Michael Moore’s Free Movie Download Bound to Set Trends
It’s election season, and Michael “Mr. Farenheit 911, Sicko” Moore has been quite quiet lately, only to startle us out of nowhere with Slacker Uprising a documentary Moore has made available online gratis to viewers via an arrangement with interactive hosting firm Hypernia.
The film’s cost rounds to about $2 million dollars, and most likely Moore will not recoup a dime from the free dowloading delivery. Many critics are hailing this move (free web release) as unprecedented. More is hoping for some guerilla-style viewing too; CityNews reports that Moore’s
“hoping the file will be shared via email, online and in homes, and will be shown in schools, colleges, church halls and community centres, insisting he’s fine with having it freely distributed everywhere, something that would turn the stomach of most movie executives in Hollywood.”
The unanswered question now is, will other filmmakers follow suit? Will they produce million-dollar movies and distribute them for free over the internet? Some observers have actually been panning the film, in particular Ben Walters of The Guardian who (while praising Moore’s millenial movie distribution strategy) waved off Slacker Uprising as a “disappointment that will give ammunition to those who see Moore as a self-aggrandising propagandist while contributing little of substance to the present campaign”. The same sentiment was reiterated by film critic John Serba whose evaluation of the documentary was pretty much summed up in the headline: you get what you paid for.
Maybe Moore ought to try this freebie strategy with his next movie. Then we won’t assume its quackery.
What the Financial Bailout Means for the Movie Industry
On Wall Street, hearts have gone from heart attack-provoking levels to pitter patters, as an agreement was reached concerning the historic financial bailout. Hollywood, however, was never scared, actually.
In fact, while the rest of the nation was feeling the heat banking quagmire that in the past week, Hollywood was waltzing to a different tune. Brooks Barnes of the New York Times noted:
“Hollywood’s most prominent independent production companies, closed on a $350 million revolving credit fund led by JPMorgan Chase and Comerica. The financing effort began just six weeks ago, said Asif Satchu, co-chief executive of the film company.”
An executive from Media Rights told the Times that this development goes to prove that ”money available banks are still in the business of putting money to work; they’re just making many fewer bets.”
Disney Brings Oprah on Board for The Princess and the Frog
Disney announced that—none other than talkshow host and one-woman empire Oprah Winfrey—will be one of the star voices for its first African-American animated production The Princess and the Frog. The Princess and the Frog has of course been under a great deal of scrutiny from the African-American community.
Could it be that this voice-over casting is a way for Disney to appease the criticism and skepticism it has received concerning the stereotypical plotline of the upcoming animated feature, scheduled to be released in the latter part of 2009? After all, popular wisdom seems to be that anything with Oprah involved is pretty much al-right. In any case, it’s a great move on the part of Disney to beef up The Princess and The Frog’s stellar cast that includes Anika Noni Rose (Dreamgirls), Keith David (Barbershop 1).
Movie Business and Big Tobacco Were Bosom Buddies? No!
When James Dean puffed a cigarette in Rebel Without a Cause in a gesture that many came to regard as the ultimate symbol of super masculinity and manliness, when Bette Davis and Paul Henreid lighted two cigarettes simultaneously in the 1939 film Now, Voyager, it was all premeditated, according to a study by Dr. Stanley Glantz of the journal Tobacco Control.
“One justification for smoking in the movies is the fact that there was a lot of smoking in the golden age of Hollywood, and that smoking on-screen is part of the art of making films, something used from the beginning to create mood and develop character, and you see these iconic old movies being cited over and over again. These old documents blow away that myth and show that it was not artistry but big business, involving huge amounts of money.”
Glantz and his team studied nearly 200 actors’ contracts and uncovered that far from being a candid act, smoking in the movies was part of a direct dalliance that movie studios and cigarette-manufacturers. The former
“negotiated cigarette ad deals, insisted on publicity for themselves and their latest films, and directly benefited from millions of dollars in tobacco advertising in newspapers, magazines, and nationwide radio campaigns”.
And this product placement worked like no other, prompting over 200,000 of America’s youths to adapt smoking each year, according to Dr. Glantz’s study.