Dark Days Ahead for Little Movies

Many go straight to DVD as too many films vie for screens

(NEWSER) - A surplus of Hollywood movies is forcing many independent films off the big screen, and driving down box office takes for those that do make it, reports the Wall Street Journal. Mainstream films with bankable stars are being sent straight-to-DVD, as too many movies fight for too few theater slots every weekend. More than 600 feature films were released last year—up from 466 in 2002. More»

Influential director made 'Bonnie and Clyde,' 'Little Big Man'

(AP) - Director Arthur Penn, a myth-maker and myth-breaker who in such classics as Bonnie and Clyde and Little Big Man refashioned movie and American history and sealed a generation's affinity for outsiders, died last night, a day after his 88th birthday. Daughter Molly Penn said her father (no relation to actor Sean) died at his home in Manhattan of congestive heart failure. More»

Movies disappoint, but rarely go the way of Ishtar

(NEWSER) - It's rare these days to see a big-studio movie truly bomb, and that's a shame, laments Tom Shone of Slate . Sure, we get our share of misfires like Jonah Hex or The A-Team , but few reach the depths of those glorious financial busts of yesteryear like Ishtar, Waterworld, and Cutthroat Island—"the swashbuckler that derailed the careers of Renny Harlin, Geena Davis, and Matthew Modine—and the last film to actually force a movie studio to close, Heaven's Gate-style." More»

Tampa span unsafe, so pols pitch studios

(NEWSER) - A Florida county is looking to demolish an old bridge, and hopes to convince Hollywood to foot the bill. Find a film that needs some fireworks, a Tampa politician posits, “And they would do it under their budget, and it wouldn’t cost us a thing, or very little.” More»

Recommended only for Jon Hamm die-hards

(NEWSER) - Stolen, in which finds Mad Men star Jon Hamm in a mystery involving the search for two missing children, is getting panned by most critics.

• "First-time feature director Anders Anderson brings nothing to the table in terms of style or modulation," writes Noel Murray for the Onion .
• "Hamm is unable to do much with his underwritten role," writes Frank Scheck for the Hollywood Reporter , while co-star James Van Der Beek "sports some of the worst old-age makeup in memory in the present-day sequences," Lou Lumenick adds in the New York Post .