Those of you who were hoping for a slightly darker, more emo Avengers instead of the big, fun, dumb superhero spectacle Joss Whedon delivered to overwhelming enthusiasm are in luck — that’s exactly what a newly unveiled deleted Captain America scene and alternate opening sequence provide. Feel Steve Rogers’ existential PAIN as he walks the streets of modern New York City, doomed to a rudderless time-jumping existence filled with dead friends and free wifi! Such is life, Steve. Welcome to the 21st century. I mean, life is so hard for Cappy even a Stan Lee cameo can’t wake him out of his ennui. At least it’s not as much of a downer as Cobie Smulders’ bitchfest of a post-op report. This could’ve opened the movie — in flashback no less, the most overused device of them all — so let’s all thank Whedon for lightening the mood. Can’t wait to see what else awaits in the 30+ minutes of deleted footage when Avengers hits home video. [ Playlist , Yahoo ]
This week, your Labor Day holiday viewing kicks off with Tom Hardy in cardigans in John Hillcoat’s Lawless for the grown-ups and the PG-13 horror flick The Possession for everyone else. Well, almost everyone else; if you have eyeballs and live in the targeted marketing range of self-professed Teletubbies PR whiz Kenn Viselman, another new offering is jockeying for the disposable ticket monies of the kid-toting demographic out there. Its name is Oogieloves . And it’s coming for you. The Oogieloves In The Big Balloon Adventure is, like The Teletubbies , colorful G-rated children’s programming built around giant humanoid creatures, this time full-bodied puppet-kids Goobie, Zoozie and Toofie. (Unfortunately the stoner entertainment potential seems much, much lower here.) There’s no good reason for you to know what the Oogieloves are, though if you’re like me the billboards and posters around town have a lingering, disturbing effect. My immediate reaction to turning the corner to come face to face with one of these Oogieloves posters: WHAT ARE THESE GIANT FABRIC CANDY-COLORED CHILDREN-PUPPETS WITH NO NOSES? WHY DO THEY STARE AT ME FROM BEHIND THOSE BALLOONS LIKE PUPPET PEEPING TOMS?? DEAR GOD THEY’RE GOING TO EAT ME, AREN’T THEY??? And side note: Guys, just stop trying to make “Oogust” happen. Oogieloves aims to set itself apart from the competition by offering children and parents an interactive moviegoing experience: Here, the young viewer is encouraged to dance and sing with the screen characters as a gaggle of semi-recognizable celebrities (Toni Braxton, Cloris Leachman, Chazz Palminteri, Cary Elwes, Jaime Pressly) turn in cameos to keep the grown-ups from falling asleep/banging their heads against the seat, at least on some basic level of C-list celebrity spotting. I’m not a parent, so I don’t have much of an idea of how excruciating it is to sit through the majority of television and film programming aimed at the toddler set. I imagine Oogieloves isn’t any less torturous to sit through than your average kids picture. But there’s also a practical upside to the experimental interactive angle. “Instead of giving our children popcorn and soda and asking them to sit still during a 90 minute movie, we looked at the experience from a child’s point of view,” Viselman explained to the Sacramento Bee. It’s not just Baby Brigade night at your local cineplex; it’s playtime for a theater full of energetic tots who don’t have to try to sit still for an hour and a half, staring passively at the screen. Herein lies Viselman’s genius, if I may use that word (it’s been applied to him in the past for blowing up The Teletubbies phenomenon by fabricating the Tinky Winky gay rumors, and casting George Carlin in Thomas the Tank Engine ). Oogieloves , regardless of its actual content, fulfills a need that parents can’t find elsewhere – the chance to bring children to the movies without having to shush them, or wrangle them, without worrying about disturbing other patrons. Viselman teamed up with educator/Ph.D. Faith Rogow to pen a Parents Guide to Oogieloves ( pdf ) that outlines all the ways in which Oogieloves is an enriching educational film for 3-5 year-olds. It doesn’t include my favorite trivia bit about this whole Oogieloves business: That Viselman concocted the idea after going to a Tyler Perry movie and noticing how members of the audience were super into talking back to the screen. So if you find yourself dragged along to see Christopher Lloyd flamenco dancing with giant scary puppet spawn this week, you know who to blame/thank. ( Oogieloves is directed by Matthew Diamond, whose 1998 Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary for the Paul Taylor dance doc Dancemaker , amazingly enough, lends the pic some Oscar cred.) So what the good God is Oogieloves to any of us without children to entertain? I boil it down to the famous people trapped in this ultimate paycheck gig, even if some of them seem to be enjoying themselves much more than others. Let’s rank the celebrity cameos based on film stills and guess at who’s Oogielovin’ and Oogiehating their lives this week, in order of increasing enjoyment/decreasing humiliation: Christopher Lloyd as Lero Sombrero The front-runner of the Oogieloves misery contest appears to be Christopher Lloyd but hey, only a viewing of the film will tell. Even Piranha 3DD made more sense than this. Carey Elwes as Bobby Wobbly Remember Cary Elwes’ glory days? Sigh. Chazz Palminteri as Marvin Milkshake Fascinatingly enough, the Oscar nominee almost seems like he’s actually having fun, or at least doesn’t give a shit that he’s serving milkshakes to puppet children in a movie called Oogieloves . Jaime Pressly as Lola Sombrero Likewise, there’s no trace of sadness in Pressly’s face. I fully believe her dedication to the Oogieloves cause. Toni Braxton as Rosalie Rosebud On the other hand, Toni Braxton looks completely unfazed playing an over-the-top singer modeled after Mariah Carey . This could be her acting breakthrough. Cloris Leachman as Dottie Rounder And that brings us to the unsinkable Cloris Leachman, who appears to be having a freaking ball (as she always does). This is your Oogieloves MVP right here. Anyone planning on seeing Oogieloves this week? Come on back and tell us how it was. Follow Jen Yamato on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Speaking of old…. Dax Shepard deployed one of the oldest marketing tricks in the book on the Conan show on Monday when he diverted attention from the lame box-office performance of his movie Hit and Run by poking fun at the aging action stars who kicked his cinematic ass, the cast of The Expendables 2 . Shepard told host Conan O’Brien that the cast of the Sylvester Stallone-directed The Expendables 2 were “all show and no go” when it came to their collective well-muscled appearance. “It looks like the zombie apocalypse is saving the earth,” Shepard said in reference to the veteran ensemble. Alas, Hit and Run might have benefited from scenes of a zombie apocalypse, or something that would have raised moviegoer interest. The picture, which also starred Bradley Cooper and Shepard’s real-life girlfriend Kristen Bell grossed just $5.9 million in its initial five-day opening. The movie ranked 10th for the weekend, well behind The Expendables 2 , which saw a $13.5 million weekend and a 15-day domestic box-office take of $52.3 million. Feeling a little insecure there, Dax? Follow Frank DiGiacomo on Twitter. Follow Movieline on Twitter.
The Washington Post caught up with Jon Voight , Hollywood’s “new senior Republican,” while the 73-year-old actor was stumping for his favorite candidates down in Tampa, FL: “‘The Hollywood community is historically conservative,’ he said. ‘All the people that I so admired growing up were very patriotic and loved the country.’ But then came the left-wing ‘nonsense’ of the 1960’s, which Voight admits he also got caught up in it. ‘I’m quite ashamed of it, actually. . . I know as much as anybody about this stuff and I know how poisonous it is.'” [ Washington Post via Salon ]
Scarlett Johansson might have some competition from Lizzy Caplan in the Avengers world. Although the short film Item 47 , which stars Caplan, hasn’t officially debuted yet — it’s one of the many Avengers Blu-ray extras, due out September 25 — the actress had fun riffing on the possibilities if her appearance in the one-shot S.H.I.E.L.D adventure could lead to to her suiting up as a Marvel superheroine. “Well, I can definitely foresee Marvel not only asking me to be the star of one of their action movies from that short, but also [asking me] to cast the other people in the movie,” Caplan coyly replied during an interview for her latest picture, Bachelorette . “So I’ve been thinking about this a lot, and I think we would be…” she trailed off before turning to Bachelorette (and former Party Down ) co-star, Adam Scott, for assistance. “I need to think of some Marvel character…” she whispered with a laugh, before adding enthusiastically, “Adam would be the She-Hulk, and I would just be a regular person!” Her response suggests that in any future Marvel projects she would just be playing her Item 47 character, Claire, a human who (with Jesse Bradford) comes across an extraterrestrial weapon and goes on a crime spree — only battling a superhero instead of holding up banks. However, given her natural quick wit and the image of her toting a Chitauri gun in Item 47 , we could envision her fitting right in with Iron Man & Co. Think about it — how fantastic would it be to see Caplan and Robert Downey Jr. play off of each other? Since Caplan is already (literally) in the door at S.H.I.E.L.D., they could have her suited up and smashing box offices across the country in no time. But until Marvel makes a decision, Caplan is planning to make a grand entrance in Pawnee, Ind. “I think she would be great on [ Parks and Recreation ],” Scott said, Caplan quickly interrupting him: “As She-Hulk!” And, of course, Movieline had to suggest that he would run into the superhero when his character, Ben Wyatt, heads to D.C. for a new job. “I mean, spoiler alert: I know for sure The Hulk is going to be a big part of this upcoming season,” Scott said with a laugh. “She-Hulk, I’m not totally sure about, but we can look into it.” Previously: Lizzy Caplan and Jesse Bradford Talk Item 47 at Comic-Con Alyse Whitney is an editor at Wetpaint Entertainment in New York City. Her work has been featured on TVLine, Movieline, and Bon Appétit, among others. You can find her on Twitter @AlyseWhitney.
Tony Scott did not leave a reason for his suicide. The news came Friday from the Los Angeles County coroner’s office, which said that notes left behind by the Top Gun filmmaker did not give a motive for his self-inflicted death south of Los Angeles last Sunday. The coroner’s office also said Friday that the notes written by Scott did not mention any health issues, according to A.P. Soon after his death, ABC News quoted an insider who said the director had been diagnosed with inoperable brain cancer, which was later refuted by family members. Tony Scott, 68, jumped from the Vincent Thomas Bridge, which spans the busy L.A. Harbor south of downtown. The coroner’s office performed an autopsy Monday, but the results will take a month or longer before official details are released about the cause of death, though it is being treated as a probable suicide. Coroner’s office spokesperson Ed Winter said that the notes left behind had a list of emergency contact numbers and a separate message to friends and family. [ Source: A.P. ]
Don’t shoot the messenger! This week’s wide release of the Joseph Gordon-Levitt bike courier film Premium Rush inspired Movieline to deliver this cinematic parcel to your doorstep. Once each generation, Hollywood pushes a product centered on the travails of these municipal nomads; back in the 1970s there was a love story with Tom Berenger in Rush It ; CBS tried out the courier-based sitcom Double Rush with Robert Pastorelli and David Arquette; Jessica Alba played an urban biker in Dark Angel ; and, most recently, came the Chinese import Beijing Bicycle . The desire to portray the world of bike messenger-ing is understandably tempting — the close-knit society, rebellious personalities, and high-risk action of the work beg for a dramatic treatment. But one title rises seat and handlebars above all the others in this micro-sub-genre: 1986’s Kevin Bacon vehicle Quicksilver . Nestled perfectly in the middle of the decade, this film typifies a 1980s offering, so light in actual content you could fit it in your shoulder bag. Characters are revealed less via action than by name – Apache, Cha-Cha, Airborne, Spider, and Shorty. Even the main characters are communion-wafer thin when it comes to complexity. Curiously, Quicksilver features a preponderance of comedians in the cast: Paul Rodriguez has a major part, Saturday Night Live writer Andrew Smith appears, and Louie Anderson is, theoretically, a messenger named Tiny. (I say “theoretically” because the corpulent stand-up never once straddles a bike seat, possibly because he couldn’t.) The synth-heavy score comes courtesy of Genesis keyboardist Tony Banks, and it immerses you in the era — so much so it feels like more energy went into crafting the soundtrack than the script. Roger Daltrey had a slight hit with the Giorgio Moroder song, “Quicksilver Lightning”, and other ’80s soundtrack regulars, including Ray Parker Jr., and John Parr appear as well. To go along with multiple extended chase scenes, that other ’80s cinema staple — the musical montage — gets heavy usage. No fewer than three of these occur within the first 30 minutes while we await an actual story. One of these vital plot breaks involves Kevin Bacon at home with his modern-dance/ballerina girlfriend. Despite being destitute, Jack and his leggy lovely somehow San Francisco loft that is roughly the size of a parade float manufacturing center. Behold its size as you watch the couple interact, like all lovers do, silently professing mutual love by incorporating their dance and biking professions: It becomes the job of the viewer to find the plot amid these interludes. We begin with Bacon riding in a taxi. A bike messenger cruises beside his cab, and for no reason we can understand, Jack tells the driver he’ll pay him 50 bucks if he beats the bike rider to his destination. The bike dodges obstructions and the cab skids to a halt as the courier loses his beret. Jack races over and clutches the abandoned headpiece, and we are supposed to grasp that an unspoken bond has been forged by these two. Revel in a feeling of revulsion as Jack grips a stranger’s sweaty, grime-coated hat! At the start of Quicksilver , Bacon wears glasses and sports the facial hair of a sexual sadist, looking every bit like the serial killer that neighbors are always surprised to learn has a softball team buried in the back yard. (This is the same look Bacon sported in his recent commercials for Logitech, by the way.) Jack works as a hot shot trader at the San Francisco Commodities Exchange. He and his partner Gabe try to corner the market on a stock only to have its price move on them, causing the pair to lose millions, including the life savings of Jack’s parents. He is so distraught that next we see him opt for street urchin fashions, ditch the glasses, shave off the pedophile moustache, and grow his mullet out to its Footloose splendor. He is now working for Quicksilver Courier Service. Jami Gertz plays Terri, a new hire, and this allows us to be introduced to the United Nations staff. When asked where she’s from Terri tells Hector (Paul Rodriguez) she moved around a lot because her father was a jet pilot. (Apparently the Air Force has military bases in Chicago and Detroit.) She meets Jack, but there is also a dark undercurrent to their profession: When after a meal at a diner, Terri cannot find her money, a suspicious man ominously offers to pay for her meal. The top rider at Quicksilver is Voodoo (Lawrence Fishburne), who augments his salary by making runs of contraband for a local hood named Gypsy. He happens to be the guy who bought Terri’s waffles. As villains go, Gypsy is not the most intimidating. He motors around the Bay Area in a sad, rundown Ford LTD, perhaps waiting for MTV’s Pimp My Ride to be invented. Gypsy and Voodoo have a professional disagreement, and ,later, when Jack and Voodoo challenge each other to a race that is the focus of another montage, Gypsy runs Voodoo down in the street. This means Jack Casey is now the top rider at the service. I guess it also means he needs to get a new goofy name. Soon enough, the plot gets yanked forward by the aspirations of the riders. Hector has a pregnant girlfriend and dreams of one day owning a hot dog cart. Gypsy orders Terri to take over Voodoo’s duties. (Somehow she has become indentured to a criminal over a $5 breakfast tab.) Meanwhile, Jack is getting lured back to his brokerage life by his former partner. Initially, he resists, explaining his new lifestyle to Gabe: “When I’m on the street I feel good – I feel good, I feel exhilarated. I go as fast as I like, faster than anyone. The street sign says one-way-east [CLAP] I go west. They can’t touch me! When I’m on the bike I forget about . . . I dunno – I dunno.” Okay, so it’s not the Henry the V battlefield speech, but you feel his passion . . . I guess. The financial pressures on Jack and his friends inspire him to revisit his past for the finale. After weeks of studying the Wall Street Journal he’s convinced he’s found a surefire stock choice, so he takes his shot. At the exchange Jack gets a VISITOR pass, strides onto the floor and begins buying call options instantly. And — SPOILER ALERT — after a few tense hours, his stock leaps two points in a matter of minutes! He pockets around $50,000 for a few hours’ work, everything is resolved and everyone, including his parents, get their share of the profits. I had to resort to an expert opinion as this felt more than ridiculous. Writer Brad Laidman, who had actually worked on that very options floor, assessed Quicksilver ‘s realism factor. Laidman actually recognized people on screen as legitimate exchange workers, so he knew the details. “While I could see him getting the pass and visiting the floor,” he explained, “there was no way in hell he’d be able to walk out and start trading that day. It’d take a month of paper work to get a trader’s badge, and he’d have to establish an account with the exchange.” “What they showed was like buying a ticket to a Chicago Bulls game, and somehow you found yourself on the court, taking the winning shot. Then later, he goes in the back and they start printing out checks, like he was at the race track. The whole thing was a fantasy.” As I suspected. But hey, this wouldn’t be Hollywood without a Hollywood ending. Jack sort of separates from his girlfriend and sort of gets together with Terri (after barely interacting with her up to that point). They happily amble up to their friend Hector, who’s doling out his dream dogs — the movie’s way of telling us that everyone lives happily ever after. Studios love lecturing on the venal capitalist undercurrent in this country, and yet look what they were selling audiences circa 1986: For a white guy studying the newspaper and wearing a tie, one afternoon if enterprise would net you tens of thousands of dollars. Meanwhile, if you were ethnic, applied yourself and worked extremely hard, you got the a shot at hustling tube steaks from a cart on a street corner — provided you had a smart white guy to help you out. Thanks, Quicksilver ! Read more in the Bad Movies We Love archives! Brad Slager has written about movies and entertainment for Film Threat, Mediaite, and is a columnist at CHUD.com . His less insightful impressions on entertainment can be found on Twitter .
Also in Thursday afternoon’s round-up of news briefs thriller Maniac is heading to North American theaters. An Icon Productions exec joins The Weinstein Company as head of acquisitions. And an Artist actress will replace Marion Cotillard in Oscar-winner Asghar Farhadi ‘s follow-up project. Gus Van Sant’s Promised Land Set for Late December Release Two-time Oscar nominee Gus Van Sant’s contemporary drama Promised Land will open in theaters in L.A. and New York December 28th and expand further in January. Starring Rosemarie DeWitt, Oscar nominee Hal Holbrook ( Into the Wild ), Scoot McNairy ( Killing Them Softly ), Titus Welliver ( The Town ), and Academy Award winner Frances McDormand, the film revolves around Steve Butler, a corporate salesman who arrives in a rural town with his sales partner, Sue Thomason. The duo hope to persuade the economically down and out town to go for an offer of drilling rights. But things get complicated when a school teacher objects with support from a grassroots campaign led by another man. The film’s original screenplay was written by John Krasinski and Matt Damon, based on a story by Dave Eggers. Franck Khalfoun’s Thriller Maniac Heading to Theaters Elijah Woods stars in the remake of William Lustig’s 1980 film of the same title. The film revolves around Frank who develops an obsession with a young artist when he decides to help her with an exhibition. But the obsession unleashes a compulsion to stalk and kill a la a 21st century Jack the Ripper. IFC Midnight picked up rights to the Cannes out of competition title for North America. Mark Gooder Joins The Weinstein Company Gooder, who served as CEO for Icon Productions for six years, will serve as President of Acquisitions/ Australian Operations. Gooder’s new role involves the day-to-day running of the acquisitions department and leading the charge of bringing in projects for the company, from scripts through finished films. He will also attend major markets and festivals including the upcoming Toronto International Film Festival. Around the ‘net… Ang Lee Tops Sony’s List for Cleopatra Columbia Pictures has begun courting the Life of Pi director for its project that will star Angelina Jolie. No formal offer has been made yet, however, THR reports via Vulture. Mireille Enos Set for David Ayer’s Ten Enos ( The Killing ) will star in the feature that will star Arnold Schwarzenegger. She will play a member of the elite DEA team and married to co-star Sam Worthington’s character, Deadline reports . Bérénice Bejo To Replace Marion Cotillard In Oscar-Winner’s Next Project Bejo ( The Artist ) will join Oscar winning director Asghar Farhadi’s next untitled project set to begin shooting in October in Paris. She will replace Cotillard due to scheduling conflicts. The storyline is secret but is apparently in the vein of his award-winning A Separation with “an element of suspense,” Deadline reports .
Aspiring actors are a dime a dozen in L.A., but few would go as far as attempting to extort one of Hollywood’s most powerful movie moguls for their big payday. (One would hope… but we all know a few kooky actors, don’t we?) Not so for Vivek Shah of suburban Illinois by way of West Hollywood, who was arrested this week for allegedly threatening Harvey Weinstein and his family if the superproducer didn’t pay him millions. The Smoking Gun has the affidavit naming Shah, a 25-year-old bit actor seen on a 2012 episode of “Bones” and in Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight (per his IMDb page), as the alleged extortionist who contacted Weinstein and four other high profile figures threatening their safety and that of their families. Although Weinstein is named only as “A Connecticut resident and co-founder of a film studio,” Deadline’s Nikki Finke confirmed Weinstein was the targeted victim. Above: Shah (right) posing with actor Donald Faison and Relativity Media CEO Ryan Kavanaugh at the Anti-Defamation League Entertainment Industry Awards Dinner at The Beverly Hilton hotel on October 11, 2011. It’s an exhaustive document detailing the authorities’ investigation of Shah, who bought prepaid phone cards and debit cards, used multiple false identities, and set up foreign bank accounts apparently to receive the extortion moneys in locations all over the familiar turf of L.A. actors — the West Hollywood Rite-Aid! The Gelson’s on Santa Monica! — in what the affidavit refers to as “The Scheme.” Most concerning is the bit at the end, which reveals that authorities who had been tailing Shah discovered that he was “scheduled for training in handgun shooting” at a local gun range after his return to the Los Angeles area earlier this month. Shah was arrested outside of Chicago and charged with “two counts of interference with commerce by threats, and two counts of transmitting threatening communications in interstate commerce” and could face as many as 20 years in prison. [ The Smoking Gun , Deadline ]
