Friday, November 6

• Hobbit Director Talks Dragons and Spiders and More

  In an in-depth interview with Total Film, Hobbit director Guillermo del Toro lays out his vision for The Hobbit in detail and talks about how he plans to take creature design out of the shadow of The Lord of the Rings. In conceiving these creatures, he says he will "keep the DNA in the same gene pool as the Rings trilogy," but with some critical differences.

  ...in the trilogy most of the creatures are brutish or inarticulate. In The Hobbit, the creatures speak: Smaug has beautiful lines of dialogue; the Great Goblin has beautiful lines of dialogue; many creatures do. So we had to design them with a different approach because you are not just designing things that are scary.

  I also wanted some of the monsters in The Hobbit to be majestic.

  I wanted the Wargs to have a certain beauty so that you don't have a massively clear definition: what is beautiful is good and what is ugly is not. Some of the monsters are absolutely gorgeous.

  Of course, the most anticipated of these creatures is the dragon Smaug. It's something that del Toro has been working especially hard on, and he promises something really unique here.

  ...we're finishing his colour palette and a little bit of the texture. But the bulk of the design took about a year, solid. It's because of the unique features of the dragon.

  Early in production I came up with a very strong idea that would separate Smaug from every other dragon ever made. The problem was implementing that idea. But I think we've nailed it.

  And then there are the spiders of Mirkwood.

  Well, they are the progeny of Shelob, but Shelob was quite a promiscuous girl [laughs]. She mated with many partners. And insects and spiders are incredibly adaptable creatures. There will be spiders.... They are more creatures of the shadow, more creatures of the deep forest. They are not earth nesting. They are nesting in the canopies so physically they have adapted to that environment.... With Shelob, she was quite low to the ground so she moved like a tank. Our spiders have to feel massive but be very nimble.

  What comes through most in this interview — which is well worth reading in full — is just how much fun making this movie is for him. And from all the hints he drops, it looks to be massively fun for the audience as well.

  
  

  Posted 11/06/2009 by Bill

  Related: Guillermo del Toro | The Hobbit

• Resident Evil: Afterlife Set Photos, Tweets, and Casting News

  Resident Evil: Afterlife is currently shooting in Toronto, and Milla Jovovich has begun using her Twitter account to update fans on their progress. She began by mentioning a scene with Ali Larter and Wentworth Miller "on a skiff approaching the huge ship" with the cast enduring freezing temperatures. Just a day later, a few photos from that set have surfaced online.

  Missing from the photo is new cast member Sergio Peris-Mencheta, who ShockTillYouDrop reports was recently added to the cast in an unspecified role. If he's "lucky," he may end up in one of Jovovich's tweets.

  so, Wentworth, Ali and i are doing this scene right now where chris r.[Miller] and clair r.[Larter] run into the V22 hangar, guns blazing, trying to shoot Wesker [Shawn Roberts], but to run in groups firing weapons is VERY dangerous. and the last time we all did a scene when we were all firing together, i could feel my hair flying up from the guns behind me.and one of Wenty's shell casings pegged Boris Kodjoe right on the ear. ouch.

  and its supposed to be super heroic with all of us shooting thru a wall of undead as we run towards a potential escape route...but in the end we all end up looking like such a**holes, cause we're all trying to dodge eachothers bullets and shooting one another...tripping and sliding thru the gravel, falling in a most unimpressive manner! lol!so stupid! we look like such imbeciles!

  And it was all captured in 3-D by writer-director Paul W.S. Anderson. Well, the whole episode might make the DVD.

  
  
  Next Showing: Resident Evil: Afterlife is scheduled to open August 27, 2010

  Posted 11/06/2009 by Ryan

  Related: Paul W.S. Anderson | Boris Kodjoe | Sergio Peris-Mencheta | Milla Jovovich | Ali Larter | Wentworth Miller | Resident Evil: Afterlife

• Anthony Hopkins Will Play Hemingway in Andy Garcia Movie

  When Anthony Hopkins finishes his work as Odin in Marvel's adaptation of Thor, Variety reports he will play a different icon — Ernest Hemingway in Andy Garcia's Hemingway and Fuentes.

  Hemingway and Fuentes is the first movie Garcia has directed since making his 2005 debut, The Lost City. It chronicles the two decades Hemingway spent in Cuba fishing with best friend Gregorio Fuentes. The project became a personal one for Garcia, who plans to play Fuentes, after meeting some of the men who fished with Hemingway.

  I was specifically most interested in Hemingway's connection to Cuba, where he spent the last 20 years of his life, and his relationship with his last captain, Gregorio. As an avid fisherman, I got to know older Cuban fisherman who knew Gregorio from the fishing culture of the '40s and '50s, and who would compete in tournaments outside the city of Havana, which was really the beginning of competitive fishing.

  Garcia wrote the movie with the aid of Hilary Hemingway, the granddaughter of Ernest Hemingway, though he put it aside to direct The Lost City. Annette Bening will play Hemingway's third wife, Mary Welsh Hemingway.

  Officially, we are going out with the movie and starting conversations with all foreign distributors. I've done about six movies that way, and sold domestic later. When I worked with Francis Coppola on The Godfather 3, he said the way you make a movie is, you begin. We've begun.

  
  

  Posted 11/06/2009 by Ryan

  Related: Andy Garcia | Annette Bening | Anthony Hopkins | Ernest Hemingway

• Risk the Next Board Game To Hit the Big Screen

  Director Peter Berg is adapting Battleship for Universal, the Tron Legacy writers are working on a Ouija Board screenplay for Platinum Dunes and Paramount, so is it any wonder that Sony Pictures wants to make a movie based on the board game Risk? While former players of the game might question how it could be adapted into a movie, Columbia president Doug Belgrad told Variety that the game is a natural fit for the big screen treatment.

  The strategic thinking and the tactical gambles that players must take in the game are what make Risk a classic, thoroughly engaging game. Those elements translated into an action-packed, thrilling story are what will make this a uniquely exciting movie.

  Risk will be produced by actor Will Smith and producer James Lassitter's Overbrook production company. Could Smith be willing to accept an acting role in the adaptation? Well, he does have a history of success with movies that deal with powerful entities vying for total world domination...

  
  

  Posted 11/06/2009 by Ryan

  Related: Will Smith | James Lassiter

• The Box Reviews

  So far director Richard Kelly's The Box is one of the more polarizing movies of the year. Like it or not, one thing we can all agree on from seeing the trailer: Cameron Diaz totally cannot do a Southern accent.

  "Yes,The Box is crazy and convoluted, moody and melodramatic. But above all it is, in narrative and form, a mystery."

  — Chris Cabin, filmcritic.com

  "...The Box triumphantly qualifies for one of my favorite adjectives, 'preposterous.' But if you make a preposterous movie that isn't boring, I count that as some kind of a triumph."

  — Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

  "The Box is alternately fluid and inspired, and rarely dull (though it is a little, on occasion). But too often it also feels strained..."

  — Manohla Dargis, New York Times

  "This preposterous Cameron Diaz thriller offers a promising premise: a mysterious box bestows riches in exchange for killing a stranger. But then it dumps in existentialism, government conspiracies, aliens, nosebleeds, deformities—and dresses it all in ugly '70s polyester fashions and geo-print wallpaper. Blecch."

  — Matt Stevens, E! Online

  "An artistic fiasco that cuts across genre lines and all logic to become, perhaps, an instant midnight movie."

  — Kirk Honeycutt, Hollywood Reporter

  
  
  

  The Box Trailer

  Cameron Diaz and James Marsden star - Releasing Nov. 6, 2009

  Posted 11/06/2009 by reelz

  Related: Richard Kelly | The Box

Thursday, November 5

• Janet Jackson Stars in First Trailer for Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married Too?

  In Tyler Perry's upcoming sequel to his dramedy Why Did I Get Married, the same four couples reunite for their annual vacation. But this time they head to the Bahamas (instead of Colorado) and an ex-husband (not a "sexy young temptress") disrupts the fun.

  The trailer for Why Did I Get Married Too? debuted last night on Entertainment Tonight. It starts will some vacation fun ... and then seques to the ominous message "One of these couples will not make it" and a sobbing Janet Jackson. Couples Retreat with a whole lot fewer laughs?

  
  

  Posted 11/05/2009 by reelz

  Related: Janet Jackson | Tyler Perry | Why Did I Get Married? | Why Did I Get Married Too

• The Men Who Stare at Goats Reviews

  Earlier this year when writing about The Men Who Stare at Goats for our holiday movie guide, we said, "Jeff Bridges brings back large parts of his famed 'Dude' role as the druggie, hippie leader of psychic soldiers on a mission in Iraq. George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, and Kevin Spacey co-star in what looks like either the best comedy of 2009 or a colossal bomb (so to speak)." Roger Ebert likes it, but most others lean towards the latter.

  "...funny..."

  — Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

  "Hey, this is a movie about a 'New Earth Army' full of misfit soldiers yearning for a chance to be non-conformists with a cause, which means it's already two-thirds of the way to being awesome. Had [director] Heslov eased back a bit, Goats might've made it the rest of the way."

  — Noel Murray, Onion AV Club

  "The movie isn't funny enough to work as farce, but it's far too dippy to take seriously."

  — J. Hoberman, Village Voice

  "...ends in a confused mix of LSD-induced giggles and a call-to-destiny that seems both parodic and sincere. Its scattershot blasts at unconventional warfare and hippie transcendentalism are too impotent to produce much laughter, let alone the characters' longed-for ability to run through walls."

  — Bill Weber, Slant Magazine

  "...a magical-realist sitcom war farce that ends up being about nothing but its own slovenly smugness."

  — Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly

  
  
  

  The Men Who Stare at Goats Trailer

  A comedy about psychic soldiers

  Posted 11/05/2009 by reelz

  Related: The Men Who Stare at Goats

• John C. Reilly and Mary-Louise Parker Join Cast of Red

  Earlier this week, Helen Mirren officially joined the cast of the upcoming movie adaptation of the graphic novel Red. She took her place alongside a cast that already includes Bruce Willis and Morgan Freeman.

  Now, The Hollywood Reporter writes that John C. Reilly and Mary-Louise Parker have signed on as the newest additions.

  The story of Red was written by noted author Warren Ellis and illustrated by Cully Hamner. It focuses on a menial clerk, Paul Moses (Willis), who is actually a CIA operative with a long history of killing enemies of the state. He must come out of retirement when the new CIA director (Freeman) discovers his past and orders his death. Mirren is rumored for the part of Moses' former boss, although it is unclear how much screen time she will have, if any.

  Reportedly, Reilly will portray a retired CIA agent with a streak of paranoia while Parker will play Moses's love interest, a pension worker who helps Moses in his struggle to survive.

  Red is being helmed by Flightplan director Robert Schwentke and will begin shooting in Toronto and Louisiana this coming January. Summit Entertainment has scheduled a November 19, 2010 release.

  
  

  Posted 11/05/2009 by Rich Z

  Related: Bruce Willis | Helen Mirren | Morgan Freeman | John C. Reilly | Robert Schwentke | Mary-Louise Parker | Warren Ellis