Of remakes stopped, crazy and just plain audacious

I didn't bother to see "Mars Needs Moms," not because the idea of martians kidnapping and killing little kids' moms offended me, but just because I found something better to do (spend the weekend with mi hermano for a couple of epicly good Baseball Project shows.)

It seems, however, that that simple act of ignoring may have been my little part (and probably yours, since I don't think anyone went to see that) in stopping something much more insidious.

Robert Zemeckis, a producer of "Mars Needs Moms," had been plotting a digital remake of "Yellow Submarine," I guess just because he has the technological skills to do such a thing and, well, maybe he's just bored. Well, luckily, it seems the complete failure of "Mars Needs Moms" has led Disney to put the kibosh on that before it really got off the ground. Bully to that.

Another remake that is almost finished has apparently had a late and rather funny change of villainy in hopes of expanding its box office take.

The Los Angeles Times is reporting that MGM is changing the villains in "Red Dawn" from Chinese to North Korean in order to keep its access to the humongous Chinese box office. Take a second to let it sink in just how funny that is. The studio is apparently, though not terribly surprisingly, still looking for a distributor for the movie starring Chris Hemsworth, Josh Peck, Josh Hutcherson, Adrianne Palicki, Isabel Lucas, Connor Cruise and Jeffrey Dean Morgan.

Per the L.A. Times, the changes will cost less than $1 million and will "involve changing an opening sequence summarizing the story's fictional backdrop, re-editing two scenes and using digital technology to transform many Chinese symbols to Korean." Priceless. Actually, I think that might be enough to get me to at least watch this on DVD to see how many accidental Chinese symbols remain.

And in a final word about remakes before a couple of fun videos, it seems that Netflix is making a "bold" movie into "original" programming by paying $100 million or so for David Fincher and Kevin Spacey's remake of the sublime UK TV series "House of Cards." Quotations added by me and fully intended to be facetious.

To acquire the show, which I assume it will then lease to a TV network, Netflix has agreed upfront to a two season, 26 episode commitment, but I really can't see how in the world this is going to catch on.

If you've never seen the original, it stars the late and truly great Ian Richardson as Francis Urquhart, aka F.U., an enterprising Conservative politician who rises through the British Parliament from chief whip all the way to prime minister through increasingly and comically evil means. I just don't see how Spacey or anyone else will be able to pull off his unique brand of malevolence as its translated across the pond.

But only a sucker would bet against Netflix, which now has a rather amazing 61 percent of the streaming content on the Internet (and I must say I've been thoroughly enjoying its all six seasons of "The Larry Sanders Show" - TV perfection.) Stay tuned to find out if this turns out as well as just about everything else Netflix has laid its hands on.

OK, after all that today, all I have is a couple of videos. First up comes the comedy duo of Simon Pegg and Nick Frost taking a break from the set of "Paul" to do a fairly funny "Star Wars" send-up for the folks at College Humor. All the early reviews I've seen so far "Paul" indicate that Greg Mottola's movie will deliver broad sci-fi laughs when it his theaters Friday, so I'm certainly in. Enjoy the video, then stick around for one more.

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

Finally today, courtesy of Yahoo, here are the first five minutes of "Source Code," director Duncan Jones' follow-up to his sci-fi gem "Moon," which is set to hit theaters April 1. I suppose if you don't know what exactly Jake Gyllenhaal's character is supposed to stop in this flick, the end of this clip is a bit of a spoiler, but since it happens in the first five minutes, I really don't think it can be much of one. I've decided I'll be going to see this flick, which also stars Michelle Monaghan. Enjoy the clip, and have a perfectly endurable Wednesday. Peace out.

Get a first look at Duncan Jones' "Source Code"

If you've ever heard the soundtrack for "Crazy Heart" or just seen the movie (which I already have a rather ridiculous three times), you know that among the many things Jeff Bridges does amazingly well is singing real country music.

And so it's not terribly surprising news but good all the same that The Dude is reuniting with producer T-Bone Burnett to record an album. Here's what he said to say about it:

“I’m making an album with T-Bone Burnett right now. After I leave here I’m goin’ to the studio and we’re cutting some more tracks with this band that’s just phenomenal.”

Nothing but goofy awesome there, but it keeps getting better. The band will be called the Royal We (yes, really), and after the album is released "sometime next year," the band will be going on tour. Yes, that's something I'll gladly drive to Atlanta and pay a whole lot of money to see.

And in other news, while here on vacation in New Orleans, and perhaps thanks to some kind of voodoo curse, I seem to have developed the ability to see the future, and here it is: In late January or so of 2013, Daniel Day-Lewis and Steven Spielberg will be taking home at least 10 Oscars.

Yes, the awards show is entirely predictable, even that far in advance, when you know this: DreamWorks Studios just announced that Day-Lewis will take on the role of President Abraham Lincoln in the biopic to be directed by Spielberg.

Not enough prestige for you? The script for this has been penned by playwright Tony Kushner, from the Lincoln biography by presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin. All kidding aside, this does indeed sound pretty amazing, and shooting is set to begin in fall of next year (nothing like planning ahead), with an eye on a fall 2012 release.

And after that, all I have today is a trio of clips, but just trust me and stick around until the end for something that may just truly blow your mind (so, I guess it might be a good idea to put some towels on the floor at least to sop up the mess.)

Before that, however, I'll start with the first trailer I know of for Duncan Jones' "Source Code." If you haven't seen Jones' debut film, "Moon," there really are very few rental ideas I could recommend higher. It's just first-rate sci-fi allegory of the kind we rarely see anymore, and Sam Rockwell, who is all alone in just about very frame of this, is astonishingly good (and living proof again that the Oscars are often just all wet.) For his followup, as you'll see from the trailer below, David Bowie's son (yes, really) has recruited Jake Gyllenhaal and Michelle Monagahan to star in some kind of time-clock thriller about a man who briefly inhabits the body of a soldier to stop a massive train bombing. Not exactly my favorite kind of thing, but I'm still confident Jones will come up with something worth watching when this comes out April 15. Enjoy the trailer.



OK, next up comes a clip from a flick I'm really looking forward to, and which I'd imagine should get a bit of a boost from the fact that it stars perhaps the world's two biggest movie stars in Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie. "The Tourist," directed by "The Lives of Others" helmer Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck (try saying that five times fast) with a script by he and Christoper McQuarrie, is set to come out Dec. 10, and should really be a lot of fun. Enjoy this clip, and like I said, definitely stick around for one more for which the word amazing really does no justice.


'The Tourist' Exclusive Clip

Trailer Park Movies | Myspace Video

Now, I'm well aware that Luc Besson's "The Fifth Element" is just one big mess of a movie, but that's one of the main reasons I adore it and always will. Well, thankfully, so apparently does a singer named Laura Workman McMurtrey, so much that she actually tried to re-create the "Diva Dance" song by Diva Plavalaguna for Leeloo's fight with the Mangalores (did I not say this movie is crazy?) And, even more thankfully, she has the rather remarkable pipes to pull this off. Any more words from me would be a waste of time, so, via badassdigest.com, enjoy this superfantastic clip, and have a great weekend. Peace out.