Oh my. I just watched the pilot episode for The Sarah Connor Chronicles — or at least, a version of it dated April 23 — and I am now more interested in this series than I expected to be. For one thing, it occurs to me now that this series could give Sarah Connor and her son John a chance to bond properly as mother and son, which is something the movies never really allowed them to do: John didn’t... Read more

Slashfilm.com reports that Lucasfilm has filled in the forms at the MPAA and registered six possible titles for Indiana Jones IV: Indiana Jones and the City of Gods Indiana Jones and the Destroyer of Worlds Indiana Jones and the Fourth Corner of the Earth Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull Indiana Jones and the Lost City of Gold Indiana Jones and the Quest for the Covenant You have to wonder how many of these titles were included... Read more

From a Los Angeles Times story on New Line Cinema’s woes: Eager to move ahead with “The Hobbit,” New Line has quietly been trying to mend fences with “Rings” filmmaker Peter Jackson, who has sued the company over his share of profits from the first “Rings” films. When asked if it was true that company insiders had been in talks with Jackson’s reps, Shaye replied, “Yes, that’s a fair statement. Notwithstanding our personal quarrels, I really respect and admire Peter... Read more

The ScreenGrab has posted a top ten list of “The Most Notable Product Placements in Movie History”. Most of the examples come from the past quarter-century, though the oldest specimen is the Pan Am logo on the spacecraft in 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968; my comments). The list begins with the following statement: It’s hard to think that there was a time when movies and TV didn’t regularly feature major subplots touting the life-affirming, alien-attracting, desert-island-loneliness-averting, catastrophic-explosion-shielding properties of popular... Read more

It’s always a tad irritating when a supposedly “national” newspaper puts off reviewing a film until it opens in Toronto. The latest example: Today’s National Post devotes the entire first page of the arts section to a graphic which, in turn, points the reader to an inside page featuring a 1.5-star review of Raoul Ruiz’s Klimt, which stars John Malkovich as the famous Austrian painter. Barry Hertz begins by noting that there are two different versions of the film, and... Read more

IGN.com says so, in its latest report on Star Trek XI. Read more

Last night I saw Helvetica, a new documentary by Gary Hustwit — here making his first directorial effort, after producing films like the Wilco pic I Am Trying to Break Your Heart — and I saw it with the best possible audience: a crowd of graphic designers. The fact that I saw the movie was a happy fluke. My wife happened to get home a bit earlier from the picket line than I expected, so I decided to go see... Read more

Having flopped in North America, it is time for Evan Almighty to flop overseas. I mentioned earlier that the film’s Japanese release had been cancelled altogether. Now it is playing in Great Britain. The Guardian reports that the distributor went after the religious market in England as aggressively as they did here: Helping churches to exploit the faith-friendly content is Universal Pictures, which hired a specialist PR firm to target ministers, Christian publications and websites and promote different ways of... Read more

The Hollywood Reporter says Leningrad-born 18-year-old Anton Yelchin has joined the cast of Star Trek XI as Pavel Chekov, who was first played by the nearly 31-year-old Walter Koenig in 1967. This is interesting, as Chekov did not join the show until its second year — though Chekov must have been on the ship somewhere during the first year, otherwise Khan would not have recognized him years later in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982). Read more

Twelve days ago, it was announced that 30-year-old Zachary Quinto will play Spock in the new Star Trek movie. The role was created, of course, by Leonard Nimoy, who was 35 when the series began in 1966 — though he had played the role a couple years earlier, too, in the long-shelved first pilot ‘The Cage‘. Now, Ain’t It Cool News claims to have the casting breakdowns for some of the movie’s other characters — including their ages: James Kirk... Read more