Thursday, August 21

• Death Race = Chick Flick?

  Just because it's packed with fast cars, hot chicks and big guns, don't think for second that Paul W.S. Anderson's ultraviolent Death Race is just some mindless guys' movie. But don't take our word for it -- listen to Death Race co-star Joan Allen, who recently instructed us on the film's female-friendly qualities:

  "If you don't care about the characters and their relationships and those don't really work, then the action stuff doesn't really pay off as much," the three-time Oscar nominee told us with a straight face. "I think what makes (Death Race) more appealing to women is that Jason Statham is in this situation where his wife has been killed and he can't get to his baby."

  It's practically Fried Green Tomatoes, Beaches and The Notebook, all rolled into one. With cars.

  
  
  Next Showing: Death Race opens tomorrow in theaters everywhere.

  Posted 08/21/2008 by reelz

  Related: Jason Statham | Joan Allen | Death Race

Tuesday, July 29

• Done in 150 Seconds

  Until recently, we've been quite concerned about Death Race's believability issues. To wit: Badass convicts set loose from the big house to engage in a cross-country demolition derby/road race and the winner gets his freedom? Not when taxpayers have to shell out $4 per gallon to fund this free-for-all! But now that gas prices have dropped to $3.95 a gallon, we're totally on board.

  Guardian movie critic Anna Pickard is too -- she especially likes the fuel efficiency of Death Race's trailer: "For never before has a trailer's plot so accurately and succinctly described the plot of a movie," she writes. "The entire plot. All of it. In under two and a half minutes."

  Actually, two and a half minutes is about two and a half minutes more than is necessary to sum up the plot of this flick. In fact, we think we can do it in two words: Death race. Got it? It's a race! With some death involved! Do you really need to know more? Okay, here: Joan Allen, who looks like a sadistic, tight-lipped evil prison warden in every role she plays, finally actually plays a sadistic, tight-lipped evil prison warden. (Bottom image actual Death Race still.) We are already revving our engines.

  
  
  Next Showing: Death Race opens August 22

  Posted 07/29/2008 by reelz

  Related: Joan Allen | Death Race

Monday, July 30

• Blonde ambition: Scarlett, Paris and Allen

  Hollywood.com is reporting that Scarlett Johansson (Lost in Translation, Match Point) has been tapped to star in a film adaptation of porn star Jenna Jameson's biography, How to Make Love Like a Porn Star. Word ist that Jameson personally picked the buxom 22-year-old to play her.

  However, People is stating that Johansson's rep is denying that she has been cast, or that she has even seen a script. Says the rep: "She has no interest in playing the role."

  And speaking of famous blondes, Paris Hilton has signed on to join Paul Sorvino (Nixon, Bulworth) and Alexa Vega (Spy Kids, The Deep End of the Ocean) in the cast Repo! The Genetic Opera reports Variety. 

  Directed by Darren Lynn Bousman (Saw), Repo! is a thriller/musical set in 2056 when the only humans who can survive a plague are those that can afford organ transplants. Hilton, who will sing in the piece, plays the daughter of an organ transplant magnate. Sounds interesting...

  And finally, MTV reports that Tyrese Gibson (Transformers) and the unlikely Joan Allen (The Contender, Pleasantville) will be joining Jason Statham (Crank, The Italian Job) in Death Race 3000, Paul W.S. Anderson's remake of the 1975 David Carradine and Sylvester Stallone cult classic.

  Gibson and Statham will play two tough guys (in a cross country race where you score points by running over pedestrians) who have to go up against Allen. Said Anderson of his female lead: "She kicks the most ass out of everybody."

  
  

  Posted 07/30/2007 by reelz

  Related: Jason Statham | Scarlett Johansson | Tyrese Gibson | Paul W.S. Anderson | Jenna Jameson | Paris Hilton | Paul Sorvino | Alexa Vega | Darren Lynn Bousman | Joan Allen | Untitled Jenna Jameson project | Death Race 3000 | Repo! The Genetic Opera