Utah Home Inspired by Disney Movie ‘Up’ Sold

A Utah house modeled after the home featured in the animated movie “Up” has been sold to a family who are self-described Disney and Pixar fanatics.

Clinton and Lynette Hamblin of Pentaluma, Calif., are buying the home in Herriman, Utah, for $400,000.

The Hamblins say they were searching for a home in California that was similar to the colorful cottage seen in the movie when they heard about the Disney-approved “Up” house in Utah.

Builder Adam Bangerter has said the blueprints for the house were drawn based entirely on details found in the popular movie.

Much of the home had to be custom-designed.

The house has a stenciled front lawn mailbox, a vibrant exterior paints and colorful murals inside that make it immediately recognizable to “Up” fans.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)

‘Up’ House Replica Boosts Tourism in Utah City

The suburban Salt Lake County city of Herriman says it’s seeing a surge of visitors after a replica of the house in the Disney/Pixar movie “Up” opened to widespread publicity.

The Salt Lake Tribune reports (http://bit.ly/qcS7I6) an estimated 27,000 visitors have come to Herriman since the vibrant green-and-pink house opened this summer. One of the home’s builders, Blair Bangerter, says about 1,000 people visit the home each week.

Herriman’s population is about 20,000.

The 2,800-square-foot, 4-bedroom home is a precision re-creation of the house in the 2009 movie. It features a stenciled mailbox in front of the house that reads “Carl & Ellie” as a nod to the main characters.

Bangerter says he and his brothers — who collectively own Bangerter Homes — wanted to replicate the house because it’s iconic and plays an important role in the movie. They got permission from Disney to use the movie to promote their creation.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)

Secrets of the Oscar Ballot Box

I found this Brisbane Times newspaper article while searching for printable Oscar ballots. Thought I’d pass it along for those who don’t know about the voting process – I sure didn’t!

NOT long after Adam Elliot won an Oscar in 2004, he became a member of the organization that bestowed the award, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. One of the first things he received from the organization was a book of etiquette for members: one of its strictest rules, he says, is that ”you can’t be photographed with false icons”, that is, in the company of giant Oscar statuettes. Copyright rules mean, he says, that you can’t even be photographed with an exact replica.

Membership also means that he can vote for the awards and, once again, there are rules laid down about procedures.

”You’re not meant to accept studio gift baskets and you can’t be taken out to dinner by studios during the Oscar season,” Elliot says.

Living in Melbourne, he says, he is less affected by things like Oscar buzz and hype, which he imagines can be a factor in Hollywood. ”I’ve been there during Oscar season and there’s billboards everywhere with ‘for your consideration’ in giant letters. Even though they can’t send gifts, money talks, and the media saturation for certain films and buzz has to be persuasive, particularly if the audience is in Los Angeles.”

The voting process begins for him in October, when he starts to receive between 60 and 100 DVD copies of films – sent in low-key packaging, without lavish brochures, as decreed by the academy. The organization does not give out names and addresses, so it is up to members to contact studios to be put on mailing lists.

Elliot knows, from his own experience, that this is an expense for low-budget productions to meet – last year when he had a feature film contender, Mary And Max, it cost about $50,000 to send out DVDs.

One year, because of concerns about piracy, he recalls, ”they sent every member a special DVD player that would only play academy-approved encrypted DVDs”, but the experiment was never repeated.

He takes the issue of security seriously in any case, adding: ”I’m paranoid; I destroy them after I have seen them, and I’ll buy a copy of the films I like – I think that’s only fair.”

Sitting down to vote for the first time, he felt a sense of responsibility. ”I realized,” he says, ”that we may have only won by one vote. You feel like you have a lot of people’s careers in your hands. An Oscar does change people’s lives.”

There are more than 6000 members of the academy, which is an invitation-only organisation of film practitioners. The membership is divided into 15 branches, ranging from producers to editors to public relations people. The largest is the actors branch (1183 members), the smallest is make-up artists and hairstylists (118).

The awards were first presented in 1929. While there has been airtight secrecy about the tally since 1940 – a change that took place when the embargoed results were published by the Los Angeles Times ahead of the ceremony – there is less control involved in monitoring the voting.

Five years ago, a reporter quoted Samuel L. Jackson claiming he let his maid and his nanny fill in the ballot papers – something the actor furiously denied ever saying.

There is also an industry joke that ”producers’ wives” are the most consistent voters. Some categories are decided by a designated group of academy members who attend screenings, but otherwise there is no way of knowing who has filled in the ballot, or whether the voter has seen the films.

The Academy Awards are very different, however, from the Golden Globes, Elliot says. Last year, when he submitted Mary and Max for consideration by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, which runs the Golden Globes, he was told he would have to put on a special catered screening for its 80 members. ”I would have to provide a star: could I bring Philip Seymour Hoffman [the voice of Max]?”

He then discovered that Pixar, which was submitting Up, was taking all the members on hot air balloon rides.

Another Australian Oscar voter is director Fred Schepisi, who has been an academy member since the early 1980s. He participates every year, although he regards it as more of ”a bit of fun” than anything else. ”I’m not a lover of awards; I see them as a marketing exercise.”

Schepisi finds it relatively straightforward to make his voting decisions, he says, ”although if it’s a really good year you might have two or three films where you think the direction is pretty well equal”.

And when he watches the Oscars, he generally has two opinions: ”What I think will win and what I think I’d like to win.” There’s generally not much of an overlap.

This story was found at: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/entertainment/movies/secrets-of-the-oscar-ballot-box-20110204-1agub.html

‘Toy Story 3’ Chock Full of Hidden Facts, Movie References

“Toy Story 3” has entertained children and parents alike (and has made at least one childless, unmarried adult male in his thirties cry) to the tune of $110 million dollars in its opening weekend.

Chances are, considering the amount of money the film made over the weekend, that if you’re reading this, there’s a better than average chance you’ve seen the film. If you have, there are a few hidden “Easter eggs” (the cinematic term for meaningful images or references buried in a movie) worthy of a second look. Even if you haven’t seen “Toy Story 3,” it’s worth reading on for some fun facts you can impress your friends with. 

Slashfilm and ComingSoon.net have put together exhaustive lists of the Easter eggs hiding in “Toy Story 3,” and the New Orleans Times-Picayune also did some digging and found a few pieces of trivia that bear repeating. Highlights of those lists include:  

• “A113,” the number of a classroom at CalTech where many Pixar animators studied, shows up as an Easter egg in every Pixar film. In the “Toy Story” series, it’s the license plate on Andy’s mother’s car.

• Sid, the bully from the first movie who wears a skull T-shirt, appears as a garbage man in the new film wearing the same skull T-shirt.

• There’s a postcard on Andy’s dresser addressed from the featured characters from last year’s “Up,” Carl and Ellie Fredrickson.

• Lightning McQueen from “Cars” is referenced a few times throughout the film: A miniature toy car at the daycare center, on a child’s shirt at the center and on a fictional train that shares McQueen’s number, 95. That number is itself an Easter egg, referring to 1995, the year the first “Toy Story” was released.

• A calendar from Pizza Planet is clearly seen. Pizza Planet has appeared in every Pixar film except “The Incredibles.”

• Pixar has a history of hiding a character to be featured in a later movie somewhere in a current film. Nemo first appeared in “Monsters, Inc.” and “Toy Story 3” newcomer, Lots-o-Huggins Bear (who, ironically, is not very huggable), first appeared alongside a bed in “Up.” A poster on Andy’s wall shows a character from next year’s “Cars 2.” It shows Finn McMissile, a British sports car/secret agent who plays a major role in the sequel.

• Buzz Lightyear’s batteries are from “Buy ‘N’ Large,” the giant corporation responsible for ruining the planet in “WALL-E.”

• Totoro, the furry, friendly creature from Hayao Miyazaki’s Japanese animated classic “My Neighbor Totoro,” shows up as a toy that Woody meets. Pixar founder John Lasseter has called Miyazaki an inspiration for his work, and Lasseter produced his most recent film, “Ponyo.”

• A significant amount of the film takes place at a daycare center. At the daycare center, Mr. Ray the Scientific Stingray from “Finding Nemo” makes a cameo. Nemo himself appears as a sticker on Andy’s toybox.

• “Toy Story 3” director Lee Unkrich performs one line in the movie, as the voice of the Jack in the Box character.

• The “Toy Story 3” screenplay took 2 1/2 years to write and storyboard.

• John Ratzenberger keeps his streak alive of appearing in every single Pixar film made to this point. For “Toy Story 3,” he reprises his role as Hamm.

• Ken, voiced by Michael Keaton, was based on a 1988 version of him called “Animal Lovin’ Ken” which included his “own chimpanzee to care for and love.” Um, okay. The Barbie featured in the film is based on a 1983 version titled “Great Shape Barbie.”

• Ken wears 21 different outfits in the movie.

• Woody has 229 animation points of movement in his face. Buzz has 215 animation avatars in his face.

• There are 302 characters in the film.

“Toy Story 3” marks the best opening weekend in the history of Pixar, which is quite a feat, considering all eleven Pixar films have opened as the number one in their respective weekend. “Toy Story 3” is the first film in the “Toy Story” series to be released in the very lucrative 3D format. Considering the added cost per ticket, plus the demand to see the film, it’s little surprise that “Toy Story 3” is on pace to pass the $400 million mark in domestic box office.

Found via Yahoo!

‘Avatar,’ ‘The Hurt Locker’ lead Oscar nominations

Complete list of 82nd Annual Academy Award nominations announced Tuesday:

1. Best Picture: “Avatar,” “The Blind Side,” “District 9,” “An Education,” “The Hurt Locker,” “Inglourious Basterds,” “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire,” “A Serious Man,” “Up,” “Up in the Air.”

2. Actor: Jeff Bridges, “Crazy Heart”; George Clooney, “Up in the Air”; Colin Firth, “A Single Man”; Morgan Freeman, “Invictus”; Jeremy Renner, “The Hurt Locker.”

3. Actress: Sandra Bullock, “The Blind Side”; Helen Mirren, “The Last Station”; Carey Mulligan, “An Education”; Gabourey Sidibe, “Precious: Based on the Novel `Push’ by Sapphire”; Meryl Streep, “Julie & Julia.”

4. Supporting Actor: Matt Damon, “Invictus”; Woody Harrelson, “The Messenger”; Christopher Plummer, “The Last Station”; Stanley Tucci, “The Lovely Bones”; Christoph Waltz, “Inglourious Basterds.”

5. Supporting Actress: Penelope Cruz, “Nine”; Vera Farmiga, “Up in the Air”; Maggie Gyllenhaal, “Crazy Heart”; Anna Kendrick, “Up in the Air”; Mo’Nique, “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire.”

6. Directing: James Cameron, “Avatar”; Kathryn Bigelow, “The Hurt Locker”; Quentin Tarantino, “Inglourious Basterds”; Lee Daniels, “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire”; Jason Reitman, “Up in the Air.”

7. Foreign Language Film: “Ajami,” Israel; “El Secreto de Sus Ojos,” Argentina; “The Milk of Sorrow,” Peru; “Un Prophete,” France; “The White Ribbon,” Germany.

8. Adapted Screenplay: Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell, “District 9”; Nick Hornby, “An Education”; Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci, Tony Roche, “In the Loop”; Geoffrey Fletcher, “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire”; Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner, “Up in the Air.”

9. Original Screenplay: Mark Boal, “The Hurt Locker”; Quentin Tarantino, “Inglourious Basterds”; Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman, “The Messenger”; Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, “A Serious Man”; Bob Peterson, Pete Docter, Tom McCarthy, “Up.”

10. Animated Feature Film: “Coraline”; “Fantastic Mr. Fox”; “The Princess and the Frog”; “The Secret of Kells”; “Up.”

11. Art Direction: “Avatar,” “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,” “Nine,” “Sherlock Holmes,” “The Young Victoria.”

12. Cinematography: “Avatar,” “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince,” “The Hurt Locker,” “Inglourious Basterds,” “The White Ribbon.”

13. Sound Mixing: “Avatar,” “The Hurt Locker,” “Inglourious Basterds,” “Star Trek,” “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.”

14. Sound Editing: “Avatar,” “The Hurt Locker,” “Inglourious Basterds,” “Star Trek,” “Up.”

15. Original Score: “Avatar,” James Horner; “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” Alexandre Desplat; “The Hurt Locker,” Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders; “Sherlock Holmes,” Hans Zimmer; “Up,” Michael Giacchino.

16. Original Song: “Almost There” from “The Princess and the Frog,” Randy Newman; “Down in New Orleans” from “The Princess and the Frog,” Randy Newman; “Loin de Paname” from “Paris 36,” Reinhardt Wagner and Frank Thomas; “Take It All” from “Nine,” Maury Yeston; “The Weary Kind (Theme from Crazy Heart)” from “Crazy Heart,” Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett.

17. Costume: “Bright Star,” “Coco Before Chanel,” “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,” “Nine,” “The Young Victoria.”

18. Documentary Feature: “Burma VJ,” “The Cove,” “Food, Inc.” “The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers,” “Which Way Home.”

19. Documentary (short subject): “China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province,” “The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner,” “The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant,” “Music by Prudence,” “Rabbit a la Berlin.”

20. Film Editing: “Avatar,” “District 9,” “The Hurt Locker,” “Inglourious Basterds,” “Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire.”

21. Makeup: “Il Divo,” “Star Trek,” “The Young Victoria.”

22. Animated Short Film: “French Roast,” “Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty,” “The Lady and the Reaper (La Dama y la Muerte),” “Logorama,” “A Matter of Loaf and Death.”

23. Live Action Short Film: “The Door,” “Instead of Abracadabra,” “Kavi,” “Miracle Fish,” “The New Tenants.”

24. Visual Effects: “Avatar,” “District 9,” “Star Trek.”

Kellene’s 2010 Oscar Nomination Predictions

 Getty

So here we go again. We’re in the middle of awards season with the granddaddy of them all still several weeks away. Academy Award nominations will be announced on February 2^nd. Until then it’s up to analysts (and psychics) to discuss and ultimately guess who will get a nod.

And that’s where I come in!

I do this to stretch my brain. I don’t work for PricewaterhouseCoopers; I don’t have some inside track. I just want to see how well I can guess. And the best way to prove my intentions is to post them on the web. Where else? The time stamp is proof I posted beforehand.

Best Picture

Up

Up in the Air

Avatar

The Hurt Locker

Nine

Precious

Inglourious Basterds

The Hangover or The Blind Side

A Serious Man

An Education

New rules this year stipulate there will be TEN best picture nominees. Yes, you read that right – ten! The first five possible nominees were somewhat easy to choose, but it’s the second set that may doom me. Should ‘The Hangover’ be nominated? I really don’t think so, but when you widen the net it really could be nominated.

Best Actor

Jeff Bridges – Crazy Heart

George Clooney – Up in the Air

Robert Downey Jr. – Sherlock Holmes

Morgan Freeman – Invictus

Colin Firth – A Single Man

I’ve been on the fence for this one for months – until I saw Sherlock Holmes in early January. I was absolutely taken aback by Downey Jr.’s performance. It was nice seeing him back in his element. He deserves to win, but I also thought Mickey Rourke also deserved to win last year. (Instead Sean Penn won for Milk.)

Best Actress

Sandra Bullock – The Blind Side

Meryl Streep – Julie & Julia

Gabrourey Sidibe – Precious

Helen Mirren – The Last Station

Carey Mulligan – An Education

All year I’ve said Meryl Streep would win (and she still could); did you hear this woman’s voice as Julia Child? Oh my God, to die for! Only she could bring her to life as how we all remember her.

But now that some time has passed I’m starting to lean more towards Sandra Bullock. Ms. Streep has been nominated 1,000 times before and although the academy adores her, it’s nice to see someone else come up the ranks.

Best Supporting Actor

Matt Damon – Invictus

Christoph Waltz – Inglourious Basterds

Stanley Tucci – The Lovely Bones

Woody Harrelson – The Messenger

Alfred Molina – An Education

No one really stood out for me until I kept seeing Christoph Waltz keep winning awards. Gotta go with him.

Best Supporting Actress

Anna Kendrick – Up in the Air

Mo’Nique – Precious

Penelope Cruz – Nine

Vera Farmiga – Up in the Air

Diane Kruger – Inglourious Basterds

I think this category has got to be a no-brainer unless you have lived under a rock this pas year.

Best Director

James Cameron – Avatar

Jason Reitman – Up in the Air

Kathryn Bigelow – The Hurt Locker

Lee Daniels – Precious

Quentin Tarantino – Inglourious Basterds

Is there really any doubt on this one? The man disappeared for a decade only to resurface to break his own record! He now has directed two top grossing films of all time! If James Cameron doesn’t win I’ll lose all faith in humanity! (Mental note: pray things I write come true!)

Best Animated Feature

Fantastic Mr. Fox

Coraline

The Princess and the Frog

Pixar produces fabulous movies, but I think Up will get a best picture nod thanks to the new 10 nominee rule. With that said, this category really opens up to other interesting choices. I gotta go with the Fantastic Mr. Fox. (But notice I’m also banking on there will be three nominees like in years past.) We’ll see what happens.

AFI Ranks Top Ten Movies, Shows of 2009

“The Hangover” isn’t the type of movie that usually wins awards, but there it is among the critically-acclaimed films on the American Film Institute’s top 10 movies of the year.

The AFI doesn’t rank the movies in any kind of order.

In addition to “The Hangover,” the list also includes “Up in the Air,” “Up,” “Precious” and “The Hurt Locker.”

Rounding out the top ten are “A Serious Man,” “A Single Man,” “Sugar,” “Coraline” and “The Messenger.”

Meanwhile, “Glee” and “True Blood” are on the American Film Institute’s list of the top 10 TV shows of the year.

“30 Rock” didn’t make the cut this year.

Other shows on the list include “Mad Men,” “The Big Bang Theory,” “Modern Family,” “Friday Night Lights,” “Big Love,” “Nurse Jackie,” “The Number One Ladies Detective Agency” and “Party Down.”

(Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)

Cannes Fest Names 20 Films in Competition

This year’s Cannes film festival will pit a roster of festival veterans, including four former winners of the glamorous film competition’s top prize, against challengers from emerging cinema hotbeds from China to the Philippines.

Quentin Tarantino, Ken Loach, Jane Campion and Lars von Trier, each of whom has won top honors at the prestigious festival on the French Riviera, are all presenting their newest films in the competition scheduled to run from May 13 to 24.

Tarantino, who won the festival’s top prize, the Palme d’Or, for “Pulp Fiction” in 1994, is in the competition with “Inglourious Basterds,” an action flick starring Brad Pitt featuring Jewish soldiers dishing out chaos among the Nazis.

Festival President Gilles Jacob said the 62nd edition of the Cannes festival would focus particularly on independent cinema. Speaking at a news conference in Paris, Jacob, who has been involved in shaping the festival’s selection of films for over three decades, said he wanted to counter the idea that independent cinema was dead.

“There’s a trend emerging, especially among certain Anglo-Saxon commentators, that takes as established fact the death of auteur cinema …,” Jacob said. “These films supposedly have no more viewers, so they are becoming extinct.”

Jacob said that the 20 films in competition for the Palme d’Or as well as another 19 films in a secondary competition called “Un Certain Regard” would demonstrate that creative, inventive and energetic filmmaking survives, even if it is more likely to be found today in Bucharest, Tel Aviv and Hong Kong than in Los Angeles, New York or Paris.

Another former Palme d’Or winner in competition this year is Britain’s Ken Loach, with “Looking for Eric,” starring soccer great Eric Cantona. Cantona plays himself in a film about a soccer fan who imagines the former Manchester United goal scorer helps him deal with life’s difficulties.

Loach’s film “The Wind that Shakes the Barley,” won Cannes’ top prize in 2006.

Jane Campion, the New Zealand director whose “The Piano” took the Palme d’Or in 1993, is back with her new film “Bright Star,” about 19th century English poet John Keats’ love affair with his muse Fanny Brawne.

Denmark’s Lars von Trier, who won a Palme d’Or for “Dancer in the Dark” in 2000, will try for another top prize with “Antichrist,” a horror movie that depicts Satan, rather than God, as the world’s creator. It stars Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg.

This year’s competition also features Cannes veterans Pedro Almodovar and Michael Haneke.

Spain’s Almodovar, who won Best Director at Cannes in 1999, will present his new film “Broken Embraces.” It recounts the tale of a writer and director telling the story of an accident that left him blind 14 years earlier and a torrid relationship with an actress — played by Penelope Cruz.

Austrian director Haneke, whose “The Piano Teacher” won Cannes’ second-highest award in 2001, is in the competition with “The White Ribbon.” The black-and-white film is set in a German village on the eve of World War I.

Park Chan-wook, the South Korean director who took Cannes’ Grand Prix, the second-highest award, in 2004 with his gory “Oldboy,” is back in competition with his new film, “Thirst” — about a priest who becomes a vampire.

Another Asian entry comes from Johnnie To, the prolific Hong Kong director who has shown four of his films at Cannes since his “Breaking News” was screened out-of-competition in 2004.

This time To is in contention for top honors with “Vengeance,” a thriller starring French rock legend Johnny Hallyday as a father who tries to avenge the death of his daughter, her husband and their children.

Oscar-winning filmmaker Ang Lee’s new movie “Taking Woodstock,” is set against the background of the Woodstock music festival 40 years ago.

Pixar’s ‘Up’ to Open 62nd Cannes Film Fest

There will be an animated opening for this year’s Cannes Film Festival.

Organizers say the festival’s opening-night film will be “Up,” a 3-D animated feature from hitmaking studio Pixar.

The film is a comedy adventure about a 78-year-old man, voiced by Ed Asner, who rigs helium balloons to his house and flies to South America.

It marks Cannes’ return to a populist curtain raiser after last year’s bleak opener, “Blindness,” and is the first animated film to open the world’s most prestigious film festival.

The festival said Thursday that “Up” would have its world premiere at the festival on May 13 and open in the United States on May 29.

The Cannes Film Festival runs from May 13 to 24.

(Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)