Welcome to Tuesday! While we’re ongoing behind the scenes to bring you some new content soon, as promised by Rand last week, there’s not much new to sell you on the site today, but news just in is that Paramount/DreamWorks’ Shrek The Third has passed the $600m grossing mark. With a history making US debut (the largest domestic opening for an animated film released on a Thursday between 4:01pm in the afternoon and 8:36pm in an evening with a non-stormy weather outlook…what is it with these records!?) and a take so far of $316m added to the international gross of $324m, Shrek 3 sits at a comfortable $640m and counting. While the finances look good, the series became creatively bankrupt with this current threequel and might as well have been nicknamed Shrek The Turd. Quite how Katz & Co are going to stretch this to not one, not two, but three more movies (including the Puss In Boots spin-off) intrigues me, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the audiences’ love affair with the fractured fable cast is well ogre long before the filmmakers make it to their fairytale ending.

In perhaps more exciting news, Warner Brothers Home Entertainment has announced the release of the landmark feature The Jazz Singer for October 16. Not only is this a really important title in the annuls of filmmaking (it was, of course, the first film to run with a synchronized soundtrack a full year before Mickey tooted his way across the screen in Steamboat Willie in 1928), but the three-disc set will come packed with a collection of period cartoons, early sound era shorts and ultra-rare Vitaphone music and comedy pieces. Added to the pack is The Dawn Of Sound: How Movies Learned To Talk, a new feature-length documentary supervised by George Feltenstein – the very same guy who gave us all those wonderful animation LaserDisc sets back in the day and who continues to push for the release of classic titles including the Looney Tunes on DVD. As such, this issue of The Jazz Singer is sure to appeal not only to vintage film fans, but any animation enthusiasts genuinely interested in the early days of feature film and cartoon production.

As the man said, “You ain’t seen nothin’ yet!” – Ben.