Ellen Page is headed to "Hell"

The big news this morning, of course, is that the writers' strike finally appears to be at an end.

Showrunners are back at work today, and writers are expected back Wednesday, but I have to ask: what exactly did they win? WGA west President Patric Verrone said the new deal is "... not all that we hoped for, and it is not all we deserve." Judging from what I see in TV commercials, however, I fear it will be even worse than that.

Why so pessimistic? I was fairly happy that this was all over until, on Sunday night, I saw a commercial for something on NBC with the word "Truth" in it (the full name escapes me, and I really just can't justify the effort to find out what it is). On this rather reprehensible program, a man seemed to be answering questions, while hooked up to a lie detector, with his marriage and, I presume, most of his life in the balance.

Does anyone see the entertainment value in this? And if so, could you please explain it to me? Here's hoping that the labor peace will lead to some actually scripted TV this fall, but I fear the breach will be too much to mend. I'm sure there's blame to go around, but just to pile on NBC a bit more, the network has already announced it is ending the pilot process used to woo advertisers, which can only be a bad sign.

But enough of that. Even if I fear it will be a phyrric victory at best, the writers are indeed headed back to work, and we should at least celebrate that. And, since nothing makes Mondays go down better than good news about beautiful women, that's all I'll have from here on out (at least until the very end.)

No "Heroes" until Fall

One show that will definitely return, but not until Fall, is NBC's "Heroes," which is seriously in need of a good season after the near-disaster that was Volume 2.

Hayden Panettiere, while at the Berlin Film Festival, spilled the beans to an AICN scribe that filming on season three is set to start in April, which would logically mean we wouldn't get anything new until the Fall.

Whenever it comes, I'll be ready for more. Season two was often a maddening one to me (what in the world was the point of adding the wonder twins Maya and Alejandro, for starters?), but the last few episodes really picked up steam and set up well for the next edition, so definitely bring it on.

Ellen Page is headed to "Hell"

And finally we get to the still-fairly-young lady of the moment. Lest anyone get suspicious that I write about Ms. Page so often simply because it leads to more traffic on this site (which it certainly does), you'll have to trust me that that's not it.

I've seen "Juno" twice now, and it's simply a charming little movie, and mostly thanks to Page's work in the lead role. It's not the best movie of 2007, an honor that I'd split between "No Country for Old Men" and "Ratatouille," but I would call it just about the most fun flick of the year, and that's good enough for me.

And now Ellen Page is about to spread some of her good karma to someone who sorely needs it: Sam Raimi. No one (except for maybe M. Night Shymalan) is more in need of a satisfying flick than Raimi after the dour disaster that was "Spider-Man 3," and his next one, "Drag Me to Hell," is rapidly shaping up to be just the ticket.

All I know so far is that Ellen Page has just signed on to star in the horror flick and that it's described simply as "a morality tale about the unwitting recipient of a supernatural curse."

Raimi and his brother Ted, the team behind "Spidey 3," wrote the script for this one too, so here's hoping they indeed have a lot more fun when this begins shooting in March.

"Veronica Mars" gets Disney treatment

Speaking of "Heroes," Season 2 semi-regular Kristen Bell has just signed on for a Disney romantic comedy, not at all my cup of tea but noteworthy nonetheless.

In "When in Rome," also set to begin filming in March," Bell will play a successful real estate agent in New York City who can't find a lasting relationship (already more than bit hard to believe.) When her younger sister impulsively marries in Rome, she flies out for the wedding and, after picking up coins from a reputed "fountain of love," finds an overabundance of suitors waiting for her back home.

Like I said, sounds like a whole lot of meh to me, but don't blame the messenger.

"Ratatouille" cleans up at Annies

And speaking of "Ratatouille," Brad Bird's Pixar flick won a leading 11 Annies (by my best estimate) at Friday's ceremony, so a hearty huzzah to that.

Along with best picture, best writing and best directing, it also scored the voice work prize for Ian Holm (though I would have given the honor to either fellow "Ratatouille" nominee Janeane Garofalo or the somehow-snubbed completely Peter O'Toole.) And while we're at it, congrats too to "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" vet Seth Green, a winner for best director of a TV show for the sublime "Robot Chicken."

And why not wrap this up with a look at Pixar's next summer offering, "Wall-E"? I still have doubts that this largely dialogue-free flick will work, but just a look at Wall-E's eyes is enough to give me hope. Enjoy the trailer, and have an entirely bearable Monday. Peace out.

Is the writers' strike about to end?

There couldn't be any possible bigger news this week, so in addition to my confession that I still love Tom Petty to death even if he looks like he's 95 years old, let's get right to it.

With the Oscars looming very soon (Sunday, Feb. 24, to be precise), it seems that reps from the Writers Guild of America and the major studios made a big breakthrough Friday in one of the major areas of contention, compensation for streaming Web video. Although people on both sides were quick to caution that there's still a lot of work to do (including ratification of any deal by the east and west branches of the WGA), this can only be hailed as major progress.

And it comes none too soon. What happens when there's no TV for good people to be working on? Well, they end up getting lost with Will Ferrell. Poor Anna Friel, the uber-charming star of the best new show on network TV, ABC's "Pushing Daisies," has filled the void in her acting life by signing to star as Will Ferrell's love interest in the big screen version of the Krofft's "Land of the Lost." It's entirely possible she would have made this questionable move even if there was no strike, but that's where I choose to place the blame for this. And bring back "Pushing Daisies" by summer, please!

I don't have too much to add to that this morning, so I'll just close with this rather cryptic bit of rhyming from Vic Chesnutt's "Steve Willoughby," which I just happened to be listening to this morning: "Someday I'll be a paragon, like Louis Farrakhan, but today I'm simply a mess." I have no idea what that means, but it just made me smile. Peace out.

Oscar-winner Norbit? I couldn't make this up

Now I didn't bother to see "Norbit," a k a Eddie Murphy's ultra-classy career move directly after getting his first acting Oscar nomination, but believe it or not - if you look deep enough - you'll indeed find it buried in Tuesday's Oscar nominations.

Facing off with the folks behind the maquillage in "La Vie en Rose" and "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" in the Achievement in Makeup category, Rick Baker and Kazuhiro Tsuji have a solid chance of walking away with one of those little statues primarily for, well, putting Eddie Murphy in a fat suit. Sheesh.

In much better news about a much more worthy nominee, cinematographer Roger Deakins has pulled off an impressive double dip that we haven't seen since 1971.

The cinematographer's nominations for "No Country for Old Men" and "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" are the first double in the category since Robert Surtees was nominated for "The Last Picture Show" and "Summer of '42."

Nominated five times previous to this year, Deakins is best known as the primary cinematographer for the Coens, having filmed nine of their movies thus far (and how in the world did he not win an Oscar for the wild look of "O Brother Where Art Thou?"), but among his other various credits you'll also find great flicks like John Sayles' "Passion Fish," Frank Darabont's "Shawshank Redemption" and Martin Scorsese's "Kundun."

This year, his competition comes from (besides himself): Seamus McGarvey for "Atonement," Janusz Kaminski for "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" and Robert Elswit for "There Will Be Blood."

Of those, I haven't seen "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" or "The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford," and "There Will Be Blood" certainly had a singular look to it, but no movie left a stronger or longer-lasting visual impression on me in 2007 than "No Country for Old Men," so here's hoping this artist finally gets the recognition he clearly deserves.

New hope for an end to the strike?

"Ironic" is a term I've tried to stop using too often because I'm fairly certain I use it incorrectly, but it would certainly seem to fit the latest development in the WGA strike.

As the scribes have stood strong in the picket line, the leeches who produce reality TV have jumped into the void with zeal, filling my TV set with simply unwatchable crap. Now, in what can only be called fair play in my book, it seems that in informal talks Tuesday that will hopefully lead to solid negotiations, the writers have dropped a demand to unionize the folks who create reality fare (the fine folks in the animated division apparently got cut loose too, unfortunately.)

And in another hopefully promising development, both sides have agreed to a "news blackout" until some deal can be reached. Now, people, can't we all just get along?

Why is this advertised at my multiplex?

For at least three months now there has been a poster at one of my local multiplexes, the AmStar 16 (or The Grand, or whatever it's called now), for "The Hunting Party," a flick which I've wanted to see for a long time.

So, imagine my surprise when, surveying this week's DVD releases, I found the Richard Shepard flick starring Terrence Howard, Richard Gere and Jesse Eisenberg (of "The Squid and the Whale.") In the serio-comedy, the trio embarks on an unauthorized mission to find the No. 1 war criminal in Bosnia and gets mistaken for a CIA hit squad.

Now, I'm very happy I'll finally get to see this flick, which has just been moved to the top of my (fully stocked, thanks to the readers of this site) Netflix queue, but is it too much to ask that the poster promising its mythic big-screen appearance in Macon be taken down? Peace out.

OK, now it's personal: The strike

I've tried to mostly not comment on the WGA strike in this space, not because I don't support their walkout but because I didn't want to do anything to cheapen it by sounding off on something I'm not quite sure I fully understand. When it hits my favorite TV shows, however, it does bear remarking on.

So, what is this strike mess all about? Well, as best as I can tell, at the heart of the walkout, which started Monday, is the murky issue of digital distribution.

Thanks go out to Variety for explaining this in a way even I could grasp. The revenues in the digital realm right now are fairly minuscule, with major studios each taking in about $20 million annually from the different way movies can be downloaded. On the TV side, insiders estimate that the major networks are bringing in well under $100 million each vs. $22 billion spent on network TV advertising in the U.S. in 2006, according to TNS Media Intelligence.

OK, fair enough, but the writers (and some of the actors who work with them) are on the picket lines, rather wisely, about what this still fairly new medium will mean down the road rather than right now. They want any three-year deal they sign to include compensation for growth in this arena, and frankly I can't blame them one bit.

But that's not really what this is all about here. I'm really only concerned with entertainment, and more specifically, the lack of it that will quickly be coming if this goes on for any length of time. It's still been easy to tune out as reports have trickled in about shows closing down, but now they've taken down my No. 1: "The Office" is shutting down.

According to the always extremely reliable James Hibberd at TV Week, "Office" showrunner Greg Daniels has joined the picket line at his production company.

“We’re trying to shut down ‘The Office,’” Mr. Daniels said. “We have the star of our show and the entire writing staff behind us.”

On "The Office," that means even more than it might for other shows, because many in the cast, including B.J.Novak (Ryan Howard, but not the Phillies slugger), Mindy Kaling (Kelly Kapoor) and Paul Lieberstein (Toby Flenderson), also write for the show. "Office" boss Steve Carell, a WGA member, has also apparently not been punching in either.

What else does this mean, in the bigger picture? Well, reality TV, among its many ignominious accomplishments, has managed to render writers obsolete, so production of that can go on ad infinitum. CBS has announced, not coincidentally in the least, this week that "Big Brother" No. whatever will go into production early and premiere as soon as February. Good grief.

Given the complexities of this, I really can't see it ending quickly, but one can always hope. After all, what could possibly be more important than offering me one half-hour a week of sublime entertainment (sarcasm yes, but I'm more than a little serious too.)

On the lighter side, Joss Whedon reports that any of you "Buffy" and "Angel" fans who happen to live in L.A. can do some starwatching, as Alyson Hannigan currently of "How I Met Your Mother" and David Boreanaz of "Bones" have joined the picket line outside of Fox. You see, there really is a silver lining in everything, I guess.

Year of the rat

I never really believed that Pixar would suffer from having a rat as the star of its last summer offering, even if little kids (including, of course, me) were just frightened out of our wits by the first 10 minutes or so. After that stretch, as we now all well know, "Ratatouille" turns into an utterly charming flick and easily one of my favorites for the year, and it arrives this week on DVD with an extra bonus in tow.

I had heard rumblings about Pixar assembling all the shorts that proceed its movies onto one DVD, but didn't realize it was gonna happen so soon. Available now, separately from the "Ratatouille" DVD, is "Pixar Short Films Collection - Volume 1." It assembles the 13 Pixar shorts released so far, including at least one spun off from "Cars," "Mater and the Ghostlight," that I haven't seen yet (but, since "Cars" is easily Pixar's worst flick, I'm not sure how excited I can get about a short inspired by it centered on Larry the Cable Guy.)

As for the "Ratatouille" DVD, I can't get my hands on it fast enough.

Into the "Mist": A Web-only trailer

The more I see of Frank Darabont's upcoming "The Mist," the more I start to worry that it just might suck. I mean, I'm not sure you can kill the great Andre Braugher any faster than they did in that simply unnecessary "Poseidon" remake, but it does indeed seem from this latest trailer that he might be fulfilling the black guy's traditional role in horror films by dying very early. I hope I'm wrong about that, and about the movie itself. Enjoy the trailer, and have an entirely bearable Wednesday.