Where The Wild Things Are

There’s going to be a lot of hyperbole surrounding this one as it gets closer to release, and it appears with good reason too. This movie looks gorgeous. When I first heard Spike Jonze was onboard to direct this, I knew we’d be in for a treat. It looks like he isn’t going to disappoint, either. Maurince Sendak’s beloved children’s book classic is full of honest, sometimes sad and heartfelt observations about being young, and staying  young at heart. It looks like Warners is really giving Jonze the freedom to bring that to the big screen. And considering the time it’s taken, it looks like Warners knew giving Jonze the project, he’d deliver on a uniquely faithful adaptation. I can’t wait for this one. I’ll probably cry for joy when I finally get to see this. Until then, I’ll just sing along with this great trailer and its inspired choice of soundtrack. Arcade Fire’s “Wake Up” is now forever tied to this movie for me.

It’s also available here
in QuickTime.

Red-band trailer for Chuck Palahniuk book-to-movie, Choke debuts!!

Check out the trailer for
Choke
the latest Chuck Palahniuk (Fight Club) novel to make it to the big screen. This one stars Sam Rockwell (Confessions of a Dangerous Mind) as Victor Mancini, a sex-crazed con man who feigns choking to gain favor from women and their valuables.

Jason Statham wants to be a Daredevil

Makes more sense than Ben Affleck's existence.

File this one firmly under rumor. Apparently writer Geoff Boucher caught up with Frank Miller and Jason Statham and interviewed the two together. Eventually talk of Daredevil came up and apparently that led the trio toward talks of a possible reboot movie ala Louis Leterrier’s The Incredible Hulk. Statham spoke up quickly by saying, “absolutely, just give me the chance, I would love to be Daredevil.” To which Miller responded, “”I think he should be Daredevil too.” So, there you have it. I wont be dwelling on this much, but the idea isn’t bad. Miller fleshed out the Daredevil character back in the ’70s, and while I’m not very up on my DD lore, I can safely say that there was no worse superhero movie ever made than Ben Affleck’s attempt at the 2003 atrocity Daredevil. So who knows? It could work. I could see it.

What do you guys think? Should we even care about this??

Potter takes long summer vacation

Cool poster, sucks they have the date wrong.

Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince has been pushed from its November 2008 release to July 17, 2009 effectively leaving a huge hole in the holiday movie season. For reason listed below, Warner Bros. has made this decision much to the dismay of fans everywhere. Admittedly I’m a little bummed by the news too. Anyways, here’s what WB suit, Alan Horn says:

“Our reasons for shifting ‘Half-Blood Prince’ to summer are twofold: we know the summer season is an ideal window for a family tent pole release, as proven by the success of our last Harry Potter film, which is the second-highest grossing film in the franchise, behind only the first installment. Additionally, like every other studio, we are still feeling the repercussions of the writers’ strike, which impacted the readiness of scripts for other films–changing the competitive landscape for 2009 and offering new windows of opportunity that we wanted to take advantage of. We agreed the best strategy was to move ‘Half-Blood Prince’ to July, where it perfectly fills the gap for a major tent pole release for mid-summer.”

This doesn’t seem to have any effect on the release of seventh films, Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows. Here’s WB production president Jeff Robinov dropping science:

“The release date change does not alter the production schedule for this or future Harry Potter films. Post-production on ‘Half-Blood Prince’ was completed on time, and the studio’s release plans for the two-part ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows’ will not be affected by this change. We know Harry Potter fans are eagerly anticipating seeing the final chapters unfold onscreen. In fact, the good news for them is that the gap will now be shortened between ‘Half-Blood Prince’ and the first part of ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.’”

There you have it.

Fan art further stirs Batman 3 rumors

???Addiction or dedication???

This was just too cool to pass up. First Showing posted this very convincing fan art of an upcoming “The Dark Knight Returns” movie poster. It’s a cool idea. I like the idea of the Riddler as a quasi-Zodiac killer. I even like the title. It stays in line with both the continuity of Nolan’s work and it evokes more of the Frank Miller/Alan Moore/Jeph Loeb source material that Nolan took as inspiration for his films.

Just for the record, the Nolan camp has made no official statements on anything related to a Batman sequel since The Dark Knight came out. It’s true that when Christopher Nolan and David Goyer discussed starting Batman Begins they had it conceived as a trilogy. That’s as far as the talks have gone.

Tarantino’s new bastard, Mike Meyers!?! Other rumors confirmed as new ones emerge…

Mike Meyers, yes, that’s right Wayne Campbell himself, has signed on in Quentin Tarantino’s upcoming World War Twosploitation film, Inglorious Bastards.

Meyers will be in the film for one scene playing the British commander who dispatches Archie Hicox played by Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) to join the rest of the Bastards along with Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt). According to IMDb director Eli Roth (Hostel, Cabin Fever) will star as Donnie Donowitz and B.J. Novak (The Office) as PFC Utivich to play other members of the savage Jew squadron of soldiers sent to destroy a Nazi propaganda film and take out the Nazi commander. Nastassja Kinski (Paris, Texas) is still attached to the of German Bridget Von Hammersmark.

Now add Adam Sandler (Don’t Mess With the Zohan) and David Krumholtz (Freaks and Geeks, Liberty Heights) to the list of new rumors. No characters have been attached to either, but I could see a fit.

Slow news week/writer

Hey folks,
I’ve hit a whole new plateau. I’m actively working at being completely lazy. It’s been great. Couple that fact with the also clear fact that the summer movie machine is slowing. Everyone’s getting back to their respective drawing boards while we wait on the fall movie season. However, the news comes trickling in sometimes we get the mind numbingly pointless, and sometimes we get rumors spiced with real news.

Soooo with that in mind I’ll be running some news that may not be timely, but then again it’s really not all that important. Rest assured when there is newsworthy news, you’ll get it here at least as quick as the slowest corporate website. Promise and cross my heart. Okay? Awesome.

And that brings me to my first bit of mind numbingly pointless movie news:

Gyllenhaal swears he’s straight, puts on wig

Just Jared has captured the first pics of the Jake Gyllenhaal movie to video game vehicle, Prince of Persia: Sands of Time.

I don't know why you should care either.

Expect the ambiguously gay Gyllenhaal joke quotient to shoot through the roof as this one gets closer to release. In all fairness, if this movie is half as good as Brokeback Mountain, he wont have too much to worry about. I guess. Until then, the ball’s in your court, Gyllenhaal. I’ll let you decide if I’m speaking figuratively.

The film hits theaters Summer 2010 and is directed by Mike Newell (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles) with Jerry Bruckheimer as an Executive Producer.

You can find the Just Jared article HERE

God, what else?

Inglorious gets more ingloriouser

Gloriously Inglorious

There was some cool news out of the Quentin Tarantino camp on his upcoming Inglorious Basterds. Brad Pitt has officially signed on to be Aldo Raines, the Tennessee hillbilly who leads a group of Jewish soldiers to disrupt the premiere of Goebbels’ latest propaganda film and collect a hundred Nazi scalps (each) on the way. Pitt will be paired with Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead, and the upcoming Star Trek reboot), director Eli Roth (Hostel, Cabin Fever) and B.J. Novak of The Office. Now Pegg has signed on to play a ‘British lieutenant’. The guy has been in everything lately and it will be cool to how Tarantino utilizes him in this film. Roth and Novak are rumored along with a slew of other names including Nastassja Kinski for the ‘German actress’ role. There are still Basterds to cast, and the big roles of Col. Hans Landa and the female lead Shoshanna are still up for grabs.

The Inglorious Basterds go into World War II France as part of Operation Kino, an effort to blow up a movie theater premiering a particular propaganda picture. Inglorious Basterds starts shooting – filming that is – in October in Germany.

More news for you guys tomorrow. I also have a couple reviews for Step Brothers and Pineapple Express I hope to have up by the week’s end.

Until then,

Keep it reel.

A Spanish trailer for Steven Soderbergh’s CHE is online!!!

While we’re talking about Benicio Del Toro…

…Steven Soderbergh’s four-and-a-half hour epic biopic of Ernesto “Che” Guevara (Benicio Del Toro) has managed to surface on a Spanish movie site. The trailer is grainy and in total espanol. The problem is we may never get to see the film at all. Soderbergh has yet to find a distributor in Hollywood willing to pick it up. He’s not helping his cause by adamantly refusing the film be broken up for a limited release this December. Eventually the two parts – the first, The Argentine and the second, Guerrilla – would release separately, first in January and then the second in February. Confounding Soderbergh’s situation was the film’s less-than-stellar reception at Cannes earlier this year. I’ll say this, Soderbergh has taken an…interesting look at the rebel’s life, but if there’s one guy who can make any part worth seeing, it’s Benicio. You can find the trailer here

The Wolfman trailer is back online!!!!

Benicio's having a bad hair day.

It was gone, now it’s back. A brave soul provided this footage of the trailer of the upcoming Joe Johnston (The Rocketeer) remake of the classic Universal horror film, The Wolfman. The footage isn’t bad. It’s good enough to get a good idea of what to expect. The trailer shows this movie takes place in Victorian-era England setting up for all kinds of Gothic moodiness and macabre. Johnston has done well in keeping this one under wraps, and I like that he’s taken a very classic Universal monster-movie approach staying true to the source material. Enjoy!

Harry Potter and the brand new trailer

Harry and Dumbledore fall into a ring of fire...they go down down down and the paychecks got higher.

Potter fans rejoice! The trailer for the sixth installment in the young wizard series, Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince debuted at MTV.com

I am indeed a self admitting Potter fan and can’t help but really enjoy this. From the trailer shows, this one is setting up to be darker yet as the young wizard ages with his fans. There’s some really great stuff here. You get some great dialog between the young Tom Riddle (Hero Fiennes-Tiffin) – the nephew of Ralph Fiennes – who would later grow up to be Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) and Professor Dumbledore (Michael Gambon). It looks like director David Yates has really gone through the trouble of making a very impressive Potter film and I can’t help but be optimistic for the seventh and final installment. Check it out now. The movie is set for release November 21.

You can download the trailer here in QuickTime

Tim Burton is Mad for his Hatter

Johnny goes back to the sea of Disney.

It wouldn’t be a Tim Burton movie if Johnny Depp wasn’t being used at some capacity. Depp and Burton’s collaborations have had relative success over the years, so why not? However, this may be one of Burton’s best castings of Depp in a Burton film since Ed Wood. Of course, Depp will be taking on the role of Lewis Caroll’s iconic character, the Mad Hatter in Burton’s take on the trippy childhood classic, Alice in Wonderland. It is a Disney film, so don’t expect anything like Depp and Burton’s last collaboration, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, but given Disney’s success with Depp and Burton in the past with the Pirates of the Caribbean films and Burton’s animated fare in Corpse Bride and A Nightmare Before Christmas, not to mention the cult classic Frankenweenie, it’s fair to think this may be a sure bet. Depp is the second casting in Burton’s upcoming Wonderflick. Australian actress Mia Wasikowska will play Alice. Disney wants the film to be done in 3-D.

Any thoughts?

Wolverine Teaser leaked from Comic-Con

The teaser from X-Men Origins: Wolverine has leaked on YouTube and I must say it looks pretty marvelous. The teaser showcases most of the main characters including Wolverine (Hugh Jackman), Sabretooth (Liev Schreiber), Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds), Silver Fox (Lynn Collins) William Stryker (Danny Huston), Gambit (Taylor Kitsch) and The Blob (Kevin Durand). The teaser touches on Wolverine and Sabretooth’s history in Vietnam and their eventual involvement in the Weapon X project. I can’t wait to see some more on this one.

It may disappear at any moment.

UPDATED!!!!

The powers that be from Fox have taken down the trailer as expected. Hopefully you got a chance to check it out.

In all honesty, I’ve had mixed feelings about an X-Men spinoff especially in lieu of all the truly great spinoffs that have come before, and the fact that the third installment left me wanting to bash my head against a tree until I blacked out. What the hell was Beast doing, seriously? And who the hell is the Asian mutant in that? Porcupine man? In all seriousness, the trailer didn’t manage to put any real tone to the upcoming spinoff/prequel. However, it did give us a first look at the characters. I’ll say that I like the direction Gavin Hood is going, and Tsotsi was an amazing movie, so high hopes all around, I guess. Plus there’s some major facial hair attitude emanating from Liev and Hugh respectively.

New teaser poster for Friday the 13th remake unveiled at the Con

Here we go, again.

Kraken from Ain’t It Cool News clicked these shots of the new teaser poster for the upcoming Friday the 13th redo at Comic-Con today. This movie is still a ways off. I think the release date is sometime in February 2009. Whatever the case may be, I like the poster. It’s nothing all that spectacular, but then again, when was the last time anything Friday the 13th-related was? 1980? Okay, Part 2 was pretty cool too. That was still over 25 years ago. More details to follow on this once the panel finishes up. Stay tuned!

Aronofsky is officially building a new ROBOCOP

"Think it over, creep."

Director Darren Aronofsky (The Fountain, Pi, Requiem For A Dream) is teaming with writer David Self (The Road To Perdition and the upcoming redo The Wolfman) to bring back our favorite Motor City cyborg policeman. The announcement came amidst the chaos that is Comic Con 2008. I’m not sure how I feel about this one yet. The pairing of Aronofsky and Self is a pretty good move, no doubt about it. However, I have a funny feeling about this one. Frank Miller took two shots at co-writing both ROBOCOP sequels, and the authored the comic version, ROBOCOP vs. Terminator. Each sequel has been victim to harsh criticism, but ROBOCOP 2 wasn’t that bad in my opinion. We’ll see what Aronofsky has up his sleeve for the baby food eating gun slinging cyborg as the movie is being given a 2010 release date. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the fourth movie will take place 20 years later after the ROBOCOP project was scrapped in Motor City but will now be transported to L.A.

You can catch that report here

It remains to be seen if this movie will have the same feel as its predecessors managing to take shots at capitalism and corporate cheesedicks, but the idea is getting a whole lot more interesting with Aronofsky and Self on board.

Great Odin’s Raven!!!!!!!

"Why don't you go back to Whore Island?!"

If “Anchorman” director/writer Adam McKay can conjure half the magic into an Anchorman sequel, I’m on board. It’s been four years since that movie came out, and I still catch myself quoting it. Seriously, the movie is a milestone in comedy. Since then that entire cast has gone onto sometimes bigger and arguably better things. Hopefully Will Ferrell and company can bring back that same magic. McKay tells Entertainment Weekly the sequel will pick up 10 years later with Ron Burgundy and Vanessa Corningstone aka Tits Magee aka Christina Applegate as world anchors in the ’80s. McKay and Ferrell can be seen together with other Ferrell cohort John C. Reilly next in “Step Brothers.”

That EW article can be found here