Fifteen years ago, a young-gun filmmaker named Robert Rodriguez was hired to write a new “Predator” film and now, looking back, he can chuckle at the final product he delivered. “It was this cra

zy, intense off-world story and there was just no way it could be made. The technology wasn’t there yet.”

That was then, but this is now. “Predators,” as it will be called, is happening and Rodriguez is producing. I sat down with him for a pleasant lunch at the Four Seasons Hotel and, as our sons sat together munching French fries and drawing pictures, he explained his plans for the summer 2010 sci-fi release.

“It’s the story from that script I had written way back then,” Rodriguez said. “They had hired me to write a ‘Predator’ story while I was waiting to do ‘Desperado’ back in 1994. It was crazy, this thing I came up with. So then fast-forward to now and, like, six months ago, they found the script and called me up. ‘Hey, we want to redo this franchise and we found your old script. This is where we should have gone with the series! We want to move forward.’ And that’s what we’re doing.”

“And, like I said, back when I wrote it, the technology wasn’t there yet. I didn’t have to worry about who would direct it or anything because it was a script that just couldn’t be used.”

Rodr

iguez has proven himself not only as a distinct voice in genre films (”Sin City,” “From Dusk Till Dawn,” “Planet Terror“) but as a master of making big-looking hit films on relatively small budgets. Consider the three “Spy Kids” films, which are loaded with dazzle, action and gizmos; they pulled in a collective $465 million in worldwide gross but not one of them had a budget of more than $38 million.

Rodriguez, a writer/producer/director, is the modern prototype of the nimble, maverick filmmaker. Like his upcoming bizarro family movie “Shorts” (which, by the way, I’ve seen, and it’s great — more on that to come here at Hero Complex), “Predators” will be shot in his home state of Texas on a lean budget and so far removed from Hollywood that it is doesn’t get run through the often bruising machinery of the studio. “Predators” is for 20th Century Fox and “Shorts” is being distributed by Warner Bros., but “Predators” will be clearly defined by Rodriguez and his personal style.

“They actually like that,” the 41-year-old San Antonio native said. “You’re making it less expensive then they could ever make it here. Its so much leaner. and they get a movie that they can sell as a big movie, they make money off of it, especially since it didn’t cost much at all. I get to keep it locked down creatively and, really, the studio is happy with that. It’s almost like they get protected from themselves. They know that when some things get taken through the machine they end up overspending and making the movie worse. The movie’s not allowed to breathe. That was the case with the ‘Predator’ movie. Just go make it down there in your system. We don’t know how you do it down there but somehow you make these movies very creatively and at a budget.”
The 1987 film “Predator” was directed by John McTiernan and starred Arnold Schwarzenegger, Carl Weathers and Jesse Ventura as an elite commando team on a

rescue mission in the jungles of Guatemala, where they find themselves hunted by an alien. That alien, designed by the effects team led by the late, great Stan Winston, became one of the most memorable creatures in sci-fi film history and the movie became an enduring fan-favorite that ages quite well. There was a 1990 sequel and two-crossovers with the “Alien” franchise (2004 and 2007) with varied ambitions and mixed results, but Rodriguez said the success of the first movie is still a powerful draw.

“No matter how many ‘Jaws’ movies they make, people never forget how great the first one is. You can always come back to it, people love it and they want to love it. ‘Predator’ is like that too. It’s a great premise, a great character and fans get excited when they think of what can be done with it.”

What’s the plot of this new revival? “The story is on the Predator planet and, well, it’s just crazy.

It takes place off-world which is great, and there’s a lot of them out there.” And what about the prey? “Let’s just say if there were no predators, the humans in this story would probably kill each other.”

He said he won’t have to stray far from his ranch outside Austin to create the settings he needs.

“It’ll be a mix. A lot of location sets and some green scene. There’s a lot of different places in Texas I have in mind, and we have a great rebate thing there now, only 60% has to be shot in Texas. We’re scouting for locations now. You can find some alien landscapes in Texas for sure. And with the right augmentation, you can make anywhere look like anywhere now.”

Rodriguez will be at International Comic-Con in San Diego this month to promote “Shorts” (his panel is July 24 at 1:45 p.m.), and if you’re there, you’ll want to check it out for sure. I talked to him quite a bit about his other upcoming work (”Machete,” “Sin City 2,” a fourth “Spy Kids” film, etc.) and you”ll find all that in the weeks to come by checking back here at Hero Complex.

For months and months we’ve been reading snippets from interviews with the original Ghostbusters cast and crew talking about Ghostbusters 3, which is in development. But our friends at MakingOf have director Harold Ramis (who played Egon in the original films) talking about the possibility of making a third film for almost seven minutes. He talks about how the effects might be transformed in this new computer generated world, making it look low-tech, the unproduced draft of Ghostbusters in Hell script, and how the project is developing, and the danger of making sequels. Watch the interview below (or if it doesn’t show - here)

With Public Enemies opening today, Johnny Depp is once again on our minds here at IGN Movies. He adds the infamous American bank robber John Dillinger to the resume of noteworthy characters he’s played over the years, and it just amazes us how this guy is able to continuously outdo himself with the roles that he chooses.

So to celebrate the various, often eccentric characters he’s taken on since first showing up as a Freddy Kruger victim back in 1984, we’ve taken a look at some of our favorite Depp movie moments (sorry 21 Jump Street fans, no TV stuff here!). We’ve mostly picked one scene per movie for this list, though truth be told there are so many other great Deppisms to choose from…

So read on for our Top Johnny Depp Movie Moments, and then be sure to comment at the bottom of the page and let us know what your favorites are!

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Ed Wood’s Big Finale
Movie: Ed Wood
Key Quote: “This is the one I’ll be remembered for.”

In Depp and Tim Burton’s beautiful tribute to legendary bad director Edward D. Wood Jr., all of Wood’s triumphs and travails culminate in the final scene when his masterpiece of awful, Plan 9 from Outer Space, has its premiere in front of a theater full of adoring (surely fictional) fans. As the credits and title music of Plan 9 blare on the screen, followed by the opening scene featuring his now dead friend Bela Lugosi (Martin Landau), a rapt Wood silently mouths the words of his film’s narrator. He then looks around at the audience and says to himself, “This is the one… This is the one I’ll be remembered for.” He and his girlfriend are then seen rushing out in the pouring rain to drive off and get married, in a Hollywood ending that is certainly fitting of the real Ed Wood himself — and one that sums up the boundless optimism of the character in the face of adversity after adversity, as portrayed by Depp.
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What Happens on Elm Street Stays on Elm Street
Movie: A Nightmare on Elm Street
Key Quote: “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!”

In his first role, Depp went up against none other than Freddy Krueger himself in the original A Nightmare on Elm Street — and he lost! When his character, the love interest of the female lead, nods off while watching his distinctly 1980s stereophonic home entertainment system, Mr. Sweater sees his chance to strike in the dreamscape. Freddy’s claw suddenly comes up from a hole in the middle of the bed and pulls our young Johnny (and his TV!) down into the abyss with him, and then the blood follows… oh, the blood. The blood! Red liquidy stuff flies out of the hole like a geyser, confirming that whatever happened to Depp in the bed was perhaps best left offscreen. As the cops say while investigating the scene, the coroner’s been in the john puking since he first saw the aftermath of the scene. But it’s a great moment in slasher horror because it reminds us that no one but the Final Girl is safe from the likes of Freddy.
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Edward in Neverland
Movie: Edward Scissorhands
Key Quote: “If he weren’t up there now, I don’t think it would be snowing. Sometimes you can still catch me dancing in it.”

In the wake of Michael Jackson’s death, it’s strange to look back on another of Depp’s collaborations with Tim Burton, Edward Scissorhands, and note the parallels between the fallen King of Pop and the Scissorhands’ character’s paths. Both created by mad scientists, of sorts (Vincent Price for Edward, Joe Jackson for Michael), the two were physically odd and emotionally withdrawn things, hounded by a curious public and ultimately driven to live out their lives in isolation. And for all the whimsical and humorous moments found in the film, that’s the part that really sticks with the viewer — the ending, with Edward alone in his mansion, causing the snow that falls from the sky, the result of the ice sculptures he’s still making decades after he first fell in love and was forced to leave the girl of his dreams. Too bad Jackson didn’t get such a stylish end.
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Busey Attack
Movie: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Key Quote: “I’m very lonely here.”
Depp played a version of gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson in Terry Gilliam’s 1998 adaptation of Thompson’s 1971 novel Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream. The film is less savage than it is hilarious with its feature-length acid trip featuring Depp’s Raoul Duke and Benicio del Toro’s Dr. Gonzo, the highlight of which comes when Gary Busey shows up as a highway cop who pulls the duo over. Getting pulled over by a cop while you’re tripping out is bad enough, let alone by a Gary Busey cop, but then when he says, “May I have a little kiss before you go? I’m very lonely here,” well, that’s the stuff that dreams/nightmares are made of.
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Something to Lose Your Head Over
Movie: Sleepy Hollow
Key Quote: “Horseman!” (as Depp throws the Horseman’s skull to him)
Teaming yet again with Tim Burton, Depp embarked on the role of Ichabod Crane for 1999’s Sleepy Hollow. The pair’s unique spin on the age-old Washington Irving story is interesting if perhaps not the best of the Burton/Depp collaborations, but still the actor’s variation on Crane is memorable as he plays him as a strange kind of Bruce Wayne throwback, only without the emotional baggage and bad-ass edge. He’s a tinkerer and inventor, but maybe not so good at it, but when it comes down to facing the Headless Horseman, he’s aces — especially since that ghostly villain is played by Christopher Walken. It’s a match-up to remember, especially when it turns out that it’s better to be friends with a Walken Headless Horseman than enemies!
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Elvis By Way of John Waters
Movie: Cry-Baby
Key Quote: “King Cry-Baby!”

A sort of continuation of John Waters’ Hairspray, 1990’s Cry-Baby stars Depp as the title character, “Cry-Baby” Wade Walker, the leader of the gang known as the Drapes in 1950s Baltimore. They’re the “bad” kids, but when Cry-Baby falls in love with a good girl — a Square — all bets are off, and the singing kicks into full gear. With a perpetual tear coming down his cheek, a callback to the tragedy he once endured like so many poor little boys and girls in those melodramatic radio hits of the era. But it’s the musical numbers that are most memorable, especially when Depp sings his character’s eponymous and campy song “King Cry-Baby” in Elvis-esque fashion. Only since this is a Waters film, Traci Lords is in his band and girls take their panties off during the performance.
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Wonka is Whacko
Movie: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Key Quote: “Wasn’t that just magnificent?”
In 2005, Depp and Tim Burton did their version of Roald Dahl’s classic story Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Not surprisingly, Depp’s Willy Wonka is a weirdo in the extreme, even stranger and more bizarre than Gene Wilder’s was in the original film. This Wonka is haunted by his upbringing by his dentist dad (played by none other than Christopher Lee), and once again he’s a character that sort of resembles Michael Jackson. When we first meet him it’s outside his Neverland-like factory, where a freaky music show culminates in fireworks melting a bunch of dolls in a rather dreadful fashion — much to the delight of Wonka, who suddenly appears next to his Golden Ticket winners and beams with pride over his horror-puppet show. And that’s just the start of the horror…
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Our Careers Could Go at Any Time
Movie: What’s Eating Gilbert Grape
Key Quote: “I’m sorry, buddy.”
Maybe not the flashiest of Depp roles, but his turn as the title character in 1993’s What’s Eating Gilbert Grape was important because it, along with Benny & Joon that same year, really started to show off the actor in the actor, if you will. Grape put Depp opposite Leonardo DiCaprio as a pair of brothers, the latter mentally disabled and the former the de facto caretaker of his family, and the result was that audiences got a taste of two real talents who were just starting out. The scene where Gilbert mistakenly forgets DiCaprio’s Arnie in the bath, only to find the boy hours later still sitting in the tub and freezing, is shocking and sad as it depicts how thinly stretched Gilbert is as he tries to support his family while simultaneously breaking free of it.
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Like a Rolling Stone
Movie: The Pirates of the Caribbean series
Key Quote: “Why is the rum always gone?”
Only Depp could take a Disney theme-park attraction turned movie and combine it with his best Keith Richards impersonation (with a dash of Pepe Le Pew thrown in for good measure) to earn an Oscar nomination — his first, amazingly enough. The Pirates of the Caribbean film series also went on to be amazingly successful at the box office, with much of that success coming as the result of Depp’s oddly fun and idiosyncratic performance as the pirate Jack Sparrow. Of the three films (to date) in the franchise, Jack has had many fine (and not so fine) moments, but we think our favorite has to come when the perpetually inebriated (or something) Jack realizes that his yo-ho-ho bottle of rum is empty. He slurs to himself, “Why is the rum always gone?” and then attempts to stand and walk away while the ship rocks in the waves. Suddenly, as he staggers, the answer to his question becomes quite apparent: “Oh, that’s why.”
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Lost in Gilliam Land
Movie: Lost in La Mancha
Key Quote: Pick one.
Terry Gilliam’s first attempt at making The Man Who Killed Don Quixote (he’s said to be trying again) was a failure for a variety of reasons, but it sure is a fascinating story as told in the 2002 documentary Lost in La Mancha. Depp would’ve starred in the film, which actually went into production before falling apart, and the whole thing is a favorite Depp moment of ours just because it’s a great reminder of how hard it is to make a movie – even when you’re a big-time movie star like Johnny.

But any true Seeker knows that a trip to England is a must. That’s where you can find the places that inspired the visually rich settings of the Harry Potter books and movies. In fact, a quick Google search will bring up more than a dozen tour companies ready to take your money for a day’s drive around London and Oxford.

For those needing a fix as they await the release of the Half-Blood Prince — and lacking the cash to hop across the pond, or to Chicago — we’ve put together a look at five Potter sites likely to be seen in the upcoming movie.

Hogwarts Library

Cameras aren’t allowed inside the library, so a shot upward from the sculpture of Earl of Pembroke out front is about the best most Muggles can hope to take of the second-floor Duke Humfrey’s, the oldest reading room in Oxford’s Bodleian Library. Don’t worry, though, you can get inside with a paid tour of the medieval library, where books were long chained to the shelves.

In the Half-Blood Prince book, Harry spends a lot of time in the library with Hermione, who is avoiding Ron. The new trailer has a library scene with the duo that ends with Hermione smacking Harry over the head with paper like a bad puppy. Also of note, it’s in this installment of the Potter saga that “the Hogwarts library [fails] Hermione for the first time in living memory” — the only thing she can find about Horcruxes, even in the Restricted Section, is a single mention in Magick Moste Evile that describes them as “the wickedest of magical inventions.”

Madam Pomfrey’s Infirmary

No doubt the Infirmary will appear in the Half-Blood Prince given the number of trips to the hospital wing Harry and his friends make due to accidents and other mishaps. Ron ends up there on his birthday after Slughorn accidentally poisons him with mead — notably, just moments after curing his accidental consumption of Romilda Vane’s love-potion-soaked Chocolate Cauldrons. Days later, Harry joins Ron in the hospital with a cracked skull when an overzealous Quidditch teammate accidentally fires a Bludger at his head. However, both their injuries pale in comparison to Katie Bell, whose accidental contact with a cursed necklace requires medical attention beyond the walls of Hogwarts, landing her in St. Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries.

However, it’s unlikely we’ll see the final Infirmary scenes of the Half-Blood Prince — with everyone gathered around Bill Weasley — in the movie, based on rumors about scenes being saved for the first Deathly Hallows movie.

The most recognizable element of Madam Pomfrey’s Infirmary is the ornate ceiling, which is found in the Divinity School — also located in Oxford University’s Bodleian Library and directly below Duke Humfrey’s. (The Divinity School may also look familiar for another reason — it appears in the Goblet of Fire as the area where Professor McGonagall teaches the students to dance, calling on Ron to help her demonstrate.)

Hogwarts Great Hall

Red Cloak Portrait (click for full image)

The spectacular Great Hall is part of every Harry Potter movie — and why wouldn’t it be after the expense of having to build it? If only J.K. Rowling had invented three Hogwarts houses instead of four, they might have been able to film exclusively in the Christ Church Dining Hall that inspired it.

But four long tables are required for all those sorting scenes…so a wider version of the hall was created for the movie set. And while there was little doubt the hall would materialize in the Half-Blood Prince, it’s already made its first appearance in the official movie stills.

As an added bonus, a visit to the Christ Church Dining Hall gives you the chance to see the painting rumored to have inspired the agile occupants of Hogwarts’ portraits. What about the gentleman in the red robe is so special? His eyes appear to follow you as you walk around the hall.

Staircase Outside the Great Hall

Christ Church Staircase            (click for full image)

At least they didn’t have to re-create the staircase outside of the Great Hall. In the Sorcerer’s Stone, the first years march up these stairs to meet Professor McGonagall, who explains the sorting ceremony they are about to undergo. This staircase is also where Harry meets the young Tom Riddle for the first time in the Chamber of Secrets.

And we’re hopeful the movie will keep the staircase’s first appearance in the Half-Blood Prince — when the deliciously snide Snape escorts Harry to the Great Hall, after his run-in with Malfoy on the Hogwarts Express delays his arrival to school.

Diagon Alley

Leadenhall Market (click for full image)

A back-to-school shopping trip in Diagon Alley serves as a touchstone throughout the Harry Potter series. Not surprisingly, the Half-Blood Prince has a number of scenes set in this wizarding corner of London. Before starting his sixth year, Harry travels to Diagon Alley with the Weasleys, Hagrid, and Hermione, making a stop at Madam Malkin’s to purchase school robes. And it’s from there that Harry shadows Draco Malfoy during his mysterious trip to Borgin and Burkes — a trip that obsesses Harry throughout the Half-Blood Prince.

What may come as a surprise to fans, though, is the fact that Diagon Alley has ties to a historic shopping area in London, albeit for Muggles. Built atop a market area that dates back to the 14th century, Leadenhall Market has been a covered shopping area since the late 1880s. In the first Harry Potter movie, a corner shop in Leadenhall served as the entrance to the Leaky Cauldron — behind which Diagon Alley can be accessed by tapping the correct brick in the wall.

“I prefer to walk away with the experience as opposed to walking away with the product,” he explained.

Depp is in London to promote new film Public Enemies, in which he plays the gangster John Dillinger.

Character

Depp said: “I’ve not seen the film, so I don’t know what it looks like.”

He added: “I like to portray a character, inhabit a character and build character, but I don’t want to watch the end result necessarily, because it becomes about money then and I’d rather not think about that.

“My children have seen more films of mine than I have. They’ve seen all of them within reason - many more than I have.

He added: “I have no plans to see them - any of them.”

Depp also said he does not even check his on-screen appearance during the shooting of a film.

“I wouldn’t dare watch a playback or rushes or anything like that,” he said.

Ever wonder what movie actors are really smoking and snorting when they do a line of coke or lift a joint to their lips?

Turns out that many cocaine look-alikes are ingredients you might use in a cake, like powdered sugar, powdered milk and baking soda, while herbal tobacco fills in for genuine cannabis.

Though the fakes are legal and don’t provide a high, sometimes they can make the actors feel a little buzzed. On Showtime’s “Weeds,” for instance, where potheads Doug and Andy are often lighting up, the herbal tobacco makes them feel a little lightheaded, says “Weeds” executive producer Roberto Benabib.

“According to them, it gets them higher than regular marijuana,” he says. “They end up smoking so much of it they get very lightheaded, and they don’t like it. Sometimes they do take after take, and you will see them getting woozy because it has a strange effect on them. But it’s totally legal, and it is what we are supposed to use.”

Herbal tobacco is also the preferred “pot” for cinematographer and prop master Jeff Butcher, who’s now working on a movie with “Pineapple Express” star James Franco, and who also worked with Mickey Rourke on “The Wrestler.”

“You can get herbal cigarettes made out of marshmallows and a bunch of different herbs,” Butcher says. “But they don’t have any nicotine.”

So-called stoner magazines advertise products like Herbal Ecstasy, he notes, which is an herb-based product that can be smoked or snorted. Wizard Weed is another product that can be used in place of marijuana, he says.

“You can roll it into joints and put it into bags,” Butcher says. “And it definitely doesn’t get you high.”

Some prop masters order buds and joints from International Oddities, which sells a variety of fake marijuana products, says Thomas Leupp, editor at Hollywood.com.

“They provide this fake bud, and actually they have dozens of different kinds” Leung says. “Generally, a director has a favorite prop master they use, or the studio will provide a prop master.”

For cocaine, Leupp says, some actors actually snort powdered sugar or baking soda.

“I’ve heard that they also have used Ovaltine, but I’m not so sure about that,” he says. “These are things that can be irritating to the nose, but I’ve heard that real coke is irritating, too.”

Cocaine shows up on an episode of the fourth season of “Weeds,” when Celia uses it, and baby laxatives fit the bill nicely, says Benabib.

“These are very weak and very mild,” he says. “And they’re already in powdered form.”

Butcher says that when a scene calls for cocaine, he used a vitamin called inositol.

“It is a B-vitamin of some kind, and I believe that it is the most common cocaine cut [used on film],” he says. “With inositol, you get a little bit of energy lift, but it is very mild. I don’t know about ingesting baking soda, though.”

Products like baking soda and confectioners’ sugar may work better when the “cocaine” needs to be seen on screen in bulk, Butcher adds.

When faux pot plants are needed, as they were in “Weeds,” things got costly.

“In seasons two and three, we were growing hydroponically indoors,” Benabib says. “We needed literally hundreds of the plants, and they are very expensive. They cost an arm and a leg.”

So, do any actors ever want to use the real thing?

“There is an urban legend that [Al] Pacino used real cocaine during ‘Scarface,’ ” says Leupp. “But that has never been confirmed.”

By Stephen Garrett

When I was sixteen or seventeen, I wanted to be a writer. I wanted to be a playwright. But everything I wrote, I thought, was weak. And I can remember falling asleep in tears because I had no talent the way I wanted to have.

Did you ever see Rushmore? I was just like that kid.

I’ve had wine at the table all my life. Even kids were allowed to have it. We used to put ginger ale or lemon soda in it.

I did something terrible to my father. When I was twelve or thirteen, I had a job at Western Union. And when the telegram came over on a long strip, you would cut it and glue it on the paper and deliver it on a bicycle. And I knew the name of the head of Paramount Pictures’ music department — Louis Lipstone. So I wrote, “Dear Mr. Coppola: We have selected you to write a score. Please return to L. A. immediately to begin the assignment. Sincerely, Louis Lipstone.” And I glued it and I delivered it. And my father was so happy. And then I had to tell him that it was fake. He was totally furious. In those days, kids got hit. With the belt. I know why I did it: I wanted him to get that telegram. We do things for good reasons that are bad.

People feel the worst film I made was Jack. But to this day, when I get checks from old movies I’ve made, Jack is one of the biggest ones. No one knows that. If people hate the movie, they hate the movie. I just wanted to work with Robin Williams.

I was never sloppy with other people’s money. Only my own. Because I figure, well, you can be.

Ten or fifteen years after Apocalypse Now, I was in England in a hotel, and I watched the beginning of it and ultimately ended up watching the whole movie. And it wasn’t as weird as I thought. It had, in a way, widened what people would tolerate in a movie.

I saw this bin full of, basically, garbage film. We had shot five cameras when the jets came and dropped the napalm. You had to roll them all at the same time, so there was a lot of this leader, which was just footage. So I picked something out of this barrel and put it in the Moviola and it was very abstract, and every once in a while you saw this helicopter skid. And then over in sound there was all this Doors music, and in it was something called “The End.” And I said, “Hey, wouldn’t it be funny if we started the movie with ‘The End’?”

I have more of a vivid imagination than I have talent. I cook up ideas. It’s just a characteristic.

I just admire people like Woody Allen, who every year writes an original screenplay. It’s astonishing. I always wished that I could do that.

To do good is to be abundant — that’s my tendency. If I cook a meal, I cook too much and have too many things. I was just watching a Cecil B. DeMille picture last night based on Cleopatra, and I realized how many parts of the real story he left out. So much of the art of film is to do less. To aspire to do less.

When I was starting out, I got a job writing a script for Bill Cosby. He used to have the very best wine for his friends. He didn’t drink wine himself, but he had this wine called Romanée-Conti, which is considered one of the greatest wines in the world. I never knew wine could taste like that. He also taught me how to play baccarat. And one night I had $400, and I won $30,000. So I bought $30,000 worth of Romanée wines.

You have to view things in the context of your life expectancy.

The ending was clear and Michael has corrupted himself — it was over. So I didn’t understand why they wanted to make another Godfather.

I said, “What I will do is help you develop a story. And I’ll find a director and produce it.” They said, “Well, who’s the director?” And I said, “Young guy, Martin Scorsese.” They said, “Absolutely not!” He was just starting out.

The only thing they really argued with me about was calling it Godfather Part II. It was always Son of the Wolfman or The Wolfman Returns or something. They thought that audiences would find it confusing. It was ironic, because that started the whole numbers thing. I started a lot of things.

I was in my trailer, working on Godfather II or III in New York, and there was a knock on the door. The guy working with me said that John Gotti would like to meet Mr. Coppola. And I said, “It’s not possible, I’m in the middle of something.” There’s an old wives’ tale about vampires — that you have to invite them in, but once they cross the threshold, then they’re in. But if you say you don’t want to meet them, then they can’t come in. They can’t know you.

I never saw The Sopranos. I’m not interested in the mob.

What greater snub can you get than that absolutely nobody went to see Youth Without Youth? Anything better than that is a success.

Some audiences love to sit there and see all the names in the credits. Are they looking for a relative?

What should I do now? I could do something a little more ambitious. Or less. Better less. For me, less ambitious is more ambitious.

With Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen approaching the $600 million mark at the box office, making it the second film behind The Dark Knight to do so this fast, we thought it might be fun to take a look back at how this all began. Obviously we’re already well aware of the ongoing feud-of-sorts between Michael Bay and Megan Fox following a little he said/she said full of fun, moronic quotes (get caught up here and here).

Now, though, Page Six tells us just how Megan Fox nabbed the role in the first place. According to them, when Michael Bay auditioned her for the first Transformers, he actually made her wash his Ferrari while he filmed the whole thing. Yup. She washed his car. His Ferrari. While he filmed her. And that’s how she got the role in Transformers. If you need anymore proof of just how perverted Hollywood is sometimes, look no further than Mr. Michael Bay. Oh, but it gets better …

Apparently this video exists somewhere, though no one knows where it is. (Um, have you checked Bay’s sock drawer?) Fox says she doesn’t know what happened to the footage, and when Page Six asked Bay, he said he didn’t know what happened to it either. Me wonders whether there was something a little more … hmmm … erotic on that tape? Maybe it’s stuck between the cushions of Bay’s casting couch? What do you think?

Facebook has been one of the hottest phenominons on the internet. It became so popular so quickly, it crushed MySpace within a year and is now the top social media network for professionals and regular folk alike. While I’m more  of a Twitter fan myself, Facebook is a good way to keep in touch with relatives and challenge friends to see who can get a higher score on Bejeweled Blitz.

ScriptShadow has a look at Sony Pictures’ The Social Experiment, the new draft written by Aaron Sorkin and based off of the Ben Mezrich book, The Accidental Billionaires. (Won’t be the first time Sony has used Ben’s work, having poorly adapted Bringing Down the House into the shitfest that was 21.)

Here’s an excerpt:

I think it goes without saying that as soon as Facebook supplanted Myspace as the de facto online time-wasting mechanism, the studios were looking for ways to profit off of it. So they paid Aaron Sorkin 6.2 bajillion dollars to write “the Facebook movie”. An epic story that would capture the drama of late-night status updates, the power of the poke, who and who not to limit profile access to, and of course, the all important and always necessary “delete friend” feature. Okay, well, maybe it wouldn’t be about those things per se. But it would be about computers and software and code and snobby rich kids. Still not exactly the seeds of compelling drama. Which is exactly why Sony decided on Sorkin to tend the garden.

So back in the day I used to work for this producer. He was new to Hollywood - Three years prior he’d created some hot piece of software that sold for a fortune. This left him with a ton money at a very young age and when you’re young and rich, what do you do? You make movies! He was actually a fun guy to work with. Even though he didn’t know a lot, he was smart enough to pick things up quickly. Raised on the first two seasons of Entourage, he liked living the Hollywood life just as much as he liked working in it. So a year into our relationship, he invited me to one of his lavish house parties. It was everything you’d imagine a party in the Hills to be. A lot of great-looking people, pool shenanigans, multiple bars, an overly energetic DJ (this is not me bragging btw; Culver City is much more my scene). As I was taking in the chaos, however, I noticed this quiet little fashion-challenged 30-something in the corner. He had this detached quality to him, like he was at the party but he wasn’t. Whatever his story was, I knew it had to be a lot more interesting than the last ten people I talked to (French Guy: “I’m directing this commercial in Germany.” Me: “Oh yeah? What for?” French Guy: “I cannot talk about it.”) So I made my way over and casually introduced myself. After some small talk I asked him, “So who do you know here?” “Oh,” he said, “The owner of the house.” “Yeah?” I asked. “How?” “I’m his brother.”

This answer was quite puzzling. I had known this producer for over a year and we’d had thousands of conversations but he had never mentioned a brother. I continued to pry and the brother told me the story I’m telling you now: He and the producer co-founded the software company together. The first year was the best year of their lives. They didn’t make a cent but they were doing what they loved and they were doing it together. Then the company started experiencing success. That success led to more success and within a matter of months they were making millions of dollars. The company’s next steps were critical in determining how big they’d become. Millions of dollars were at stake. The brothers could not agree on a direction though. The producer wanted to grow as fast as possible (more money). The brother wanted to retain the quality of the company and slow down (less money). Things got so bad that in the end, the producer, who had a slight majority in the company, fired his brother. The brother told me he hadn’t spoken to him in over 2 years and that these parties were the only times he got to see him (he was never invited. He just showed up). Although he now had more money than he had ever dreamed of, he said if he could do it all over again, he never would’ve started that company. Two things came out of that night. One, I’ll never forget the sadness in that man’s eyes. And two, I never looked at money the same way again.

Naturally, all of this came roaring back to me after reading “The Social Experiment.” Instead of a story about brothers though, this is a story about two friends - one a computer genius, the other a business expert - who began a website that became the fastest growing phenomenon in internet history. Three years later, one was suing the other for 600 million dollars (or 1/30th of Mark Zuckerberg’s worth). It’s a story about greed, about obsession, about our belief that all the money in the world can make us happy. But it’s also unpredictable, funny, touching, and sad. It gives us that rare glimpse into the improbable world of mega-success.

Click HERE to read the script review.

I suppose what’s fascinating about this story is how friends managed to screw each other over because of money. While I’m sure this is fascinating about how Facebook was founded but hopefully the focus is on the aftermath and not so much how they made a website in their dorm room. Doesn’t matter, I’m sure Sony will make sure the facts are so far from the truth that the friends will end up being hip hop guys who ride go-karts and like to fuck animals.