by Shane “Life Is A Highway” Hnetka
The 70th Venice International Film Festival, held Aug. 28-Sept. 7, was interesting this year. The winner of the fest’s prestigious Golden Lion prize for best film was a documentary called Sacro GRA, about life on Grande Raccordo Anulare — the highway that circles Rome.
Think about that for a second. The festival’s best film was a doc about a road.
I love the unpredictability of what a great movie can be about.
CROWD FUNDING SUCKS BOLLS
I guess it was only a matter of time before the world’s worst filmmaker would try to crowd fund one of his garbage projects. After all, it worked for Veronica Mars. Why not Uwe Boll?
Boll, a.k.a. “the master of error,” is the creator of such cinematic treasures as BloodRayne, In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale and other crap so tedious I refuse to type it. Now he’s trying to Kickstart his next film, Postal 2 — a sequel to a 2006 flop (starring Zack Ward and Kids In The Hall’s poor Dave Foley) that won Boll a “Worst Director” Razzie award.
Because this is Kickstarter, there are incentives for anyone who pledges money. For five bucks you get a newsletter keeping you up to date on Postal 2’s progress. For $25 you get a digital version of the film before its official DVD release plus the newsletter and a PDF of the script. A hundred bucks gets you the Postal 2 Blu-ray, a digital download, the soundtrack, a T-shirt, the PDF script and the ever-important newsletter.
And for $10,000? For 10 grand you’re one of Postal 2’s executive producers. Pinch me; I must be dreaming.
The Kickstarter ends Oct. 27, and as of 5:00 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 15, 336, people had pledged $57,474 toward the $500,000 goal — and four brave individuals have pledged $10,000 for the executive producer credit and a share of Postal 2’s worldwide revenues.
Somehow I can’t see there being a lot of worldwide revenue. Clearly there’s still a sucker born every minute.
STAN LEE MEDIA VS. EVERYONE
Speaking of suckers: back in the late 1990s, comics legend Stan Lee started a web company called Stan Lee Media. New owners took over in 2006, and they’ve sued everyone and everything under the sun since. They even tried suing Stan Lee and Marvel Comics, claiming that Stan Lee Media really controlled Marvel’s characters. They don’t, and the case was thrown out. They tried suing again. Again the case was thrown out.
Recently Stan Lee Media tried suing Disney, which owns Marvel. Disney called the lawsuit completely frivolous and the judge presiding over the case agreed, dismissing it with prejudice. Even the courts are getting tired of Stan Lee Media.
Marvel and Disney are far from saints but these copyright-trolling clowns make them look like champions of artists’ rights. Well, at least the bottom feeders at Stan Lee Media keep lawyers employed through economic downturns.
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Shane Hnetka might be a huge nerd but at least he’s not Uwe Boll. He writes Dog Blog’s Sunday Matinee column every weekend at www.prairiedogmag.com.
