Club Jade

Curious about Episode VII screenwriter Michael Arndt? The internet has dug up this video from 2007, where he discusses screenwriting and Little Miss Sunshine. (via)

This is only a 10 minute clip – you can watch the full hour and change at FORA.tv

Forbes, always one for making lists, has ranked Natalie Portman (aka Padmé Amidala — please tell me you knew that) as the star worth the most bang for the buck. For every dollar she is paid in salary, the studio makes $42.70. Apparently, she had some rather surprising hits outside of Black Swan. (Who knew No Strings Attached made such a big profit?)

Twilight’s Kristen Stewart was #2.

Another Lucasfilm alum making the list was Shia LaBeouf (Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull) at #3 with $35.80 returned for every dollar he’s paid. (Let’s hear it for him beating out Robert Pattison!)

More lists are surely soon to follow.

In Empire magazine’s cover story on Star Trek Into Darkness, J.J. Abrams admits that he turned down the chance to direct Episode VII.

There were the very early conversations and I quickly said that because of my loyalty to Star Trek, and also just being a fan, I wouldn’t even want to be involved in the next version of those things. I declined any involvement very early on. I’d rather be in the audience not knowing what was coming, rather than being involved in the minutiae of making them.

Thanks to ComicBook.com for the quote!

Abrams was one of the first director hopefuls that the internet championed, but he was quick to deny the possibility.

Elsewhere… Looking for some goofy Episode VII fun? Check Star Wars Sequel Debacle Simulator.

Last week, I reported on a mysterious package that ended up at the University of Chicago for Indiana Jones – it turns out that the mystery of the Lost Ark’s journal has been solved! UChicago’s Admissions Tumblr reports that the package was indeed a replica prop from eBay being sent from Guam to Italy, when it fell out of its packaging in Hawaii – and since the interior “package” appeared to be legitimate with an address, it made its way to the university.

The University has been allowed to keep the replica prop, while the journal’s maker will create a replacement for the original intended recipient. Most likely, the postal service opened up the package because it was leaving a red line around the globe as it traveled.

And here’s the ‘full’ trailer for J.J. Abram’s Star Trek Into Darkness… Does it reveal more than the teaser? Not really, no, but there is some different footage. But hey, it’s Monday, we’ll take what we can get.

The University of Chicago received an unusual package recently, addressed to Indiana Jones. Some pranksters sent a package containing a replica of Abner Ravenwood’s diary, some replica money, postcards, and pictures of Marion and had it slipped into the incoming mail at the admissions office, which is housed in the building that formerly held their geography and geology departments.

As mentioned in Raiders of the Lost Ark, Jones was the protégé of Professor Ravenwood at the University of Chicago, before their falling out over Abner’s daughter, Marion. The admissions office is trying to sort out who sent the package and why… but it seems pretty obvious to me that Abner needs to keep his documentation away from the Nazis, and sent it to someone who could use it. The bigger mystery: if Professor Ravenwood died in Nepal, who mailed it from Egypt? (Also, the addressor appears to have misspelled “Illinois” and added a ZIP code, which didn’t exist yet in the 1930′s, when Raiders takes place.)

“Doctor Jones! I’m so glad you’re back! Your mail is on your desk.” — Irene, Indy’s secretary at the college

In the meantime, the University has set up an email to accept information about the package: indianajonesjournal@uchicago.edu. Is it from a prospective student? Is it just an elaborate hoax? Is it some sort of guerilla PR work to ramp up for some new Indiana Jones announcement – some sort of new story focusing on the legacy of Abner Ravenwood? It’s not the first time Abner’s death had been exaggerated.

It seems like Salmon Fishing in the Yemen flew mostly under the radar this year, so there was plenty of surprise when it received 3 Golden Globe nominations – most notably, for our purposes, best actor in a comedy or musical for Ewan McGregor.

McGregor is up again Jack Black (Bernie,) Bradley Cooper (Silver Linings Playbook,) Hugh Jackman (Les Miserables,) and Bill Murray (Hyde Park on Hudson.)

The Golden Globes nominations are, per usual, very slight on genre.

USA Today reports that a digitally restored version of Lucasfilm’s fantasy film Willow will be coming to DVD on March 12.

Willow was originally released in 1988. It was produced and written by George Lucas, directed by Ron Howard, and starred Warwick Davis, Val Kilmer, and Joanne Whalley.

The Blu-ray will contain commentary from Howard, Davis’s own personal video diary, and and Dennis Muren’s “From Morf to Morphing: The Dawn of Digital Filmmaking” with a new intro.

Anyone who thinks George Lucas might have issues with redheaded ladies working for evil empires should probably check this one out. Of course, as a child of the late 80′s, I admit I have a HUGE soft spot for this movie and will totally be buying it.

Here’s the trailer for Zack Snyder’s Superman movie, which is due out in June. Thoughts?

Indiana Jones was called a grave robber and “obtainer of rare antiquities” in his career, but at least in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the skull ended up in its rightful place. Not so much with another crystal skull, which was referenced in the 2008 film: the Mitchell-Hedges skull, found in British Honduras (now Belize) in the 1920s.

Now, the Institute of Archaeology of Belize is using the Illinois courts to get the Mitchell-Hedges skull back from its discoverer’s family, and are even claiming that the skull’s likeness was used as the basis for the fictional skull in the Indiana Jones film without Belize’s authorization and thus the country deserves a chunk of the profit from Lucasfilm and Paramount (and now Disney). Or could it be that the crystal skull prop (and the Mitchell-Hedges skull) are based on the design of human skulls (albeit for the movie, some proportions were extended to alien dimensions).

The lawsuit alleges that there are only four known major crystal skulls in the world, including the one in the British Museum. Wait, the British Museum rock crystal skull was determined not to be Mayan or Aztec, but made later, from material not in the pre-Columbian Mexico trade network. Not a good start for this case.

Whether the Mitchell-Hedges skull is stolen property that needs to be repatriated to Belize is one case, but then dragging Lucasfilm into the case for claiming stolen profits is going to be a much tougher case. Or was the goal to just get some PR for this lawsuit?