smarts department, latches onto Schmidt) and then rookie officers. After botching that aforementioned pot bust, the two are reassigned to an undercover unit — headed by a hard-ass, and very funny, Ice Cube — in which their job is to pose as teenagers and find the source of a drug that’s sweeping the local high school. 21 Jump Street is at its best when directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller — the guys behind the much-loved 2009 Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs — just let Hill and Tatum run with the patent ridiculousness of the setup. (The script is by Michael Bacall, from a story by Bacall and Hill.) Hill is reasonably funny and relaxed here; even when he’s playing the loser-sadsack, he radiates more confidence than he has in the past, instead of just relying on shtick. He still has that unassuming, “Who, me?” demeanor, but he’s more fully in control of it than ever before. And Tatum, who has already proved to be a marvelous dramatic actor even in throwaway pictures like Dear John (he also recently starred in the megahit The Vow ), has the kind of comic timing that’s deceptively laid-back and sharp at the same time. His Jenko comes off as an easygoing galoot, which makes the idiot-savant observations he comes up with that much funnier. Schmidt, upon his return to high school, notes that all the things that made him uncool in his own high-school days (caring about the environment, being tolerant) have now become hip. Jenko agrees, and he doesn’t like it, looking for a place to lay the blame: “I know the cause. It’s Glee ,” he says definitively, like a Sherlock Holmes who’s spent too much time parked in front of the tube. Together Hill and Tatum are so much fun to watch that it’s disappointing when the story around them becomes overly cluttered and convoluted. To say 21 Jump Street loses the plot isn’t quite accurate: It’s a pretty loose-limbed affair from the get-go. But Lord and Miller insist on turning it into an action film, complete with elaborate car chases and shootouts that betray the spirit of silliness they laid out at the beginning. 21 Jump Street falters when it becomes too ambitious. Its finest moments — as when Schmidt and Jenko sternly forbid a bratty kid from feeding ducks in the park, which causes him to immediately (what else?) feed the ducks — are the ones that feel unplanned and tossed-off. In those moments, 21 Jump Street shows a kind of wayward, pigeon-toed brilliance. Maybe that particular brand of half-assed genius is too evanescent to survive a whole movie. Then again, half an ass is better than none. Follow Stephanie Zacharek on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
This week at SXSW Movieline caught up with director Gareth Evans, whose Indonesian martial arts actioner The Raid: Redemption is set to knock your socks off later this month courtesy of Sony Classics. (Haven’t heard of the martial arts form silat? You will, come March 23.) With his film steadily collecting kudos left and right, Evans is already thinking ahead to his Raid sequel (working title: Berandal ), and an insane, dangerous-sounding four-on-one car fight he plans on working into the mix. First up, though, is the U.S. remake currently in the works at Screen Gems. The original film worked with the unique (and relatively new to most audiences) martial arts form silat , employed dynamically in a fairly basic setup: A SWAT team trapped inside a tenement building locked down by a vicious gangster must fight their way out. The American remake will build on the elements of The Raid , with Evans on hand as executive producer and Raid stars/fight choreographers Iko Uwais (who plays hero Rama) and Yayan Ruhian (who steals scenes as the sadistic Mad Dog) working on the remake’s fight choreography. “There will be elements of silat in there, which is kind of cool because there’s a respect for the original,” Evans said. “And I’m curious because the thing is yes, silat is an Indonesian martial art, but it’s practiced all over the world. There are schools of silat in London, there are schools of silat in America, there are schools of silat in France, and they have international championships as well. So there are a lot of people that know silat around the world, so it’s not a far-fetched idea that someone in America could know silat, the same way that it’s not far-fetched for a guy in America to know kung fu or muy thai.” While screenwriter Brad Inglesby has been recruited to script the remake, a director has yet to be found. Whoever it is, Evans isn’t worried about passing the reins to another filmmaker’s vision. “For me it’s like this: the storyline and the central concept is streamlined,” he explained. “It’s a very straightforward action film. So there’s room for improvement, and I think that director, whoever it is, has to be given the kind of creative freedom to push it in whatever direction he wants to push it and not have somebody standing over his shoulder saying, ‘You can’t do this, or you can’t do that.’ I think it should be that person’s decision.” After his Raid promotional tour is done, Evans will turn to pre-production on the sequel, with plans to begin filming next January. But how do you follow a film that’s already packed with non-stop, relentless, wall-to-wall, inventive action? “By going in a slightly different direction,” he teased. “If I try to replicate and copy it’ll fall on its ass, so I want to do something kind of different. We’re going to take the story out now and go onto the streets. So everything that was scary about that building and about that boss is small fry compared to the gangs we meet in the sequel — now we meet the people who let him have that building. And we expand the world out, we explore certain characters that were kind of hinted at in this but not expanded upon, and we ramp up some of the set pieces as well.” Evans’s Raid films will always retain their focus on silat, only showcased within different environments. Like, for example, the limited confines of a moving automobile. “We’ll have one fight scene,” Evans said, “a four-on-one fight inside of a car, and Iko’s going to be kicking people out through the windows, and it’s going to be nuts. What we’re doing now is we have to figure out how to shoot that without killing anyone. “Once we get that sorted,” he continued with a laugh, “then we’ll start shooting that.” Read more from SXSW here . Follow Jen Yamato on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Pop star shows off new ‘do at a Las Vegas charity event. By Rebecca Thomas Katy Perry at 1 Oak in Las Vegas on Saturday Photo: David Becker/WireImage Katy Perry is feeling a little less blue these days. The pop star began rocking an electric-blue bob not long after news broke that husband Russell Brand had filed for divorce late last year. But Perry, who stepped out in Las Vegas this weekend, appears to have dipped her locks in the dye once again. On Friday night, KP hit a charity event dressed in a beaded frock, her razor-cut ‘do colored in a rich turquoise. The party at the Vegas outpost of nightspot 1OAK was hosted by GiveLove.org , an organization devoted to improving public health in Haiti. But although newly separated Perry reportedly put on a good face, one source told amNewYork the “Waking Up in Vegas” singer seemed “subdued.” The pop star “pretty much sat in the same spot the whole night” as her friends danced, according to the source. While Katy has always been adventurous about her hair hues, post-split, she seems, anecdotally at least, to be hitting the bottle — of dye — with increasing frequency. Brand and Perry announced the end of their marriage on December 30, after 14 months together. The exes have been a keeping a rather low profile ever since. The comic is set to perform on March 4 at New York’s Radio City Music Hall as part of an Amnesty International benefit, while Perry may turn up next at the Grammy awards on February 12, where she’s up for two statues. She was spotted earlier this month shooting an Adidas ad , not long after wrapping two concert dates in Indonesia and the Philippines. Share your thoughts on Katy’s latest look on our Facebook page. Related Photos Katy Perry Returns To The Spotlight At 1Oak In Las Vegas Related Artists Katy Perry
On the JoBro’s latest episode of ‘Hot in Cleveland,’ premiering Wednesday night on TV Land, his and Hewitt’s characters get engaged. By Kara Warner Joe Jonas Photo: MTV News Jet-setting actor/musician Joe Jonas has once again made time in his busy schedule for a little stop through Cleveland — “Hot in Cleveland,” that is, the popular show on TV Land starring Valerie Bertinelli, Betty White, Wendie Malick and Jane Leeves. Jonas has a guest-starring role on the sitcom as the wayward son of Bertinelli’s character. MTV News was lucky enough to visit the set of “Cleveland” on the day Jonas filmed his second guest spot, which premieres Wednesday night (January 25) at 10 p.m. ET. When we caught up with him for a few minutes between scenes, he shared some details about his return to the show. “Being back on the show, [my character Will is] engaged, and I have to be engaged to Jennifer Love Hewitt, which is really nice,” he said. “We’re both sons and daughters of characters on the show, and we show up and surprise everybody. They don’t expect us to be engaged.” Jonas said that while it was fun to work with Hewitt, their characters’ engagement doesn’t exactly last for long. “Both of our characters are really different. I think I’m a little bit blinded by the fact that she may not be the perfect person for me. I think we last probably less than Kim Kardashian in this,” he joked. Long engagements or no, Jonas said he loves his time on the show and would be happy to come back any time. “I would love to be able to return again. The first episode when I left, people were like, ‘Are you going to be back soon?’ and I said, ‘I think so.’ I don’t think my character passed away, so I think we’re good. I don’t die in this episode either,” he added. “So I’m still around, so I could definitely come back if they’d like me to. I have a fun time being on the set and I love the cast; it’s kind of like a family.” Are you excited to see Joe in “Cleveland” again? Let us know in the comments! Related Artists Joe Jonas
Brand will join Coldplay, Mumford & Sons, Jon Stewart at Amnesty International benefit. By James Montgomery Russell Brand Photo: Getty Images Russell Brand is set to make his first public appearance since filing for divorce from Katy Perry when he takes the stage at New York’s Radio City Music Hall as part of an Amnesty International benefit. Brand will perform alongside Coldplay, Mumford & Sons, Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Reggie Watts and others at Amnesty International’s Secret Policeman’s Ball, a long-running celebration of free speech and comedy, set for March 4 at the venerable NYC venue. The event marks the first time the ball has been held in the U.S. and also is Brand’s first scheduled appearance since he and Perry split in December; the “California Gurls” hitmaker has already made a pair of public appearances, first filming an Adidas commercial earlier this month and then returning to the stage for a concert in Jakarta, Indonesia . Check out photos of Russell and Katy from happier times. In a video promoting a then-upcoming comedy tour of American colleges — which was shot in mid-November, before the couple announced their split — Brand was seen jokingly removing his wedding ring . To date, he’s yet to announce any additional appearances. According to
Expect Twitter to explode shortly with reactions to the Sundance premiere of Gareth Evans’ The Raid , the Indonesian actioner that blew minds at Toronto but has been kept largely under wraps until now by Sony Classics, who smartly snatched up the pic and will distribute it this March. I caught The Raid last week at a pre-Sundance screening with its new score by Mike Shinoda — yes, of Linkin Park — and can attest that the early praise was well-earned because holy crap, it’s amazing . Everything you’ve heard about it? True. I know, I just got done ranting about film festival goggles and inflated pre-release hype. But being mindful of falling into that trap, I’ve thought a lot about The Raid in the days since, and it’s stuck. Not only that — it’s the rare film that I can’t wait to see again. I’ve described it by pointing to the famous one-take staircase fight in Tony Jaa’s The Protector : It prompts the kind of rush of that scene, only for the entire runtime. Briefly, the simple premise of The Raid : SWAT agents in Jakarta, Indonesia, descend on an apartment building run by a local crime lord, only to find that the place is infested with criminals and the odds are stacked against them. The action emphasis is on gun battles and a form of martial arts called silat, which Evans previously used in his 2009 film Merantau , and to say the very least, it’s a brutal, stabby, bone-crunching kind of action pic. Pairing Evans’ film with a new electro-ish score by Shinoda works extremely well as their energies are well-matched, though I can’t say what the original score sounded like. Suffice to say it may be the best thing to come of Linkin Park, like ever, and it adds a strangely perfect universality to the proceedings — as if of course even halfway across the world in Indonesia dubstep is a thing, and folks imagine their every move underscored by a badass, grimy soundtrack. Who doesn’t? There are plot intricacies that are best left unspoiled, touching on the documented predominance of crime and corruption in Jakarta, but human relationships at the center of the chaos work well; in star Iko Uwais, Evans found a performer who can balance character while pulling off great, believable fight choreography right in front of your eyes. Even the extras seem like seasoned martial arts pros, and there are dozens, maybe a hundred who play nameless thugs and cops, battling it out in this feature-length melee. As for those fights, The Raid features some of the bloodiest, impressive, and most inventive action sequences in recent memory. It’s a movie packed with highlights and few moments of rest, full of bruising elbows and machetes and machine gun blasts and axes to the neck where most action flicks these days throw stage punches in the wind. This is the unrelenting action tour de force we’ve been waiting for, and a window into the world of silat, heretofore largely unexplored in film. Need more proof? Watch a few redband clips below. The Raid will be released on March 23. Follow Jen Yamato on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter . Get more of Movieline’s Sundance coverage here.
Fan spotted her filming an Adidas commercial in California this week. By Jocelyn Vena Katy Perry and fan Eric Berlanger on the set of her Adidas commercial Photo: Splash News Online While Katy Perry was missing in action at Wednesdays People’s Choice Awards , where she won five prizes, the pop star was spotted on the set of an Adidas commercial in California this week. A photograph of Perry , who happened to be wearing the new Adidas Originals X Jeremy Scott collection, posing with fan Eric Berlanger first appeared on the It’s Just Roxie Tumblr page before going viral. It marks the first time that the pop singer has been photographed after her husband Russell Brand filed for divorce New Year’s weekend. The last time she was photographed was in the days leading up to the announcement, when she was in Hawaii on vacation without Brand. “It was great to see her. I met her a couple times before,” Berlanger told UsMagazine.com of hanging with Perry on the Santa Barbara shoot (the singer hails from the SoCal town). “I am a big fan! She was great, really nice. She seemed happy.” As Perry settles back into public life after her split from Brand, she has also resumed her usual cat tweeting ways. On Thursday (January 12), she only wrote “meow,” before posting a photo of her cat Kitty Purry. As the Grammy Awards approach, it seems like fans will see more of the colorful singer . Perry is up for two awards at the February 12 show, and she is scheduled for two concerts later this month, one in Jakarta, Indonesia, and another in the Philippines. “I am so grateful for all the love and support I’ve had from people around the world,” she wrote a week after Brand filed for divorce in her first comments about the split . “You guys have made my heart happy again.” What do you think of Katy Perry’s blue hair? Let us know in the comments Related Videos MTV News Extended Play: Katy Perry Related Photos Lovebirds: Katy Perry And Russell Brand Related Artists Katy Perry
Singer tweets for the first time since her split with Russell Brand By Jocelyn Vena Katy Perry Photo: Getty Images A week after news broke that Katy Perry and Russell Brand are divorcing after a year of marriage, the pop singer has broken her silence. On Saturday, she took to Twitter to open up publicly for the first time since the split. “I am so grateful for all the love and support I’ve had from people around the world,” she wrote. “You guys have made my heart happy again.” In another tweet minutes later, she addressed the tabloid chatter that has been swirling around since Brand filed for divorce in Los Angeles on December 30. “Concerning the gossip, I want to be clear that NO ONE speaks for me,” she said, “Not a blog, magazine, ‘close sources’ or my family.” See a timeline of Katy Perry and Russell Brand’s relationship. The tweets come days before Perry is set to make her first public appearance at the People’s Choice Awards on Wednesday [January 11] where she’s up for a number of awards. The People’s Choice Awards marks the beginning of a slew of expected appearances from the singer. She’s also slated to make two appearances on her California Dreams Tour later this month, one on January 19 in Jakarta, Indonesia, and another on January 22 in the Philippines. Perry’s next awards show appearance could take place February 12 at the Grammys, where she’s up for two awards: Record of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance for “Firework.” Brand released a statement at the time of the announcement, saying, “Sadly, Katy and I are ending our marriage. I will always adore her and I know we’ll remain friends.” Related Photos Lovebirds: Katy Perry And Russell Brand Related Artists Katy Perry
Pop star has plenty to keep her busy, between her music and budding acting career. By Jocelyn Vena Katy Perry Photo: Getty Images Katy Perry is kicking off 2012 a single girl. Over the holiday weekend, news broke that Russell Brand had filed for divorce after a year of marriage with the pop star. And while Perry has remained low-key since the split, she is amping up for what is sure to be another busy year. Perry hasn’t been spotted in public since Friday’s breakup announcement, but she did make some non-relationship-related headlines Tuesday (January 3) when a demo version of the Jessie James track “Bullet” hit the Net; Perry co-wrote the sassy track for the singer’s 2009 album. The singer has two shows later this month — one scheduled for January 19 in Jakarta, Indonesia, and another January 22 in the Philippines — as part of her California Dreams Tour. Come February, Perry is set to appear at the Grammys, where she is up for two awards, including Record of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance for “Firework.” It’s been nearly two years since Perry’s megahit Teenage Dream album dropped. While no word has come down about new music from the star, when MTV News spoke to producer Tricky Stewart , he hinted that Perry was working on a new release of some older material, including a track called “Dressing Up.” “Katy and I went into [the studio] just to address some issues with records that we had done in the past that didn’t end up going on Teenage Dream, ” he told MTV News about the top-secret project. “So we are in the process of just listening and freshening up things and getting ready for something special she has going on.” Perry hasn’t announced plans to tackle any more acting roles, but in 2011, she made fans laugh on the big screen as the voice of Smurfette in “The Smurfs” and as the host of “Saturday Night Live” in December, teasing a possible second career in film and TV. Since the split made headlines, Perry has not addressed the divorce . However, Brand said in a statement, “Sadly, Katy and I are ending our marriage. I will always adore her and I know we’ll remain friends.” Related Photos Lovebirds: Katy Perry And Russell Brand Related Artists Katy Perry
