I'm doing things a little different this week. Peter has covered this week's great releases in his column, noting flicks like Teeth and I'm Not There. For you Hilary Swank lovers, there's some post-death love after the jump, but below is a collection of film spoofs, rather than a plain ol' film.

The Passion of Greg the Bunny, Best of the Film Parodies Volume 2

After Fox canceled the Seth Green-starring Greg the Bunny, it seemed like that was the end of the show. But like some other Fox victims, that wasn't the end. There was a bit of a hiatus, and then IFC jumped on board and allowed Greg to get cinematic and merge television land with movie land. The result -- a whole bunch of puppet movie spoofs. Click here to get an idea of what you'd be in for. It's not every day that you get to see a puppet embodying Frank Booth.

This release includes spoofs of movies like Monster and American Movie, plus the 2005 reunion special that takes on Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Rain Man, and more. As for guests, this batch includes Seth Green, Sarah Silverman, and Adam Goldberg.

Buy the DVD

It's a fact of modern movie watching: as bland storytelling becomes more and more ascendant, you have to be on the lookout for clichés. And most of the time, we remember that -- and occasionally lose sight of the fact that there really are no cliché plots, just cliché execution of the moments within those plots. I can't think of a better example of that fact than the new big-budget tear-jerker P.S. I Love You, starring Hilary Swank and Gerard Butler as a young couple torn apart by untimely death. As P.S. I Love You opens, we witness young married couple Holly (Swank) and Gerry (Butler) fussing, feuding and fighting before they kiss and make up; then, after the credits, we jump ahead to ... Butler's wake. And while that leap is a little brusque, the real indicator of the movie we're in for comes soon after. A priest introduces the playing of Gerry's favorite song, and the opening chords of the Pogues's "Fairytale of New York" fill the air ... and then the song jumps ahead several bars, skips selectively through the verses, and then leaps to the chorus. Really? The music Jerry wanted played at his wake was a clumsily-edited version of a song, cut for no other reason than to move the movie forward faster? This is not playing a character's favorite song; this is cheap manipulation, designed to engage your feelings as swiftly and cheaply as the filmmakers can. And so goes the movie.

I have no objection to a film trying to warm my heart; what I object to is a film trying to microwave it. P.S. I Love You barrages us with high-frequency waves of cheap sentiment, lazy writing, absolute fabrication and only-in-the-movies nonsense, a purely mechanical process designed to make us feel sadness as swiftly as possible, imbuing the sort of emotional heat that, like the hot patches in a microwaved burrito, doesn't really spread through the entire film or endure beyond a few seconds. And I know it's unfair to compare one film to another, but P.S. I Love You is so clumsy that I found myself thinking of far better films about terminal illness (My Life Without Me) or the unexpected loss of a loved one (Truly, Madly, Deeply) not immediately after but, in fact, during the film's agonizingly long dead spots and bland, off-the-rack montages.

Well, I knew I Am Legend was going to do well, but HOLY TOLEDO! Will Smith's apocalyptic science fiction/horror flick set a record for a film opening in December, an honor previously held by 2003's The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Alvin and the Chipmunks also found its niche, pulling in some righteous bucks of its own. As you can see, the gap between these two and the holdovers from previous weeks is quite dramatic. Here are the final numbers:

1. I Am Legend $76.5 million.
2. Alvin and the Chipmunks $45 million.
3. The Golden Compass $9 million.
4. Enchanted $6 million.
5. No Country for Old Men $3 million.

We've got a whopping five big releases this week, with three of them using colons in the titles. That must be a record right?

Charlie Wilson's War
What's It All About: Tom Hanks plays Charlie Wilson, a real life congressman who sought to aid Afghani rebels fighting off Soviet soldiers during the 1979 invasion.
Why It Might Do Well: As the TV spots are touting, this one has five Golden Globe nominations and some strong critical buzz working in its favor (83% Fresh over at Rottentomatoes.com). With bankable stars in front of the camera like Hanks, Julia Roberts and Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Mike Nichols at the helm, what's not to like?
Why It Might Not Do Well: There's some serious competition out there this week from both newcomers and last week's two big releases. Also, a film dealing with politics may not be what people are looking for in a holiday movie.
Number of Theaters: 2,500
Prediction: $15 million

National Treasure: Book of Secrets
What's It All About: Nicolas Cage returns as Ben Franklin Gates, the globe trotting artifact hunter who must now track down pages of John Wilkes Booth's diary to clear his family's name.
Why It Might Do Well: The first National Treasure movie opened to a respectable $35 million weekend in 2004 before going on to make $173 million domestic and $347 million worldwide, so I bet a lot of folks who liked the first will be back for more. This one opens in way more theaters than anything else coming out this week and I suspect this will be next week's number one movie.
Why It Might Not Do Well: It depends on how many people are willing to forget Ghost Rider.
Number of Theaters: 3,500
Prediction: $55 million

The moment has finally come. P.S. I Love You opens this week -- the sad and funny romcom that stars Hilary Swank and Gerard Butler. You might remember my previous posts on the film. I've been following it ever since the production gave me my favorite example of spastic injuries back in November of last year, when Swank got hurt. Why? During one scene, Butler does a striptease, and a flying suspender beaned her on the head and required stitches. Since then, there's been a slew of images, and a trailer to check out. There was also the chance, earlier this month, to submit questions for Moviefone's Unscripted series. The questions were picked, Butler and Swank chatted away, and the new clip is now up over at Moviefone.

You'll get the chance to see Swank laugh a lot and give affection to Butler's new shoe, lots of talk of letter writing, and all that love-related sort of stuff. They even mention the accident, but only in passing, unfortunately. Most of the time, it's just the two joking around. Hearing how Butler talks about a scene that includes a powerful embrace surrounded by cheering music fans, it's no wonder that he's looking to stop the whole historical action drama theme. Gerry's got a big ole soft spot.

P.S. I Love You is the tale of a woman (Swank), who falls for the perfect Irish man (Butler), only to lose him to an illness. But he's not completely gone. To help his love get over the shock of his death, he's created a number of letters that get sent to her, guiding her to take chances and move on to her next love. Could it be Harry Connick, Jr.? Jeffrey Dean Morgan? James Marsters? Not bad choices at all. If only every girl could have those men to choose from.

Hilary Swank has confirmed what was reported a while back -- her next project is a big biopic of flying ace Amelia Earhart. Collider reports that Swank gave some details at the recent junket for my-husband-just-died romcom weepie P.S., I Love You. "It's happening," Swank says of the Earhart film. "I start doing my research in January. It's my next project." She goes on to note that the strike may put a crimp in the plans, as the script is not quite finished. "The film's almost done, but with the hopes that ... we're not filming that till late February, so while I'm doing my preparation and breaking down the script -- sorry, not breaking down the script -- when I'm doing my preparations in breaking down Amelia, who she was and doing all that research, hopefully the writers get what they need and we can start working on that. It's very minor, minor work that needs to be done on the script." Swank also said the film does not attempt to offer a solution to the mystery of Earhart's disappearance.

Want to hear more? As is often the case, the Australian press is out in front on this. A couple weeks ago, The Australian broke the story that Philip Noyce is attached to direct this film, and it already has a title -- The Story of Amelia Earhart. Catchy. The paper also revealed that Noyce will shoot the film in Hawaii and Nova Scotia. That's it for details thus far, but expect more casting news and the like in the next month, assuming this picture doesn't become the latest in an increasingly long line of strike casualties.

Usually huge masses of pictures come by way of superhero movies. Everyone is dying to see how different characters will be presented, and there's so many particular details to see that even a big pile of pictures won't spoil the final, cinematic outcome. Hell, the set pictures that just went up for Watchmen will only be the tip of the iceberg there -- fans still haven't glimpsed the heroes themselves, Nite Owl's ship, or any of the goodies sure to hit us at some point. But then sometimes, there are just a ton of pictures for a random, part-drama romcom. Rope of Silicon has just added 61 new images to their gallery for P.S. I Love You -- the film about the woman who gets letters from her husband about how to move on after he dies -- the same one where Hilary Swank was injured due to a suspender.

Sixty-one. Logic might make you wonder if they're showing a flip-book of the whole movie, which would be cool, but also pretty pointless and spoileriffic. No, instead these are a mixture of set and promotional pictures. There's Hilary Swank with dead hubbie Gerard Butler, smooches with Jeffrey Dean Morgan (who you'll see much more of once pics of his Comedian work in Watchmen hits the web), and lots of slightly-different shots. By that I mean shots they almost work like a flip -- hugging from far away, a close up, a lean-in for a kiss, an almost-kiss, the same pose in a different outfit... you get the idea. At least you can see James Marsters finally -- who looks to be gearing up to perform for Swank. Personally, an outtake with that suspender is all I'd need to see it, but maybe sixty-plus pictures will help convince some other people. The film opens on December 21 -- just in time for Christmas.

I know I make it look easy, but it's tough to be this prescient. A few days ago, we got word of an unspecified Amelia Earhart project being ramped up for a pre-strike shoot, and at the time I pointed out that the whole idea of doing this story as an indie film -- as the mystery project was then described -- is absurd. There's hardly ever been better fodder for a big-budget piece of Oscar bait than the story of Earhart, the legendary flying ace and early feminist hero who disappeared over the Pacific in 1937, never to be seen again. Hollywood apparently agrees -- the New York Post is reporting that two-time Oscar winner Hilary Swank has just put pen to paper to star as Earhart in a biopic. According to the paper, Swank's agents had to ditch a party the other night to take "urgent calls about the deal," and the next day she signed on to the project. This all sounds so on-the-money that I'm already onto wondering who is going to direct this thing. In my earlier post, I mentioned Scorsese, but since he's already put his stamp on Howard Hughes, you can rule him out. How about Anthony Minghella? Joe Wright? The project needs a majestic scope.

As of right now, there's no further information available on the film or Swank's deal, but let's keep the speculation train going: Who should play Fred Noonan, the co-pilot who went down with Earhart? How about Luke Wilson, in a grown-up role for a change? Who should play the wealthy feminist who bankrolled her flights? I said Susan Sarandon last time.and I'll stick with that. Stay tuned as more information on the project comes into focus -- I'm sure the moneymen will be watching to see how well P.S., I Love You does this Christmas.

I want this week's trailer park to be a celebration of the strange, a bash of the bizarre. Once again, we are the weird, and where better to start than:

Weirdsville
You gotta love that title, and the tagline "the road to salvation is paved with burned out hippies," is pretty cool too. Dexter and Royce need to pay off their drug dealer and dispose of a body quick, but run into trouble when the abandoned drive-in theater they chose for a grave site is being used for a satanic ritual. We've got midgets in medieval armor, gnomes and talking mice too. Nice. I have high hopes for this one, and it goes into limited U.S. release on October 5.. Monika Bartyzel saw Weirdsville at the Toronto International Film Festival and you can read her review here.

Southland Tales
Future cult classic or the next Ishtar? Judging from the trailer it could go either way, but I'm dying to see this. I stumbled across Richard Kelly's previous film Donnie Darko when it hit DVD and absolutely loved it, and like many others I've been waiting for his followup project for some time. Cinematical's James Rocchi reviewed the film in May 2006 after it played at Cannes, but apparently the release version represents a very different cut of the film. Synopsizing Southland Tales is quite a challenge, especially since I've only seen this preview, but apparently Kelly is expanding upon his apocalyptic visions from Donnie Darko. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson plays an action film star and Sarah Michelle Gellar is his porn star girlfriend who has the best line in the trailer when she says "Scientists are saying that the future is going to be far more futuristic than they originally predicted." There appears to be some kind of paranoid conspiracy at work, and I'm getting flashbacks of Terry Gilliam's Brazil and the works of David Lynch.

One movie I have been dying to see is Hilary Swank's P.S. I Love You, but not because of the subject matter. One of the first posts I wrote for this site was about the film, when the actress suffered injuries during a scene where co-star Gerard Butler does a strip-tease. A suspender flew through the air, smacked her in the forehead, and gave her stitches. That's comedy gold that just can't be re-created. Excuse me, ma'am -- how did you get your scar? A suspender...

Finally, almost a year later, we've got a trailer to check out. To recap -- the film is about a woman who is haunted by the ghost of her dead husband. Instead of exiting her life in a sudden clap, he has left her a series of messages to help her move on with her life. From the look of the trailer, the messages come in all shapes and sizes, and give her a list of tasks to complete, sort of like a treasure hunt out of mourning. Between the music and the tear-jerking aspects, I'm sure this will be a big romantic hit and rampant date movie -- one just in time for the holiday season, since it comes out right before Christmas.

Beyond Swank and Butler, there's a pretty solid cast to back the duo up -- Prey for Rock 'n' Roll's Gina Gershon, Buffy's second tortured soul James Marsters, Friendly Lisa Kudrow, Grey's Anatomy's doomed Denny, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Bug's Harry Connick Jr. and the wonderful Kathy Bates. Sadly though, Marsters didn't even get a mention in the trailer, although he's one of the top billed. Hopefully this will give the actor some cinematic cred. Anyhow, there's only a few months left to wait, and try not to get blind-sided by some flying suspenders in the meantime.

Is Gerard Butler an A-list star now? It certainly seems so, though I honestly don't feel like I could pick the guy out of a line-up even after sitting through 300. Variety is reporting that Butler has snagged the lead in the Fox Walden fantasy adventure Nim's Island, which we previously told you will feature Jodie Foster and Abigail Breslin. The story involves a little girl who lives on a tropical island with her father, but ends up living there alone, fending for herself. The husband-wife directing team of Mark Levin and Jennifer Flackett will be helming the project, from their own screenplay. It's set to begin filming in Australia.

It's also been announced that after Nim, Butler will be jumping into the world of Al Capone when he stars alongside Nic Cage in Capone Rising, the Untouchables prequel, which will be distributed by Paramount. It's not exactly clear at this point who Butler will be playing, but since he's British I assume it might be the Sean Connery role. Butler is also going to be leading a high-profile romantic dramedy, P.S. I Love You, opposite Hilary Swank. That one is getting a big Christmas release, and if that's not enough for you, he's also set to star in the thriller Game, which begins shooting in January. There's also been talk that if they actually go forward with a remake of John Carpenter's Escape from New York, Butler is the go-to guy for that. So, it looks like Hollywood has decided that he's our new star. Let's start getting used to him.