Y’know, we took a couple of weeks off to let Hollywood come to its senses and quit making these kind of announcements. (Well, that’s at least part of the reason we’ve been gone. Family business and other things have also been the cause of some delay, but hopefully all of that is taken care of for awhile.) Obviously we were wrong…

from variety:

Columbia Pictures has set an untitled comedy that will star Sacha Baron Cohen as master detective Sherlock Holmes and Will Ferrell as Watson, his crime-solving partner.

Etan Cohen (”Tropic Thunder”) is writing the script, and Judd Apatow and Jimmy Miller will produce.

“Just the idea of Sacha and Will as Sherlock Holmes and Watson makes us laugh,” said Col co-prexy Matt Tolmach. “Sacha and Will are two of the funniest and most talented guys on the planet, and having them take on these two iconic characters is frankly hilarious.”

Apparently Matt Tolmach has confused the meanings of the words “hilarious” and “hideous”.

OK, we’ll be back in a bit with more catching up, as soon as I can find my puke bucket…

Yep, it’s catch-up day again…

OK, first let’s get those pictures we posted a couple of weeks ago out of the way…

This one, of course, is easy if you took a look at the Dr Who: Planet of the Dead preview that we put up last week. Yep it’s one of the new monsters from the upcoming Easter special. Originally these were identified as the Tritivore, but now there seems to be some confusion as to whether that is the name of these creatures or the flying things also seen in the preview. Either way, we should know come Saturday.

Saturday should also bring more fun as we catch up with Lister, Rimmer, the Cat and the rest of the crew of the Red Dwarf courtesy of Britain’s Dave TV which will be airing a new three part special this weekend beginning Friday entitled Red Dwarf: Back to Earth. That, of course, would be the source of these pics:

Finally, there was this picture which we posted as perhaps the worstest of the worster ideas coming out of hollywood lately:

Despite some good guesses, no one was able to identify the subject of the shot as Nic Cage in his costume as the Sorcerer in the all-new live-action adaptation of Disney’s The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. Yep, you read that right. Remember the short from Disney’s original Fantasia? Well it’s getting an updating, set in New York, with Jay Baruchel (see picture below) in the Mickey Mouse role, and Alfred Molina as an evil sorcerer.

No word yet on the rumors that Paul Reubens is being cast as the out of control broomstick…

The Planet of the Dead, that is. Yep, here it is, the official BBC trailer for the upcoming Dr. Who Easter Special. (Oh, and this should also answer one of the “left hanging” picture questions from last week…)

Actually, the picture below may very well perfect our Bad Hollywood Idea trifecta. Who is it? What’s it from?

Check back over the weekend for the answers…

Following up on yesterday’s Bad Hollywood Idea comes word of the Coen Brothers’ next project: a remake of the John Wayne classic True Grit. According to Cinematical:

According to Variety, the Coen Bros aren’t aiming for a traditional remake — they want to return to the original Charles Portis novel, and make a more faithful adaptation. Their version will be told from Mattie’s point of view, as the original novel is, and keep Cogburn as a side player. The Coens will undoubtedly amp up the Biblical tone and include the darker elements … like what really happens to her after the snakebite.

Plans to remake True Grit have apparently been in the works for some time — it originally begun at DreamWorks, but was left behind when Steven Spielberg and his shingle split with Paramount. Undaunted by the task, the Coens are tackling it before their adaptation of Michael Chabon’s The Yiddish Policeman’s Union.

Well, I suppose however you feel about it, you’ve gotta admit the brothers have grit… (Yeah, DS, I went there..)

Ok, so things started out bad enough when rumors began surfacing about a biography of the Three Stooges. Especially when we ran across a quote from the screenwriters/directors of the project stating that the movie was to be “not a biopic, but rather a comedy built around the antics of the three characters that Moe Howard, Larry Fine and Howard played in the Columbia Pictures shorts.” Oh, and that quote? Yeah, it was from the Farrelly Brothers… you know, the high-class crowd that gave us Dumb and Dumber and There’s Something About Mary, and are currently attached to the movie version of the children’s book Walter the Farting Dog. (Amazon link provided only so you know that I am NOT making that one up. Oh, and just in case you think I’m kidding about there being a movie version, here’s the IMDB entry for it.)

Of course, the more I think about it, with qualifications like that, maybe they ARE the right ones to make a pic about the Stooges. Still, today from Variety comes word that the cast for the movie is now pretty well set, or at least as far as the main trio is concerned. So, you ask, who are the three? How about Benicio Del Toro as Moe, Jim Carrey as Curly (reportedly he’s agreed to gain 40 pounds for the role) and Sean Penn as Larry.

Let’s run over that one more time… Benicio Del Toro (who just finished playing Che Guevara in Che and is in post production now on Universal’s new interpretation of the Wolfman) as Moe. Jim Carrey (alright, I’ll admit in some ways he’s been prepping for this role all his life, but at the same time I’m not sure he’s proven he can play anyone except Jim Carrey when it comes to comedies… dramatic roles, I’ll grant you he’s gained my respect… but that’s a “whole ‘nother thing”…) as Curley. And Sean Penn (personally I suspect the man had a funnybone-ectomy after playing Spicoli) as Larry.

Gee, maybe if we get lucky they can get Hugh Jackman to play Shemp and Leonardo DiCaprio to play Curly Joe.

Here it is, the first trailer for the Spike Jonez adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are:

Thots?

Not a lot of time for a big post at the moment, but I thought I’d give ya these teaser pics that have come across the ol’ moose desk the past couple of days… What’re they from? I’ll give ya a hint, Easter’s looking busier and busier… Full explanations (or at least as full as I know at the moment) tomorrow…

Ok, Mooseheads, today we set the wayback machine for 1975. (Y’know, i’m starting to think maybe I should have called this the “Once upon a time” blog or something like that for all the posts that start “wayback when..”… anyway…)

So, ok, it’s January 1975. In response to rising complaints about the amounts of sex and violence on television, Richard Wiley, the head of the FCC, announced that the three national networks, ABC, NBC, and CBS had all agreed to set aside the first hour of prime-time (from 8-9 on the east coast)for family friendly programming. This “family viewing hour” was to be implemented by the start of the fall 1975 season.

However, according to wikipedia:

many television series suffered from the Family Viewing Hour mandate. All in the Family, which was the runaway top-rated show in the U.S. since 1971, was moved to 9 p.m. on Mondays after five seasons leading the Saturday night lineup. Producer Norman Lear, citing an infringement on creative freedom and on his First Amendment rights, mounted a lawsuit with the support of varying guilds including the WGA, but the case was later dropped…

n 1976, United States circuit court Judge Warren Ferguson declared the Family Viewing Hour null and void, starting with the fall 1977 season. Ferguson stated while the idea was good in theory, the FCC had overstepped its bounds in having it instituted; the FCC privately lobbied the three major networks to adopt the policy instead of holding public hearings on the matter, and Ferguson ruled on those grounds that the Family Viewing Hour had no binding merit. The decree made by the National Association of Broadcasters in 1975 was also overturned, giving stations free rein on what to air in the pre-prime time slots.

So by the end of 1977, the family hour was officially dead. Unofficially, however, even today there are some who think about the first hour of prime-time as a period that should at least try to be family friendly and most networks do seem to hold their harsher shows for later viewing (though how Jay Leno’s upcoming domination of the 10 o’clock eastern time slot on NBC will affect the rest of that network’s nightly programming is yet to be seen.

All of which is background for the short video clip below. As cited above, one of the shows most affected by the family hour restrictions was All In the Family. And typically for the show and it’s creator, they were not quiet about it, composing the following take off on the show’s theme song in response. Though never actually aired, it was performed for the show’s studio audience. And now, they perform it for you…

I’ve written often of my fondness for the card sharp Ricky Jay. Another all time favorite is Bill Malone - how often do you get to see someone use an entire deck of cards in one trick? Well you will today, as Malone tell the story of Sam the Bellhop: