Here are the figures for the past weekend, arranged from those that owe the highest percentage of their take to the Canadian box office to those that owe the lowest. Step Up 2: The Streets — CDN $5,130,000 — N.AM $48,593,000 — 10.6%Definitely, Maybe — CDN $2,590,000 — N.AM $26,519,000 — 9.8%The Other Boleyn Girl — CDN $803,554 — N.AM $8,300,000 — 9.7%Juno — CDN $13,040,000 — N.AM $135,135,000 — 9.6%No Country for Old Men — CDN $6,480,000 — N.AM... Read more

Y’know, skeptical though I may be of Pixar films from time to time — including, for now, the seemingly derivative robot movie WALL-E — I have to say there is a definite cuteness factor to this Super Bowl ad that I find impossible to resist: Click here if the video file above doesn’t play properly. Read more

The newest issue of BC Christian News is not online yet, but the film column I wrote for it went up on their website yesterday. The first half of the column is a comment on Best Picture Oscar winner No Country for Old Men, which I had not yet reviewed in print, and the second half is my belated top ten list for 2007. Read more

The Canadian government is censoring the movies! So say some people, at least, in light of current proposed changes to the Income Tax Act. First, the Globe and Mail reports: The Conservative government has drafted guidelines that would allow it to pull financial aid for any film or television show that it deems offensive or not in the public’s best interest – even if government agencies have invested in them. The proposed changes to the Income Tax Act would allow... Read more

Variety has updated the story I linked to in my previous post a few times now. The current version says this, among other things: The colorful 40-year run of New Line is coming to an abrupt end, costing the jobs of most of the company’s 600 staffers. The company — home to “The Lord of the Rings,” “Austin Powers,” “Friday the 13th,” “A Nightmare on Elm Street,” “Rush Hour,” “The Mask” and “Boogie Nights” — will be folded into Warner... Read more

Variety has the scoop. More details later. UPDATE: Nikki Finke has the official press release. Read more

The Passion of the Christ has inspired all sorts of cinematic spin-offs and follow-ups: documentaries such as Sister Rose’s Passion and The Big Question, would-be sequels such as The Final Inquiry, hopeful imitators such as The Nativity Story, sort-of remakes such as the BBC’s The Passion, re-issues of older movies such as Monty Python’s Life of Brian, and so forth, and so on. So, do you think there’s any chance Mel Gibson’s film, which was based in part on the... Read more

(Hat tip to my friend Andrew in New Zealand.) Read more

Time to unload some more notes that I’ve been sitting on. 1. My favorite comment on the recent awards season, including the Oscars, comes from Salon.com‘s Andrew O’Hehir: It’s no surprise that “No Country for Old Men” swept the three biggest prizes, but here’s how odd the year was: The academy showers its laurels on a film that has made about $63 million in domestic box office, while the big winner at the supposedly independent Spirit Awards has grossed double... Read more

I have a special interest in movies about memory, amnesia, and so on, so I have to say I am intrigued by Variety critic Jay Weissberg’s review of the French film Cortex: A high-ranking retired cop with Alzheimer’s suspects there’s a killer loose in his nursing home in Nicolas Boukhrief’s unusual, cerebral thriller “Cortex.” In “Memento,” the protag’s brain is wiped clean every few minutes; here, the detective’s senility floats in and out, leaving auds guessing whether he’s deliberately fooling... Read more