BoxOfficeFangrl

The $3 ticket deal includes all premium formats in participating theaters, though it is only one day out of the weekend. But a lot of people who want to see it in IMAX probably would go on Saturday if they can.

That's why it gets so boring when the nominees are performed at the Oscars. Mix up the types of songs that get nominated, AMPAS! Gaga just won in the category not too long ago, is there any incentive to give her another Oscar for a song that's not regarded nearly as well? Plus, her campaigning can be...a lot, and I don't think it helped her last season. *If* "I Ain't Worried" is eligible and gets in, it would probably stand out among a sea of ballads that play over the credits. Do we have any "thematically important within the movie" songs in serious contention this year? Very wary of anything attached to Don't Worry Darling at the moment...

The last few James Bond songs contained some elements of the original Bond theme and they've still won. Maybe you can get away with a few similar notes or a chord progression and it's not considered a proper sample? The songs you mention do seem to have more overt examples of sampling, though. Still, this feels like a bit of a campaign ad: There are plenty of examples with musicals where the song from the movie that gets pushed for awards isn't considered the "best" or isn't the most popular. Just last year, it happened with Encanto. For a non-musical, though, a similar example doesn't easily come to mind. If the Academy is a stickler about samples, then Paramount pushes "Hold My Hand". If not...they have to go with the actual hit, right?

Fox Animation took the claims of teenage Anastasia allegedly escaping the Bolsheviks assassinating the rest of Romanov family, and turned it into a G-rated musical with an undead Rasputin as the antagonist, so... Times have changed, stories that Disney hasn't already adapted before might face more scrutiny about being too problematic for kids, even with updates. Not that Twitter Discourse seals a movie's fate.

Well, she did turn 25 a couple months back... I wonder how many years Leo's publicists have been just praying for him to date someone who’s even, like, 28...

Budgeted at $20m but ballooned due to Covid impact/delays. Speaking of Covid: Give it another few days and one of the trades will confirm the ghost directing rumors, too, haha! All the other TikTok rumors about DWD seem to be true.

I know, but Encanto was still a well-regarded box office success (by pandemic standards). Many Disney musicals have had the "wrong" song win the Oscar, anyway. Or, they could have just gone with Beyoncé. Guess we'll never know... This $3 ticket day is exciting, the domestic market hasn't had anything like it on this scale in decades, if ever. There's Cheap Tuesday, but it's not as universal and not such a reduction from the normal price. I wonder if some genres will benefit more than others.

That Chosen special also did well as a Fathom event and played for multiple days. There's less risk (but less potential reward), though if it exceeds expectations, the run can be extended. Maybe Top Gun: Maverick does less in the UK with No Time to Die as competition? It seemed like it only "underperformed" in the US. Also, I wonder who would've won Best Original Song for 2021 with Billie Eilish out of the way...Lin-Manuel? LOL Diane Warren?

Well, yeah, though I'm not sure Reminiscence would have done much better this year. King Richard still would've been a tennis movie, sadly a flop of a sports movie genre, but even that would've made more. At least West Side Story wrapped production in 2019, so they didn't want to keep it on the shelf for three years. Makes sense. House of Gucci filmed in Spring 2021, coming out the next year would've been more typical. It was so strange that Ridley had The Last Duel and HoG out in back-to-back months.

This marketplace is so dead... Whoever thought that time War Room was #1 would be the good old days? Has there been a breakout "faith-based movie" in a while? I think they expected more from Father Stu. That Kurt Warner biopic from last Christmas could be crushing it right now. Do you think any other 2021 movies could have been bigger hits this year? I never understood the rush with House of Gucci.

She was too busy filming Dune to answer questions for that Olivia Wilde Variety profile, when Harry just participated via email. LOL, is all the sand messing with the internet access over there? At a certain point I had to admit the rumors of discord had to be true on some level, clichéd as it might be.

Wilde did talk about Shia's "combative energy" and how her responsibility was "creating a safe, trusting environment" and protecting the production and the cast. The implication is of bad/troubling behavior of some sort on Shia's part while working on DWD, and Olivia had to part ways with him over it. Again, it would be unwise of Shia to be all, "I didn't get fired, I quit!" about Olivia's interview if the truth is that his behavior did cross a line or was inappropriate in some way. But then, maybe he lacks self-awareness about that and will just get buried even worse if it turns out Florence/other DWD cast members have stories about him as well. Why are people convinced Harry is supposed to be doing an accent; couldn't his character be British? It's not like there weren't British people living in California in the 1950s. I think he just doesn't sound like a newsreader from London, he's from the Manchester area IRL and has probably spent a lot of time in America so his natural accent is now a bit of a mishmash. Still, there were probably other clips they could have picked, or maybe picked up the scene at a different point.

The thing is, when a person lies/is misleading about one thing, who knows how much else they're lying about? Everyone figured Shia was fired, mostly because of his reputation (for years of being "difficult", not just his ex's accusations). Maybe Florence comes out tomorrow and says Shia creeped her out and she's glad he exited the project. Sadly, no one would be surprised. OTOH, maybe it turns out that they clashed but not in "he was gross to her" way. Something to consider: would Shia really insert himself into the DWD narrative right now if it turns out he did actually behave sleazily to the beloved Florence Pugh, but he was a sleaze who quit vs. a sleaze who got fired? It's a distinction without a difference; neither is a good look for him. Either way, Wilde looks really bad here: either Shia was a #MeToo situation waiting to happen with Florence and Olivia was willing to overlook it privately, while publicly making herself out to be the badass who stands up for women...or, Shia didn't do anything cancellable here and quit, but Wilde knew everyone would believe the worst about LaBeouf regardless, so why not throw him under the bus to make herself look good?

No one really raised any eyebrows when Shia exited the project, given his history, everyone figured he must have done something or been "difficult". Olivia kind of implied as much when it happened and definitely accused him of impropriety in this week's profile. Who knew he's been sitting back all this time with receipts? But since he quit, I guess that explains why he wasn't bothered by whoever ended up with the role. The speculation that Florence does not care for Olivia is looking more and more true by the day. Sure, the media likes to pit women against each other, but sometimes coworkers just don't always get along. This seems to be somewhat one-sided, at least. Some of the Styles fans are really unhinged in their hatred of anyone he dates, however, that doesn't necessarily the person a faultless angel, either. Olivia really went to Variety and told them her whole chest that Shia would cause an unsafe work environment on set so she had to fire him, meanwhile she was practically begging him to stay with the project. Like, she didn't remember that she sent texts to Shia and did video chats that tell a very different story than the one she provided the media? Is she one of those people who believes in the "emotional truth" of whatever they are saying at the moment? I wonder what the mainstream entertainment media will say about Wilde now, their narrative has been that any and all criticism is misogynistic.

Oscar Campaign Spending Reaches New Heights in Competitive Season (Variety, Jan 2019) Tracking Netflix’s Relentless Quest for Oscar Glory (Nerdist, April 2021) Other reports say Netflix has spent even more on campaigning in other years (some put the Roma campaign at $60 million) and estimated their total spend for the 2019 season above $100 million, which they denied. On the other hand, Neon's campaign for Parasite was reportedly only $4-5 million (Deadline), but it had far more going for it than most awards contenders. Apple spent about $10 million for the CODA campaign (The Wrap). These are movies that were hoping to get into Best Picture, presumably it costs less if the movie is only really aiming for an acting nomination/win. Elvis could go either way, really.

I've thought of Elvis as more of an acting contender, but worse-reviewed movies have made it into Best Picture. If the Whitney biopic goes over in a similar way, it could benefit from being more recent. At the nomination stage, I don't see why two musical biopics couldn't get into Best Picture. Usually, though, the woman-centered one is relegated to being a Best Actress contender. It seems like Zaslav is a penny pincher, he's made moves to alienate talent, types like that don't always see the value in awards. Time will tell...

But seriously, I wonder if WB being broke will affect the awards run for Elvis... Those campaigns aren't cheap and the movie will be out of theaters by the time awards season is in high gear, so will Zaslav think the spend is worth it? OTOH, it may not matter, they absolutely love rewarding biopics like this in lead acting categories.

They had a choice of all the clips and picked this one? The news of WB barely having money to release much else this year puts even more pressure on this to not flop massively.

No big boost from "Top Gov"?

New frontrunner? The song is said to be sweet and/or creepy, depending on the context, and featured prominently throughout the film-not just a credits thing.

For some, "holding people accountable" online is really just a socially acceptable form of bullying. It can't be that you just don't like [insert person/thing] because they get on your nerves or you're jealous, etc. now people invent a self-righteous soapbox to support their visceral feelings and call it "activsm". In olden times, at least you had to show up in person to stone someone. I am skeptical about DWD (the trailer doesn't give me hope the new script is that much different from the old one), but still hope it's a success, if only to irritate the anti-Olivia contingent.

It's the craziest portion of the Harry Styles fans who don't like that he's dating Olivia, so suddenly they care about every "problematic" thing she said in interviews ten years ago. If not for that, there wouldn't be a tenth of the Twitter vitriol. They're like that toward any woman Harry is linked to, until the breakup, then suddenly they stop trying to "cancel" the poor lady. The whole "Larry" phenomenon is the QAnon of celebrity ships, it's that level of widespread conspiratorial lunacy. Olivia must really think Harry is worth it, because that part of his fanbase would have me running for the hills. They brag about being rude to her at his concerts! He and Olivia are being really restrained and polite about how terrible those "fans" are.

I *want* to be skeptical of the Florence/Olivia feud speculation, but...Flo is really not helping the case here. There was an email option to participate in this profile, yet she was too busy even for that. In her recent Harper's Bazaar profile, Florence decried the focus on the sex scenes for DWD once the trailer dropped, while Olivia can't say enough about them. And the business with Pugh sharing Oppenheimer promo materials on her social accounts, but not for the movie that comes out this fall, where she's a lead...it's a bit sketchy. Obviously, I don't believe the most ridiculous "Florence ghost directed the movie!" stories from Deuxmoi, but...hmmm.

GOT was widely beloved for years, people named their kids after those characters. Fans mostly blamed the writers for not being up to par at the end, and they're not involved in the new series. Well, no wonder Emma Stone split up from him... And, he ended up getting nominated for Hacksaw Ridge instead. The lesson, kids? Try acting! J/k, Andrew seems to like what he got out of the experience, so good for him I guess.