Oh my, oh Miley. Blogs around the internet are buzzing over these photos of 15-year-old Hannah Montana star Miley Cyrus, taken by famed photographer Annie Leibovitz for Vanity Fair. Movie City News' David Poland, writing about the pics on his Hot Blog, said, "People do know that 15-year-old breasts, while they really have no business being shown in public, do exist, whether covered in a sheet or a t-shirt, right?" (Poland has the full picture up on his website, I'm not going to put it up here. You can see it there or on Vanity Fair.)
Well, yes, we know that 15-year-old girls have 15-year-old breasts, but that does that make it appropriate for a magazine to publish photos of a half-naked teenager? Whether because the folks over at Disney, where Cyrus's show Hannah Montana is one of its biggest properties, pitched a bitch about the photos, or because she's genuinely mortified by the photos in retrospect, Cyrus issued a statement to fans that said, in part, "I took part in a photo shoot that was supposed to be 'artistic' and now, seeing the photographs and reading the story, I feel so embarrassed."
The Montana madness continues! Now that the writer's strike is resolved, Variety reports that Disney is the latest studio to revamp their schedule and stake out some prime release dates.
Among their 2009 and 2010 releases will be The Hannah Montana Movie, to be released on May 1st, 2009 and pitted against 20th Century Fox's X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
Wolverine versus Hannah Montana. I'm laughing just thinking about it. I want someone to make a comic book cover of this right now. (Seriously. I will frame it.) My money is on Wolverine to actually win that battle, but who knows what incredible powers Montana may possess.
All sarcasm aside, I imagine this will actually be a very good move by Disney. Moms and daughters can go watch Hannah Montana, while their fathers and brothers go see Wolverine. The whole family wins!
No, Miley Cyrus (aka Hannah Montana) did not get caught sending nude photos to a boy (one would think the girls from Disney would know better by now). But Cyrus, who's currently the biggest thing to hit the tween market since Cabbage Patch Kids, is right smack in the middle of a new controversy -- one that's apparently upset the folks over at ConsumerReports.org. During a scene in the recently-released 3-D movie Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concer Tour, apparently Miley and her father, Billy Ray Cyrus, are shown riding in the back seat of a Range Rover on their way to a concert rehearsal. Ah, but look a little closer and you'll notice ... neither of them are wearing a seat belt!!!
As CR notes, "Miley, her father, and Disney had a perfect opportunity to help influence teens and counteract -- rather than encourage -- this trend." Statistics show that in 55 percent of passenger vehicle fatalities in 2006, the occupants were not wearing seat belts. And in the 13-to-15-year-old age group, that number rises to 65 percent. I'll admit to not wearing my seat belt in the back seat on occasion, and even Miley herself has stressed through her music that "Nobody's Perfect!" -- but I agree the teenager should've set a good example by strapping in while she was on the road. What do you think? Is this a big deal? And seeing as this girl is watched by thousands upon thousands of young kids, should she be a little more careful in the future?
Hannah who? OK, not only did the Hannah Montana movie surprise me and most of the participants in last week's competition, but it broke the record for a film opening on Super Bowl weekend (previously held by the 2006 remake of When a Stranger Calls) as well as the record for the smallest number of theaters for a film debuting at number one. This was aided in part by the fact that most venues were charging $15 per ticket, but the teen concert flick still raked in more than twice as much as The Eye which took second. 27 Dresses held third place for the second week running. Here's the rundown:
There's not much in the way of genre diversity this week as all three new flicks are comedies, though admittedly three different kinds of comedy. Fool's Gold What's It All About: A surf bum turned treasure hunter (Matthew McConaughey) attempts to reconcile with his his estranged wife (Kate Hudson) as the two embark upon a search for a fabulous treasure that was lost at sea in 1715. Why It Might Do Well: These two strong leads are joined by Donald Sutherland and Alexis Dziena (who had a particularly memorable show stopping scene in Broken Flowers) making for a cast worth seeing. McConaughey and Hudson starred together in How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, which made $177 million worldwide, so the folks who saw that one may come back for more. Why It Might Not Do Well: The trailer makes this seem like a retread of Romancing the Stone and rottentomatoes.com is giving this a mere 7%. Number of Theaters: 2,700 Prediction: $20 million Vince Vaughn's Wild West Comedy Show: 30 Days & 30 Nights - From Hollywood to the Heartland What's It All About: Concert film shot during a thirty day tour in which Vince Vaughn emceed a group of "renegade" comics, also including footage shot behind the scenes. Why It Might Do Well: Well, Hannah Montana proved a concert film with a small release can kick some butt, so why not this one? That was a joke, people. Why It Might Not Do Well: I still haven't forgiven Vaughn for the dreadful The Break-Up, and I may not be the only one holding a grudge. Number of Theaters: 800 Prediction: $6 million
Whoo, I bet you couldn't have seen this coming: after bringing in a whopping $29 million on just 683 screens and selling out shows left and right, the Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour has added another week to its one-week limited engagement. This will be great news to all the Hannah fans out there who weren't able to score a ticket the first time around, or who just want to enjoy another week of Hannah-mania. Variety's Pam McClintock noted that the concert's take is the highest Super Bowl weekend gross of all-time, outscoring even mega-hit Titanic*.
My oldest daughter contributed to Titanic's box office by seeing the film something like 20 times with her friends when it was in theaters, and now I expect her 10-year-old sister is going to want to see the Hannah Montana concert at least that many times. The first thing she said on the way out of the theater Friday night was, "Can we go again?" Superbowl weekend is typically heavy on the estrogen, but Disney really scored big with the tween set by making the wildly popular Best of Both Worlds concert available in theaters.
*Typo corrected, thanks to reader Ler for pointing it out. - ed.
Today, as millions of (mostly) men are watching the Super Bowl, possibly witnessing the Patriots make history (sorry Erik), millions of (mostly) girls are watching Miley Cyrus (aka "Hannah Montana") make history of her own. As you read this, across the country the 3D concert film Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour is selling out its show times for the day. Actually, it's more likely that at many theaters show times have long been sold out.
On Friday, when the Disney release opened, I took a look at the status of the weekend show times in the tri-state area on Moviefone, Movietickets.com and Fandango. Most times were already unavailable. But I had no way of knowing how recently those times had sold out, because tickets went on sale back on December 1, and many people (our own Kim Voynar and her daughter included) bought theirs way in advance. As Kim mentioned last week, Fandango announced that more than 1,000 show times had already been sold out and that theaters were trying to squeeze in more screenings. The online ticketing company also announced that since December 1, the film has been one of its top selling titles and that this past week the film accounted for 91% of all the company's online ticket sales (compared to 1% each for Rambo, 27 Dresses and Cloverfield).
True confession: I had more fun at the Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus Concert Tour than I've had in a long time at the movie theater. I think it's safe to say that we're seeing the beginning of a new wave in movie theaters; bringing concerts to fans in 3-D in the comfort of a movie theater, for a fraction of the ticket prices of a live concert, is going to be the Next Big Thing -- so long as it's done as well as Disney has pulled off the Hannah Montana concert.
Here's the backstory, in case you haven't heard. Hannah Montana is the Disney Channel's huge hit show among the tween set. It's more than a show, it's a phenomena, spawning everything from Hannah Montana dolls to Hannah wigs and dress-up clothes to a sing-and-dance-along video game that teaches girls (and boys, let's not be gender-specific here) all Hannah's cool moves. Part of the enormous appeal of Hannah Montana is the show's central conceit: Hannah Montana, a famous pop star, is the secret superstar identity of Miley Stewart, an ordinary, dorky girl struggling to get through her freshman year of high school.
If you've got a tween girl in your life, chances are pretty good you know the name Hannah Montana. The popular Disney series stars Miley Cyrus (daughter of former mullet king/country star Billy Ray Cyrus, who stars in the show as Miley's father) as an ordinary girl who lives a secret double life as a wildly popular pop star.
The Best of Both Worlds concert tour last year (which features young Cyrus both as herself and in her Hannah Montana persona) sold out across the country within minutes, largely due to ticket scalpers snatching up tickets and then reselling them for exorbitant markups.
Hey, it's good enough for Spinal Tap, Hannah Montana and The Monkees. Now Dewey Cox, of Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story, is the latest fictional music artist to go on a real-life tour. Yes, according to Variety, John C. Reilly is suiting up to perform in character for the "Cox Across America Tour." Joined by his band, the Hard Walkers, Reilly/Cox is making appearances in seven cities: Cleveland; Chicago; Austin; Nashville; San Francisco; Los Angeles and New York City. The first gig is this Wednesday at Cleveland's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and all shows include a screening of the movie, a music biopic spoof from the smartest man in Hollywood, Judd Apatow, and director Jake Kasdan (The TV Set).
Unfortunately, at the time of this writing, only the Chicago date is not sold out. My guess is that by the time of posting, even that show will be unavailable, but feel free to check Sony's RSVP page to find out. Otherwise, you can at least hear Cox's music on the Walk Hard soundtrack, which hits stores today.
I certainly wouldn't mind seeing Reilly as Cox. I also wish I could have seen Reilly tour the nation as Lefty, his character from A Prairie Home Companion -- accompanied by Woody Harrelson as Dusty, of course. If I could see any fictional artist in concert, though, I'd pick The Venus in Furs, or maybe Jesse and the Rippers. How about you? What fictional band or artist would you most like to see go on tour?
Anyway, stay tuned to Cinematical because we're working on something special to coincide with the "Cox Across America Tour."
If you're one of the millions of kids who weren't able to snag (i.e. afford) tickets to see Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus in concert, you now have an opportunity to see the next best thing. For one week in early February, a film of one of the concerts will be shown at movie theaters nationwide. And to make it seem even more like you're attending the real thing, the film is in 3D! Compiled from three concerts in two cities from the "Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds" tour, the Disney-produced film is directed by Bruce Hendricks (Ultimate X: The Movie) and was shot using 3D digital cameras rather than shot with regular digital cameras and rendered in the format later (meaning sorry, no 2D versions of this one), as has been the case with most digital 3D movies so far. By the way: the cinematographer in charge of those cameras is Transformers DP Mitchell Amundsen.
Not only is this a big deal for Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus fans, but also it's a huge deal for theater owners and their continued attempts to offer substantial alternative entertainment at their cinemas. I'm sure you all know this isn't the first concert to be shown in theaters. There have been Rolling Stones concerts, drumline concerts, Metropolitan Opera performances, Dane Cook stand-up concerts, and many other events. Some of them have even been broadcast live to theaters via satellite. Many of them, such as today's (Dec. 2) live presentation of the St. Olaf Christmas Festival, are one-day-only events.
I don't believe the hype that 3-D will dominate the movie world in the near future, but it does seem like a lot of movies are using the technology these days. The Hollywood Reporter has announced that Disney will release the animated feature Bolt, (once called American Dog) in Digital 3-D next year. Bolt features the voices of John Travolta, Woody Harrelson, and Susie Essman (who had better curb her Curb Your Enthusiasm language!). It tells "the story of a TV star dog named Bolt (Travolta) who is accidentally shipped from his Hollywood soundstage to New York, where he begins a cross-country journey through the real world." Chris Williams directs the film.
Disney has been one of the biggest supporters of 3-D. In recent years, Chicken Little, Meet the Robinsons, andthe sweet, sweet Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas were all released in the format. Speaking of Nightmare, as Monika told you earlier this month, Tim Burton has signed to produce and direct 3-D versions of Alice in Wonderland and his own terrific short film, Frankenweenie for Disney. On the opposite end of the cool spectrum, Disney's next 3-D release is the Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour, which will play in theaters Feb. 1-7. Start scalping those tickets now!
You may think High School Musical 2 is unmitigated dreck, but enough kids (or their adults on their behalf) bought the film's CD over the weekend to push the soundtrack to the top of the pop charts, sayeth AOL News. The made-for-cable film's premiere last Friday scored 17.24 million viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research, making it the highest-watched basic cable telecast ever.
Meanwhile, as Disney, understandably, seeks to continue riding the remarkable wave of success it's found with the hit movie series, MSNBC reports trouble may be brewing in the talks for High School Musical 3 (working title, according to IMDb: High School Musical 3: Gradu-Dancin' -- groan). The third installment of the series -- aimed at the big screen, not cable -- may have hit a speed bump, as reports surfaced Wednesday that the series' stars Zac Efron and Vanessa Anne Hudgens are holding out for more money. Efron, who has already moved on to bigger (and presumably higher-paying) big-screen roles with Hairspray and the upcoming Footloose, is sizzling-hot property these days, and his on-screen charisma is a huge draw for the tween set at which the film is targeted, so it wouldn't really be surprising if the kid held out for more cash.
Oh my, oh Miley. Blogs around the internet are buzzing over these photos of 15-year-old Hannah Montana star Miley Cyrus, taken by famed photographer Annie Leibovitz for Vanity Fair. Movie City News' David Poland, writing about the pics on his Hot Blog, said, "People do know that 15-year-old breasts, while they really have no business being shown in public, do exist, whether covered in a sheet or a t-shirt, right?" (Poland has the full picture up on his website, I'm not going to put it up here. You can see it there or on Vanity Fair.)
The Montana madness continues! Now that the writer's strike is resolved, 
No, 
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Whoo, I bet you couldn't have seen this coming: after bringing in a whopping $29 million on just 683 screens and selling out shows left and right, the 
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Hey, it's good enough for Spinal Tap, Hannah Montana and The Monkees. Now Dewey Cox, of 
I don't believe the 
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