While hanging out with a couple of friends last night, somehow our conversation organically transformed into a debate over Bill Murray's best all-time performances. Don't ask me how we got there (I think it's because I had watched What About Bob on cable earlier in the day, and so the film was on my mind), but we began with our top three. That is until I mentioned how this would make a good Cinematical Seven -- and since the guys (who both help run two prominent film festivals here in NYC) love reading our Cine Sevens -- we took about a half hour and finally agreed upon the man's seven best performances. Now, keep in mind these aren't necessarily the best Bill Murray films -- these are simply his seven best performances, in our opinion.

1. Arthur Denton, Little Shop of Horrors -- Coming up with our seven favorite Bill Murray performances was difficult to say the least, but deciding on an overall favorite was fairly easy. Murray's cameo as a patient who's just itching to be manhandled by an insane, over-the-top macho dentist (Steve Martin) in this big-screen adaptation of the staged musical takes the cake. The scene itself is short, and Murray's performance is almost all improv, but it's quite possibly the funniest character he's ever played. In fact, I'd love to see an entire movie about that guy -- who's with me? Additionally, for those who may have missed it (or would love to watch it again), here's the clip on YouTube.

2. Dr. Peter Venkman, Ghostbusters -- Who else would get into the business of hunting down ghosts purely for the women? While supporting players like Dan Akroyd, Harold Ramis, Rick Moranis (who I feel is right there with Murray in this film) and Sigourney Weaver do a fine job in the flick, it's Murray's Venkman character that truly breathes life into one of the great comedies of my generation. Overly confident, yet insecure in a lot of ways, Venkman also provided all of the most memorable lines of dialogue in the movie -- most notably, "He slimed me!" and "We came, we saw and we kicked its ass!" It's funny, it's scary and till this day I still hum the title song from time to time. Who you gonna call ... when you're in the mood to laugh? Bill Murray!

I don't like picturing Jessica Lange dating Haley Joel Osment, but that is what popped into my head while reading about Sammy. The romantic comedy follows a relationship between a woman who communicates with animals (à la Lange in Broken Flowers) and a man who communicates with the dead (à la Osment in The Sixth Sense) . The script has been written by Delia Ephron, but instead of being directed by her sister Nora, the project has Lasse Hallstrom attached.

I pretend that I dislike Hallstrom as a director, but honestly the only film of his I've bothered to see is The Cider House Rules. Still, I have noticed that his career hasn't been going so well of late. His next film The Hoax is due in a month, and he's also set to direct Daughter of the Queen of Sheba, either of which could turn his luck around (he also mentioned plans for The Royal Physician's Visit last fall), but lowering himself to the level of a paranormal rom-com is not a good direction to go in. Seriously, what was the last successful romantic comedy with fantasy elements? I understand that Hallstrom could be desperate enough to make studio fluff, but unless he simply needs the paycheck, he can't hope for much good to come out of this.

If there is one filmmaker out there who doesn't need to plagiarize, it is Jim Jarmusch. For the past twenty years he has been making some of the most original films in America. Partially his work is too simple to be a copy, but mostly it is too concerned with style over script to necessitate his ripping someone off. In the world of screenwriting, though, there is always that someone who thought up an idea first, before that other person who managed to make the idea into a film. In the latest case, Jarmusch is being accused of plagiarizing his latest film Broken Flowers. Reed Martin, a freelance journalist and professor of film marketing at NYU, says that his own script, "Heart Copy" (formerly "Two Weeks Off") is similar right down to Jessica Lange's animal communicator character and the pink envelope catalyst. Further cause for him to think that his work became Broken Flowers is Martin's claim that his agent, Glenn Rigberg, gave copies of the script to Julie Delpy and Sharon Stone (both actresses appear in the film) and Focus Features co-president David Linde. His lawsuit against Jarmusch, Vivendi Universal Entertainment, Focus Features and Rigberg, was filed in March. He is seeking $40 million, the film's theatrical gross.

The thing about Broken Flowers is that some of its themes have to do with coincidence and the abstract connections that our minds are prone to make. I haven't seen Martin's script so I won't assume that his accusation is based entirely on the brain's tendency to make associations seem more significant than they truly are, but I think the chance of this is high.

In his defense, Jarmusch wrote in an email to the Boston Globe, "I had never had any contact with him or his work. I'd never even heard of him. I still haven't seen the work he claims I copied. Anyone who is familiar with my films and my writing process will know that his claim is ridiculous."

Sharon Stone says after she saw a rough cut of Basic Instinct 2 she pushed for more of the wild sex scenes that had been cut to be put back in the film. "I wanted a lot of sex in the sequel, and I wanted more nudity," Stone said in an interview with The Telegraph. "I was coming from a really kinky place." I suppose if the sex and nudity are there because they make sense from a standpoint of story arc and character development it makes perfect ... oh, come on, who are we kidding? 

Basic Instinct made Stone famous more because she flashed her hoo-hoo at the camera than because of her acting. Her post-Basic Instinct film career has been decidedly uneven. She got the Oscar nod a decade ago for her role in Casino. Since then, we have Diabolique (yawn), The Mighty (a decent enough film that bombed at the box office), The Muse (meh), and a bunch of crapedelic filler (voice acting the "blind art teacher" on Higglytown Heroes? Did she have a high credit card bill to pay off or something?) 

Because she obviously needs a break from all of that Hollywood money and taking off of clothing, among Sharon Stone's follow-ups to (the supposedly eagerly-awaited) Basic Instinct 2 will be an independent film called When a Man Falls in a Forest. The film, written and directed by Ryan Eslinger, is about a trio of lonely men whose lives "intersect as they struggle to overcome their deepening isolation as they search for connection." Well that sounds cheery. Jeez. According to Production Weekly, Stone will play "an unhappily married woman who shoplifts to break her boredom." How she interacts with the men in question, and if she encounters all three of them or not, is unclear.

It's refreshing to see that Stone is finally settling in to playing women who are people rather than simple sex objects - and, as her performance in Broken Flowers showed, she's certainly capable of taking on weightier material. It'll be interesting to see how this movie shapes up as more details become available.

When a Man Falls starts filming in Canada next month.

• Jim Jarmusch's Broken Flowers topped the indie box office take this weekend, with Wong Kar Wai's 2046 coming in a very respectable second. Broken Flowers took in over $780K its opening weekend - not a bad take, considering that Jarmusch's Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai, only took in $3 mil total. Looks like long-time indie fave Jarmusch might be on his way to his biggest commercial success to date.
• Beverly Kills, a film about an aging drag queen out for revenge (a screen shot from the film is at right), which has been making the festival circuit, has scored distribution from TLA Releasing. The film won the best men's feature award at the Fort Worth Gay and Lesbian Film Festival. TLA will release the film in mid-2006.
• The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till, a documentary about the murder of a black man in Mississippi in 1955, has been acquired by ThinkFilm US. The two men tried in the case were acquitted by an all-white jury. The film's New York premiere will take place at the United Nations through the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network, with attendees including Mos Def and Al Sharpton.
• Organizers of the Toronto International Film Festival, which kicks off September 8, has announced the addition of 29 international documentaries to the festival lineup, including the world premieres of Sydney Pollack's Sketches of Frank Gehry, Lian Lunson's Leonard Cohen I'm Your Man, and The Heart of the Game, a film about a girl's basketball team which finds success under a maverick coach.