Flushed Away

Just got around to seeing Flushed Away. Somehow this movie fell through the cracks- it's actually pretty good! Made by Aardman Animation and Dreamworks. It compares favorably to Over the Hedge and Open Season.

The singing slugs are fun throughout the movie, but my favorites are the ninja frogs.

After watching, compare notes with Wikipedia and see if you spotted all the "hidden" references to other movies and characters.

Dennis Muren Interview

In the 6th grade, I became fascinated with movies and movie special effects. I poured through magazines, books, etc. One name I came across frequently was Dennis Muren. He is responsible for the visuals of many of my favorite movies including Star Wars, They Abyss, Jurassic Park, War of the Worlds, and others.

From CG Society.com:

On February 11, the Visual Effects Society honored Dennis Muren, one of their own, with a Lifetime Achievement award. Muren began working at Industrial Light & Magic in 1976 on the first ‘Star Wars’ film, for which he won his first Oscar. He has gone on to receive 15 Oscar nominations and win nine Oscars, the most of any living person still making movies. In 1999, he became the first visual effects artist to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (at 6764 Hollywood Blvd). His most recent Oscar nomination was last year for the visual effects in ‘War of the Worlds’. We talked with him to find out what’s keeping him interested today.

Read more.

Matt Groening Interview

From Crave Online:

What took so long to do the movie?

For me, part of the reason was, we're coming up on the 20th year of the show, we're coming up on the 400th episode, and if we're ever going to do it, we should do it now. I don't want to do it [when] for some reason the show goes away and then do a movie. I thought it would really be neat to do a movie while the fans are still clamoring for it.

You'll see more of The Simpsons than you really should see and probably things, people you don't want to see. Whoever you don't want to see naked on The Simpsons, you know that's who you're going to see. Sorry about Marge.

Futurama is coming back!

Talk about a day job and night job, my night job after The Simpsons is Futurama, which is coming back on Comedy Central in 2008, 16 new episodes, and we're going to be running the old episodes, as well.

I always felt like we were a little bit like the original Star Trek. I always thought that working with my partner, David X. Cohen, that we knew that the people who loved the show really, really loved it and they wrote petitions, they wrote letters and e-mails and it just seemed right. And also, everybody that worked on the show loved it. So when it came time when the show did come back, everybody without exception said, "I'm on board." At this point, I said, "We're thinking of gearing up the show again." They said, "I'm on board." Everybody, Katy Sagal, all the actors, John Dimaggio, Billy West. The original animation team, the original animation house, the original writers. Everybody came back. It was great.

Cool Trailers

Enjoy...

• Paprika
• Sunshine
• Across the Universe
• Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
• Caffeine
• 1408

More Star Trek Casting Rumors

From TrekToday:

First came the rumours that J.J. Abrams would direct Star Trek XI, then the rumours that he would not, and finally the confirmation that he will. Now the rumour that Matt Damon will play Captain Kirk - debunked by both Star Trek insiders and Damon's reps - has returned with a vengeance.

IGN Movies cites studio sources who have told the web site that the roles of James T. Kirk, Mr. Spock and Dr. McCoy may go to three very big name stars: Damon, Adrien Brody and Gary Sinise.

Damon is said to be in talks with Paramount to take over the role originated by William Shatner, who has won two Emmy Awards for his more recent role as Denny Crane on Boston Legal. Brody, an Academy Award-winning actor for The Pianist, is reportedly negotiating to play Leonard Nimoy's iconic role of Spock.

Both Shatner and Nimoy have said that they would be interested in appearing in Star Trek XI as older versions of their characters if they liked the script, and Nimoy added that he believed his contract entitled him to image approval for any actor playing young Spock.

Sinise is the current star of CSI: NY and is said to be in discussions to play physician Leonard "Bones" McCoy, a role originated by the late DeForrest Kelley. A Golden Globe winner, Sinise previously appeared in the space epics Apollo 13 and Mission to Mars.

Recent rumours have also suggested that Scottish actor James McAvoy might be in talks to play engineer Montgomery Scott, and IGN claims that Lost's Daniel Dae Kim, who previously played Corporal Chang on Enterprise, may be in line to take over the role of Sulu from George Takei, who is currently appearing on NBC's hit series Heroes as the father of a Star Trek fan.

Until Paramount makes an official announcement, all casting rumours should be considered just that. The original story is at IGN Movies.