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'Madagascar' to Trample 'Role Models,' 'Soul Men' in Deadly Multiplex Stampede

STV — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 11:50:54 EST

Welcome back to Defamer Attractions, your guide to everything new, noteworthy and/or intolerable this week at the movies. Another competitive fall weekend yields perhaps the season's biggest blockbuster alongside David Wain's studio breakthrough, not to mention choice candidates for the weekend's biggest disappointment and must-see indie gem. As always, our opinions are our own, but what can we say? We're just in a giving mood!

WHAT'S NEW: Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa revives the DreamWorks zoo-animal-on-the-loose franchise this weekend in the hopes of pulling down as much as $60 million — which it might manage, considering High School Musical 3's slowed box-office pace in its third week. Universal deftly counterprogrammed David Wain's R-rated comedy Role Models, featuring Paul Rudd and Seann William Scott as would-be mentors to McLovin and a black kid whose best jokes you've probably already seen in the commercials. That shouldn't stop it from pulling down around $12.6 million while the screeching Madagascar throngs tear down the multiplex around it.

Also opening:Stranded: I've Come From a Plane That Crashed on the Mountains, the reenactment-heavy doc about cannibal survivors of a 1972 plane crash in the Andes; the Holocaust drama The Boy in the Striped Pajamas; and the goth horror-musical Repo! The Genetic Opera.

THE BIG LOSER: Maybe "loser" is too harsh an estimation of Soul Men's fate, but let's face it: If it weren't the final entry in both Bernie Mac and Isaac Hayes's filmographies, it wouldn't likely fare in the top five on any weekend outside the dumping grounds of January or August. But as cynical, posthumous curios go, it'll draw, coaxing up to $9.5 million and possibly cracking the top three. Whatever sells, we suppose.

THE UNDERDOG: The documentary Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father defies conventional review, if only to preserve the mystery that makes it one of the year's most gripping and extraordinary films. The less you know about it, the better, but: Director Kurt Kuenne originally set out to chronicle the legacy of his childhood friend Andrew Bagby, who was murdered in 2001 by his ex-girlfriend Shirley Turner. When Turner fled to her native Newfoundland, pregnant with Bagby's child, Kuenne's personal film suddenly inherited a true-crime narrative laced with extradition battles, custody haggles and, ultimately, unbelievable tragedy. That it must be believed (and reckoned with, if you can) makes Dear Zachary an infuriating, devastating, graceful and utterly essential theatrical experience. Bring Kleenex.

FOR SHUT-INS: If you've managed to plow through last week's box-set bounty, reward yourself with last summer's Get Smart updating, Waterworld: The Extended Edition (!!!) or another complete-series windfall: The Wild Wild West, The Outer Limits, I Dream of Jeannie and/or Batman: The Complete Animated Series.

So after you check out Dear Zachary, what's next? Is anyone actually contemplating going, ahem, 2 Africa? Are you paying final, $10 respects to Bernie Mac and Isaac Hayes? Or are you the one American in the market for an extended edition of Waterworld? Go ahead, be honest — we're all friends here.

Stifler Latest 'American Pie' Star Relegated To The Dustbin Of History

Mark Graham — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 19:30:00 EDT

Ah yes, we fondly recall the halycon days of the summer of 1999, when a fresh-faced batch of no-names captured the zeitgeist by bringing the carnal pleasures of beating off to webcam porn and fucking pastry items to the big screen. Yes, that's right, American Pie was a surprise hit that summer, grossing over $100 million back in the days when that threshold still meant something. It went on to launch the careers of a whole handful of marginally talented actors and even managed to spin off not one, not two but FIVE sequels. The intervening years, however, have not been kind to the cast. Some ended up in rehab (Tara Reid, Natasha Lyonne), some were exposed as having no talent (Jason Biggs, Chris Klein), and some found themselves twirling around dancefloors in silly costumes on utterly banal reality television programs (Shannon Elizabeth). Of the lot, only Alyson Hannigan and Seann William Scott are still in a position where people actually return their phone calls. At least that's what we thought until we saw Stifler out himself on last night's Late Night With Conan O'Brien by confessing that his Q Rating with the millenial set is somewhere south of Carrot Top's. Good luck, Alyson — now you're the last counselor left at Band Camp with any cred. [Late Night With Conan O'Brien]

WATCH VIDEO

Seann William Scott Comfortable With His Victoria's-Secret-Model-Banging Heterosexuality

Seth — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 14:18:27 EDT

Defamer readers might recall a post from late last July regarding a NY Daily News sighting, which put Most Powerful Gay in the Universe David Geffen on the arm of Seann William Scott, aka That Dude Who Managed To Spin Stiffler Into A Reasonably Successful Movie Career That Peaked Two Years Ago, at an L.A. gay bar. A mere nine months later, Page Six is happy to offer the real scoop on the actor, with a clarifying item that doesn't at all feel like a publicist-planted tip about the hyper-heterosexual, Victoria's Secret-model-fucking habits of their not at all gay—but entirely comfortable with the concept!—client:

"AMERICAN Pie" star Sean William Scott [sic] is very comfortable with his sexuality - so much so that when another paper claimed Scott had shown up with David Geffen at "Heat," a nonexistent L.A. gay bar, he didn't even bother to correct them. Maybe it's because he was too busy laughing.

Scott showed up at Upper East Side eatery Phillipe the other night with his longtime girlfriend, Victoria's Secret model Deanna Miller, and enjoyed a two-hour dinner while engaging in some major public displays of affection. Onlookers say they looked "very much in love and were all over each other." A friend of Scott said the two have quietly been dating for more than two years.

We always had our suspicions about the sighting (though the Defamer Correspondent on Chickenhawk-Related Activities tells us the bar in question was probably "Tigerheat," the gay dance club frequented by Britney Spears whenever she needs some cheering up by way of watching her security detail taser overly enthusiastic fans), but with this report of a dinner featuring fine champagne sipped from intertwined arms, lots of lingerie-model face-sucking, and Scott spinning around repeatedly to shout to neighboring tables, "Can you believe how not gay I am? It's like, ridiculous, right?" we are now 100% convinced of its fraudulence.

GOOD FOR YUKS [NY Post]

Trade Round-Up: KISS Finally Ready To Leverage Their Brand For Extramusical Pursuits

Mark — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 14:41:36 EST

· Studios aren't as horny as usual to pimp their event movies during the Super Bowl, preferring to spend their ad dollars on hit primetime shows instead of the year's biggest advertising orgy. But for those who change their minds, there's plenty of available space towards the end of the broadcast, when drunken football fans are less likely to pay attention to commercials. [Variety]
· More on the announcement of Gail Berman and Lloyd Braun's BermanBraun, which will either produce multimedia content or high-end kitchen appliances: leaking news about their venture forced them to come clean about their plans a few weeks early. [THR]
· Kiss finds yet another thing upon which to slap its name, planning a Kiss 4k comic book in which the band transforms from aging, whiteface-loving entrepreneurs into "world-protecting warrior spirits." [Variety]
· For reasons we might never understand, Paul Rudd consents to co-star with Seann William Scott in a comedy for Universal. [THR]
· Var invites charges of institutional anti-Sorkinism by pointing out that Studio 60 "retained less than half of its demo lead-in" in last night's Nielsen race. [Variety]

Is Seann William Scott David Geffen's Billionaire Boy Candy?

Seth — Thu, 20 Jul 2006 18:17:47 EDT

Nestled deeply in the "Surveillance" section of today's Rush & Molloy column in the NY Daily News comes this item regarding Seann William Scott, star of such upcoming entertainments as Coxblocker and Mr. Woodcock, tripping the gay light fantastic with none other than Carbon Beach land baron, David Geffen:

Sean William Scott turned heads when he showed up at Los Angeles gay bar Heat on the arm of David Geffen ...

We imagine the rather fishy smelling item—there is no LA gay bar called Heat, to our knowledge—was most probably planted by someone looking to stir up trouble, and reported without checking the facts. (Just like we do with our sightings!) Then again, perhaps we've just become far too skeptical, and Geffen has indeed managed to woo the actor with expensive gifts and promises to finance Scott's very own DreamWorks shingle.

Surveillance [NY Daily News]

Paramount Cockblocks Topher And Seann

Mark — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 10:34:21 EST

Variety reports that Topher Grace and Seann William Scott will co-star in Paramount's Cockblockers; no need to explain the concept, it's about pretty much exactly what you fear it might be. But what could we possibly love more than reading the word "cockblockers" in the pages of Variety? (Lesser publications were a little more coy about the title.) That there were originally two competing Cockblockers projects in the Hollywood ether, and that the one picked up by Paramount is a sort of Super Cockblockers:

Scott and Larson had been shepherding a "Cockblockers" project for some time, only to learn that Coolidge and principals at management-production outfit H2F Entertainment had one of their own. They combined their development and then plucked Grace to star alongside Scott before taking it out to studios Wednesday.

We've said it before, but it's Friday morning, and we're severely hung over and emotional: Sometimes we love this goddamn town so much we could cry.

Par blocks all bidders [Variety]