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Daily News
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Fox Says That Ain't Cool
The movie is called Rise of the Silver Surfer, but on the eve of its release, all anyone was talking about was the ruse of the Memphis projectionist.
Thursday, June 14, 2007 at 6:00 PM
By FilmStew Staff
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20th Century Fox
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Projecting a poor reception
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What was he thinking? As a $7-an-hour projectionist at a Malco Theatres chain cinema in Memphis, TN, Jessie Morrison was hired for neither his good looks nor his movie opinions. His job was to make sure the film loaded properly for each showing, and remained in focus thereafter.
But clearly, Morrison had other aspirations in mind. In addition to blogging for the movie chain’s website and contributing to its in-house flyer, he had been posting advance reviews over on Ain’t It Cool News, under the handle of ‘Memflix.’ But unless you are Daily Variety, the Hollywood Reporter or, apparently, some guy named Emmanuel Levy, coming out with an advance review is a no-no.
Morrison’s latest piece on AICN was presented as “Memflix Crushes All Hope for Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.” Two days after it was published, Morrison was called to a meeting with a vice president of the theatre chain and was advised that he was suspended until further notice, with a strong suggestion that he would not be coming back at all.
Morrison claims that 20th Century Fox also threatened to pull press and trade screenings from the theatre over the incident, an assertion the theatre chain has denied. But the chain does acknowledge that it was the studio that first informed it about the unauthorized Fantastic Four review.
Regular readers of AintItCoolNews have pledged their support of Morrison, even in some cases giving him job offers. But the Memphis projectionist is undecided as to his future. “I’m at some kind of crossroads right now,” he says. Our verdict is that he must have been looking to get fired, because he must have known that blowing the lid on his place of work’s Hollywood product would immediately lead to that perilous fate.
Update - 06/15/07: Sure enough, Morrison has been fired. So there's now absolutely nothing standing between him and a blurb-o-rific career as a movie reviewer. All he needs to do is pick a URL for his personal blog. Our suggestion - SquawkingInMemphis.com.
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