Meatballs Tagged Articles at Cinematical

You have probably already forgotten about the R-rated comedy Sex Drive that opened in 9th place the weekend of Oct. 17 and quickly disappeared altogether. With no big stars, a generic concept, and an uninteresting title, even the smattering of good reviews it got -- and it actually was pretty funny -- couldn't help it.

But you tend to fail upward in Hollywood, and the two guys behind the film -- writer/director Sean Anders and co-writer John Morris -- are still in demand. Not only are they writing a Meatballs remake for Lionsgate, but now they're set to co-direct a comedy called Hot Tub Time Machine. According to The Hollywood Reporter, it's about a group of grown-up friends who visit a hot tub where they once partied, discover it's now a time machine, and travel back to when they were young, raunchy fellows. Hilarity ensues.

You might say, "Why make a movie about a time-traveling hot tub?" Well, I say, "Why not make a movie about a time-traveling hot tub?" Anders and Morris' first film, the indie comedy Never Been Thawed, was about a group of frozen-food collectors and a Christian rock band. It sounds like Sex Drive, about a teenager driving cross-country for a booty call, was probably the least bizarre of their projects.

Hot Tub Time Machine is being written by someone named Jason Heald, by the way, who doesn't appear on IMDB. First-timer? Pseudonym? Typo? If Mr. Heald is reading this, please contact us and tell us whether your screenplay is funny and why we should trust you. Thanks.

This week, I have had the fortune of working from a cottage, surrounded by trees, birds, and a large and peaceful lake (as well as insidious horse flies, determined mosquitoes, and about 50 million caterpillars). In between the work and the sun, I've mused about cottages and movies. There's not many cottage-based films out there -- at least not ones that are about the actual experience, rather than something about a scary killer, or maybe a campfire ghost story.

But there are a lot of camping movies. You have color wars, swimsuits, canoes, trees, and all of that big nature-on-the-water stuff. I wanted to include Poison Ivy tonight, the awesome TV-movie camp fest that stars Michael J. Fox and Nancy McKeon, a counselor and camp nurse who team up with the kids to face off against Adam Baldwin's evil Ike Dimick. However, I can't find so much as a trailer for that.

So instead, whip up some smores and check out an old classic and newer gem -- Meatballs and Happy Campers.

At the age of 30, Jason Reitman has directed a half dozen short films, two narrative features, and an episode of The Office. He has been nominated for an Academy Award for Best Achievement in Directing. He is beyond the usual Hollywood definition of "hot": he is, thanks to the runaway success of Juno, superheated, like the molten core of the sun.

At the age of 30, his father, Ivan Reitman, had directed one short film and two narrative features (the immortal Foxy Lady and Cannibal Girls). At that point of his career, it is safe to say he was as far from "hot" as possible: he was as cold as the far side of the moon, at least as far as Hollywood was concerned. Three years later, the success of Meatballs, especially in relation to its budget and its recognition as the one that made Bill Murray a film star, warmed things up for the senior Reitman, in much the same way that Thank You For Smoking would later warm up his son's career, raising expectations.

Thus it's interesting to compare Ivan Reitman's follow-up, Stripes, with his son's follow-up, Juno. Strictly in financial terms, Stripes was comparable to Juno, earning $85 million in 1981, a year in which only nine films broke the $50 million mark. (To be fair, Juno's budget, at $2.5 million, was only 1/4 of Stripes' reported budget.) Stripes wasn't nominated for any Academy Awards and Ivan has never been nominated, so that gives a leg up for Jason, but that's more a reflection of the Academy's malleable taste than any intrinsic merit. Though Stripes is remembered as a broad, mainstream comedy, I'd argue that it's just as edgy and independent as Juno, and displays some of the same borderline reactionary leanings as the newer film.

Based on the description, I'm going to go out on a limb and say this one is like The Sandlot ... but for swimmers. With swimming slowly becoming the next go-to sport for big-screen "feel good" films, Disney has decided to hop in the water with Pool Rats; a new comedy to be directed by Andy Fickman. With a script being written by Fickman, Nichole Millard and Kathryn Price, project reunites the same creative team (writers, directors, producers) behind Disney's The Game Plan -- an upcoming family comedy staring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. While the filmmakers would like to produce a film that's in the vein of Meatballs or Little Darlings, expect the flick to still project Disney's family-friendly vibe (which kind of stinks, because I'd love to see a Sandlot-type film featuring a bunch of foul-mouthed knuckleheads).

Based on Fickman's own real-life experiences, the film will revolve around the "wild times" one man has while coaching a neighborhood league swim team during a summer that changes both his life and the lives of his swimmers. Pic follows in the footsteps of the Lionsgate film Pride, which received decent reviews, but failed to make any kind of splash when it hit theaters this past spring. For my money, I'm a huge fan of the little-seen indie The Big Bad Swim -- starring one of my favorite up-and-coming actresses, Jess Weixler (Teeth). That film is about a group of local folks who sign up for a swim class and, in turn, learn a lot about themselves and help change the lives of those around them. I'm not sure whether the film was ever picked up (I know it played a ton of film festivals), but if you ever get a chance, I highly recommend it. As far as Pool Rats goes, there's no cast or production start lined up yet; expect it to arrive at some point next summer while most of us are looking for a way to cool off during those ridiculously hot days.

I'm not exactly sure why you couldn't just make a summer camp comedy and NOT use the name Meatballs, but according to a CHUD source, it sure looks like Lionsgate is about to kick a new remake into production. Yes, world, there will now be two separate movies with the title of Meatballs -- neither of which have anything to do with ground beef.

The original "camp" comedy known as Meatballs actually hails from Canada, and it hit the scene in the summer of '79. Kick-started the (very) successful careers of Bill Murray and Ivan Reitman is what it did -- although it didn't really do all that much for folks like Chris Makepeace. Aside from young master Murray's inspired aloofness, the flick's a fairly forgettable affair. And as the CHUD source points out, it's not like Meatballs is on the same level as a Caddyshack or even a Stripes. Plus, who wants to share a title with movies like Meatballs Part 2, Meatballs 3: Summer Job or Corey Feldman's Meatballs 4?

But without Bill Murray, does the title "Meatballs" even matter? I say not. Er, no. Having said that, at least Lionsgate had the smarts enough to hand the project off to some funny people. Sean Anders and John Morris (of the very funny indie Never Been Thawed) have been tapped to pen the remake, while further buzz indicates that John Whitesell (See Spot Run, Malibu's Most Wanted, Big Momma's House 2, Deck the Halls) is in talks to direct, although with a resumé like that, forgive me for being a bit skeptical. I'm just wondering if they'll keep that song in the remake. You know the one I mean...

We are the C.I.T.s so pity us!
The kids are rats, the food is hideous!
We're gonna smoke and drink and fool around....