Akira Kurosawa had an amazing talent. Just to realise he influenced more cinema in one single movie than most people have in their entire career. The Seven Samurai helped the creation of a raft of movies from westerns to space epics, and it continues to influence our cinema to this very day.

So what’s the news? His son, Hisao Kurosawa, is about to lift the megaphone and enter his fathers realm, and not just with any old film either. Hisao is to complete Akira’s unfinished script Oni before he directs it.

The story sounds wonderful, and promises much, especially if we find that Hisao carries his fathers huge talents. My only reservation was the final comment made in the BBC films news story:

“…a samurai’s struggle to discover his destiny in 16th century Japan. It’s scheduled for release in 2006 and will also be adapted into a videogame for PlayStation 2.”

My hackles went up when I heard it was already scheduled to be made into a videogame. I hope that this is a decision that has been made independant of the script and the movie, and is heading off for separate development. My fear would be if the two are tied, or the game influences (or even restricts) the writing and production.

Whatever the outcome, I do think this will be a movie and script to watch carefully. It will be interesting to see if another generation of Kurosawa magic is coming to grace the dulled and incredibly retrospective cinema of today.

Being a big fan of Far Eastern cinema, Horror in particular, I’m very excited when a new project comes along that promises to utilise some of its talent. So great news from Fangoria that the Pang brothers are coming West.

Danny and Oxide Pang, responsible for The Eye - An excellent movie despite it’s lacklustre ending - are earmarked for a project from Ghost House.

Ghost House Pictures is the brainchild of Sam Riami and Rob Tapert, delivering a host of Horrors for general release. Along with the recent The Grudge, they are also working on Dibbuk Box (Stephen Susco writing, writer of The Grudge) and 30 Days of Night (Stuart Beattie writing, writer of Collateral).

What caught my eye though was news of the Beattie written script in production at Ghost House for the Pang brothers. I’ve just found out the title too, it’s on IMDB, and called Scarecrow.

Their style is fast, cool and very slick. Really knowing how to make all aspects of film making work for them, camera, lighting, etc. The brilliant use of focus in The Eye adds fathoms of atmosphere to the creep out sequences.

Very excited about this one, and if you haven’t seen The Eye, go see it now.

Empire have the quotes from Pierce Brosnan as he leaves the franchise for good, and it looks like he wasn’t happy about it. I’ve read rumours which claimed that he wanted to do the fifth and that he was told no. They were going to make it with another actor, someone they hadn’t even begun to look for.

“Bond is gone,” the 51 year old actor tells us in the new issue of Empire. “Over. Done. Dusted. My contract was for four movies, they [EON Productions] invited me back for a fifth and I said yes, then somewhere in the middle of negotiations they changed their minds.”

To me this makes no sense at all. I mean Brosnan is the archetypal Bond, I would even go so far to say he’s in the top three Bonds of all time, although I’m not going to name my top three, I’ll wait and see what you all come back with. Now if one of the best Bond’s ever comes to you as his contract is running out and says he’d like to do another movie, and you have no other actor lined up and the franchise is running well enough to produce another movie quite quickly, what would you do?

I know what I would do and that would be to sign him up for at least another movie, or keep him on option for more than one. Use the filming time to search for the next Bond, and if there isn’t, use him for another. It makes good sense to me, there’s nothing wrong with Brosnan doing another, he hardly looks his age does he?

I can’t fathom this decision at all. However, with Quentin Tarantino openly speaking about his desire to remake Casino Royale (returning to the original text) wouldn’t this be a perfect opening? Brosnan himself has even said that he would be interested in bringing this to the screen as it goes back to the roots of the Bond character, Check out the story at Empire, but the key quotes are below.

“Tarantino said that he would ditch the high-action antics of the past few Bond movies in favour of a return to the more character-driven spy plots of the first few 007 films”

“Pierce Brosnan, speaking a couple of weeks ago to Chud.com, also expressed a strong desire to get back to character, and professed an admiration for Casino Royale as “somewhat the blueprint for the Bond character. If you go to that book, you find out more about James Bond than in any of the other books.””

““The producers now seem to be in a malaise of confusion as to how to go forward.” He [Brosnan] said that he still wants to be the next Bond, and finished by saying of the Bond producers, “They know where to find me if they want me for the next one.”“

Still makes no sense to me. What would be the hunger for the next Bond movie to be a return to the origins of the book character, with Tarantino as screenplay writer and director and Brosnan as Bond? To me that sounds fantastic! Do it!

I know Bond is cheesy, but the movies are some cracking entertainment, and this would just bump up the level a notch higher. Perhaps that is what they are afraid of, the formula right now is quite easy, and bettering that will mean that future movies will be gauged against this one. I don’t know. Still sounds like they are missing a golden opportunity.

I’m drooling at the mouth I want this movie to get made so badly! Indiana Jones 4 should have been made 5 years ago, but those untalented hacks George Lucas and Steven Spielberg keep saying they’re “busy” (please note, I actually worship those 2 guys). But it looks like the wheels continue to be in motion, even if they’re slow. The two mega geniuses have just signed up Catch Me If You Can man Jeff Nathanson to write up the next installment of Indy. I’m excited about this. Cinema Blend gives us this:

Today brings news that Jeff Nathanson (Catch Me If You Can) will be the next writer to take a stab at the Indiana Jones 4 screenplay. Is this good or bad? Nathanson has experience with Spielberg but who knows if that’s enough to make it pass Lucas. By the time this movie is ever made, will any body still care? Does anybody actually want to see Indiana in a wheelchair?

Personally, I think the idea of an older Indy makes for a much more interesting story. How does the man evolve? What does he become in his latter years? I think it creates a lot more story depth and possibilities. I’m looking forward to it. But this really ticks me off: How is it fair that Ford is now in like his 60’s and yet STILL 10x better looking than me?!?!! How depressing.

Funny, it was only a few weeks ago that I posted my interest in seeing another Hannibal Lecter film… and POOF… suddenly news comes down the pipe that the movie rights to the newest Hannibal book (coming out next fall) have been snapped up. Man, I should put up a post about my wild night in Cuba with Jennifer Garner and see what happens. Anyway, don’t expect Sir Anthony Hopkins to reprise the role of the cannibalistic shrink, because this one is going to be a prequel set deeper in the past than Red Dragon. The happy go lucky folks at CHUD give us this:

The book is titled Behind the Mask, which sounds like a featurette on one of the Friday the 13th DVDs, and will chronicle the early years of the erudite sadist with the fondness for pan-seared neighbor. “Millions of readers in 25 languages have wondered how Dr. Lecter developed his particular appetite for evil,” says Bantam Dell Publishing honcho Irwyn Applebaum, making one wonder if Esperanto and Gujarati are among them. “This novel will satisfy their curiosity.”

I like the idea. Hannibal is one of the more interesting characters to hit the screen in a long time… I welcome the chance to explore him a bit more.

I really am getting bored of this, another remake. What the hell is going on. Since I started writing here most of my stories have been about remakes, there seems to be nothing but remakes. You’re saying it in your comments, and we’re saying it in the posts, where has the originality gone? Why is Hollywood regurgitating stories like mad? What is the reasoning behind it all?

I just considered listing all the remakes that are noted throughout the blog, but you know what, I can’t be bothered. There are loads, believe me, and it looks like there’s just more and more coming. Now we’re looking at the mini-series V. Yes, V. With the hamster eating lizards (awww, Diane was hot. Come on…didn’t you think she was hot? No…ahem…okay…move on.)

What is just as amazing is the return of some of the original cast, Just take a look at those credits confirmed. Jane Badler as Diana, Faye Grant as Dr. Juliet Parrish, Marc Singer as Mike Donovan and Robert Englund as Willie! It’s now so bad that they not only are making remakes by the bucket load, but they are going to start using the old casts as well as the scripts. Perhaps they are on the old contracts and at a fraction of the cost or something?!

Ah…hold the press. Not strictly a remake, it’s actually a sequel. Phew, well that makes all the difference. Perhaps I am being too harsh, maybe they are going to give it a good crack and it might be a really good sequel…what’s the feeling out there?

I used to be a big Stephen King fan, I mean huge. I read everything he did without fail and was never disappointed. That is, until he moved from his traditional horror and started down the road of psychological horror, and then beginning to write people stories, it stopped working for me, so I stopped reading his books. Sad, because some of them are actually quite good. Now and then though I would pop back and read the odd book, and some of them were okay, a few were astounding.

One I picked up was called The Talisman co-written with Peter Straub, it’s an excellent story that really goes to the roots of storytelling, mixing a teenagers journey with fantasy and quite adult themes (not in that way!). It’s the prequel to The Black House, written by the same authors, and a step towards the world of The Dark Tower, an awesome seven book story by King.

Anyway. It’s enough to say that The Talisman is an excellent book, and now it looks like it’s getting a movie treatment.

For some reason there are a number of King films in production at the moment:

Salem’s Lot - Rob Lowe, Donald Sutherland, Rutger Hauer
Riding the Bullet - Ermmm…ermm…next.
Bag of Bones - No one on board.
Desperation - As above…well, no one well known!
Eyes of the Dragon - A french animation

Many have the usual TV movie plastered all over them, although I have heard interesting things about the Salems Lot remake - you guys can maybe put me right if you’ve already seen it.

This looks like it will be different though, Spielberg has become involved and Dreamworks are onboard, with Ehren Kruger (Arlington Road, Ring 1 and 2) writing the screenplay. It all sounds excellent, and on track to be another excellent King adaptation. I can only hope that The Dark Tower is next.

I think John Carpenter himself says it best in the story at BBC’s Film news:

“…now is the season of the remake.”

It appears so John, whether we like it or not, and while you’re on the subject, why not have a crack at remaking The Fog?…Oh, they are. He goes on to say:

“I have done it once, and I don’t want to do it again,” Carpenter said. “I did my Fog, and now it’s someone else’s time. It’s very flattering. It’s terrific that they want to make it. We have been thinking of doing The Fog over for some time, maybe as a sequel. But now is the season of the remake.”

Well I would say it’s good that he is on board as the Producer at least. However, is that a good thing or might it hinder a new Director with a new take on it? From the quote above it does sound as though he’s been asked, since he thinks it’s flattering. Someone obviously wants to make it rather than him just fishing for a remake.

Oh dear god. Did anyone else see that on Mr Carpenters IMDB resume? Halloween 9? ARRGHHHHHH!

Ah yes, one of the powerful trends these days in movies is the TV Show to Big Screen adaptations. There have more of them in the last couple of years than you can shake an A-Team at. However, lest we forget that the transition has also been made the other way. And like TV Shows that have jumped to the big screen, some have been good, and some have been very NOT good. Heck, even George Lucas has been talking about a Star Wars TV shows once the Revenge of the Sith is done and out of the way with. I think the reason a “Movie to TV Show” is more rare is because it’s a lot easier to make a single 2 hour movie from YEARS worth of Tv shows than it is to come up with years of TV shows from one single 2 hour moive. Just not as much source material to work with.

Some of the films that made for a good show are:

M*A*S*H* - I had totally forgotten this one was ever a movie. It was on TBS the other night. I had never seen it before (It’s a little before my time). But wow… it was amazing.

Stargate - I’ve never really watched Stargate SG-1 (even though my old company did a couple of effects shots for the show) until this year. Good show.

The Highlander - Ok, now before you get too excited, I’m not talking about any of the Craptastic sequels. I’m talking about the original Highlander that was made into the TV show. I know a lot of people slam the show, but honestly I thought it was pretty fun.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer - Much like M*A*S*H, this in one where a lot of people forget there was a movie first. And no, Sarah Michelle was not in it.

How about some of the Horrible ones:

My Big Fat Greek Wedding - This was just an awesome movie that is still probably my favorite “sleeper” hit of the last 5 years. But WOW did the TV show SUCK! I was so disappointed. It was really terrible… and I don’t even know if it made it to it’s 5th episode or not.

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off - Truly classic movie turned into a truly horrible show. Yuck.

Clueless - I was so surprised by this movie. It’s actually really funny and quite charming. The show on the other hand was quite annoying and I just wanted to punch it in the face.

Ok, so that’s my little list off the top of my head. Are there any really good ones I’m missing? Any really bad ones? And one more thing… what movie do you think would make a good tv show? Personally I think The Shawshank Redemption would make a great “Fugitive” kind of show.

So Total Film Magazine in the UK did a big poll to gage who the public thought was this years top Film Villain. Who do you think it was? Perhaps Gollum? Nope. Well then, it was probably Doc Ock from Spider-Man right? Nope. This years top film Villain was… GEORGE W. BUSH for his “part” in Fahrenheit 9/11. Yeah, he is creepy. I guess not many members of the NRA voted in that survey. :)

The picture is of him using his super mind trick powers to fool the world into believing Iraq has weapons of mass destruction. You can read the whole (although short) story here.

Well it had to happen sooner or later, and quite frankly I’m surprised it’s taken this long… but the first little “review” of Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith has made it’s way online… and apparently it’s very good. Keen in mind this isn’t coming from any sort of “official” source, but the good folks over at TheForce.Net (The guy who once ran it is actually a good friend of mine) are rarely misleading. The happy dwellers at Empire Online give us this little rundown:

It rocks, apparently, ranking second only to The Empire Strikes Back in the overall saga. High praise indeed. The full force.net review, by Josh Griffin, won’t be up on the site until November 1 (provided Lucasfilm’s cease and desist stormtroopers don’t pay him a visit first). Meanwhile, though, if you want to know more, first-hand info from the screening has been posted on one of the site’s message boards. And when we say spoiler heavy, we mean spoiler heavy.

We obviously won’t go into great detail, but with reports of some serious Darth Sidious-Yoda action, mind-blowing effects and action (for those sequences already complete, that is), more new planets than you can shake a Star Destroyer at, and new creatures (Yoda at one point rides a dragonfly-esque creature called a Can-Cell), we’re more excited than Jabba the Hutt at an all you can eat buffet.

Oh man! Yoda fighting Sidious?!?! I am beside myself with joyful glee! You have to understand, even if I KNEW the new film was going to suck I’d still be excited about seeing it… and I think it’ll be good. And after reading this review, I’m even more pumped. So, you wanna read that spoiler heavy review? Are you SURE? Cause if YOU do… then you can go here. Holy crap it looks really good.

Ok, It’s not exactly an official promotional release or anything, but apparently the UK paper “The Sun” got their dirty little hands on this snapshot taken of Johnny Depp from the set of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I dig the top hat… I think I’ll start wearing one. Just to the gym at first until I get more comfortable with it and move on to wearing it on dates an such. Anyway… despite the fact that I am a Johnny Depp fan and really enjoyed the original, I really have my doubts about this flick. The biggest (and probably the only) reason for my reservations is Tim Burton. It has been well documented on The Movie Blog that I do not like Burton’s work (aside from Pee-Wee’s and the first Batman). I’ve never liked his treatment of style or the way he tells a story… so I’m really nervous about this one. Who knows… maybe he’ll prove me wrong… but I doubt it.

Everyone around the web seems to have this picture now. Christian Bale as Batman. I’ve already read a few people who really dislike the outfit… but personally I think it’s great. Man this movie is going to blow the roof off. Chris Nolan hasn’t let me down yet.

I really am liking Tom Cruise again. There was a time when his fame and press persona was starting to really irk me, but suddenly he started being nice, following the golden rule of celebrity. When you get so big, bring yourself back to the audience, and he did, very successfully.

He’s got the fans hooked, not only is he producing some really good performances, he’s also picking some excellent scripts (or is that being offered). I really do like the persona of Cruise. I like his style in interviews, I like his onscreen characters and I love the fact he walks the crowd for so long and even leaves messages on their mobiles for them. Nice.

Anyway, this story talks about Cruise discussing a War of the Worlds scene, but for me the killer line comes later, after this.

“Cruise also said that he was offered “a ton of money” for Top Gun 2 and strung the studio on a bit with no intention of ever doing it.”

That would be so cool if it’s true, and shows that either Cruise has a huge grasp of his image and press persona, engineering all of this for the ability to release it to the press, or he just really does have fun with the whole movie-stardom thing. I hope it’s the latter and I will hang onto it.

What’s the feeling of Cruise out there? Meglomaniac with a clever understanding of manipulating the press, or just a great actor having great fun?

If I could ask everyone to bow there heads and have a moments silence for Revolver.

Thank you. What was set to be a return to form for Guy Ritchie in his well loved Gangster stories, now looks tainted and threatened by the news that Madonna is to join the cast as a Gangland boss. I pray to high heaven that her part is less than two minutes, or even gets cut. Please, please, please. I mean the only decent acting role she has ever been in was the short movie from BMW Films called Hire: The Star starring Clive Owen. Come to think of it that was directed by Ritchie!

Seriously though, I do hope that the film isn’t jinxed, I don’t know what you all think of Madonna’s acting career to date, but it doesn’t bode well. With Jason Statham and Ray Liotta are in it then I’m sure they can pull it back from the tainted hands of fate.

(By the way, some of those BMW shorts are really quite good, top Directors and actors, and they’ve won some awards too.)

I laughed out loud at work (yes don’t tell anyone I write some of these at work) when I read this story from ComingSoon. The plot outline is fantastic, and I wonder what the hell the production team were on when they thought this one up.

“Snakes centers on a ruthless assassin who unleashes a crate full of lethal snakes aboard a packed passenger jet over the Pacific Ocean in order to eliminate a witness in protective custody. The rookie pilot and frightened passengers must band together to survive.”

“Hey dude…” [drag] “…I hate flying.”
[drag] “Yeah, I hate snakes”
“Woooah. How about a movie where a snake hijacks a plane?”
“How about a whole family of snakes going on holiday?”

Surely this is Airplane III?

Who loves you baby? Well I do. I love Ving Rhames, I think he’s an actor with more presence than Darth Vader dressed up as Santa, and Kojak just seems a perfect part for him, how did we never think of that before?

Okay, so it’s a new television series produced by Bonnie Hammer of the Sci-Fi Channel and USA Network, but the production ended in August on a two hour movie to kick start the series when it begins to air in March 2005.

I realize that this might be a travesty to some, you might not think Kojak could ever be replaced, but I do believe that Mr Rhames is the one who could do it. The teaser of the movie in ComingSoon says:

The show was celebrated by police departments around the country for what was then considered a realistic portrayal of police work. In the pilot, Kojak hunts down a serial killer who continues to puzzle New York City detectives by targeting prostitutes with young children. After visiting a crime scene where he meets a victim’s children left without their mother ? let alone a legal guardian ? he is overcome with anger and compassion, and vows to personally avenge the killings.

Now that’s a blurb I like. Okay everyone, what do you think? Is Rhames a good choice?

Geoffrey Rush has pulled out of the romantic comedy Eucalyptus, also starring Nicole Kidman and Russell Crowe. No surprise really as the BBC are reporting, the filming schedule was clashing somewhat with his already bulging workload on the shooting of the two Pirates of the Caribbean sequels. I would presume that would be back to back (or even mixed day to day) filming.

I can’t decide if that is necessarily a bad thing or not, churning out two sequels at once banking on the original. In fact it is a huge trend in Hollywood to leap at sequels as soon as they can.

I mean here is the news today from the Guardian, that The Grudge is rolling towards a sequel. That’s no bad thing, I mean the original is quite good (although disjointed) and I have yet to see the US remake, but have heard good things. Yet that’s not the real problem here, the Studio see cash and they want a sequel. Have they got a writer or a director? Apparently neither are on board as yet. Let’s hope they are going ahead because they are within signing distance of this, but if they’re sitting in their offices shouting “That one returned well, throw out another one” then it’s surely bad.

I’ve been a big fan of Sean Bean ever since I saw him as Trevelyan in the James Bond flick GoldenEye. The guy carries a real power and rugged strength on the screen. At the same time he can be really suave and slick. He was the ONLY decent thing about the horrendously awful Don’t Say a Word, he was the ONLY decent thing in Ronin, he was the ONLY decent thing (perhaps along with Eric Bana) about Troy, and honestly, I truly think he gave the best individual performance as Boromir in the Lord of the Rings flicks.

From the looks of it, seems like he’ll probably be the only decent thing about National Treasure too. This guy delivers every time. Solid solid solid. On top of that he’s a good lookin dude too. So WHY ON EARTH IS NO ONE GIVING HIM A SHOT AT A LEADING ROLE?!?! In an age where Nic Cage still gets feature films, an age where DMX has several leading credits to his name, an age where Vin Diesel is considered a “leading man”… why can’t a solid actor like Bean get a shot?

You can’t see me right now… but take my word for it… I’m on my knees here. I’m BEGGING some producer out there to rekindle my faith that the industry is still mainly about talent. Someone take a script you’re looking at, and say to yourself “damnit, I’m giving this leading role to Sean Bean”. It boggles my mind that I have to beg someone to give Bean a leading role at the same time that Eminem, 50 Cent and Justin Timberlake have all been announced as getting their own movies. The human race is hopless.

Ummm… is that Jennifer Garner about to kiss another woman? I need to go spend some time by myself. In the meantime, the USA Today is giving us all this first look at the villain Typhoid Mary from the upcoming DareDevil spin-off Elektra. I think this is a great picture with many… ummm… artistic flavours… and uhhh… qualities that… ummm… oh it’s just hot.

I still remember how much of a kick I got out of Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure. Man that guy is nutty. Not to mention that besides Batman it’s the only Tim Burton film that I enjoyed. The only negative thing about Pee-Wee seems to be that it pretty much limited the career of Paul Reubens, who when given the chance has shown that he can be a fairly serviceable actor (for example Blow, or one of my favorite comedies Mystery Men).

Well fear not boys and girls, cause it looks like there is a solid chance that Pee-Wee could be back on the big screen yet again. The titans over at AICN give us this:

In an interview airing at seemingly random times on TVGuide Channel, Paul Reubens is asked about doing a Pee-Wee skit at the recent Groundlings celebration. He says that Pee-Wee won’t be seen again until the new Pee-Wee movie is released, which he has been in talks for and is getting close.

It’s hard to believe that it’s been almost 20 YEARS since Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure (I suddenly feel a little old). It would be neat to see the character again.

Oh goodness, someone seems to have puked on the floor… oh wait… that’s just the idea for a fourth Rambo movie. Ugg. The happy family over at Chud give us this quote from Stallone himself:

“It won’t be what you think - not the same Rambo with the headband. In keeping with some sort of believability, he would be passing the torch to a younger generation of high-tech combatants. We’re working on an interesting premise where Rambo is brought back from living on a ranch somewhere, and because of his skills in jungle warfare and survival, he’s asked to lead a young group in a search-and-rescue mission. They can’t believe this decrepit guy is a war hero, but when their technology fails, they see where Rambo excels.”

Oh, ok. NOW I’m a believer. This movie will change the face of cinema! Ugg. Cop Land proved to me that Stallone can really act when given the right role. Would someone close to him PLEASE try stearing him in that direction again… PLEASE.

I always get excited when I hear a really solid story is getting made into a film. Hence my giddiness over The Phantom of the Opera! With all the garbage that gets turn into films these days it’s nice to see a classic. Don’t know what Phantom is about?:

The movie tells the story of a disfigured musical genius (Butler) who haunts the catacombs beneath the Paris Opera, waging a reign of terror over its occupants. When he falls fatally in love with the lovely Christine (Rossum), the Phantom devotes himself to creating a new star for the Opera, exerting a strange sense of control over the young soprano as he nurtures her extraordinary talents.

How cool. I can’t wait for this one to hit theaters. As an added bonus, if you want to hear a clip of music from the upcoming film, the good folks over at Coming Soon have provied us all with it. You can go hear it here.

Well, I guess this isn’t the first time (or the last time) the internet rumour mill has been wrong. As it turns out Buffy and Angel director Joss Whedon is NOT going to be directing the new X-Men film. Looks like he said so himself at a recent event. This is sad news to me. Not that I was ever a huge Buffy or Angel fan, but this guy just seems to know how to deal with the genre in general. I still think he would have been a great fit for the project. So where does this leave X3? The search for a director goes on I guess.

Ok, I know the man has made some real stinkers along the way, but I just love Greg Kinnear as an actor. I have always thought he deserved an Oscar for As Good As It Gets, and the man was just AWSOME as Captain Amazing in Mystery Men. Having said that, I’m not so sure about this decision to appear in the remake of the classic “The Bad News Bears“. If you’ve never seen the original, you really should rent it sometime… but i just don’t know if a remake will fly in todays market. Meh, I guess we’ll wait and see. Having Kinnear and Billy Bob Thornton on board won’t hurt the cause.

I found a link (somewhere, so apologies to whoever drew my attention to it for the no mention) pointing to the National Treasure 10 minute snippet of the film.

I kept downloading it to watch and found I had to close it before watching for various real life reasons, but finally today I got round to watching it. Oh dear. I just wasted 10 minutes of my life…excluding download time.

I can’t believe how contrived the script appears, even in the short space of 10 minutes. I pray that they edited lots of exciting bits together to make this short teaser, but I really don’t think they did.

The most astounding moment is when Benjamin Franklin Gates (doh!) played by Nicolas Cage, delivers his breath free deduction of the next clue in the discovery of the treasure.

Why in the hell he didn’t pick up on the last, and most obvious clue, first I didn’t understand, and the leaps in logic were astounding. Plus it’s just got such an overly fast pace, I felt the story was flying by and not giving me a chance to react.

Okay, 10 minutes isn’t enough to go on, and it could be cut together for the teaser. Take a look at the 10 minute opener and see what you think. (Note that the link is direct to the streaming quicktime, and being 10 minutes is quite large.)

I can’t believe it. Call me Rich the Remake Writer, ’cause here comes another one. Oh, and it’s gonna be bad.

Sites are reporting a remake of another Alec Guinness movie, however Empire, are saying it like it is. Another fantastic British film from yesteryear, Last Holiday, starring the amazing talents of Guinness is going to be remade.

Well, okay, maybe they could have learned from the Coen remake of The Ladykillers and understood the small quirks of what makes those comedies great. One of the biggest things they missed was the fact that the lady in question was supposed to be extremely meek and timid, a creature that could in no way cause them harm, and yet accidentally despatch them all. A small difference, but quite imperative to the charm of the story.

So, do you think they’ve realised their mistakes and attempted to pay homage and remake it well?

Now I may be wrong, but adding Queen Latifah and LL Cool J to the main roles, reversing the male and female leads, doesn’t bode well already. I mean they have turned out some good performances, and I think LL is a bit of a dude, but I just can’t see it working myself.

Empire hold slightly more hope than I do…

…both Ms. Latifah and, erm, Mr. Ladies Love Cool James have easy charm in buckets and, provided that the script is better than some of Latifah’s recent star vehicles, this could be a surprise hit. And no, for once there’s no silent S there…

Just about every website that has anything to do with film news is covering the story of the new cast members for the movie The Exorcism of Anneliese Michel. However not everyone is focusing on the possible storyline based on true events.

You’d think from the title we’re talking about an Exorcist type movie, and you’d be right. Oh…ermmm…well not that intriguing after all…but wait.

This 22-year-old woman was a student at the University of W√جø¬Ωrzburg and in the late 1 970s exhibited symptoms — including spasms, writhing, speaking in devilish tongues — construed by her devout Catholic family as diabolic possession. The archbishop of W√جø¬Ωrzburg concurred with their diagnosis and entrusted two priests to perform the Exorcism from the 17th-century Rituale Romanum. To the embarrassment of the church, the victim died of starvation during the procedures, for the exorcists had added the discipline of fasting to the other means of driving out the demons. Insult was added to embarrassment when the district attorney’s investigation and a trial found the two priests guilty of negligent manslaughter.

There are many places around the Interweb that carry details of this story, but it’s hard to find ones that match or that take a common view. That paragraph, taken from The Institute for Psychological Therapies is the only decent reference I could find.

However, this does show that the events of this poor girls death make a compelling story however you look at it, but the movie treatment seems to leave a lot to be desired. As the rather worrying plot summary shows at IMDB:

A bitter and repressed single lawyer (Laura Linney) takes on the church and the state when she fights for the life of a priest who performed a deadly exorcism on a young woman. Linney must battle the cocky state lawyer as well as her own lonliness, as she realizes that her career so far has not fulfilled her, nor is she happy in her job on a day to day basis.

Ah, wonderful. I really do hope that this isn’t the real plot. Firstly belittling such an important story focusing on the performance of bitter lawyer and her own problems is far from the controversial story that this really was. I mean this brought two worlds clashing together, that of the Church and the Law, and without relying too much on clever puns, the Law won.

I really do hope they investigate what happened to the poor girl, did the Church kill her with their over zealous and antiquated practices when she was suffering from a curable or at least controllable mental illness. Or was she truly the victim of a demonic possession, abandoned by science and her memory and family destroyed by our modern practices we call Justice? Please, let the film show some intelligence and take us to those questions.

Not literally… but man the box office was cruel to the man. In it’s opening weekend (you know, the weekend when a movie makes more money than on any other), Ben Affleck’s new film “Surviving Christmas” was utterly destroyed taking in only $4.5 million. Bend over Ben, the movie going audience has something for you. Ouch, that hurts.

The Superhero genre keeps marching on. It appears that the newest hero that will be making the jump to the big screen is Iron Man. The Big Wigs over at New Line have apparently bought in to the screenplay penned by David Hayter and want production to get rolling by early 2005. That’s a pretty aggressive time table considering they don’t have a director yet. The good folks at Cinescape give us this:

…the search is on for a director, and that Hayter’s take on the material is “Tom Clancy-esque in tone and involves the conflict between Tony Stark and his father Howard over Stark Industries.

Ok, that all sounds good, but here’s my concern. I never really thought the Iron Man character to be all that interesting… or original. On the plus side this is a Marvel property, and in my opinion, pretty much all the Marvel films have been good to great (yes, that includes Punisher, Daredevil and Hulk). But I don’t know. The Superhero movie is running out of film-worthy characters. Perhaps for now they should just focus on existing franchises before the market gets over saturated with new characters. Time will tell.

I’m a factoid kind of guy. I get a kick out of lists and top 10’s and things like that. So when I came across EOnline’s list for 101 Most Awesome Moments in Entertainment, I couldn’t help but give it a read. Obviously there are a few things on there that I REALLY disagree with (like that Beyoncé & Prince duet at 2004 Grammys being #18… give me a break). However, there are some really great film moments on the list too (Like Darth Vader proclaiming “Luke, I am your father!!!” at #2). Go on over and give it a read.

Under the category of “some of the stupidest things ever said”, Marvel comic writer Brian Bendis said that a movie version of The Avengers probably won’t be hitting the big screen anytime soon because they’re estimating the project would cost… are you ready for this… $700 million to produce. Ok, this is just ignorant. Having worked in the Visual Effects industry for a few years I realize big effects films can cost a lot of money to make. But this $700 million comment is insulting. Considering that Spider-Man 2 cost around $200 million (really expensive), and no Star Wars film (Best visual effects films every) cost $200 million… and all 3 Lord of the Rings films together cost about $368 million to produce… how stupid does Bendis believe we are? Or, in the alternative, how stupid is Bendis himself to actually believe that? Why not just say “The new Captain America movie is going to cost Eleventy bajillion zillion dollars”. If it’s impossible to make the movie right now then just say “it’s impossible to make the movie right now” and move on.

BBC news is talking about the possibility of Ben Kingsley playingDr Jack Kevorkian, a Doctor who is famed for his active endorsement of euthanasia. Currently behind bars he is offering support and access to his private papers to the Director, Barbara Kopple who stated:

“I don’t intend to make a film that bolsters euthanasia. This is a story about an extraordinary life. No matter what you think of Kevorkian, he is a genius.”

So, no shortage of controversy in this movie then. I think this is good to see, more movies that are not mainstream and safe, and another movie that is dealing with real life events and circumstances, perhaps even offering a chance to educate and inform through entertainment. I say more of that style of movie… just as long as they don’t become preachy, or provide an agenda for those who can exploit it.

I like movies that take an unusual style of storytelling or film making, something that leans over to the audience, grabs them by the shoulders and shakes them awake. Things like Nick of Time with Johnny Depp filmed in real time, or Mike Figgis movie Timecode filmed using multiple screen techniques, even The Last Broadcast or BlairWitch using those hand held digicam techniques.

I get excited with the promise of something fresh or just not the norm, and I especially get excited by the multiple view of a single story. I just think it’s such a clever plot device and unrolls a story particularly well. So here comes this news story from ComingSoon which simply says that Columbia Pictures as bought the script for the film Vantage Point which…

“…depicts the attempted assassination of the president told from five different points of view.”

See, that gets my juices flowing. Now just wait for them to totally cock it up, throw subtlety out the window and make it glaringly obvious who dunnit with over egged camera shots and hookey lines. Sigh…maybe it’s not so good after all!

News came out last week on Roger Avery�s web journal that the draft script for the movie Silent Hill is almost complete, he addresses fans fears almost immediately about the speed of the script production saying�

√جø¬ΩThe reason we wrote this FAST is because it’s a GO MOVIE√جø¬Ω.They need to plan for the massive special effects√جø¬ΩThey need to begin all of the preproduction√جø¬Ω they begin shooting in February, after all√جø¬Ω. It’s quite likely that writing will continue right up into shooting. So everybody relax. We’re making a movie here, not just a script.√جø¬Ω

�There�s interesting reading on his entire site, not just the journal itself, so take a look if you�re even vaguely interested.

For those of you who aren�t aware, the Silent Hill series of games is incredibly tense, atmospheric and downright scary. Each game revolves round a strange occurrence, originally the disappearance of pretty much everyone in the town of Silent Hill and the arrival of strange monsters and ghosts � odd, to say the least. It�s very similar to the style of the Resident Evil game, solve puzzles, get scared by what could be round the corner and kill everything. However, Silent Hill is more cinematic and has a slow, creeping death style. It�s very cleverly done with some shocking scenes and truly leap out of your chair moments.

The Resident Evil movies haven�t really been achieved that well to be honest, although the first was quite good fun. I just hope they can give a decent treatment to this movie, instead of trying to recreate the game rerun in live action, I hope they take the ideas, step back, and try and create a proper movie experience from it.

Games and movies really are close together, games developers have realised that the more involved the gamer is, the more likely they are to play and stay with the game and franchise. In the days when graphics and audio offer so much depth, they can�t afford to produce a simple flat gaming experience.

It’s no small marketplace either, gaming is fast becoming one of the top leisure industries of our time, and the movie adaptations attract a lot of interest, look at the names involved in some of these to date: Angelina Jolie, Christopher Lambert, Milla Jovovich, Ben Kingsley, Michael Madsen, Meatloaf, Jean-Claude Van Damme (Oh dear) , Kylie Minogue (okay…stopping now!)…
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I’m as excited as the next movie geek about the upcoming Godzilla Final Wars. Now it’s been announced that just before the release date, Godzilla is getting a star on the Hollywood walk of fame. At first, this sounded kinda cool… but it’s really quite stupid. Since when did stars on the Walk of Fame get given out to CHARACTERS? I thought they were for real people? Wow… what a coincidence that this is happening RIGHT AT THE SAME TIME that Final Wars is getting released. If you don’t think some studio marketing department bribed this star on the walk… then you’re more naive than me… and that’s saying something cause I’m pretty darn naive.

File this one under the “Too Good To Be True” category, but apparently rumors are floating around that Bryan Singer is thinking about casting Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor. If this was true, I’d need to go spend some time by myself I’d be so happy. Now, before you start thinking this is too far fetched, keep in mind that Spacey and Singer have worked together before in The Usual Suspects, and Spacey has said how much he liked working with Singer. This would just be amazing if this were true. We’ll find out.

On the Lois Lane front, Comic Book movie is reporting via Cinescape that the list has been narrowed to 6 contenders:

“the following six actresses are being considered for the role of Lois Lane: Mischa Barton from “The O.C.”, Charisma Charpenter from “Angel,” Mia Kirshner from “The Crow: City of Angels,” Evangeline Lilly from “Lost,” Natalie Portman from the “Star Wars” prequels, and Keri Russell from “Felicity”

Not a bad list. Personally I think I’d go with Keri Russell. Not that I think she’s the best actress on that list… but I think she’d play the role well. And before you start thinking she’s way too young… remember that this isn’t 1995 anymore… she’s 28 now. Damn, this movie is shaping up so nicely!!!

Time for me to come out of the closet. I’m secretly a wrestling fan (GASP). Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a fanatic… but every once in a while if I’m home on a Monday night I’ll flip RAW on. I’ve liked it since I was a kid. For about 8 years now my favorite wrestler has been Triple H (Hunter Hernse Helmsley to those wrestling uneducated out there). So I was pretty giddy to see him get a spot in the new Blade film. This guy just oozes machoistic attitude… perfect for a vampire bad guy. Seriously… I wonder how he’ll do?

Ok, this one flew under my radar. As we just mentioned a couple of days ago, it’s now official that Keith Richards is playing Johnny Depp’s father in the upcoming Pirates of the Caribbean 2. What I didn’t know, what that Richards has signed on for number 3 as well. I guess they’re moving ahead. It’s probably a good idea to get Richards singed up now and to film #3 as soon as possible… because I’m pretty sure Richards died about 12 years ago… no telling when his body twitching might stop. :)

I think this is good news. The first one was quite enjoyable… 2 looks like it’ll be fun… so why not shoot for a third? Found Cinema Eye.

I’ve been stunned by the feedback a lot of people have been giving the casting of Brandon Routh. Oh he’s too young (I’ve said that too), oh he’s not experienced enough, Oh they should have got Tom Welling… and on and on and on. We all seem to have our reservations. However…

The main thing all of us armchair movie pundits must keep in mind is that NONE of us have read the script. Therefore, we have NO IDEA what type of actor should be cast to play the part. NONE of us were there during the read through auditions, so none of us have any idea who was great and who wasn’t.

The only thing I’m getting tired of hearing is people wanting Welling to play Superman. Look, at first I thought that might not be a bad idea, but the truth is that this is a SuperMAN movie… not SuperBOY. Welling is FANTASTIC as the young Clark Kent… but everything about him screams “young teenage kid”. That’s why he excels in Smallville (a show which I LOVE by the way). But could Welling even hope to pull off a totally different Kent character? One that isn’t supposed to be in his adolescence or teenage “aww shucks” phase of his life anymore? I doubt it. And for those of you who swear “sure he could!”, you’re just guessing, because you’ve never seen him is such a role. Neither have I. This movie is “Superman Returns”, not “Smallville: The Later Years”.

But here’s the bottom line folks: IF BRYAN SINGER SAYS BRANDON ROUTH IS THE RIGHT GUY TO PLAY SUPERMAN, THEN BRANDON ROUTH IS THE RIGHT GUY TO PLAY SUPERMAN! Singer is a MASTER at casting the right people for the right roles in his movies. I’ve always thought The Usual Suspects was the best cast movie of all time. Apt Pupil ranks right up there too.

I remember how much people complained when Singer cast a relative unknown by the name of Hugh Jackman to play Wolverine. “This sucks!” people wrote to me. “What the hell is Singer thinking?”, and “That’s it, X-Men will suck!”. I myself had serious doubts. I heard it all. But Bryan Singer made us all look stupid. Once again he showed us that he, and he alone, is the best person to know who would work best in a particular role for his films. Can ANY of us imagine Wolverine being played by anyone else now? I’d say Singer has earned our trust as far as casting goes. So if he says Routh is Superman… then as far as I’m concerned Brandon Routh is already Superman.

Would I have cast Brandon Routh? Honestly… no. But that’s why Bryan Singer is a multi-millionare successful film maker and I’m sitting alone in a dark room with no one but my pet Chinchilla to keep me company while I write for this stupid web site. I’m so lonely. :)