| | Sly Stallone's Bullet To The Head looks to be a gleefully unreconstructed old-school actioner. So it seems appropriate that it's just received a barely constructed poster. Displaying a few bulletholes, a splash of blood, and a rather wonkily rotated and already widely distributed still of Stallone, it is, shall we say, a little slapdash. Hopefully that's not a reflection of the finished movie. Fear not though: we have high hopes for lowbrow awesomeness from Bullet To The Head, since it's directed by action maestro Walter Hill (48 Hours, The Long Riders, Southern Comfort). The film is set in New Orleans, and it's about a cop (Sung Kang) and a hitman (Stallone) who join forces to take down their common enemy Adewale Akkinuoye-Agbaje. It's based on the French comics series by Alex "Matz" Nolent and Colin Wilson, and it's Hill's first cinematic outing since Undisputed in 2002. Amazingly, he never worked with Stallone back in the day, but he racked up Sly's fellow Expendables Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis in, respectively, Red Heat and Last Man Standing. Christian Slater, Jason Momoa, Holt McCallany and Sarah Shahi are also on board, and it's out in the UK on February 1.  |
12/14/12
Bullet To The Head Poster Crashes Online
12/13/12
Amber Heard Gets Three Days To Kill
| Though it boasts a high concept plot spawned by Luc Besson and co-writer Adi Hasak and McG seated in the director's chair, action thriller Three Days To Kill has already scored Kevin Costner and Hailee Steinfeld. Amber Heard is the latest to join their ranks. Kill will star Costner as Ethan Runner, a Secret Service agent who is shocked to discover he's dying. But then he's tempted with the offer of a possibly wondrous drug that might just extend his life and give him more time with his daughter (Steinfeld). There are just a couple of teeny, tiny complications, though: he has to go on one final mission as a condition of taking the treatment and, oh yes, the drug gives him incredibly weird hallucinations which will make carrying out the job that much more complicated. Heard is set to play the woman who dangles the offer of the miracle drug in front of our hero. Last seen in The Rum Diary, she'll next crop up in Robert Rodriguez action sequel Machete Kills (which should aptly prepare her for working from a Besson-penned script) and corporate thriller Paranoia alongside Liam Hemsworth. |
Latest Zero Dark Thirty Trailer
| | Kathryn Bigelow's latest, Zero Dark Thirty, is scheduled to touch down across the pond next week, but is already scoring plenty of awards. The final trailer – at least that US audiences will see before it opens there – is now online and can be watched above. This one focuses mostly on Jessica Chastain as Maya, one of the CIA analysts at the heart of the search for Osama Bin Laden. The film itself is a multi-faceted look at the manhunt for the terrorist mastermind, a search, as one man seems to indicate in the trailer itself, that was increasingly feeling like a wild goose chase with no end in sight and a money pit waiting to happen. But after months of controversial and questionable interrogations came an intelligence break and… well, the rest is literally history. Based on the real events, albeit dramatized by Bigelow and writer Mark Boal, the movie features an impressive cast including Jason Clarke, Kyle Chandler, Jennifer Ehle, Mark Strong, James Gandolfini, Joel Edgerton, Chris Pratt and Mark Duplass. Zero Dark Thirty lands in UK cinemas on January 25. |
Garrett Hedlund Back For Tron Sequel
| Given how quickly studios tend to sign their actors to sequel deals when there's a franchise in the offing (usually before the first movie is in the can), it's not really a surprise to learn that someone who starred in, and made it all the way through, the first film will return for a sequel. But Garrett Hedlund has announced that he'll do just that for the new Tron film. Frankly, it was more of a surprise to learn that Disney really was going for a sequel to 2010's Tron Legacy, given that it didn't quite hit at the box office. Still, it took in $400 million around the world and the studio is newly enthusiastic about its continuing prospects. Talking with Next Movie about On The Road, Hedlund admitted that he's in, and that both he and Disney are excited about the future. Disney has not yet confirmed any details beyond the film's development, but Legacy man Joseph Kosinski is attached to direct again. Jesse Wigutow was most recently hired to write the latest draft of the new sequel's script, which will most likely follow Hedlund's Sam Flynn and – assuming she's also locked in – Olivia Wilde's Quorra both on and off the grid. We definitely haven't seen the end of the threat from inside Kevin Flynn's virtual world. |
Olivier Megaton Will Be Taking Gotham
| With a surname like his, Olivier Megaton was all but destined to end up either A) directing action movies or B) becoming a cheesy super-terrorist. Thankfully (depending on how much you enjoyed Taken 2), he chose the former route. And Megaton will be back behind the camera for yet another high-octane thriller with Taking Gotham. Thomas Kelly wrote the movie, apparently based on actual events. In what sounds like a modern version of the team seen in the upcoming Gangster Squad is formed after a string of brutal robberies in New York. For a while, the secretive NYPD squad is effective at curbing the robbers, but then a deadly sting operation happens and police chiefs disavow the unit. Desperate to clear their name, the squad goes rogue, heading deep underground and acting without authorisation. Nicolai Fuglsig had been attached to call the shots, but now Emmett/Furla Films has Megaton in place to spend $60 million mostly on bullets and blood squibs. He's crank up the madness this coming March. |
Dylan McDermott Finds Mercy
| Paranormal Activity producer/found footage maven Jason Blum's Blumhouse productions is targeting Stephen King in a big way at the moment. One of the two big projects bubbling away at the company in Mercy, which Peter Cornwell is busy developing to direct. He's just hired Dylan McDermott to co-star. McDermott, who last tackled a creepy tale with the first season of American Horror Story on TV, is joining the film to star alongside Frances O'Connor, Chandler Riggs and Joel Courtney. Mercy, adapted from the short story Gramma that appeared in King's Skeleton Key collection, finds two lads discovering that their grandmother – the titular Mercy – is a witch. Naturally, that will cause some problems for the family. O'Connor will play their mother. Cornwell has Matt Greenberg- who last worked in the King realm with 1408 – on script duty and McG is also throwing his weight behind the project as a producer. There's no word on when it'll get shooting yet, but we'd expect cameras to be rolling within the next couple of months. McDermott was last seen in The Perks Of Being A Wallflower. He'll crop up in White House-under-siege action thriller Olympus Has Fallen. But we hope the producers of Mercy don't think they've hired Dermot Mulroney. It's so hard to tell them apart… |
New Look At Disney's Frozen
| Disney has been working on Snow Queen-based-fairytale 'toon Frozen for so long now, we saw concept art back when we visited the company for The Princess And The Frog. It has been going through quite the development process, but now the Mouse House has released a new piece of art from the movie to EW and you can check it out above. Frozen, which hits our screens next year, stars Kristen Bell and Idina Menzel (or their voices, both spoken and singing) in a mythical tale of two sisters. Kind-hearted Anna (Bell) will have to go on a dangerous quest to track down frostier Elsa (Menzel), who is causing their land to suffer through a perpetual winter. Anna sets out with cliffhanging adventurer Kristoff (Jonathan Groff had been rumoured for his voice, but Disney has not confirmed that) on a dangerous mission in the chilly, Scandinavian-inspired landscape. "We wanted to push it to the extreme," says co-director (and Wreck-It Ralph screenwriter) Jennifer Lee. "The unnatural quality of the ice emphasizes this is not, you know, sky-made ice, but ice made by someone." And while it's tough to research he magical ability to create strange snow and ice, it was easier to get a bead on sibling issues, especially after hosting a "Sibling Summit" for the filmmaking team that brought in their families to talk relationships and issues. "We got a ton of information from that," says her colleague Chris Buck, "and it kind of grounds these characters in believability in magical and unbelievable world." For more from the Frozen duo, head to EW's site. The film arrives on December 20, 2013. |
2013 Golden Globes Nominations Arrive!
| Awards season is getting seriously under way now with the nominations for the Screen Actors Guild awards already public and now the Golden Globe nominees revealed. And it's looking like a good year for the front-runners, including Les Miserables, Argo, Zero Dark Thirty and Lincoln. There were few surprises in the big film categories, though Richard Gere has snagged a nomination for Arbitrage and The Master is in the race here after being mysteriously ignored by SAG. Plus Django Unchained is shown a little love, too. It's nice to see The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel getting more attention, though we're surprised to see Salmon Fishing In The Yemen rubbing shoulders with the likes of Les Mis. TV-wise, a lot of repeats here, though apparently the HFPA believes that Mad Men was not among the best dramas of the year. Hhhm… The Golden Globes will be handed out on January 13 at a ceremony hosted by Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, so it should at least be good for a few chuckles. Here's the full list: BEST MOTION PICTURE, DRAMA
BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTRESS IN A MOTION PICTURE, DRAMA
BEST ACTOR, DRAMA BEST MOTION PICTURE, COMEDY OR MUSICAL BEST ACTRESS, COMEDY OR MUSICAL BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS BEST SCREENPLAY BEST ANIMATED FEATURE BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM BEST ORIGINAL SCORE BEST ORIGINAL SONG BEST TELEVISION SERIES, DRAMA
BEST ACTRESS, TV – DRAMA BEST ACTOR TV – DRAMA BEST TELEVISION SERIES, COMEDY OR MUSICAL
BEST ACTRESS, TV – COMEDY OR MUSICAL
BEST ACTRESS, TV - MINI-SERIES OR MOTION PICTURE BEST ACTOR, TV - MINI-SERIES OR MOTION PICTURE BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR |
The Hobbit UK Premiere Report
| They've travelled from the gilded halls of Khazad-dûm to the bucolic surrounds of the Shire's hobbit-holes and onto the goblin-crept caverns of the Misty Mountains. Last night, finally, Bilbo and the company of dwarves arrived in the Bustling Square of Leicester to sip from the chalice of soft drink and delve into the pick 'n' mix of merriment for the UK royal premiere of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Prince William was there to meet elf royalty, Queen Galadriel, aka Cate Blanchett, and the nearest thing the dwarves have to a monarch in the buffed shape of Richard Armitage and Thorin Oakenshield. That's Thorin son of Thráin, son of Thrór meeting William, son of Charles, son of Elizabeth. There's some lineage for you. As you can see, Peter Jackson, Sir Ian McKellen, Martin Freeman and Andy Serkis were all present and correct on a night not even a wyrm's breath could warm. The Lord Of The Rings' hobbity duo Dominic Monaghan and Billy Boyd also popped up to take the trip up the green carpet. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is out now. For lots more on the return to Middle-earth, head over to our bumper Hobbit coverage. |
The Girl
| Poor Toby Jones. Every time he gets a plum part, something comes along to overshadow it. First there was Dobby the House Elf in the Harry Potter films, a computer-generated homunculus forever destined to be Gollum’s poor relation. His Truman Capote turn in Infamous was accomplished but struggled for attention in the wake of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s Oscar-grabbing interpretation. And now it happens again, his performance as Alfred Hitchcock in this BBC/HBO co-production having the misfortune to arrive just as an Anthony Hopkins-led biopic hits the big screen. You could say the same of Sienna Miller, a star whose private life always seems to lure attention away from her achievements as an actress. In that respect the pair are ideally matched in Ju lian Jarrold’s film, a behind-the-scenes melodrama that explores the complex relationship Hitch had with Tippi Hedren over the course of making what were arguably the former’s last two decent movies. The first, of course, was 1963’s The Birds, a masterpiece of unsettling avian horror that catapulted former model Tippi to international stardom. According to Gwyneth Hughes’ screenplay, however (based on Donald Spoto’s 2008 tome Spellbound By Beauty: Alfred Hitchcock And His Leading Ladies) her success did not come easily, Hitch responding to an early rebuff of his advances by making the shoot as physically arduous and psychologically tortuous as possible. Tensions reached their apogee during the filming of the attic scene, a gruelling ordeal that saw Hedren fending off real birds for seven exhausting days. This is recreated effectively and harrowingly in Jarrold’s drama, as is another unpleasant mome nt when Hitch sends a fake crow smashing into Hedren’s phone box set with no prior warning. The way Hughes tells it, it’s a wonder she made it out alive. But what’s really astounding is that she chose to go through it all again by shooting another picture with Hitchcock straight afterwards – a mystery left unanswered in a film whose portrait of the director as a creepy, lascivious ogre amounts to nothing less than a wholesale character assassination. The Marnie section is the weaker here, Jarrold spurning the opportunity to give Sean Connery a role in what, Imelda Staunton’s cameo as Alfred’s wife notwithstanding, is pretty much a two-hander. It’s good then that the leads click so well together, a subtly prostheticised Jones proving memorably reptilian and a predictably glamorous Miller nailing both Hedren’s glacial exterior and the terrified naïf within. The Girl News and Features 
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Wolverine Motion Poster Lands
| We'll hand it to director James Mangold and the 20th Century Fox marketing team – they're treating us all to some stylish imagery to promote The Wolverine. We got an arty teaser poster for the film in October and now a motion poster is online and can be seen below. The Wolverine finds Hugh Jackman's Logan headed to present-day Tokyo, where he where he falls for the mysterious Mariko and becomes embroiled in a brutal gang war. Out of his depth in an unknown world he faces his ultimate nemesis in a life-or-death battle that will leave him forever changed. Vulnerable for the first time and pushed to his physical and emotional limits, he confronts not only lethal samurai steel but also his inner struggle against his own immortality, emerging more powerful than we have ever seen him before. You know, the usual for him. And this latest poster is certainly nifty, making full use of the motion aspect for pouring rain (he's lucky adamantium doesn't rust!), raging storm and flickering lights of the city. And no title, either! Wolverine sells himself. Hopefully a trailer will be headed our way soon. And the film itself arrives in 3D on July 26. You can see Mangold and Jackman discussing the film below. |
12/12/12
Del Toro Opens Book Of Life
| While his biggest current project – that would be a certain action epic named Pacific Rim – has just put a trailer online today, there is also news about a much more tangential Guillermo del Toro project. The animated movie formerly known as Day Of The Dead is now called Book Of Life and is set to arrive in cinemas (in the US at least) on October 10 2014. The movie itself, backed by Fox Animation, is still shrouded in some secrecy, though when it was first talked up back in February, there was mention of a musical, Romeo and Juliet-style romance set against the famous Mexican celebration. Del Toro is still simply producing the film, leaving the actual filmmaking to handpicked director Jorge Gutierrez. He'll bring his experience on shorts and TV 'toons to play making the new movie and has written the script with Doug Langdale. The October release date seems fitting given the subject matter, but we do wonder whether it'll end up competing with Lee Unkrich's still untitled Dia de los Muertos project bubbling away over at Pixar. That said, the Pixar film doesn't have a confirmed release date yet, and the company already has The Good Dinosaur set for 2014. |
Warm Bodies Posters Online
| From the looks of everything we've seen so far (including the latest trailer you can watch again at the bottom of the page), the adaptation of Isaac Marion's apocalyptic zom-rom-com novel Warm Bodies is set to give the romantic comedy genre a good tweak and breathe some life into zombie movies. Summit has put some new posters up for the film, which you can see in the gallery below. Warm Bodies, directed by 50/50's Jonathan Levine finds R (Nicholas Hoult) a zombie existing in a world where the undead outnumber the living. He and his rotting contemporaries regularly raid the pockets of human survivors, lured by the warm, fleshy delights and focused on eating brains. But on one of the scouting missions, R meets and engages with Julie (Teresa Palmer) and something unusual happens: R starts to feel something. Could it be that his lingering humanity is starting to return as he tentatively tries to woo this woman? And what will the rest of his zombie brethren think, including best "friend" M (Rob Corddry)? As R and Julie bond, the threats mount both from the freakish "Boney" zombies and from her father, General Grigio (John Malkovich), commander of the local human camp and a fervent believer in slaughtering any zombies that come near his compound. Blending humour with horror, Warm Bodies promises plenty. We'll see if it delivers on February 8. |
Peter Jackson Wants Tintin 2 For 2015
| Though the majority of his time at the moment is being spent either promoting the first part of The Hobbit, An Unexpected Journey or working on the other two parts of the trilogy, Peter Jackson has not completely forgotten about animated boy reporter Tintin. Now comes word from the man himself that he has plans for making the second part of the trilogy he's planning alongside Steven Spielberg. In October last year, Spielberg talked up the fact that the sequel – currently titled Prisoners Of The Sun and once more based on Herge's writings, had been in development for a while. "Sony and Paramount were willing to do one movie with us and then give us the financial wherewithal to develop a script, do all the visual storyboards and get it really in launch position. So we can launch pretty quickly on a second movie. The script is already written," he explained. Of course, there's no solid word on whether the studios have indeed officially agreed to the shoot, but Jackson seems fairly confident, revealing to Belgian journalists that the plan is for him to carve out some time next year while he fine tunes the other Hobbit films to squeeze in the relatively brief performance capture shoot for the new Tintin adventure, which is then handed to the CG teams to work on. The aim is to have the film ready for 2015. It remains to be seen if this comes to pass, especially since Jackson also has to shoot additional Hobbit material to fill out the trilogy. But let's face it – if any duo thinks they can get it done and deserve our faith, it's Jackson and Spielberg. |
Mark Wahlberg Finds Hacker Thriller
| Argo, and, to a lesser extent (since the man partly responsible for source articles was also writing the movie) Zero Dark Thirty, are just the most recent examples of newspaper and magazine articles fuelling movies. It's a long-standing tradition and one Mark Wahlberg intends to keep going. He's attached to produce an as-yet untitled thriller about a hacker for Universal. Jonathan Herman has been hired to write the script, which will adapt David Kushner's piece for GQ called The Hacker Is Watching. The real-life case saw a ruthless, skilled hacker targeting the students at a large high school in the US. He gained access to their computers, sent malware and various files and even fired up the webcams on laptops to record them unawares. As the script has yet to be written, we don't know how much of the actual case will feed into the finished product, but it's certainly a compelling subject for a drama thriller in this techno savvy world. Can't wait to see what the viral marketing campaign will be… Wahlberg for now is simply attached to produced, though he could end up taking a role. He'll next appear in Broken City (which he's also producing), 2 Guns and Peter Berg's Lone Survivor. |
Pacific Rim Trailer Roars In
| Guillermo del Toro knows how to do creepy. He's proven he can do rip-roaring entertainment. And he's also a hugely charming raconteur. But now, with the first proper trailer for Pacific Rim, he's proving he's got massive blockbuster chops. Check out the footage above. In a wildly thrilling trailer that plays like an adrenalin shot straight to the heart, we get the very basic setup thanks to Charlie Hunnam's Raleigh Antrobus, who introduces the idea of massive, trans-dimensional beasties emerging from the ocean. These creatures – every bit as alien even though they didn't fall from the stars – are known as kaiju and are looking to destroy humanity. But they had reckoned without our indomitable spirit and ability to build giant robots, called Jaegers, that can take the fight back to the monsters. Piloted by two people at once via neural link, these skyscraper-sized 'bots go into battle against the encroaching beasts. And let's face it – giant robots vs huge monsters brought to the screen by Guillermo del Toro? They already have our money. GDT also plays it canny by not showing too much of the monsters – just enough to whet our appetites. We'll have to wait until July 12 to see it all in cinemas, but this little treat feels like an early Christmas present. And that's before Idris Elba gets to deliver a little motivational speech...
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SAG Award Nominations Announced
| Like something out of a film itself – albeit perhaps not the most exciting spy thriller ever – the Screen Actors Guild across the pond suffered a security leak today, when it appeared that the nomination lists for its annual awards had made it online. But the official categories are online now, and they're not exactly shocking. The various film and TV categories contain actors and actresses most would have predicted to feature, including the likes of Lincoln, Les Miserables, Argo and Silver Linings Playbook. Actors including Daniel Day Lewis, Denzel Washington and Hugh Jackman all got nods in this year's list. More surprising was the presence of Nicole Kidman in the female actor category, given that it was for The Paperboy, which hasn't exactly been praised for much of anything. And Joaquin Phoenix was oddly ignored for The Master. TV revealed even fewer surprises, though Homeland finally got some love. Take a look at the full lists below. The awards will be handed out on January 27. Film OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY A CAST IN A MOTION PICTURE OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY A MALE ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY A FEMALE ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY A MALE ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY A FEMALE ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY AN ENSEMBLE IN A DRAMA SERIES OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY A MALE ACTOR IN A DRAMA SERIES OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY A FEMALE ACTOR IN A DRAMA SERIES OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY AN ENSEMBLE IN A COMEDY SERIES OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY A MALE ACTOR IN A COMEDY SERIES OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE BY A FEMALE ACTOR IN A COMEDY SERIES OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE - FEMALE ACTOR IN A TV MOVIE/MINISERIES |
New G.I. Joe: Retaliation Promo
| One of the dangers for a movie that has been waiting to be released as long as G.I. Joe: Retaliation has is that we've seen several trailers already. So there's not as much new footage to go around. Fortunately for director John M Chu, there have been some reshoots as the action sequel goes through the 3D-fication process. Now comes a new promo with some fresh material. Check it out above. Introduced by The Rock himself, Dwayne Johnson, we get a sort of greatest hits of previous promos first – the cliff face ninja scrap, the Joes being betrayed, attacked and left for dead as Cobra consolidates its power after successfully replacing the US President (Jonathan Pryce) and shots of the team in action. We also get some of the villains' master plan, including the demonstration of a new super-weapon that takes out the middle of London (cue Empire's HQ team relocating to a secret bunker underneath Stonehenge… which is probably not as secure now that we've talked it up. Damnit) and Johnson's Roadblock leading our heroes in a strike back against the baddies. And then some new material kicks in, including more banter between Roadblock and Channing Tatum's Duke, plus extra moments with Lady Jaye (Adrianne Palicki) and Bruce Willis' Joe Colton, who comes out of retirement to help his team. We're still hopeful – particularly with Franchise Viagra Johnson in place – that Retaliation can wipe the disappointing first movie from our brains. It storms in on March 27. |
Peter Strickland Finds Duke Of Burgundy
| You already know we think a lot of Peter Strickland's Berberian Sound Studio (which just scooped four BIFAs). So we're excited to learn that he's hard at work on another project, The Duke Of Burgundy. Berberian co-star Chiara D'Anna will star in the film, described as a dark melodrama. She plays an amateur lepidopterist – one who studies moths and butterflies, fact fans! – whose wayward desires cause trouble in her relationship. In case you were wondering, the title does not point to his being a stealth tribute to Anchorman, but instead to the name of a butterfly subfamily. Empire news: it's educashun in acshun! "After damaging my eardrums with too many screams during the Berberian sound mix, I wanted to make something tender and quiet, but also quite intense. It's a simple love story about a devoted couple whose intimate needs are rarely in harmony," Strickland says in a statement. He's developing this new film in concert with Sightseers director Ben Wheatley's company Rook Films as the first non-Wheatley project to clank through the system. Strickland is getting some funding from the BFI Film Fund and is looking to shoot next year. And if you've not yet caught Berberian Sound Studio, it hits home (video) on December 31. |
Arrested Development S4 Extended?
| Update: More good news! Though Netflix has yet to officially make a decision on the number, Mitch Hurwitz has enough material to begin assembling more episodes beyond the original order of ten for the streaming season 4. A break in production is now planned so he can decide what new scripts need to be generated and then filming will resume around the busy cast's schedules in late January. We could be getting anywhere from 12-15 episodes! Steve Holt! --- Though it's painful to say so, Arrested Development isn't a movie property. Two and a half seasons of high quality TV comedy, yes, actual movie, no. Despite this, what limited coverage of AD's return that's appeared on empireonline.com has made many forumites / Facebook fans / Twitter followers very happy indeed, so it's with great pride that we share this snippet of news from the Bluth family's resident Analrapist, Tobias Fünke. Speaking to The Rolling Stone from the set of the resurrected cult favourite, David Cross was asked whether the 10-episode plan with Netflix was still going strong. "I think it's going to be 13 episodes, not 10," was his response. "There's too much story. Some characters will have two-parters. Everybody sort of participates, sometimes in a bigger way and sometimes in a tiny little thread that goes through everybody else's stories." Rumours so far indicate that each of the new episodes will centre around one of the family Bluth, which Cross's quote ratifies, but there's no news on who's deemed worthy of their own particular outing. In other words, Annyong fans might want to get back into the wallspace for the time being. The Rolling Stone interview has much more teasing info for you to enjoy, but one other quote is particularly smile-enducing: "[Show creator Mitchell Hurwitz's writing is] really audacious and amazing. I think a lot of people will miss the work that is involved, the story, the Venn diagrams that are being created, the domino effect that characters have with each other in their various episodes. I know what he's doing, and this has never been done on a TV show like this. This makes Lost look like a Spaulding Grey monologue." Elsewhere, Ron Howard - the best narrator this side of Scandalmakers - has been tweeting pictures from somewhere near the banana stand, and here's just one below to give you a taste, with the Rush director standing beside creator Mitchell Hurwitz and star Jason Bateman. The new Netflix episodes of Arrested Development are set to air in early 2013, with no precise dates announced as yet. |
Haunting In Georgia Scares Up A Trailer
| | 2009's Haunting In Connecticut may not have quite set the world alight, but it was a reasonable enough ghost story, and did enough business to make a sequel worth investigating. Opting for an anthology approach, the next entry in the nascent series was announced last year as The Haunting In Georgia, and here's the trailer and a poster. Except... Apparently we're no longer to call it The Haunting In Georgia: it's now The Haunting In Connecticut 2: Ghosts Of Georgia, just to make sure you get the connection with the first one. This despite the fact that Georgia and Connecticut are several states apart. Those marketing folks, eh? If you didn't laugh, you'd cry. Understandably, given the location, this instalment's aiming for the southern gothic vibe, with a story - once again supposedly true - based around Georgia's slavery-heavy history, and the "stationmasters" who saved lives by helping slaves escape. Potentially quite rich material if handled right then, although the modern-day part of the story, of course, involves a family moving into a new house, and a child that can see dead people. The poster meanwhile, seems to be channeling The Last Exorcism. Tom Elkins, editor of Connecticut, is the director of Georgia, and the cast is a TV roster comprising Chad Michael Murray (One Tree Hill), Abigail Spencer (Mad Men - although she's since been in Cowboys & Aliens and Oz: The Great And Powerful), and Katee Sackhoff (Battlestar Galactica's Starbuck). A mid-level horror sequel is kind of coming full circle for Sackhoff, since pre-BSG her most visible role was in Halloween: Resurrection, where we got to see her severed head roll down the stairs. Hopefully she'll come out of this one intact. The Haunting In Connecticut 2: Ghosts Of Georgia is out in the US on February 1, but we don't have a date in the UK yet. If all goes to plan, the series' next haunting will be in New York.
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Michael Shannon Reaps The Harvest
| If you caught that fleeting glimpse of Michael Shannon in Man Of Steel's new trailer and began thinking, 'Hhhm… I wonder what he's planning for a future role?' we have the answer. Variety reports that Shannon and Samantha Morton have signed on to star in director John McNaughton's new horror film The Harvest. With a script by Stephen Lancelotti, the film will find Morton and Shannon as a married couple who work in the medical industry. Their son (Charlie Tahan) suffers from a rare condition and so spends much of his time in a controlled environment, which is hardly the most fun situation for a growing tyke. But then a girl (Natasha Callis) moves in next door and he sees the hope of a better life. But there's a problem – the teens begin to grow closer, and that threatens the carefully orchestrated world his over-protective mother has wrapped around him. As it unravels, things get nasty. McNaughton, who launched his career with 1986's Henry: Portrait Of A Serial Killer, is finally taking a stab at a shocker once more. "This is the first horror script I've been interested in in 25 years, so it's kind of cool to return to the genre," he tells Variety "I got the script a few years ago and loved the story, which is dark and has a great twist. It's like a cross between Hansel And Gretel and Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf." We expect fun things. In addition to his Superman-battling assignment, Shannon also has David Wain's They Came Together trundling through post-production and likely to hit either late next year or early 2014. Morton will next be seen techno comedy Her. |
Arrested Development Season 4 Extended?
| Update: More good news! Though Netflix has yet to officially make a decision on the number, Mitch Hurwitz has enough material to begin assembling more episodes beyond the original order of 10 for the streaming season 4. A break in production is now planned so he can decide what new scripts need to be generated and then filming will resume around the busy cast's schedules in late January. We could be getting anywhere from 12-15 episodes! Steve Holt! --- Though it's painful to say so, Arrested Development isn't a movie property. Two and a half seasons of high quality TV comedy, yes, actual movie, no. Despite this, what limited coverage of AD's return that's appeared on empireonline.com has made many forumites / Facebook fans / Twitter followers very happy indeed, so it's with great pride that we share this snippet of news from the Bluth family's resident Analrapist, Tobias Fünke. Speaking to The Rolling Stone from the set of the resurrected cult favourite, David Cross was asked whether the 10-episode plan with Netflix was still going strong. "I think it's going to be 13 episodes, not 10," was his response. "There's too much story. Some characters will have two-parters. Everybody sort of participates, sometimes in a bigger way and sometimes in a tiny little thread that goes through everybody else's stories." Rumours so far indicate that each of the new episodes will centre around one of the family Bluth, which Cross's quote ratifies, but there's no news on who's deemed worthy of their own particular outing. In other words, Annyong fans might want to get back into the wallspace for the time being. The Rolling Stone interview has much more teasing info for you to enjoy, but one other quote is particularly smile-enducing: "[Show creator Mitchell Hurwitz's writing is] really audacious and amazing. I think a lot of people will miss the work that is involved, the story, the Venn diagrams that are being created, the domino effect that characters have with each other in their various episodes. I know what he's doing, and this has never been done on a TV show like this. This makes Lost look like a Spaulding Grey monologue." Elsewhere, Ron Howard - the best narrator this side of Scandalmakers - has been tweeting pictures from somewhere near the banana stand, and here's just one below to give you a taste, with the Rush director standing beside creator Mitchell Hurwitz and star Jason Bateman. The new Netflix episodes of Arrested Development are set to air in early 2013, with no precise dates announced as yet. |
12/11/12
Joel Edgerton Knows Jane Got A Gun
| Natalie Portman and director Lynne Ramsey have managed to wrangle the elements (and funding) together successfully so far for Western vengeance drama Jane Got A Gun, including locking down Michael Fassbender. Well, one buzz worthy leading man was clearly not enough for the pair, who have now set their sights on Joel Edgerton. The actor, who will be seen hunting Osama Bin Laden in Zero Dark Thirty this coming January, is now in talks to snag one of the other lead roles in the film. Jane , written by Brian Duffield, is built around Jane Hammond (Portman), whose outlaw husband is betrayed by his own gang. With him badly hurt (bullets will do that, y'all), she reaches out to a former lover, Dan Frost (Fassbender) to help strike back against the criminals, who are coming in to finish the job. Edgerton will be channelling his darker side to play John Bishop, the leader of the gang looking to kill Portman's hubby. Ramsey should be cranking the cameras early next year. As well as Zero Dark Thirty, 2013 is shaping up to be a solid year for Edgerton, since he has both Felony and The Great Gatsby due out. |
Bay May Have Transformers 4 Leads
| With new apparent best mate Mark Wahlberg locked in place for Transformers 4, Michael Bay had turned his attention to casting the other main roles in the film. You know, besides Optimus and the rest of the 'bots. Now, according to Twitch, Brenton Thwaites and Nicola Peltz are the lucky recipients of Bay's approval. After a typically extensive lengthy screen test process, Peltz is apparently on to play Wahlberg's daughter in the film, while Thwaites is close to the role of her boyfriend, a race-happy biker. As for the plot, not much is known yet, but Ehren Kruger's script is set to carry on the story from Dark Of The Moon, albeit a few years later and with the new human characters alongside Cybertron's finest The actors are still relatively unknown, but then you'll recall that Shia LaBeouf was hardly the biggest household name until Bay and Steven Spielberg plucked him to play with their giant toys. Peltz has had roles in Deck The Halls and The Last Airbender and is also set to appear in several episodes of the new Psycho prequel series Bates Motel. Thwaites, meanwhile, is a graduate of the Home And Away school of young Aussie actors and starred in recent TV movie Blue Lagoon: The Awakening. But his profile is set to rise a little more next year when he shows up in Maleficent. Neither has been officially confirmed, so they're flirting with rumour status still, but given Twitch's reliable sources on TF4 in the past, we'd expect them to be locked in soon enough. |
