AND FROM THE MOVIE STUDIO THAT IS ONE BIG ICEBERG

To recap, yesterday Fox started giving out free tickets to a 16-minute advertisement for James Cameron’s Avatar (teaser trailer below).  Since this was Fox (yeah that Fox, and that one and that one), take a guess how it went:

Fans seeking free tickets to a sneak-peek at the 3D sci-fi adventure “Avatar” have crashed the Web site for the upcoming James Cameron film.  Visitors to the site Monday who clicked to get tickets to a free 15-minute preview scheduled for Friday instead got an error message.  A representative for 20th Century Fox said the site was being repaired. [Yahoo]

And more details, from THR:

Ticket ordering was scheduled to begin online at noon PDT, but at about 11:55 a.m., the site started experiencing difficulties. About 17,000 of the 68,000 available tickets were distributed before the heavy traffic forced the site down for several hours.

You may have outdone yourself this time, Fox.  Wait, I spoke too soon:

Read the rest of this entry »

You guys will never believe this, but Paramount is greenlighting a movie based on a Mattel toy! To be produced by the guy who directed Revenge of the Nerds II: Nerds in Paradise!

Max Steel revolves around a 19-year-old extreme sports junkie recruited by a secret agency after an accident infects his body with nanobots, making him superhuman.

OOO WHA-AA AA-AA!  I smell franchise potential!  Max Steel II: Double Pits to Chesty!

Although Mattel introduced the character in the U.S. in 1999 as an action figure, and soon after in an animated series that ran from 2000-2002, he’s proved more popular in Latin America, where Max Steel is the region’s No. 1 action figure. Mattel has continued to produce animated direct-to-DVD features for the region.

But Mattel wants to use movies as a way to relaunch the toy line in the U.S. and the rest of the world, [like Transformers]. Mattel was keen on pairing with [executive producer Joe Roth], considering the Max Steel character has similarities to the “XXX” franchise he launched while head of Revolution Studios. The Xander Cage character in the first film was an extreme sports athlete turned spy. [So, Mr. Roth, I can see by your resume that you have sh-tty movie experience.  That's going to be invaluable in this position].

So basically, Max Steel is like the Mexican Triple X.  Triple MexXx, say. Mira, I deed a backfleep on my lawnmower, ése!  And now I gonna paint a virgen on the side with glitter.  MEXXXTREEEME GLITTER! (*shotguns Jarritos, accordion music plays*)

In conclusion, f-ck yourself, Paramount.