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The History of American Cinema: 2008

1/1 -

Paramount enjoys the highest percentage of market share in 2007 – the first time since 1998 that it has won such status – with an annual domestic gross estimated at approximately $1.48 billion.   For the first time ever, six major studios pass the $1 billion mark.  [MORE]

1/1 -

The four top-grossing movies in the US in 2007 are Spider-Man 3 ($336.5 million), Shrek the Third ($321 million), Transformers ($319 million) and  Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End ($309.4 million).   It is the first time that four films make more than $300 million in one year. [ADD]

2/1 -

Andrew Piddington’s The Killing of John Lennon, a dramatic reconstruction of Mark Chapman’s murder of the singer, is released amidst accusations of exploitation.   Jonas Ball stars as Chapman. [ADD]

2/1 -

Domestic box office ticket sales for 2007 total a record of between $9.62 billion (Neilsen EDI and Rentrak) and $9.68 billion (Media By Numbers), a 4% increase on the previous year. [ADD]

2/1 -

The most popular illegal movie download of 2007 via BitTorrent is Michael Bay’s Transformers, according to web site TorrentFreak.   Next most popular: Knocked Up, 300, The Bourne Ultimatum. [ADD]

2/1 -

Universal Pictures report that 2007 was the company’s most successful year in its near-100 year history.   Its worldwide theatrical gross amounted to $2.133 billion ($1.099 domestic).   [MORE] 

3/1 -

An unidentified member of the board of the striking Writers Guild of America denies reports on L.A. Weekly columnist Nikki Finke’s Deadline Hollywood Daily blog that top film screenwriters are planning a secret meeting to form a coalition to force the WGA to accept the same deal agreed to by the Directors Guild of America. [MORE]

3/1 -

It is announced that Italian director Bernardo Bertolucci is to receive a star on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame on 19^th February 2007.   Other Italian artists who have received stars include Rudolf Valentino, Anna Magnani, Arturo Toscanini, Enrico Caruso and Sophia Loren. [ADD]

7/1 -

The National Society of Film Critics vote Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood the Best Picture of 2007.   Anderson also wins Best Director for the film. [ADD]

7/1 -

Top stars like Julia Roberts, Keira Knightley and Johnny Depp are reported to be prepared to boycott the Golden Globes Awards ceremony on Sunday 13^th January in support of striking writers. [MORE]

7/1 -

Johnny Depp is named Top Money Making Star for the second year running in the 76^th annual Quigley Publishing Co. poll.   Second was Will Smith, followed by George Clooney, Matt Damon and Denzel Washington. [ADD]

7/1 -

WGA negotiators claim that Nikki Finke was the victim of a hoax after she claimed on her Deadline Hollywood Today blog last week that some screenwriters were joining forces to accept any deal negotiated between the Directors Guild and the studios. [ADD]

8/1 -

This year’s Golden Globe Awards are cancelled and replaced with a press conference to announce the winners. [MORE]

8/1 -

A six-year legal battle between screen tough guy Steven Seagal and his former business partner Julius R. Nasso settle with an out of court settlement. [MORE]

10/1 -

Organisers of the Golden Globe Award announce that the awarding of the prestigious Cecil B. DeMille Award to Steven Spielberg will be delayed until the 2009 ceremony following the cancellations of this year’s event. [ADD]

10/1 -

The WGA calls off its Los Angeles Awards show which is due to be held on the 9^th February. [ADD]

11/1 -

Rob Reiner’s The Bucket List, in which Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman star as a pair of terminally ill men on a road trip, is released. [ADD]

13/1 -

Atonement (drama) and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (comedy/musical) win the best film awards at this year’s severely truncated Golden Globe Awards. [ADD]

13/1 -

Screenwriter Roger Avary is charged with vehicular manslaughter and driving under the influence after a passenger in his car dies following a car crash in Los Angeles. [MORE]

14/1 -

George Clooney offers to mediate between the striking Writers Guild of America and the major Hollywood studios. [ADD]

14/1 -

Wesley Snipes’ trial for tax fraud and conspiracy begins in Ocala, Florida. [MORE]

14/1 -

86-year-old Arthur Swerdloff, writer, director and producer of more than 120 documentary and educational films, dies of a stroke in Los Angeles.   Swerdloff’s award-winning films included The Earth Sings (1951), Out of Darkness (1951), Heart Behind the Whip (1959) and Conquest (1959) [ADD]

15/1 -

25-year-old actor Brad Renfro is found dead at his home in Los Angeles. [MORE]

15/1 -

Howard Washington, the off and on car park attendant at Warner Brothers Studio from 1929 to 1994 dies of pneumonia in Los Angeles at the age of 98. [ADD]

16/1 -

A four-year-old video in which Tom Cruise speaks about his Scientology beliefs is leaked onto the internet. [MORE]

17/1 -

Three DEA agents file a $55 million lawsuit against Universal Pictures, producers of American Gangster, for defamation. [MORE]

18/1 -

Matt Reeves’ monster movie, Cloverfield, opens to reasonable reviews and good box office.   Lizzy Caplan, Jessica Lucas, T. J. Miller and Michael Stahl-David star as members of a small group terrorised by a rampaging monster in New York. [ADD]

18/1 -

Woody Allen’s Cassandra’s Dream is released to mixed reviews.  Ewan McGregor and Colin Farrell star as brothers who turn to crime – and against one another – because of financial problems. [ADD]

18/1 -

Actress Lois Nettleton dies of lung cancer in Woodland Hills, California at the age of 80.   The Emmy-winning actress made her official debut in 1962, although she had a bit part in Elia Kazan’s A Face in the Crowd.   Her film roles included Period of Adjustment, The Man in the Glass Booth and The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. [ADD]

19/1 -

Actress Suzanne Pleshette dies of respiratory failure in Los Angeles at the age of 69.   She had suffered from lung cancer since 2006, when she had part of a lung removed and underwent chemotherapy. [ADD]

22/1 -

Australian-born actor Heath Ledger is found dead in his SoHo apartment.   The 28-year-old was discovered lying naked on his bed by the building’s housekeeper and Ledger’s masseuse.   A bottle of sleeping pills were on the cabinet beside the bed.   Originally cast in juvenile roles, Ledger’s career took a more serious turn recently with his role in Brokeback Mountain.   He had recently completed filming of the latest Batman film, The Dark Knight, in which he stars as the Joker.  [MORE]

24/1 -

Film producer Gerald Green and his wife Patricia are freed on bail after pleading not guilty to Federal bribery charges in Los Angeles.   They were arrested on 17^th December for bribing a Thai government official to obtain contracts to run the film festival in Bangkok. [ADD]

25/1 -

Rambo, in which Sylvester Stallone reprises the role of John Rambo for the first time in 20 years, is released.   The film, which Stallone also directs, is set in Burma where our hero assembles a group of mercenaries to find the missing members of a Christian Aid mission.   The 91-minute film contains 11 minutes of credits. [ADD]

25/1 -

Jason Friedberg’s low-brow spoof comedy Meet the Spartans recoups its production costs in its first weekend.   The film beats Sylvester Stallone’s Rambo into second place at the domestic box-office.  [ADD]

27/1 -

The winners of the Screen Actors Guild are announced. [MORE]

30/1 -

Actress Sean Young checks into an unspecified rehab centre after being forcibly ejected from this year’s Directors Guild of America Awards for unruly behaviour. [MORE]

1/2 - 

RKO announce the launch of subsidiary Roseblood Movie Co, which will remake eight classic horror films originally made when Val Lewton headed RKO’s low-budget horror unit in the 1940s. [MORE]

1/2 -

Wesley Snipes is found guilty of failing to file his taxes for five years by a Florida court, but is acquitted of tax fraud and filing a false claim as well as three misdemeanour counts of wilful failure to file a tax return. [MORE]

3/2 -

The Coen Brothers’ No Country for Old Men wins the Best Film Award at this year’s Producers Guild of America ceremony. [ADD]

3/2 -

The unreleased drama Kings of the Evening wins best film, best director (Andrew P. Jones), and best supporting actor (Glynn Turman) at this year’s San Diego Black Film Festival awards.   The film stars Tyson Beckford as an ex-con finding life difficult on the outside after completing a two-year sentence. [ADD]

4/2 -

3D movie Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert breaks box office records on its opening weekend. [ADD]

5/2 -

Actress Rebecca De Mornay is sentenced to a three-month rehabilitation programme after pleading guilty to driving under the influence in October 2007. [MORE]

6/2 -

The New York Medical Examiner rules that actor Heath Ledger died from an accidental overdose. [MORE]

10/2 -

Actor Roy Scheider, best known for his role as the police chief in Steven Spielberg’s Jaws, dies in the University of Arkansas Medical Sciences hospital at Little Rock, Arkansas at the age of 75.   He had been fighting multiple myeloma for two years. [ADD]

11/2 -

The Los Angeles Coroner rules that 25-year-old actor Brad Renfro died from an accidental heroin overdose.   The actor, who was found dead in his LA apartment on 15^th January 2007, had a history of drug-related problems. [ADD]

11/2 -

The estate of J.R.R. Tolkien sues New Line cinema, producers of the Lord of the Rings films, for non-payment of royalties, claiming it is owed a large slice of the trilogy’s gross profits. [MORE]

11/2 -

Benedict Fitzgerald, writer of The Passion of the Christ, sues Mel Gibson and his production company for breach of contract and unfair business practices. [MORE]

11/2 -

A Los Angeles Court hears from attorney Moses Lebovits that actor John Ritter’s life could have been saved by a simple chest X-ray.   The actor died in 2003 while filming 8 Simple Rules. [MORE]

12/2 -

Patric Verrone, President of the Writer Guild of America West, announces that the three-month writers strike is finally over. [MORE]

18/2 -

District Judge Colleen McMahon dismisses a legal case brought by a group of retired federal drug enforcement agents against the producers of the hit film American Gangster for defamation.  She rules the film fails to show ‘a single person who is identifiable as a DEA agent,’ and therefore fails to meet defamation law standards. [ADD]

20/2 -

Actor Nicolas Cage is accused of using his production company to ‘wrongly write off $3.3 million in personal expenses'. [MORE]

21/2 -

Veteran Egyptian heartthrob Omar Sharif is ordered to pay $318,000 in damages to a car park attendant he punched in 2005. [MORE]

21/2 -

Bloomberg News reports that the cost of an Academy statuette has risen $100 in the past year to $500 each because of the soaring price of gold. [ADD]

23/2 -

Lindsay Lohan wins the worst actress awards at this year’s Razzies for her performance in I Know Who Killed Me, which won a total of eight awards.   The actress failed to claim her award. [MORE]

24/2 -

Best Picture Oscar at this year’s Academy Awards goes to the Coen brothers’ No Country for Old Men. [MORE]

25/2 -

Producer Sidney Beckerman dies in Los Angeles at the age of 87.   Beckerman produced such films as Marathon Man, Kelly’s Heroes and Joe Kidd.   His last film was Michael Cimino’s The Sicilian. [ADD]

27/2 -

Online social networking site Facebook stops an advertising campaign for Universal’s Untraceable due to the level of violence contained in its film clips. [MORE]

28/2 -

Time Warner announces that it will merge the New Line Cinema studio into Warner Bros., and lay off hundreds of employees. [MORE]

4/3 -

Oscar-winning composer Leonard Rosenman dies from a heart attack at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, California at the age of 83. [ADD]

5/3 -

Patrick Swayze’s doctor confirms the actor has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, but denies news reports that he is close to death. [MORE]

7/3 -

Roland Emmerich’s prehistoric adventure movie 10,000 B.C. is released to largely negative reviews and disappointing box office business. [MORE]

11/3 -

Access Integrated Technologies Inc announce they have reached an agreement with four major studios – Disney, 20^th Century Fox, Paramount and Universal – to finance the conversion of 10,000 cinema screens to the digital technology required to accommodate 3D films. [MORE]

14/3 -

A jury clears two doctors of negligence in the treatment of actor John Ritter, following a month-long $67 million wrongful death lawsuit brought by the actor’s widow Amy Yasbeck. [MORE]

14/3 -

Jimmy Hayward and Steve Martino’s adaptation of Dr Seuss’s Horton Hears a Who! is released to generally favourable reviews.   Jim Carrey provides the voice of Horton, an elephant who discovers a microscopic community in a speck of dust on a flower. [ADD]

17/3 -

Paramount arrange a screening of the forthcoming Mike Myers comedy The Love Guru for a group of Hindu leaders to placate growing concern at the alleged stereotyping and ridiculing of holy men and women. [MORE]

24/3 -

Veteran film star Richard Widmark dies at his home in Connecticut at the age of 93 after a long illness. [ADD]

24/3 -

It’s reported that Jennifer Lopez and her husband Marc Anthony were paid $6 million by People magazine for the first pictures of their new twins, Max and Emme. [MORE]

25/3 -

Bob Yari, a co-producer of the 2005 Academy Award-winning film Crash, loses his appeal to be awarded a retro-active Oscar for his part in the making of the film. [ADD]

25/3 -

Village Roadshow announce a planned 50-strong chain of luxury cinemas in the US over the next five years.   Tickets will cost $35 and the screens will feature reclining seats with footrests, waiter service and upmarket food. [ADD]

25/3 -

Screenwriter Abby Mann dies of heart failure in Beverly Hills at the age of 84.   Mann won an Oscar for his script for Stanley Kramer’s Judgment at Nuremburg in 1961. [ADD]

28/3 -

Kimberly Peirce’s Stop-Loss, in which Ryan Philippe stars as a decorated war hero ordered back to Iraq against his will, is released. [ADD]

4/4 -

George Clooney’s football film, Leatherheads, which evokes the spirit of the screwball comedies of the 30s and 40s is released.   Clooney stars as well as directs. [ADD]

4/4 -

Shine a Light, Martin Scorsese’s documentary film about the Rolling Stones, is released. [ADD]

5/4 -

Screen legend Charlton Heston dies at his home in Beverly Hills.   The 84-year-old star of Ben-Hur and Planet of the Apes had been suffering from Alzheimer’s disease for more than six years. [ADD]

5/4 -

Documentary director Alex Grasshoff dies after complications following surgery in Los Angeles at the age of 79.   Grasshoff won the Academy Award for best feature documentary in 1969 only to have it withdrawn on a technicality. [ADD]

7/4 -

George Clooney withdraws his membership from the Writers Guild of America. [MORE]

8/4 -

MGM and United Artists announce that the release of Valkyrie, the forthcoming Tom Cruise war drama about the plot by German generals to assassinate Hitler, is to be delayed until February 2009.   Cruise plays Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, the leader of the plot.  [MORE]

9/4 -

Disney head of Animation John Lasseter announces that all Disney and Pixar animated features will be released in 3D from 2009. [MORE]

9/4 -

Young@Heart, a British documentary about a group of octogenarian rockers directed by Stephen Walker, goes on limited release. [ADD]

14/4 -

Reuters report that Paramount are struggling to raise around $400 million in financing for upcoming features because of investor nervousness after a number of deals ended up costing investors millions of dollars. [ADD]

14/4 -

Time Warner cuts 450 jobs at New Line six weeks after the company was folded into Warner Bros. as part of a $50 million cost-saving exercise. [MORE]

15/4 -

60s scream queen Hazel Court dies of a heart attack near Lake Tahoe at the age of 82. [ADD]

15/4 -

Ollie Johnston, the last surviving member of Walt Disney’s ‘nine old men’, creators of such animated classics as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Cinderella, Fantasia, Sleeping Beauty, and Alice in Wonderland, dies in Sequim at the age of 95. [ADD]

18/4 -

Rob Minkoff’s The Forbidden Kingdom starring Jackie Chan and Jet Li is released.   The film is made by a major US studio, but was produced in China using a Chinese film crew. [ADD]

18/4 -

Joy Page, the actress who played the young Bulgarian newlywed in Casablanca, dies of complications from a stroke and pneumonia in Los Angeles at the age of 83.  Page was Warner chief Jack L. Warner’s stepdaughter. [ADD]

22/4 -

Rocky, the five-year-old bear that appeared in the Will Ferrell comedy film Semi-Pro, kills one of his handlers at Big Bear Lake in California. [MORE]

23/4 -

Movie ticket service Fandango announce a new service which will enable people with GPS mobile phones to speak the name of a film into their phone and receive directions to the nearest cinema playing it. [MORE]

24/4 -

Wesley Snipes is sentenced to three years imprisonment for tax evasion. [MORE]

30/4 -

Warner Bros announce they will issue a ‘SmileBox’ version of their Blu-ray release of John Ford’s 1962 film How the West was Won to make the screen look as if it is curved like an old Cinerama screen. [ADD]