Movies

You have got to hand it to Disney. They know how to create demand for a film. Namely: Don't show it to anyone.

At a recent shareholder's meeting, Disney CEO Bob Iger was asked -- for the second year in a row -- whether "Song of the South" might be coming out on DVD. He was at pains to give a straight answer, saying, "Our concern was that a film that was made so many decades ago being brought out today perhaps could be either misinterpreted or that it would be somewhat challenging in terms of providing the appropriate context."

"South's" sixtieth anniversary might have been the appropriate context, but it passed last year with nary a commemorative gold-plated special collectors 2 disc platinum edition directors cut, which is how Disney keeps making money on shopworn chestnuts like "Peter Pan" -- keep 'em out of circulation for a while, then hype the hell out of 'em.

"South" has been in theaters four times in the intervening decades since its debut in 1946, but it has never been available on home video. Per the AP, you can see why: "The movie doesn't reveal whether it takes place before or after the Civil War, and never refers to blacks on the plantation as slaves. It makes clear they work for the family, living down dirt roads in wood shacks while the white characters stay in a mansion. Remus and other black characters' dialogue is full of 'ain't nevers,' 'ain't nobodys,' 'you tells,' and 'dem dayses.' "

The most "appropriate context," of course, would be in the home, where parents could discuss and explain to kids both what they're watching, and where stereotypes come from. Suppressing material like "South" is, at best, a missed opportunity and at worst, a white-washing of history.

Certainly, the rottenest thing that could happen to Remus would be to get the Aunt Jemima treatment in re-release: Over the years, the demi-goddess of pancakes has morphed from kerchief-wearing mammy of a slave, to a vaguely benevolent mother-figure with a string of pearls. Despite the image rehab, it's a name that's permanently tarnished; there just aren't ever going to be any black toddlers named 'Jemima' running around on the playgrounds of the future.

It used to be, when a Hollywood studio underwent regime change, if you were lucky, the new chief let you keep a bungalow on the lot with a desk and a phone. Maybe you'd hang up a shingle as a producer, and still lunch at the commissary.

Now, thanks to Wall Street, things work a little differently.

TMZ has learned that former Paramount Pictures vice chairman and COO turned distributor Rob Friedman is closing in on about $600 million to finance a slate of movies over the next few years. The deal would put Friedman in partnership with foreign sales company Summit Entertainment, which would handle the overseas distribution of the films it would make or acquire.

Persons familiar with the talks cautioned that the agreement with investment bank Merrill Lynch wasn't final, and that terms were still being negotiated. But were the deal to close, it would essentially turn Summit into a brand new film studio, akin to independent outfit Lionsgate Entertainment. Lionsgate has successfully balanced releasing gory slasher pictures like "Saw" and "Hostel" with Oscar-bait such as Best Picture winner "Crash."

Insiders say the new venture, which would retain the Summit moniker, would be looking for popcorn-style fare that will play well on 2,000 screens. To date, Summit has already gotten into that sort of business: It's releasing the new Paris Hilton comedy "The Hottie and the Nottie" worldwide next year, as well as the overseas rights to higher-brow movies like "Love in the Time of Cholera."

In Friedman, Summit would have a valuable marketeer and picture-picker: He started in the mailroom of Warner Bros. Pictures, and worked his way up to president of worldwide marketing, overseeing franchises like "Batman" and "Lethal Weapon," as well as the Oscar winning "Driving Miss Daisy." When Friedman arrived at Paramount in 1997, he helped create the marketing strategy for "Titanic" in partnership Twentieth Century Fox; it would become the highest grossing film in history.

Recently, Merrill Lynch has been exceptionally active in Hollywood: The bank leapt into bed with Tom Cruise, securing $500 million worth of film financing at United Artists last month, and has also underwritten labels like Marvel Entertainment and producer Ivan Reitman. (Marvel has already used Merrill money to begin pre-production on the forthcoming "Iron Man.")

Calls to Summit Entertainment executives were not returned at deadline, and Friedman declined to comment.

Anna Nicole Smith's estranged mother Virgie Arthur is in hot water over alleged unpaid legal bills. She's been summoned to the Bahamas once more because her former attorney Jamal Davis claims she hasn't coughed up the money she owes him.

Davis, who says he helped Arthur obtain an order to keep Dannielynn in the Bahamas while paternity is being determined, told Entertainment Tonight, "We represented her to the best of our abilities. We managed to avoid the child being removed from the Bahamas up until the point of time that we stopped representing her and we haven't received payment for our time and devotion spent on this matter."

"We're just exercising our right as any creditor would do to recover our fees. It's unfortunate we have to take this route," he said.

In other Anna news, on Monday the results of her autopsy will be released.

After a tumultuous reign, former boozer beauty queen Tara Conner passed her Miss USA crown on to Miss Tennessee, Rachel Smith, last night. Conner was almost prematurely dethroned in December, after allegations of wild partying and heavy drinking emerged. It was only after a heartfelt plea to pageant boss Donald Trump and a stint in rehab that Conner was allowed to keep her crown.

Now that it's all over, she told People magazine that, "the reign of Tara was miraculous. Literally, because I got sober during it, and that's the most important thing."

The Donald, too, seems satisfied. "We're very happy with Tara, very proud, and hopefully she will have set the example for many people that have problems with drugs and alcohol."

Conner offered her successor some advice. "Be yourself and put your own flavor on the title" -- just as long as that flavor isn't whiskey, vodka or beer.

Brit singer and new tabloid princess Amy Winehouse is making frenemies with Lindsay Lohan. Lohan was recently seen purchasing a Winehouse CD, and Winehouse, whose star is rising thanks to a song called "Rehab," recently told Giant magazine that she's worried about Lohan. "I want to coddle that girl. I really want to hug her," she said. She then goes on to poke a little fun at Lohan, adding that "I saw pictures of her coming out of the doctor's [office], and she's crying. She's holding papers in her hand, like, 'Oh, it's a note from my liver saying, "Dear Lindsay, I've gone to Vegas!" Winehouse is no teetotaler herself -- she has quite a rep for putting in booze-fueled performances, and in recent weeks she's canceled several concerts, allegedly for alcohol-related reasons. Maybe Winehouse should stick to singing, and leave the stand-up schtick to the pros.

Adam Sandler and Don Cheadle take a wild scooter ride through Manhattan in their new film, "Reign Over Me." But it wasn't icy roads or crazy cabbies that they were most concerned about. "You were rubbing up on the Sandman," says Adam, not entirely comfortably, referring to Cheadle's taking hold of his co-star in a rather intimate position on the two-wheeled vehicle.

The pair sat down for AOL Moviefone's Unscripted series to talk about "Reign." Sandler plays Cheadle's former college roommate who loses his grip on life after his wife and children are killed on 9/11.

This wasn't supposed to be how it went down: A prestigious package of opinion pieces in one of the country's most-lauded newspapers, the Los Angeles Times, guest-wrangled by one of Hollywood's most powerful producers, Brian Grazer. As entertainment firebrand Nikki Finke snarked when the deal was first announced a week ago, Grazer's was a nothing-if-not-ironic menu of op/ed pieces: "Pitbull entertainment litigator Marty Singer wrote a piece about the 'power of allegations'; ...psychologist Paul Ekman -- who's a facial interpretation expert wrote about the subject of 'catching liars.'"

While Finke's headline summed up most folks' skeptical reaction: "Hollywood Producer is LAT Guest Editor; No Wonder He Assigns Essay About Liars."

So it came as a considerable surprise when it was the integrity of the Los Angeles Times Op-Ed editor, Andres Martinez, that would be called into question: After media blogger Kevin Roderick broke the story on his L.A. Observed blog that Martinez was dating Kelly Mullens, one of Grazer's publicists, the excrement really hit the whirling blades.

First, Martinez tried to explain things away in his LAT blog. It didn't cut much ice, especially after an announcement of Grazer's guest gig featured his girlfriend as the press contact. Then, per Roderick: "Los Angeles Times Publisher David Hiller, under heavy pressure from the news staff, scrapped the Current [LAT's Opinion] section that was to be published Sunday under the guidance of Hollywood producer Brian Grazer." Moments later, Martinez resigned, and even offered an unusual online explication of why. Speaking of opinions, a sampling of the L.A. Times feedback section suggests readers feel that both the paper's op-ed editor and its publisher are suspect here.

Can white men jump ... or not? That's the debate raging in the TMZ newsroom after we got word from an insider on the set of Will Ferrell and Woody Harrelson's new flick, "Semi-Pro," that both actors are garbage on the basketball court.

According to our source, the pair were a couple of ball-bumbling baboons yesterday. In fact, our guy said that for the majority of the 15-hour day, the guys could barely get a shot near the rim.

This has, however, sparked a rumble here in the office. According to Daniel, a TMZ staffer who has actually played with Ferrell before, "Will definitely has game". Now, since Daniel has yet to reveal the quality of his own athletic talent, it's possible that Will could suck and yet be considered an all-star compared to our guy. (Ed.'s note: I'm good, dammit! -- Daniel)

As far as Woody goes, he played the ringer in the 1992 film "White Men Can't Jump," and appeared to be a b-ball expert in the film. In fact, a friend of TMZ wrote in to say Woody is definitely a baller. Guess anyone can have an off day.

BREAKING NEWS: We have just pressed Button 'E,' and using the Mach 5's special vision-enhancing infrared light goggles, have peered far into the future of film: Yes, we can just make it out in the distance! The Wachowski Bros.' "Speed Racer" has cast its title role!

Who'll be playing the young do-gooding leadfoot of the title?

Why it's Emile Hirsch, the talented young actor who got his big break as Johnny Truelove in Nick Cassavetes ' "Alpha Dog" last year.

Hirsch recently wrapped up a plum gig for director Sean Penn -- one where he starred opposite Vince Vaughn: A feature adaptation of Jon Krakauer's "Into the Wild," with Hirsch playing Christopher McCandless, the doomed idealist who disappeared into the Alaskan wilderness in 1992. "Wild" hits theaters in September, around the time that the Wachowskis will probably be shooting "Speed," coincidentally.

Anyway, we hear Hirsch has just gotten the offer from Warner Bros. Pictures today, and his agents are putting the heel to the steel to make a deal for him to portray a driver who is equal parts Elvis in "Viva Las Vegas!" and James Bond.

It was supposed to be a moment of triumph for a company with a sketchy history when it comes to racial diversity in animation. After years of "Snow White" princesses, Disney announced that it was releasing it's first animated film with a black blueblood, about a princess named Maddy who lives in the French Quarter of New Orleans.

The film's unfortunate title? "The Frog Princess."

Given that 'frog' is a favorite English epithet for the French, we're eagerly awaiting a Frenchie firestorm: After all, in 1993, when Disney trotted out its first ever non-snowy white princess in "Aladdin," angry protests from Muslim Arabs erupted; they called the animated "Aladdin" racist for showing a Middle East filled with arbitrary violence. For example, one offending "Aladdin" lyric went:

"I come from a land, from a faraway place,where the caravan camels roam, where they cut off your ear if they don't like your face; it's barbaric -- but hey, it's home!"

That line was, unsurprisingly, cut from the final "Aladdin."

Calls to the French Consul-General's office in Los Angeles were unreturned at deadline.

The final product of Lindsay Lohan's movie-set meltdown is finally here ... well, at least the trailer is.

Today, the trailer for Lohan's new flick, "Georgia Rule," dropped over at Moviefone, but the real story is the string of mishaps that went down behind the scenes. While shooting the film, Linds was hospitalized for "dehydration," was verbally attacked by William H. Macy, and received a very public reprimand in a letter leaked from the CEO of Morgan Creek, who called the starlet "discourteous, irresponsible and unprofessional," adding that she "endangered the quality of this picture."

TMZ has obtained more clips from Anna Nicole Smith's final movie, "Illegal Aliens."

The movie, scheduled for a straight-to-DVD release in May, shows Anna Nicole (baby doll voice and all) as a space alien trying to stop an intergalactic terrorist -- played by the equally outrageous Chyna Doll. Smith gets to show off her acting chops by dropping TrimSpa references ("You like my body?") and feigning fear of Chyna's character giving her mind controlling suppositories.

BREAKING NEWS: In an exclusive interview with City of Industry, producer-directors Mike Tollin and Brian Robbins tell TMZ that after 15 years together, they are "reconfiguring" their production company "to more easily pursue invidual projects."

The love affair, they stress, is not up-ending their company, as the Hollywood rumor mill has been buzzing for weeks. That said, Robbins is setting up a new first-look production shingle at DreamWorks -- without Tollin.

If any producing partnership is akin to a marriage, it's fair to say even though they are sleeping in separate bedrooms, but they're staying together for the sake of the children: The "kids" they've produced include the CW hits "Smallville," and "One Tree Hill." Tollin Robbins are also producers of comedies like the Eddie Murphy fat-suiter "Norbit" and the ensemble comedy "Wild Hogs," the latter of which is spawning a sequel at Disney as it edges closer to $80 million in box office receipts.

Both have also directed films: Tollin's been at the helm of movies like "Radio" and "Summer Catch," Robbins, the aforementioned "Norbit," and a remake of "The Shaggy Dog."

Explains Tollin: "The worst part of being succesful is that you become more a manager and less a filmmaker," adding that his more indie sensibility has him getting behind the camera again as a director with "Counting Down," a comedic family drama that's being put together even as you read this post, at GreeneStreet Films. Simultaneously, Robbins is next directing "Starship Dave," an Eddie Murphy comedy about tiny aliens that are struggling to save their planet from destruction. That the duo would have been spending time apart anyway made Robbins decision to answer DreamWorks' flirtations all the more rational.

Says Robbins, "Different tastes have made the company successful." Joining Robbins at DreamWorks is Sharla Sumpter Bridgett, previously an exec at Tollin-Robbins.

So "300" director Zack Snyder told EW recently, and his ambivalence about the film's sexual ambiguity has served him well: An astonishing $70 million opening for Snyder's adaptation of Frank Miller's graphic novel means people ignored the negative reviews and showed up for those rippling, shaven, oiled chests -- and the spears that plunged into them.

With a headline that blared, "Rivers of Blood, Oceans of Nair," the Seattle alternative paper The Stranger put it best, "By the end, I didn't know which I wanted more: a cigarette, or, like, a whole bottle of aspirin."

Aesthetics aside, what's interesting about "300" isn't the prurience or the CG violence, (as the Chicago Tribune's John Kass wrote, "War-nography is hard to define, but you know it when you see it.") but the reason that the studio used CG in the first place.

Again, EW: "It would be shot almost entirely on bluescreen soundstages with computer-generated backgrounds added later. CG would also be used to create geysers of spurting blood worthy of Jackson Pollock, the better to control the precise level of the gore if the MPAA's ratings board found it all too much."

The muscled hunk enjoyed his last days of anonymity as he snuck into a 4:45 PM show at The Grove Theater in L.A. on Friday.

Unfortunately, unlike in the movie, Butler was wearing a shirt on this outing.

Reese Witherspoon has backed out of a big movie in which she was slated to star and produce. Now TMZ knows why Reese bailed.

The movie, "Bunny Lake Is Missing," was to be a remake of Otto Preminger's 1965 film about a woman whose daughter disappears from a nursery school. Cops then try to convince the woman that her daughter was a figment of her imagination.

Reports are circulating that Witherspoon did not feel emotionally invested in the film, and that her psyche was fragile in the wake of her divorce from Ryan Phillippe.

But a well-placed, high-powered Hollywood source tells TMZ the problem had nothing to do with emotions. We're told Reese signed onto the project after being presented with the idea and a draft script. Last week, Reese was presented with what she thought would be a completed script, but turned out to be 80 pages that had major sections of the movie outlined but not written.

Clad in Borat's trademark green "swimsuit," the mustachioed doubles all read copies of London's Sun newspaper ... and then tried to have sex with each other's sisters. Wawaweewa!