They're all top seeds in the American Film Institute's just-released best-of-genre lists.

The Associated Press reports:

Films featuring those characters were among the No. 1 picks Tuesday on the AFI's top-10 lists of the finest flicks in 10 genres, including mystery, Westerns, sports tales and courtroom dramas.

The best genre movies were announced in the CBS special "AFI's 10 Top 10," the latest in the institute's annual best-of shows. The winners were chosen by actors, filmmakers, critics and others in Hollywood from ballots that included 50 nominees in each genre.

Past AFI lists have included rankings of the top-100 American films, comedies, love stories, screen stars and movie quotes. (Heads up, to download the lists the site requires you to register.)

Some are no-brainers (Disney ruled the animation category, and Alfred Hitchcock dominated mystery), but others might surprise you.

Seeing "Harry Potter" on the list would be just a fantasy, and popular Western "The Magnificent Seven" was excluded.

"These countdowns are a collective opinion of leaders from across the film community," said Bob Gazzale, AFI president. "Any surprise about an omission would be entirely subjective."

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An Academy Award event in Beverly Hills last weekend might serve as a Hollywood crystal ball.

Eleven students received cash prizes and trophies for short films competing in the 35th annual Student Academy Awards, The Associated Press reports.

The gold medal prize for narrative films went to USC student Rajeev Dassani for the film "A Day's Work."

The top prize for animation was presented to Nicole Mitchell of the California Institute of the Arts for "Zoologic," while the documentary winner was Laura Waters Hinson of American University for "As We Forgive."

Another regional winner was Shih-Ting Hung of USC, who got the gold medal in the alternative category for "Viola: The Traveling Rooms of a Little Giant."

Established in 1972, the Student Academy Awards are intended to support young filmmakers. Past winners include Spike Lee, Robert Zemeckis, John Lasseter and Trey Parker.

Pretty good credentials, eh? Check out a full list of winners -- and, more importantly, clips of their work.

Consider it an investment in your entertainment -- and a chance to gain some enviable knowledge for the cocktail parties and watercooler conversations of the future.

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Looking for something to keep your kids busy this summer without breaking the bank? Check out some of these summer movie programs geared toward kids.

AMC Theaters runs $1 movies during its "Summer Movie Camp" every Wednesday at 10 a.m. The Southbay Galleria 16 in Redondo Beach and the Del Amo 18 are participating this year. Here's the schedule:

June 25: Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium
July 2: The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep
July 9: Alvin & The Chipmunks
July 16: Shrek The Third
July 23: Bee Movie
July 30: Surf's Up
August 6: TMNT

The Promenade Stadium 13 in Rolling Hills Estates participates in Regal Cinema's "Free Family Film Festival." Every Tuesday and Wednesday during the program, movies are free at 10 a.m. for kids and their parents. Here's the movie schedule:

06/17/2008-06/18/2008 Clifford's Really Big Movie (G) Alvin And The Chipmunks (PG)

06/24/2008-06/25/2008 Jonah: A Veggie Tale Movie (G)
The Martian Child (PG)

07/01/2008-07/02/2008 Adventure Of Elm In Grouchland (G)
Water Horse: Legend Of The Deep (PG)

07/08/2008-07/09/2008 Doogal (G)
Shrek The Third (PG)

07/15/2008-07/16/2008 Everyone's Hero (G)
Open Season (PG)
07/22/2008-07/23/2008 Carebears 2 (G)
Firehouse Dog (PG)

07/29/2008-07/30/2008 Pirates Who Don't Do Anything - Veggie Tales (G)
Monster House (PG)

08/05/2008-08/06/2008 Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium (G)
Bee Movie (PG)

08/12/2008-08/13/2008 Charlotte's Web (G)
Surf's Up (PG)

Pacific Theaters don't have a kids program, but they do have Monday Morning Mommy Movies at the El Segundo theater each week at 11 a.m. Here's the spiel:

Moms, Dads and Caregivers - here's your chance to see a first run adult-themed movie...with your baby! No one will mind if your baby cries, everyone will have a baby and all babies cry. So pack up your diaper bag and stroller, and we'll see you at the movies!

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One of the ways America dealt with the Great Depression was by going to the movies. While no one thinks the current economic dip will mirror that disaster, higher gasoline prices make heading to the movies a cheap entertainment even at current movie prices. And for the summer lineup, First Showing is the place to start. It has trailers that go beyond just the big-budget studio films as well as alerts about coming projects and comment boards where you can rant and rave about the state of Hollywood and individual movies.

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Just who is Anthony Stark? He's "The Invincible Iron Man" of Marvel Comics fame, and Robert Downey Jr. portrays him in "Iron Man," the just-released first superhero movie of the summer blockbuster season. His gleaming, high-tech look has come a long way since the character debuted in the "Tales Of Suspense" comic #39 in March 1963:

http://en.marveldatabase.com/Tales_of_Suspense_39

For a complete rundown on his history, special powers and other bits of arcane metallurgic lore:

http://www.marvel.com/universe/Iron_Man_%28Anthony_Stark%29

If the cost of acquiring the original Silver Age comics daunts you (and it should), the entire run of Iron Man issues from 1963-2006 is available on CD-ROM.

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If you’ve ever had a desire to design your own movie poster, or are just looking for a fun way to kill time, you should check out this site.The Web site allows you to choose from a wide range of scenes, super heroes, villains and fonts. And, once you’re finished with your creation, you can send it to a friend, or save it to pull up another time.

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How many times have you gone to movies and wound up covering your kids’ eyes and ears — or your own — at the sex, violence and language found in what you thought was a family film?

Next time, go to Kids-in-Mind before you plunk down money for the tickets. In addition to a 1-10 scale for sex, violence and profanity, there’s a detailed summary of any questionable content.

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Judging by the preview of "10,000 BC," the caveman feature opening in South Bay theaters today (here are some show times in and around the South Bay), almost none of the film is historically accurate. In LA.com, our film writer, Glenn Whipp, points out that "10,000 BC" is faithful to the caveman-film tradition of causing archaeologists and students of ancient history to scratch their heads -- who could forget Raquel Welch in "One Million Years B.C." having to deal with giant sea turtles and dinosaurs? But it certainly isn't faithful to the history books.
Where to begin?
How about with the sailboats? In the preview, we see red-dyed sails powering boats along a river. Aside from the dubious physics of that scene, it's pretty clear that sophisticated sailing of that type wasn't occurring until about 4,000 B.C.
So if our "10,000 BC" cavemen hadn't discovered sailing yet, surely they'd been getting around by domesticated horse. Wrong. The earliest hypothesized date for horse domestication is 4,000 B.C.
Well, what about saber-toothed tigers? Most sources agree that the huge, fearsome cats were extinct 10,000 years ago, or 8,000 B.C. Our caveman friends in the film encounter them (if we're to believe the movie's title) around the tail end of the cats' existence. So that's not to say there couldn't have been any saber-toothed cats roaming the area -- except that saber-toothed cats are known to have inhabited North and South America. And if the pyramids in the "10,000 BC" preview are the ones in Egypt -- which wouldn't have been built until roughly 2,000 B.C. -- the movie isn't taking place anywhere near Kansas. Or anywhere near the Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan, an Aztec site that was likely built in the 14th century A.D. That's right, A.D.
So before we ruin the entire film for you, we'll stop with the too-easy historical debunking. But let's just say that you should watch "10,000 BC" for entertainment value only.

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The Associated Press reports on the new "Indiana Jones" film:

Times sure have changed in the 19 years since Harrison Ford last donned the signature fedora of thrill-seeking archaeologist Indiana Jones. The viral spread of the trailer for “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” is proof of that.

The trailer for the May 22 release has drawn highly enthusiastic responses in theaters. But it may have had its biggest impact online, on a younger audience that may not think of Ford, 65, as equal to today’s spry action heroes.

After its premiere Feb. 14 on “Good Morning America,” Lucasfilm and Viacom Inc.’s Paramount Pictures sent the trailer to the Web, plus movie theaters and TV stations around the world. Paramount estimates the trailer was seen more than 200 million times worldwide in the first week alone.
There were cheers in the theater when the familiar theme song kicked in, said Harry Knowles, the “head geek” who runs the movie fan site AintItCool.com, and comments on his Web site have been positive.

“People generally really, really loved the trailer,” he said. “Some people think it’s a little more cartoonish-looking compared to the prior (films), with him whipping the lights and swinging on them and stuff. But at the same time, it seems that everyone is extremely excited that there’s a new ‘Indiana Jones’ film.”

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LA Observed, a fine blog covering the Los Angeles area, has partnered with Eric Estrin, a TV writer and much more, for a community script-writing experiment. Here's the idea, as described on LA Observed:

Eric has written the opening pages of a screenplay set in and about Los Angeles. It has a name, Right of Way, and a mayor who may or may not be shady as the main character. You can write the rest by submitting a few pages of scene and dialogue. Each week he'll select the best pages and post them.

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The Breeze has gone through a lot of typography and design changes in the past year. One of them was switching our main sans serif typeface to Helvetica, generally regarded as one of the most readable, comfortable sans serif fonts in the world.

In 2007, 50 years after the font was first developed, a documentary filmmaker released, "Helvetica," which explores the impact one font has had on the visual design world, as well as the psychology of typography. The movie is now out on DVD.

From the filmmaker's statement on the film's Web site:

Since millions of people see and use Helvetica every day, I guess I just wondered, "Why?" How did a typeface drawn by a little-known Swiss designer in 1957 become one of the most popular ways for us to communicate our words fifty years later? And what are the repercussions of that popularity, has it resulted in the globalization of our visual culture? Does a storefront today look the same in Minneapolis, Melbourne and Munich? How do we interact with type on a daily basis? And what about the effects of technology on type and graphic design, and the ways we consume it? Most of us use computers and digital fonts every day, so are we all graphic designers now, in a sense?

The Web site also has links to reviews of the movie, trailers and clips, and a blog, for ongoing discussions about the font and typographic design issues.

If you're inspired to play with type yourself after seeing the movie, download free faces at www.dafont.com, or submit your own.

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There are only 29 days to prepare yourself for the Academy Awards by watching video previews of nominated movies, reminiscing on last year'snominees for each category.

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... to come back to our blog, we bring you The Shark Is Still Working. It's a Web site devoted to -- you guessed it -- "Jaws" and everything even tenuously linked to that horror film of horror films. You'll find information about a documentary, discussion boards, fan info galore and goofy references to the film peppered throughout -- "can't beat that with a compressed air tank." Because, you know, sometimes you just can't get enough "Jaws."

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You've no doubt heard by now that Peter Jackson, the Academy Award winning director, is on board to make "The Hobbit" in two movies. You'll be able to dress up and wait in line for midnight showings twice more if all goes to plan -- once in 2009 and again in 2010. Get all the dirt on Middle-earth's return to the big screen at the official "Hobbit" blog.

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