Yes, Jonah Hex is that short, actually. It’s 81 minutes and change, and if you throw out eight minutes for the end credits and almost six minutes of opening credit noodling, in which a live action sequence is intercut with some stylish animation, that’s around 67 minutes of actual narrative in which crucial character backstory, motivation and basic plot questions still aren’t answered.

The AP’s Christy Lemire has a nice piece in which she assays the lack of review screenings for Killers, and in which I partially rhapsodize on Lionsgate’s general strategy of muffled opinion for its forthcoming action-comedy, starring Ashton Kutcher and Katherine Heigl.

The hilarious money quote of explanation from Lionsgate’s Wednesday statement: “We want to capitalize on the revolution in social media by letting audiences and critics define this film concurrently. In today’s socially connected marketplace, we all have the ability to share feedback instantly around the world. In keeping with this spirit, Lionsgate and the filmmakers want to give the opportunity to moviegoing audiences and critics alike to see Killers simultaneously, and share their thoughts in the medium of their choosing.”

This ignores some facts, of course. Sandwiched in between the releases of Gerard Butler’s The Ugly Truth and Law Abiding Citizen, each of which screened for critics and posted an opening weekend of over $20 million, Lionsgate released Gamer in September of last year. It didn’t screen in advance for critics, and it opened to around $9 million. But hey, a bonus to whomever at Lionsgate drafted the above response; it’s good, hard spin. Ridiculous, but in a finger-to-the-wind, let’s-toss-this-into-the-zeitgeist-peppermill-and-see-if-it-takes kind of way.

Is Lionsgate making junketeers sign nondisclosure agreements barring any pre-release voiced or written critical opinions (i.e., reviews) for Killers, its Ashton Kutcher–Katherine Heigl action comedy, opening June 4? Yes, yes it is. Make of that what you will.

The American Cinematheque’s Margot Gerber, guesting over at The Wrap, takes a look at all the big screen infidelity coursing through the Cannes Festival, including Gregg Araki’s Kaboom, which sounds… interesting. As she notes of the film’s raunchy slang — comment dites-vous “vagetarian?”

Trendspotters, take note. Less than a week after screenwriter J.D. Shapiro manned up and (amusingly) apologized for his part in Battlefield Earth, Monster House screenwriter Dan Harmon is dropping nuts on director Gil Kenan and executive producer Steven Spielberg in an email to a friend, calling the former a “hack” and the latter a “moron.” Movieline has the scoop, which, though a few days old and removed from its original source, is probably still eliciting apologetic emails.

Greenberg director Noah Baumbach and critic Armond White do not like each other… partly because the latter suggested in a review that Baumbach’s mom should’ve had an abortion? Sweet Christ I’m glad I’m not involved in shenanigans like this. Writing with vitriolic flair (when deserved) is one thing, but ad hominem attacks of that sort make clear that the critic’s chief interest is really himself, which shouldn’t be the case. The closest I’ve come to being the subject of a filmmaker vendetta, to my knowledge, is Troy Duffy, who threatened me over the phone and helped orchestrate a campaign of minor harassment on occasion of the original release of The Boondock Saints.

Sometimes, when you’re an actor, you get drafted for silly promotional stunts, as happened to Hot Tub Time Machine costars Clark Duke and Collette Wolfe (far right) at the Air Canada Center in Toronto last night, as part of a “Tub Crawl” promotion at the Maple Leafs hockey game. When it involves ladies and soap suds, though, that’s not a bad thing, truth be told.

So apparently Crystal the Monkey visited Fox & Friends to promote tomorrow’s DVD release of Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian. And while I’m sure there’s a sophisticated organ grinder joke to be made that serves as a cutting metaphor for the Iraq War and the politicizing of terror, let’s be honest — this post is just so I can run a photo of a monkey sitting on Karl Rove‘s head.