Fan Fare

Michael Jackson’s “This Is It” trailer released to Web

After giving the world a first look at the upcoming Michael Jackson film “This Is It” at the MTV Video Music Awards on Sunday, Sony Pictures has now made it possible for fans to download the trailer of the much talked-about rehearsal footage, shot in the weeks before the singer’s death in June.

Fans can visit this Sony website to access the trailer, which runs for nearly three minute.

In the trailer, Jackson looks thin as always but appears healthy, as he dances around the rehearsal stage, in footage that comes complete with sound effects, such as “whoosh” and whip-like noises used to accentuate Jackson’s movements.

The trailer also accentuates the positive in Jackson, as Sony Pictures committed to do when it paid $60 million for the rights to the footage produced by concert promoter AEG Live before a series of comeback shows in London that were to start on July 13.

“Imaginarium” gives Heath Ledger a magical reappearance

Heath Ledger is back, more than a year after the Australian actor died in New York of an accidental overdose of prescription drugs. It’s magic, or more specifically it’s a role in the magic-infused film “The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus,” which was the 28-year-old star’s final movie role. As Johnny Depp says at the end of the trailer for the movie, “Nothing is permanent, not even death.” The trailer landed on the Internet on Tuesday, offering a glimpse of Ledger’s final performance. Ledger died on Jan. 22, 2008, when filming was still unfinished on director Terry Gilliam’s “Imaginarium.” To finish the film, producers cast Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell in Ledger’s role of Tony, a man in a dream world who tries to rescue a 16-year-old girl claimed by the devil. The replacement actors pledged to donate their salaries to Ledger’s 3-year-old daughter, Matilda. Ledger played another role requiring a series of actors when he starred as singer Bob Dylan in the 2007 film “I’m Not There.” Ledger portrayed the film’s detached, 1970s version of Dylan, but in that case director Todd Haynes was not forced to  cast more than one actor for the role, he just wanted to.  “Imaginarium” hits theaters on Oct. 16. Will it generate the kind of frenzied interest that Ledger’s role as The Joker contributed to the July 2008 opening of “The Dark Knight”? It surely won’t hurt. See the trailer below.

“Star Trek” trailer rockets past download record

Move over “Watchmen,” a new movie epic is getting all the buzz these days in Hollywood.
It’s director J.J. Abrams’ “Star Trek.” Paramount Pictures said on Wednesday the new trailer for the film received a record-breaking 1.8 million downloads its first 24 hours after a March 6 launch at Apple.com.

A trailer for the film already played with the Nov. 14 release of James Bond movie “Quantum of Solace,” and at the time movie industry watchers said that some hardcore Star Trek fans would buy a ticket for James Bond just to see the trailer. So there is no doubt that ”Trekkies” are a passionate fan base, which helps explain the out-of-this-world download numbers for the trailer.