No news today. Light posting through the weekend. Enjoy the holiday weekend and don’t blow off any appendages.

Top Story: Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs is heating up the box office. The third film in the animated franchise beat the seemingly unbeatable Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen on Wednesday, taking in $14 million compared to the robot film’s $10 million.  (Variety)

In Other News: Sony has moved the release dates for two of its upcoming comedies. The Adam Sandler picture Grown Ups has moved from March of 2010 to June 25, 2010, while Seth Rogen-starrer The Green Hornet was shifted to July 9, 2010. (Variety)

The video game Asteroids is getting a movie. (THR)

And the movie Grease is getting a video game. (Variety)

Fin.

Karl Malden has died. The Hollywood star won an Oscar for his role as Mitch in A Streetcar Named Desire and was nominated for his role as Father Barry in On the Waterfront. He was 97.

It looks like a Soderbergh film but feels like a Coen brothers. movie. The Informant stars Matt Damon as a white collar worker at an agricultural conglomerate who blows the whistle on his company’s price-fixing scheme.  It’s a comedy. A dark comedy. And a thriller. Hopefully it’s everything Burn After Reading should have been.

The Informant, starring Matt Damon, directed by Steven Soderbergh, opens Oct. 9.

(500) Days of Summer (2009)–**

You should know up front this is not a positive review. It’s not a negative review either. But if you take (500) Days of Summer seriously, I guess you could say it’s a “real” review.

This Marc Webb film longs to find something genuine in its tale of two lovers while wrapping the picture in a tired faux-indie package. It’s a romance made for middle-class hipsters, people who are smart enough to recognize a nod to Bergman but who would rather not experience his films. If that’s you, then you’ll probably love this movie. For most audiences, (500) Days of Summer) is a film with some good times and great moments, but it’s certainly not the one movie we’ll be spending the rest of our lives with.

Read the rest…

Top Story: Bill Nighy has let the cat out of the bag. The self-described “only British actor who hasn’t been in Harry Potter” will finally join the series. No word yet on who he is playing, but some reports indicate that he’ll be Rufus Scrimgeour, who succeeds Cornelius Fudge the Ministry of Magic at the end of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Price.  Scrimgeour also appears in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. (The Independent)

In Other News: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences invited 134 entertainment professionals to join its ranks yesterday, including Hugh Jackman, Emile Hirsch, Emily Blunt, Jane Lynch, Melissa Leo, and Seth Rogen. (THR)

Opening Today:
Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
Public Enemies

Fin.

Top Story: When you title your movie Unstoppable, you’re asking for an ironic turn of events. It looks like director Tony Scott and Denzel Washington’s once fast-tracked runaway train picture has been forced to hit it breaks. Fox is concerned over the budget and Washington’s high price tag, along with an action-heavy screenplay, has the studio ready to put the movie on hold. The lousy box office results for the most recent Scott-Washington picture, The Taking of Pehlham 123, could also be a factor. (THR)

In Other News: Amy Adams is in negotiations to join Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale in the David O. Russell-directed boxing flick The Fighter. (Variety)

Michelle Trachtenberg and Kevin Smith’s buddy Jason Lee have joined Smith’s upcoming action comedy A Couple of Dicks.  The film stars Bruce Willis and Tracy Morgan. (Variety)

And in remakes that will piss people off news, Dimension Films has snagged the rights to John Landis’ An American Werewolf in London, setting the cult classic up for a remake. (THR)

Fin.

Top Story: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen brought in $201 million to score the second highest 5-day opening of all time. The critic-proof blockbuster came within $2 million of toppling The Dark Knight’s $203 million 5-day record.  Worldwide, the film debuted with $387 million. (erc BoxOffice)

In Other News: The Academy Awards ceremony is undergoing quite a makeover.  After last week’s news that there would be 10 Best Picture nominees, the AMPAS announced that it is tweaking the Best Original Song category so that there could possibly be no nominees at all. The Academy will also move the honorary Oscar presentations from the live broadcast to a black-tie gala in November. Stay tuned for more news on the Academy’s self-destructive pandering. (Variety)

Fin.

Top Story: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen scored the biggest non-opening Thursday of all-time yesterday. The big Baygasm took in $27 million, putting it well ahead of Spider-Man 2’s $23 million gross.  Only Star Wars: Episode III, The Matrix Reloaded, and Star Wars: Episode II had bigger Thursdays, but on the day of their actual release. (Variety)

In Other News: The already massive Valentine’s Day cast just got a little bigger. Topher Grace, Emma Roberts and Hector Elizond have joined Garry Marshall’s rom-com. Julia Roberts, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Alba, Jessica Biel, Jennifer Garner, Shirley MacLaine, Bradley Cooper, Katherine Heigl and Ashton Kutcher had previously joined the cast. (THR)

Universal has kicked Richard Curtis’ latest film, The Boat that Rocked, over to Focus Features after a disappointing run overseas. The film will now be released in November under the specialty banner instead of on Aug. 28 as originally planned. (Variety)

Opening Today:
My Sister’s Keeper
Away We Go (wider)

Fin.

Time reports that Iranian television is airing a 9-hour marathon of The Lord of the Rings in order to keep protesters off the streets.

From Time:

In normal times, Iranian television usually treats its viewers to one or two Hollywood or European movie nights a week. But these are not normal times, so it’s been two or three such movies a day. It’s part of the push to keep people at home and off the streets, to keep us busy, to get us out of the regime’s hair. The message is “Don’t worry, be happy.” Channel Two is putting on a Lord of the Rings marathon as part of the government’s efforts to restore peace.

This is definitely a positive. Americans and Iranians have more in common than most people would like to believe. I’m just glad our elections aren’t decided by some panel of partisan jurists.