Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Today's Film News: Fraggles Rock Again


By Katey Rich

FraggleWith Jason Segel working on a new Muppets movie, another set of Jim Henson's creatures are heading to theatres as well. The Weinstein Company will distribute a movie based on "Fraggle Rock," the 1980s TV show that featured a mix of furry puppets and humans. Variety reports that Cory Edwards, who directed TWC's largely hated Hoodwinked!, will write and direct this one. Not to pick sides among Jim Henson's babies, but early instinct puts Jason Segel ahead on this one. Can anyone even remember a coherent plot from "Fraggle Rock"? At least Kermit and Piggy have the will-they-won't-they romance to play off.



One of the most iconic screen couples of the early-90s, for me at least, were Steve Martin and Diane Keaton in the Father of the Bride movies. Now my eight-year-old self can rejoice, since the two will reteam at Paramount for From Zero to Sixty, a comedy pitch written by Martin. According to Variety, Robert Simonds, who produced Martin's The Pink Panther and the upcoming sequel, will produce the film.



26305indy_billboard341x182The Hollywood Reporter has a short little feature about the massive outdoor advertising campaign going on for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, which even my dad has pointed out I'm a bit too excited about. Apparently massive billboards are par for the course in Los Angeles, but Steven Spielberg and the Paramount marketing team have pioneered using two adjacent billboards to spell out a single message. The article doesn't specify exactly what that message is, but my guess is it's just one word: "INDY." I mean, what more needs to be said?



For a while it looked like David O. Russell's Nailed would be facing even greater troubles than it did when James Caan stormed off the set a few weeks ago. On Friday the Screen Actors Guild demanded that production shut down, but yesterday the producers worked out their financial woes and got things rolling again. But now Variety is reporting that the production company, ThinkFilm, is still facing plenty of financial woes, and may be heading into Cannes this week without any money to put forward for new titles.



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