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A group of students at the Claremont Colleges are in search of a roommate, but insist the roommate not be white.

 

http://campusreform.org/?ID=7977

 

FTA:

 

“This is directed to protect POC, not white people. Don’t see how this is racist at all…” responded AJ León (PZ ’18), a member of the Pitzer Latino Student Union.

 

 

Substitute "white" with ANY OTHER term, and see what happens.

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CONFIRMED: HOLLYWOOD STILL OFFICIALLY BANKRUPT OF NEW IDEAS.

Rebel Wilson to Star in Gender-Flipped ‘Dirty Rotten Scoundrels’ Remake.

Coming hot on the high heels of the Lady Ghostbusters box office misfire and the upcoming remake of Splash with Channing Tatum in the Daryl Hannah role.

 

 

 

'Ocean's Eight' will have an all-female crew of thieves, including Anne Hathaway and Rihanna http://cnnmon.ie/2aVAHwd

 

 

CplvFBgXgAAcdib.jpg

 

 

My objection is not really with an all female cast, there are lots of good actresses there.......

 

its the total lack of originality.. :D

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'Ocean's Eight' will have an all-female crew of thieves, including Anne Hathaway and Rihanna http://cnnmon.ie/2aVAHwd

 

 

CplvFBgXgAAcdib.jpg

 

 

My objection is not really with an all female cast, there are lots of good actresses there.......

 

its the total lack of originality.. :D

 

Media consolidation. Studio conglomerates now care more about the bottom line than the product which in turn has made them more risk adverse which results in less original material being made and more reliance upon existing IP with "built in audiences". The recent push for more diversity has meant that they can simply gender swap and create something new from something old rather than going through the effort (and expense) of creating something new that's also diverse.

The studio system is toast, I've been saying it for years. They're eating themselves.

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Media consolidation. Studio conglomerates now care more about the bottom line than the product which in turn has made them more risk adverse which results in less original material being made and more reliance upon existing IP with "built in audiences". The recent push for more diversity has meant that they can simply gender swap and create something new from something old rather than going through the effort (and expense) of creating something new that's also diverse.

The studio system is toast, I've been saying it for years. They're eating themselves.

 

So what you're saying is that it's only a matter of time before we see the release of "The Husband of Frankenstein"?

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'Ocean's Eight' will have an all-female crew of thieves, including Anne Hathaway and Rihanna http://cnnmon.ie/2aVAHwd

 

 

CplvFBgXgAAcdib.jpg

 

 

My objection is not really with an all female cast, there are lots of good actresses there.......

 

its the total lack of originality.. :D

Is it too late for them to learn anything from the new Ghostbusters failure?

 

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/ghostbusters-heading-70m-loss-sequel-918515

Edited by Joe Miner
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So what you're saying is that it's only a matter of time before we see the release of "The Husband of Frankenstein"?

 

:lol: Universal is revamping all their monster movie franchises right now actually. They had rooms of writers two years ago just rebreaking all the franchises (Frankenstein, The Mummy, Dracula). They paid A list writers over 250k a week to sit in a room and come up with a new world. Tom Cruise's Mummy reboot is shooting now (I think) -- but it wouldn't surprise me to see them do something like that.

 

Is it too late for them to learn anything from the new Ghostbusters failure?

 

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/ghostbusters-heading-70m-loss-sequel-918515

 

The big difference between the Ocean's 8 remake and Ghostbusters (and Splash) is that it's not a reboot. It's a sequel to the Ocean's movies so, from that perspective, I don't mind it as much.

 

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels was already a remake of a Brando movie, so the fact they're rebooting it doesn't bother me.

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:lol: Universal is revamping all their monster movie franchises right now actually. They had rooms of writers two years ago just rebreaking all the franchises (Frankenstein, The Mummy, Dracula). They paid A list writers over 250k a week to sit in a room and come up with a new world. Tom Cruise's Mummy reboot is shooting now (I think) -- but it wouldn't surprise me to see them do something like that.

 

 

The big difference between the Ocean's 8 remake and Ghostbusters (and Splash) is that it's not a reboot. It's a sequel to the Ocean's movies so, from that perspective, I don't mind it as much.

 

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels was already a remake of a Brando movie, so the fact they're rebooting it doesn't bother me.

Sequel vs reboot, you're technically correct. But how will the audiences really perceive it?

 

An all girl sequel coming out at the same time we get to see Channing Tatum as a mermaid, and chicks bustin ghosts doesn't bode well for people's perception of the movie.

 

Not to mention that there are too many Oceans movies to begin with.

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Media consolidation. Studio conglomerates now care more about the bottom line than the product which in turn has made them more risk adverse which results in less original material being made and more reliance upon existing IP with "built in audiences". The recent push for more diversity has meant that they can simply gender swap and create something new from something old rather than going through the effort (and expense) of creating something new that's also diverse.

The studio system is toast, I've been saying it for years. They're eating themselves.

 

Let me take you inside the sausage factory, again.

 

The culprit isn't consolidation, it's globalization.

 

You can't talk about the five families of Hollywood as monoliths. You have to break it up across businesses and distribution.

 

The nature of tentpole feature films changed a long time ago because now there's as much money at stake in the international markets as there is in the US. So the studios focus much more on blockbuster releases because the RoI is much better, and you won't be wasting expensive movie making resources on little films that at best may bring in $20 million domestically and zero internationally. That makes studios risk-averse and that's why you see a lot of more reboots. The reason the formula works is because people are still going to see the bastardization of classics. We may complain all we want, but we're not the ones who are buying the tickets.

 

The silver lining is that opens up great productions from the same studios in other outlets. I actually think it's great that Sony can make a $ billion on a shlocky re-release of Ghostbusters 25, as long as that money funds the production of Breaking Bad & Saul. I would never pay to see the former, but I'm glad they make a boatload of money to also do the latter.

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Sequel vs reboot, you're technically correct. But how will the audiences really perceive it?

 

An all girl sequel coming out at the same time we get to see Channing Tatum as a mermaid, and chicks bustin ghosts doesn't bode well for people's perception of the movie.

 

Not to mention that there are too many Oceans movies to begin with.

 

All valid points, certainly. I was just speaking from my own perspective as a writer in the industry. For some reason, as silly as it may be, the Ocean's remake doesn't seem as egregious as the others just because it's not trying to erase what came before it. Ghostbusters didn't need to be a reboot, it could have functioned on it's own with the new cast without missing a beat. It seems like they added an unnecessary hurdle.

 

Splash remake / gender swap reeks of the worst kind of pandering to me. No arguments there. Though I think Jillian is hilarious and like Tatum -- so, we'll see how it turns out.

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:lol: Universal is revamping all their monster movie franchises right now actually. They had rooms of writers two years ago just rebreaking all the franchises (Frankenstein, The Mummy, Dracula). They paid A list writers over 250k a week to sit in a room and come up with a new world. Tom Cruise's Mummy reboot is shooting now (I think) -- but it wouldn't surprise me to see them do something like that.

 

 

Oh, no - I was just being sarcastic. Those are actually three of my all-time favorite movies - the stories all kind of suck (well, Frankenstein isn't really so bad story-wise. It just has a weak ending), but Karloff is the archetype for both Frankenstein and The Mummy, as is Lugosi for Dracula. Colin Clive. Edward Van Sloane. Dwight Frye. Black and white with a scratchy sound track. Tom @$#&ing Cruise???? Are you #@%&ing kidding me????

 

Ugh....

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Let me take you inside the sausage factory, again.

 

The culprit isn't consolidation, it's globalization.

 

You can't talk about the five families of Hollywood as monoliths. You have to break it up across businesses and distribution.

 

The nature of tentpole feature films changed a long time ago because now there's as much money at stake in the international markets as there is in the US. So the studios focus much more on blockbuster releases because the RoI is much better, and you won't be wasting expensive movie making resources on little films that at best may bring in $20 million domestically and zero internationally. That makes studios risk-averse and that's why you see a lot of more reboots. The reason the formula works is because people are still going to see the bastardization of classics. We may complain all we want, but we're not the ones who are buying the tickets.

 

That's not accurate. Globalization plays a role, no doubt. But you're giving it far too much importance while ignoring the structural changes within the industry itself that's really caused the problem. It's got far more to do with consolidation and the turning over of studio control to the marketing wings rather than the creative wings than it does globalization. That changeover didn't happen until '08 after the fallout from the WGA strike in '07. The economy collapsed and the conglomerates that own the studios used that window to restructure the entire way movies get made inside the studio system (they tried to Moneyball the process), starting first by gutting development slates and budgets.

 

Too big to fail became the studio model for tentpoles. The marketing big wigs determined if they put enough money into a movie's marketing it's guaranteed a ROI regardless of its quality, but because the number required to guarantee an ROI is so absurdly high (150-250m) the studios simply couldn't afford to make as many movies while also dumping a quarter billion dollars into just marketing for each one. The marching orders became, "we can make more money by making less films". And because quality of the product is now secondary to how it's marketed, development departments became second banana and were cut to the bone.

 

That's how a notion like, "we can just do the same movie but with a gender swapped cast" becomes a reality.

 

That's not to say there wasn't bloat that could have been cut from the development departments at that time, there was. A lot of scripts in development were caught in a constant circle of hell -- being re-optioned, re-written, re-broken, only to have the option lapse before it gets made and then the script/project moves to another studio to do the same dance all over again. From the studio's perspective this was flushing money down the drain, and to some extent they were correct. But this dance, as painful and as expensive as it could be, also tended to make most projects stronger and simultaneously allowed the studios to develop young creative talent and keep them in their pipeline for future work. Think of the development world as almost the studio's farm system for up and coming talent.

 

Without development departments finding and developing material and creative talent, studios simplified the process by relying upon existing IP because it's cheaper (they already own it, thus don't need to pay for the rights) and requires less development since they're known commodities with built in audiences. The problem is that a lot of bankable writers and directors want no part of this new tentpole process. It's too micromanaged (as any billion dollar project usually is) by non-creatives focused on the bottom line rather than the quality of the product or the process itself. The studios are then forced to rely upon untested directors whom they can steamroll, and a revolving door of hired gun writers to plug holes in leaky scripts, just to get a film to the finish line. That's a recipe for a bomb.

 

In short, the change gutted not only the development wings of the studio system, but their talent pool as well. There's a reason we're in a "golden age" of TV -- it's because all the creatives who otherwise would be working in features moved to a world where they can actually create rather than just work on a soulless assembly line. After 8 years of this new mentality we now have a studio system making less movies than ever before for more money than ever before while they're systematically sidelining every creative voice and talent in town in favor of marketing execs.

 

This all has resulted in worse movies, made for more money, released at a time when audiences have more options than ever before in terms of content and how they choose to view it. That's suicide for the industry.

Globalization has played a role in shaping tentpoles since the early 90s, it's not a new phenomenon nor is it the major culprit for the rise in Super Hero flicks and the move away from original material. Recently Hollywood has turned more to international financing for a multitude of reasons, primary among them is the fact that these international financiers are the only ones with money willing to do the work the studios used to in terms of development. Catering films to those foreign markets isn't really an issue either, at least in terms of creativity or originality. Yes, existing properties sell well in foreign markets -- but so do original properties so long as they aren't comedies (laughs are cultural and thus don't translate as well).

 

 

 

The silver lining is that opens up great productions from the same studios in other outlets. I actually think it's great that Sony can make a $ billion on a shlocky re-release of Ghstbusters 25, as long as that money funds the production of Breaking Bad & Saul. I would never pay to see the former, but I'm glad they make a boatload of money to also do the latter.

 

You're wrong if you think one will not adversely affect the other. It already has begun.

 

Every studio is rethinking their pilot system, Sony included. They should, because the pilot system is as broken as the studio system in many ways. Literally every studio spends 5-10m on about 10-15 new pilots a season knowing they're only going to pick up one or two. They might as well set fire to a trash barrel of cash instead.

 

As such, and because marketing departments are the ones calling the shots studio wide, TV is beginning to feel the impact of the structural changes outlined above. Marching orders from every major studio's TV department over the past two years has mirrored the feature's department: more shows based on existing IP with built in audiences at the expense of original properties.

 

Look at the slate of shows coming out, hell every staff job I went up for this year was on a remake (Training Day, Lethal Weapon, McGuyvier, Star Trek -- the list goes on). Every studio is making less content now while digital platforms -- who tend to give more creative control to its content creators as well as relying less on existing IP -- are the ones drawing in all the best creative talent and thus creating the more "buzzed about" shows.

 

Writing rooms are smaller than ever, less shows are being made, network TV is dying a loud and painful death with cable right on its heels...

 

The studio system has always been a weird animal because it was trying to find balance between art and commerce. But there used to be a balance between those two opposing forces, now there's none. It's all commerce, all about the corporate bottom line and not about the quality of the products themselves.

 

That's because of consolidation, not globalization.

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That's not accurate. Globalization plays a role, no doubt. But you're giving it far too much importance while ignoring the structural changes within the industry itself that's really caused the problem. It's got far more to do with consolidation and the turning over of studio control to the marketing wings rather than the creative wings than it does globalization. That changeover didn't happen until '08 after the fallout from the WGA strike in '07. The economy collapsed and the conglomerates that own the studios used that window to restructure the entire way movies get made inside the studio system (they tried to Moneyball the process), starting first by gutting development slates and budgets.

 

Too big to fail became the studio model for tentpoles. The marketing big wigs determined if they put enough money into a movie's marketing it's guaranteed a ROI regardless of its quality, but because the number required to guarantee an ROI is so absurdly high (150-250m) the studios simply couldn't afford to make as many movies while also dumping a quarter billion dollars into just marketing for each one. The marching orders became, "we can make more money by making less films". And because quality of the product is now secondary to how it's marketed, development departments became second banana and were cut to the bone.

 

That's how a notion like, "we can just do the same movie but with a gender swapped cast" becomes a reality.

 

That's not to say there wasn't bloat that could have been cut from the development departments at that time, there was. A lot of scripts in development were caught in a constant circle of hell -- being re-optioned, re-written, re-broken, only to have the option lapse before it gets made and then the script/project moves to another studio to do the same dance all over again. From the studio's perspective this was flushing money down the drain, and to some extent they were correct. But this dance, as painful and as expensive as it could be, also tended to make most projects stronger and simultaneously allowed the studios to develop young creative talent and keep them in their pipeline for future work. Think of the development world as almost the studio's farm system for up and coming talent.

 

Without development departments finding and developing material and creative talent, studios simplified the process by relying upon existing IP because it's cheaper (they already own it, thus don't need to pay for the rights) and requires less development since they're known commodities with built in audiences. The problem is that a lot of bankable writers and directors want no part of this new tentpole process. It's too micromanaged (as any billion dollar project usually is) by non-creatives focused on the bottom line rather than the quality of the product or the process itself. The studios are then forced to rely upon untested directors whom they can steamroll, and a revolving door of hired gun writers to plug holes in leaky scripts, just to get a film to the finish line. That's a recipe for a bomb.

 

In short, the change gutted not only the development wings of the studio system, but their talent pool as well. There's a reason we're in a "golden age" of TV -- it's because all the creatives who otherwise would be working in features moved to a world where they can actually create rather than just work on a soulless assembly line. After 8 years of this new mentality we now have a studio system making less movies than ever before for more money than ever before while they're systematically sidelining every creative voice and talent in town in favor of marketing execs.

 

This all has resulted in worse movies, made for more money, released at a time when audiences have more options than ever before in terms of content and how they choose to view it. That's suicide for the industry.

Globalization has played a role in shaping tentpoles since the early 90s, it's not a new phenomenon nor is it the major culprit for the rise in Super Hero flicks and the move away from original material. Recently Hollywood has turned more to international financing for a multitude of reasons, primary among them is the fact that these international financiers are the only ones with money willing to do the work the studios used to in terms of development. Catering films to those foreign markets isn't really an issue either, at least in terms of creativity or originality. Yes, existing properties sell well in foreign markets -- but so do original properties so long as they aren't comedies (laughs are cultural and thus don't translate as well).

 

 

 

You're wrong if you think one will not adversely affect the other. It already has begun.

 

Every studio is rethinking their pilot system, Sony included. They should, because the pilot system is as broken as the studio system in many ways. Literally every studio spends 5-10m on about 10-15 new pilots a season knowing they're only going to pick up one or two. They might as well set fire to a trash barrel of cash instead.

 

As such, and because marketing departments are the ones calling the shots studio wide, TV is beginning to feel the impact of the structural changes outlined above. Marching orders from every major studio's TV department over the past two years has mirrored the feature's department: more shows based on existing IP with built in audiences at the expense of original properties.

 

Look at the slate of shows coming out, hell every staff job I went up for this year was on a remake (Training Day, Lethal Weapon, McGuyvier, Star Trek -- the list goes on). Every studio is making less content now while digital platforms -- who tend to give more creative control to its content creators as well as relying less on existing IP -- are the ones drawing in all the best creative talent and thus creating the more "buzzed about" shows.

 

Writing rooms are smaller than ever, less shows are being made, network TV is dying a loud and painful death with cable right on its heels...

 

The studio system has always been a weird animal because it was trying to find balance between art and commerce. But there used to be a balance between those two opposing forces, now there's none. It's all commerce, all about the corporate bottom line and not about the quality of the products themselves.

 

That's because of consolidation, not globalization.

kdk5l.gif

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Perhaps you should look up the term consolidation.

 

Major movie studios in 1970's

 

Disney

Paramount

Warner Brothers

Universal/MCA

20th Century Fox

 

Major movie studios in 1980's

 

Disney

Paramount

Warner Brothers

Universal/MCA

20th Century Fox

 

Major movie studios in 1990's

 

Disney

Paramount

Warner Brothers

Sony/Universal)

20th Century Fox

 

Major movie studios in 2000's

 

Disney

Paramount

Warner Brothers

Sony

20th Century Fox

 

Major movie studios in 2010's

 

Disney

Paramount

Warner Brothers

Sony

21th Century Fox

 

The five families are still alive & well (unconsolidated).

 

And most of your posts supports my point that the industry is far more RoI driven, and they're not going to do small movies anymore because they don't justify the marketing outlays. No matter what the production cost is, P&A is getting astronomical, and no one is greenlighting a $20 million cult flick knowing that P&A will cost $100 million. It's a far safer road to spend hundreds of millions on proven brands than take a risk on something new. As long as the kids keep buying tickets, the model will continue.

 

Your argument is more along the line that the industry is changing because the new owners care more about the bottom line, than they do about the artistry.

 

Welcome to the 21st century.

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And most of your posts supports my point that the industry is far more RoI driven, and they're not going to do small movies anymore because they don't justify the marketing outlays. No matter what the production cost is, P&A is getting astronomical, and no one is greenlighting a $20 million cult flick knowing that P&A will cost $100 million. It's a far safer road to spend hundreds of millions on proven brands than take a risk on something new. As long as the kids keep buying tickets, the model will continue.

 

 

You're arguing from the new system's perspective as if the old system never existed and wasn't immensely profitable despite its flaws.

 

At no point in Hollywood's history has a $20 million dollar budget been considered a "cult movie" budget until marketing departments came up with their moneyball formula after the crash in '08 (matching production budgets and marketing budgets) because suddenly $20 million meant at least spending $40 million, if not $80m. With that math, of course the studios were going to be more reluctant to make smaller movies with riskier returns. But that math never existed before 2008, at least not as a mandate.

 

Mind you, none of that added money makes the quality of the product better, in fact there's a strong case to say it usually works in reverse. And, there's no reason to spend that kind of money other than to funnel that money into other companies owned by the same conglomerate and thus raising everyone's bottom lines -- even the companies that have nothing to do with the movie... which brings us back to consolidation. I'm not talking about just the studios. I'm talking about who owns the studios / what else those studios own. Look at where the marketing money from DC movies is being spent -- it's almost exclusively being spent promoting on other Time Warner platforms.

 

Studios used to give medium budget movies (20-40m) time to find an audience without heavily marketing it (or without paying for said marketing and instead relying on word of mouth). The majority of the year's slate of middle class movies wouldn't turn much of a profit -- but one or two would become hits and virtual printing presses of cash. Today, that's not possible, not because advertising is so expensive, but because they are using up more screens than ever to show their billion dollar budget movies leaving less space for movies that could make a substantial profit for the studios.

 

And kids aren't buying tickets anymore. The domestic box office is dying precisely because of this.

 

Your argument is more along the line that the industry is changing because the new owners care more about the bottom line, than they do about the artistry.

 

Welcome to the 21st century.

 

Like I said, the studio system has always been an odd battle between art and commerce since its very creation. There's always been a balance struck between the two opposing forces, and while I side more with the creatives by nature I understand the industry itself cannot exist without the commercial side of the coin. But instead of realizing this, the studios have obliterated this balance entirely in favor of boosting not their own company's bottom line -- but the bottom lines of all the other companies owned by the studio.

 

The artists don't even get a say in the process anymore. Even back in the original mogul days where studio heads were Gods they gave the artist a voice in the process because they realized the only true innovation in their business comes from the artists they employ. Today that's not the case. And because of that, the industry is going to collapse entirely. The model being used today isn't one designed to sustain the industry, it's designed to pick the last bits of flesh from its carcass.

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Holy crap GG and Greggy you make OC's posts look concise while arguing whether globalization or consolidation produced a world where an all chick Ocean's 11 can get made. It's like you're both on fire and arguing whether it was the match or the lighter fluid that caused it. It's bad enough that we're all burning to death. We don't need to know why, we just need to B word about it. This thing is going to be on HBO 93 times a month until the sun peters out. Do I have to listen to you two argue about why to make it even worse? Occum's Shaver says it not consolidation or globalization......it's MORONS........so get a room.

 

 

And for those of you on this board who do not believe in God I offer as proof the fact that even the doofusses in Hollywod did not attempt to go all in with 11 broads. Dollars to donuts someone floated the idea and some exec said "Jesus Christ.....you have to get rid of at least 3 of them". Thank you Jesus.

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'Ocean's Eight' will have an all-female crew of thieves, including Anne Hathaway and Rihanna http://cnnmon.ie/2aVAHwd

 

 

CplvFBgXgAAcdib.jpg

 

 

My objection is not really with an all female cast, there are lots of good actresses there.......

 

its the total lack of originality.. :D

I will now attempt to name all of these chicks without looking at Googlebot.

 

1. Dear Ann please bring your cat woman suit to keep the budget in line.

2. Kelly from Saved by the Bell. She has three names and the only one I can spell is Amber.

3. I know she is annoying but don't remember her name.

4. Oh crap. I know she made out with Ally McBeal. Her name will come to me.

5. Ahhhhhhh named after that Fleetwood Mac song but it's not Gold Dust Woman because that's a wrestler. That'll come to me too.

6. Fran Drescher, Minnie Driver or the receptionist from the original Ghostbusters.

7. Sandra Bullock and they better not make her woo a man at any point in the flick because it is already unrealistic enough.

8? I swear to God if it's Maggie Gyllenhall someone is going to pay because Sammy will not have any of it. It's the one thing we agree on.

 

Coming back to #4 I still can't think of it but I might be wrong. It might be iCarly

5 is Rhianon.

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I will now attempt to name all of these chicks without looking at Googlebot.

 

1. Dear Ann please bring your cat woman suit to keep the budget in line.

2. Kelly from Saved by the Bell. She has three names and the only one I can spell is Amber.

3. I know she is annoying but don't remember her name.

4. Oh crap. I know she made out with Ally McBeal. Her name will come to me.

5. Ahhhhhhh named after that Fleetwood Mac song but it's not Gold Dust Woman because that's a wrestler. That'll come to me too.

6. Fran Drescher, Minnie Driver or the receptionist from the original Ghostbusters.

7. Sandra Bullock and they better not make her woo a man at any point in the flick because it is already unrealistic enough.

8? I swear to God if it's Maggie Gyllenhall someone is going to pay because Sammy will not have any of it. It's the one thing we agree on.

 

Coming back to #4 I still can't think of it but I might be wrong. It might be iCarly

5 is Rhianon.

I'm pretty sure #3 is Galadriel. No clue what the actress name is, but I'm pretty sure it's the chick that played the Lady of Lothlorien

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