'John Carter' Stumbles As 'Lorax' Takes Box-Office Crown

Dr. Seuss film is highest-grossing movie of the year so far.
By Ryan J. Downey


A scene from Dr. Seuss' "The Lorax"
Photo: Universal Studios

"Dr. Seuss' The Lorax" was the #1 movie at the box office for a second consecutive weekend, but the bigger story was the film that came in at #2.

"John Carter," which Disney hoped would kick off a franchise based on the classic Edgar Rice Burroughs stories that inspired generations of sci-fi, opened with $30.6 million. In an article bearing the headline " 'Ishtar' on Mars," the New York Times reported that "John Carter" cost about $350 million to market and produce. Even with its $71 million overseas total, "Carter" is a long way from an estimated break-even point of $600 million. "Ishtar" is a 1987 film famous for how hard it flopped despite the presence of two A-list stars (Warren Beatty, Dustin Hoffman) and huge marketing.

The tale of a Civil War veteran who finds himself in the middle of a local conflict on Mars, "Carter" is the first live-action film directed by Andrew Stanton ("Finding Nemo," "WALL-E") and stars "Friday Night Lights" alum Taylor Kitsch in the title role. Reviews were decidedly mixed; Rotten Tomatoes had assigned it a "Tomatometer" rating of 49 percent at press time. "Lifeless on Mars," proclaimed TheWrap.com's Alonso Duralde. "For all its efforts and intentions, and despite the occasional minor thrill, 'John Carter' winds up being as generic and forgettable as its title."

The folks behind "The Lorax," meanwhile, had plenty to celebrate. The animated Dr. Seuss adaptation made $39.1 million in its second weekend in theaters, putting it past "The Vow" to become 2012's highest-grossing film thus far with its estimated total of nearly $122 million. The second-week 44 percent decline of "The Lorax" was about on par with "Horton Hears a Who!," which made $154 million during its domestic theatrical run in 2008.

Found-footage party film "Project X" was #3 at the box office with $11.5 million for a $40.1 million total. Horror flick "Silent House" was a dud, opening at #4 with $7 million. The top five was rounded out by another box-office disappointment, "A Thousand Words," which debuted with $6.3 million, barely more than the opening-weekend numbers for fairly recent Eddie Murphy flops "Meet Dave" ($5.25 million) and "Imagine That" ($5.5 million). Neither "A Thousand Words" nor "John Carter" suffered as badly as Eddie Murhpy's sci-fi comedy "The Adventures of Pluto Nash," which made $4.4 million during its entire theatrical run in 2002 against a production budget estimated to be more than $100 million.

The comedy "Friends With Kids" opened at #13 with $2.1 million but played at only 374 theaters. By comparison, "John Carter" was at 3,749.

This weekend's new releases include the comedic big-screen version of "21 Jump Street," the '90s cop show that launched Johnny Depp. The reboot co-stars and was produced by Jonah Hill. Also coming up: Will Ferrell's Spanish-language comedy "Casa de mi Padre," the Jason Segel/ Ed Helms comedy "Jeff, Who Lives at Home," the Adrien Brody drama "Detachment" and the latest in a string of poorly reviewed Nicolas Cage films, "Seeking Justice."

Check out everything we've got on "Dr. Seuss' The Lorax" and "John Carter."

For breaking news, celebrity columns, humor and more — updated around the clock — visit MTVMoviesBlog.com.

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Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1680881/lorax-john-carter-box-office.jhtml

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Debi Mazar & Giulia Have The Luck O' The Irish

Is she feeling lucky? Debi Mazar and her daughter Giulia were spotted as they arrived at a home in Los Angeles, Calif. on Thursday (March 15) with a large shamrock-shaped balloon.

Maybe they were getting a jump on St. Patrick's Day, or perhaps having an early birthday celebration for Giulia ? she turns 6 on March 17!

Top Story? (feature beneath menu): 
no

Source: http://celebritybabyscoop.com/2012/03/16/debi-mazar-giulia-have-the-luck-o-the-irish

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Google Play Store updated, new tabbed My Apps UI and app review features

Google Play Store

An update is beginning to push out to the Android Market Google Play Store bumping it to build number 3.5.15. With it comes a change in the UI to the "My Apps" area, and some handy new features built into application reviews that bring it more into line with the desktop version. For us outside North America we also seem to have been renamed from "Play Shop" to the much better sounding "Play Store." 

The change to the "My Apps" area is the most obvious change brought with this latest update. Gone is the single -- and incredibly long in some cases -- list of old, and in comes a new tabbed interface in the same vein as the main store.  The installed tab is now split into two parts, the updates still showing at the top but the remainder are now labelled as "up to date" below. 

Swipe left and we now get the "All" tab. Handily this contains all the applications you've ever installed. Gone are the days of scrolling all the way to the bottom of your installed apps list to find your not installed paid apps selection. This also contains all the free applications you installed before but don't have currently. Everything is here. This tab also has a handy dropdown box at the top listing all your Google accounts, providing a much smoother and easier way of switching without having to go into the menus. 

Heading out into the main store, further changes can be found in the app reviews. Now the device on which the app on the device which the reviewer was using. Reviews can also be filtered by "most helpful first" or by "newest first," and also for the latest version of the app and for your type of device only. This last one could be particularly handy for anyone running Ice Cream Sandwich, since we still seem to have compatibility issues with some applications. 

One final thing to note. When I first started trying to download apps after the update, everything kept flashing up with "Error 941." Force stopping the app, clearing cache and starting again seemed to do the trick. Not great, but seemed to fix the issue at least. 

For a few screenshots hit the break. If you find any other features worth noting, shout out in the comments below.

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Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/androidcentral/~3/n8iNjoKUv-U/story01.htm

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'21 Jump Street' Cheat Sheet: Everything You Need To Know

MTV News has been awaiting the arrival of the TV-show-turned-R-rated-comedy since it was first conceived back in 2008.
By Kara Warner


Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill in "21 Jump Street"
Photo: Sony

At this point in the end of a long promotional stretch for "21 Jump Street," it seems as though we've been talking about the hilarious TV-to-movie adaptation forever. As it turns out, we have. Well, not forever, but for nearly four years, since it was first announced that Jonah Hill and screenwriter Michael Bacall would be tackling the screenplay for an R-rated version of the popular '80s TV show that launched Johnny Depp's career.

Here's everything you need to know about the next great action/ buddy comedy:

It's Based On a Really Awesome TV Show
"21 Jump Street" has a special, nostalgic significance for a lot of us who grew up in the late '80s. The series, which ran for five seasons from 1987 to 1991 on the fledgling Fox network, followed a group of undercover cops who posed as high school and college students. The show featured an attractive group of young actors led by Depp, Holly Robinson, Peter DeLuise and Richard Grieco (as loose cannon Dennis Booker), and was a unique hybrid of television archetypes: the classic cop show and the teen-issue show.

Back in May 2008, news broke that Sony was working on adapting the show for the big screen and had tapped Jonah Hill, then most well-known for "Superbad," to do it. The then-24-year-old would write the screenplay and serve as executive producer of the film, but no announcement was made about casting at that time.

It Wasn't Exactly Welcomed With Open Arms
Because of the show's cult status, many people seemed to have issues with a young funnyman like Hill adapting the material and took to the Internet to air their grievances. But Hill set the record straight, assuring fans that his version would not be "crappy."

"People expect you to do something crappy [when] adapting a TV show into a film. ... When I hear it, it seems totally unoriginal," Hill told MTV News. "We're approaching it from an original standpoint, I'll tell you that much."

Hill promised that it would not be a spoof, revealing that he and Bacall had written a Johnny Depp cameo into the script with hopes that somehow the Academy Award nominee would think about making an appearance in the film. Not long after that, the casting announcements started rolling in, with Hill and Tatum in the lead roles supported by the likes of Ice Cube, Rob Riggle, Dave Franco, Ellie Kemper, Nick Offerman and Jake Johnson.

You'll Get to See a 'Bit' of Johnny Depp
We're not ones to toot our own horns or take credit when it's unwarranted, but with regard to the Depp cameo in the film, we can trace both Hill's and Depp's comments back to interviews we conducted with both parties separately. After Hill told us about what they'd written with Depp in mind, we asked the man himself, who seemed open to the idea at the time, even though no one had passed along a script yet. A couple years and several will-he-or-won't-he rumors later and Depp confirmed that he did his "bit" in the film.

Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum Are Total Bros
MTV News was lucky enough to be invited down to New Orleans to visit the film's set, where we got our first glimpse of Hill and Tatum in action, along with their obvious real-life friendship that translates onscreen.

"I've got to be honest: I'm about as 'fish out of water' as I can possibly get," Tatum said of his first full-on comedic role, adding that he knew he signed onto the role for a reason. "I signed on for Jonah, and I watched this show growing up, so this is home for me."

Hill later revealed that he "begged" Tatum to sign on, that he needed someone with Tatum's action and leading-man background to help carry the film.

They're Already Planning a Sequel
When we finally saw the first full-length red band trailer and realized that the film was very well going to deliver on all Hill's early promises, we were psyched, to say the least. And then came an exclusive extended clip, followed by a few interviews with all the key players at both the New York press day and the film's world premiere at the SXSW Film Festival, where Hill revealed that he got the call to start on the film at SXSW five years earlier.

All the while, the buzz kept building, so much so that it seems that the studio has already commissioned a sequel which, according to Bacall, will take place almost immediately after the end of the action in the first film.

Check out everything we've got on "21 Jump Street."

For breaking news, celebrity columns, humor and more — updated around the clock — visit MTVMoviesBlog.com.

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Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1681192/21-jump-street-tv-show-comedy.jhtml

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Iran Likely Suspect in Cyberattacks Against BBC

The BBC was the target of hack attacks earlier this month, according to comments made by BBC Director-General Mark Thompson in a wide-ranging speech to the Royal Television Society on Wednesday. There was a simultaneous attempt to jam two different satellite feeds of BBC Persian into Iran, and to disrupt BBC's London telephone lines via multiple automatic calls, he said. There was also a sophisticated cyberattack on the news service.

Source: http://www.technewsworld.com/rsstory/74645.html

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How Apple Is Bringing Textbooks on iPad

Apple has been reinventing the way people use technology to their advantage. They have drastically changed the way people play, interact with each other and entertain themselves. Now, they are focusing on education. Recently, Apple released its newest application called iBooks 2. This application allows the user to read textbooks on iPad. They claim that it will revolutionize learning in a fun and interactive kind of way. iBooks 2 seeks to solve one of the most common problem of students: [...]

Source: http://tabletbuzzblog.com/how-apple-is-bringing-textbooks-on-ipad/

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Opening the Vault: How Classic B-Ball Footage Finds New Life Online

March Madness is upon us, and there are few better places for hoops fans to get their fix than the NCAA Vault. The Vault, powered by Thought Equity Motion, is a treasure for hoops nuts, hosting video content of the NCAA Basketball Tournament dating back to the 1970s -- dunks, buzzer-beaters, even entire games.

Source: http://www.technewsworld.com/rsstory/74640.html

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