Update #2: People.com says that Bale has been released this afternoon, and will return to the station in September.

Update: Christian Bale was arrested earlier today on allegations of assault. No, Batman. Bad Batman. Not when you do $158 million on opening weekend, Batman!

We try not to dwell on the tabloid fodder here at Cinematical, but considering the nature of the story and, more importantly, who's involved, this is a tough news nugget to let slip by.

According to the Associated Press, Christian Bale has been accused of assault by his own mother and sister just before the European premiere of the record-breaking The Dark Knight. Bale allegedly assaulted them at a London hotel on Sunday, and while the allegations were formally made on Monday, Bale was not taken in for questioning until Tuesday -- which leads some to theorize that the premiere was to proceed without interruption.

Naturally, Bale's various representatives are refusing to return calls at the moment, and while I have little doubt that Bale won't be charged, I also can't help but think that two members of his family would even suggest as much were there not an incident of some sort. What do you guys think?

Photographers, journalists and casual television watchers alike went into frenzies late last year when the Sex and the City team reunited all across New York for the feature-length version of the hit series. Whether or not you're a fan, it's hard to deny that Sex and the City qualifies as one of those event films, if only because it puts a definitive cap on the six seasons when the show became a phenomenon. It's automatically a quintessential New York film, belonging to a separate class from any number of movies that come out each year incidentally featuring New York that could take place anywhere else.

For that reason, you'd imagine that the movie would celebrate the town of its title with a glitzy New York premiere at some big media affair, of which there is never a shortage. Oddly enough, the Los Angeles Times is reporting that Sex and the City might premiere in London, of all places. London? Really? When Spider-Man 3 opened last year, the Tribeca Film Festival dedicated an entire week to the webslinger with large scale events throughout New York's five boroughs. Considering all that Sex and the City owes to New York -- its entire legacy, really -- the idea of fleeing to Europe first sounds a little confused. Then again, I never understood the appeal of this show anyway, but that's just me. Right?

Earlier this week, I was fortunate enough to land a spot on the black carpet for one of the most exciting premieres to hit New York City in a long time. Only, this bad boy wasn't in the heart of Manhattan -- nope, they decided to take the premiere to Peter Parker's hometown, Queens. Not only was the black carpet a mile long, but there were fans screaming everywhere; I guess it could be compared to being on the field during a football game ... except, tack on about 700 screaming teenage girls. Though there was a lot of space for the stars to cover, Cinematical did manage to snag a few shots of the man himself, Tobey Maguire. Also included in the video is Spider-Man 3 director Sam Raimi, and I ask him what the chances are of him returning to direct a Spider-Man 4.

These events are pretty draining; although this video is roughly four minutes long, I was actually on the red carpet for about four hours. Yes, four hours. Tack on another two and a half hours for the actual movie, and I've spent an entire work day with this damn superhero. But it was a cool event, an exciting film and it was all worth it to see a ton of little kids lined up, excited to catch a glimpse of the guy they dress up as for Halloween each year. My favorite part of this video, however, is when I ask director Ang Lee whether he would be interested in taking on another comic book character. By the look on his face, you can tell how excited he was to answer that question. All in all it was a fun time; Spider-Man 3 officially arrives in theaters tomorrow, and you can check out my review of the film here.

Over at Variety, Anne Thompson wrote an excellent piece yesterday on Premiere Magazine ceasing publication, and how it's getting harder and harder to find places to publish long-form movie journalism. Space for writing of any decent length about film has all but disappeared from most mainstream print publications, and the proliferation of movie writing on the Web has made it harder for print pubs about movies to continue to exist, Thompson says.

Part of the issue is that readers who have grown accustomed to the tendency on websites and blogs to write shorter posts with less commentary have less interest in (and patience for reading) longer, more thoughtful pieces about film.

Here at Cinematical, we have always supported longer reviews than readers will typically find at places like People or Newsweek, where real estate for more in-depth film coverage is hard to come by. Our regular reviews tend to run around 1,000 words, with fest reviews typically clocking in around the 500-750 word range. This gives our writers a lot more room to delve into things like the history of a genre as it relates to a given film, or to compare a particular film with previous works by the same director, or even to just talk about things like how the editing or cinematography or production design affect the film overall.

If you're a hardcore fan of The Simpsons, then you might want to get ready to book a round-trip ticket ... to Springfield, literally. However, we're not sure which Springfield yet. 20th Century Fox has asked 16 different Springfields (I didn't even know there were that many) from around the country to compete to host the premiere of this summer's animated Simpsons flick, The Simpsons Movie. Here's how the competition will play out: Fox has asked all 16 Springfields to submit films of their community, somehow linking their hometown to the Simpsons TV show.

This could go both ways -- perhaps your Springfield is exactly like the Simpsons' Springfield, but if that's the case, then it also means your hometown is jam-packed with eccentric morons. In the end, who cares -- you get to host the premiere! The winning city and its mayor will also be featured in the film's closing credits; here's hoping that person is a bit more competent than Mayor Quimby. If you happen to live in one of these 16 Springfields (and are also a huge Simpsons fan), make sure you find out who's putting together your video so that your town is in it to win it. The Simpsons Movie arrives in theaters on July 27.

[via Cebritology]

I guess because I'm not a dedicated Hugh Grant fan I don't quite understand the impulse to handcuff myself to him. It might not have been the actions of an overzealous fan, but that's what happened to the star at the Dutch premiere of the romantic comedy Music and Lyrics with Drew Barrymore. Hollywood.com reported that Dutch TV personality Cielke Sijben from 101 TV approached Grant as he walked the red carpet at the Amsterdam Pathé theatre and without saying a word, calmly shackled herself to him. It is assumed that Sijben was performing a prank for a show for the network but that didn't make the incident any less bizarre for those nearby.

An onlooker at the event commented, "It was incredible. She appeared from nowhere and Grant couldn't believe it was happening." Police later arrested Sijben, but not before Grant had to stand attached to her for almost ten minutes before fire fighters could arrive to cut the handcuffs. Grant said nothing while waiting to be freed, but as soon as the cuffs were off he went back to working the press line alongside co-star Drew Barrymore. After Grant had fulfilled his publicity obligations he was described as seeming to be "relieved when he disappeared into the theatre--she could have been a maniac." Not to mention that the sensation of wearing handcuffs probably brought back some unpleasant memories.

In case you missed the news, the premiere of Pixar's Cars will take place at the end of this month in Charlotte, North Carolina. Why Charlotte, you ask? Um, duh -- it's because the Lowe's Motor Speedway is there. The premiere, you see, is going to be a NASCAR-style blowout, with four massive screens constructed on the track's infield -- big enough, at least, for all 30,000 ticket-holders to get a clear view of the movie (it's "the first multi-screen digital cinema premiere ever," don't you know). Attending the event will be the movie's voice stars Owen Wilson, Paul Newman, Larry the Cable Guy, and Richard Petty, along with director and Pixar god, John Lasseter. All of which begs the question: is Disney making a massive mistake by focusing their advertising so tightly on the motor sports crowd? Massive thought it undoubtedly is, I can't imagine that audience alone will be enough to bring in the profits we've come to expect from Pixar productions.

NASCAR fan or not, if you wanted to go you're out of luck: every single ticket is gone. That's right: 30,000 freaking tickets have been sold, and we're still almost three weeks from the big day. The nice thing, though, is that a proceeds from ticket sales are going to Speedway Children's Charities and Association of Hole in the Wall Gang Camps, two local charities. Good Pixar.

Premiere Magazine's June issue is top-lined by their eagerly-awaited (I say that because I'm sure some people can't wait to read the thing, if only to see if they're on it. Right? Us peons tend to care slightly less.) annual power list. Though the magazine won't be on newsstands for a couple of weeks yet, the folks at ETonline (Remember those terrible days when we only had access to Entertainment Tonight for a half-hour every evening? I shudder at the mere memory.) have spilled the beans -- some of them, anyway. According to ET, Captain Crazy himself, Tom Cruise, comes it at #13, a spot that makes him the highest-ranked actor on the list. Other mega-powerful actors include a pair of list newbies, Reese Witherspoon (#29) and Keira Knightley (#45), as well as Vince Vaughn -- who, at #31, seems to be bizarrely high -- and Steve Carell (#33).

Before we start to analyze the list o' power too closely, however, we'd do well to check out Nikki Finke's disgusted dissection of the list at her blog, Deadline Hollywood. According to Finke, in addition to being irrelevant to 99% of the world, the list is used by Premiere essentially to please the people from who they need favors. She's been told that "the mag's editors and writers use the Power List to get that needed facetime during office sitdowns with the power players. That entrée fuels articles and covers for the next year." I don't know about you, but I am shocked -- shocked, I tell you! -- by this news. Back-scratching? Narcissism? In Hollywood? Say it ain't so.

I looked forward to seeing The Cassidy Kids because I'd enjoyed Dear Pillow, the previous feature film from local filmmakers Jacob Vaughan and Bryan Poyser. The Cassidy Kids, which Vaughan directed and Poyser produced, was quite a different film. For one thing, this movie had an actual budget: it was in color and its cast included nationally known character actors. The Cassidy Kids looked slicker and more commercial than I expected. The film also has a much more complicated setup than Dear Pillow, with several storylines entwining that occur in different places and times.

The title of The Cassidy Kids was misleading: many people at SXSW seemed to think it might be a kids' movie, or that it would be primarily about children. While the movie does flash back to childhood scenes from the main characters' lives, it is the adults in the present time who are the focus of the story. As children, the "Cassidy Kids" were involved in the resolution of a mysterious murder case, which inspired a TV show (called The Cassidy Kids, natch) in which adorable child actors portrayed the kids and solved much less serious mysteries. Decades later, the original group is reunited when the TV show is released on DVD, and they realize that not everything in the mystery they "solved" might have been quite as straightforward as it once appeared.

The Cassidy Kids reminded me a lot of John Sayles' 1995 film Lone Star. Both are ostensibly mystery/suspense films: decades-old situations surface for the characters to resolve. However, the films are not about these mysteries as much as they are about the relationships beneath them. In The Cassidy Kids, Rebecca (Anne Ramsay) encounters her childhood friend Dennis (Kadeem Hardison) after decades of not speaking. She's also trying to care for her sick father, pack and move her childhood home, and deal with other childhood acquaintances she'd rather not see again. The resolution of the mystery plot may seem pat and predictable; however, the suspense for me was not in the unsolved aspects of the mystery, but in the relationships these characters might develop or break by the end of the movie.

SXSW released its complete list of features for the 2006 film festival today. It's a long, varied list and a little intimidating to absorb all at once. Depending on what type of films you want to see, you can look at the list in several ways:

The SXSW regular: "I see Joe Swanberg has a movie at SouthBy again this year (LOL), as do Jacob Vaughan and Bryan Poyser (The Cassidy Kids). Be nice to see them all again. Bradley Beesley is back, too, co-directing the documentary Summercamp with Sarah Price. Do you think the documentary Fuck is just a riff on The Aristocrats?"

The all-star premiere fan: "Ooooh, Hugh Grant And Dennis Quaid in American Dreamz, Kim Basinger and Danny DeVito in Even Money, Ben Stiller in Andy Dick's film Danny Roane: First Time Director, and Natalie Portman in V for Vendetta. How early should we get in line at the Paramount to see A Prairie Home Companion and Friends with Money?"

The arthouse film geek: "Can't miss the Wim Wenders film (Don't Come Knocking) and the Jonathan Demme documentary about Neil Young. Look, Richard E. Grant is directing a movie (Wah-Wah) that stars Gabriel Byrne. And it's a great chance to see some movies we missed at Sundance: Old Joy, Thank You for Smoking, Forgiving the Franklins, Awesome: I Fuckin' Shot That, and Kinky Boots."

Me: "Wow, look at all the cool documentaries. How many movies can I see in ten days?"