(Get a job.)

The only major release this week is This is It, the Michael Jackson movie.  I have no interest in seeing it (not because of a knee-jerk about him being a pedophile or anything like that, I’m just really, really sick of hearing about him) and I can’t imagine why anyone would, but it already made $2.2 million.  And it’ll probably make a lot more because, hey, no competition.  The only good thing I can imagine about it is seeing the dedication “For Blanket.”

The big limited releases are Gentleman Broncos, which is looking like a stinker, and Boondock Saints II, which, as I’ve already noted, is like watching a gorilla finger paint.  Black Dynamite is still playing in New York, L.A., Atlanta, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Seattle.  Now if you’ll excuse me, it’s Friday and I’m going to go get drunk.  Oh, and here’s a picture a dog dressed like Jackie O.  Happy Halloween.

[via NYMag]

This is It premiered last night and everyone loved it and blah blah blah.  Michael Jackson was the King of Pop, he was one of kind, an extraordinary entertainer — really, we get it.  That doesn’t make this any less of a tacky media circus.  And please, for the love of God, can we stop writing articles that read like they should have Chariots of Fire playing in the background? From the LA Times:

It was just plain weird that Michael Jackson wasn’t at last night’s world premiere of his concert film “This Is It” at L.A. Live’s Nokia Theatre.

Really, L.A. Times?  It was weird that Michael Jackson wasn’t at the premiere of a movie that wouldn’t have been released if he was alive?  Now I’m no professional journalist, but it seems to me like it’d be bad thing for your first sentence to be complete bullsh-t.

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The people behind the Michael Jackson movie This is It have always maintained that the movie would only have an oh-so-classy limited run of two weeks.  And if you believed that, punch yourself in the face for being a dipsh-t.  Turns out, before he died they re-recorded videos for “Thriller”, “Man in the Mirror”, and “Earth Song”, and of course you’ll be able to see those.  IN 3-D!  And possibly… 4-D!  That’s a lot of D!

The intention was to use the new videos as transitions into the performed versions of the songs, transitions that are a long way from the original. Choreographer/associate producer Travis Payne promises that the new “Thriller” is nothing like the boy on the date with the girl, while at the same time, “We didn’t touch what we considered the sacred inside of it.”

And while the new version of “Thriller” and the other songs will be screened with This Is It in plain old 3D next week, that’s not how they were intended to be seen, and that might not be the last we see of them either.

Ortega also revealed that there may be a 3D re-release of Michael Jackson’s This Is it later on, including the revamped music videos that were originally to be broadcast during the concerts in 3D. But that’s not nearly as elaborate as how the videos were originally intended to be shown. The plan was to have the audience members don 3D glasses in the middle of the concert, but it was going to be much more than just 3D screens in the corner. As Payne explained it to me, “We had 3D and also frontal elements and overhead elements that actually created a 4D environment that the audience was sitting in.” [CinemaBlend]

That’s right, they were sitting IN A TIME MACHINE!  We could watch the extinction of the dinosaurs, the Big Bang, or the Kennedy assassination, BUT F-CK IT, LET’S GO TO A MICHAEL JACKSON CONCERT.  Looks like I won’t be needing this anymore!  (*lights Intro to Physics book on fire*)

The producers of This is It, the movie hastily slapped together in order to profit off Michael Jackson’s death, have decided to officially dedicate their corpse rape to Michael’s children.  Aw, how sweet.  It’s just like when my stepdad would bang strippers and say, “I’m doing this because of you.” (See? Because the stripper was my mom.) From slug person Roger Friedman:

When audiences finally see “This Is It” next week, they will also have a lump in the throat moment at the end: a dedication of the movie to Michael’s kids, Prince, Paris, and Blanket.  I’m told the decision was made to dedicate the film that way by Jackson’s executors, John Branca and John McClain. They are also the film’s executive producers.

(*sniff*)  I always cry at manipulative, shamelessly contrived cash grabs.

Sony is also releasing a companion album to the movie next Tuesday. But it won’t contain any of the live music played during rehearsals in the film. Instead, it’s an album “inspired by the film.” In other words: it will contain the known studio recordings of songs included in the movie like “Human Nature” and “Billie Jean.” Fans who expected a true “live” album from Jackson may be a tad disappointed. The album does include the title song, however. That’s something!

Do you like the songs of Michael Jackson?  Own all his albums?  Well now you can own those same songs… on a new album!  Do it for Blanket!

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I’ve been getting emails saying This Is It, the Michael Jackson concert movie, has been number one in online ticket sales on Fandango for like two weeks now, and now Nikki Finke reports that the concert company is predicting an opening bigger than Spider-Man and Harry Potter.

Execs with the concert promoter AEG also capitalizing on the singer’s death are now openly predicting that This Is It will make a staggering “$250 million in its first 5 days”. And they claim the pic is already $5 million in the black even after Sony Pictures paid $60 million for the movie rights.

But this may be my favorite AEG revelation: that the rehearsal footage including meetings and auditions and other behind-the-scenes was only shot in the first place because Michael Jackson wanted it for his personal archive. And that when the whole pre-concert production began running wildly over its $25M budget, AEG almost stopped the HD crews from filming the rehearsals to cut costs. “Michael had no concept of budget,” an AEG insider reveals. “So the thought was we might as well fire the HD crew because there was no real plan to use the footage.”  As soon as AEG executives involved in organizing Michael Jackson’s 50-night schedule of shows at London’s O2 arena learned of his death, they met at Staples Center in Los Angeles and secured all of the 100 hours of rehearsal footage which Michael Jackson had done there with the intent to turn it into live albums, a movie, and TV special. As Randy Phillips, president and CEO of AEG Live, has ghoulishly boasted to the media, ”He was our partner in life and now he’s our partner in death.”

I’m not sure what’s worse, these shameless death-profiteer whores who can’t go more than a second of the trailer without tacky Michael-Jackson-as-Jesus imagery, or that there are still so many people out there who still haven’t seen enough Michael Jackson death coverage that they’re willing to spend $12 on a hastily slapped-together, two-hour love letter to profit written by an illiterate.  Hey, I have an idea! They should take his body bag on 50-city tour!  The Shroud of Tourin’, they could call it.