In Hollywood, everyone recognizes the lead actors that appear within their favorite movies, and many audiences also remain quite familiar with directors of those films as well. However, not all movie lovers realize that most of the driving force behind the images of the celluloid screen actually resides within the producers of these motion pictures. If it wasn’t for the efforts of producers, all of the award-winning movies of yesterday and today (and the lesser recognized films as well) would have never made it into theaters. As such, producing is a vital and integral aspect of filmmaking even though most producers remain invisible in terms of the audiences they hope to entertain.

Film producers generally oversee every aspect of a movie’s production from beginning to end. Officially, studios task producers with the financing of a movie, and producers not only secure movie-making funds from investors but often pitch in their own funds as well, especially before the cameras start rolling. This initial phase is called pre-production, and the producer usually makes his presence known throughout the casting process and works closely alongside the director and producer to put a film’s particular vision into motion. While some producers prefer to let the director handle most of the day-to-day business of orchestrating a film once the first “Action!” is yelled, many other producers will maintain a careful collaboration with the writers, directors, and editors all the way through the filming process and throughout the post-production phases. Producers can spend many long hours in the editing room and oversee the finest details including the scoring of a film.

One particularly successful producer in Hollywood today is Marc Shmuger. His most recent projects (and there are several of them) fall into several genres, but here are the most compelling examples: (1) Spacesuit: Fashioning Apollo, which will present an ultimately patriotic underdog story from the perspective of the seamstresses who fashioned space suits for Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to wear during the first moon walk; (2) A new Scarface reboot, which will be the third retelling of the outlaw story once portrayed as an alcohol prohibition tale (in the 1932 version) and then upgraded to the rise and fall of cocaine dealer Tony Montana (in the 1932 flick starring Al Pacino); and (3) A Wikileaks movie that will certainly entertain as well as inform viewers about the true story of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange.

With the above-described movies, Marc Shmuger demonstrates that he’s sure to have his hands in many projects for years to come, and we look forward to his future work. In addition to these future movies, Marc’s tenure as the former co-chairman of Universal Pictures included overseeing the production of Inglourious Basterds, which starred Brad Pitt and brought director Quentin Tarentino’s epic Jewish revenge theme into fruition with a marvelous alternate history on the fate of the Third Reich (and it just happens to be one of our very favorite movies of all time). If this is any indication of what is to come, I’d say that Marc Shmuger will certainly continue to enjoy a very long, fruitful, and inspiring career as a producer for many years to come.

My review of Cars 2 is now available for your reading pleasure.

Who Asked For Cars 2 Again? 5 Children’s Sequels That Should’ve Arrived Instead.

It’s been a while since we posted any stories about Amy Winehouse, mostly because after a certain point it felt less like celebrity mockery and more like poor dumb animal torture. But it’s worth noting that Amy’s latest attempt at a career comeback has gone down in flames. Her planned tour of twelve European cities was cancelled in its entirety after a disastrous opening in Belgrade, which actually managed to go downhill after Amy stumbled onstage and yelled, “Hello, Athens!” One local newspaper called the concert “the worst in the history of Belgrade.” (Just for perspective, Belgrade has been called by that name for well over a thousand years, so Amy was competing against a very long list of concerts.) Following the show, Amy’s management released a statement reading in part:

Despite feeling sure that she wanted to fulfill these commitments, she has agreed with management that she cannot perform to the best of her ability and will return home. … She would like to apologize to fans expecting to see her at the shows but feels that this is the right thing to do.”

Fans who think this cancellation means they’re missing something might want to check out the YouTube link above and compare it with this video of Amy performing the same song (“Back to Black”) just three years ago. It’s anyone’s guess what the future holds for Amy Winehouse, but right now it seems pretty clear that the talented version of Amy has left the building.

Yeah, this isn’t creepy at all. The Glico confectionary company isn’t exactly widely known outside of east Asia, but in that part of the world it’s a household name. This is due in part to their sponsorship of something called AKB48, which is some J-pop version of Menudo except with Japanese schoolgirls instead of teenage Latino boys. AKB48 includes a lot of Japanese schoolgirls—fifty to sixty of them, at any given time. Each year girls compete to join various combos, and then move on once they start looking too adult to fill the role. Business as usual on planet Japan, yes? But Eguchi Aimi, the latest girl to join AKB48, is a bit different. Supposedly she narrowly missed joining the group in the twelfth competition, and was accepted this year. But Glico has revealed that Aimi is in fact a virtual composite, created in a not-at-all Frankensteinian way from the physical features of various meatspace members of the group:

The new girl is a virtual character and composite image of – bear with us, many young Hongkongers know these names – Minami Takahashi (face shape), Yuko Oshima (hairstyle), Atsuko Maeda (eyes), Mayu Watanabe (eyebrows), Tomomi Itano (nose) and Mariko Shinoda (mouth).

The Telegraph has a video showing precisely how this horrific feat was accomplished (a video which is a skosh light on the technical details, I might add). Credit where credit is due, Aimi comes closer to avoiding the Uncanny Valley than almost any virtual creation I’ve seen. There’s also a link to Glico’s website, where you can mix and match features from various members of AKB48 to create your own virtual Japanese schoolgirl. And while you’re working on that project, maybe you should just have a seat over there.

Not so long ago Mel Gibson was worth nearly a billion dollars. Let’s hope he takes better care of that money than he has of his career and relationships, because thanks to the systematic beat-down Mel’s delivered to his public image over the last several years, his schedule of future projects is wide open—i.e., nonexistent. Interestingly, Mel’s relationships have followed a downward arc strikingly similar to his movie career. First, twenty-plus years with Robyn Moore Gibson, then a briefer, sketchier relationship with Oksana Grigorieva. Now Mel has hooked up with Stella Mouzi, a Greek-born Goth fetish model some thirty years his junior. The next logical step in this death-spiral is Kat Von D, but she won’t be available for months. Weeks, anyway.

At this point not much is known about Ms. Mouzi, except that she’s less than half Gibson’s age. Also, a fetish model. And that’s probably enough, because once you’ve said “fetish model,” you can’t go on to say “but aside from that…” and add anything that will make this sound like a good bet for a steady, long-term relationship. On the plus side, she looks more than capable of delivering some massive retaliation for any physical abuse Gibson might feel like dishing out. She might even deliver some creative, degrading punishments of her own. It’s possible Mel feels that’s exactly what he deserves, and I’m not going to tell you he’s wrong about that.

(Image courtesy of Starpulse.)

My review of Mr. Popper’s Penguins is now available for your reading pleasure. He’s not stupid, he just dupes it.

Somehow we all forgot to observe Cheer Up Keanu Day this year, but Sad Keanu Reeves isn’t going to let that bring him down—not any further down, anyway. No, Sad Keanu has decided that if life hands you lemons, you should go straight out and publish a book of lemon recipes. Hence Keanu’s new book Ode to Happiness, which begins: “I draw a hot sorrow bath. In my despair room.” That’s what my apartment is lacking—a despair room.

Keanu claims the book was inspired by listening to a radio program full of absurdly despairing, bathetic songs (“Sometimes When We Touch” had to be in there someplace), but we all know better. The man still contains deep, deep wellsprings of sadness that he can plumb for future projects. “I’m considering another idea I call Haikus of Hope,” he says. “Basically like, ‘I want to kill myself, and go on from there.”

Christina Hendricks set herself on fire this last Wednesday. And you can stop even pretending to be excited, because this really wasn’t anything major. Apparently she stood a little close to a candle at an aftershow party for the Tony Awards, which led to a minor blaze in her trench coat that she quickly put out. No harm done, except for the loss of a trench coat that should never have been approved by the Consumer Products Safety Commission in the first place.

But this non-event provides the perfect excuse for about a million “Christina Hendricks is red hot!!” stories that are going to flood the internet over the next day or so. To be honest, I don’t get it. Don’t misunderstand me: she’s a decent actress, she tends not to say or do anything too obnoxious or sleazy, and she’s reasonably attractive. But she really isn’t the sexiest thing since sliced bread. Actually, it wouldn’t hurt at all if Christina cut back a bit on the human souls or whatever it is that gingers snack on. Still, it’s interesting to learn that she’s one of the very few modern actors who could also qualify for a gig playing drums for Spın̈al Tap.

It’s been more than three months since Rebecca Black’s “Friday” appeared on YouTube, which means that it’s now totally passé. By August it will be revived on some nostalgia kick, and come fall PBR-swilling hipsters will revive it as a retro item, yammering about how they were into “Friday” back when it was still Thursday. But right now you can’t see it at all, because the video that racked up more YouTube hits than Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber has been removed from YouTube. This is one maneuver in a legal dispute between Rebecca Black’s lawyers and Ark Music, the sort-of-a-studio where Rebecca recorded the song. Apparently Ark was no more prepared for the success of “Friday” than Rebecca was, and when the song took off they neglected to go through the usual contractual formalities before they started marketing ringtones and other spinoffs.

This is yet another sordid example of why it’s called show business, not show art, and Rebecca is learning way too much about what it’s like to be publicly reviled and exploited at way too early an age. She’s just a 13-year-old kid, fer crissakes. What’s more, she seems like a reasonably nice, normal teenage girl. Showbiz is a more appropriate venue for creatures like Taylor Momsen. I bet Momsen actually gets off on this sort of legal mud-wrestling.