Few industries enjoy taking really, really, really long extended holiday vacations quite like Hollywood. So when we get to this time of the year, there’s really not much in the realm of “movie development news” to discuss, especially not in a weekly column which normally includes 10 different stories. So, last week, we instead reviewed 12 of the year’s top “Fresh Development” stories, and this week, we’re looking at 12 Rotten Ideas, presented to you in monthly chronology. Our retrospective begins with one of the year’s biggest stories (or series of stories), which was…
In appraising the Rotten stories of 2014 (or any year), one tricky question is whether you’re looking at the eventual result, or what the story felt like at the time. Since the Weekly Ketchup is about film development news, we’re also likely to think foremost about how the story impacts the future of movie production. The Franco/Rogen comedy The Interview led to so many news stories this year, almost all of which have negative implications, that it was something of a no-brainer. First, there were the many e-mail leaks, on a wide, wide variety of topics. Fortunately, a few different sources have compiled timelines of it all, so you can take your pick of New York Magazine, Business Insider, or Deadline for such breakdowns. How all of this was Rotten can be interpreted in various ways: the views expressed in some of the corporate e-mails, the decision by Sony to pull The Interview from theaters, or the concurrent decision by New Regency to scrap plans for Pyongyang, directed by Gore Verbinski and starring Steve Carell. Of course, some of that was turned around when Sony ultimately decided to release The Interview in a few hundred theaters and on VOD services like YouTube, Vudu, and various cable companies. Even so, for that week before Christmas, it looked like the bad guys had won, and Hollywood had started down a very slippery slope, where the world would be prevented from watching whatever sophomoric comedy they want. Even Rotten ones.
Admittedly, this story might actually be a Fresh Development if it did indeed involve a zombie apocalypse (that movie was already made twice, and it was called Dawn of the Dead), but it will probably just be more of the same. “The same” being whatever it was that attracted the hordes of moviegoers who invaded cineplexes in 2009 to see the Kevin James comedy Paul Blart: Mall Cop. James and Adam Sandler (via Happy Madison) are once again teaming up to produce the sequel to Paul Blart: Mall Cop, which James will also cowrite. Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 will be directed by Andy Fickman, whose streak of green splotches on RT has included She’s the Man, Game Plan, Race to Witch Mountain, You Again, and Parental Guidance. And it’s a streak that’s unlikely to be changed by Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2, which Sony Pictures has scheduled for April 17, 2015. That wasn’t the only sequel-to-a-Rotten-rated-movie we heard about in January, however. There was also The Nut Job 2, which will be released on the same day (1/15/16) as another Rotten Idea sequel announced this year, Ride Along 2, and a week before yet another one, Mechanic: Resurrection.
Obviously, Hollywood celebrities are humans, and humans die. Hopefully, it happens for most after a long, fruitful life and a long and happy retirement. Since the Weekly Ketchup is about film development, the deaths of actors and directors who are retired doesn’t necessarily fall within our purview, but this year, there were three major deaths involving actors whose passing very much changed the future of movies. First, in early February, there was the shocking drug overdose of Philip Seymour Hoffman, whose position among our most talented actors had been difficult to refute. Hoffman had just been announced to direct a drama called Ezekiel Moss with Amy Adams and Jake Gyllenhaal, and he had filmed a Showtime pilot called Happyish (his role has now gone instead to Steve Coogan). Hoffman’s last released film will be The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2, to be released on November 20, 2015. Also in February, we lost comedian, writer, and director Harold Ramis, who had long been attached to star in Ghostbusters 3. Later in 2014, Sony Pictures announced new plans for Ghostbusters 3, which will now be a reboot featuring a female team of supernatural combatants. Then, in August, we also lost Robin Williams, who took his own life at his home in Marin County, California. Right up until the end, Robin Williams stayed prolific in his film work, which included A Merry Friggin’ Christmas and Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb (both currently still in theaters), and next year’s Absolutely Anything. Plans for a Mrs. Doubtfire sequel had also topped the Weekly Ketchup back in April. Here are retrospectives of those we lost in 2014, courtesy of The Hollywood Reporter, The Wrap, and Deadline.
When we start calling new movie projects Rotten Ideas, we need to immediately acknowledge that we’re not always right. And so, we’re going to do that right here: we don’t know if Jem and the Holograms will be eye-stabbingly horrible, or a new pinnacle of filmmaking genius and a rousing entertainment that will live on for generations. Having said that, we’re still calling it one of the Rotten Ideas of the year. There are only so many hours in the day, and in the mid 1980s, this writer just didn’t have enough of them to spend on a cartoon series like Jem and the Holograms, so you’re not going to be seeing any nostalgia here. Not everyone, however, apparently agrees, because at least three people got together to announce that they’re working on a live action Jem and the Holograms movie. Those three would be director Jon M. Chu (Justin Bieber’s Believe, G.I. Joe: Retaliation) and his producing partners Scooter Braun (a record producer) and Jason Blum (of Blumhouse, the horror production company behind the Paranormal Activity franchise). The new movie about a pop singer aided by a “holographic computer” is looking for help from fans, and you can watch their video pitch at the newly launched website. Besides other, possibly more obvious reasons, this is one of the year’s Rotten Ideas because Justin Bieber: Never Say Never is the only Fresh movie on Jon M. Chu’s resume. Jem and the Holograms also made the news in May, when it was announced that Juliette Lewis and Molly Ringwald would also be in the film, along with the young stars Audrey Peeples, Hayley Kyoko, Stefanie Scott, and Ryan Guzman. Universal Pictures has scheduled Jem and the Holograms for October 23, 2015.
Yes, there is an animated character called The Pink Panther, and yes, he’s appeared on TV a few times over the years, but when you look up “pink panther” on Wikipedia, he’s not even what comes up. No, of course not, because The Pink Panther is a comedy classic, as were a few of its sequels, and the “Pink Panther” of the title was basically just a joke that didn’t have anything to do with the actual movies (except appearing in the credits). The true main character of the Pink Panther movies is, of course, Inspector Clouseau (most famously played by Peter Sellers and, most recently, by Steve Martin). So, of course, it would just be silly to imagine a movie called The Pink Panther without Inspector Clouseau. With that in mind, MGM has announced plans for an animation/live action hybrid comedy about The Pink Panther, with absolutely no French police detectives named Clouseau. Perhaps most oddly, the movie is still being described as a “caper.” This version of The Pink Panther will be directed by David Silverman (The Simpsons Movie, The Road to El Dorado).
Among “fan” circles, there were basically two “Rotten Idea” stand outs in 2014. One involved the reboot of The Fantastic Four (discussed below), but that was more of a series of stories than one single announcement. The winner in that category would have to be Edgar Wright’s departure from directing Marvel?s Ant-Man, which came some eight years after he first started work on the film. In other words, he actually predates most of what we now know as the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Having said that, it’s admittedly debatable how bad this news actually is. Two weeks later, Peyton Reed (The Break-Up, Yes Man) was announced as the new Ant-Man director, working from a new script rewrite by Anchorman creator Adam McKay. The popular reason offered for Wright’s departure is that his vision didn’t fit what Marvel wanted, and by the hiring of both Peyton Reed and Adam McKay, we can be fairly certain that what Marvel wanted was a big, mainstream comedy. Edgar Wright’s films are always comedies, but he has yet to deliver any sort of mainstream box office success close to what Marvel is aiming for, with his top film Scott Pilgrim vs the World only earning $31.5 million in the USA. Of course, the same argument could have been made (even more so, actually) about director James Gunn before Guardians of the Galaxy.
As noted in the Ant-Man story, there wasn’t exactly just one single horrible story about this August’s reboot of The Fantastic Four (via 20th Century Fox). It was more like a whirlwind of little cuts. In February, there was the casting of the four leads, two of whom had (at that point) just costarred in the critically panned comedy That Awkward Moment (Miles Teller as Mister Fantastic, and Michael B. Jordan as Human Torch), along with Jamie Bell as The Thing and Kate Mara as Invisible Woman. The online reactions to Michael B. Jordan were particularly nasty, and he reacted to it. This was followed by the casting of Toby Kebbell (Koba from Dawn of the Planet of the Apes) as Doctor Doom, which was followed later in the year by the news that the reboot “Doom” is an “anti-social programmer” who calls himself Doom on blogs. There was also the story about The Fantastic Four utilizing “found footage elements” (director Josh Trank made his mark with the superpowers found footage movie Chronicle). This was also the year Kate Mara mentioned that the movie’s not based on comic books, Michael B. Jordan said they’re just kids who had an accident, and we got our very unofficial first glimpse of The Thing in who sort of looks like a clinically depressed rock monster from The NeverEnding Story. Finally, this was also the year when Marvel Comics announced the cancellation of the Fantastic Four comic, which some perceived as a reaction to the way that 20th Century Fox has handled the movie rights. (It’s worth noting that this will not be the first time that Marvel has stopped publishing a Fantastic Four comic.) 20th Century Fox has scheduled The Fantastic Four for August 7, 2015.
In the late 1990s to early 2000s, a hot trend was Japanese horror, especially featuring young girls with straight black hair. Specifically, we’re talking about movies like Ringu, Ju-on: The Grudge, and Audition. This was soon followed by Hollywood remaking some of those movies, and spawning their own franchises (which was particularly confusing when the original films were also producing sequels). The Ring Two was released to a 20% Tomatometer score in 2005, and the third American Grudge movie went direct-to-video in 2009. This year, however, both American franchises announced plans for returns. The Grudge was first, back in March, with Jeff Buhler (The Midnight Meat Train) working on a remake/reboot, ostensibly because there’s a whole new generation that hasn’t seen a spooky little girl lurking in the background, all out of focus and spooky-like. Then, in July, there was news of a planned prequel to The Ring about Samara, the girl in the spooky VHS tape (never mind that her story has already been told in previous films). It’s also going to be 3D, or so one would presume by the title The Ring 3D.
Regardless of its reviews, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles opened to over $65 million this August, so of course, there’s a sequel coming. This news came around the same time that there was also talk that the sequel will include the big-brained villain Krang (sort of the TNMT equivalent of both MODOK and Arnim Zola). This was followed by further talk of including Casey Jones, as well as the animal-themed henchmen Bebop (the pig guy) and Rocksteady (the rhino guy). And finally, we learned a few weeks ago that Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2 will be directed by Dave Green, who this year gave us the 48% Rotten movie Earth to Echo.
As much as writers (like this one) might bemoan the waves of remakes, reboots, and retreads, it’s something Hollywood has been doing since (20 years) before someone at MGM got the idea for a color musical version of The Wizard of Oz. Something that you notice, however, when you write about these projects week after week is that the average dates for the original movies (somewhat logically) gradually creep forward with the passing of time. Every movie from the 1980s is already optioned? Great, move on to the 1990s. And there really were few movies with casts as definitively “nineties” as 1997’s I Know What You Did Last Summer. Jennifer Love Hewitt, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Freddie Prinze Jr, Ryan Phillippe, Johnny Galecki, and Anne Heche all appeared in the slasher movie (the success of which also inspired a sequel). Producer Neal Moritz has hired Oculus writer/director Mike Flanagan to start work on the remake, which, like the first film, will be adapted from the 1973 novel by Lois Duncan. This is one of the year’s Rotten Ideas not because of Flanagan’s credits, but because, sometimes, an idea is just “rotten” on its own merits (i.e. enough with the horror movie remakes). Hardly anyone ever remakes pirate movies. How about trying that for a while?
2014 was another big year for Netflix and other online streaming sites, as they collectively move towards more and more original content. On one hand, it’s great news for their customers, but on the other hand, there are signs that the trend might shift some forms of movies away from being theatrically released, in lieu of focusing on streaming (The Interview ended up being an example of this). First, there was the announcement for the Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon sequel, which now has the full title of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: The Green Legend. We’ve known for a while that the sequel was being produced by The Weinstein Company, but what was much less expected was that the sequel will premiere exclusively on Netflix (and in selected IMAX theaters). This was also something of a big deal for the Weekly Ketchup, because our rule has always been not to (knowingly) cover “direct to video” movies, but where does “direct to Netflix” fall in that definition? This announcement was also closely followed by news of a boycott from AMC, Regal, and Cinemark, which account for the majority of IMAX theaters in the USA. You can (figuratively) smell the tension in a quote like this one: “No one has approached us to license this made-for-video sequel in the U.S. or China, so one must assume the screens IMAX committed are in science centers and aquariums.” Truthfully, this isn’t the Rotten part of this story. No, that came later in the same week, when Netflix also announced the online streaming service has signed a four movie deal with Adam Sandler. If Sandler (and his contemporaries) start making deals with services like Netflix to bypass theaters, what does that mean for the future of movies? Will there even be certain genres at the cineplex ten years from now? Or… was Adam Sandler inevitably going to start making “direct to video” movies soon anyway, and this is just how it happens?
Melissa McCarthy is certainly a box office phenomenon, with Bridesmaids, The Heat, Identity Thief, and The Hangover Part III all making over $100 million domestically (also, breaking news: Melissa McCarthy was in The Hangover Part III). But her record seems a lot less impressive when you look at her Tomatometer, which shows that, of her last eight films, only Bridesmaids and The Heat earned Fresh Tomatometer scores. And don’t even get us started on director Shawn Levy (Just Married, The Internship), who, by this point, we sort of wish would lay off announcing new films so we could stop including his stories in the Rotten Ideas section. Having said all that, we haven’t even gotten to the really crazy part, which is that Melissa McCarthy is attached to star as Tinker Bell in an untitled comedy that Shawn Levy is attached to direct. J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan is now in “public domain,” which unfortunately means that Tinker Bell is pretty much fair game for this sort of comedy. On the bright side, November was relatively light on truly rotten ideas, or this particular story wouldn’t have even been included here. Overall, that was this writer’s take on Rotten Ideas in 2014: outside of January, February, and March, there seemed to be a lot fewer of them this year. There were a few weeks where I didn’t even list one “Rotten Idea.” Progress!
For more Weekly Ketchup columns by Greg Dean Schmitz, check out the WK archive, and you can contact GDS via Facebook.
