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Hard on the heels of his colossal triumph in The Dark Knight , Christian Bale takes on another Blockbuster Buzz favourite with his portrayal of future freedom fighter John Connor on the fourth Terminator movie.
No Arnie this time, he's too busy governing California, but we are promised a Schwarzenegger lookalike as either an early model Terminator or perhaps the human model upon which the killer cyborgs were based.
It's hard to make too many predictions about the movie when the trailer is so wilfully 'distressed'. But given that we have (a) Christan Bale and (b) Heavily armed killer robots from the future it's not likely to be a bad movie, now is it?
Clip after the cut...
Continue reading "Terminator 4: Salvation - First trailer" »
Even though Watchmen isn't due in cinemas until next spring, the feverish geek-pectation that was until last week being expended on Dark Knight is now being transferred to a new target: Zack Snyder's bold cinematic recration of the seminal Alan Moore comics serial.
The trailer is a masterpiece. Each scene is a loving tribute to a specific frame in the comic book, thereby defusing any ire among the fanboy faithful who would have been quick to jump on any percieved inaccuracies. With any negative publicity thus negated, the PR machine can go into full swing explaining to the uninitiated exactly what Watchmen is, and what it's about.
Here comes the clip:
Continue reading "Watchmen - at last a trailer!" »
 To tie in with the hotly-anticipated release of Christopher Nolan's second Batman film, The Dark Knight, Warner Home Video are releasing the first film in the new, re-imagined series Batman Begins on Blu-ray™ Disc this month.
The film, starring Christian Bale (The Machinist), and directed by Christopher Nolan (Memento), follows the first stages of the Caped Crusader's crime-fighting career, tracing the beginning of his quest for justice after the murder of his parents, and showing how Bruce Wayne develops the awesome physical and technological power of The Batman.
Enter our Batman Begins competition and you could find yourself in a Batworld of your very own. The winner will take home a state of the art Sony BDP-S300, which can offer the most authentic hi-definition cinema experience you can get in your own home, together with a copy of Batman Begins so they can savour the full immersive Gotham City experience. Four runners up will each win the Batman Begins Blu-ray™ Disc, but will need to find their own player!
To be in with a chance of winning, all you have to do is answer the following question:
Which character does Morgan Freeman play in the new Batman movies?
a) Comissioner Gordon
b) Lucius Fox
c) Harvey Dent
To enter, simply click here
Batman is the trademark and copyright of DC Comics. © 2005 Warner Bros Ent. All rights reserved
Continue reading for competition terms & conditions
Continue reading "Competition: Take Batman home" »
I saw Dark Knight last night. On an IMAX screen. If it's at all practical for you that's the way to see it It rocks. Hard. If you haven’t seen the movie yet I would urge you (a) to do so and (b) to bookmark this post and read it later, because it’s impossible for me to write this list without revealing certain plot points that you might prefer not to know about in advance. The list below the cut will outline my reasons for believing that The Dark Knight is not just the best Batman movie to date but is also is the best representation of The Batman in any medium.
Continue reading "10 things that make Dark Knight the best Batman ever." »
So they've added yet another viral marketing website to the dozens already out there.
This one purports to be a Gotham City news channel. There are items on Batman sightings and Harvey Dent's political campaign, but the whole thing's been comprehensively 'Jokerized'
At the current rate of expansion the Internet will be 100% Batman viral marketing by 2050. Sounds OK to us.
For all the big talk about how the big summer movies are 'character driven' pieces that stretch actors to the limit, we all know that a lot of what makes a blockbuster bust blocks is the effects that make everything go boom.We grabbed 10 minutes with Nick Davis, Visual Effects Supervisor on Dark Knight, here’s what he told us.
Before we talk CGI, in a recent interview Gary Oldman was quoted as saying about possible recasting of the Joker: “Maybe we don’t need the Joker. Because we’ll have The Riddler.” Are the rumours true?
I haven’t heard anything about it, I’ve no idea if Chris will even do another one. And there aren’t any hints in the movie about what’s coming, not like the first one. I hope they don’t recast The Joker, Heath’s performance is incredible. Enormous depth and range. I thought that before the tragedy of his death. I have amazing memories of watching him on set.
Will he outshine Christian Bale?
It’s hard being the straight guy in any movie. It’s always the bad guy who gets the fun roles but Christian gives a profound performance. It’s a character based movie, that’s the strength of it and Batman is a multi-dimensional character too.
Does Maggie Gyllenhaal kick Katie Holmes to the curb?
She’s extremely good as Rachel Dawes. There’s no loss by changing actresses. I don’t think we’ll even miss it.
I hear Christopher Nolan doesn’t dig CGI were you on the B-team?
With a movie of this ilk and style the special effects can’t all be done or made practically, not for things like flying a C130 fighter plane right next to a city, or having Batman jump from a Hong Kong skyscraper. It’s about getting a balance between the two.
How much of the movie is CGI
700 shots in the move are visual effects shots. There’s a bit more cg in this movie compared to Batman Begins and less miniature work.
That sounds a lot..
That includes every type of visual effect. It’s probably more than average.
It’s an old question but maybe you can put it to bed, is there too much CGI in movies?
It’s very movie dependent. If you know there’s only one way to achieve what the nature of the movie and audience expectations demand then you use cgi. It’s a fantastic tool that way, but it is over-relied on by some.
Name names?
Uhh..none come to mind.
How much of Chicago is there in Gotham?
It’s a real mix of things. We got loads of real footage of Chicago, then we used visual effects and models to turn it into Gotham. For this movie we photo-documented 50-80 buildings with high resolution stills to build up the library we use to create city extensions and extra skyline.
Apparently Christian Bale was upset that he didn’t get to jump off a skyscraper in Hong Kong?
Yeah, we had to do that with cgi. There are just some things you can’t do in a city.
We had a lot of sequences in the movie where we were going to have Christian or his double jump off the skyscraper or fly through the city, but it just couldn’t be done without risking lives. For the jump we put a stunt man on a big green set and recreated Hong Kong behind him. All the shots of wings opening and flying around Hong Kong are CG too.
What’s the strangest thing you had to fix in the mix?
Chris is a big lover of the oddity, strange flares or abnormal things happening with the light. He’ll say, “leave that, I love that,” When other directors might have it fixed. I He thinks that’s the beauty of film, that it can be so unexpected.
The world's coolest cigar-chomping demon goes up against more supernatural terrors in Guillermo Del Toro's dsitinctive comic book adaptation:
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And you thought sitting next to the guy with the loud iPod was the worst thing that could happen. Woody Harrelson essays a rare serious role in this tale of a couple having a distinctly uncomfortable Inter-railing experience:
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A belated sequel for the paranormal 'Moonlighting'. Is that Billy Connolly giving it some 'mad' there?
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Surprisingly little Keanu and almost no Gort in this retread of Michael Rennie's visionary sci-fi classic.
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It's indicative of Hollywood's faith in the skull-suited vigilante that this is the third attempt to bring this ostensibly quite straight forward comic-book hero to the screen, the first two having resulted in ignominious defeat. Marvel/Lionsgate haven't compromised for the box-office mainstream though, creating a no-holds-barred action flick that has earned the 'kiss of death' R-rating from the US censors..
It's hard to say too much about an extended montage of gun-fu shots that could have been from Ultraviolet, Equilibrium, or more or less any high-concept shoot-em-up of the last decade. One promising note is that in this iteration of the Big P legend we finally see the Punisher's arch-enemy Jigsaw on screen, although he's not conspicuously evident in this trailer.
Well. To an extent. Four of the winners of the 'Make a Watchmen universe commerical' contest are online now. The range from a generic airline ad, a keenly observed but unconvincingly low-budget shill for the Ozymandias and Bubastis action figures, a near-wordless hair product spot that flags up Watchmen's 'alternative eighties' setting, and a couple of runs at Veidt's scientifically designed cologne 'Nostalgia'. They're worth watching, if only to find out how you're really supposed to pronounce Ozymandias's last name.
Continue reading "See scenes from Watchmen right now!" »
If you weren’t excited enough about the new Batman movie
before, you defintely will be now as we see the horrifyingly deadly scope of The Joker’s
madness and Two-Face’s tragic genesis
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Some early glimpses of James Bond’s revenge on S.P.E.C.T.R.E
in a sequel that carries on where the non-stop action of Casino Royale left off
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The forthcoming Star Wars Clone Wars CGI animation probably
represents Star Wars fans’ last, best hope for a truly great cinema experience.
The three ‘prequel’ movies weren’t quite as bad as they are sometimes painted
but all of them, especially the first, suffered from an excess talkiness that rather
detracted from the thrill of the situation.
After all, the Star Wars movies are kids movies, They’re
just kids movies that a lot of adults enjoy. And who wants to watch a kid’s
movie about a trade dispute? Even if it’s a trade dispute in space?
The Clone Wars trailers promise to wipe all that
disappointment away. They take the fizzy, aspartame-crazed excitement of Genndy
Tartakovsky’s original animated shorts and add the solidity and sheer spiffy ‘now-ness’
of an all-CGI production.
If you grimly sat through all three prequels waiting for
some of that classic laser-sword and force-ery magic to come back, now is your
time. Watch the trailer below to see what I mean.
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In a world where directors of even the shallowest, most popcorn-munching summer action flick feel obliged to keep you in the cinema for at least two bladder-testing hours, Will Smith's new superhero comedy Hancock is a breath of fresh air. It clocks in at a tight, unpretentious 90 minutes. It feels like longer though – in a good way. The expected ‘drunken superhero in Miles Davis sunnies gets a makeover’ arc is wrapped up in the first hour, giving way to a darker second section in which the invulnerable, almost immortal protagonist gets a taste of what it means to be truly human.
Indeed, the movie only really returns to its early light action comedy tone with the now-obligatory post-credits skit, in which the costume-designers own up to having plagiarised their own Wolverine costume.
The movie achieves its refreshing brevity by dispensing with the usual origin sequence, delivering the hero to us as an already washed-up, but still eminently likeable force of nature. We get an insight into the hero’s background later in the film as it’s revealed that he’s part of a lost race of supermen who were once revered as gods but who died out because of one fatal flaw. Their power is diminished whenever they come close to one of their own kind. It’s a good thing that Hancock is all alone in the world. Or is he?
It’s worth noting that the movie’s title makes a lot more sense in the US, where John Hancock’s ebullient penmanship on the declaration of independence gives rise to the expression ‘John Hancock’ meaning signature. We’re more likely to think of Anthony Aloysius Hancock, and whereas the movie has, especially in its opening section, some very funny moments it’s got nothing to do with Blood Donors or Radio Hams.
It may not be one of the Big Three superhero movies this summer, but Hancock shouldn’t be overlooked. Despite its slightly uneven tone it has great action, great comedy, and even (unusually for a movie of its kind) some actual acting.
Best of all, it’ll only cost you an hour and a half. With England out of Euro 2008, it’s the best ninety minutes of the Summer.
Few of cinema’s ‘backroom boys’ become household names in
their own right. Directors and Actors may get their names up in lights but very
few moviegoers could name a creature effects creator or animatronics
supervisor. If they could name one, it would almost certainly be Stan Winston
who died this week at the age of 62.
Stan Winston originally trained as a painter before moving
to Hollywood in 1968. Initially he aimed to become an actor but decided after a year of unsuccessful
auditions to use his artistic experience to secure an apprenticeship in the
Makeup Department at Walt Disney Studios.
He first crossed into the limelight with his pioneering work
in 1984’s The Terminator, which featured several shots of star Arnold Schwarzenegger’s
face partially shot away to apparently reveal a glinting robot skull beneath. The
final robot endoskeleton which emerged from The Terminator’s cyborg skin became
a cinema icon and is set to stalk the ravaged Earth yet again (without its
creator) in next year’s Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins.
Winston excelled at robotic effects, unlike his
werewolf-creating rival Rick Baker, as can be seen at the cinemas right now in
Iron Man, where the gap between live action and CGI is seamlessly blended using
Winston’s signature animatronics. Nevertheless his very biological-looking dinosaurs for Jurassic Park and his giant Alien Queen for Aliens are counted among his greatest achievments.
He was a restlessly creative, constantly busy man, working on dozens of movies in various capacities and winning 4 Oscars. As he
once said:
"I have two comic books series that are out and that
are developing screenplays based on them. I've got a toy company. My production
company has about twenty projects in production, pre-production or
in-development. I've started, as of last year, SW Digital, under my roof. Other
than that, I'm not doing anything." As a master of practical effects in an increasingly digital
age Stan Winston will undoubtedly be missed but the companies he founded have
trained dozens of young animatronics effects specialists who will continue his creative
legacy into the far future.
It wouldn't be a Bond movie without a Bond Girl, so who is 007's latest foil?
Here's a sneak peek at Olga Kurylenko, the Ukrainian-born beauty who plays Camille in Quantum of Solace.
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The pivotal moment in the movie where KGB agent Emil Blonsky (played by Tim Roth) realises that he wants the awesome power of the Jolly Green Giant for himself.
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If you are one of those people who have to read every last detail about a film before they see it, there's a play-by play of the forthcoming Nolan/Bale Bat-flick over at i09.
Personally, I like to enter a movie theatre fresh, with no preconceptions, but that's not too easily done in my line of work
These lovely new banner-shaped posters surely exist only to tempt the bloggers among us to give the hotly-anticipated new Batman movie some free advertising.
Read on to see the new TV spot which will be airing in theUS next week.
Continue reading "Dark Knight: New TV spot and two very pretty posters" »
The Minutemen were the first superhero team in the Watchmen universe. A sort of 'Justice Society of America' to the Watchmen's dysfunctional JLA. This terrific still from the eagely-anticipated adaptation of Alan Moore's deep, multilayered comic book series suggests that there will be ample attention paid to the wider context provided in the comic by Hollis Mason's memoir.
Remember, too that The Black Freighter is being filmed as a standalone animation that will, we now hear, be released as a DVD at or around the same time as the movie hits the multiplexes.
How Watchmen will play to newcomers I wouldn't like to say, but for those of us that revere the original trade paperback as one of the pinnacles of comic book creativity this is going to be a spectacular treat.
Time to relive those boardwalk moments, as Joel Schumacher's brat-pack vampire classic gets a DVD release.Better late than never, and in good time for the straight to DVD release of the long awaited sequel, Lost Boys The Tribe.
The transfer to DVD is fine, but dont expect much in the way of extras. Aside from the theatrical trailer, there's nothing to write home about, just some text based guff on cast, crew and so forth.
Don't let this absence of insight put you off. The film is as good as it ever was, and an essential edition to your library. IMDB's plot summary keywords give a good sense of the film; 'homoerotic tension', 'teen angst', 'wine' (although we know its really David's blood), 'garlic' and 'lifting person in air' (not unlike the portrayal of Kirk Douglas in Star Stories).
Yet, there is so much more. The thrill of the bike race to the point at Hudson's Bluff. Grandpa's taxidermy collection (he was Blossom's grandpa too you know). The infamous maggots scene that made me yearn to be a vampire - if only for the power to freak out fellow diners - and created an obsession with the difference in chinese take-out packaging accross the Atlantic. The soundtrack is as good as it ever was, Echo and the Bunnymen's Doors cover a great fit with the introduction to Creepy Santa Carla. Tim Capello Still Believes that tie dye leggings, oiled chest, chain jewellery and a Michael Bolton baiting hairpiece are de-rigeur. Judging by the current threads sported in East London, I'm inclined to agree.
As fashion and movie making comes full circle, remember things as they were. A true classic. Fun, yet gently frightening in places.
Somehow the sequel seems a bit too Buffy and unlikely match the original. The trailer is worth a peak. Poor old Corey Feldman has aged, but still seems to be dressed in the same vampire hunting getup. All those years of surfboard shaping haven't dented his desire to stake his claim as California's highest grossing hunter of the undead.The Lost Boys is available on DVD from Warner as part of the Movies that Matter series of re-issues. Go Warner!
And do check out that headband. Edgar Frogg, you rock hard!
Admittedly, it's one of those trailers that leaves you feeling like you've seen the whole film but clearly the studio thinks we need that from a superhero that we won't have read about before.
Hancock's not just any superhero though - he's the superhero that we would be if we were suddenly gifted with incredible powers: Unreliable, clumsy, irresponsible and frequently a little drunk.
When superhero parodies are done right (as in Mystery Men) they're fantastic. When they're done wrong (as in My Super Ex-Girlfriend) they're still pretty good.
With Iron Man, Incredible Hulk, and Dark Knight slugging it out for top spot this Summer, Hancock might just be the one that flies in and surprises everyone. Hopefully he won't break anything when he lands. You need Flash Player 8 or higher to view video content with the ROO Flash Player. Click here to download and install it.
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Cinema Blend reports this morning that the (not quite original, but definitely definitive) Jack Ryan, Harrison Ford, is under consideration for a return to the role he made his own in two early 90s movies.
Although preceded by Alec Baldwin in The Hunt for Red October Ford is still the actor most closely identified with Tom Clancy's CIA analyst turned super-agent turned President. A prequel of sorts, with fresh-faced Hollywood Jonah Ben Affleck as a younger version of Ryan, was met with little acclaim.
Recent reports had suggested that a complete reboot of the property was in hand but Ford's return to prominence on the release of the long-awaited fourth Indiana Jones outing seems to have turned the minds of the suits at Relativity Media toward a return to the old and familiar Ford face for the next Ryan movie - which will probably be based on Clancy's 'Without Remorse'.
No release date is currently set for the movie. An adaptation of Clancy's techno-thriller Rainbow Six is also in development for a potential 2010 release.
Batman on film has snagged a satisfyingly large version of the newest Dark Knight poster, which shows Heath Ledger as the Joker in all his twisted glory. Go here to download the full-sized image, which deserves to be on every Batman fan's desktop until mid-June at the very least.
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Those resourceful young men at Latino Review have got their hands on a David Goyer script for a Green Arrow movie.
Not just any movie though: This one takes the Guardian readers' favourite crime-fighting archer, strips him of his costume and equipment, and dumps him in a maximum-security prison for most of its running time.
Now this is a hero that few outside the comics subculture will recognise, unless they're really devoted to Smallville. As a fourth instalment in an already-established series it might fly, but as an opener? Madness.
Even with a David Goyer script, even with the suggested casting of Matt Damon as Green Arrow, this story will never reach the multiplexes.
I'd pay cash money for the graphic novel though...
There's a terrifically acerbic bit over on Cinema Blend announcing that John Cusack has signed for Roland Emmerich's next project, 2012.
It was only a matter of time before someone made a movie based on the ancient Mayan prophecy that the world would end in 2012. And, Roland Emmerich being the principal auteur of the modern disaster movie, it's no surprise that he's stepped up to the plate.
It's harsh, although funny, for Josh over at CB to say..
(Emmerich) has one script. It’s only the CGI that changes.
..and he goes on to predict that 2012 will be a complete turkey.
I'm more optimistic. I think Cusack is so likeable that he can rescue the most unpromising material. As long as the script steers clear of referencing London's hubris-ridden Olympic games I think it'll be a tolerable popcorner. Maybe a DVD rather than a cinema experience but all the same worth squandering two hours of your life on.
We'll see.
In an interview with Fox news, George Lucas has let slip that he is already thinking about another movie in the recently-revived Indiana Jones series.
The twist is that Harrison Ford would only be making a cameo appearance: "I haven't even told Steven or Harrison this," he said. "But I have an
idea to make Shia the lead character next time and have
Harrison come back like Sean Connery did in the last movie. I
can see it working out.
"And it's not like Harrison is even old.
I mean, he's 65 and he did everything in this movie. The old chemistry
is there, and it's not like he's an old man. He's incredibly agile; he
looks even better than he did 20 years ago, if you ask me."
Lucas is a brave man. There's little doubt that a LeBeouf-led Indy movie would meet the same widespread disapprobation that his widely (sometimes unjustly) Star Wars prequels did.
I must confess, I'd like to see him announce it formally - just for the fun of watching the baying mob form up over at Ain't it Cool news comment forums!
The first press audience to see Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull in Cannes this afternoon greeted the movie with sustained applause after whooping and hollering throughout.
Watch Times Chief Film Critic James Christopher's 60 second video review
Make no mistake, there is no danger of this film tanking. Harrison Ford is back to his athletic, wise-cracking, combatitive best as Dr Jones in Steven Spielberg's fourth installment of the series, and side kick Shia LaBeouf is a revelation, in more ways than one.
Everything about this Indiana Jones is bigger than previous instalments. The movie is effectively a chase from its opening scenes in the New Mexico desert to a climatic ending deep in the Amazonian jungle.
Ford is greyer than before, but otherwise looks and acts much the same as in the previous installment 19 years ago. He has his usual quota of punch-ups, chases and hair raising getaways, including a frankly implausible escape from a nuclear explosion where he's blasted to safety inside a lead lined refrigerator.
In his first dialogue, Dr Jones admits that "it won't be as easy as it used to be", but for the rest of the movie he goes about disproving his own theory.
His first jump is more like a lumber than the rolling leaps of 1981's Raiders of the Lost Ark, but the thrills and spills get more and more outlandish as the movie progresses.
Indiana has to deal with giant waterfalls, giant red ants and the biggest temple complex he's ever had to negotiate.
Playing a Soviet agent keen to harness the Crystal Skull's powers as a weapon, Cate Blanchett is less menacing than Indy's Nazi rivals in previous movies, but the real battle was always going to be winning over the critics.
If today's hyper-critical Cannes press audience liked it, there's a good chance you will too.
Tonight on the Cannes red carpet, Spielberg, Lucas and Ford will confidently stride up the steps knowing they've delivered a sure-fire hit.
Steven Spielberg and the cast of the new Indiana Jones movie will have woken with smiles on their faces this morning. After days of rain Cannes is basking under blue skies.
There's an unmistakable sense of Indy-mania on the Croisette, with scores of fans already surrounding the Palais (the complex of cinemas and media facilities that hosts screenings), holding signs begging for a precious "invitation" to this evening's world premiere.
Spielberg's Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull sees Ford back as the fedora-wearing adventurer for the first time in 19 years.
Excitement reaches fever-pitch today when the film shows out of competition, with a press conference and photocall this afternoon.
The fourth instalment in Steven Spielberg's blockbusting adventure series has taken nearly two decades to reach the big screen after the release of the rather misnamed Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade, which saw Indiana and his grumpy father, played by Sean Connery, wrest the Holy Grail from the clutches of the Nazis.
The third adventure became the highest grossing picture of 1989 and of the entire series. Episode IV is expected to supersede all predecessors.
The new film sees Indy and sidekick Mac (British star Ray Winstone) escape a close scrape with Soviet agents on a remote airfield. Dr Jones returns home to Marshall College - only to find things have gone from bad to worse.
The dean of the college explains that Jones is under suspicion, and that the government has put pressure on the university to fire him.
On his way out of town, Indy meets rebellious young Mutt (Shia LaBeouf), who carries a grudge and a proposition for the archaeologist - if he will help him on a personal mission, he could make one of the most spectacular finds in history - the Crystal Skull of Akator. The archaeological treasure is an object of fascination, superstition and fear.
As Indy and Mutt set out for the most remote corners of Peru, they realise they are not alone in their mission. Soviet agents are also hot on the trail of the Crystal Skull. Chief among them is ice maiden Irina Spalko (Cate Blanchett), whose elite military unit is scouring the globe. They believe the find could help the Soviets dominate the world - if they can unlock its secrets.
Indy and Mutt must find a way to grapple with enemies and friends of questionable motives and stop the powerful Crystal Skull from falling into deadly hands.
At the age of 65, Harrison Ford recently tied with Die Hard star Bruce Willis for the top spot in a Pearl and Dean poll to find the greatest ever action heroes.
If the new film is also a smash hit, it could spark a renewed interest in archaeology.
Ford has been elected to the Archaeological Institute of America (AIA)'s board of directors after glamorising the subject on the silver screen.
AIA president Brian Rose recently said that Ford, in his role as Indiana, had played a major part in stimulating interest in archaeological exploration.
The group promotes archaeological excavation, research, education and preservation around the world.
Crystal skulls are intricately-carved artefacts which have been linked to the Aztec and Mayan civilisations.
Some people believe they have magical healing properties.
Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull is released in the UK on Thursday, May 22.
No one in Cannes apart from a select few movie executives has actually seen Indiana Jones and
the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, but the buzz here tonight is as gloomy as the weather (it's been raining all day).
A poster called ShogunMaster on leading movie website Ain't it Cool News said: "I remember seeing the two trailers and though I was excited to see the
old man in action again, I was kind of worried that they seemed to be
missing 'something'. That something was tension. During the whole of
the movie, there was not a single moment that I thought our hero Mr.
Jones (actually Colonel Jones as he was a hero in WWII now) was in any
sort of peril or even significant inconvenience. In most cases, you
were so many steps ahead of the characters that it was really just an
arduous wait for them to get through it."
You can read the full review here: but be warned, there are plenty of spoilers.
Check back tomorrow afternoon for James Christopher's review.
Apart from "is it any good?" the other question on everyone's lips out here, is whether 65-year-old star Harrison Ford can still cut it as an action hero.
Taking questions from journalists ahead of the tomorrow's premiere, Ford
said there had been no attempt to hide his real age.
"We don't handle the age question, we ignore it. We've moved 20 years deeper into history. We're no
longer dealing with Nazis, but we have Russian villains.
"Age has its virtues and it has its disadvantages. I think we embrace the reality of the passage of 20
years. We're not coy about it."
On Sunday afternoon Indiana Jones faces his most gruelling test ever, something even more challenging than giant runaway boulders, Nazis on sidecars or chambers full of snakes.
This nemesis? The hyper-critical massed ranks of the world's most serious film critics and most important movie executives, lined-up in the Grand Theatre Lumiere in Cannes to judge the first Indiana Jones for 19 years.
Two years ago, Tom Hanks climbed the red carpet steps for the world premiere of The Da Vinci Code already knowing critics' damning verdict was in. Hanks and director Ron Howard had to smile for the tuxedo clad paparazzi through gritted teeth - and they looked similarly shell-shocked at the afterparty.
To avoid a similar scenario on Sunday, director Spielberg, producer Lucas and studio Paramount have adopted a different strategy.
Leaked screenings have already dampened expectations. Junket interviews are scheduled before the screening, rather than the usual practise of letting journalists see a film before they question its stars, and access to Spielberg is strictly limited to the official press conference.
In contrast to the huge and heavily criticised Da Vinci Code party, where stars had to mix with hostile critics, Sunday's Indy party will be a "film-makers' party" for a strictly controlled 250 guests - with no press.
So why even open in Cannes given the possibility of a hostile reception?
It's a trade off worth making. Spielberg and Lucas cement their position as Grand Old Men of Cinema on a carpet trod by masters such as Fellini and Bergman.
Every international media outlet interested in film has a presence in Cannes, so the film is guaranteed huge global exposure.
And even if the Crystal Skull is a turkey, it's unlikely to affect the movie's box office numbers. Cinemas report huge numbers booking in advance. Despite the critical mauling after its Cannes premiere, The Da Vinci Code earned $758m worldwide.
Not quite sure if Tintin qualifies as a Comic Book Hero, but he was one of mine when I was a kid, and he was clearly a favourite of Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson's too.
The ET and Jurassic Park director has confirmed that he will "probably" co-direct the third film in the forthcoming Tintin trilogy with the Lord of the Rings supremo.
"We're making three movies back to back", Spielberg said in Los Angeles. "I'll direct the first one, he'll [Peter Jackson] direct the second and we'll probably co-direct the third."
The triology will star King Kong and LotR's Andy Serkis as Captain Haddock, and Thomas Sangster as Tintin.
One: Despite all the ballyhoo about Iron Man's impressive box office figures, and despite the numerous hints at a sequel scattered throughout the movie's screenplay, Jon Favreau is by no means certain to direct the second movie in the franchise.
Speaking on Howard Stern's radio show last week, Favreau said "They haven't offered me anything yet. They're all talking -- they want to do it, they even announced a date."
If Marvel Studios really don't have Favreau locked in right now that's a considerable oversight. It'll be a good deal harder to negotiate with a director when his movie is at the top of the box office charts.
Two: keen-eyed fanboys across the globe are sure that Captain America's iconic shield can be spotted in the background of Tony Stark's workroom in one scene of Iron Man. It seems improbable, given that the film's continuity doesn't even hint at a meeting between Stark and Cap at that point, and that the super-soldier would be unlikely to just leave his most potent weapon lying around on someone else's workbench.
There's something there alright though. What do you think? Take a look at the screengrabs over at i09
In 100 hours time those clutching a precious Invitation for the hottest ticket in Cannes - the world premiere of Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull - will climb the steps to the Grand Theatre Lumiere and sit in eager anticipation of Spielberg's blockbuster spectacular.
What's taken him so long? This week the director revealed that it was Oscar night in 1994 when Indy star Harrison Ford first asked "When are we going to make another Indiana Jones movie? I'm ready." A whole fourteen years ago.
"That was five years after The Last Crusade," remembers Spielberg, talking to the press last week in LA. "I said I didn't know, you have to call George [Lucas]. So Harrison called George and about a week later George called me and said |
