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Most Famous Bank Robberies in America

Adam Tod Brown — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 15:39:47 +0000

By now you’ve probably seen The Town – the movie that has been getting almost-universal acclaim for the writing, acting, and directing and has spent several weeks at the top of the box office charts. To celebrate Ben Affleck‘s return to form, our friends from TravelInsurance.org have put together a list of the most famous bank robberies from American history. Also, check out our review of The Town.

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The Economics of Star Wars

Adam Tod Brown — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 17:28:10 +0000

Unlike his often-partner Steven Spielberg, George Lucas shouldn’t be be expected to be applying for a personal loan anytime soon. The writer/director’s net worth is estimated to be over $3 billion dollars, owing largely to the unparalleled success of the Star Wars franchise. Here’s a look at the economics of the franchise that set him up for life.

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Source: Personal Loans Blog

Film-graph: Steven Spielberg Climbing the Box Office

Adam Tod Brown — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 13:43:59 +0000

Spielberg is by far one of the most commercially and critically successful directors of all time. Here’s a look at his filmography sorted by box office grosses as well as statues won over the years. Despite his immense riches (his personal net worth is reportedly over $3 billion) the director last year applied for a $325 million personal loan.

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Source: Personal Loans Blog

Mark Wahlberg Signs On For “Prisoners”

Adam Tod Brown — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 23:00:34 +0000

In news that should warm the hearts of budding screenwriters everywhere, one of the most talked about scripts in Hollywood right now comes from a writer who, until very recently, nobody had even heard of. Brooklyn native Aaron Guzikowski signed with the Endeavor talent agency just two weeks ago. Now, his screenplay for a film entitled Prisoners has attracted the attention of nearly every major studio in Hollywood and has already drawn a commitment from at least one major star.

Mark Wahlberg, who is also represented by Endeavor, attached himself to the script shortly after Guzikowski signed the deal. The Prisoners story involves a Boston man (makes sense) whose daughter is kidnapped. He seeks revenge, awesomely, by kidnapping the man responsible. Hell, I already want to see it!

As for Guzikowski, he was apparently noticed by Madhouse Entertainment two years ago. Since that time, they have been working to develop the script and will be producing the film. The two years worth of work seems to have paid off, as several studios have been working to get the rights to the film for the past few days. For the time being, Endeavor is holding off on making a sale until they can find a director for the project.

Source: Yahoo News

Are you budding screenwriter? If so, does this news give you hope or just make you burn with jealousy and contempt? More importantly, how will Wahlberg possibly pull of a role that requires him to appear to be from Boston? Relax, that last question is a joke.

Canadian Filmmaker Plans to Have Camera Installed In His Eye

Adam Tod Brown — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 23:38:32 +0000

Rob Spence, a 36 year-old Canadian filmmaker who injured and later lost his eye due to a shotgun mishap is planning to have a camera implanted in his prosthetic eye. Once in place, the camera, which he calls an “Eyeborg,” will be used to film documentaries and raise awareness about surveillance in modern society.

According to Spence, “In Toronto there are 12,000 cameras. But the strange thing I discovered was that people don’t care about the surveillance cameras, they were more concerned about me and my secret camera eye because they feel that is a worse invasion of their privacy.”

I think I have to side with the people on this one. There is a big difference between surveillance cameras sticking out like a sore thumb in public and cameras implanted inside the dude with the wonky eye at the gym who seems to linger in the showers a little longer than everyone else. While Spence vows that the camera will be turned off when not needed and will only be used for documentary purposes, this still sets a creepy precedent for would be one-eyed villains of all sorts. With that said, I’d totally install a camera in my fake eye if I had one.

Spence also assures that the camera will be in no way connected to his nerves or brain. Oh, well in that case, not creepy at all! Check out the video below for some background on The Eyeborg Project.

So, what would you use the camera implanted in your eye for?

Movies Releases: Transformers, My Sister’s Keeper, Cheri… (0)

5 Reasons Why Watchmen May Bomb At the Box Office

Adam Tod Brown — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 18:00:45 +0000

These days, a film generating a healthy amount of buzz on the internet weeks or months prior to its release is nothing unusual, but the amount of hype surrounding the March 6th release of Watchmen is bordering on unhealthy. Don’t get me wrong, I hope Watchmen kills at the box office and I suspect it likely will. It’s not like it has a lot of competition, and a big opening weekend could give it the momentum it needs to be a certified blockbuster. Nevertheless, it certainly has some factors working against it. Are any of these things enough to turn Watchmen into a full on box office disaster?

5. It’s Rated R

Big deal, right? Well, yeah, it is kind of a big deal. It’s certainly not impossible for an R-rated movie to do big numbers at the box office. Some of the top grossing movies ever were rated R. The problem is, that box office dominating violence and sex fests are rarely comic book movies. In fact, it’s yet to be seen. A successful comic book movie has to appeal to a much wider audience than, legally, an R rating will allow. It isn’t the type of thing that is going to transcend demographics and appeal to damn near everyone. A comic book flick, especially one like Watchmen, has a very specific audience. If any of that audience is shut out because they can’t con their parents into taking them to see it, it could spell trouble for Watchmen. On the bright side, the sixth highest grossing R-rated film of all time…was 300 (by Watchmen Director Zack Snyder).

4. There Are No Real “Stars”

As far as making a quality film goes, not having big stars is not necessarily a detriment. Hell, quite often it’s a good thing. That may very well be the case here. And no “stars” doesn’t mean “bad actors.” Jackie Earl Haley slayed in Little Children, and by most accounts, he does the same in Watchmen. But understand, I’m not talking about whether Watchmen will be a good movie. The point of this article is will Watchmen live up to the hype at the box office? It’s a given that a healthy majority of internet types are going to turn out in droves. But you know what? The internet probably turned out in big numbers for Snakes On a Plane also. Unfortunately, they were the only ones. Don’t take it as a given that internet hype, Billy Crudup and the chick from The Heartbreak Kid will translate to sustained box office dominance. And actors aren’t the only lesser knowns to worry about.

3. The Characters Aren’t That Well Known By the General Public

It’s really a bit unfair to even call Watchmen a comic book movie. Anyone who has read it knows that Watchmen is not your typical comic book. These aren’t “superheroes” we’re dealing with. Up to this point, even the more “artistic” comic book movies, like The Dark Knight or, on the more horrifyingly bad side of things, Spiderman 3, have featured well known comic book icons that everybody, whether a comic book fan or not knows and sometimes loves. The type of superhero that, on name alone (Batman), will bring in a certain demographic that doesn’t necessarily read comic books but likes watching people fly through the air and beat gun wielding villains with their bare hands. Nothing about the current advertising for Watchmen implies to the average moviegoer that this what they should expect.

I know what you’re going to say next…what about Sin City? Good question. If you want the short answer to why it was financially successful, re-read point #2. But also, I implore you, understand that I’m not talking about whether Watchmen will be any good. I’m asking will it be financially successful. Sin City, because of how it was filmed, was made on the cheap. Watchmen had a $150 million budget. That’s a lot to recoup, even before you factor in the lawsuits.

2. There Will Be Backlash

Do you know where we are? We’re on the internet, baby! No matter how the opening weekend numbers turn out, the internet is going to howl. If it kills opening weekend, the fanboys will unleash their fury over what was left out, which is apparently a lot, and scream about how the essence of the original work was lost and watered down in an effort to make the film more palatable for a wider audience. If it fails to draw the crowds, they will bemoan the decision to bring on Zack Snyder as director and begin pontificating on all of the things he could have done to make it a better film. Either way, they are going to bitch. Anyone who has ever held a fast food or customer service job has had the following preached to them time and again…a happy customer will tell one friend about their experience, an unhappy customer will tell ten friends.

Translating a work like Watchmen to the big screen cannot be done without leaving a lot of unhappy customers in its wake. Opening weekend numbers will assuredly be impressive, it will be interesting to see if they can be sustained though.

1. People Are Broke

Hopefully you haven’t spent too much time debating the merits of a Watchmen film without the squid to notice that something else of equal importance is brewing stateside right now. People are fucking broke. People that aren’t broke yet are saving money like never before in anticipation of the day when they are. While that has been in the news for quite awhile now, it’s really in the news right now. Watchmen is the first should be blockbuster to test the economic waters that have been the focus of American life since the beginning of the year. Can a lawsuit plagued, R-rated comic book movie with no major stars overcome the economic uneasiness and do big business at the box office? I think it can. I hope I’m not wrong. But really, we’re just talking money here, money none of us will ever see. In the end, I just hope Zack Snyder can deliver a great movie and do an epic graphic novel the justice it deserves.

So. I’ve said my piece. What do you think? Will Watchmen tank or soar to new box office heights?

For further reading:

Interview with Jeffrey Dean Morgan

Interview with Jackie Earl Haley

Watchmen Review

Win a Free Watchmen T-Shirt

Top Ten Greatest Comic Book Movies

5 Displays of Oscar Acceptance Speech Obnoxiousness

Adam Tod Brown — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 20:00:30 +0000

Winning an Academy Award must be a fantastic feeling. Just imagine, after years of hard work, one day your peers finally take note and say “you were the best this year.” Either that, or they say “sucks that you died so early, we really thought we’d get a chance to make it up to you for screwing you over in 2005. But better late than never, right?” Which ever way it happens, an Academy Award is a special moment, and everyone treats it as such. Or at least in a perfect world they would. Sometimes, they pull stunts like this instead…

Sally Field Acknowledges Her Likeability Way Too Much

Trivia time! What actress famously proclaimed “you like me, you really like me!” in her 1985 Best Actress acceptance speech?

Answer: It’s a trick question, nobody said that!

Sally Field is quite possibly the most frequently misquoted woman in pop culture history. Because of her 1985 acceptance speech, she has become synonymous with the phrase “you like me, you really like me!” despite never having even said that. The actual quote is “you like me, right now, you like me!”.

So how is it possible that for over two decades now people still get it wrong? Simple, because you can only hear the ramblings of a crazy person for so long before you tune out. By that point in her unhinged acceptance speech, it was pretty clear that the moment had rendered Sally Field temporarily insane. It’s a wonder she didn’t start ranting about Zionists.

But even more unstable than the speech itself was the sentiment behind it. After mentioning how she had longed for the respect of her fellow actors, she explains that the first time “she didn’t feel it.” This implies that in 1979, either the Academy voters were forced to vote for her, or she was an unappreciative jerk.

Adrien Brody Slips Halle Berry Some Tongue

Nobody expected Adrien Brody to take home the Best Actor award for his role in The Pianist. When his name was announced, it seemed as if he was caught off guard more than anyone else in the room. For a few seconds there, it had all the makings of a truly heartfelt Oscar moment. The crowd went wild, tears were shed, it was perfect. As Brody stood at the top of the steps that led to the stage, you could sense the collective thoughts of everyone who was watching. “What an appreciative, gracious young…um, why the hell is he sprinting towards Halle Berry like that?!?”

Faster than you could say “sexual assault” Adrien Brody transformed from appreciative award winner to the guy who would be kneed in the groin under any other circumstances by grabbing award presenter Halle Berry and jamming his tongue in her mouth. A few seconds later, he amped up the sleaziness by turning to her and saying “I bet they didn’t tell you that was in the gift bag.” When the camera caught her reaction, she looked less amused and more ready to fight.

Despite the borderline criminality of it all, this is routinely ranked as one of the greatest moments in Academy Award history. Just don’t try it with that hot girl in accounting should you stumble upon an unexpected promotion someday.

Angelina Jolie Weirds Out Everyone In the Room

In the sports world, they say a tie is like kissing your sister. What they fail to mention is that if you’re the person watching the siblings kiss, it’s not like a tie at all. It’s a loss. A brutal, devastating loss that you will never wash from your memory bank no matter how hard you try.

Who but Angelina Jolie could be trusted with the lofty task of bringing the unspeakable discomfort of overboard public displays of sibling affection into the national spotlight. On the red carpet of the 2000 Academy Awards, Jolie planted the type of kiss on her brother that would leave most dudes scrambling for a change of clothes. In case anyone missed it, the process was repeated a few more times throughout the evening.

But the uneasiness didn’t end there. During her acceptance speech for the Best Supporting Actress award that night, she took to the podium and proclaimed “I’m so in love with my brother right now!” Oh A.J., you’re so edgy. Combined with the lip-locking shenanigans, that statement was enough to set the media ablaze with speculation of an “unhealthy” brother/sister relationship and cemented Jolie’s status as a full on tabloid sensation. Unwanted attention? For some people, there is no such thing.

Vanessa Redgrave Fights the Zionists!

Film is a powerful medium, so powerful that quite often, films inspire outrage amongst various religious and political groups. It’s to be expected, and most people shrug it off pretty well. And then there is Vanessa Redgrave, who in 1977 not only starred in Julia, a film about a woman murdered by Nazis, but also financed and narrated a documentary about the plight of the Palestinians. Jews and Palestinians, they get along pretty well, right? (No.)

When you straddle a line like that, someone is bound to take some offense. Sure enough, after Redgrave was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Julia, members of the Jewish Defense League protested and picketed outside the award ceremony. They also burned effigies of Redgrave, but in a conflict like this, that sort of comes with the territory, no?

Being a professional and all around level headed lady, Redgrave responded in the only reasonable way possible…by referring to the protestors as “Zionist hoodlums” in her acceptance speech and calling their behavior “an insult to the stature of Jews all over the world.” Subtle! Her remarks were met with a mixture of applause and boos, presumably from the Palestinians and Jews in the audience, respectively.

Later, screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky scolded Redgrave while presenting another award, advising that her win was “not a pivotal moment in history” and that it did “not require a proclamation.” With that double standard securely in place, the rest of the broadcast continued with no further incident.

Marlon Brando’s Boycott Stand-In

There are people out there who say actors and singers should not share their political beliefs with the public. I disagree. This is a free country, people can say whatever the hell they want. With that said, there is a time and place for everything.

Are you accepting an award for a movie about global warming? Sure, say something about the environment in your speech. Did you win an Oscar for playing some long forgotten musician who was way more influential than people gave him credit for? By all means, talk about how much things have changed but how far we still have to go. But if you’re accepting the Best Actor award for your role as a mafia boss in The Godfather, using the moment to protest violence against Native Americans just seems a bit out of place. Really, should you be protesting violence of any sort when you’re fresh off a movie role that involved beheading horses and placing the results in your enemy’s bed?

For Marlon Brando, the answer was a resounding “yes!”. But being that this is Marlon Brando we’re talking about, a simple mention in your otherwise gracious acceptance speech wasn’t going to do it. Instead, Brando boycotted the 1973 Academy Award ceremony as a way of expressing his displeasure about… the treatment of Native Americans in South Dakota? What in the hell does that have to do with Hollywood? If you said nothing, you’re correct, so an obligatory “and to protest Hollywood’s treatment of Native Americans” was thrown in for good measure.

He then donated all of the cash he made from The Godfather to charity. Ha! Just joking! Nobody hates Hollywood that much. But he did send a woman named Sacheen Littlefeather, armed with a FIFTEEN page speech, to the ceremony to accept the award in his place. Thankfully, producers talked her out of attempting to read the diatribe on the air, although she did read it afterward to reporters backstage. Historians today credit Brando’s boycott as having directly altered the course of absolutely nothing at all.

Review: Friday the 13th

Adam Tod Brown — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 17:00:43 +0000

Much like Rob Zombie’s quite excellent version of Halloween, the latest installment in the Friday the 13th franchise has been billed as a remake of the 1980 slashtastic original. The problem with that is, in the original flick, Jason’s mom did all the killing. Fast forward to 2009 and nobody wants her cockblocking their quality time with her son. Other than a brief re-enactment of that iconic scene where she gets her head flown with a machete, which comes right at the beginning of this film, momma Voorhees mostly sits the bench this time around. So technically, this is more like a remake of Friday the 13th Part 2, but for the people behind the film to admit that would just be stupid. But questionable remake status doesn’t mean it’s not worth your time.

Just like with any slasher film, Friday the 13th is far from a master class in quality acting. There are no real “stars” to speak of, unless you count Willa Ford or the goofy Asian kid from Disturbia, which you absolutely should not. It relies heavily on slasher film clichès, but why the hell wouldn’t it? Some of the scenes require shaky logic to work, like when we learn that goalie masks might be fine for deflecting high velocity hockey pucks but they are no defense against the force of a kick from a malnourished young woman. If technicalities like these bother you, this definitely is not the movie for you.

Fans of slasher flicks certainly won’t be disappointed with the pace of the film. After the opening machete beheading, we’re treated to a high speed camping party massacre taking no less than five horny young lives (or so we’re led to believe). This all happens before the name of the film even makes its way to the screen. After that, things slow down a bit, giving the viewer time to sort out who they hope will die first (the douchebag in the convenience store), who they absolutely know is not going to die (the hero on the motorcycle… and don’t pretend like that’s a spoiler) and who they hope to see slaughtered while topless (Willa Ford, obviously). It’s a slasher flick, we all play that game before the action unfolds. Once those issues are sorted out, there is no shortage of gory action.

It’s hard to watch a film like Friday the 13th without seeing it as some kind of thinly veiled morality tale. Smoke weed, you die. Have premarital sex, you die. Bring your urban ass to the country and disturb the simple way of life, you die. Stumble upon the cabin of a deranged killer you just heard a story about who has filled his home with trinkets commemorating his life but for some reason has no souvenirs from his trip to Manhattan and you fail to flee the scene immediately, you’re an idiot who deserves to die. Time and again throughout the movie, no act of stress relief or relaxation goes unpunished. But that’s just how slasher flicks do. Would you really wish to have it any other way? Friday the 13th never pretends to be anything other than what it is – a kind of shitty movie that is still pretty entertaining. It’s a fine enough return to form for a long ailing franchise.

Friday the 13th is in theaters now…

ScreenCrave.com » Adam Tod Brown

Most Famous Bank Robberies in America

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