Shyamalan's Next Move?

Despite the lackluster boxoffice performance of his latest release Lady In The Water, Shyamalan is still considered an A-list director in Hollywood -- and probably he would be the man to sit in Director's chair for a future Harry Potter production. While Lady made a disappointing little over $34 million until today, the film certainly isn't a flop. It cost nearly $60 million, half the budget of most major studio releases. Once overseas and DVD revenues are added in, the film is likely to squeeze out a small profit.

A flop or two often hurts the ego of a director and sometimes he or she becomes more aggressive and try to recapture box office glory with a bigger film. Steven Spielberg, for example, followed 'The Color Purple' and 'Empire Of The Sun' with the mammoth 'Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade'. It's not clear how Shyamalan, who was called 'the next Spielberg' by Newsweek magazine on its cover, is going to take his next step.

In the meantime, British magazines got abuzz with the speculation that Shyamalan might take on a Harry Potter film next. While promoting 'Lady In The Water' recently in London, Shyamalan revealed that a Potter film was on the cards. He also revealed that the first Harry Potter film, The Philosopher's Stone (directed by Chris Columbus) was offered to him. But that conflicted with his 'Unbreakable'. We hope Shyamalan who is always so secretive of his scripts, would go along well with Harry Potter author JK Rowling who always enjoys the authority of giving final approval to every screenplay based on her bestselling books.

Two Footnotes:
1) Shyamalan might also have the last laugh on Disney production chief Nina Jacobson. Jacobson turned down 'the Lady In The Water' script, but a number of awful flops she had (The Alamo, among others) finally returned to haunt her. Jacobson was unceremoniously given the boot few weeks ago when Disney cut over 600 jobs worldwide.

2) The fifth big-screen Potter adaptation 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix' is currently under production. It's being directed by award-winning British filmmaker David Yates, whose other movies include 'The Girl in the Cafe', 'Sex Traffic', and 'State of Play'.

The World According to Shorts

This is a great package of 6 short films released only in New York last Friday. The package is distributed through New Yorker Films. According to the distributor, these films have been chosen from previous programs, with many considerations in mind —among them, "a balance of geographical origins, tones, styles and genres". Here are short descriptions:

"La Perra" (Chile, 17 min)
Director: Hugo Maza. A couple with an empty life make up a story about the new maid in order to satisfy their sexual obsessions.

"Ring of Fire" (Germany, 15 min)
Director: Andreas Hykade. Animated. Replete with outrageous sexual imagery, this tale of innocence lost and ultimately redeemed is accompanied by a lyrical voiceover (in appropriate cowboy drawl) that seems to have only the loosest of connections to the action on-screen.

"We Have Decided Not to Die" (Australia, 11 min)
Director: Daniel Askill. There are Three rituals, Three people, Three modern-day journeys of transcendence. The poster for this posting is from this film.

"United We Stand" (Norway, 9min)
Director: Hans Petter Moland. Eight old timers come upon a young woman stuck in a swamp. This short film was inspired by the Norway's Labour Party, and is a part of the collective feature film 'Utopia: No One is Perfect in the Perfect Country'.

"The Old Woman's Step" (Brazil, 15 min)
Director: Jane Malaquias. An old lady travels from the fishermen's village where she lives to the city to sell a chicken so she can buy her grandson a present.

Lady In The Water

The newest film of M. Night Shyamalan is going to be released this week on Friday, July 21st.

The name of the film is 'Lady in the Water' based on a bed-time story that Shyamalan wrote for his children. The story centers on a apartment building superintendent (played by Paul Giamatti) who saves what he thinks is an ordinary woman from the building's pool. He soon discovers that this "woman" is a character from a children's book, and he begins working with the building's residents to help her return to her world by fighting off those intent on keeping her out of the storybook. Bryce Dallas Howard, the beautiful daughter of celebrated Director Ron Howard is starring as the 'woman', the central character of the story. In fact, Bryce made her debut in Shyamalan's last film 'The Village'.

On August 31st, 2005 Shyamalan started the shooting of this movie. Some of this film was shot in Levittown, Pennsylvania at a Jacobson logistics warehouse site. (Shyamalan has committed to using films sites in PA. Pittsburgh is the place where he grew up). This movie was originally set up at Disney, but Shyamalan departed from the studio over "creative differences", and brought it to Warner Brothers (read our past posting). Disney has produced Shyamalan's previous four films, and the studio's subsidiary Miramax Films also produced 'Wide Awake' (1998) which Shyamalan wrote and directed.

The movie is rated PG-13 for some frightening sequences. Here is the official site: ladyinthewatermovie.com

Pirates Plunder BoxOffice

"Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest", Walt Disney Co.'s adventure-comedy sequel, starring Johnny Depp as the woozy, swaggering Captain Jack Sparrow, shattered the weekend box-office record with an estimated take of $132 million in the United States and Canada and went past the previous record holder "Spider-Man," which grossed $114.8 million in its first 3 days of release in 2002.

"Pirates" also broke the single-day record when it opened Friday with ticket sales of $55.5 million, eclipsing "Star Wars: Episode III Return of the Sith," which grossed $50 million when it came out May 19, 2005. The mania continued Saturday, as it became the first film to cross the $100-million mark in two days. Playing at 4,133 theaters — the widest opening in Disney's history — the film averaged $31,945 per venue. As we predicted last week, the weekend's second-biggest movie, "Superman Returns" went down to the second spot averaging $5,375 per location for a total of $21.9 million.

In this sequel Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) discovers he owes a blood debt to the legendary Davey Jones, Captain of the ghostly Flying Dutchman. With time running out, Jack must find a way out of his debt or else be doomed to eternal damnation and servitude in the afterlife. Making matters worse, Sparrow's problems manage to interefere with the wedding plans of a certain Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) and Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley), who are forced to join Jack on yet another one of his misadventures.

Gore Verbinski is the director. The film is rated PG-13 for intense sequences of adventure violence, including frightening images. Here is the official site: pirates.movies.com.

Superman Returns

'Superman Returns' took in 52.15 million dollars over opening weekend, lifting its 5-day total since its debut Wednesday to 84.2 million dollars. That puts the Warner Bros. film ahead of the premiere of last year's 'Batman Begins', another Warner superhero revival, which took in 48.7 million dollars over its opening weekend and 72.9 million dollars in its first 5 days. But 'Superman Returns' finished far behind Sony's 'Spider-Man 2', the record-holder for best 5-day opening, with 152.4 million dollars over 4th of July weekend in 2004.

Superman may not enjoy a long stay in the top spot. The coming weekend sees the opening of 'Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man's Chest', which is expected to be one of the summer's bigger films.

The first big-screen adventure for the Man of Steel in 19 years, 'Superman Returns' traces the comic-book hero's homecoming after a mysterious five-year absence. Played by newcomer Brandon Routh, Superman discovers lady love Lois Lane (Kate Bosworth) has a son and a new man in her life, while arch enemy Lex Luthor (Kevin Spacey) has hatched a plot to control the world. The film is directed by Bryan Singer, who made the blockbusters 'X-Men' and 'X2: X-Men United'.

The film is rated PG-13 for for some intense action violence. Here is the official site of the movie: supermanreturns.warnerbros.