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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.
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.
It's a tenuous enough suggestion at this point, but it's enough to get me excited: Keanu Reeves has not quite said 'no' to a possible third installment of the air-guitar-playing time-travelling, dimension-crossing wonderment that is Bill and Ted. At least, according to MTV movies.
Bill S.Preston Esq. and Ted 'Theodore' Logan last graced the screen in 1991 and since then Alex Winter (the blond one) has carved himself out a lucrative career directing TV commercials, music videos and the odd movie while Keanu Reeves (the one who says 'woah!') has gone on to say 'woah!' in Speed, Point Break, The Matrix and some other films we don't care about.
I refrained from posting this yesterday, mindful of the date, but as no-one has come out yet and said it's a joke..and as no-one has actually said a third Bill and Ted movie is coming, it seems safe enough now to mention it.
The complex online viral campaign for new Batman movie The Dark Knight had an entirely understandable pause after the untimely death of Joker actor Heath Ledger but seems now to be gathering momentum again. This Gotham-themed Drudge clone is my current favourite. The latest development is the mysterious Clown Travel website which is currently displaying a cryptic photo (see above) but may well be doing something altogether different tomorrow.
Most of the existing campaign has involved events in the US, but note the stickers on the suitcase (while trying to ignore the slightly shaky perspective work). Could the Clown Prince of Crime be on his way to London?
We'll find our on April Fools' day. Or maybe we won't. It depends on who exactly the Joker is setting out to fool.
After the collapse of Jack Black's rather unlikely attempt at Green Lantern it looked as if the property might be dead, at least until after George Miller's Justice League movie completed its interminable gestation.
Now, though Comicology suggests that Greg Berlanti, writer of neo-Dallas Dirty Sexy Money is currently working on the script for a live-action Green Lantern movie. Maybe that sneaky poster in I am Legend that hinted at a live action movie about the interplanetary peacekeeper wasn't such a red herring after all..
Nevertheless, IMDB is currently displaying an eerily blank page with just a year of release, 2010, for Green Lantern.
The smart money is on any Green Lantern project featuring the John Stewart incarnation of GL, although Comicology offers this intriguing counter-argument: However, the Justice League movie has John Stewart already set to be
their Green Lantern, so Berlanti’s Green Lantern may still be Hal
Jordan. And, fortunately for Hal Jordan fans, the direct-to-DVD movie
Justice League: New Frontier gave Mr. Jordan a lot of new fans, and has
increased his grip on his standing as the Green Lantern among kids and the general public.
It's a tough one: I loved the Hal Jordan Green Lantern books as a young lad, but I can't help thinking that the effects technology to convincingly depict the power of the ring is likely to remain beyond our grasp for a couple of decades yet. What do you think? Does this sound like a great fun movie or a disaster in the making? Sound off in the comments below:
Frank Herbert’s messianic tale of worm-related hi-jinks on Arrakis, the Desert
Planet, has already been a sprawling miniseries for the SciFi channel and (most
memorably) a giddy gothic epic starring Kyle McLachan and featuring tantric bassman Sting in an amusing
space Speedo.
Now, perhaps emboldened by the huge success of the Lord of
the Rings trilogy, Paramount are gearing up to attempt the galaxy-spanning spice saga again. Instead of the
weirdo’s weirdo David Lynch at the helm we have actor/director Peter Berg, best
remembered as the all-too-mortal bounty hunty hunter Pistol Pete Deeks in
Smokin’ Aces. Berg has also directed Will Smith’s nice-looking superhero comedy
Hancock which is due for release in July.
This new version doesn’t have a script or even a writer yet,
but Berg is reportedly promising an entirely different direction than the one
Lynch took. The project is slated as a major Summer blockbuster for Paramount with, they say, its theme of finite ecological resources promising to be particularly timely.
This early in production it would be reckless to predict a
release date, so I will: Dune will be in cinemas in Summer 2010.
Samuel L.Jackson's cameos in (definitely) Iron Man and (probably) The Incredible Hulk have been widely reported around the web and a few shots of the cult favourite actor have escaped the set to be distributed around the globe. The short scene, together with the notion that it might set up a future Avengers movie, is something that has excited the vast legion of Internet-savvy fanboys to an almost fever pitch.
Except now it might not happen. Or it might. There's talk over on Comic Book Resources that it 'may' not: “Iron
Man” will hit theatres on May 2nd. Samuel L. Jackson IS playing Nick
Fury but his cameo may not appear in THIS film. They also confirmed
that there is a crossover between this movie and “The Incredible Hulk”. [my italics]
Whether the Fury scene is being held back for some sort of DVD extra, or whether Marvel are just trying (quixotically) to restore the element of surprise is hard to say. It seems improbable that Jackson's performance will end up on the cutting room floor. He's still in IMDB's cast list and one look at the Ultimate Avengers incarnation of Fury (see pic) will convince you that Marvel believe in Sam L. as the director of S.H.I.E.L.D.
Sympathy for Lady Vengeance is a 2005 Korean movie from the same team
that produced the crossover hit Oldboy. It tells a roughly similar story to
Oldboy too: In it a woman is convicted of a crime she did not commit and, rather
then forming a team with Hannibal and Mr.T, concocts a long carefully thought out plan of revenge.
The original movie is beyond our remit here, being both in
foreign language and possessed of an elaborate piece of art-house artifice
wherein the movie is slowly drained of all colour as the protagonist’s
personality becomes more cold and ruthless.
However news that Oscar winner Charlize Theron is planning to produce and star in an English-language remake puts Lady
Vengeance firmly on our radar: For every brainy film like Monster that she
performs in there are two pieces of outright popcorn silliness in her CV. She’s
due to appear in Will Smith’s superhero comedy Hancock later this year, she was
in wildly giddy futuristic thriller Æon Flux, and – for goodness’ sake – she was
even in Children of the Corn III.
Charlize Theron’s production of Sympathy for Lady Vengeance
will be released in cinemas some time in 2009.
Classics scholars may find this unlikely, but SOS Hollywood assures us that a second installment of Zack Snyder's comic book epic 300 is on its way down the pipe.
There are certainly a whole bunch of other epic battles in the history books to take a look at, but could another 300 ever have the visual or dramatic impact of the original?
Some people just can't get enough of the movie franchise turned comic book crossover turned movie franchise that is Aliens versus Predator.
And some of those people, it seems, are at Fox. The movie nerd maths geeks over at Shock Till You Drop have crunched the numbers, looked at their tea leaves, and made a phone call to an un-named Fox executive which brings them to the conclusion that a third instalment of the giant acid-filled bug thing versus freaky-mouthed dreadlock hunter series is a 'certainty'.
It seems like the law of diminishing returns ought to have kicked in by now but I suppose they still have all the rubber suits, maybe they've even got a couple of tubs of alien mouth goop left over, and it's not like they have to pay Arnie or Sigourney Weaver any more.
The Starship Troopers 'Direct to DVD' route strikes me as the sensible option for the studio here. Let's see how long it takes them to come to the same conclusion. PS: This piece of craziness, which I found in the comments on this story over at Fark.com, would be a wonderful basis for any future AvP movie!
PPS: We've seen Aliens-themed games before, but here's a new one...
Well, from IESB actually.
Although it's hardly shock news IESB have obtained confirmation from Warner Bothers that former X-Men director Bryan Singer has officially signed to direct the followup to his first Superman movie, Superman Returns, which is to be called Man of Steel.
Of more interest, lower down in the credits, is the suggestion that Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris will not be asked back to write the sequel and will be replaced by Transformers alumni Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman. That's not necessarily bad news: Transformers was a lot better than most reviews might have you believe even if it was more of a 'ride' than a 'film' and the unwise introduction of the half-Kryptonian hybrid super-baby in Superman Returns struck a needlessly jarring note I always felt.
Of course now the new writers have the interesting challenge of either using or losing Brat-El in a way that doesn't mess too severely with the continuity of the rebooted franchise.
In an interview with MTV's movie blog Mean Girls and Wedding Crashers actress Rachel McAdams has expressed her enthusiasm to play one of the superhero roles that everyone seems to be playing at the moment.
Not just any superhero though, but an incredibly niche character that only long-time comic book nerds will remember. Black Orchid started out as a filler character in DC comics of the mid Seventies. She had the standard superhero flight and strength tricks, but cracked her cases principally by stealth, often spending an entire story disguised as someone in the villain's household.
The character never really took off and was abandoned by DC after a couple of years only to be resurrected by Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean during the great graphic novel boom of the late Eighties.
Gaiman has a magical realist style that seems to work just as well on film or in novels as it does in the funny papers, and it matched well with his dreamlike tale of a plant based heroine, a sort of sexy Swamp Thing, who budded off her own replacement when killed by her enemies.
Here's Rachel's explanation of Black Orchid's singular charm:
“I just read this book ‘Black Orchid’ and it’s a really interesting
character,” the actress said. “She’s a superhero that’s a flower. I
don’t know if that would work or the audiences would be interested in
that, but she was kind of cool.”
There's no firm deal to make the movie, and indeed no business action around the property other than McAdams' enthusiasm, but with that one interview she has guaranteed herself a lifelong following of fanboy comics nerds who are thrilled that she seems to be one of their tribe.
Now this is a pretty tenuous rumour but if there's any truth to it it's a very exciting one.
Slashfilm are today reporting that the owner of Satin Dolls, the strip club that Sopranos fans know as Bada Bing, has been approached by the producers of a mooted Sopranos movie and asked not to change his décor for the time being, so as to retain continuity with the recently completed television series.
The inconclusive finale of the show does rather leave the door open for another go-around with everybody's favourite dysfunctional mob family, although with Christopher gone and Silvio at death's door Tony doesn't have too much of a crew to work with any more.
Hot on the heels of the talk of a 24 movie iand with Sex and The City due out soon it's a good time for fans of high quality TV drama transposed to the big screen for no apparent reason.
I hope it's true. Slashfilm better not be bustin' our balls.
What with writers strikes and drink-driving charges the 24 camp is a little behind on delivering the hot whisper/chase/torture/kidnap drama that 24 fans crave.
Which is why the fine people at Fox are thinking they might assuage the desire of desperate Jack Bauer fans by delivering a feature-length prequel that fits between series six and seven of the riotously implausible but endlessly entertaining anti-terrorist drama.
That's according to Hollywood Reporter anyway, and we have no reason to doubt them.
Everywhere you look on the Internet right now, there seems to be a report that Disney are gearing up to produce a sequel to the 1982 nerd-fest Tron.
The movie, which starred Jeff Bridges as a computer hacker digitised and inserted into the electronic world he manipulates, won a huge fanbase for its pioneering look at virtual worlds and for the (then) state-of-the art chromakey effects.
Bridges was reportedly reviewing a script for the sequel, which is expected in 2010, but there is no hard information about any casting on the new movie yet. Indeed IMDB's page for the new Tron movie is completely blank apart from the expected release date although multiple sources are positing Joseph Kosinski as the likely director. Kosinski's best known work so far is the promotional short for Halo 3, Starry Night.
Another consistent element in the great whirl of wild rumour is the assertion that the movie will be in 3D, which given Hollywood's renewed enthusiasm for depth perception in film, combined with Tron Rev 2.0's likely all-digital production, seems so likely as to be perhaps the only certainty in the entire story.
Also in today's Variety is the news that Terminator 4, or Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins to give it its correct title, now has an official release date of May 22, 2009. Buried near the bottom of the report though is the first inkling that this new film will not terminate the series:
Storyline is being kept under tight wraps, but plot is part of a
planned three-picture arc that begins after Skynet has destroyed much
of humanity in a nuclear holocaust.
Not perhaps the hugest surprise, given Hollywood's desire to milk every franchise until its pips squeak, but with the inclusion of Christian Bale giving the new movie significant star weight this enterprise has the air of a fresh new start for the series after the comparative disappointment of Terminator 3 rather than the beginning of a long slow slide into direct-to-DVD purgatory.
Wildest and most tenuous rumour of the morning is that JJ Abrams has already selected a title for the follow up to his much-discussed creature feature Cloverfield.
There is speculation, very sensibly guarded speculation, over at MoviesOnline that it may be entitled Aladygma.
Not much more can be said on the subject until the inevitable viral
marketing juggernaut starts up, but at least you'll have a few months
to figure out how to pronounce it.
Set in the timeframe bertween Batman Begins and the hotly anticipated Dark Knight, the Batman:Gotham Knight DVD contains six Batman stories by the likes of David S.Goyer and Greg Rucka which have been animated by a number of top Japanese artists, giving them distinctly different look and feel to the by now standard Bruce Timm interpretation.
There are at least three animation houses producing content for the DVD: Madhouse, Prodiction I.G and Studio 4ºc are definitely working on segments. This should give each individual stories a characteristic visual style. It's reminiscent on the approach taken on The Animatrix, the suite of animations that was released between the two Matrix sequels and explored different aspects of the Matrix universe.
Anticipation for Christopher Nolan's next chapter in the Batman story is already running at fever pitch, so the appeal of this DVD, due out before June this year, should spread far beyond the fans who bought feature-length animated Batman productions like Mask of the Phantasm. Personally? My order's in.
Despite rumours of its demise, little snippets just keep popping up about Justice League. Blockbuster's blog (no relation) has the following quote attributed to 'A Hollywood Casting Agent' I hope it's a hoax:
“Feb
28, Sydney, Australia: The film is about Green Lantern, Green Arrow and
others of the Justice League of America, an organisation made up of the
world's greatest superheroes. They must deal with the expulsion of
Batman and the death of Superman at the hands of the monstrous
Doomsday”.
Well, I follow the logic of keeping Superman out of it, that halves your effects budget right there: although you still have complex flying effects for the likes of Green Lantern and J'onn J'onzz to consider. However if you're losing both Superman and Batman that's the recognition factor for non comics geeks totally eroded at a stroke. Who's going to replace them? Booster Gold? Blue Beetle? There are very few movie fans who will have the slightest idea who those characters are and, worse, may not care to find out.
I would love to see a JLA movie done right, but George Miller's production shows at this early stage no sign of being any better than this one.
It's not all bad news for Batman fans though. Click here for some exciting news from Gotham City
Although we still await official confirmation, Ain't It Cool News is this morning confident that they know who will be replacing Heath Ledger in Terry Gilliam's epic fantasy The Imaginarium of Dr.Parnassus.
In a clever coup, Ledger's role will be taken by three wildly popular male stars. Made possible by the film's subject matter, the scenes already filmed with ledger in the 'real world' will be retained but every time he passes through a mirror-portal into one of the film's fantasy worlds his character will portrayed by (successively) Jude Law, Colin Farrell, and Johnny Depp.
Something like this has been rumoured for a little while, but it's astounding that Gilliam has managed to snag three such high-profile stars. Perhaps this marks an end to the run of disasters that seem to have plagued the former Monty Python animator since the Nineties.
If nothing else, sheer curiosity will drive significant numbers of extra moviegoers to check out this extraordinary production.
Matrix creators Andy and Larry (or is it Lana?) Wachowski have already begun work on their next film after May’s Speed Racer. It’s called Ninja Assassin and will star South Korean pop star Rain.
Also known as Jung Ji-hoon, Rain seems to have mastered the knack of picking movies with wonderful titles: his only previous appearance was in in fellow Korean Park Chan-wook's 2007 Berlin Competition entry I'm a Cyborg, but That's OK and he has recorded a version of Carl Douglas’ seventies hit Kung Fu Fighting for forthcoming all-star animation Kung Fu Panda.
The Wachowskis will write and produce, with James McTeigue, who worked on the Matrix series before going on to direct V for Vendetta, in the director’s chair. Not much is known of the plot yet, but the movie’s called Ninja Assassin. How bad can it be?
Shooting War, the bleakly cynical look at a near-future war that began life as an online strip, before morphing into a graphic novel, is
about to change its form again. The Forbidden Planet blog is today reporting
that Dan Goldman and Anthony Lappe’s creation has now been optioned as a
feature film.
The web comic always had a somewhat cinematic, or
televisual, feel, with the shape of the frames carefully chosen to feel like it
was an HDTV news broadcast beamed in from the future. It’ll be interesting to
see which details from the ground breaking strip survive in the movie. Will John
McCain be the President in 2011? Will the producers dare to bomb a branch of Starbucks in
the first scene?
As Joe notes over at Forbidden Planet, a great deal more movies
are planned than are released (the quoted producers have several other properties in development including an adaptation of late night TV favourite The Equaliser) but material of such obvious cinematic promise should
be hard to ruin. Shooting War: The Movie is something to look forward to.
Depending on your level of geekiness you describe either
Revenge of the Sith or Return of the Jedi as the ‘last’ Star Wars movie. Now it
looks as if there will be another possibility to further confuse matters. The official
Star Wars website has confirmed the recent rumours bubbling throughout the web that
Lucasfilm will be releasing their new, all-CGI, ‘Clone Wars’ feature in cinemas
before transferring to television for a weekly series. It's thought that Lucas also still intends to continue with the live-action Star Wars TV series that was widely reported in 2007.
The new series' style of the animation is markedly different to Genndy
Tarkovsky’s high-on-aspartame animated Clone Wars shorts which were so popular
with younger satellite subscribers and older DVD buyers in 2003. Anakin
Skywalker takes centre-stage, looking a little like Hayden Christensen but
somehow less so than the surly line drawing of the earlier cartoon. He also
appears to have a young apprentice in tow who has previously not been mentioned
in any of the complex concordances of the Star Wars universe. It will be
interesting to see just how George Lucas weaves her in without unravelling the delicate
skein of story holding his imaginary universe together.
The action of the new Clone Wars saga will take place between the second and third films of the prequel storyline, representing a continuity challenge of enormous proportions for the writers if they are to avoid bumping into plot points of Revenge of the Sith.
The feature will be released in US cinemas on 15 August, and
in UK cinemas later in the year. The series will air on Cartoon Network in the Autumn.
There's a new thaw in Hollywood this week as directors are daring to believe that they might be making movies again some time soon.
Ridley Scott has stopped talking about his frankly baffling plan to adapt the classic board game Monopoly as a feature film property and is instead talking up Nottingham, a re-examination of the Robin Hood legend featuring that master of historical action Russell Crowe.
Meanwhile Neil Marshall has been added to the impressive list of directors under consideration for the new Conan movie. The project has been on hold for the duration of the Writers’ Guild strike but with that now all but resolved Thomas Dean Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer’s scripting plans are back under way. Marshall was of course director of the exuberantly silly Dog Soldiers, and so has already demonstrated a sure hand with combat, gore, and wilful self-mockery. He should be perfect for Conan.
Finally, the vast catalogue of planned movies to be helmed by Hellboy director Guillermo del Toro just got a little longer. Marvel Comics’ in-house sorcerer Dr.Strange is said to be next for the big-screen treatment and del Toro is, wisely in our view, chatting to celebrated fantasy author Neil Gaiman about a script. Whether that’s to be filmed before or after he wraps on The Hobbit, or consummates his long-held desire to shoot a Harry Potter movie is anybody’s guess.
 Cinematical is reporting this morning that Bollywood star turned tabloid darling Shilpa Shetty has signed to play a character called 'Devi' in the new James Bond movie Quantum of Solace.
Shetty, best known for her dignified response to an avalanche of abuse from a group of other inmates in the last Celebrity Big Brother, has appeared in around 50 Hindi-language productions but the James Bond outing would represent her first Hollywood role.
Little is known yet about the scope of the character - whether it's a significant part or a cameo - but it's undoubtedly the kind of thing Shilpa was shooting for when she entered the Big Brother circus.
It looks as if those fine people over at The 213 may have the answer to one of the hottest casting questions of 2009: Who could possibly replace The Governor of California in the next Terminator movie? Arnold Schwarzenegger is in pretty good shape for a politician but it would be a very brave 62-year-old who went up against Christian Bale in a scrap.
Strangely-named director McG has revealed that he is instead looking to Josh Brolin to step up as the killer cyborg from the future in Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins. Josh is the son of Amityville Horror star James Brolin, and stepson of Barbra Streisand so he’s practically Hollywood royalty. Recent roles in No Country for Old Men and In the Valley of Elah have built his reputation as a name to watch.
McG says in the interview: "It's very difficult to say because it's a decidedly masculine role and I think we're living in a time where a lot of actors are very effeminate and they're sort of skinny, heroine [sic] chic and there's really a masculine component to the role. And there's guys out there like Russell Crowe and Eric Bana, bring a good physicality, they do what they do, but I don't know if they're exactly right at the end of the day. Josh Brolin is a very exciting actor - we'll see"
The movie is the long-promised ‘future war’ segment of the Terminator franchise so far seen only in short flash-forwards in the main movies and a 3-D special at the Universal Studios theme park.
It would be a brave man indeed who would bet against Arnie turning up in at least a cameo role, but even if he doesn’t, this film has just been added to our list of big silly movies to get excited about. While we're wating for the movie to arrive, why not read our list of The 50 Best Robots in Movies ?
Many gentlemen of a certain age will have fond memories of Robin Hardy's cult pagan chiller The Wicker Man, which featured a notorious nude folk song performance by Britt Ekland (or her body double) that considerably enlivened the bleak 1970s. It was the first, and until Mel Gibson's Apocalypto, probably the only film to make commercial hay from JG Frazer's learned treatise on world religion The Golden Bough and taught many an impressionable young urbanite that the wilds of Scotland were to be avoided at all costs.
Now, before the shock of Nicolas Cage's rather unnecessary remake has fully subsided, Ms. Ekland has told The Sunday Herald that many of the original cast are reuniting with director Hardy to revisit the subject matter in Cowboys for Christ, an adaptation of Hardy's own Wicker Man inspired novel from 2006.
Britt Ekland and Christopher Lee are both set to appear, with Joan Collins taking the part played by Vanessa Redgrave Diane Cilento in the 1973 film. There is also talk of a third film about the perils of the Hebrides. The Scottish Tourist Board may never recover.
Cinema Blend is today suggesting that a standalone movie may be in the works featuring Venom, the sinister black slick of alien goo that temporarily became the web-slinger's costume in Spiderman 3. It doesn't sound like the most likely project to us, certainly not as live-action, but if the generally very reliable CB report it then there's likely to be at least some truth behind the rumour. You heard it here first. Or, strictly speaking, second.
The first solid details are starting to emerge about what, for me at least, is the most exciting movie prospect of 2009. Watchmen, an adaptation of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' hugely influential comic book series, was first promised as a Terry Gilliam epic back in the mid-1990s. The melding of Moore's dytopian parallel history and the dreamy alternate world of Gilliam's 'Brazil' looked to be a winner but budgetary constraints consigned the project to development hell. In Gilliam's words, 'I recognised that I was about the only person who could do it well, but then I didn't get the money. So I was 'saved' from that one"
Now helmed by Zack Snyder, who demonstrated his facility with bringing comic book fantasies to life in '300', the movie finally looks to be edging towards completion. Carla Gugino, who plays the original Silk Spectre in Snyder's production, spoke to MTV's movie blog:
“It incorporates real history and the fictitious world of Watchmen, and so it’s very cool,we meet Nixon and all sorts of people.”
Sin City actress Gugino's character ages from her early twenties to her mid-late sixties in the story, which follows the exploits of a superhero team from the 1930s to an apocalyptic Cold War scenario some time in the eighties. It remains to be seen how the effects team will handle radioactive demigod Dr.Manhattan on screen, and diehard fans who have been waiting twenty years for the film version will be desperate to see how the interstitial chapters of Hollis Mason's autobiography and The Black Freighter will fit in.
We'll no doubt find out more over the next twelve long months as we wait for the film that stands a fair chance of being the Best Superhero Movie Ever. Michael Moran
Despite Harvey Weinstein's optimistic assertion that the revived Rambo franchise would spawn further sequels, The Guardian today quotes star Sylvester Stallone as saying that the shirtless killing machine had knifed his last anonymous ethnic heavy. He's also ruled out further bouts for Rocky. No word either way yet on a sequel for Stop! Or my Mom will shoot! Michael Moran
In an interview for Gothamist magazine Cloverfield director Matt Reeves talks mainly about the experience of making this season's most talked-about creature feature but also lets slip a few details about what his next project might be. Invisible Woman won't have anything to do with Marvel's Fantastic Four property, although we don't doubt there will be some legal discussion about that, and instead looks to be (we hope) a gender-flipped re-take of the Claude Rains classic featuring a see-through beauty queen. There are few details available at the moment, but as JJ Abrams is producing, expect a new twist on an old idea, a sassy female lead, and of course a protracted viral teaser campaign.
Michael Moran, the Invisible Man
Our friends over at The Register tell us that the next venerable franchise to get a reboot will be Wes Craven's Nightmare on Elm Street. Hard to see what any director could bring to the table that Wes hasn't already explored with his hallucinogenic Eighties horror films, the spin-off TV series, and range of lunchboxes and table linen. Hard, that is, until you read that the director is Master of Explosions Michael Bay. Two entire universes of silliness are about to collide, and we want to be there when it happens.
Michael Moran
Hellboy director Guillermo del Toro has reportedly signed to direct two movies based on JRR Tolkein's The Hobbit. The book, which introduces characters and situations later explored in Tolkein's sprawling Lord of the Rings trilogy, was once considered as the basis for a Beatles movie but has only been filmed once as an animated 1977 TV special. Del Toro recently expressed a desire to get involved in another world-beating fantasy franchise, is still talking about his long-cherished HP Lovecraft project and is reportedly developing an adaptation of Frankenstein. He can't make all those films. Can he?
Michael Moran
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