- For years, the only thing that stood between me and the Nike Air Mag, the auto-lace-up, glowing shoes Marty McFly wore in Back to the Future Part II, was the tiny fact that they didn’t exist. Now the only thing that stands between me and these monuments to capitalist excess is thousands of dollars. You see, Nike is auctioning off the only 1,500 pairs of these shoes that will ever be made, with proceeds going to Michael J. Fox’s Parkinson research organization. So not only do I get to be mad that I don’t make phat rapper money and can’t afford to plop down the $10,000 that this footwear has demanded, but I get to feel bad about feeling mad because it’s going to such a good cause. The future is such a tease.
- Please know, this is the sort of story you can’t make up. Mel Gibson is lining up to direct a movie based on a script from Joe Ezterhas, the writer of Showgirls, about Judah Maccabee, who as a legendary Jewish leader led a revolt around 160 BCE. Again, that’s the guy who told a cop “Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world,” buddying up with the Showgirls author to direct a movie about a revered Jewish hero. This is a real thing. Sometimes, the set-up is so funny, I don’t even need to write a clever take on it.
- While Hollywood may be celebrating a summer box office that exceeded last year, there’s a catch: attendance was the lowest in almost 15 years. Inflated 3D ticket prices masked the fact that only 543 million tickets were sold, the lowest total since 1997, when 540 million were sold. Clearly, Hollywood needs a congressional bailout. I mean, it’s that or make better movies, and we know that’s not likely.
Cutting Room provides breaking local and national movie news … complete with added sarcasm. Send any relevant information to film@thereader.com. Check out Ryan on Movieha!, a weekly half-hour movie podcast (movieha.libsyn.com/rss), catch him on the radio on CD 105.9 (cd1059.com) on Fridays at around 7:30 a.m. and on KVNO 90.7 (KVNO.org) at 8:30 a.m. on Fridays and follow him on Twitter (twitter.com/thereaderfilm).