bag boy Tagged Articles at Cinematical

You knew it was coming sooner or later (personally, I'm in favor of later), and Variety has just made it official: National Lampoon will begin production this fall on National Lampoon's 301: The Legend of Awesomest Maximus Wallace Leonidas. Awesome! Looking to spoof such films as 300, Gladiator, Troy and Braveheart, pic will follow an out-of-shape Spartan general named Awesomest who "fails forward on a path to greatness." Hmm, do I smell Ryan Reynolds and Anna Faris circling this script? Written by Jason Burinescu, the film will be produced by National Lampoon, Dan Farah and Burinescu.

Lampoon, who recently began financing and producing their own films in-house, instead of licensing away their name so that it could appear on the cover of crappy Paris Hilton movies, have just completed work on two new flicks: National Lampoon's Ratko: The Dictator's Son and National Lampoon's Bag Boy (based off a script from someone who watched Employee of the Month and actually thought there were ideas in there worthy of further big-screen exploration). I can't remember the last time National Lampoon actually produced an all-out spoof flick (come to think of it, have they ever?), and so part of me is looking forward to seeing what they do with this. I expect a ton of green screen work and shoddy acting (no cast has been announced yet), but hopefully we'll find a few laugh-out-loud moments somewhere in there. There hasn't been a fun spoof since, well -- do we count the original Scary Movie? Will 301 be the exception? Or will we walk away with a list of 301 reasons why the movie should never have been made?

Now that National Lampoon has set up their own in-house shop, the first thing on the agenda is to begin setting up a few projects that a) are actually funny, b) are worth the price of admission and c) will help revive their reputation. They just recently partnered with the Farrelly brothers on a comedy called Bag Boy and, as Variety reports, have announced the first of four projects based solely on National Lampoon properties that the company will co-develop with Half Shell Entertainment.

See, the main problem with National Lampoon lately is that, instead of developing projects themselves, they've been simply lending out their name in order to bring a little familiarity to a film and help boost its box office numbers. However, they now want to control the show and have begun digging through the archives of their now defunct magazine to find something -- anything, really. Seeing as I've been tough on National Lampoon lately (c'mon, Pledge This -- are they serious?), I'll be the first to say that I absolutely love the idea behind their newest project, The Last Night in October. Yes, it's Halloween-related. And yes, it sounds hysterical.

Described as a "Dazed and Confused-style ensemble piece" (I like it already), pic revolves around a town which declares war on Halloween after a thumbtack is found in a piece of candy. Oh, and it takes place in 1986. We're not sure if they intended it to take place in 1986 or if that was simply the year this particular story showed up in their magazine. Either way, it could be hilarious -- I'd love to see National Lampoon bring back a little dark humor. The original Vacation was packed with risky jokes (Clark ties dead grandma down to the roof of his wagon??), and so if they can unearth some more of that -- without Paris Hilton's involvement -- then I will officially be the first one in line for a ticket. You?

The Farrelly Bros. (remember, they had that one good movie called There's Something About Mary back in 1998?) are teaming up with National Lampoon (sadly, I believe we have to travel back into the 80s in order to dig up the last piece of quality entertainment from these folks) on a new comedy called Bag Boy.

What's essentially an attempt by National Lampoon to revitalize their brand, pic marks the first of four films annually National Lampoon plans to shovel out -- all of which will be packaged together and produced inhouse -- a rarity for the 36 year-old company. According to CEO Daniel Laikin, each flick will have a budget of around $12 million or less and they will focus on developing properties found within their magazine, which ceased production in 1992. So, not only will the comedies be bad, but they'll be based on extremely old ideas. Yay!

As far as Bag Boy goes, it appears they're taking the only funny thing about Employee of the Month and stretching it out into a feature film. That's right, pic will revolve around the world of competitive grocery bagging. And, while I don't want to depress you any further, I do have to note that the script was re-written by Mort Nathan -- yes, as in Mort "Boat Trip" Nathan. Production will begin next year, and there's currently no word on whether the Farrelly Bros. will also direct or strictly produce.