Last weekend brought the tragic news that the Aston Martin featured in the upcoming 007 movie Quantun of Solace was wrecked beyond repair. It turns out that's not the only danger on the set of the film, currently shooting in Italy: On Wednesday, a James Bond stuntman crashed while performing a chase scene in the area, and is currently in critical condition. suffering minor injuries It's probably better that this stuff is happening now, considering how many people were ready to pounce on the last film in order to prevent Daniel Craig from taking the reins from Pierce Brosnan. Now that the franchise appears to have a newfound groove, Quantum has a lot of positive buzz. So why does it seem like the set is suddenly cursed?

Accidents of varying degrees are commonplace on large scale film shoots, but the sense of peril can impact the final result in different ways. In the Twilight Zone movie, the helicopter accident during the John Landis-directed sequence killed three actors, causing Hollywood to avoid similar stunts for many years to come. The stuntman who suffered burns on 60% of his body on the Mission: Impossible III set, however, couldn't affect that movie, even when he decided to sue Tom Cruise. In the case of Quantum of Solace, subversively, the accidents might be a positive indicator of the sheer intensity that director Marc Forster hopes to bring to the film.

For whatever reason, the other day my friend and I were watching Mission Impossible III. I had only seen it once in the theater, and remembered digging it, so we decided to throw it on the boob tube (in glorious HD) to take in another screening. During one of the many Tom Cruise jokes we were cracking ('Remember when this movie came out, and they said Cruise could run, like, 40mph?'), we started talking about what it would look like if the character of Ethan Hunt was brought into another franchise. I immediately thought it might be fun to merge the Bourne franchise and the Mission Impossible franchise -- ya know, make it so Ethan Hunt's next mission is to track down Jason Bourne (Matt Damon). For some reason (I dunno, maybe it was one too many birthday cocktails), I thought that would be a swell idea. Of course, my friend was adamant about James Bond also making an appearance; if only to pop into one scene to go, "Hey, I'm British." The Bourne Impossible 4: Things Get Tougher. Anyone? Anyone?

It was during that conversation where we began to discuss what other franchise cross-overs would look cool on the big screen. Of course, we already have a Freddy vs. Jason movie, and the Alien vs. Predator franchise is about to churn out another one of those flicks, but there have to be other characters that you'd like to see meet on screen for the first time. Heck, if it were up to me, I'd throw Superman, Batman and Spider-Man in the same film -- but make it a romantic comedy -- and work in a premise that has all three superheroes fighting over the same girl. Killer! Or, how about a film that teams up John McClane and Axel Foley? We could call it Die You Filthy Beverly Hills Cop. Oh man, I'm such a genius.

So, I ask you: Which franchise cross-overs would you like to see happen? And don't worry about which studio owns what, just have fun with it.

2006 was the first full year of Cinematical, and it was a very busy year for its bloggers. A lot of big news, shocking news and ongoing news kept us busy as we followed the important stories and passed the significant bits onto you. There was good news, bad news, unexpected news and unbelievable news. There were deaths, births, rebirths and remakes. There was so much going on that it takes an amazing film geek to recall everything (have you tested your memory yet?).

But what was the most important story for film in 2006? The end of the box office slump? The Weinsteins' devilish pact with Blockbuster? Peter Jackson's possibilities of directing The Hobbit? Uwe Boll boxing his critics? Sorry, but none of those affected the consciousness of cinema as much as these other stories from the past 12 months:

• Disney Buys Pixar - When 2006 began, the future of Disney's relationship with Pixar was still uncertain. There had been hint of a new deal between the two companies in the last few days of 2005, but nothing was concrete. Three weeks went by, in which time the new year came in and Pixar's stock prices went up, and then finally the first installment of news came through on January 19: Disney would buy Pixar. Three days later, we were reminded that the deal was not yet done, that it was still awaiting approval from Steve Jobs and the rest of the animation studio's board. On January 23, however, it was in the bag: Disney bought Pixar for $7.4 billion. And John Lasseter was named head of Disney animation.
  
  The story didn't end there. Throughout 2006, the effects of the acquisition continued to be felt. First, Toy Story 3 was killed. But then it was greenlit again. Disney closed its new computer animation studio, Circle 7. Then many months went by before Disney fired a whole lot of people working in its animation departments. Finally, just a few weeks ago, the company announced they'd be trying out the ol' hand-drawn stuff again. By year's end, it felt as though Pixar was the one who owned Disney.
  

I have an issue with year-end best-of lists. Or, I should say I have an issue with making them, myself. Every year I think about giving in to the tradition, but then I stop myself when I realize that I haven't seen enough movies. There are the last-minute releases of late December to wait for. There are films I missed earlier in the year that haven't yet arrived on DVD. And ever since I took a hiatus from reviewing films, it has gotten worse, because I see fewer movies than I normally do. Typically I don't discover my favorite pic of a given year until the following year or later.

So, rather than write up a list that may change tomorrow or the next day or 10 years from now, I've decided to reflect on the bad movies I saw. I've definitely seen more bad movies than good movies, anyway. But rather than make a list of the worst of '06 -- I probably haven't seen the real worst any more than I've seen the best -- I fondly recalled the movies that were crap, but were enjoyable, nonetheless.

Some of the movies on my list are wholly guilty pleasures, while others have one or two specific aspects that I found more guiltily pleasurable than the movie itself.

• 10.) Cobra Starship's 'Snakes on a Plane (Bring It)' video from Snakes on a Plane - Sure, Snakes on a Plane is a guilty pleasure -- it was made to be. But it is just too obvious to mention it as a whole, and anyway it really wasn't as enjoyable as it should have been or was meant to be. The music video during the movie's credits, though, is another story. In my opinion it overshadows the actual movie by a long shot. It may be as self-consciously intent on producing irony and camp, but it succeeds where SOAP doesn't. Maybe because it is catchy, maybe because the band looks like a parody of contemporary hipster bands, or maybe because it is shorter -- I am far more likely to return to the video for a good laugh than to the movie (not that I'll turn off the movie on a lazy Sunday with nothing better to do; it is still a guilty pleasure, itself).

Yesterday marked the final day of Tom Cruise and long-time partner Paula Wagner's deal with Paramount Pictures, and the LA Times is reporting that the new contract on offer from Paramount significantly scales back its financial commitment to the duo. Though Wagner denies that she and Cruise ever got such a massive amount from the studio, insiders put their yearly take under the old contract at about $10 million "to cover overhead, project development and other costs." And I think I speak for everyone when I say "Holy crap!" to those numbers.

Paramount's new offer, while still generous, is a far cry from $10 million/year. According to unnamed people familiar with the deal, the studio is offering Cruise and Wagner in the neighborhood of "$2 million plus a $500,000 discretionary fund each year for two years." While this is being seen as yet another sign of Hollywood's newfangled interest in financial responsibility, the fact is that Cruise's shrinking box office potential is directly linked to his recent off-putting behavior.* That said, however, when a guy is expecting to earn a rumored $80 million from Mission: Impossible III, one wonders how much the loss of $8 million/year is going to mean to him.

*Yes, MI3 is making a ton of money. According to the LA Times, however, even if the film earns an additional $200 million from DVD sales, Paramount will only break even on the film, once Cruise's percentage is taken out.

Odds and ends from Friday:

• It worries me to watch the producers of Casino Royale talk so much about the film they plan to make after Royale, instead of, well, the film they have coming out this fall. While it's already been discussed on several occasions, Bond producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson officially announced their plans to release the 22nd film in the James Bond franchise on May 2, 2008. Pic, which will be competing against Paramount's big screen adaptation of the Marvel comic Iron Man, will find Daniel Craig reprising his 007 role.
• You've already heard me rant about those clever little pop-culture phrases Hollywood writers dream up, so there's no point in regurgitating my own shtick. Yes, they're annoying. Yes, I hate them. Let's move on. Paramount Pictures has snatched up the spec script Swingles, written by Duncan Birmingham. Romantic comedy will center around a single guy who is dumped by his "wingman" and forced to team up with a woman he can't stand in order to meet single ladies. Birmingham said he came up with the idea after stalking thousands of women in karaoke bars throughout the country. Okay, the stalking part isn't true -- but it does make the story more interesting, right? The Swingle Stalker? I like that.
• If you live in China and have spent numerous hours praying Tom Cruise and Mission Impossible 3 would somehow find a way onto the big screen, you're in luck -- the film has finally made it into theaters ... minus six minutes. And now we finally know which scenes were removed: One showed Cruise distracting Chinese soldiers by throwing baseballs, then killing them; the other involved elderly Chinese playing mahjong, while Ethan Hunt's wife is being held hostage next door. Seems fair, but how did they miss the fact that Tom Cruise is in the film? Shouldn't he be censored as well?

Remember the long, drawn-out review that China's government censorship board put Mission: Impossible III through? And how it was, at long last, eventually cleared for release with just a few short cuts (most of them assumed to involve negative depictions of Shanghai)? Well, Chinese bloggers are guessing that there's one subversive message that the censors missed.

According to Chinese message boards, there's a shot in the film (thank you, pirated DVDs) in which Tom Cruise passes a nondescript wall on which is written a phone number. If you call that phone number, you reach Mr. Ba, a man who can hook you up with any forged document you need, from faked IDs to falsified college diplomas. Niiiice. Mr. Ba has apparently been interviewed online, but since no one here can read Chinese, we're left guessing what he might have said -- probably something like "Thank you, J.J. Abrams, for increasing my business 700-fold. I have to get off the phone now, because my flight for Aruba is boarding."

The only problem is that all the chatter on Chinese websites will probably alert the government to the number's presence; since the movie doesn't come out until July 20, they may still have time to either take it out, or recall the prints and push the release even further back.

Right now, I know what you're thinking: "But dude, they already made a Mission Impossible: 3 and it came out in May -- what the hell are you talking about?" See, Hollywood is like a serial dater -- they keep screwing different people until eventually committing to what, at the time, seems to be the best thing out there. In the case of MI:3, the film swapped hands a number of times before finally landing in the lap of J.J. Abrams.

For example, did you know David Fincher was originally tapped to helm the third installment in the Mission Impossible franchise? Yes, David freaking Fincher. Imagine that one. However, with Tom Cruise running the show and Fincher being, well, Fincher, no one expected that relationship to last long. (Insert witty Fight Club joke here.) Actually, Fincher's version had Cruise playing his age and not acting like the superhero he was in the first two films. Seeing as Cruise is, in fact, a superhero in real life, that idea was shelved immediately. Following the Fincher affair, writer Joe Carnahan (Narc) was brought on to try and update the franchise by giving it a grittier, darker edge. However, in the end, Tom Cruise doesn't do dark stuff and so J.J. Abrams was brought on to make sure the film retained its "commercial blockbuster" status.

In a recent interview with the French website, Mesclun Art Media, storyboard artist Rusty Dumas provided us with some details regarding Carnahan's version of the script. Dumas was the original storyboard artist on MI:3 and even went as far as to give us a peek at his storyboards for what was supposed to be an opening sequence set in Africa. While the interview is in French, the good folks over at Dark Horizons were able to get a rough translation. It seems Carnahan's version was awfully political, focusing on the "links between arms sales in the States, the Baltic and the African West." Sounds interesting, but for Mission Impossible? I don't think so.

Though there hasn't been an official announcement regarding another sequel in the Mission Impossible franchise, Tom Cruise hinted to a possible scene in the fourth installment that would require the city of Tokyo to literally shut down ... everything. Oh that Tom Cruise and his nutty ideas.

Cruise made the comment alongside director J.J. Abrams while the two were off promoting Mission Impossible 3 in Japan. The actor went on to explain that, although citizens would hate life and traffic would hit an all-time high,  he promised an action sequence that would be remembered forever. In return, Tokyo would only have to shut down for one week -- a minor inconvenience for, what could potentially be, Tom Cruise running throughout the streets at super-human speed.

Though it sounds absurd, a similar situation arose during filming of MI:3 in Shanghai. At that time, the Chinese government closed off large sections of the city at night to allow for filming some of the pic's more elaborate scenes. Personally, after being named Forbes most powerful celebrity, I think Tom Cruise is trying to see exactly how powerful he really is. I'm still waiting for the day when the guy tries to buy a planet and name if after himself. Screw Mars or Jupiter -- Planet Cruise sounds so much more ... relaxed. Am I right? Or am I right?

As we reported last month, Mission: Impossible III has been having all sorts of problems getting approval to be released in China. Among other things, the filmmakers were accused of portraying Shanghai in a negative light (Laundry! Hanging out of windows! Can you imagine?), and the release was delayed while censors re-examined the film. Now, after unspecified cuts, the movie has a release date: July 20. As expected, the date comes after the 5-week blackout on foreign films that will accompany China's celebration of the Communist Party anniversary. In addition, since the international release date came in early May, bootleggers have had ample time to put together high-quality pirated DVDs, copies of which are surely widely available in China for just a few dollars, a situation that can't help but hurt the movie's box office prospects. That said, however, at least The Da Vinci Code is gone, so competition will be reduced.