Has Love Fallen into Hole?
Courtney Love was hospitalized Thursday for a possible drug overdose after she was arrested attempting to break into a friend’s home. Love was apprehended after officers received a burglary call and later found the actress/singer standing in the middle of the street outside of a home in Wilshire, an area close to Los Angeles. (What an excellent hiding place!) She was taken into custody and then released with a $2500 bail. Later, police and paramedics received a 911 call at another home from Love, who said that she had overdosed. She was taken to a nearby hospital, and though there is no word on her condition, she has been released. Courtney Love is the widow of Kurt Cobain who committed suicide in 1994. Love hasn’t released an album since Hole’s Celebrity Skin in 1998. She was supposed to have released a solo album on October 28, but it has been postponed until February.
Time Out For Matrix
Warner Brothers has announced that the new Matrix Revolutions, the third movie in the trilogy developed by the Wachowski Brothers, will be released simultaneously in 70 countries. The final installment will officially hit theaters on November 5th at what the Warner Brother’s execs call “zero hour,” the exact same moment around the globe. So listen closely. This means that Revolutions will open at 6 a.m. in Los Angeles, 9 a.m. in New York, 2 p.m. in London, 5 p.m. in Moscow and 11 p.m. in Tokyo. This release strategy has never been attempted before but studios hope that this will prevent piracy in countries in later timezones and also create more hype for the film. “The zero hour simultaneous opens.deof Revolutions once again positions the Matrix films as the cutting-edge experience in motion pictures,” says Dan Fellman, president of Warner’s domestic distribution. The studio bigwigs hope to finish this trilogy with a bang, and they think that this is the way to do it. We just hope it’s worth the hype.
Studios Beat Up Indies
Looks like indie filmmakers are the ones being stuffed in lockers this week! That’s right, if you are an avid fan (like me) of little Indie films, you won’t like this news. According to recent reports, execs from several specialty distribution groups within the major studios met with honchos from indie houses in order to find a way to avoid the recent Motion Picture Association of America’s Oscar Screener Ban. While this ban was created to stop film piracy, indie heads say that it was initiated in order to prevent small distributors from gaining major awards. Being able to send out DVD’s to those in the Hollywood community who vote for the Oscars and other major awards is the primary way that small indie films get noticed. United Artists president Bingham Ray instigated a close-door sit-down with Miramax co-chairman Harvey Weinstein, who agreed to the ban, as well as representatives from New Line Cinema, Focus Films, Sony Pictures Classics, and Paramount. While the details of the meeting were not disclosed, they are set to meet again to discuss a strategy for dealing with the ban. IFP/New York exec director Michelle Byrd, Killer Films chief Christine Vachon, and Greene Street founder-president John Penotti formulated a response to the MPAA edict, stating “the policy change will seriously diminish the diversity and quality of indie films immediately and the mainstream film industry in the long run. By undermining their Oscar potential, riskier and edgier films will not be made. Given that most piracy comes from outside the U.S. and from in-theater taping, the least likely culprits — Academy members and other insiders — are the ones most likely to suffer.”
Archived article by Amanda Hodes