It's been a bumper week for film news, with an extraordinary selection of stories catching my eye, even if some of them appear to be less likely than me winning the lottery this evening. Actually mainly what we've seen this week are stories concerning directors who just can't seem to make their minds up about the next excuse to get behind the camera. In fact for the various big name helmers I'm going to mention this week there are at least 20 projects they've been "attached" to so far this year and given they can't possibly make all of them it seems unlikely that any will be made. Once again we're facing the fact that the Internet will eat itself in it's desperate attempt to create and sustain news feeds. Like a sucker though I just carry on reading and digesting everything for just the slightest indication of what's coming up. So to mix it up this week I'm going to be labeling the projects I've read about against their potential auteurs (although given the range of some of the titles I think we can safely say the director is not the author of the film when it is a studio picture) rather than the titles.
Robert Zemeckis
Having seen his Yellow Submarine remake sank Zemeckis appeared to be going into live action movie making again with Flight with Denzel Washington just having gone into pre-production. However he's now been attached to Major Matt Mason, a 3D extravaganza based on the 1960's Mattel action figure with Tom Hanks in the lead role. Side note, given Hanks's long time association with a different kind of toy do you think he's doing this as a way of competing with Buzz Lightyear?
The action figure's (see below for his lifelike limbs) story was surprisingly complex, given it was a standalone product, with several different coloured suits for his assistants in space and a giant foe who proved to be more help than hindrance against more hostile aliens. 
Of course the toys must have had a large, albeit unsung, cultural influence. They were released around the same time as the original "Star Trek" series and with them popularised the idea of colonization of space by a future collective of humans able to put former nationalistic ideas of Earth to one side. Although these days it will probably feel too much like a throwback, the plot could be a retread of Star Trek only for a much younger audience with elements of John Carter of Mars thrown in for good measure, so it might struggle to build up it's own identity in a crowded genre field. I also suspect the trend for 3D presentations will be well and truly dead by the time the film is made.
Read on for more debunking of the auteur theory, the latest casting gossip and my reaction to the latest group of actors inducted into AMPAS.
Ben Affleck
Currently in pre-production for his CIA mission movie Argo, including chucklesome plans to lock the actors up for a couple of weeks together to give them an idea of what's it's like being in captivity, Affleck has also been named as the go to guy for the American remake of French thriller Tell No One (see poster, left). Going back to Harlen Coben's source novel, itself American, the story focuses on a doctor who begins to suspect his wife is still alive several years after her murder at the hands of a known serial killer. The French version, written and directed by Guillaume Canet, was a huge success in both Europe and the States so any remake will have to work very hard to survive the inevitable comparisons.
Ethan and Joel Coen
At the opening of the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center earlier this week the Coen brothers and Noah Baumbach were discussing film openings in front of an invited audience when a small clue about the Coen's next project was revealed, in that it involves music but little playback (the comments were in response to a question about their dislike of the cumbersome process of playback recording). Of course without anything else we're completely in the dark, although it's worth noting earlier this year they said one of their potential projects was a mockumentary - or rather a fake documentary in that it won't be openly comedic. Could that be focused on a musician?
Catherine Hardwicke
I hope she's liking her wounds following my scathing review of Red Riding Hood (unlikely I know, and in the picture on the right she's still smiling so I guess Catherine hadn't heard my views then) and hopefully she's taking my advice about returning to pubescent girls for the subject of her next movie. Regardless of whether she is it's still what she's going to do with the announcement of a Scandinavian set crazy, raw and gritty true story of which more will be announced over the next few weeks (hang on why didn't I wait for that...)
Sean Penn
The only name here is isn't pimping himself out to the highest bidder is actor and sometime director Sean Penn, who doesn't go behind the camera often but when he does it's a fascinating thing. This week we've been asking whether he's going to take on the Art Linson script The Comedian which has already grabbed the attention of Robert De Niro. The project was originally intended for Martin Scorsese but it looks like he's passed leaving Sean Penn free to pick it up, if so this seems like a unlikely but hopefully fruitful combination of talent involved.
David O. Russell
I wish this guy would just make up his mind over what he wants to do. So far this year he's been linked to Cocaine Cowboys, Fighter 2, Joe, Politics and Pasta, Silver linings Playbook (currently in pre-production), Uncharted: Drake's Progress (which he's ruled himself out of) and a Russ Meyer Biopic. Not to mention his Nailed which is languishing in post-production vaults waiting for the money to finish the cut. So imagine my surprise to see two more projects land on his desk including Disney's Cinderella spin-off Maleficent (surely not what someone like Russell should be concentrating on) and The Mission which may be about the rescue of 15 FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia, left) hostages in Columbia in 2007 by cross-national agencies working together and certainly will be produced by Lorenzo di Bonaventura.
Steven Spielberg
I've been keeping the two I least suspect of making it to multiplexes under the directors I've attached them to until last - it's not just because it's his name last alphabetically - which stems from the difficulties in separating Spielberg the producer from Spielberg the director. Anyway over the last few days there have been stories in connection to Jurassic Park 4 and Transformers 4 both of which could have the beard in control, and both of which would be interesting to see, but I suspect a less-assured name will be found soon to take over both projects.
Casting News
Plenty of exciting stuff going on in the casting couches of Hollywood including Darren Aronofsky courting Christian Bale as the lead in his Noah's Ark picture and the curious news that Annette Bening has signed onto to He Loves Me, the writers block movie from Valarie Faris and Jonathan Dayton, the directing duo behind Little Miss Sunshine, which explains why she's dropped from Rob Reiner's similarly themed movie. Elesewhere Ed Harris has signed on to World War Z, Kate Winslet and Josh Brolin are circling Jason Reitman's Labor Day and John Hurt and Kevin Bacon will be passing through Jayne Mansfield's Car. Finally there's been the surprise sighting of Liam Neeson on the set of Dark Knight Rises in the costume of Ra's Al Ghul, the character he played right up until he drove a train off it's tracks in Batman Begins, so of course the fans on the net have been trying to figure out how that will affect the plot (and how he got out of the predicament). Personally I suspect the truth is less exciting, we already know Josh Pence is playing Ra's in flashbacks, surely it's not to difficult to make the leap to more recent flashbacks with Neeson in the role? 
How they know Neeson was in costume confuses me as he wore a variety of clothes in the first film, maybe he's dressed for a fight like in this picture.
AMPAS
Another year and another cohort of inductees find themselves offered membership into the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. As ever it's a fascinating list that says as much about the Academy as it does about those invited. In terms of the actors (I'll be honest it's the group I'm most interested in) there's been 27 performers who've received invitations, up 7 on last year, with a large number of younger members whose tastes are hopefully more hip and in touch with public tastes than the older conservative members. None of those invited this year have riled me as much as Ryan Reynolds and Seth Rogen did over the last couple of years, although you do have to question the wisdom of letting Russell Brand and John Corbett identify quality movies. Anyway here is the full list of actors and the films that probably formed part of the reason for their invitation, in order that I think they deserve that honour.
John Hawkes - Winter's Bone; American Gangster; Miracle at St. Anna; Miami Vice; Identity; Perfect Storm; Flesh and Bone
Jesse Eisenberg - Social Network; Cursed; Village; Emperor's Club
Ellen Page - Juno; Inception
Jacki Weaver - Animal Kingdom; Picnic at Hanging Rock
Jennifer Lawrence - Winter's Bone;
Vincent Cassel - Black Swan; Eastern Promises; Elizabeth; Ocean's Thirteen; Ocean's Twelve; Jefferson in Paris
Anthony Mackie - Hurt Locker; Half Nelson; Million Dollar Baby; She Hate Me; Manchurian Candidate; 8 Mile
Lesley Manville - Vera Drake; Secrets and Lies; Another Year; Christmas Carol; All or Nothing; Topsy-Turvy; High Hopes; Sammy and Rosie Get Laid; Dance with a Stranger
Jennifer Garner - Juno; Catch Me if You Can; Valentine's Day; Deconstructing Harry
Rosemarie DeWitt - Rachel Getting Married; Cinderella Man;
Robbie Coltrane - Mona Lisa; Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire; Ocean's Twelve; World is not Enough; Message in a Bottle; Nuns on the Run; Henry V; Revolution; Loose Connections; Krull; Britannia Hospital; Death Watch
David Duchovny - Chaplin; Full Frontal; Zoolander; Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead; Bad Influence; Working Girl
Gerard Butler - Mrs Brown; Game of Their Lives; Phantom of the Opera; Timeline; Cherry Orchard
Connie Nielsen - Gladiator; Return to Sender; Hunted; Mission to Mars; Devil's Advocate
Wes Studi - Dances with Wolves; Avatar; Heat; Last of the Mohicans; Doors
Dominic Monaghan - Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring; The Two Towers; The Return of the King
Mia Wasikowska - Kids are All Right; Alice in Wonderland; Defiance
Beyonce Knowles - Dreamgirls; Fighting Temptations
Mila Kunis - Black Swan;
Rooney Mara - Social Network;
Natassja Kinski - Inland Empire; One Night Stand; Crystal or Ash, Fire or Wind, As long as it's Love; Revolution; Maria's Lovers; Hotel Blue Hampshire; Unfaithfully Yours; Cat People; One from the Heart; Tess
Tea Leoni - Spanglish; Hollywood Ending; Flirting with Disaster; Wyatt Earp; League of Their Own; Switch
Thomas Jane - Killshot; Mist; Dreamcatcher; Magnolia; Boogie Nights
Peter Dinklage - Death at a Funeral; Find Me Guilty; Station Agent; Human Nature
Bradley Cooper - Valentine's Day; New York I Love You
Russell Brand - Tempest
John Corbett - Raising Helen
The other Academy news story this week was the twist in the number of films the Academy will nominate for best picture this year, it will now be a variable figure between 5 and 10 based on the number of films getting over 5% of the vote for the best films. It's an odd way of doing things, but it sure will make the announcement of the nominations more exciting.
Yes, this man, holding his hand out to the Academy in the dreadful Sex and the City 2 now has more of a say about what the best films of the year are than you do, reader.
Saturday, 18 June 2011
Toy Stories (Film News - 18/06/11)
Saturday, 21 May 2011
Do the Can(nes)-Can('t) (Film News - 21/05/11)
Cannes continues, for everyone except Lars von Trier that is. And yes I'm going to briefly mention that elephant in the room before moving onto the real film news. Seriously what do the Cannes bigwigs think they're doing and what they're going to achieve. Lars von Trier has always been a joker, with every film he makes you know he's courting for controversy, desperate to chase the headlines from the festival. The critics seemed to like Melancholia and not find it headline grabbing other than it's quality so of course they had to bait him in the press conference and of course he positively glowed when he started on the Nazi comments, knowing the effect that would have. The Committee should have just told him off whilst ensuring they are aware it was poor taste humour not a real political diatribe. Why not watch it here and let me know what you think:
And now onto the real news...
Byzantium
Vampires remain inexplicably popular right now, largely due to the Twilight franchise, although that doesn't seem to explain why so many non-teenage projects are getting the green light and basically picking up middling box office receipts. Never mind because the latest project coming out of the blocks will a mother/daughter vampire tale starring Saoirse Ronan and Gemma Arterton (they're both fine actresses and worth the ticket price but surely the age difference isn't enough, although the synopsis includes the suggestion they sometimes pretend to be sisters). The script, an original piece by Moira Buffini (Jane Eyre), has caught the attention of experience vampire filmmaker Neil Jordan (remember the faintly unsettling Interview with the Vampire) and producer Stephen Wooley. With that group of talent involved it's hard to resist even when the genre is so overdone.
Here is Kirsten Dunst in Neil Jordan's last foray into the world of Vampires, which is lovely as it links nicely to Lars above, and if Jordan can get performances as good as he gets from Kiki that Byzantium will definitely be one to watch.
Read on for Martial Arts competitions, fairy tale private eyes, evil step mothers, treks from Egypt, Court intrigues, Cold war meetings, school buses and Audrey Tatou as well as a minor casting story. 
Bloodsport
Certainly the most bizarre story to come out of Hollywood this week is the proposed remake of the 1988 Jean-Claude van Damme martial arts vehicle (left). Essentially a disaster on release the win or death knockout adventure gained a whole new lease of life on DVD, emerging as a cult favourite for the van Damme nuts out there. It's hard to imagine this sort of bruiser hero taking the box office lead today either, even after The Expendables proved there's still a market for pumped up leads. That said I am fascinated by whoever will want this potential albatross around the neck of their career.
The Defective Detective
Can Terry Gilliam catch a break in the fickle world of film financing? With The Man who Killed Don Quixote spiralling once more into the history of abandoned projects there's been little news from the former Python. Never one to let it get him down Terry's hinted that he may return to a Richard LaGravenese script they worked on around The Fisher King and 12 Monkeys and which never gathered the necessary funding. The story is curiously close to the Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus following a detective on the hunt for a missing girl in a fantasy world. If it has the same manic energy and resourceful plotting as those other films from that period then I will certainly be booking a ticket should it ever gets made!
Maleficent/Moses
This week saw the high profile departure of Tim Burton from Disney's live action origin story for Melficent, the evil step-mother from Sleeping Beauty (right), which is set to star Angelina Jolie. There doesn't seem to be a big fight with blame and recrimination about the tone or content or directorial vision just a run of the mill scheduling issue. It's partly a shame because I'd love to see Burton handling a villain front and centre, although maybe the studio would constrain him too much and keeping it firmly in the PG wheelhouse. So the potential replacements are being discussed on the net with David Yates (Harry Potter) currently the favourite, but Darren Aronofsky also being linked by Badass Digest - I suspect it's bunkum, if we consider Burton as being held back in his relationship with Disney then surely Aronofsky would be ever more so. They also say Warner Bros. are interested in recruiting him for the upcoming Exodus picture which might be more interesting form an audience point of view but isn't he more concerned with the earlier Biblical story, that of Noah and his Ark?
Music and Silence
Danish director Lone Scherfig will be returning to her roots with the latest literary adaptation she's taking on. Set in the 17th Century Danish court the story charts an illicit romance between two servants, one of whom works for the noble King Christian IV, the other for his philandering wife. The script is being written by Martin Sherman, based on Rose Tremain novel, with BBC films stumping up the cash.
Reykjavik
Every once in a while a high profile director known for big cast, big budget movies takes on an unlikely character pieces. Ron Howard did it a couple of years ago with the powerful Frost/Nixon and now, jumping a few Presidents into the future, Ridley Scott will be helming a reconstruction of the head to head between Reagan and Gorbachev that paved the way for the end of the cold war - that's them on the left but I'm not sure of the location. Ridley has already got a massively overcrowded slate but this could be a quickie to be filmed in between the more complex productions he's currently working on including the single film adaptation of the excellent Red Riding trilogy that he's been mentioned with again this week.
The We and The I/Untitled Michel Gondry/Audrey Tatou collaboration
Visionary director Michel Gondry is currently serving on the short film Jury in Cannes and has been chatting to the New York Times about all the projects hanging around on his plate. Next up is The We and the I which appears to to be inspired by his previous Be Kind Rewind and features a child only cast on a school bus, seems slight but it could be interesting. On the new film front he's been courting Audrey Tatou - for a French language picture - by making short films and animations or her. Obviously I'm holding back the vomit as I type, but at least the combo of Tatou and Gondry seems like it could be worth a look.
Casting News
I'm always fascinated when additional cast members, especially quite famous ones, appear in the press releases after the camera has started rolling - have there been drop outs, were their agents not ballsy enough to force a comment on their casting? - who knows. Anyway Stanley Tucci and Cloris Leachman have both been added to the cast of the Coen brothers scripted Gambit. Just when you thought Christopher Nolan's third Batman film The Dark Knight Rises couldn't possibly pick up more characters stand by for Matthew Modine, Tom Conti and Joey King joining in - so at least we now know Modine is still alive.
Obviously I couldn't mention The Dark Knight Rises without having the first publicity shot released, showing Tom Hardy in full Bane look. One picture down, 14 months to go:
Saturday, 23 January 2010
Film News (23/01/2010)
Slightly less news this week when compared to the overstuffed article we had last week. Still there's a fair selection of stories. We'll start with the most intriguing and move on to the good guys after the jump.
Maleficent
Tim Burton's clearly enjoyed his reunion with Disney on Alice in Wonderland, so much so he's started work on a Sleeping Beauty re-imagining from the view of poisoned spinning wheel providing Maleficent. Oddly I can't remember having seen Sleeping Beauty as a boy, although obviously i know the story, so I don't have the original as a point of reference but the idea of a Grimm fairytale with the villian as the centre is quite delicious. 
Obviously Helena Bonham Carter will up for the lead, but let's hope some non-Burton regulars get a chance.
Read on for dancing penguins, gun toting vicars, civil rights leaders and something suicidally depressing.
Gods of Carnage
In Roman Polanski news this week both sides of the abuse scandal have been digging in their heels. On the prosecution U.S. Courts have declined Polanski's request to be sentenced in absentia - probably indicating they want to lock him up. On the defence his wife has been letting on about Polanski's plans to film Yasmina Reza's God of Carnage. The play has had tremendous success in it's native Zurich as well as the West End and Broadway picking up a few Tonys on the way. It's a four hander about two well educated wealthy couples fighting about their children (among many other things) during one dinner party. Polanski has done well with small casts before (see Death and the Maiden) so this could be oe to watch, assuming he gets the chance to do it.
Happy Feet 2
The original Happy Feet was surprisingly adult for a cartoon, with some very realistic elements of how the animal kingdom is full of a violent struggle to survive and the effects of global warming on extreme environments. I doubt the sequel will be quite as viscereal but at least it's bagging an interesting cast. This week Brad Pitt and Matt Damon both signed on. I don't know if they'll be dancing penguins, but I'll let you know when I know.
Labor Day
During an interview with ESPN's Bill Simmons Jason Reitman has mentioned a number of porjects he's currently working on, including both a football and a hockey film, but coming next will be Labor Day, based on the novel by Joyce Maynard. It's a coming of age tale about a boy who struggles to connect with either his peer group or his family, especially his mother who is harbouring a deep secret. Juno proves Reitman has form with this age group, and the virtually agoraphobic mother could be a juicy role for any actresses of a certain age.
Machine Gun Preacher
Gerard Butler would like to remind us all that he can act. (Looking at his back-catalogue of drab rom-coms and mindless action you'd be forgiven for thinking he can't.) He will do this by starring in the biopic of Reverend Sam Childers (left), the drug-taking biker who found God then moved to Sudan to help protect orphans from Joseph Kony's Lord's Resistance Army; which he has done by forming a civilian militia. Whilst I suspect there's a powerful and interesting story to tell in Childers' life I very much doubt that Butler and the baggage he carries with him is the best way to tell it.
Martin Luther King Biopic
Steven Spielberg's untitled Martin Luther King biopic (he's definitely producing but no confirmed director is attached) is moving on following the hiring of Ronald Harwood to script with unlimited access to the estate. South African Harwood has a fascinating and quality pedigree including The Pianist, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly and The Browning Version so expect some high quality scribbling.
Ang Lee and James Schamus project
Lee and Schamus have collaborated on a number of projects over the years including The Ice Storm, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and last years Taking Woodstock, so it was good to hear in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter this week that Schamus is already working on thier next script together. Although he has curiously described it as "the good old, tragic, suicidally depressing Ang!" Which presumably means less of this:
and more of this:
