Flickgrrl

As I joked earlier in the week, some pharmaceutical company could make a lot of coin by inventing a cure for sequelitis. The summer whirlwind of movie sequels starts today with the opening of Spider-Man 3, prompting this movie geek to ask, can a sequel ever surpass -- or be as good -- as the original? For my money, The Godfather, Part II and Aliens gave me more than the first installment. And there are many who'd argue that Spidey 2 was better than the first. Sequels are popular -- more than ever, it seems, this summer, with Shrek the Third, Die Hard 4, Ocean's 13 -- for many reasons. Principally, they are cash cows that arrive with a high recognition factor and tend to make more money than the prior installment. In the best of all possible worlds, like episodic television, they permit us to see characters we like meet new challenges. My gripe with most of this summer's sequels is that they promise to be more special-effects-driven than character-driven. I hope I'm wrong. But with certain franchises -- Matrix and Star Wars come to mind, the longer the franchise ran, the lower my interest. What do you think of Spidey 3? And what are your nominations for sequels that were more satisfying than the original?

"We realize that the Ritz 16 is a special place," said Shari Redstone in a telephone interview on Thursday. The head of National Amusements, Inc. (pictured left), which acquired the Voorhees, N.J. jewel on April 27, is emphatic about this: "Give us a chance. Come to the theater and see what we do. Don't make assumptions. Don't speculate. WE WANT YOUR FEEDBACK."
Responding to the fatalism of many patrons that Redstone had taken the Tiffany's of moviehouses and planned to turn it into a Fortunoff's (see entry: "Hand-Wringing Ritzheads, below), Redstone said, "We listen to our customers. We understand that the 16's demographic is accustomed to an adult-oriented experience and that will be a key part of our philosophy moving forward. If that's what the community wants, that's what it will get -- but not at the exclusion of our other demographics."
Translation: Kids between 6 and 16 -- who formerly could buy a ticket only if accompanied by a parent or guardian -- will be able to see kid-oriented fare unaccompanied.
Meanwhile Redstone and her staff are exploring ways to dedicate a minimum of two to four screens for her company's evolving "Cine-Art" brand. Which would mean separate ticket takers and concierges. And which could mean "creating a VIP experience" that could include dinner and a movie -- with liquor service. "I pledge to Ritz clientele that they will not have to go to Philly or New York to see art films."
Redstone says the 16 carries National Amusements' "Showcase" rather than its "Cinema De Lux" brand, "Because Cinema De Lux means we serve liquor and have VIP seating," something that NA is exploring for the Voorhees site.
To those Ritzheads who were turned off by the "NASCAR-style," Pepsi branding at the concession stand, Redstone responds, "I don't like anything overly commercial. Maybe it's there and maybe it's too much."
Redstone says that she will come to Voorhees to personally meet with Ritzheads to hear their concerns. Until then, she says, "You don't have to lose what you already have in order to get more."
BTW, these films -- not big-studio pics -- are currently playing the 16:
Year of the Dog
Namesake
Hoax
Hot Fuzz
Black Book
In the Land of Women
Flying Scotsman

Are there other issues the Ritzheads are worried about? You can use the comments section here to voice them, or you can write directly to Ms. Redstone at: National Amusements, Inc./200 Elm Street/Dedham, MA 02025.

That's HM QEII on the left; on the right is Helen Mirren in her Oscar-winning role as The Queen.

Can you think of another public-relations turnaround as dramatic as that of Queen Elizabeth II? Remember 1992, her "Annus Horribilis," when three of her children separated from their spouses, a fire blazed through Windsor Castle and her subjects cried that the Queen should pay taxes like everyone else? How long ago that seemed this week, when on her American visit HM demonstrated that light is the wit who wears the crown. Did the film The Queen help rehabilitate her image, transform her from the Queen of Diamonds to Queen of Hearts? Sure, it helps to have a geezer-babe like Mirren play you --she could warm up an iceberg. But it also helps to have a dramatist as sympathetic as Peter Morgan imagine the richness and complexity of your inner life, framing you as a "No emotions please, we're British" product of The Greatest Generation. And it doesn't hurt to have a filmmaker as shrewd as Stephen Frears to position you as the Pack Leader of a country of Corgis. Can you think of another film portrait that made you sympathize with a figure about whom you were neutral or antipathetic?

Will the next installment in the Harry Potter series debut in your den? The technology is there -- via pay-per-view -- to enable you to premiere a movie at home the same day it opens in movie theaters. But would you pay $30 to $40 for the privilege? Here's a story about the latest set in the match between the forces that want to make first-run movies available on your home screen on the same day and date they open at the multiplex and those who believe the current arrangement should be maintained. Me? I'm a big-screen girl for many reasons. 1) One of film's unique powers is that it is larger than life. 2) Directors compose on an epic canvas that loses something when it get shrunk to home-screen size. 3)Moviegoing is a group experience. My kids are what the experts call "plaftorm-neutral": They don't care whether the movie is in a theater, on the home screen or downloaded onto a handheld. My hunch is that if the technology is there, day-and-date release of movies to theaters and pay-for-view is inevitable, but that doesn't mean I'll be a subscriber. For me, to watch movies on the small screen is like looking at a slide of a painting rather than the original itself. What are you willing to pay to see a new film at home? Or do you prefer the premiere at the 'plex?

Sir Duke was the knighthood bestowed upon Mr. Ellington by Mr. Stevie Wonder. I'm borrowing it on the occasion of John Wayne's hundredth birthday (that's Himself, left, in The Searchers, his defining role) on May 26.
For my entire moviegoing life, I've wrestled with The Duke (as Wayne was known) and what he represented. Onscreen, he personified America's man of the West and its man of war. Offscreen, he was a citified gentleman who never served in the military yet was an outspoken advocate of U.S. involvement in Vietnam and justified his position in the mawkish, hawkish The Green Berets.
One measure of Wayne's cultural influence is that Buddy Holly wrote "That'll Be the Day" in tribute to Wayne's character in The Searchers and Clint Eastwood, whose taciturn acting owes much to Wayne's, made Letters from Iwo Jima as a corrective to the gung-ho militarism of Wayne war movies such as Sands of Iwo Jima.
Now, I don't let an artist's ideology get in the way of appreciating his art, as you can read here in my reflections upon Wayne's centenary. I love Wayne movies. I also love a man who, whenever I turn on a Wayne film, walks out of the room.
However mixed my feelings about Wayne, the man, my sentiment toward his movies is unalloyed.
Stagecoach is a breathtaking look at the landscape of America and American masculinity. Seven Sinners, where Marlene Dietrich eyes naval officer Wayne like a hungry gal looking at a crown roast, is rollicking fun. Red River plays like Oedipus on the Chisholm Trail, contrasting Wayne's surly macho with Monty Clift's quieter power. That boulder of blarney, The Quiet Man, where Wayne sweeps Maureen O'Hara into his arms, is the Sexiest. Kiss. Ever. (BTW, Wayne kinda invented that Stop. And. Go. Talk.) The Searchers is so powerful a film about revenge and reconciliation that it makes me cry just thinking about it. The James Stewart/John Wayne relationship in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance works both as a contrast of two different strains of American manhood as it does a commentary on the disparity between fact and legend. And I defy you to watch The Shootist, Duke's last film about the gunfighter dying of a terminal disease (as the Duke was in real life) without shedding a tear.
So, Pilgrim, I ask you: John Wayne, Godzilla of American imperialism or god of the American Olympus?
And, what are your five favorite Wayne flicks? Defend your choices.

Update:

So far in this season of the three-quel, Spider-Man 3 and Shrek the Third -- and now Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End -- have broken box-office records. With a reported budget of $258 million, Spidey has taken in three times that in under three weeks. The third installment in the saga of the Grumpy Green Ogre (reported budget: $160 mil) has taken in $152 mil in its first week. While POTC 3 didn't surpass the three-day tally for Spidey 3, it outpaced Memorial Day weekend record holder X-Men 3 by taking in $142 mil over four days. Worldwide its box-office exceeds $400 mil. BTW, that's the POTC 3 trio, Geoffrey Rush, Keira Knightley and Johnny Depp, pictured above.
Like many of my colleagues, I prefer the first installments of these franchises to the three-quels. This trend will, I'm certain, be noted by the films' producers to show how out-of-touch critics are with the public. (You can read my review of POTC 3 here.) Hey, everyone likes a fast-food burger, but let's not pretend it's Kobe beef.
Not every sequel is a diminished version of the original (see "Sequelitis" below.) But many are. You can pretty much divide movie trilogies between the intentional and the opportunistic varieties. Intentional trilogies (the original Star Wars and Lord of the Rings come to mind) were conceived as episodes in an epic story and boast shapeliness, flow and coherence. Opportunistic trilogies (Back to the Future, Matrix and POTC) cash in on the success of the original.
Yes, I know, there are franchises such as Terminator, Alien, and Superman, Even The Godfather -- where the first two were sensational and the third stank.)
Mad Max i one opportunistic trilogy where each episode was well-structured and directed.
Any thoughts about trilogies? And am I the only one who thinks Orlando Bloom is a human Bermuda Triangle, sucking the life out of action films?