Hanks Switches from Badger to Muskrat Wig For Da Vinci Sequel

This just in! Apparently still smarting from the cavalcade of criticism over the dead animal he stapled to his head for 2006's The Da Vinci Code, Tom Hanks has apparently released the subterranean dwelling vermin into the wild and glued a much tamer muskrat to his dome for the upcoming sequel Angels & Demons currently filming in Rome. No word on whether fellow badger abusers John Travolta and Steven Seagal will follow suit and let their own cranial critters scurry back to the forest from whence they came. Animal rights activists are hot on Hanks' trail nonetheless.

"We think it's a shame that a person of Mr. Hanks' stature would deliberately enslave a defenseless creature for the sole purpose of performing in a film," PETA spokesperson Ronald Barr said, "When you consider all the synthetic alternatives one could use for hair augmentation, it shouldn't matter if it's a land-bound or aquatic mammal. Animals should not be adhered to a human's head for vanity's sake."

God Loves George Clooney

By Special Mung Hour correspondant Double-S

I finally have to take umbrage with the otherwise brilliant idontlikeyouinthatway.com because it's clear that either 'Jenny' or 'Todd' simply doesn't understand what it is to be Clooney. Honestly, I can only dream of what it must be like, but I do know why the former Batman spent a year with an obvious skank.

One, he can presumably afford the best rubbers in the world. Two, it's evident she'd let him do anything to her for one more week of free room and board in one of his homes. Anything. You date Cameron Diaz or one of those snooty Victoria's Secret models, there will be limits. It's evident from the pictures of her that she'd have no trouble with:

"Look sweetheart, I just paid $4,000 at Christie's for Linda Harrison's costume from Planet of the Apes. I've thrown down some hay in the back of the garden shed. Put the rawhide panties on, go out there and take a nap and later, after I've had a few Grey Gooses and a Viagra, I'm going to come out and cornhole you while Richard Kind shoots us with a garden hose. Any problems with that?"

"No, George. That'll be fine."

Yeah, I'm sure the first two or three times Tom Brady peeled off Giselle Bunchen's panties, it was the kind of joy/terror the rest of us can only experience in the wake of surviving intense military combat. Now, TMZ follows the poor whipped bastard around and takes pictures of him buying Tampax for her.

You don't see a dejected Clooney shuffling around a Tarzana RiteAid at 8am on a Sunday praying some pap doesn't show up to snap him putting a jumbo box of Kotex on his platinum Amex. Why? Because he is Clooney and Clooney doesn't do that kind of shit. I'm sure you're thinking, "But, you haven't addressed why this Oscar winning actor/director would spend a year of his life with an obviously ignorant stripper/hooker/waitress."

Actually, I have. Though Tom Brady is twenty years younger, he spends all his time running for his life from Ray Lewis, Bridget Moynahan's lawyers, and Giselle's personal assistant. He's praying for death every time he lines up against the Pittsburgh Steelers, because he was too arrogant and stupid to man-ram anonymous tramps. Nope, he had to go all Romo and date famous actresses. Babyfaced bastard even impregnated one. If only Terry Bradshaw or Joe Montana could've intervened in time.

Meanwhile, George associates himself with the kind of woman he can leave handcuffed to a bed for three hours while he goes and plays a game of pick up basketball. At the end of the day, what's she gonna do? Leave him? Boo hoo. And once he's defiled her in every way possible, he calls James Woods to give him first dibs on sloppy seconds and proceeds to find a NEW skank!

RIP Skank Du Jour. See you in the pages of Penthouse or online at www.seewhatgeorgesaw.com.

You Were a Tomato! (R.I.P. Sydney Pollack)

Sydney Pollack's feature directorial debut was directing the other great Sydney, Poitier in 1965's The Slender Thread. He went on to direct 20 more films before he passed away on May 26, 2008. A lot has already been said this past week by colleagues and journalists, particularly that he was "an actor's director." So often, this moniker is bantered about, but rarely does it truly apply. Pollack was one of those rare directors who was also a damn good actor. Though he may have started his life in showbiz as an performer, he was not a Redford or a Costner who became a star first, then jumped into the director's chair. He was a director first, and a damn good actor second.

That said, it's only fair that The Mung Hour allow some of the very characters he directed to speak directly about the man.

Dorothy Michaels - from 1982's Tootsie: "He was relentlessly pushing me to be sexier, as if to say that the woman I was wasn't good enough for him to begin with. Well, if that were true, you macho shithead, then why did you have me in this sexist pic to begin? Shame on you, Sydney Pollack. If I had a cattle prod, I'd zap your balls in front of your wife and kids. That would curl that Brillo pad head of yours. Shame on you!"

Katie Morofsky - from 1973's The Way We Were: "Wouldn't it be wonderful if we were old? Then we could say we survived all this. Everything thing would be uncomplicated, the way it was when we were young? Then Sydney, you would still be alive."

Attorney Michael Colin Gallagher - from 1981's Absence of Malice: "You know something? When you kill yourself, it's a homicide, so they do an autopsy. They'll get a knife. They start here. They're gonna split her open. Up here they use shears. Shears, for Christ's sake! Don't let them do that to you, Sydney!!"

Mitch McDeere - from 1992's The Firm: "Hey Sydney, wouldn't it be funny if I went to Hollywood, you went to jail, and we both ended up surrounded by crooks?"

Iron Man Fans to Indy Fans: Our Film is Gonna Kick Your Film's Ass!

Well, here we are, a week away from May 3rd, the day that kicks off the insanity of Summer Movies '08. Apparently, the Iron Man fans are lining up accordingly, sitting in lawn chairs amongst the tent town of fellow 20-something men, sucking down cans of Rock Star by the dozens, not a female to be found anywhere, and all eager for the premiere of Robert Downey Jr. in his new suit of metal.

Remarkably absent are the throngs of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull fans competing with them for valuable sidewalk real estate. That film opens a few weeks later, yet there's not a single 265lb. fedora-and-bomber-jacket-clad groupie at the theaters. Could the George Luca$ fanboy machine be slowing with age, or did the sanguine distaste of the Star Wars prequels ruin the fans' orgasmic anticipation for years to come? Sadly, gone are the days where you would see a film like The Phantom Menace and wade through a sea of Jedi, Princess Leias, Darth Vaders, farts and body odor.

The Iron Man fans are a younger breed of 'cool dorks' who choose to distance themselves from the slavish, Indy fans who lap anything up from their 1980's youth, particularly the waning Spielberg and Luca$ era. The I.M. fans view themselves as working professionals and comic book aficionados, some with real girlfriends they met in college or from co-workers' boardgame nights.

One Iron Man supporter we interviewed for this article, had this to say while standing outside a Burbank cinema in 85 degree heat while moviegoers blew past him to see Forgetting Sarah Marshall, "I think most of us here resent being mentioned in the same sentence as those internet shut-in, Indiana Jones fans. What a bunch of fa*gots. I mean that franchise is soooo twenty years ago. Harrison Ford is a total pot-head lush. That film is gonna blow. Everyone knows that Iron Man is the sh*t! "

Pausing for a swig from his 64oz. Slurpee, he went on to say, "Indy's just gonna suck balls. Like I'm supposed to give a sh*t that Shia LeBoef's in it? He was alright in Transformers but who cares? My dad might want to see it, so I'll probably be dragged along with he and my little brother who won't have a f*cking -- can I say f*cking? Won't have a f*cking clue who the f*ck Indiana Jones is. Cate Blanchett is kinda hot, but she's had too many kids and that wig makes her look like this creepy lebanese (sic-lesbian) I knew in college. Anyway, Iron Man is THE movie to see. Which is why we're here staking our claim to get the good seats."

When asked how asked how he felt about relinquishing their sidewalk claim after Iron Man actually opens, one of his sleeping-bagging buddies chimed in, "No, dude. We'll be right back in line Monday morning for the new Batman flick."

He was referring to the Batman sequel, The Dark Knight which won't open until July 18th, nearly three months from now. Invariably, they are stocking up on Pringles, Dr. Pepper and Pork Rinds for the wait.

Original Idea: Hot Blonde Makes Lemonade Out of C-Cup Lemons

The trailer for The House Bunny, the remake of the intense courtroom drama, Legally Blonde has hit the net. Wait, it's not a remake. My apologies. The legal team at The Mung Hour has informed me that this is NOT a remake. It is an 'homage'. My sincere apologize for suggesting anything of the sort.
Hailing from Adam Sandler's Happy Madison Productions, this daring new indictment of how women are viewed in society is a new form of cinematic thriller and destined to sweep the awards in 2009. One is awestruck by the audacity for a major studio like Sony to produce a fish-out-of-water story about a blonde-haired bimbo teaching everyone around her how to shop and wear Manolo Blahnik shoes. How could such an original concept be greenlit is a mighty question indeed and one we should all applaud.
This film boasts an impressive pedigree of seasoned dramatic actresses like American Idol's Katherine McPhee, in her screen debut, as well as Rumer Willis, who will be joining Chelsea Clinton and Alexa Rae Joel in the new reality show, "God Has a Sense of Humor".
After you watch the trailer, you all can judge as to which film this movie is ripping of-- paying homage to:
A) Blonde Ambition
B) Revenge of the Nerds
C) Sister Act
D) Real Genius
E) Apocalypse Now
F) All of the above

Don't Vomit on Prom Night

Somewhere in the ether, I see a prison where incarcerated movie projects drag their chains through their prison cells, praying for a quick death at the box office gallows. Today we have another inmate shuddering with fear under the same thunderous cry of its fellow movie inmates, "REMAKE WALKING!"

Prom Night opens in theaters nationwide starring Brittany Snow in the role that six people will remember. Half of those people will think, "Damn, that Tara Reid still looks pretty good." Personally, I'd prefer to remember Brittany as the white supremacist hottie on FX's Nip Tuck who nearly burned her face off trying to bleach the ethnicity from her skin. So, here she is headlining another in a string of 70s/80s teen horror films being remade by the Michael Bays of the world.

To rail against these reprobate remake flicks is noble but pointless. Get over it. It's like getting mad at Rush Limbaugh for saying "liberals" five times a minute or glaring at Simon's v-neck sweater on American Idol. Remakes are here to stay, or at least until every movie ever made gets remade. Then, the extra chromosomes of remaking a remake will brew up an in-bred stew ruled by the divine grandchildren of Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta Jones. Andy Warhol will dance in his own grave.

So instead of raging at the lack of creativity in Hollywood, I say we pity these poor prisoners, these films destined to either a swift box office hanging or home video purgatory. Then again, if a film costs $30 million to produce and market then makes its money back at the box office with profits from DVD sales, there really are no last rites to speak of.

We really can't wait for the remake of Ghoulies. Opening scene is at the Minnesota International Airport where one of the man-eating creatures pops out of a toilet in use by a horny Idaho Senator. That's entertainment.

Never Too Late to Give An Oscar-Winner Career Advice

(Special Contributing Mung Hour Writer - Double-S)

 

George Clooney needs to start thinking about a commercial film and soon. I understand he's carving out an Eastwoodian niche for himself as he moves into late middle-age, but he's leaving out one important component that was/is crucial to Eastwood's unprecedented longevity. Hit movies.

Clint interspersed his artistic endeavors with very profitable films. Clooney is really not bolstering his artistic side with reliable commercial productions. The Ocean's franchise limped to a close last summer. He needs something less quirky that will make money. Leatherheads was DOA six months ago when they delayed it. The Cohen Brothers movie is also going to be too quirky. He needs to try for these kind of mid-budget thrillers/dramas that Denzel takes to the bank every eighteen months.

I'm sure George will be calling me soon to ask for my help ...