2014 Oscars In Memoriam Plus Bette Midler's 'Wind Beneath My Wings' Performance

There were a number of times during last night's Oscars ceremony when I found myself near tears. And no, it wasn't just me crying over another Degeneres joke that landed like a ton of bricks. With another year having gone by, we've lost a great many actors, writers, directors, and others who contributed to this world of movies we love so much. This year's In Memoriam segment was introduced by Glenn Close, beginning with the late James Gandolfini and closing with the recently-passed Philip Seymour Hoffman.

And as if it wasn't a moving enough segment on its own, Bette Midler came out at the end to perform "Wind Beneath My Wings" and guarantee there wasn't a dry eye in the house. It may have been a better idea to have her perform it during the video rather than after, but oh well. You can check out the In Memoriam video and Midler's performance below.

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New 'Parental Guidance' trailer with Billy Crystal and Bette Midler

"Grandpa tells lots of jokes....that you won't get."  They should put that as the marketing motif for Parental Guidance, an old and tired comedy that looked bad when the first trailer emerged a couple of months ago, and somehow looks like it aged about ten years since.

Who needs all those pesky Oscar contenders next month? Sometimes you just want to get away and watch somebody getting hit in the groin by a child. Or getting sprayed with water....again in the groin. The film stars Billy Crystal and Bette Midler as grandparents who discover their old school ways of parenting may no longer work when they're asked to take care of their daughter's three kids. Marisa Tomei, Bailee Madison, and Tom Everett Scott co-star.

Parental Guidance opens on Christmas Day, where it'll go head-to-head with Django Unchained. There's a pretty good chance families will gather around to see this so don't be surprised if it debuts strong before burning out quickly. I'm afraid if it does too well it may turn into the next Meet the Parents-style franchise. Check out the trailer below....

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New trailer for 'Parental Guidance' with Billy Crystal and Bette Midler

Y'know, if this were 1988 then Parental Guidance would be the most talked about movie of the fall season. Why, it stars two long-in-the-tooth comedic heavyweights like Billy Crystal and Bette Midler, and the premise is light and airy enough that families can go to it without fear of having their brains taxed all that much or seeing anything more vulgar than the occasional baseball bat to the groin.

But this is 2012 and Parental Guidance just looks really old and terribly unfunny. It's basically the cinematic equivalent of Crystal's fossilized hosting performance at the Oscars earlier this year. The film stars Crystal and Midler as old fashioned grandparents who agree to babysit their daughter's kids, and of course they can't quite keep up with how things have changed in modern times. Everybody involved deserves better than this, including Marisa Tomei as their daughter and Bailee Madison(Brothers) as the oldest grand kid.

Parental Guidance is directed by Andy Fickman and opens against Django Unchained on Christmas Day. Which one will you be taking your family to?

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Bailee Madision, Bette Midler join Billy Crystal in Us & Them

Child actors tend to be a big distraction for me. Most of the time they're so bad as to totally take me out of the moment, and since they are kids don't have the ability to do much but scream and act bratty.  Bailee Madison was a rare exception, though, providing quite the emotional punch in 2009's Brothers, opposite Jake Gyllenhaal and Tobey Maguire. She was so impressive that Natalie Portman basically got her the lead gig in Guillermo Del Toro's Don't Be Afraid of the Dark, which she was totally irritating in. But even though she hasn't really lived up to her performance in Brothers ever since, Madison's future is still pretty bright, and now she'll get to star in a comedy with two Hollywood legends, Billy Crystal and Bette Midler.

Variety reports that she and Midler have joined the cast of Us & Them, a family comedy starring Crystal and directed by Andy Fickman(You Again, Reefer Madness: The Musical). The script is by the City Slickers duo of Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel, and I only wish this was the third part of that series. Instead the film has Crystal and Midler as a married couple in the midst of a separation, who find themselves forced together staying at the home of their three grandchildren.

Sounds hilarious. Old fogeys rendered dazed and confused by all that new fangled technology and modern parenting techniques. We'll see how this one shakes out. Production kicks off later this month in Atlanta.

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