The Long Wait Pays Off (For Some)
Since the debut of the DVD format in the late nineties there have been several films that I have wanted to own on the new format. Many of them have been issued on DVD (Strange Brew, Citizen Kane, The River's Edge), while others (sadly) have not (Star Wars, Quick Change, Indiana Jones).
Three other films that I have been waiting for the DVD bow of will finally see the light of day today..., but only in America.
I refer to the late Polish director Krzysztof Kieslowski's wondrous trilogy on liberty, equality, and fraternity: BLUE, WHITE and RED.
American cinema fans will get to own, watch and enjoy these films today, while we Canadians will have to wait until March 18th.
Why, you ask? Well in Canada we have a "U" in the word Colours. So the Canadian studio - who will go unnamed here for the moment- who will eventually release the films must change the U.S. packaging to reflect the Canuck spelling of the word, and to ensure that their logo is highly visable.
Now with that I have no legitimate beef. It is their property so let them do what they want with it. But why couldn't they have gotten everything done weeks ago, in order to have the films released all across North America, and especially in Canada, at the same time?!?
That is a rhetorical question to which their is no answer. And even if there was an answer it would be moot because this has happened before, and I assure you it will happen again.
Special Editions of MEMENTO, JACKIE BROWN and PULP FICTION were all delayed in Canada because this same studio was unable to respect the people who buy their products and get their act together in time to release them simultaneously with the U.S.
Instead they delay them, knowing full well that there is nothing you nor I can do.
So today, it has come to this. Today I am forced, due to my love of great films, to state that I wish I lived in America.
Thank you Alliance Atlantis Home Video! Here's looking forward to the next title you delay.
Even Though Canadians Have To Wait For THE THREE COLOURS TRILOGY, We Can Enjoy THE RING
There are some great flicks being released on DVD and Video today, so pick one that you want and enjoy!
The Ring - In this superb horror film a video tape kills viewers within one week of its viewing. (Naomi Watts, Martin Henderson, Brian Cox)
Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie - The kids' series first movie is a musical version of Jonah and the Whale. (Phil Vischer, Mike Nawrocki, Tim Hodge)
Half Past Dead - A "gangsta" breaks into prison to find his hidden cash. Man does this movie suck! (Steven Seagal, Morris Chestnut, Ja Rule)
Best Of The Muppet Show: Harry Belafonte/Best Of The Muppet Show: Peter Sellers - If you need me to say more... (fill in the blanks with something that is not flattering)
Blue, White & Red Gift Set - Only in America today (See above).
The Osbournes: The First Season - The complete first season of the popular MTV reality series with outtakes and some other goodies. (Ozzy Osbourne, Sharon Osbourne, Kelly Osbourne)
Ringu - A reporter researches videotape that kills people. This is the original Japanese film that THE RING (See above) was based on. (Nanako Matsushima, Miki Nakatani, Hiroyuki Sanada)
The Weight Of Water - A journalist unveils one story as she is writing another. Beware: This movie is so frickin' boring! (Sean Penn, Catherine McCormack, Sarah Polley)
Limp Bizkit's Durst Revels In Song Leak And Reaction
Limp Bizkit has offered up "Just Drop Dead" on its website, which is a brand-new song and the first since Wes Borland left the band after the cycle for Chocolate Starfish And The Hot Dog Flavored Water.
Durst was asked if the tune will be on Limp Bizkit's May 13 release Bipolar, and whether or not the rumor that it's about Britney Spears is true.
"I don't know," Durst said. "It was just something I felt like leaking out. And people seem to think it's about a certain person and it's pretty amazing that it's not. It sure sounds like it, though, doesn't it?"
Durst was also asked if he found it amusing that people read into his songs. "Oh, yeah," Durst said. "It's unbelievable. But you know what? That's part of it all, and it's cool to sit back and laugh, and watch and learn from it all."
Limp Bizkit's Bipolar is slated for release May 13. There will be a short tour in support of the album, providing Limp Bizkit can find a touring guitarist.
Celebrities Gum It Up
It's considered rude, adolescent and low-class, but celebrities seem to have no shame about chomping on gum in public.
Britney Spears, Drew Barrymore, Sharon Osbourne and the "stars" of Joe Millionaire and The Bachelorette all seem to have very little compunction about chewing with their mouths open, even when the cameras are rolling.
"I saw it everywhere and thought it was gross and tacky," said New York Post editor Maureen Callahan, who recently featured a collage of celebrity chewers in the paper's Sunday section.
Callahan caught Barrymore gumming it up at the premiere of Confessions of a Dangerous Mind and Osbourne masticating during L.A.'s Fashion Week.
But Spears, whose wad of gum is as ubiquitous as her newsboy cap and bared navel, is the "worst offender," Callahan said.
"At The Recruit premiere with Colin Farrell, she wasn't even chewing with her mouth closed," she said.
The Louisiana lass has also been photographed blowing big blue bubbles and spitting an already-been-chewed gob out a car window.
Gum has hit the reality circuit, too. Viewers of Joe Millionaire saw competitors for Evan Marriott's heart chomping before on camera — not to mention smoking cigarettes and cursing.
And Bachelorette winner Ryan Sutter had no qualms about showing the world how he keeps his breath fresh for Trista Rehn. He chewed away on camera as he got ready for the couple's final TV date.
The trend could be due to the rising popularity of gum. Wrigley's spokesman Chris Perille said business in the U.S. has been "very positive" over the last couple of years.
"There has been more energy and activity in the past year or two," he said. "The growth rate in Wrigley's volume was 5 percent in 2001 and 9 percent in 2002. Roughly half the population chews gum on a regular basis."
Perille also asserted that gum's reputation for being tacky has changed over the past few generations. "People have grown up with it. They recognize the benefits and know the product can be used discreetly in a number of settings," he said.
These benefits include tooth-cleaning and whitening, breath-freshening, appetite-suppressing and tension-easing, Perille said.
Etiquette expert Lesley Carlin, co-author of Things You Need to Be Told: A Handbook for Polite Behavior in a Tacky, Rude World!, agreed that gum has become acceptable — as long as it's used quietly.
"It's OK if you can do it without attracting attention to yourself," she said.
In fact, it may even be hip to chew gum now — or so Wrigley's ads would like us to believe.
Orbit gum commercials are narrated by the attractive British spokesmodel "Vanessa," and have a "tongue-in-cheek, almost mod approach," Perille said. Big Red advertising targets the "social sirens," which Perille defines as club kids. And print ads for Eclipse gum feature the hip-hop saying "fa shizzle," which means "for sure."
"There's been a concerted effort to make sure ads are edgier, with more use of humor," Perille said.
Elycia Rubin, fashion director for E! network, said stars like Spears and Barrymore chew gum not carelessly but deliberately, to show they're "sassy and fun."
"They do it because they have a sense of humor and an edge," she said. "They're like your best girlfriend having fun."
But Callahan said she doesn't think most stars in sticky situations are even conscious of their bovine behavior.
"It's a thing that everybody does, but most people are not in a position to be constantly photographed," she said. "They forget they shouldn't be talking and chewing at the same time."
Carlin agreed that there are times and places for gum, but the red carpet is not one of them.
"Have an Altoid," she said.
Holy Flashback! West, Ward Reunite
LOS ANGELES - Holy reunion! Thirty-seven years after Adam West and Burt Ward put on skintight suits to keep Gotham City safe from the villainous Penguin, Joker and Riddler, the Dynamic Duo is back together for a peek at what really happened behind the scenes.
There were on-set explosions that left Ward injured daily, encounters with lusty female fans, whispers of West and Ward being gay, and complaints from censors about the sexual innuendo in the ABC series that aired from 1966-68.
"Our show was a lot different," Ward said. "We teased them, taunted them and played with their minds. For kids, it was kept clean. Teenagers saw all the double meanings and they appreciated it."
West and Ward play off each other as well as they did during the swinging '60s in the CBS movie "Return to the Batcave: The Misadventures of Adam and Burt" airing Sunday at 9 p.m. EST.
"It's dramatized to an extent, but most of it really did happen. All good comedy is based on truth," West said. "Now they're saying we're a wonderful comedy team. What were we before?"
In the two-hour movie, West, 74, and a rotund Ward, 57, are forced to relive their past to find clues to recovering the Batmobile after it's stolen from a Hollywood charity event.
When a bystander suggests calling the police, West in his best deadpan says, "This is a job for actors. We'll find the Batmobile."
"Us?" Ward replies. "We wouldn't even know where to start."
The movie was done by the same team behind the 2001 CBS hit movie "Surviving Gilligan's Island." Dawn Wells, who played Mary Ann, is co-executive producer, Duane Poole wrote the script and Paul Kaufman is director and executive producer.
"The network realized the value of the 'Batman' series and the way the public responded to West and Ward," Kaufman said. "There's something about those two. Watching the series as a child, it was very exciting to work with them."
West saw the movie as a chance to reward fans who clamor for additions to the "Batman" franchise when they meet him at conventions.
"They always greet me with warmth and humor," he said. "People do lines from the show, do entire scenes, they ask me to say lines. People are very funny about the show. I've got three generations who come up to me."
The adventure reunites them with Frank Gorshin (Riddler), Julie Newmar (Catwoman) and Lee Meriwether (Catwoman). In one bar scene, Newmar plays a vivacious vixen who grooves with West to the old "Batman" theme.
"That was a reference to Batman drinking the mickey in that first episode and him doing the Batusi," West said. "I'm always asked, `Do the Batusi?'"
Viewers of the old show will appreciate the inside jokes, as well as familiar touches like a spinning Batmobile between scenes, cartoonish exclamations on screen during a fight, and voiceovers (by Lyle Waggoner) leading into commercials asking if the Caped Crusader and Robin the Boy Wonder can solve the mystery.
West and Ward haven't kept up with each other over the years, but they picked up where they left off when filming began.
"I had a fantastic time with Adam," said Ward, who lives outside Los Angeles and runs Boy Wonder Visual Effects, providing 3-D animation and special effects for movies and television. "You put the two of us together and we don't have to say anything and people start laughing. We were doing things on the first or second take."
After the show was canceled in '68, both actors had the same reaction: Holy typecasting! West and Ward were virtually unemployable and got stuck making personal appearances for several years.
"I was rushed into some not very good movies, and I just hit the beach and nursed my wounds for a while," said West, who eventually got work doing voiceovers and guest shots. "Part of it was the dinosaurs of Hollywood went away, people who didn't get it. I was certainly more welcome when the younger people came in."
Whatever bitterness West felt is gone. He lives in Ketchum, Idaho, with his third wife. They've been married 31 years and have six grown children between them.
"I have such a fondness for it. It's my signature role," he said. "I'm grateful I had a chance to create a classic character. I don't want to be a bitter, aging actor who thinks he's typecast. My God, what man wouldn't want to be Batman for a night?"
Or maybe longer, since there's already talk of a sequel.
"I may not pursue my plan to become a total recluse," West said.
Fedorov Confirms Brief Marriage to Kournikova
TORONTO (Reuters) - Detroit Red Wings center Sergei Fedorov has admitted he and tennis player Anna Kournikova were married but are now divorced and no longer talk.
Fedorov, 33, rated as one of the top players in the NHL, confirmed his relationship with his 21-year-old fellow Russian in The Hockey News, which went on sale on Monday.
"They are true," said Fedorov, when asked about rumors concerning their wedding. "We were married, albeit briefly, and we are now divorced."
Fedorov has had a long-running relationship with Kournikova dating back to when she burst onto the tennis scene as a teenager. His mother told reporters back in 2001 that they had been married in a Moscow registry office.
One of the world's most recognizable athletes and a target of paparazzi around the globe, Kournikova has been linked with several other high profile athletes and entertainers, including New York Rangers sniper Pavel Bure and singer Enrique Iglesias.
A torrid Russian love triangle involving Fedorov, Bure and Kournikova raged in the tabloids on both sides of the Atlantic with the two multi-millionaire ice hockey players both claiming to be engaged to the tennis diva.
Fedorov told The Hockey News that he questioned Kournikova about Bure and wanted to break up but was convinced by the tennis pinup to continue their relationship.
"I still don't know what it was," Fedorov said. "I read only in magazines what was going on and I basically tried to break up.
"But she had an explanation and I really believed that it was true and I, sort of ... we patched things up."
ROMANTIC LINK
More recently, Kournikova has been linked romantically with Iglesias, appearing in his videos and accompanying the Spanish singer to various music award shows and premieres.
Fedorov, who becomes an unrestricted free agent next season and is seeking a contract in excess of $50 million, recently changed agents leaving Octagon, who also represent Kournikova.
It has been reported Fedorov left the company because he blamed them for introducing Kournikova, voted by People magazine as one of the world's 50 Most Beautiful People, to Iglesias.
Fedorov said his split with Kournikova did not enter into his decision to leave his long time representatives but felt the company no longer had his "best interests at heart."
"I wanted to make a fresh start with both my personal and professional life," said Fedorov. "I needed to make a complete change from what had gone on with the last four years that I was being represented by Octagon.
"There were some things that happened when I was being represented by Octagon that I found out about after the fact.
"I just don't think they had my best interests at heart."
Fedorov has been linked with Kournikova since she was 16 and his relationship with the "tennis Lolita" was greeted with unease in North America.
During the 1997 Stanley Cup parade in Detroit, 17-year-old Kournikova rode with Fedorov, waving to the crowd.
DIAMOND RING
Two years later at the 1999 Wimbledon, Kournikova flashed a diamond ring and it was rumored she had become engaged to the millionaire hockey player.
"I think the reason the media made such a big deal was because of the age difference," said Fedorov. "We were friends for quite a while.
"We were just so much apart and those things when you fell in love or are falling in love, it happens at such a young age... it's just impossible because I was a little bit older, I think.
"People didn't realize we have parents. She has parents, I have parents. Everything was normal as far as I'm concerned.
"They (teammates) were quite supportive because they knew we came from the old word and pretty much, to us, it was normal. But no one really knows our story.
"We didn't really speak about it. I don't think my teammates had any problems. They had problems later, though ... They wanted to support me, I guess."
While Fedorov's value as an athlete is on the rise, Kournikova's continues to wane, her tennis fortunes in decline since reaching eighth place in the world in 2000.
She is now a lowly 67th in the WTA rankings and is still looking for her first singles title.
Things reached a new low in the second round of the Australian Open in January when she was thrashed, 6-0, 6-1, by Belgian Justine Henin-Hardenne -- her heaviest defeat in a grand slam tournament.
Magazine: Michael Jackson Put 'Curse' on Spielberg
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Embattled pop star Michael Jackson wears a prosthetic nose and once paid $150,000 for a "voodoo curse" to kill director Steven Spielberg despite being deep in debt, Vanity Fair magazine reported on Monday.
Vanity Fair, in an article for its March 11 edition, also reports that Jackson bleaches his skin white because he does not like being black. The 44-year-old singer sometimes refers to black people as "spabooks," the magazine said
Jackson's manager did not immediately return phone calls and a faxed request for comment on the article. Jackson's London publicist could not be reached for comment.
The onetime King of Pop has been dogged by controversy for months, first over his odd appearance in a California courtroom last November. That same month, Jackson stunned fans in Berlin by briefly dangling his young son from a hotel balcony.
And in February a British television documentary that aired to blockbuster ratings both in England and the United States caused a stir when Jackson told his interviewer that he slept in the same room, and sometimes the same bed, as young boys.
Vanity Fair reported in the article that in 2000 Jackson attended a voodoo ritual in Switzerland where a witch doctor promised that Spielberg, music mogul David Geffen and 23 other people on the entertainer's list of enemies would die.
Jackson, who underwent a "blood bath" as part of the ritual, then ordered his former business adviser Myung-Ho Lee to wire $150,000 to a bank in Mali for a voodoo chief named Baba, who sacrificed 42 cows for the ceremony, the magazine reported.
Vanity Fair reported that Jackson wears a page-boy wig and a prosthesis that serves as the tip of his nose. The magazine interviewed a source close to Jackson who said that, without the device Jackson resembles a mummy with two nostril holes.
According to the magazine, Jackson's extravagant lifestyle and declining record sales have left him $240 million in debt.
The article, which relies in part on court filings in a $12 million lawsuit against Jackson by Lee, said that since the mid-1990s the reclusive entertainer has relied on a series of multimillion-dollar loans to cover his expenses.
In addition to the lawsuit by Lee, Jackson is also enmeshed in a $21 million court battle with German concert promoter Marcel Avram over canceled Millennium concerts and has been sued by Sotheby's auction house for $1.6 million.
The magazine reported that Jackson must pay off the principal on a $200 million loan within a few years, which will be nearly impossible unless he sells his most valuable asset, the Beatles song catalog. He owns only half of the catalog while Sony Corp. owns the other half in an arrangement that might make selling his share difficult, Vanity Fair reported.
Jackson has also run up nearly $4 million per year in expenses from his Neverland Valley ranch in central California, where in April 2001 his amusement park equipment was nearly repossessed for late payments, the magazine said.