UPDATE: It’s not an update per se, but I added the Fantastic Mr. Fox featurette video after the jump which shows Wes Anderson directing and explains the process.

A while back, I reported on Wes Anderson’s Fantastic Mr. Fox, and how he’d directed the movie via email from Paris.  Since Fox is stop-motion animated, and it’s not really the director’s job to build the puppets or miniature sets, it’s debatable how big a deal him not physically being there is.  But his main reason for not being there seems to be “because I didn’t want to”, and his animators don’t seem to like him much.  The LA Times did a feature on it over the weekend:

Anderson [made the] unorthodox decision to hole up in Paris for most of the shoot’s one-year duration while principal photography commenced at London’s Three Mills Studios. He wasn’t working on another project, and nothing Paris-centric demanded he be there; Anderson simply “didn’t want to be at Three Mills Studios for two years.”

The move did little to endear Anderson to his subordinates. “It’s not in the least bit normal,” director of photography Tristan Oliver observed last spring. “I’ve never worked on a picture where the director has been anywhere other than the studio floor!”

For his part, Anderson implies that his crew might be disgruntled because he asked them to do things differently, not because he wasn’t there:

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Christ, I should be working at the Enquirer with these headlines.  Anyway, we all remember when Katherine Heigl whined because Knocked Up was sexist, right?  Good.  Well Seth Rogen and Judd Apatow recently went on Howard Stern, who naturally asked them about her.  They responded by saying the obvious things, but it was still cool because Katherine Heigl is a bitch.

Rogen says he doesn’t see how Heigl’s new comedy, The Ugly Truth, makes women look even better. “That [movie] looks like it really puts women on a pedestal in a beautiful way,” he quipped.
Added Apatow, “I hear there’s a scene where she’s wearing … Underwear …with a vibrator in it, so I’d have to see if that was uplifting for women.”
Even more baffling, said Apatow, “We never had a ‘fight’” with Heigl while filming. “Seth always says, it doesn’t make any sense – she improvised half her s***,” Apatow said. [USWeekly]

And then Rogen was all, “Yeah dude, it’s like she doesn’t even have a BRAIN!” and I looked over and he was totally holding his nuts so it looked like a brain.  So hilarious, bro, you should’ve been there.

Spike Lee, who knows a thing or two about bashing movies for historical inaccuracy, is facing a backlash of his own from Italian partisans over Miracle at St. Anna.  It seems the film incorrectly implies that an antifascist Italian partisan gave information to the Nazis which led to the 1944 massacre of 560 Italians. The writer was apologetic:

“This is a fictional story,” [James] McBride said. “The real question for me was how to make ‘St. Anna’ a reveal, because that is the craft of fiction.  I am very sorry if I have offended the partisans. I have enormous respect for them. As a black American, we understand what it’s like for someone to tell your history, and they are not you.  But unfortunately, the history of World War II here in Italy is ours as well, and this was the best I could do,” McBride added.

Yeah so settle down, people who risked death to fight fascism.  As a black guy, James McBride knows your struggle.  But wait, I’m sure Spike will clarify things!

“I am not apologizing for anything. I think these questions are evidence that there is still a lot about your history during the war that you (Italians) have got to come to grips with.
“This film is no clear picture of what happened. It is our interpretation, and I stand behind it.” [Variety]

You know, sometimes I feel bad for bashing Spike Lee as much as I do when his movies are important to so many people.  And it’s true, he tries to tell the stories that need to be told when not a lot of people are telling them.  The problem is, he’s such an arrogant little douchebag that the only side of the story he ever sees is his own.  Complain about racism all you want, Spike, and every once in a while you’re even right. But be honest with yourself, under different circumstances you would’ve made a great nazi.

^{Weinstein and Rudin tied for first in the Les Grossman Lookalike Contest}

So despite the fact that studio head Harvey Weinstein (left) and producer Scott Rudin (right) are basically the same person, they’re in the middle of a big fight.  At issue is The Reader, a movie Billy Elliot director Steven Daldry did for The Weinstein Company.  The film was first delayed 8 weeks by Nicole Kidman’s pregnancy, then faced another, even sexier delay when they had to wait for one of the actors to turn 18 so she could shoot a sex scene.  Even though it started shooting four months behind schedule, Harvey still wanted it finished in time for awards season (deadline is in November), despite that the director, who officially had creative control, said that was basically impossible. Rudin, who backed the director, claims Weinstein explored a number of sleazy options for forcing him to finish earlier, including claiming recently deceased producers Sydney Pollack and Anthony Minghella “would have wanted” the movie finished in 2008 (I use that strategy with chicks all the time).  But this is all backstory.  You can get the full rundown here.

Today’s news is that Weinstein offered to give $1 million to charity if someone could produce the supposed email in which Rudin accused him of mistreating Anthony Minghella’s and Sydney Pollack’s families.  It seems a charity is in luck, because Nikki Finke just published it:

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Comedian Michael Ian Black has a book out, and to publicize it, he challenged Tucker Max (pictured) to a fight.  Max wrote the best selling I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell, the movie adaptation of which is currently in production in Louisiana.  Black doesn’t sound serious, but Tucker accepted the challenge anyway. I really hope they fight, because the advice my dad gave me on his deathbed was that saying you’re going to fight and then not actually fighting is what queers do.  Black’s challenge:

So Tucker Max, you drunk, misogynistic motherfucker – I am officially calling you OUT! I am going to fist fuck every hole in your boozy little body until you crawl away like the sniveling little bitch that you are. YOU’RE DEAD!

Max’s response:

I’m completely serious. I’d LOVE to fight you.  I’ll even promise to show up drunk as shit. I’ll drink an unreasonable amount of alcohol before we fight–20 beers, 30 beers, whatever it takes to me plastered. And if you don’t think I’m drunk enough, I’ll keep drinking. As long as I am conscious and able to stand on my feet, I’ll fight you.  And here’s the kicker: If you beat me, I’ll give you the next royalty check from my book.  It should be about 150k, give or take agent fees and other things. I am completely serious.

Black’s response to Tucker’s response:

So Tucker Max has officially accepted my challenge to a fight. Good. That was the easy part. The hard part? Deciding exactly how I am going to rearrange his face. Will I pluck out an eye and stuff it up his nostril? Will I make him choke down his own tongue until he throws it up and then sit on his head and force him to lap up his own puke like a bad little puppy? Or will I simply knock out his teeth and then use them as Chinese death stars which I will then throw into his black heart? I just do not know. But I do know this: Tucker Max is going down. How do I know this? Because Tucker may have the athleticism, the muscles, the fighting skills, the experience, the guts, and the heart. But I have something he will NEVER have – I’m not sure what that is, but if I think about it long enough I will probably come up with something. I might be better at Scrabble, for example. (I also have one of the original pets.com sock puppets, which I’m sure he doesn’t have, and will never have, but I don’t think that will help me in the fight.)

This isn’t going to happen.  Which sucks, because when I write a book, I will definitely fight Tucker Max.  Or Michael Ian Black.  Or a homeless person. Or a scarecrow stuffed with chickens. I’m completely serious.  Really, I just like to punch things.