You’ll never guess what the villain in the new movie “Man on a Ledge” does for a living.

No, Ed Harris’ character isn’t a crusading journalist, a nonprofit executive or a green energy czar. He’s a… wait for it… super rich real estate developer out to smite the common man. Harris plays him with all the requisite sleaze the Oscar winner can muster, which is plenty.

It’s Donald Trump without the unfortunate hair, but more importantly, the role represents Hollywood’s latest attack on the rich. It’s a trend already seen in recent fare like “In Time,” “Tower Heist,” and “A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas.”

“Ledge” producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura told The Huffington Post that the film’s choice of villain is no accident.

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The price those the left label as apostates pay is always a high one. Their very identity is questioned, and these attacks are always ignored by the same MSM that labels facts, such as the record number of food stamp recipients under President FailureTeleprompter, as racist. Moreover, heaven help a comedian who aims a little satire at the gay community, but once again, openly sexist, racially-charged attacks against leftist apostates are always met with the media’s approval in the form of complicit silence.

Crystal Wright is an accomplished commentator and writer who holds a  Masters from Georgetown. But she just happens to be black and female and Republican, so therefore …. this gets fired out to nearly a quarter of a million people:

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Ms. Wright wrote about what happened at Freedoms Journal:

What’s curious is no other race, White, Hispanic or Asian, gives over 90% of their vote to one party but blacks. In exchange for this block vote, Democrats, including President Obama, our first black president, take the black vote for granted each election cycle because they don’t have to work for it.

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NEW ‘TERMINATOR’ FILM TO BE R-RATED

That’s the ONLY news on ‘Terminator 5.’ Nothing else is really happening, just a tweet from the woman funding the film.

This might be heresy, but I thought “Terminator 3″ was damn good and could care less about the rating. The story was tight, held my attention, surprised at the end, and contained all kinds of superb action scenes. “Terminator: Salvation,” on the other hand, was utter crap; a third act right out of a Sy-Fy Channel movie.

Worry about the storytelling. Let that process take you to the rating, not the other way around.

MONTY PYTHON MEMBERS SET TO REUNITE FOR SCI-FI COMEDY ‘ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING‘

“Life of Brian,” “Meaning of Life,” and “Holy Grail” are all brilliant, but something happens to these guys as they get older. They lose their comedic edge and just get meaner towards “safe” targets, and an obvious political correctness seeps into their work:

“a group of aliens who endow an earthling with the power to do ‘absolutely anything’ to see what a mess he’ll make of things — which is precisely what happens. There’s also a talking dog named Dennis who seems to understand more about the mayhem that ensues than anyone else does.”

Who knows where this could lead, but let’s hope that self-importance is off limits. As a Christian and Catholic, it’s an honor to get my butt kicked by the boys in the trio of films listed above because the films are clever, not mean-spirited, avoid preaching, and come from a  less fascist time when it was still okay to make fun of everyone.

Because liberals ruin everything, that’s just not the case today.

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“Man on a Ledge” is a tight little crime thriller—a heist-movie variant—with a few small problems and one big one. Given the top-notchness of the supporting actors here assembled—Ed Harris, Jamie Bell, Anthony Mackie, Titus Welliver—the casting of doughy Sam Worthington in the lead seems crucially ill-advised.

True, Worthington was also the nominal star of James Cameron’s “Avatar”; but really, who will ever think of that techno-epic as a Sam Worthington film? The mildly amiable Aussie is a stranger to star power, and putting him at the center of this picture is like building a fancy banquet around a main course of vanilla pudding.

In any case, the character Worthington has been called upon to play would challenge many a more resourceful actor. Nick Cassidy is a disgraced New York City cop, framed for a high-profile jewel theft and consigned to Sing Sing for a very long stretch, who escapes his warders, returns to Manhattan, checks into a room on the twenty-first floor of a midtown hotel, climbs out the window, and then spends most of the rest of the movie huddled on the titular ledge, in what we at first take to be suicidal despair. This constrained situation offers little opportunity for physical or emotional expression, and it shines a cruel light on Worthington’s charisma deficit.

Still, there’s some snappy action going on all around him. The script, by Pablo F. Fenjves—a star-bio specialist whose literary credits include ghostwriting the reviled O.J. Simpson murder book If I Did It—is a compendium of nicely tweaked genre clichés.

Read the full review at Reason.com

Another Sensei call streak reached double digits last week. Looking ahead, things will only get more unpredictable at the box office. Or, as Master Iron Fist puts it, “more fun.”

This weekend’s predictions and revenue results go as follows:

1. The Grey ($15 Million) – This wilderness action film falls right in place for its target audience and is receiving strong critical reviews. That should allow enough momentum to take the top spot. Be warned. Liam Neeson has very strong box office appeal in action films (“Unknown,” “Taken”), and has a solid history of beating box office projections.

2. Underworld Awakening ($12.4 Million) - The sci-fi sequel continues to do well and is hunting at an “Underworld Evolution”-like box office pace. Look for another solid runner-up finish for Ms. Beckinsale–A.K.A. “Ms. January.” (more…)

What will it take to finally bring humankind together, to unite us all in respect and appreciation and a sense of shared purpose? How about a pack of vicious wolves intent on tearing us to bloody shreds? Judging by “The Grey,” director Joe Carnahan’s new deep-freeze thriller, that might do it.

The best thing about this movie is its shivery hypothermic vérité, a credit to the skill of cinematographer Masanobu Takanayagi, working under what must have been very trying conditions.

The story is set in the snow-blown wastes of Arctic Alaska, and the brutally frigid environment, with its attendant sub-zero temperatures, is vividly depicted—the actors, haloed in clouds of breath condensation, really appear to be freezing. (The picture was actually shot in northern Canada—not a tropical getaway in any event.)

The main characters are part of a group of oilfield roughnecks who were en route from their remote worksite for two weeks of R&R elsewhere when their shuttle plane took a dive into the icy tundra, leaving them suddenly either stranded or dead. Only eight men have survived. Fortunately, one of them is Liam Neeson, whose warm, hefty presence would be reassuring in any predicament. His fellow survivors are a traditionally mixed bunch: a couple of nice guys (Dermot Mulroney and Dallas Roberts), one wiseass (Frank Grillo), and one gentle fellow (Nonso Anozie) who clearly shouldn’t be making any long-range life plans.

Read the full review at Reason.com

Tonight marks the end of a tumultuous five-season run for the NBC action-comedy/spy-drama series Chuck, from creators Josh Schwartz and Chris Fedak.

The story of “Chuck” revolves around computer service technician Chuck Bartowski, played by Zachary Levi, who inadvertently becomes a CIA/NSA asset when his former Stanford roommate turned CIA operative downloads the only copy of a secret government database, the Intersect, directly into Chuck’s brain. The government assigns two agents to protect and work with Chuck, CIA Agent Sarah Walker (Yvonne Strahovski) and NSA Major John Casey (Big Hollywood’s own Adam Baldwin).

The supporting cast includes Chuck’s best friend Morgan (Joshua Gomez), sister Ellie (Sarah Lancaster), brother-in-law Devon (Ryan McPartlin) and fellow computer technicians and lackeys Jeff and Lester (played to comedic brilliance by Scott Krinsky and Vik Sahay). Guest stars over the years have included Chevy Chase, Scott Bakula, Linda Hamilton, Timothy Dalton and Carrie-Anne Moss.

The cast worked incredibly well together which, when combined with good writing and interesting storylines, produced a series that was extremely entertaining and kept me watching from the first episode. For whatever reason, the show was never able to draw in a large audience and slipped in the ratings in each subsequent season.

Chuck was able to stave off cancellation numerous times thanks to a very vocal and loyal, but unfortunately small, fan base who mounted multiple “Save Chuck” campaigns. If not for a unique sponsorship deal with the Subway restaurant chain, the series would have never even seen a third season. A deal between production company Warner Brothers and NBC for a 13-episode fifth season was only struck to get to the minimum syndication threshold of 88 episodes, which brought the series to a total of 91 episodes.

I recently spoke with Big Hollywood contributor Adam Baldwin about the series, its finale airing at 8 p.m. EST tonight and being a conservative in Hollywood.

How did you get involved with “Chuck?”

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Yes, the Woody Allen screen persona is well-known and established, but the actor does play different characters within that persona. Sometimes it’s just a few degrees off and hardly perceptible to the naked eye, but his Isaac Davis in “Manhattan” is noticeably unique. Isaac is something of an innocent, an unassuming man whose unwavering integrity comes naturally.

In a city like Manhattan, this, of course, might lead to his downfall, and the genius of Allen’s absolutely brilliant screenplay (Marshall Brickman co-wrote) is how this story is all about driving towards the film’s final line, a beauty of a closer that perfectly hits every cinematic sweet spot right before the fade:

“You have to have a little faith in people.”

Another of Isaac’s weak spots (and much of the film’s humor) comes from his inability to suffer pretentious, elite, liberal intellectuals. This is what likely cost him his first two wives, both of whom were pretentious, elite, liberal intellectuals. Overall, though, when we first meet him, Isaac is doing just fine. He’s making good money as a television comedy writer, is a loving father to his son, and his close friends — the married Yale and Mary (Michael Murphy and Anne Byrne Hoffman) — have taken him under their wing like a kid brother.

Isaac isn’t perfect; he is involved in a love affair with Tracy, a 17 year-old high school student. In his defense, she is more mature than he is and he refuses to lie to her. He’s very open about the fact that eventually she will have to move on with her life, that she has to experience life without him, and that what they have together isn’t permanent.

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Katherine Heigl could have been the next Meg Ryan, Hollywood’s new rom-com sweetheart. She was beautiful in an approachable way and could break our hearts with one crooked, well placed smile.

But the “Grey’s Anatomy” standout trashed the movie that started her big screen career, “Knocked Up,” and caused a ruckus on the set of her ABC hit series by pulling herself out of Emmy competition because she didn’t think she was given award-winning material.

She’s been doing damage control ever since.

How far has she fallen? Her latest film, “One for the Money,” opens tomorrow without critical reviews. That’s a sign the studio knows it has a clunker on its hands. Making matters worse, the discount company GroupOn is offering special deals on “Money” to help boost the film’s opening weekend ticket sales.

Last weekend, Heigl appeared on the cover of USA Weekend looking prim and apologetic next to a dog. She’s practically begging audiences to reconsider her as a movie star, but it didn’t have to go down this way.

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Will Ferrell should still be apologizing for “Land of the Lost.”

Instead, he’s making excuses for President Barack Obama’s first term.

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The increasingly political “Saturday Night Live” alum is co-chairing a Feb. 15 fundraiser for the president’s re-election campaign. But you have to be a one percenter to afford the entrance fee – $35,800 each. Let’s hope that includes Ferrell wearing his cheerleader outfit for some high-energy kicks and jumps.

The bigger issue is getting Obama re-elected, and Ferrell argues the president’s case with a little fuzzy math.

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Even people who recoil at “Saturday Night Live’s” inability to hit the Left as hard as the Right will admit the show’s sketches look great.

Terrific makeup. Top-flight impersonations. Impressive production values.

Actor Justin Long proves in his latest video that’s he’s not ready for prime time, “SNL” style.

Long is partnering with far-left MoveOn.org to play up the already discredited meme that former Gov. Mitt Romney likes to fire people. “SNL” beat Long to the punch, but the “Live Free or Die Hard” star doesn’t want to let it go.

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The Sundance Film Festival is where one-percenters gather to hurl stones at haughty, out of touch (Republican) politicians whom they claim are hurting the ninety-nine percenters. This year a curious thing happened: Gene Simmons rolled in and cleaned house.

The bassist for KISS, who can always be trusted to speak his mind and who, unlike many other entertainers, actually has something to say, gave us his take on Robert Redford, President Barack Obama, and Mitt Romney.

Regarding Redford’s statements against one-percenters, statements that only Occupy Wall Street types could love, Simmons said:

He means well, he’s a great guy. But it’s a bit hypocritical, since he’s part of the one percent, to address the 99 percent.

Simmons then went to speak to that fact that he doesn’t like all the class warfare, all the dividing of people into different camps.

Either we are all Americans, or you’re going to fall victim. This is the reason why the old Roman Empire died, it fell from within. Division from within is one of the stupidest things you can do.

Regarding Obama, Simmons basically called him a rookie, and stated anew his regret for supporting him in 2008.

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STEVEN SPIELBERG MIGHT PART RED SEA FOR WARNER BROS.

Which Spielberg will show up to direct this one? If it’s the “Munich” Spielberg, the moral illiterate who sees an equivalency between Islamists who target the innocent and Israelis who target those who target the innocent — no thanks.  If it’s the “Saving Private Ryan” Spielberg, the moral illiterate who told us saving a single man was  ”the one decent thing we were able to pull out of this whole godawful, shitty mess” also known as World War II — no thanks.

RUSSELL BRAND WILL STAR IN ANOTHER MOVIE — A FAMILY COMEDY

After the remake of “Arthur” flopped rather spectacularly, Hollywood is proving once again they are just about tapped out of stars. Brand is THE most unlikable, charmless, and creepiest guy Hollywood has ever tried to turn into a leading man. And not creepy in a Karloff, Lugosi, Lorre kind of way — not creepy in a way that delights. You wouldn’t let him near your daughter. He should be doing extra stand-ins as Prisoner Number Five in insane asylums.  But here we go again.

EVANGELINE LILY CHATS ABOUT ‘THE HOBBIT’

If she manages her career well, Evangeline Lily has, in my humble opinion, what it takes to be a genuine star, a real box office attraction like Sandra Bullock. She’s undeniably talented, looks great on the big screen (see “Real Steel”), and her presence has the exact right qualities: strong, intelligent, sexy, womanly, approachable, and she carries herself with dignity.

She reminds me of Elizabeth Banks before she did the sleazy “Zack and Miri Make a Porno.”

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This week on HomeVideodrome, Hunter reviews Haywire, Shame, and Warrior, Jim has cedar fever, and we plow through a cornucopia of new releases.  Head on over to The Film Thugs to check it out.

Okay, so I was a little hard on Real Steel when it came out.  Revisiting it, I still stick by most of my criticisms, as I still find it irritating that the intelligence level of the Hugh Jackman and Dakota Goyo characters varies to insanely disparate levels whenever the script finds it convenient.  Goyo’s screechy kid-who-talks-and-thinks-like-an-adult is also excruciating (the fault of the writing and directing, not the child actor), and their robot Atom’s suggested sentience is nothing less than a ploy to attempt to make the audience care whenever he gets pounded on.  And no matter how nifty the CGI robot boxing is, nothing can compare to the dramatic potential of two actual humans fighting in the ring for family, country, or dignity.  But when it comes to the stock fanboy line of the greatness of “robots hitting each other,” “Real Steel” trumps Michael Bay’s cynical “Transformers” films on every level.

“Real Steel” has a heart that has hints of saccharine, but the film has a touch of middle Americana that is lacking from mainstream movies today, and despite its shortcomings, the father/son story does have a potent emotional core that pays off when it should.  “Transformers” has none of these things, as Bay is only interested in boys and their toys, said toys including cars and women.  “Real Steel” has higher aspirations that don’t have the stink of pseudo-family-friendly misogyny and vapid materialism.

Hugh Jackman is such a likable lead that he’s laughable when he’s attempting to be unlikable like he is during the first act of “Real Steel”, however Jackman’s potent presence alone keeps this from ever actually hurting the movie.  He’s entertaining to watch, even in the worst movies he’s been in, as he was one of the few things that made Gavin Hood’s dreadful “Wolverine” something one could feasibly sit through from start to finish. The humanity Jackman brings as an actor pumps blood into the heart of “Real Steel”, more so than the undercooked boy-and-his-robot sub-plot could hope to.  The father/son relationship a the movie’s center is marred by an obnoxious child performance, but it hits the necessary emotional beats that help one overlook the painful dialogue fed to the child actor, as well as the delivery seen as acceptable by the director.  Because it it hits those beats, it manages to mask most of its flaws, giving the movie an emotional core that is lacking in most blockbusters.

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Hard for me to imagine, but I am now 41. Amazing. It seems like yesterday my poofy mullet and parachute pants were all the rage, and Prince had a #1 hit on the radio. Now I’m married to the most beautiful woman, raising six children, and living the American dream. Our country has changed so much since my days of fighting with Carol and Ben on TV. America has always been known as “the land of the free” and “the home of the brave.” It’s the richest, freest nation the world has ever seen. Everyone wants to live here. But as I look around, I’m left with a sinking feeling that America is losing her way. Big time. The soul of our country is sick, and history shows me we are headed for disaster if we don’t change course now.

I’ve been looking around for answers, but all I hear is noise. Everyone is pointing fingers at the Left or the Right, blaming Hollywood or Capitol Hill. Time is flying by too quickly for petty arguments. My children’s future won’t wait. I’ve got to do something now.

Here’s my hunch: Could it be that we have simply forgotten what made us such a great nation in the first place? So many people are waiting around for our leaders to come up with a grand plan to save our nation. But is that really how America got started? What if things actually work the other way around? What if real change doesn’t start at the top but at the bottom? What if the best place to begin transforming our country is not the Oval Office but the dinner table?

For the past year and a half, I’ve been making a film called “Monumental,” and I am thrilled to announce that it’s coming to theaters on March 27. We are creating a live, one-night national event in 500 theaters where audiences can experience a monumental moment together. Then we will release the film in theaters in select cities, while providing helpful new resources to families, churches, and schools who want to go further with what they’ve experienced in the film.  (more…)

Just like four years ago, another group of legendary Obama 1 percent supporters have stepped forward to lend a creative hand to help the President raise money for his 2012 bid for reelection. Last time around it was “Runway to Change.” This time the design-for-Obama group effort has been dubbed “Runway to Win.”

Anna Wintour, the Vogue editor that hosted Obama’s supporters in her New York townhouse and who recently co-hosted a $35,000 per person fundraiser at Hollywood movie mogul Harvey Weinstein’s home, is heading up the venture. In the past, Wintour’s tony political functions were attended by the likes of Alicia Keys and $70,000 dinner power couple Coldplay singer Chris Martin and his actress wife, the “suddenly everywhere” Miramax “muse,” Gwyneth Paltrow.

So with Wintour now raising reelection funds, you can just forget the $5 raffle tickets for a hot dog dinner with Barry and Shelley. Instead, the campaign will be hawking designer duds to people who, last time around, were in such dire straits they hoped the new president would fill their gas tank and pay their mortgage.

For her latest effort, Anna Wintour has recruited Hollywood notables, designers, pop and hip-hop artists, and other all-around really rich people to raise money for Barack 2012 by designing overpriced T-shirts, tank tops, scarves, wristlets, and bags to sell at inflated prices to people who, in the midst of an Obama recession, really can’t afford them.

Thus, “Runway to Win” is yet another example that Barack Obama and his helpful circle of elite Hollywood friends and Seventh Avenue designer devotees are all pretty much insulated from reality, out of touch, and oblivious to the plight of the common man.

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Everything’s not coming up Rosie for the former Queen of Nice.

Rosie O’Donnell’s new OWN talk show is still struggling to find its audience. So the minds at Oprah Winfrey’s nascent network decided to start the new year with a fresh executive producer and set.

Shane Farley, who worked with O’Donnell on her previous Emmy-winning syndicated talker, The Rosie O’Donnell Show, has come on as executive producer … Farley has more than 15 years of experience producing talk shows, most recently Rachael Ray. The Rosie Show kicked off 2012 with a new smaller and brightly-colored set. It fits about 70 audience members, about a fifth of the original set, and is inspired by Rosie’s art studio at her home in New York….

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The Stop Online Piracy Act resistance continues to draw players from both sides of the ideological aisle.

This week, the Free Press Action Fund blasted MPAA President Chris Dodd for threatening to cut off money to politicians who dared to block the unpopular legislation.

As a result, the media reform group wants politicians who previously pocketed Hollywood cash to return those checks, or at the least send the money to a charitable cause instead.

It all started with a tersely worded statement Dodd gave to Fox News regarding SOPA, according to a press release Free Press fired off this week:

After Congress shelved two controversial Web-censorship bills, Dodd told Fox News: “Those who count on quote ‘Hollywood’ for support need to understand that this industry is watching very carefully who’s going to stand up for them when their job is at stake. Don’t ask me to write a check for you when you think your job is at risk and then don’t pay any attention to me when my job is at stake.”

Free Press Action Fund President and CEO Craig Aaron made the following statement:

“The MPAA is so brazen in its efforts to buy legislation with campaign cash that its leader, himself a former senator, sees nothing wrong with threatening legislators on national TV. We think it’s time that Congress showed that its votes are no longer for sale. The first thing Congress must do is give back the MPAA’s tainted campaign cash or give it to charity. Congress must make it clear to the world that it won’t be bullied into supporting censorship.

“Last week’s unprecedented grassroots uprising, in which millions mobilized against the Stop Online Piracy Act and the PROTECT IP Act, clearly got Washington’s attention. And we’ve since seen dozens of legislators scrambling to show they were really against these bills all along. But the real test is whether they will put their money where their mouths are by returning the MPAA’s dirty money.”

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The upcoming Comedy Central series “Key & Peele” got some viral video love earlier this month with a sketch reminding us just how cool, tough and awesome President Obama is.

Just ignore those pesky economic statistics, the flotilla of broken campaign promises and the roiling state of the world. Last night, the show’s co-hosts took to Twitter to ramp up their Obama defense during the State of the Union speech.

Caution: the language is pretty salty, although, to be fair, some of the Tweets are funny. Here’s just a short sample of what the pair fired off last night during Obama’s speech:

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