You gotta love Bob and Harv. If there's one thing Hollywood's favorite blustery librul Jewish Democrats love more than spending too much money to acquire independent movies at Sundance and then not releasing them, it's just, you know, fuckin' with people.
First, they announce that their new post-Miramax shingle The Weinstein Group will be launching a new company to release "faith-based" movies, meaning Christian movies. So all the Christian Right hand-wringers who've been bemoaning librul Jewish Hollywood and its librul Jewish agenda to undermine American values had about 48 hours in which to scratch their heads in confusion. Then — haha, suckers! — the other shoe dropped with their announcement of the release of the cheapass slasher movie remake Black Christmas on December 25.
Nikki Finke at LA Weekly wasted nary a moment to go into a full end-of-civilization-as-we-know-it fit of blog apoplexy.
Shame, shame, shame on Harvey and Bob Weinstein, and their distributor MGM's Harry Sloan, for opening a holiday-themed slasher movie on Christmas Day... And the entertainment industry wonders why it continues to have a huge PR problem as promoters of garbage?... Still, I don't understand: just how many disturbed human beings does The Weinstein Company and MGM think actually want to go see a gory movie on December 25th.... Is the intended audience supposed to be non-Christians?
Well, when you consider that the most recent movie made for an intended audience of Christians, The Nativity Story, has been sinking like the Bismarck, that might not be a bad plan after all. Nativity's weak business (barely $16 million in its first 10 days) has left New Line wondering if that vast Passion of the Christ audience might have already been Raptured away. And who's to say Christians won't go to Black Christmas just as eagerly as anybody? After all, they don't seem to want to see a movie about the baby Jesus released in the Christmas season, so maybe a mindlessly retro bit of slasher movie stupidity will be just the ticket to take the bad taste of eggnog, obnoxious relatives, and ugly gift sweaters out of everyone's mouths. Bob and Harv didn't get to be Bob and Harv by being idiots, you know.
It will, of course, be very amusing to see what Nikki Finke thinks of whatever gets released as part of their "faith-based" line.
