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Star Wars

If one movie a night is never enough for you and you're looking for a flick to get you in the mood for this week's new release, Double Feature Friday is here to help. This new weekly column takes a look at the week's releases and pairs them with a complimentary film to watch before, after or as a substitution.

"Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace in 3D" & "Serenity"
The connection between these two goes deeper than their deep space setting. Joss Whedon filled the big-screen continuation of his television space opera, "Firefly," with the fun and swagger of their original "Star Wars" trilogy, while creating a vision that was entirely his own. Sure, Mal burrows from Han, but that doesn't make Nathan Fillion an ounce less likable or cool. You could easily argue that "Firefly" and "Serenity" were more earnest continuations of the space opera/western combo-genre that Lucas established with "Star Wars" back in 1977. "Serenity" can stand on its own, but watching "Firefly" beforehand will increase your enjoyment exponentially. Also, 2D.

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Happy St. Patrick's Day! Originally a March 17th holiday for Catholics, the day has transformed over the years to become a general celebration by all of Irish culture. For many people, this means two things: whiskey (preferably Jameson) and Guinness.

Of course, St. Patrick's Day is also all about shrouding yourself in the color green. Each year, the Chicago River is dyed that color in celebration. In Seattle, they paint the day's parade route in green lines. Hell, this morning at breakfast in MTV's cafeteria, even the bagels were green. Bad choice there, I think. Who wants to eat a green bread product?

My point is, green is a vital part of St. Patrick's Day. Which is why, after the jump, I run through a sampling of the many variations of "green" movies you can find. Read more...

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Alice in Wonderland1. "Alice in Wonderland" ($62 million)
2. "Green Zone" ($14.5 million)
3. "She's Out of My League" ($9.6 million)
4. "Remember Me" ($8.3 million)
5. "Shutter Island" ($8.1 million)

Even with four new wide releases in theaters this weekend, director Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland" proved its staying power by claiming the gold medal at this weekend's box office. Suffering a 46.6% drop from last weekend's $116.1 million intake, "Alice" still managed an impressive $62 million stateside result. Combined with foreign box office numbers, "Alice" has made $429.6 million worldwide in just two weeks. Read more...

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Alice in Wonderland1. "Alice in Wonderland" ($17.4 million)
2. "Green Zone" ($5 million)
3. "Remember Me" ($3.6 million)
4. "She's Out of My League" ($3.3 million)
5. "Our Family Wedding" ($2.5 million)

Moviegoers proved that there's still plenty of wonder to be had within the 3-D world of Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland." The Disney fantasy film took a decisive $17.4 million first place finish on Friday, bringing the worldwide total to $258 million thus far. The weekend is still young, but it'll take quite a bit of effort to dethrone "Alice" for its second week in a row. Read more...

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Amy Ryan had a great run on "The Office." Last season we saw her character, HR's very own Holly, wine and dine Dunder Mifflin Scranton's head honcho Michael Scott with her own geeky charm. She made corny jokes and loved Michael's. She had a great Yoda impression and she didn't seem to mind that Michael confessed his feelings for her very, very, very early on in the relationship.

However, like all amazing things, this relationship came to an end. The bosses found out about them and moved her all the way to TK. They broke up. However, we're still holding out some hope that they may reunite and fall passionately back in love. An idea Ryan wouldn't rule out. Read more...

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Wow. This looks awesome. I replied to one of our reader's comments earlier today, someone who expressed hesitation about Matt Damon potentially being cast in the Coen brothers' planned adaptation of "True Grit," a Western. I responded with the opinion that Damon is a fantastic talent, that he possesses the rare ability to fully inhabit the characters he portrays. I used to be iffy about the "Bourne" movies, but have since come around in a big way. So you can imagine how exciting "Green Zone" is, since it reunites Damon with "Bourne" director Paul Greengrass.

You're on board now, right? Looks like pretty compelling stuff. Action-packed, topical, Damon in action hero mode, Greengrass in blockbuster mode. March 12, 2010 is suddenly a long way away.

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Greg KinnearEven as I was in the act of writing a recent article about Paul Greengrass’s new film “Green Zone,” I couldn’t help but call bs on myself. After all the quote at the heart of the article was from film co-star Jason Isaacs, who told MTV News that the flick didn’t really use a script, that Greengrass changed his direction every take, that the bulk of the movie was made up of a sort of guerilla style, high-octane game of improv.

That couldn’t possibly be right, could it?

“Yes I would say that Jason nailed it pretty nicely there,” “Green Zone” Greg Kinnear said of Isaac’s observations, which included lines like “[Paul] just throws you into the deep end.” Read more...

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Jason IsaacsPaul Greengrass’s newest film has a script credited to Academy Award-winning writer Brian Helgeland and Greengrass himself. Yeah, big whoop - reading it will give you absolutely no idea about the lines in the final film, Jason Isaacs laughed.

“There’s a script but that’s no more than a start for improvisation. There’s no blocking. There’s no continuity,” he said. “It changes every single time. [Paul] just throws you into the deep end. He creates what feels like chaos but is actually far from it. The whole thing is live organic storytelling. As an actor it pulls the rug out from under you.”

“Green Zone,” formerly “Imperial Life in Emerald City,” is a critical look at the US reconstruction in Iraq, particularly in Bagdad, starring Matt Damon as a CIA officer in search for weapons of mass destruction. Read more...

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