Movie Cricket

Movie blogger Bill R., writer of the blog "The Kind of Face You Hate," posted a correction today to his blog — something about Robin Williams — and it's very easy to understand how he could make that mistake.

Especially if you've seen the ads for "Old Dogs."

(HT: Movie City News)

Scott Foundas, movie critic at LA Weekly (and one of the Cricket's Sundance Film Festival pals), is leaving the critic game to become associate program director at the Film Society of Lincoln Center, the folks who run the prestigious New York Film Festival.

This follows the recent hiring of former Newsweek critic David Ansen to be artistic director of the Los Angeles Film Festival, and former Variety critic Robert Koehler getting a job with AFI Fest.

“I’m repeating what Robert Koehler said to me, ‘like a lot of critics, I had a couple of fingers in the seasonal festival pie,’ " Foundas told IndieWire. "[He and I] have co-programmed here in L.A., and in this line of work, you often whisper in the ears of programmers. I’ve enjoyed moonlighting as a programmer, and when this opened at the Film Society, there was just this sense that this was the right move.”

Anne Thompson, writing in her Thompson on Hollywood blog (also at IndieWire), asserts that Foundas' hire means "film criticism is a dying art. As one of the best critics working today, Foundas should be anticipating a long and happy career. He’s giving it up to program movies. This should not happen. He’s looking to survive."

Thompson is looking for silver linings, though. She suggests that Foundas could, "unless he screws up," eventually be running the New York Film Festival. She also thinks she knows who could replace Foundas at LA Weekly: "Ex-Spout critic Karina Longworth should send her resume forthwith. She’ll have plenty of competition from all the other critics who lost their jobs this year."

For the first time since the category was created in 2001, the animated-feature race for the Academy Awards will have five nominees.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences today announced the 20 animated features that will be eligible for the Oscar. Academy rules say that if there 16 or more eligible films, five can be nominated — but if there are 15 or fewer eligible films, only three can be nominated.

Here are the 20, and don't be shocked if you've never heard of some of them:

• “Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel” - Computer-animated follow-up to the 2007 film, opens Dec. 23
• “Astro Boy” - Computer-animated update of the Japanese manga character, in theaters now.
• “Battle for Terra” - CGI sci-fi drama, opened in May.
• “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” - Computer-animated comedy about a food-making machine going berzerk, still in theaters.
• “Coraline” - Henry Selick's stop-motion adaptation of Neil Gaiman tale of a girl finding a parallel world. Opened in February, now on DVD.
• "Disney's A Christmas Carol” - Robert Zemeckis' motion-capture CGI version of the Dickens classic, in theaters now.
• “The Dolphin – The Story of a Dreamer” - Peruvian computer-animated undersea adventure. No U.S. release dates listed.
• “Fantastic Mr. Fox” - Wes Anderson's stop-motion adaptation (pictured) of the Roald Dahl book, opens nationally on Nov. 25.
• “Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs” - Computer-animated continuation of the popular franchise, opened in July.
• “Mary and Max” - Clay-animated drama (which opened the 2009 Sundance Film Festival) about a pen-pal relationship between a little girl and a man with Asperger's. Released in October, in theaters in larger cities and via IFC's on-demand cable service.
• “The Missing Lynx” - Computer-animated animal adventure from Spain. U.S. release date pending.
• “Monsters vs. Aliens” - Computer-animated adventure/comedy about a group of monsters battling alien invaders. Opened in March, released on DVD in September.
• “9” - Shane Acker's computer-animated drama about mini-creatures in a post-apocalyptic society, opened in September.
• “Planet 51” - Computer-animated comedy about an astronaut landing on an alien planet, opens Nov. 20.
• “Ponyo” - Hayao Miyazaki's cell-animated adventure about a boy who discovers a girl who used to be a fish, opened in August.
• “The Princess and the Frog” - Disney-produced cell-animated fairy tale (pictured), a twist on the classic "Frog Prince" story, opens Dec. 11.
• “The Secret of Kells” - Irish cell-animated story of a boy trying to complete the mystical "Book of Kells." No U.S. release date announced.
• "Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure” - Computer-animated Disney story starring the famous fairy from "Peter Pan." Released on DVD in October; had brief theatrical run in L.A. to qualify for Oscars (increasing the odds that Disney's other entries — "Up," "A Christmas Carol" and "The Princess and the Frog" — could get nominated).
• "A Town Called Panic” - French stop-motion story of plastic cowboy and Indian toys learning to get along. No U.S. release date announced.
• “Up” - Pixar's computer-animated story of a man who sends his house airborne, with an eager Wilderness Explorer as a stowaway. Opened in June; DVD released this week.

When a filmmaker is run through the sausage grinder that is a movie publicity campaign, things start to repeat themselves.

Especially, the questions asked by reporters tend to repeat themselves.

Director Jason Reitman ("Thank You for Smoking," "Juno") has been making the rounds promoting his new movie, "Up in the Air." As he has been fielding journalists' questions, he's noticed the same questions keep coming up again and again.

So Reitman compiled the questions and put them into pie-chart form on his Twitter feed:

If there's a lesson here, it's that entertainment reporters need to get out of their pack mentalities — or movie studios have to give reporters more time with filmmakers so they can get past the most frequently-asked questions and have a real conversation.

Longtime Newsweek film critic David Ansen — who took a buyout in March 2008 (and is No. 31 on the Cricket's list of "The Departed" movie critics) — has a new gig.

Ansen has been picked as artistic director of the Los Angeles Film Festival, set for next June. According to the Los Angeles Times, Ansen will oversee a programming staff that will select about 80 dramatic and documentary feature films from some 5,000 submissions.

"In a lifetime of watching movies, I've basically been a programmer in my own virtual film festival all of my life," Ansen told the L.A. Times. "It's so strange to be on the other side. But I think it will be an exciting and nice change."

Ansen's new boss, festival director Rebecca Yeldham, is a movie producer ("The Kite Runner") and a former programmer for the Sundance Film Festival.