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• io9, a new blog from Gawker Media devoted to all things sci-fi, launched today. Posts relevant to our purposes so far include Six Reasons Why Star Trek Should Stay Dead, Back to What Future? and Diary of a Mad Black Trekkie.
• Vulture sends word that Deitch Projects will host an exhibition later this month built around Michel Gondry’s Be Kind Rewind. The installation will allow visitors to make and watch their own “sweded” films.?? This will be the gallery’s second feat of Gondry art synergy; in 2006, they hosted art by Gondry related to The Science of Sleep.
• 21, directed by Robert Luketic and starring Kevin Spacey, will open the 2008 SXSW Film Festival. David Hudson has early details on the rest of the lineup at the link.
• Mike Jones reviews a few writeups of the Baghdad International Film Festival, which was apparently THE hipster event in Iraq last week. Yes, seriously.
• “Ego overmatches imagination in the work of the vast majority of critics, bloggers and editors,” sniffs The Reeler, who has once again declared war on Top Ten lists.
• Speaking of lists, the Village Voice/LA Weekly Critics Poll is out. Southland Tales, which placed high on the Best Film lists of the Voice’s J. Hoberman and Nathan Lee, also tied The Bucket List as the year’s Worst Film.

Under discussion:

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix  (2007)

Spider-Man 3  (2007)

Transformers  (2007)

Zodiac  (2007)

Michael Clayton  (2007)

Across the Universe  (2007)

Hairspray  (2007)

The Bourne Ultimatum  (2007)

Beowulf  (2007)

Ratatouille  (2007)

Letters from Iwo Jima  (2006)

Enchanted  (2007)

Knocked Up  (2007)

The Kingdom  (2007)

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street  (2007)

Superbad  (2007)

Juno  (2007)

Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story  (2007)

Alvin and the Chipmunks  (2007)

Here is my follow-up to last month’s question of what mainstream movie will feature on the most top ten movie lists. And the winner is … Ratatouille. Oh wait, didn’t I disqualify that one for being too obvious? No? Well, I should have. Yes, according to Movie City News’ Big Ass Chart (aka Scorecard) of critics’ top tens, the Pixar movie made it on to 51 best-of lists, making it the best-grossing best movie of the year. But maybe it wasn’t the most mainstream, if you define mainstream as studio-produced fare. Under that qualification Zodiac was the best mainstream movie of 2007, having been made jointly by Warner Bros. and Paramount and showing up on 70 best-of lists. Other Warner successes include Michael Clayton, which featured on 54 lists, Sweeney Todd, which received 44 mentions, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which showed up on one list, and Letters From Iwo Jima, which showed up a little late on one list.

As far as those mainstream movies I predicted would feature heavily, Knocked Up (34 lists) ended up defeating Superbad (25 lists) — meanwhile, the third Judd Apatow movie of the year, Walk Hard, managed to get on one critic’s list — though both were actually behind The Bourne Ultimatum (28 lists), when it came to “average vote” (average numerical placement on the list). If we’re going by mainstream appeal (and if Karina is correct in her view of the film), then Juno was the best mainstream comedy of the year with 63 lists. Hairspray (13 lists) beat out its crappy musical siblings Across the Universe (7 lists) and Enchanted (8 lists). In addition to showing up on Richard Corliss’ list, Beowulf managed 3 other mentions. And Transformers not only showed up on a top ten list, it featured on 3! Of course, it’s more surprising that Spider-Man 3 made it on 4 lists. The greatest thing to happen, of course, was Manohla Dargis listing The Kingdom as one of her favorites. Joining her is Don Payne. If I had made a top ten list (instead of this thing), the film could very well have beaten Transformers. Oh well, at least nobody put the shocking blockbuster Alvin and the Chipmunks on their list … yet.

Under discussion:

Alvin and the Chipmunks  (2007)

David Cross has written a long blog post justifying his appearance in Alvin and the Chipmunks. He lists four “mitigating factors” (and #4 has a sub-clause, so it’s really five), but it all pretty much comes down to what you’d expect: “indie hipster cred” doesn’ pay for upstate cottages, and he needed the job. An excerpt:

I like to work. I really do…Up to working on Alvin I had not worked in six (SIX!) months. That is an eternity if you’re an actor. Think about not working for two months with no hope of anything on the horizon. Now triple that. It was the longest period without work since after Ben Stiller got cancelled (the show, not the man) and I was going nuts. I was depressed and difficult to live with. I was VERY happy to have the work. Again, no regrets.

Cross basically has to do this (the blog post, not the work) because his fan base consists in large part of post-punk consumerists??????ie: people who themselves enjoy the spoils of consumer culture, but persist on holding their cultural icons to an impossible high standard of “integrity” and commercial purity. This is why we don’t see similar posts from, say Helen Mirren, justifying her choice to follow up her Oscar-winning work in The Queen by playing sexy academic in National Treasure: Book of Secrets. Which is a shame, because I’d love to see her follow in David Cross’ footsteps, and use a New York Times review as evidence for why her fans could/should “suck it.”