This summer, while many students were away from the classroom, the world of entertainment worked overtime to ensure they still learned numerous life lessons.
These lessons should be taken to heart, and they just might make the world a better place.
In one corner stands \The Island,"" director Michael Bay's first foray out from Jerry Bruckheimer's watchful eye. In another corner stands ""The Fast and The Furious"" director Rob Cohen's ""Stealth,"" featuring Academy Award winner Jamie Foxx, who may be the hottest thing in Hollywood right now. And in the final corner (of this oddly three-sided ring) stands ... penguins-marching penguins, to be precise.
Now, conventional wisdom dictates ""Island"" or ""Stealth"" to be far-and-away the box office champions. They have the pedigree and the fortitude to destroy a small documentary about birds. However, this summer proved that logic wrong when these standard summer blockbusters crashed and burned, paving the way for the penguins to fly their way to the top.
In a summer filled with headlines of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's affair, a smaller, sweeter relationship slipped through the cracks. Anne Bancroft, wife to Mel Brooks, and a star in her own right, passed away in early June. Her relationship with Brooks was no flash-in-the-pan summer romance; it lasted over 40 years and saw both stars on the top of their game through success and failure.
""Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas"" came out in October 2004 and featured head shots, assassination plots, chainsaw dismemberments and other various acts of depraved violence. Upon its release, it sported a well-deserved Mature rating due to the extreme brutal nature of the game.
However, in late July, a Dutch hacker released the infamous ""Hot Coffee"" patch for the game, which unlocked hidden sex scenes. This patch prompted a full-scale Federal Trade Commission investigation, a re-evaluation of the Electronic Software Ratings Board, and re-rating ""San Andreas"" up to a restrictive Adults Only ranking.
This scene of pixilated sex apparently trumps the extreme violent portions of the game. Ironically enough, anyone who wants to use the ""Hot Coffee"" modification must download a patch, install it, and get it running properly. By the moment they expended even more energy than just Googling ""Pornography.""
It makes for a nice story. Spurned author Terry McMillan took a holiday in Jamaica where she fell in love with Jonathan Plummer-a man over two decades younger than h. A whirlwind romance resulted in their marriage, a bestselling book and a modest blockbuster of a movie.
But it was all a sham.
Plummer shattered the fairy tale romance by revealing he was not only gay, but he courted McMillan for the soul purpose of earning American citizenship. He also extorted roughly $200,000 from her in a failed business venture, and they have since filed restraining orders against each other.
The only positive side to come from this story is McMillan's new novel titled ""How that Green-Card-Desiring Homosexual Stole a Whole Lot of Money from Stella"" should be a smashing success.
Comedian Dane Cook's second CD/DVD Retaliation, released July 26th, debuted in the number four spot on Billboard's top 200 chart, selling more than 86,000 copies.
Not since Steve Martin's ""A Wild and Crazy Guy"" hit number two in 1979 has a comedy album broken the top five-that is, of course, not counting Clay Aiken as a joke.
Aside from his hit album, Dane is keeping himself busy. In August, he began filming the pilot for his television show ""Cooked."" Plus, he is co-starring in the upcoming movie ""Waiting"" in which he plays, guess what ... a cook.
As they say in the kitchen-where there's smoke, there's fire. Dane Cook may as well be a chimney.
Throughout Fox's relatively short history, it has broadcast numerous critically praised shows which did not make it to season three, or sometimes did not pass season one. ""Andy Richter Controls the Universe,"" ""Tru Calling,"" ""The Critic"" and ""Undeclared,"" among many other shows, all felt Fox's ax relatively early in their lifespans.
So, it felt refreshing when new Fox programming president Peter Liguori stepped in and saved the critical darling ""Arrested Development."" Despite earning numerous Emmy's and other awards, the show has not yet found an audience and commonly lost its timeslot.
However, Liguori re-upped the series for another season at Fox's upfront presentation in May. Not only did he renew the series, he also rebroadcast the entire second season as part of Fox's summer schedule.
Hopefully, Liguori will remain a fan of ""Arrested Development"" and keep it for years to come.
Before this summer, Tom Cruise's stock in Hollywood was a thing of wonder. He appeared in numerous blockbusters and also carried smaller films like ""The Last Samurai"" and ""Vanilla Sky."" However, something happened this summer-he went crazy.
Granted, ""War of the Worlds"" still claimed the No. 1 slot for summer blockbusters, but that feat occurred despite Cruise, not because of him. His publicity campaign for the film seemed geared not to support the movie, but toward convincing people he was certifiably insane.
Jumping up and down on Oprah's couch proclaiming his love for Katie Holmes and telling Matt Lauer about the curative power of vitamins and Scientology while slamming psychiatry caused many people to question Cruise's sanity.
