Negromancer News Bits and Bites from January 25th to 31st, 2026 - UPDATE #11

by Leroy Douresseaux a.k.a. "I Reads You"

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TREATS: From AnotherCookie?:  There is a new online cookie retailer, "AnotherCookie?" The cookies are delicious.

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NEWS:

SCANDAL - From APNews:  The Associated Press lets you know "What to know about the civil rights charges Don Lemon faces for covering church protest in Minnesota"  Lemon, the former CNN anchor, is among nine people, including another journalist (Georgia Fort), have been charged with violating two different federal laws in connection with the protest that interrupted a worship service at the "Cities Church" in St. Paul.

AWARDS - From THR:  The nominations for the 2026 / 79th British Academy Film Awards (BAFTAs) have been announced.  "One Battle After Another" leads with 14 nominations.  The awards will be handed out at ceremony held on February 22, 2026 at Royal Festival Hall in London.

MOVIES - From WorldofReel:  Director Daniel Goldhaber’s “Faces of Death” remake, which has been ready to go since 2024 and was shot in 2023, will reportedly get a nationwide release on April 10, 2026.  The film is supposedly a remake of director John Alan Schwartz's notorious 1978 film of the same name.

DISNEY - From Variety:   Hulu has set the premiere date for “The Testaments,” the follow-up to the streamer’s hit series adaptation of “The Handmaid’s Tale.”  The series will see its first three episodes drop on on April 8,2026 with new episodes dropping weekly thereafter. Like “The Handmaid’s Tale,” the new show is based on author Margaret Atwood's 1985 novel of the same name. 

BOX OFFICE - From BoxOfficePro:  The winner of the 1/23 to 1/25/2026 weekend box office is Amazon/MGM Studios' "Mercy" with an estimated take of 11.1 million dollars.

TELEVISION - From THR:  Ashton Kutcher talks about returning to television to play a villain in FX's buzzy new series, "The Beauty."

OBITS:

From Deadline:  Canadian and American actress, comedian, and screenwriter, Catherine O'Hara, has died at the age of 71, Friday, January 30, 2026.  O'Hara first gained prominence for starring in the Canadian sketch-comedy television series, "SCTV."  Her most famous film role may be that of "Kate McCallister," the mother of actor Macauley Culkin's character, "Kevin McCallister," in the blockbuster Christmas film, "Home Alone," and it's sequel, "Home Alone 2: Lost in New York" (1992).  She also appeared in director Christopher Guest's "mockumentary" films: "Waiting for Guffman" (1996), "Best in Show" (2000), and "A Mighty Wind" (2003), and "For Your Consideration" (2006). Other notable film roles include "Beetlejuice" (1988) and its sequel "Beetlejuice Beetlejuice" (2024).  O'Hara was nominated for ten Primetime Emmy Awards, and she won twice, including "Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy" for her role in the Canadian sitcom, "Schitt's Creek."

From Deadline:  The site offers a look at the life of Emmy-winning actress Catherine O'Hara, who died today at the age of 71, via a "Career in Pictures."

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From THR:  American television actor, ordained minister, and Vietnam veteran, Demond Wilson, has died at the age of 79, Friday, January 30, 2026.  Wilson is best known for playing "Lamont Sanford," the son of the late actor Redd Foxx's "Fred G. Sanford," in the former NBC sitcom, "Sanford and Son" (1972-77).  Wilson also starred in two short-lived sitcoms, CBS' "Baby... I'm Back" (1978) and ABC's "The New Odd Couple" (1982-83).  Wilson served in the United State Army from 1966 to 1968 and served in Vietnam, where he was wounded and earned a "Purple Heart."

From Deadline:  Jamaican drummer, songwriter, producer, and recording artist, Sly Dunbar, has died at the age of 73, Monday, January 26, 2026.  Dunbar is best known for his work with the late Robbie Shakespeare (1953-2021) to form the reggae rhythm section known as "Sly and Robbie."  The hugely influential duo was known for their work with such reggae artists as Peter Tosh, Bunny Wailer, and "Black Uhuru."  Their work extended beyond reggae to such rock and pop acts as Bob Dylan, Mick Jagger, Grace Jones, Cyndi Lauper, and Yoko Ono.  Sly and Robbie also released numerous albums of their own, beginning with 1985's "Language Barrier."  For his work, Sly was nominated for 15 Grammy Awards, winning twice. 

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OSCARS:

From THR:  The nominations for the 2026 / 98th Academy Awards have been announced.  Director Ryan Coogler's Sinners leads with history-making 16 nominations, including for "Best Picture," "Best Director" (Coogler), and Best Actor (Michael B. Jordan).  The winners will be announced March 15, 2026.

From Truthout:  Directed by Andrew Jarecki and Charlotte Kaufman, the 2025 documentary film, "The Alabama Solution," is one of five nominees in the category of "Best Documentary Feature."  The film chronicles the horrific conditions inside the state of Alabama's prisons.  The incarcerated men who produced footage for "The Alabama Solution" were abruptly transferred to solitary this month (January).

From TheGuardian:  Director Ryan Coogler's "Sinners" earned 16 Oscar nominations at the 98th Academy Awards, the most in the 98-year history of the awards.  The previous record is 14, held by "All About Eve" (1950), "Titanic" (1997), and "La La Land" (2016).

From Variety:  With her fifth Oscar nomination, for "Best Costume Designer" for "Sinners," Ruth E. Carter is now the most Oscar-nominated Black woman in the history of the Academy Awards.

From Truthout:  One of the five nominees for this year's "Best International Feature" Academy Award is "The Voice of Hind Rajab."  Representing the nation of Tunisia, the film is a mix of drama and documentary, and it tells the story of Hind Rajab, a five-year old girl who was killed January 29, 2024 by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during the Israeli invasion of the Gaza strip.

From YahooEntertainment:  At the age of 73, actor Delroy Lindo finally gets his first Oscar nomination - in the category of "Best Supporting Actor" for "Sinners."  The actor also talks about being "profoundly disappointed" by previous Academy snubs.

From EW:  Oscar-nominee Kirsten Dunst is not pleased that her husband, previous Oscar-nominee, Jesse Plemons, was not Oscar-nominated for his work in the recent acclaimed film, "Bugonia."

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TIMOTHY BUSFIELD & OTHER SCANDALS:

From AlbuquerqueJournal:  A judge has ordered director and Emmy-winning actor Timothy Busfield released from jail as he awaits trial on child sex abuse charges.

From CBS:  Director and Emmy-winning actor, Timothy Busfield (Thirtysomething), surrendered to New Mexico authorities in answer to an arrest warrant for child sex abuse charges.  The complaint involves twin brothers who claim that Busfield molested them on the set on the former Fox suspense drama, "The Cleaning Lady," for which Busfield was a series director.

From NBCNews:  Already facing charges related to claims that he molested twin brothers on the set of a TV series where he was a director, Emmy-winner Timothy Busfield is also facing accusations that he kissed and inappropriately touch a 16-year-old girl years ago.

From THR:   In the wake of his arrest on child sex abuse charges, Timothy Busfield finds himself without a talent agency  The Santa Monica-based agency, "Innovative Artists," has ceased working actor and director.

From Deadline:   Daniel Stern ("Home Alone") is no longer part of ABC‘s comedy pilot, "Do You Want Kids?," which is set to star Rachel Bloom and Rory Scovel.  ABC and the producing studio, 20th Television, will be recasting the series-regular role that Stern was supposed to play.  Stern was recently arrested on a misdemeanor charge of soliciting a prostitute.

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"Open Season" is a Good Buddy Comedy

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 49 (of 2007) by Leroy Douresseaux


Open Season (2006)
Running time: 96 minutes (1 hour, 36 minutes)
MPAA – PG for some rude humor, mild action, and brief language
DIRECTORS: Roger Allers and Jill Culton with Anthony Stacchi
WRITERS: Steve Bencich & Ron J. Friedman and Nat Maudlin; from a screen story by Jill Culton and Anthony Stacchi; from an original story by Steve Moore and John Carls
PRODUCER: Michelle Murdocca
EDITORS: Ken Solomon and Pam Ziegenhagen

ANIMATION/FANTASY/COMEDY and ACTION/ADVENTURE

Starring: (voices) Martin Lawrence, Ashton Kutcher, Gary Sinise, Debra Messing, Billy Connolly, Jon Favreau, Patrick Warburton, Gordon Tootoosis, Jane Krakowski, Georgia Engel, and Cody Cameron

Open Season is Sony Pictures Animation’s first computer-animated (or 3D animation) feature film. This fish-out-water, reluctant buddy movie is a likeable story, but the animation is truly the star here.

Boog (Martin Lawrence), a domesticated grizzly bear, lives the good life in the tranquil town of Timberline with his kindhearted surrogate mother, Beth (Debra Messing), who rescued Boog when he was a cub. One day, Boog rescues Eliot (Ashton Kutcher), a mule deer with one antler missing, from the clutches of Shaw (Gary Sinise), the local law breaking, fanatical hunter. Eliot follows Boog home to his cushy digs where he lives with Beth, but this reluctant new friendship lands Boog in a lot of trouble. Before he knows it, Boog is left out in the wild, completely unprepared to live in the real world. Suddenly Boog and Eliot are forced into a partnership, and they have to survive the start of open season or they and all the forest animals may end up mounted on some hunter’s wall.

With 2006 being a busy year for 3D animated films, Open Season stands out for two reasons. First, the voice performances are very good, in particular Martin Lawrence, Ashton Kutcher, and Gary Sinise. Lawrence mixes gruff charm, a slight ego, and a genial self-effacing attitude that makes Boog come across as a sort of everyman who is simply looking to enjoy his comfy life without making too many waves. Kutcher’s Eliot is the classic manic funnyman who is always in trouble and manages to drag an unsuspecting stranger down with him. Sinise’s Shaw is a great comic villain, and he gives a fine performance by making his recognizable voice unrecognizable.

The animation is very good, and immediately had my attention. The character motion is fluid, and the movement of objects within the sets (car chases, floods, battle scenes, etc.) is spectacular. Sony Pictures Animation manages to duplicate the “squash and stretch” effect (think classic Looney Tunes and MGM cartoon shorts) of DreamWorks’ Madagascar with the kind of lush colors Pixar delivers in films like Finding Nemo and Cars. The characters are rubbery and flexible, and that adds to the comedy, especially in big action scenes (like the “dam break” and the battle between the forest animals and hunters). Open Season’s color palette perfectly recreates a lush autumn forest and the comforting earth tones of the great outdoors.

Open Season makes the buddy action comedy seem new by setting it as a delightful animal fable with lots of sassy banter and gentle innuendo. The animation captures the eye because it imitates the best of earlier 3D cartoon features, but also manages to be its own new thing. The characters are endearing, and Boog and Eliot make an excellent animation comedy pair, but this beautiful animation with its idiosyncratic visual style is something to remember.

7 of 10
B+

Sunday, March 11, 2007

"Dude, Where's My Car?" Makes Dumb Funnier Than it Should Be

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 66 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux


Dude, Where’s My Car? (2000)
Running time: 83 minutes (1 hour, 23 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for language and some sex and drug-related humor
DIRECTOR: Danny Leiner
WRITER: Philip Stark
PRODUCERS: Broderick Johnson, Andrew Kosove, Gil Netter, and Wayne Rice
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Robert Stevens (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Kimberly Ray

COMEDY/SCI-FI/FANTASY

Starring: Ashton Kutcher, Seann William Scott, Jennifer Garner, Marla Sokoloff, Kristy Swanson, David Herman, John Toles-Bey, and Hal Sparks

I planned never to see Dude, Where’s My Car?, figuring my initial curiosity to be a sign of intellectual weakness. After seeing Seann William Scott in Bulletproof Monk and really digging his performance, my intellect further weakened, I decided to seek out some of his other films and came across Dude, Where's My Car? again. Scott co-stars in this outlandish comedy with Ashton Kutcher, who came to prominence in the television series “That 70’s Show.” Whatta you know: this turned out to be one of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen.

Jessie Richmond (Kutcher) and Chester Greenburg (Scott) wake up one morning to find Jessie’s car missing, and they have no memory of what happened the night before except for the wild and crazy things people tell them that they did. At first, Jessie and Chester are excited and proud of the calamity and craziness they allegedly committed, but in time they come to be frustrated that they got so wasted that they can’t remember anything. And they need their memory to find the car, which is the key to a lot of weird trouble for them. They owe a transvestite strip dancer a suitcase full of cash, and people claiming to be aliens are looking for an important, universe-endangering object. Losing the car was just the beginning; you have to see the film to believe how hilarious the adventure to find the car gets.

I’m sure this film was cynically conceived and produced to cash in on the youth movie craze. Film studios figure that if they make movies starring familiar young faces from TV and pad the story with jokes about sex, bodily fluids and functions, teenage jargon, twentysomething slang, and general crassness, they’re bound to make a mint, if not in theatres then in home video and television. It’s a can’t-lose option: marrying the lowbrow, the dumb, the rude, and a bit of cultural decay.

This time the studio got lucky and the movie turned out way funny. I’d rather believe that this was a happy accident, but regardless this is funny, in the vein of Dumb and Dumber, accept that Jessie and Chester, for all their dimwittedness, tend to be a little smarter than their adversaries. You can root for these guys, by awed by their occasional show of smarts, laugh at them, and with them. Dude, Where’s My Car? comes close to being the perfect dumb-but-funny movie. Don’t take it seriously, and you’ll laugh your proverbial ass off. Don’t be stuck in the mud; see it and laugh like a madman.

7 of 10
B+

And Now for the Haters: 2011 Razzie Award "Winners"

According to "The Odds" column at the The Wrap.com, there were 637 voters for this year dis-honors.  The Last Airbender and Sex and the City 2 took the brunt of these voters' ire.  Airbender is problematic, but I like Sex and the City 2:

2011 Razzie Award (not really) Winners:

Worst Picture: "The Last Airbender"


Worst Director: M. Night Shyamalan, "The Last Airbender"

Worst Actor: Ashton Kutcher, "Killers" and "Valentine's Day"

Worst Actress: Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis and Cynthia Nixon, "Sex and the City 2"

Worst Supporting Actor: Jackson Rathbone, "The Last Airbender" and "The Twilight Saga: Eclipse"

Worst Supporting Actress: Jessica Alba, "The Killer Inside Me," "Little Fockers," "Machete" and "Valentine's Day"

Worst Screen Couple of Ensemble: "Sex and the City 2"

Worst Screenplay: M. Night Shyamalan, "The Last Airbender"

Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-off or Sequel: "Sex and the City 2"

Worst Eye-Gouging Misuse of 3D: "The Last Airbender"

Review: "Guess Who" Laughs to Get Along (Missing Bernie Mac)

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 147 (of 2005) by Leroy Douresseaux

Guess Who (2005)
Running time: 106 minutes (1 hour, 46 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for sex-related humor
DIRECTOR: Kevin Rodney Sullivan
WRITERS: David Ronn and Jay Scherick and Peter Tolan, from a story by David Ronn and Jay Scherick (based loosely on the screenplay, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner by William Rose)
PRODUCERS: Jason Goldberg, Erwin Stoff, and Jenno Topping
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Karl Walter Lindenlaub
EDITOR: Paul Seydor

COMEDY with elements of drama and romance

Starring: Bernie Mac, Ashton Kutcher, Zoë Saldaña, Judith Scott, Hal Williams, Kellee Stewart, Robert Curtis-Brown, RonReaco Lee, Niecy Nash, Kimberly Scott, Denise Dowse, and Mike Epps

In the famous 1967 film, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, a young white woman (played by Katharine Houghton) brings her black fiancé (famously played by Sidney Poitier) home to meet her parents, the mother played by Katherine Hepburn and the disapproving father played by Spencer Tracy.

Director Kevin Rodney Sullivan (Barbershop 2: Back in Business) updates this classic of interracial (a tired, archaic term) dating in Guess Who. This time, Theresa Jones (Zoë Saldaña), a young black woman, brings her fiancé, Simon Green (Ashton Kutcher), a young white man, home to meet her parents, Percy (Bernie Mac) and Marilyn Jones (Judith Scott). Percy has already had a credit check done on Simon and knows that he has a high-powered job at an investment firm, but Percy doesn’t know two things about Simon: (1) he quits his job the day he’s supposed to meet Theresa’s parents who may end up being his in-laws and (2) Simon is white. Complicating matters is that Simon and Theresa plan on announcing their engagement on the very weekend that Percy and Marilyn are holding a big and expensive ceremony to renew their vows after 25 years of marriage. Percy is upfront and blunt with his disappoint in Theresa’s choice of Simon, and Simon tries his best to make friends with Percy. Will Percy ever learn to like… or at least tolerate Simon?

Guess Who is more funny than smart, and it’s actually very funny when it deals with tense issues of interracial dating and race relations in an off-handed way. Several times the films seems as if it wants to deal with America’s proverbial elephant in the room (race), but most of the time it has to awkwardly limp away from that after fumbling the ball at the 20-yard line and getting injured. Guess Who is a film about race relations that never uses the word “nigger,” but feels safe using the ineffective racial slur, “honky.” That is the best Guess Who could do as far as walking the tightrope between what is acceptable and offensive. It avoids discussing what people have in common (humanity) and what divides us (skin color, ethnicity, religion, etc.), so it certainly isn’t a daring film. In the end it’s also about as glib as Meet the Parents and, to a lesser extent, its sequel, Meet the Fockers, in terms of dealing with the conflicts that result when an outsider marries into the family and when two really different groups of people come together because of a marriage.

On the other hand, the film is funny, very funny. Mac and Kutcher have excellent screen chemistry; in fact the script gets that right, so much to the point that it could be a text book example of how to make interpersonal dynamics in screen narratives in which a screen duo or couple are of different skin colors work. The drama does seem a little leaden and forced, but if a viewer goes in expecting a typical comedy of errors and misunderstandings, he’ll get one that has a lot of laughs. There is deep fun in watching Mac’s Percy Jones and Kutcher’s Simon Green dance awkwardly around each other for a long time, each graceless meeting helping each to learn about (if not understand) the other.

That makes the inevitable hug of real friendship seem so… well, real, and rewards us with a happy moment to top of a truly funny film. You see, every movie about us (all of us) learning to get along shouldn’t involve cursing, screaming, tears, and finally a tragic incident that brings us together to appreciate life. Sometimes, we can all laugh our way to getting along, or so says Guess Who.

7 of 10
B+

NOTES:
2006 Black Reel: 1 nomination: “Best Actress” (Zoe Saldana)

2006 Image Awards: 1 nomination: “Outstanding Actress in a Motion Picture” (Zoe Saldana)

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