I just borrowed a movie from my university library, and the cover of the DVD case reminded me of a query I've had for a long time about DVD cover/advertisement design. The movie is called The Island. It stars Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson. And here's the thing: On the front of the DVD case, under the name Ewan McGregor is Scarlett Johansson, and under the name Scarlett Johansson is Ewan McGregor. Is this a mix-up? This has seemed, to me, to be a sign of a shoddily-made, generally crappy movie, but I liked this one. What's the deal? Thank you.
Answered general questions about movies, TV and more
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I wanted to submit this to the general questions page, since it is about more than one Disney movie. Has anyone ever explained why several Disney characters have deceased mothers (Belle, Snow White, etc.)?
Answer: Partially, it may be attributed to feelings of guilt over the death of Walt and Roy Disney's mother of carbon monoxide poisoning in the house they'd just bought her a month previously (For more on that, check http://www.snopes.com/disney/waltdisn/mother.asp), however, it's also a trope of children's literature to have the protagonists be orphaned or without one or the other parent, the better to go off on adventures without anyone worrying about them.
I am looking for a movie that was a direct to DVD movie. It had 3 or 4 stories in it. I remember the first story had a man fighting toy soldiers in his penthouse apartment. The last story had a couple where their car broke down in a small town. The town was being run by dead celebrities (Elvis was the sheriff) and the celebrities forced the visitors to stay and watch them perform every night. Anybody know the name of this movie?
Chosen answer: These stories were not from a movie, but from an anthology series called "Nightmares and Dreamscapes" that was shown on TNT in 2006. All of the episodes are based on Stephen King short stories. The first one you mentioned is called "Battleground" and the second one is called "You Know They Got a Hell of a Band".
I'm looking for the title of a show that has a scene in a stark white hospital room. The man is completely covered in bandages except for his nose and his eyes. He is in traction. A fly lands on his nose and his eyes go back and forth watching the fly. He is completely immobile except for his eyes. Can someone help?
Chosen answer: Could be the last scene of Daredevil, where the injured Bullseye is seen doing precisely that.
I am looking for a movie about a teen that finds this government weapon (like a blow torch zap gun) and he uses it on his dad after he kills his golden retriever named Axel. The government is chasing him and in the end he is killed. Anyone know the name of this movie? I have been searching for years. Late eighties or early nineties.
Chosen answer: Sounds like it might be Deadly Weapon (1989) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097171/.
I am looking for the name of a 1980's movie (I believe). I don't remember much, but i do remember the weapon and the hero had to go on a journey to rescue a lady. The weapon was a silver star with blades that popped out. The movie is not "Legend" with Tom Cruise.
Answer: Sounds like "Krull" from 1983. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085811/.
I saw a movie at school in the 1980's in which the main character is a bank robber. There is a cop or Fed on his trail for years. This man finally turns his life around and settles down in a small town. But, the cop shows up on the same day a child gets trapped in an airtight bank vault, that will be unopenable for days. If he saves her the cop will know who he is, but he cracks it open and saves the girl anyway. It's NOT "No Deposit, No Return". In the movie I'm looking for: there was no kidnapping in the movie, the movie took place over years, it was a drama not a comedy. Does anyone know the name of this movie?
Chosen answer: I think that movie is called The Safecracker, and the robber's name in the movie was Jimmy Valentine.
In what movie from the 1970s or 80s did a television network create reality shows where people were hunted to the death and where other terrible things were programmed? It was not "Network."
Answer: Sounds like the 1987 Schwarzenegger film The Running Man.
I can't remember much about this movie, since I only saw the last ten minutes, but it looked interesting. All that I can recall was that it seemed to be children's movie, and the villain was called the Ice Queen. After her inevitable defeat, the heroine says something along the lines of "but Winter passes. It passes." I think the heroine had a brother as well. It was most likely an '80s or '90s film but could also be '00s.
Chosen answer: Is it possibly Snow Queen (2002)? It's story about the passing of seasons in a fantasy style.
A film called The Lion and the Horse was made in 1952. Want to know where to get one please.
I'm looking for the title of a movie where some kids go into a movie with dinosaurs. They do this using their parents invention of a remote control to go into the television. Once in this world they have to help the hero dinosaur become a hero. The movie was live action, not a cartoon.
Chosen answer: Adventures in Dinosaur City.
I'm looking for a movie I seen made in the late 80's or early 90's the movie set is mostly in the woods and they have these teams of people who are playing a game and when they get to each mark they have to punch a hole in the thing showing that they been there and towards the end of the movie they have a guy who dresses in a bear suit on a motorcycle to stop some people who I think is trying to take that place from him all I can remember is they had a woman with reddish color hair in it the man looks like Jason Gedrick when he was younger but its not him and at the end of the movie the red hair woman has the bear suit on riding the motorbike?
Answer: It's a movie made in 1988 called State Park aka Heavy Metal Summer, with James Wilder. People are trying to dump toxic waste in the park.
I have seen some people create online petitions to try and stop a show from being cancelled or to bring a show back. Do the creators of TV shows ever pay attention to these petitions? Has an online petition ever successfully brought a show back or stopped one from being cancelled?
Answer: Online petitions are just one form of fan-base pressure and it's certainly true that shows have been saved from the axe by the fan community, if sometimes only briefly. Sliders was cancelled after its first season, but fan pressure prompted the studio to continue with it and it ultimately ran to five seasons. Jericho was likewise cancelled after season one, but got a short second season after protests, but was subsequently cancelled again. Farscape was cancelled after four seasons, but plans to destroy the sets were put on hold, at least partly due to fan pressure, which ultimately paved the way for a mini-series entitled "The Peacekeeper Wars", which tied up many of the remaining plot threads from the series. Fan pressure can work and online petitions are a part of that, although not really one of the most effective methods as they would be more ignorable than organising a mass letter-writing campaign to the studio. But every little bit helps.
I actually didn't see this movie myself, but I heard someone talking about it once. It was about a woman who died and she was an organ donor. Her boyfriend/husband wanted to kill everyone who got parts of her body, and there was a character who got her eyes. I think I heard about it in the 1990s, but I don't know if it came out then. Does anyone know what movie it might be?
Answer: The movie is called Blink.
Despite the creation of the PG-13 rating, certain films of the late 1980s such as Spaceballs, Big, Beetlejuice and Eight Men Out received PG ratings despite one use of the f-word. What was the first film to be rated PG-13 just for one use of the f-word?
Answer: From the IMDb: Flamingo Kid, The (1984): The first film to be given a PG-13 rating. It was shelved for five months, however, making Red Dawn (1984) the first film to be *released* with a PG-13 rating.
There was a movie that came out five to ten years ago that I had always wanted to see but, when I looked for it, could never find it. The starring man was a retired thief who was hiding out in a nursing home as a resident. One of the woman care takers finds out who he is and threatens to give him up unless he helps her with her own robbery. I'm quite sure it was a comedy. That's it, all I know.
Answer: It was called 'Where the money is' and stars Paul Newman.
There is only one scene I remember from this movie. An African American girl was, I think, trying to get home to her dying grandmother. For some reason she was in a subway station, on a pay phone calling home, and the family told her that she probably wasn't going to get home in time to see her grandmother alive. So she told them to put the phone to the grandmother's ear, and she sang a song. A group of young people overheard and were laughing until they realized something was wrong. Hopefully someone will know the name of this movie.
Answer: This was a HBO series called "Subway Stories".
I remember seeing a trailer for a movie on TV, where a car is going down the road and runs head-on into another vehicle. The car breaks into a bunch of pieces and goes around the other car (I believe it's a semi-truck) and the car forms back together and keeps driving. Any idea what movie this is from?
Chosen answer: That was the 2006 movie, The Covenant.
How does one "direct" an animated film?
Chosen answer: In the same way as you direct a normal film. The director is responsible for taking the script and turning into a visual depiction of the story being told - they determine the artistic and dramatic elements of the piece, giving the world depicted in the script a visual and audible form. In a live action film, they'll be working with lighting people, cameramen and so forth to ensure that the look of the scene matches their vision. With an animated film, they're doing the same thing, but are working with the animators instead. The basic principle is no different.
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Answer: These are two totally unconnected items that you're discussing. McGregor is the lead and the biggest name in the film, so his name appears first, just as it will in the credits of the film itself. As for the picture, that's purely down to aesthetics, how they felt the cover image looked best. The cover designers aren't going to limit themselves by constraints about having to match the image of the individual to where their name appears, they'll go with what they think is the better image. If the image and name order happen to match up, that's a happy accident, nothing more than that. If they don't, no big deal.
Tailkinker ★