What is up with Michael Fassbender in these latest X-Men: First Class promo pictures?
That photo in this past week's issue of EW (courtesy of X-Men Movies Facebook) looks like he suffers from violent hemorrhoids or something. He could have used Preparation H, and now Empire has this new one-sheet. Who is he giving that funny look to; someone off-camera? Maybe he's eyeing his buddy/soon-to-be-rival Charlie Xavier.
Is this a hint at sexual tension audiences can expect in the skirt-chasing, boos-drinking, 60s-era X-Men prequel? I mean, it is the worst kept secret that this is all one big parable about being "different" – whether that be gay, black, Muslim, a midget, etc.
This must be an independent production. How else could they explain why anyone would make the effort to hire Lindsey Lohan?
But while LiLo's casting appears to be for real (until the inevitable "They fired her uninsurable/trouble-making ass" story breaks), someone who we know for certain won't be around when cameras roll is its director.
Variety reports Nick Cassavetes (although Black Film got this out there first if memory serves me correct – so I'll credit both outlets) has vacated from helming Gotti: Three Generations.
The age-old, and eternally questionable, "scheduling conflicts" issue is the official reasoning here. Cassavetes is pre-committed to another indie drama, Yellow. Curious what’s the real culprit behind this one?
As the title suggests, I dig Elizabeth Banks and I’d love to think one of these days she'll move past the "Hey, it's that person!" phase of her career and general audiences will know her by name. Thus setting the stage for her rise to stardom. Alas I don’t think that's going to happen.
She'll have to settle on getting steady work in supporting turns in comedies, dramas and what not while the less-talented types (that is to say, most actresses who aren't Elizabeth Banks) get all the press and plum roles. Fuckers – as much as I love Amy Adams as Lois Lane, and what brilliant casting was that, damn was Banks pitch-perfect for that role?
Anyway, Variety reports Banks is in talks for the highest profile film of her career, up to this point, with The Hunger Games. The film adaptation of the popular book trilogy is mounting up for a release next March with a solid slate of actors in the leads (Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth), a good director (Gary Ross) and writer (Billy Ray) pulling the strings.
It was only last week Matt Reeves got the job to adapt Eight O'Clock in the Morning (itself was previously made into the classic John Carpenter film/Roddy Piper v. Keith David beat-down They Live).
However Heat Vision says that isn't enough to keep Reeves busy from banging on his keyboard. The Cloverfield helmer will also stick with the vampire genre (Christ, how much longer 'till this fad dies?) post Let Me In with The Passage.
Ridley Scott will produce and it's set at 20th Century Fox, via their Fox 2000 outlet. The project is an adaptation of the 2009 novel by Justin Cronin. According to the description, the plot is the classic "science gone horribly wrong" theme – this time set in the future and people turning into vampires thanks to a government-sponsored virus.
Yep, they can turn us into blood-suckers but they can't get us through the DMV any faster. Typical government at work.
It's true...everyone wants to go to Rio. At least they did at the box office this weekend. Rio's combination of 3D-animation, an all-star cast, and an exceptionally catchy soundtrack proved to be a winner with audiences, ringing up $39.2 million and just barel passing Johnny Depp's Rango to become 2011's best opening weekend so far. Not bad.
Now what the hell happened with Scream 4? The fourth installment of Wes Craven's horror-comedy franchise bottomed out this weekend, dropping 18% from Friday to Saturday to finish the weekend with $18.6 million. Even Sucker Punch opened better than that. It looks like interest in this one wasn't as high as everyone thought it would be.
Russell Brand's Hop survived the opening weekend of Rio, landing in third place with $10.7 million. That brings its total up to $82 million, which is a far cry better than Brand's other film, the remake of Arthur, which dropped 45% and down to sixth place with $6.75 million.
Soul Surfer continues to do well with the family crowd, dropping only 31% to earn $7.27 million. Hanna also did all right this weekend, finishing up with $7.28 million.
Your Highness? The less said about that, the better.
Next weekend sees the releases of the Reese Witherspoon/Robert Pattinson circus romance Water for Elephants (I'm not gonna lie, I loved this book and I can't wait for the movie), Tyler Perry's Madea's Big Happy Family, and the latest installment in Disney's nature series, African Cats.
JoBlo is reporting Thomas Jane has joined Sylvester Stallone in Walter's Hill's Headshot. The news comes straight from the horse's mouth himself, Thomas Jane, as he confirmed the news via podcast, stating "the script is fantastic" (with Walter Hill doing current rewrites), and that they start filming next month in New Orleans.
For those who don't know, Headshot tells the story of a New Orleans hitman (Stallone) who teams with an NYPD detective (Jane), as they are brought together by two vicious murders. The two proceed to take on all who stand in their way.
I've been waiting to see Jane return to the action genre since his turn in 2004's underappreciated, The Punisher, and this seems like the perfect fit for him by teaming with Stallone. Not to mention, with a guy like Walter Hill (48 Hours, Red Heat) replacing original director Wayne Kramer (Running Scared) after "creative differences" with Stallone, this looks like its gonna be a good old-fashioned action-drama.
Last year, news broke of a possible synopsis of what the Christopher Nolan-produced, Zack Snyder-directed Superman reboot, Man of Steel, could be about:
The plot involves Clark getting involved in some sort of battle between two tribes in West Africa. When he is compelled to use his secret powers to intervene in a crisis in West Africa, Clark returns to Smallville to learn more about his origins and the hero he was born to be.
While the plot was never officially confirmed, many either dismissed it as bogus, took it with a grain of salt, or just simply forgot about it.
Turns out, there may in fact be some meat to the story.
Baseline Studio System, a site that lists verified entertainment information for the industry, recently listed this synopsis for Man of Steel, via Bleeding Cool:
A young reporter named Clark Kent roams the world covering various news stories. When he is compelled to use his secret powers to intervene in a crisis in West Africa, he returns to Smallville to learn more about his origins and the hero he was born to be.
There certainly seems to be some weight to this story as this would mesh with this film's "re-imagination" of Superman in ignoring the Richard Donner influenced series. I think it would make for a hell of dynamic for a comic book film to actually deal with a reality based issue, much like Iron Man involved the war in Afghanistan. I just hope Zack Snyder shoots it legit like his producer Chris Nolan would and go to West Africa or a similar looking area, and not just blue screen the whole thing.
Also to add, with the news recently that this film will tell Superman's origins from birth, to Krypton, to Smallville, to now West Africa along with General Zod, this sounds like a heck of a long movie. Three-hour epic anyone?
Hopefully Warner Bros. releases an official synopsis soon to end all this speculation.
Man of Steel, starring Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Michael Shannon, Diane Lane, and Kevin Costner, is set to be released December 2012.
Somewhat off topic, if anyone hasn't seen this new Smallville promo for its 2-hour series finale on May 13th, here it is. I watched this show back in middle school when it debuted October 16th, 2001, and seeing this just gave me goosebumps. See for yourself:
In an interview with MTV, screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely (the duo who wrote Captain America: The First Avenger and have been commissioned to write its sequel) explain they're undecided of what time period CA 2 will take place in. Why you ask? The Avengers.
MTV: And you're writing the "Captain America" sequel now, too?
McFEELY: Yes!
MTV: I know it's early in the process, but do you have a timeline in mind for the sequel? Will it be more World War II adventures or, since it will come out after "Avengers," will it be a modern-era Captain America?
MARKUS: We're very early, still. This is the fun part — when we can say, "Hey, we can do this!" and everyone says, "Yeah!" No one says anything negative at this point in the process. We have a million great ideas and haven't thrown any of them out yet. That being said, it's sort of a weirdly huge opportunity for storytelling in that you know modern Cap through the Avengers at that point, and just by the nature of what we were talking about before, there's going to be a lot of his World War II history we haven't shown. We're going to have two entire timelines to play with.
McFEELY: I wonder if the reaction to ["The First Avenger"] will steer us in some way. First, if it does well... Then, if it does well and people embrace the World War II aspect of it, maybe there's pressure to return there in a large way. But if they don't embrace that aspect and just love Chris Evans as Steve, maybe there's less pressure to do that — you can just keep him in the Avengers universe.
Here's the head scratcher though. Everyone and their mother knows Captain America: The First Avenger begins in the present day with a team (S.H.I.E.L.D. I think) going to recover Steve Rogers body in the Arctic and ends with them finding him. I assume somewhere towards the end of the film, it will be explained why and how Chris Evans character is frozen in the first place. Doesn't that automatically make it impossible to have a sequel in anywhere but the present day, considering you're telling the audience he gets frozen then is found in our time? Unless somewhere in between, he gets unfrozen, has another Captain America adventure, then is frozen again. See what I'm saying?
Anyway, I think a sequel taking place in modern day, post-Avengers, would be pretty dam cool. Seeing Steve Rogers adapt to our modern world puts a whole new spin on a type of sequel we've never seen before. We'll find out what the game plan is eventually.
No updates on that one. Thank God, I'm sorry but jumping in that direction is way too soon when other (and better sounding) options are out there for Team Abrams. Alas Carbonell will have to "settle" on playing as Gotham Mayor Anthony Garcia again. The hardships these actors must face at times...
Variety reports the Lost actor will return for The Dark Knight Rises, and, for the moment, appears to be the only cast-member exclusive to the second film returning for this one. One only assumes we'll have scenes with him riding on Gary Oldman's ass about catching "the Goddamn Batman!"
If the world must have a sequel to G.I. Joe, then please movie gods let it continue in the same path of awesomely-retarded, epic non-sense and carnage as Stephen Sommer's The Rise of Cobra.
NOLA confirms what we've known for awhile. The G.I. Joe sequel is filming in my backyard (not literally, sadly) with Channing Tatum, Ray Parks and Lee Byung-hun are the only cast members reprising their roles of Duke, Snakes Eyes and Storm Shadow, respectively. The Jon Chu-directed follow-up also has a title - G.I. Joe 2: Cobra Strikes.
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Tue, April 19, 2011 
