OK, with all due respect to those who knew & loved this DJ AM guy when he was alive… am I alone in scratching my head and thinking, “Who the fahrvergnügen is that guy, anyway?!” And he’s just one of an increasingly-long list of “celebrities” that make me feel old every time I log onto MySpace and see their dubious list of “Celebrity Updates” such as the one I screen-snapped this morning (above).
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It goes without saying that consumers are in love with Redbox, the Coinstar-owned company who in just a few short years has built up a formidable rental kiosk business against the likes of mail-order favorite Netflix. I mean, DVD rentals for a buck a night? What’s not to like? (Unless you like indie fare like Tempe… Redbox is for the big boys only.)

Somebody explain that to the bigwigs in Hollywood. First they succeeded in mostly squashing the 99¢ iTunes new release (that’ll be $1.29 now, thankyouverymuch), and now they’re trying to put the squeeze on the $1 DVD rental.
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Another obit, this time to Circuit City, who today announced they’re giving up the good fight and liquidating the rest of their stores. Sad day for me… since moving back to Ohio from L.A., I’ve been frequenting CC far more than Best Buy, just because they offer some cool stuff the competition doesn’t (like the Archos 5 player). I’m in the market for another DVD storage unit, which I was about to buy for $10 cheaper at Best Buy anyway. Guess I’ll hold off until the bloodbath begins.

Sad days, especially for the 30k employees who will be collecting unemployment soon…

I guess Wednesday is the new Monday, because yesterday kind of sucked! In addition to Apple CEO Steve Jobs taking a medical leave of absence until late June, we’ve got the deaths of Ricardo Montalban and Patrick McGoohan to be depressed about.
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Just heard the jolly good news that HOWARD THE DUCK is making its U.S. DVD debut on March 10 (click the link above to preorder from Amazon.com). The much-maligned George Lucas production has been a no-show on DVD for 11 long years!
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Sumbitch. As I was sitting here blogging this afternoon, I happened to open my iPhone Facebook app and saw that Famous Monsters of Filmland founder Forrest J. Ackerman passed on yesterday. I’m bummed. Needless to say, I grew up reading that magazine and it inspired me to not only make movies, but even publish my own magazine years later. Dude, you will be missed.

So it looks like the Screen Actors Guild is walking away from the table again and pushing for its members to approve a strike against its foes at the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. In the wake of last year’s painful Writers Guild of America strike, my question is: “Do these guys read the newspaper?”
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I tend to watch most movies at home, either from the comfort of my Dish HD satellite DVR or as a Netflix rental (and sometimes, using their Watch Instantly streaming method, when applicable).

Yesterday, the wife and I ventured out with my father & stepmother to see the new Bond flick, QUANTUM OF SOLACE. Watching the coming attractions unspool before the flick, my wife whispered that she wanted to see a couple of them, to which I gave my customary reply: “That’s a Netflix rental.”

So the question is, what justifies a movie not being theatre-worthy?
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MySpace just posted a teaser of the FRIDAY THE 13TH rehash that’s coming (you guessed it) Friday, February 13, 2009. And it ain’t half bad, although really it just looks like a slicker, more expensive sequel than a complete “reimagining” (oh, how I hate that word!). They’re even sticking with a similar music score (at least for this teaser), although really, how could they top that classic theme?
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Maybe it’s just me getting older, but I’m too impatient to sit through a 90-minute movie anymore, let alone the 3-hour-plus “epics” that Hollywood keeps wanting to churn out. (Here’s a tip to the studios: Shorter movies = More screenings = More money!)
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