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Tuesday, November 24
While 2008 was a high-profile year for movies adapted from comic books (Iron Man, The Dark Knight), 2009 had its own army of super properties arrayed on the big screen — nine notables all tallied, including the highly anticipated Watchmen.
So, how did this year's movies stack up? We take a look back, identifying the 2009 Comic Book Movies: Winners and Losers. And here's a bonus tip for studios that just can't be repeated enough: Don't turn an anime property into a live-action movie.
Posted 11/24/2009 by reelz
Related: X-Men Origins: Wolverine | Whiteout | Push | G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra | Dragonball Evolution | Watchmen | Astro Boy | Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen | Surrogates
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It's a whole new kind of trailer and eye-candy overload, more like the palette of special feature options you get on a Blu-ray disc than any conventional preview. Avatar has gone live with an "Interactive Trailer," a stand-alone preview program that links nearly a dozen new featurettes to the trailer through a series of hot spots.
We get video profiles of all the main characters, including interviews and all sorts of new footage, along with features on how some of the creatures and the vehicles in the movie were designed. Also included are feeds to follow Avatar news on various social media like Twitter and Facebook. And there is more to come, with an in-depth "Pandorapedia" scheduled for launch in early December.
Still need more Avatar? Check out this extended clip of the thanator chase scene teased earlier.
Posted 11/24/2009 by Bill
Related: James Cameron | Avatar
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It's been months since there was any real news about the planned reboot of the 1956 sci-fi classic Forbidden Planet. Last we heard that a script idea, which looked to be pretty cool and original, had been scuttled by Internet leaks. Now screenwriter J. Michael Straczynski has started talking about the status of the project again, offering up a few details about the direction it will be taking.
The original, inspired by Shakespeare's The Tempest, centered on an expedition to discover what had become of a colony ship mysteriously lost decades before. When they land, romantic tensions over a scientist's beautiful young daughter famously erupt into technologically enhanced "monsters from the id." While remaining faithful to the original idea, JMS told SCI FI Wire he plans to expand the horizon of the story a bit.
We've actually decided to show more of the first ship when it first arrived 20 years earlier to sort of counterpoint what's happening in the present story. If you're a fan of the original, as I am, and have always been, I think it's very faithful to that.... There's a little more action, but it's still a strong character piece, because it's based on The Tempest and the idea of a father whose daughter is being courted by, in the original play, sailors that are washed up on shore. You need to have that dynamic still in place to respect the original and the source material. So there's a fair amount of talking, but there's some really cool action pieces in it as well.
What they have seen so far apparently has studio executives pretty excited. They are already talking about the possibility of sequels.
Warner is very excited about it, thinks it's a big franchise for them and a huge budget, so they're very much oriented toward getting it done.
No word yet on who will be directing. There was a rumor a while back that James Cameron might be interested, but nothing new on that front so far.
Posted 11/24/2009 by Bill
Related: James Cameron | J. Michael Straczynski | Forbidden Planet
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Fantastic Mr. Fox, which opened on a few screens about 10 days ago, gets a nationwide release tomorrow. Critics are liking it, hailing the movie as a return to form for director Wes Anderson.
"With its virtuoso tomfoolery, Fantastic Mr. Fox is like a homegrown Wallace and Gromit caper."
— Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly
"Although it may initially seem to be yet another kids-film-for-adults of the kind the industry has been pumping out of late, Mr. Fox manages to be something else entirely. Pandering to neither audience, it remains true to its story's vulpine nature."
— Chris Barsanti, filmcritic.com
"...an adventure in pure imagination that plays to the smart kid in all of us."
— Peter Travers, Rolling Stone
"Sometimes too clever by half, the film, replete with in-jokes, may in some ways work better for adults."
— Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor
"...exactly what one might imagine a stop-motion Anderson film to be: multitudes of quirky characters, immaculately arranged compositions and camera pans, soundtrack outbursts of classic rock, and a blend of tender humanism and melancholic existentialism."
— Nick Schager, Slant Magazine
Posted 11/24/2009 by reelz
Related: Fantastic Mr. Fox
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Thanks to The Twilight Saga, werewolf movies are making a comeback. The second installment, New Moon, raked in piles of money opening weekend, drawing wolfpack fans along with those of vampires.
In February, Universal's Wolfman arrives, in which Benicio Del Toro contends with the ancient curse. And now Variety has the news that The Howling, the 1981 werewolf movie by Joe Dante that generated a series of six sequels, is set for a franchise reboot with The Howling: Reborn.
The original starred Dee Wallace-Stone as a news anchor stalked by a serial killer, who turns out to be a werewolf. The plot details of the reboot are being kept tightly under wraps for now, but production is already set to start in February for a Halloween release. There's no word yet on whether they'll still use Gary Brandner's original novel as source material.
Posted 11/24/2009 by Jim
Related: Benicio Del Toro | Joe Dante | The Howling | Dee Wallace-Stone | Gary Brandner | The Twilight Saga: New Moon | The Wolfman
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Monday, November 23
The numbers just keep climbing.
As of Monday night, New Moon's opening-weekend ticket sales have been recorded at $16.1 million MORE than what Summit originally estimated. Overseas box-office figures are still "trickling in" according to the LA Times, but right now the worldwide total stands at $274.9 million.
The final U.S. number for the weekend came in at $142.9 million, up $2 million from Sunday's estimates.
Posted 11/23/2009 by reelz
Related: Taylor Lautner | Robert Pattinson | Kristen Stewart | The Twilight Saga: New Moon
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The production of James Mangold's (3:10 to Yuma) new action-comedy, Knight & Day, has been temporarily suspended after seven bulls escaped from the movie's set, injuring two people, according to THR. Formerly titled Wichita, the movie reunites Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz, who previously starred together in Vanilla Sky.
Before they escaped, the bulls were being held on set in Cadiz, Spain. The bulls ran through the streets of the city before eventually making their way to the beach, where they were captured. Filming was expected to begin today, but Cruise and Diaz's scenes were not slated to be shot until the weekend. There is currently no indication of when the production will resume.
On an ironic note, Moviefone reports that Cruise and Diaz were urged not to star in the film by CAS International, an anti-bullfighting organization that feels that depicting bull runs in movies will only interest more people in the ritual.
Posted 11/23/2009 by BrentJS
Related: Cameron Diaz | Tom Cruise | James Mangold | Wichita