Monday, June 15, 2009

Bruce Springsteen finds new fans at Bonnaroo fest

Bruce Springsteen finds new fans at Bonnaroo fest
By Troy Carpenter and Jeff Vrabel
MANCHESTER, Tennessee (Billboard) - Bruce Springsteen found himself in an unusual position on Saturday: having to preach to the not necessarily converted at a music festival.
Springsteen and the E Street Band's headlining slot at the annual Bonnaroo festival about 60 miles south of Nashville was only the band's second-ever festival date -- the first being Pinkpop in the Netherlands just weeks ago -- and instead of proving it all night to a sea of older faces comfortable singing along to every syllable of every song, Springsteen arrived to a crowd that needed some background.
"The mighty E Street Band is here tonight and we're going to do everything we can to bring down the power of the music on you," he preached during "Working on a Dream," and spent the remainder of his nearly three-hour, 28-song set doing absolutely that.
To be fair, Springsteen's set started with some bumps in the road: new tracks "My Lucky Day" and the eight-minute (Phish-length!) spaghetti Western epic "Outlaw Pete" (the latter finding Bruce in black cowboy hat) didn't quite catch with the sprawling festival crowd.
But it didn't take long for Springsteen to figure out that though his job was different, his well-honed work ethic would suit the occasion just fine. A hard-times trilogy of "Seeds," a revved-up "Johnny 99" and "Youngstown" (which featured the night's killer Nils Lofgren solo) helped Springsteen turn his focus from converting the crowd to emoting about the kind of cold, crisp realities he's been known to write about occasionally.
Not that the darkness lasted long: the now-traditional sign-collecting request portion of the evening yielded none other than "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town," probably Bonnaroo's best-ever Christmas-themed 60,000-strong sing-along ("It's too f---ing hot for Santa!" laughed Springsteen, just before playing it anyway). Other signs yielded a sweet "Growin' Up" and a gorgeous "Thunder Road." And as has also become customary over the band's past few weeks, Max Weinberg midway through yielded the kit to his 18-year-old son (and heavy metal veteran) Jay, who absolutely killed. Jay sped up "Radio Nowhere" to well past the speed limit, drove the band through "Lonesome Day" and "The Rising," and brought a raging, loose new energy to "Born to Run." Dad should be proud.
Springsteen clearly saw Bonnaroo as a challenge, but once he settled in, the band was an unstoppable train. If Springsteen didn't convert everyone on the festival grounds, he sure as hell wore them down over the course of the three-hour set, best of the fest so far.
(Editing by Dean Gooodman at Reuters)

Source: Reuters

Biz places bets on fresh talent at Vegas film fest

By Steven Zeitchik
LAS VEGAS (Hollywood Reporter) - CineVegas, the annual Sin City gathering of indie film powerbrokers amid the slot machines and black-jack tables, wound down Sunday after providing several breakouts -- and more than a few surreal spectacles.
Among the world premieres to make a splash were Jeff Mizushima's "Etienne!," Frankie Latina's "Modus Operandi" and Kyle Patrick Alvarez's "Easier With Practice."
Mizushima's "Etienne!" was a conversation piece for many over the weekend. The film, a spiritual cousin to "Lars and the Real Girl," centers on a pudgy loner who has only one friend -- the titular dwarf hamster -- whom he decides to take on a bike trip up the California coast after the critter is diagnosed with terminal cancer.
"Operandi," meanwhile, was the talk of the festival among media and execs after its premiere Saturday night. Nominally a thriller involving a revenge-bent CIA agent, it also bursts with campiness and odes to '70s movie outrageousness.
Perhaps the best-received movie of the fest was "Practice," an understated drama about an introverted twentysomething writer who develops an unlikely relationship with a woman who calls him randomly one day.
All three movies have U.S. theatrical rights available and were being circled by acquisition execs as the fest wound down.
On Sunday night, "Practice" took the grand jury prize, while "Etienne!" and Robert Saitzyk's Alaskan thriller "Godspeed" won special jury prizes.
In other categories, Doug Tirola's poker study "All In" took the documentary jury prize while Jessica Oreck's Japan-insect exploration "Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo" scored the special documentary jury prize. Jon Voight and Willem Dafoe were given achievement awards.
Executives from a range of companies -- IFC, Magnolia, Miramax and Fox Searchlight -- all turned up to scout for the next big indie thing.
"It's really one of the most enjoyable and even important of the boutique festivals," said one exec. "It's a chance to find a film or a filmmaker months or years before a lot of other people are going to hear about them."
The festival also aims for edginess no matter the subject.
"We don't want to show movies that you can see at any other festival," said artistic director Trevor Groth. "This is a city based on risk-taking, not only because of the gambling and casinos but because of how the whole city was founded. It shouldn't even exist. This place should be sagebrush and lizards."
With the Vegas setting came a mix of partying -- splashy fetes at the Palms pool and the Mandalay Bay's Morrea Beach Club anchored the weekend -- and, as the only film festival to be set in a casino, plenty of other only-in-Vegas moments.
Fest headquarters and the screening theaters are both located in the Palms hotel, and a walk between the two requires a stroll through the casino, past the sportsbook area and right between the slot and video-poker machines.
Entertainment was often brought in to the laid-back headquarters space -- like a Billy Idol impersonator (who, oh yes, also stars in a fest pic), who vamped for festgoers. Continued...
Source: Reuters

Ex-cons on kitchen duty on Canadian TV show

By Etan Vlessing
TORONTO (Hollywood Reporter) - Canadian broadcaster Citytv is putting ex-cons with no culinary skills to work in a classy Toronto restaurant for "Conviction Kitchen," a new reality series set to premiere in the fall.
Sure, TV chef Jamie Oliver trained disadvantaged youths to staff his Fifteen restaurant franchise. But the Canadian series has a film crew follow local celebrity chef Marc Thuet and his wife and co-restaurant owner Biana Zorich as they whittle down 84 former bank robbers, thieves and petty offenders to seven waiters and six cooks. The finalists then endure a three-week culinary boot camp before Conviction Kitchen opens its doors to ordinary restaurant patrons.
Thuet said the eight-part series is no media stunt to launch a new business. Instead, he said, Conviction Kitchen provides first-class food and second chances for reformed criminals newly sprung from jail.
"This (TV show) will move viewers, and prove you can hire these people. They are grabbing this second chance and turning round their lives," he said.
Dramatic tension? The original group of 13 trainees is now down to 10 after one ex-con threatened Zorich when he was told to cut his hair. Another trainee, like many an ex-addicts, left after he was found shooting up in back of the kitchen.
Thuet, a former drug and alcohol abuser now four years sober, connects on camera with ex-cons he wants to empower as chef trainees while they fight the temptation to return to destructive habits.
"This is probably the most emotional show we've ever made," said Simon Lloyd, president of Toronto indie producer Cineflex Prods. "You've got someone taking heroin, who can't stay in the restaurant because he can't be around recovering addicts."
Lloyd added that he and Thuet, a French-born chef who originally trained at the Dorchester in London, originally envisioned a TV show where they turned a prison kitchen crew into trained restaurant chefs just before they are released.
But after they failed to secure the cooperation of Canadian prison authorities, Thuet and Zorich decided to close and relaunch one of their Toronto restaurants, Bite Me!, as an Italian restaurant.
"Conviction Kitchen" differs from most reality TV series in that no one is voted off the show at the end of each episode. But Thuet and Zorich don't disguise their challenge to keep the new restaurant open beyond opening night.
And once the cameras stop rolling at Conviction Kitchen, Zorich hopes the trainee chefs and dining room servers remain with the new restaurant until they've learned enough to further their new careers elsewhere, or even open their own restaurant.
(Editing by Dean Gooodman at Reuters)

Source: Reuters

N.Y. indie film studio launches in tough times

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Two New York financiers have launched an independent film company to make and sell low-budget movies in a tight U.S. market that has seen hard times for two years due to competition, slowing DVD sales and a lack of fresh money.
Mary Dickinson and Charlene Fisher unveiled DF Indie Studios late Friday to eventually produce 10-12 films annually with a production cost of $10 million or less. They plan to guarantee distribution in the U.S. and Canada, backed by what they say is $150 million in equity financing.
DF Indie Studios (DFIS) has the support of big-name movie makers such as brothers Tony and Ridley Scott ("Gladiator") and independent film veterans Ted Hope and Anne Carey. ("Adventureland" and "In the Bedroom").
"We've been amazed to see the competitors in our budget range have pretty much disappeared," Dickinson told Reuters.
"That's why we're excited about this time period," added Fisher. "We see it working in our favor."
Dickinson and Fisher plan to usher low-budget movies from script through production, editing, marketing and distribution, and they believe they are entering the market for art house flicks at a low-point after many studio players fell on hard times starting in late 2007.
Many independent film producers making contemporary art house films like Oscar winner "Slumdog Millionaire" hope to sell their distribution rights at festivals like Sundance. But DF Indie Studios vows to self-distribute movies they produce.
Currently many of the specialty divisions of major studios, such as Twentieth Century Fox's Fox Searchlight or Universal Pictures' Focus Features and even major independent companies like Lions Gate, routinely crank out films at a cost of $15 million to $30 million and more.
But with a production cost of less than $10 million, DF Indie Studios hopes to hit it big with movies more in the vein of a "Napoleon Dynamite," which was a festival favorite before hitting mainstream success.
But DFIS comes into the market at a difficult time after a glut of low-budget movies met keen competition about two years ago, causing several indie companies to fail in 2008, a trend that continues this year.
Moreover, declining DVD sales have cut revenues and digital downloads remain a future uncertainty.
Still, Dickinson and Fisher could be entering the market poised for an uptick. At May's Cannes film festival, many major players said they were starting to see signs the glut of movies easing and that late 2009 and 2010 could mark a turning point.
Like others, Dickinson and Fisher also noted that amid the recession, theater ticket sales were currently on an upswing as people were flocking to theaters for cheap entertainment.

Source: Reuters

"Hangover" gives Murphy headache at box office

Hangover gives Murphy headache at box office
By Dean Goodman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The party kept rocking for "The Hangover," the first big surprise hit at the North American box office this summer, while Eddie Murphy suffered a headache with his second consecutive flop.
According to studio estimates issued on Sunday, "The Hangover" led the field for a second weekend with ticket sales of $33.4 million across the United States and Canada. The raunchy comedy with a little-known cast becomes the first movie to retain its crown since "Madea Goes to Jail" in February.
The film also took just 10 days to hit the century mark -- $105.4 million, to be exact -- setting a new record for an R-rated comedy. The old mark of 11 days was set last year by "Sex and the City."
Industry pundits expect "The Hangover" to hit $200 million -- not bad for a movie that cost a reported $31 million to make. The action revolves around three guys struggling to remember what happened at a wild bachelor party in Las Vegas the night before. It stars Justin Bartha, Bradley Cooper and Ed Helms, and was directed by Todd Phillips of "Old School" fame.
The film, from Time Warner Inc's Warner Bros. Pictures, easily fended off a pair of new entries boasting some major star power.
Columbia Pictures' remake of the 1974 subway-hijacking thriller "The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3," starring Denzel Washington and John Travolta, opened at No. 3 with $25 million, in line with expectations.
"It's a solid opening for us," said Rory Bruer, president of worldwide distribution at the Sony Corp unit.
Washington's last major release was "American Gangster," which opened to $44 million in late 2007. The last time Travolta headlined a drama was in 2004 when "Ladder 49" opened to $26 million. Comparative data are not adjusted for ticket-price inflation.
Murphy, on the other hand, came in at No. 6 this weekend with the Paramount Pictures family comedy "Imagine That," which tallied just $5.7 million.
"We're really disappointed," said Don Harris, executive vice-president of distribution at the Viacom Inc unit.
Murphy previously starred in "Meet Dave," which opened to $5 million last July and finished with $12 million.
Walt Disney Pictures' Pixar cartoon "Up" held at No. 2 with $30.5 million, taking its total to $187.2 million after three weekends. The previous Pixar release, "Wall-E," had earned $163 million in the same span last summer.
Rounding out the top five were the Ben Stiller comedy hit sequel "Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian" (Fox) which held steady at No. 4 with $9.6 million in its fourth weekend; and the latest Will Ferrell bomb "Land of the Lost" (Universal), which fell two places to No. 5 with $5.6 million in its second weekend. Their respective totals stand at $143.4 million and $35 million.
Walt Disney Pictures is a unit of Walt Disney Co. 20th Century Fox is a unit of News Corp. Universal Pictures is a unit of General Electric Co's NBC Universal.
In limited release, the feature debut of David Bowie's 38-year-son Duncan Jones, opened strongly. "Moon," starring Sam Rockwell as an astronaut who confronts a clone of himself while mining lunar helium, earned $145,000 from just eight theaters in New York and Los Angeles. The Sony Pictures Classics release expands across the United States throughout June and July. Continued...
Source: Reuters

Ailing Aerosmith guitarist eyes return next month

Ailing Aerosmith guitarist eyes return next month
By Dean Goodman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Aerosmith guitarist Brad Whitford hopes to rejoin his bandmates early next month after a head injury prevented him from playing on their newly launched tour, fellow guitarist Joe Perry said on Sunday.
Whitford, 57, is recovering from surgery for internal bleeding after he apparently banged his head while getting out of his Ferrari about a week before the tour began last Wednesday in St. Louis.
"It built up pressure and gave him this whoopin' headache," Perry told Reuters. "He's not prone to getting migraines, so knew something was wrong. He went right in, they did what they had to do, and now he's getting better."
The target date for Whitford's return is July 7, when the band is scheduled to play a show in Raleigh, North Carolina, Perry said. Subbing for him is Bobby Schneck, who has played with Green Day and Weezer.
Rocking out with Aerosmith can be hazardous for your health. Four out of five group members have disclosed major medical problems in the last three years, including Perry who has been plagued by a bad knee ever since he fell off a stage in Dallas 25 years ago.
He underwent knee-replacement surgery in March 2008, but was "devastated" to learn around Christmas that the area had become infected, like a "rotten grapefruit," he said, and he would need to go through the whole procedure again.
The various ailments and touring obligations mean the band has not released an album of original material since 2001's "Just Push Play." Perry said the band has recorded about 15 songs for the next disc and hopes to pick up the thread in the studio sometime after the current tour ends in the fall.
The third stop on the tour will be on Tuesday at the Comcast Center in suburban Boston. The band has been playing its classic 1975 album "Toys in the Attic" in its entirety, with the notable exception of the closing track "You See Me Crying."
Perry said the song is too difficult for vocalist Steven Tyler to sing right now, but Tyler hopes he will be able to do it after a few more shows. At any rate, the band expects to swap out "Toys in the Attic" in about two weeks, and play all the tracks from its 1976 follow-up "Rocks," Perry said.
(Editing by Philip Barbara)

Source: Reuters

"Hangover" gives Murphy a headache at box office

Hangover gives Murphy a headache at box office
By Dean Goodman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The party kept rocking for "The Hangover," the first big surprise hit at the North American box office this summer, while Eddie Murphy suffered a headache with his second consecutive flop.
According to studio estimates issued on Sunday, "The Hangover" led the field for a second weekend with ticket sales of $33.4 million across the United States and Canada. The raunchy comedy with a little-known cast becomes the first movie to retain its crown since "Madea Goes to Jail" in February.
The film also took just 10 days to hit the century mark -- $105.4 million, to be exact -- setting a new record for an R-rated movie. The old mark of 11 days was set last year by "Sex and the City."
Industry pundits expect "The Hangover" to hit $200 million -- not bad for a movie that cost a reported $31 million to make. The action revolves around three guys struggling to remember what happened at a wild bachelor party in Las Vegas the night before. It stars Justin Bartha, Bradley Cooper and Ed Helms, and was directed by Todd Phillips of "Old School" fame.
The film, from Time Warner Inc's Warner Bros. Pictures, easily fended off a pair of new entries boasting some major star power.
Columbia Pictures' remake of the 1974 subway-hijacking thriller "The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3," starring Denzel Washington and John Travolta, opened at No. 3 with $25 million, in line with expectations.
"It's a solid opening for us," said Rory Bruer, president of worldwide distribution at the Sony Corp unit.
Washington's last major release was "American Gangster," which opened to $44 million in late 2007. The last time Travolta headlined a drama was in 2004 when "Ladder 49" opened to $26 million. Comparative data are not adjusted for ticket-price inflation.
Murphy, on the other hand, came in at No. 6 this weekend with the Paramount Pictures family comedy "Imagine That," which tallied just $5.7 million.
"We're really disappointed," said Don Harris, executive vice-president of distribution at the Viacom Inc unit.
Murphy previously starred in "Meet Dave," which opened to $5 million last July and finished with $12 million.
Walt Disney Pictures' Pixar cartoon "Up" held at No. 2 with $30.5 million, taking its total to $187.2 million after three weekends. The previous Pixar release, "Wall-E," had earned $163 million in the same span last summer.
Rounding out the top five were the Ben Stiller comedy hit sequel "Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian" (Fox) which held steady at No. 4 with $9.6 million in its fourth weekend; and the latest Will Ferrell bomb "Land of the Lost" (Universal), which fell two places to No. 5 with $5.6 million in its second weekend. Their respective totals stand at $143.4 million and $35 million.
Walt Disney Pictures is a unit of Walt Disney Co. 20th Century Fox is a unit of News Corp. Universal Pictures is a unit of General Electric Co's NBC Universal.
In limited release, the feature debut of David Bowie's 38-year-son Duncan Jones, opened strongly. "Moon," starring Sam Rockwell as an astronaut who confronts a clone of himself while mining lunar helium, earned $145,000 from just eight theaters in New York and Los Angeles. The Sony Pictures Classics release expands across the United States throughout June and July. Continued...
Source: Reuters
 

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