Despite being nearly universally-reviled as shrill, self-righteous, and kunty, lots of people, including myself, rely on Nikki Finke’s website for her obnoxious scoops and bitchy insight into industry trends, delivered with her trademark headline, “TOLDJA.” Well now Nikki is hoping she can turn that stockpile of resigned acceptance into a Facebook game in which people clamor to be immersed in a virtual world based on her website. It saddens me to report that it is not called “C*ntville.” Oh hey there, obvious joke, I was hoping you’d show up.

You can see the full press release after the jump, but here’s the condensed version:

True to Deadline.com’s mission to report on the inner workings of the entertainment business, this new Facebook game allows players to experience what it really takes to make it in Hollywood. The ‘Deadline Hollywood Game’ is designed for wannabes and showbiz moguls. It also becomes the first game of its kind to incorporate real-time breaking news that influences gameplay.

“True to our mission of reporting stuff, this is a computer game.”

The ‘Deadline Hollywood Game’ introduces the real Hollywood where power, relationships, and influence are as important as money (and sometimes more so). The game employs the same mixture of street smarts and dumb luck to make it in The Industry by allowing players to choose one of several career paths – actor, screenwriter, producer, director, agent, studio executive – leading to success or ruin.

Yep, they capitalized “The Industry.”  “Donald, don’t say ‘industry…’”

The ‘Deadline Hollywood Game’ will launch this summer with invitation-only play by select showbiz insiders. Facebook users can pre-register at http://www.deadline.com/deadline-hollywood-facebook-game/ to be among the first people to know when the game goes live and to be entered to win a Hollywood Mogul Swag Bag. Additionally, 40 runners-up will win a pair of movie tickets courtesy of Hollywood Movie Money.

Along the way, they’ll find that the ‘Deadline Hollywood Game’ utilizes the same pithy intel and snark about The Industry as the website, with quips like “If you want to make it in Hollywood, move to New York” and “If you want to get a screenplay made, write a novel.” [Deadline]

So… did anyone else just puke? Much like hanging with the characters in Entourage or listening to techno in the car, I can’t even imagine having to hang out with the kind of person who would want to play this game, let alone actually playing it.
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(Challenge: Try to figure out which of thse Hollywood fat cats were in the original photo and which are 'shopped)

Hollywood Shorthand has been around for a long time (“It’s Citizen Kane meets Surf Ninjas with shades of Kangaroo Jack!”).  It used to be the best way for an aspiring writer or producer to pitch his project, comparing a work people hadn’t seen before to a couple they had, in order to give them some idea of what it was about.  Everyone does it, it’s a great way to simplify.  As time went on, the shorthand seems to have become less about simplification, and more often a jumping off point, a guide for the whole film.  “It’s Cowboys… verses Aliens! 27 Dresses!  Bridesmaids’ dresses!  She has 27 of them!”

Other times, people — producers, flacks, executives; people who give soundbites to trade mags — will simply throw in a comparison that has nothing to do with the story they’re telling, and everything to do with whatever hip, popular thing they want people to associate with it. Frequently-used references of the last five years include The 300, Avatar, The Dark Knight, Sin City… if someone had been able to copyright the word “gritty” in reference to a movie pitch, he’d be a billionaire.  Just say “with the tone of” or “with the attitude of”, and you can compare a film to anything popular.  And if it comes from a press release… well.  There aren’t many things in this world as vague, silly, and nonsensical as bad PR writing.  Even if the shorthand is apt, it can come off preposterous and hilarious-sounding depending on the idea, and more often than not, the shorthand is nonsensical and absurd, and comes out sounding like a poorly-translated mad lib to anyone who hasn’t been doing a lot of cocaine.  For instance, if you spent too much time reading Hollywood trades, you might not realize Mitch Hurwitz was joking when he told a reporter that the story of the Arrested Development movie would be “basically Valkyrie meets Hotel for Dogs.”

Of course, we’re here to celebrate, not complain.  I love absurdist, coke-fueled Mad Libs, almost as much as I love cocaine.  So here they are, some the silliest, most absurd synopsis descriptions I could find.

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Tim Burton first remade the 1968 Charlton Heston classic Planet of the Apes back in 2001, to disastrous results. But this is Hollywood.  You can’t very well leave a 40-year-old idea to wither on the vine!  So now we’ve got a prequel (EVERYONE LOVES PREQUELS!) from 20th Century Fox.  The idea came from a script by Scott Frank (Minority Report, Out of Sight), first called Caesar, which was re-written by The Relic writers Amanda Silver and Rick Jaffa and retitled Rise of the Apes, which was later changed to Rise of Planet of the Apes.  Because making sense be damned, we’ve gotta ride this wave of Planet of the Apes nostalgia! The story deals with a handsome scientist’s efforts to cure Alzheimer’s, inadvertently creating a race of super-intelligent apes in the process. Now the trailer’s here, starring James Franco in a Rupert Wyatt film, though WETA, the visual effects company, actually gets top billing.

The trailer is after the jump.  And as you may have noticed in the banner image, I’ve made an important discovery vis a vis James Franco: the way he delivers eighty percent of his lines with his eyes closed makes him look like a doo wop singer.
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LatinoReview debuted the the new poster for Disney’s Secretariat, which stars John Malkovich and Diane Lane, though you’d never know it from the poster, which seems to focus more on the Sarah Jessica Parker angle.  (Had you heard?  She somewhat resembles a horse).  And of course the tagline, “THE IMPOSSIBLE TRUE STORY.”   Talk about selling the sizzle!  Come see our horse movie!  A story so wholly impossible and totally true that it’s literally incredible!

Now, I know I’m being a word nerd here, but is it really so much to ask that you sell a product without completely raping the meanings of words?  This is not an isolated problem.  Even as I was writing this post, I got this press screening invite in my inbox:

BRAN NUE DAE is a charming new Australian-based, road movie, coming of age, comedy musical that literally bursts onto the screen with unbridled energy and fun.

Dude. “Literally bursts onto the screen with unbridled energy and fun.”  I don’t know what that means.  It means nothing.  Next time, just write “Got ___” and take a lunch break before you hurt yourself.

Michael Bay and his production company (not the one that makes crappy horror remakes) is set to produce a 3D, FX-driven action film based on Hansel and Gretel.  If that idea sounds familiar, it’s because Will Ferrell and Adam McKay announced they’d be teaming up with the Død Snø guys for Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters about a year ago.  I wouldn’t worry, I’m sure this one will be much more generic.  From the press release [via ScreenJunkies]

“Hansel and Gretel in 3D” is an action packed visual FX filled version of the classic Grimm Brothers’ fairytale. In addition to the infamous witch in the gingerbread house, the film showcases the legendary creatures of German mythology. These Teutonic beings will be designed by Joseph C. Pepe, the lead character designer from Avatar. The film is live action. The movie is being produced by The Institute and Kalliope Films. The Institute was co-founded by Michael Bay and Scott Gardenhour.  The movie is scheduled for a spring 2011 shoot on location in Germany.

God I love press releases. “Hey, Marge, what’s another word for ‘German people’?  Ooh, ‘Teutonic beings’, that’s good.”  And if that wasn’t generic-sounding enough, check out The Insitute’s mission statement (also stunningly generic: it’s called ‘The Institute’):

Their unique model employs consumer engagement, marketing, production, financing, and distribution, resulting in marketing and entertainment products that correspond with consumer demand.

GRR, ACTION WORDS!  You see, it’s a unique business model. Because first, they attempt to get the attention of people who will buy stuff from them. Then, they spend money to produce stuff to sell. Then they ship those things to places where those people can buy them.  HOLY SH*T THIS IS A F*CKING GAME CHANGER!  MULTI-PLATFORM ANALOG AND E-COMMERCE INTERFACE BUSINESS SYNERJIZZING WILL NEVER BE THE SAME!  MAKE ME A POWER POINT PRESENTATION AT ONCE!

Conclusion: This movie is going to be awesome.