(Schadenfreude Sloth would like to open an account.  F’ck, even he thinks you retards take forever.)

Great news, everyone. That huge video chain who put all the independent video stores out of business, then charged double everyone else’s late fees while hiring clerks too apathetic and surly to work at Kinko’s, just announced that they’ll be shutting down 960 of their stores.

It’s no secret Blockbuster has been closing stores at a rapid clip, but the 960-figure [about 20% of its 4400 stores] is more than twice what was previously expected. Blockbuster could close as many as 685 stores this year and 275 next year.  Blockbuster, as has been chronicled ad nauseam, has been hemorrhaging money and customers because of competitive threats mostly from Netflix and Redbox.

Die, pigs, die!  Die, pigs, die!  Die, pigs, die!

The company has its own responses to those threats, of course. And, in fact, if it expands its Redbox-like offering from 500 kiosks now to 10,000 a year from now, as it says it will, Blockbuster’s presence could actually be larger by the end of 2010 than it is today, despite the store closings. [THR]

Die, pi– wait, what?  You mean they’re not going out of business?  Aw, crap.  Oh well, guess there’s always plan B.  (*throws gas can into back of truck, lights cigar*)

(“Movie of the year,” raves Schadenfreude Sloth)

The Hangover and Up spent a second weekend at the number one and two spots this weekend, while the aggressively mediocre Taking of Pelham 123 debuted at number three, and Eddie Murphy’s Imagine That opened at number six, earning just $5.7 million even though it opened on 3,000+ screens.  As Schadenfreude Sloth reminds me, that’s Eddie’s second bomb in a row after Meet Dave.

The Hangover and Up both held well, with the Hangover dropping only 26% in its second weekend and Up declining 31% in its third.  Compare that with Land of the Lost‘s 51% drop and you wonder if maybe studios will stop trying to market everything to kids.  Or in the case of Eddie Murphy, maybe stop trying to make the same  movie over and over again, including twice in the same year once with Eddie Murphy and once with Adam Sandler.  But don’t count on it.  They’ll probably just try to recoup their expenses with Imagine That 3D.  This time with a “more mainstream” plot. (top 10 after the jump)

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_{Fox makes Schadenfreude Sloth want to c-walk}

A full-length, DVD-quality workprint of 20th Century Fox’s Wolverine has reportedly leaked online (you can check the comments section from two posts ago if you want the link), though the film isn’t set to be released until May 1st.  ThePlaylist speculates that it could be the work of someone angry over the WB/Fox Watchmen fiasco, while I’m content to merely pleasure myself chuckle at their misfortune.

In other Fox news, there was a bad batch of Slumdog Millionaire DVDs sent out that were missing the special features promised on the box, such as deleted scenes and featurettes. Fox has set up a hotline to replace the faulty DVDs, but no word yet on how much this will end up costing them.  Man, it must be awesome working for Fox.  The way I picture their board meetings, one guy wearing a blindfold walks around the office and shouts “Marco!”  And all the other guys have to shout “Polo!”  And then the blindfolded guy will take an orange out of his orange sack and throw it in the direction of the shouts, and anyone who gets hit has to make more popcorn.

_{Schadenfreude Sloth is a big fan of the Street Fighter movie}

The big surprise of the weekend was that The Jonas Brothers concert movie failed to take number one, landing in number two behind Madea Goes to Jail, which took number one for the second week.  Elsewhere, Fox’s Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li, opened all the way down at number eight, with just $4.65 million.  At this rate, it may have trouble earning back its $60 million budget (how did cost this much? it looks like a student film).  Luckily, its 0% rating on RottenTomatoes is still safe.

The question remains: who the hell actually wanted a Street Fighter movie?  Even the people getting paid to be in it must’ve been thinking, “well, if you say so, I guess…”  The only thing good to come out of this is that Chris Klein’s performance is one for the time crapsule.  Check out the clips after the jump – he’s Nic Cage in Wicker Man bad.  In fact, this may just be worth seeing.
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See what I did there with the headline?  I put shit in it.

The most accurate assessment of The Spirit I’ve seen yet was from a Variety article about the premiere that dropped the line, “Producer Deborah Del Prete said director Frank Miller would rather draw than tell the actors what he wanted done on set.”  Today, this video’s been going around the blog-o-tubes.  It’s a “for your consideration” trailer for The Spirit, hoping you’ll consider it for the worst film of the year.  The video’s a nice little compilation of all the horrible reviews The Spirit got and a great watch if you like pictures and words.  Meanwhile, I photoshopped Schadenfreude Sloth into this picture of Frank Miller.  It’s been a hectic day, let me tell you.