Tag: Guillermo del Toro (Page 2 of 6)

Movies news on a Monday night

September 20, 2010 /

Direct from the Starbucks at Pico & Robertson…

Jon Hamm in * Rumors have been circulating for at least a week that Jon Hamm of “Mad Men” and now “The Town” is being considered to play Superman. I’m a huge fan of the guy, but count me among those who think he’s a bit old to play an eternally youthful superguy, if there’s going to be more than one movie anyhow. Kal-El is not Tony Stark. In any case, apparently someone else who it appears did turn down the role of Superman director was Guillermo del Toro. Actually, if they ever make a movie set in the Bizarro world, del Toro would be the guy. Otherwise, I don’t see it at all and, it seems, neither did del Toro.

* In terms of film biz transactions, the Toronto International Film Festival surprised everyone and did rather well with numerous indie films being purchased for release. What doe it mean? Mike Fleming sees a modified return of the indie market, though with a thriftier than ever edge.

* The first casting news has come for the J.J. Abrams’ science fiction Steven Spielberg homage/collaboration, “Super 8.” Naturally, one of the stars is a young person — Elle Fanning. The other is closer to my age and is best known for his TV work. No, it’s not Abe Vigoda, but Kyle Chandler of “Friday Night Lights.”

* Speaking of people in my general age cohort who can’t escape their youth, Keanu Reeves is apparently getting colleauges like Alex Winter ready to do a middle-aged edition of the “Bill & Ted” epic. As actors go, Reeves may not be a Philip Seymour Hoffman-level thespian, but he really excels at certain kinds of comedy and I’m board for this. He does a pretty good Werner Herzog, besides.

* Tim Burton is going back to where he started as a director with a stop-motion version of his career-starting live-action short, “Frankenweenie.” The voice cast has just been announced and it will include Winona Ryder, Martin Landau, and SCTV alums Catherine O’Hara and Martin Short.

* Did anybody out there ask for a “Timecop” reboot? Simon Brew is game.

* Re: l’affaire du Hulk back in July, Edward Norton continues to kill Marvel’s Kevin Feige with perhaps not kindness, but civility. Ouch.

* I beg to differ with Sarah Silverman, her “full frontal” nude scene will be pretty. Very pretty.

sarah_silverman

* I’ve seen movies in some mighty small “shoebox” multiplex theaters and screening rooms, but if you’re wondering how small a movie theater can be, this promotion for “Buried” answers the question.

* As I write this I’m getting ready to watch the multi-director documentary “Freakonomics” for free. You however, may pay as little as a penny and as much as a $100 to see it this Wednesday. It’s your choice. Still, we know there’ s no such thing as a truly free, or almost free, anything and, as with writers like myself, some effort is expected in return. Details here.

Action Movies, Actors, Actresses, External Entertainment, External Movies, External TV, Mad Men, Movie Comedies, Movie Dramas, Movies, News, Sci-Fi Movies, TV, TV Dramas

When Cthulu calls…

August 14, 2010 /

Best not to answer. I’ve probably seen only a small fraction of the H.P. Lovecraft adaptations out there — and many more of those than I ever was able to get through his stories whenever I came across them in the many science fiction and horrorish anthologies I devoured as a very young would-be literary geek. I always expected Lovecraft to be like Poe, who I loved. He wasn’t.

Anyhow, “Re-Animator” notwithstanding, this is clearly my favorite filmic adaptation so far — and beautifully animated and more or less 100% gore-free as it is, I’d didn’t even have to make myself half-drunk to comfortably watch it. Also, unlike the stories, this one moves at a very nice clip and let’s just say the rhetorical style is a bit less deliberately arcane though future generations might disagree on that score.

Part of me wants to dig up Lovecraft (his books, I mean) now and take a new whack at it in preparation for Guillermo del Toro’s upcoming potential geek classic, “At the Mountains of Madness.”

H/t to Rob Bricken, a man of fine taste.

Animation, External Entertainment, External Movies, Horror Movies, Humor, Movies, Sci-Fi Movies

Don’t be afraid of this trailer.

August 5, 2010 /

It’s just a bit of filmed promotion. It can’t possibly hurt you. Besides director Troy Nixey and cowriter-producer Guillermo del Toro are, I’m sure, nice people who wish only to entertain you. They mean you no harm. Their remake of the 1973 TV movie “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark” doesn’t even appear to have much gore in it. (It’s rated R for “violence and terror”). Yet…well, watch if you dare. (H/t Bloody Disgusting)

Good work, that. I literally had my eyes half-covered while I watched this thing, even as I was laughing at my own fright. The longer the black lasted, the most scared I got. Why does this work? I’ll let Kirk Douglas, with a little help from “The Bad and the Beautiful” screenwriter Charles Schnee, explain.

External Entertainment, External Movies, Horror Movies, Movies

What am I going to miss next?

July 29, 2010 /

I missed yesterdays big geek news of the upcoming Guillermo del Toro doing his “one for me” project with a long delayed adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s “From the Mountains of Madness” with a little help from James Cameron. Bummer, but we’ll survive that tragedy together.

And then Mike Fleming, and every fanboy on earth it appears, found that the Comic-Con trailer for “Thor” had magically appeared on line, Wikileaks style. Anyhow, just as I had prepared this post, the folks at Marvel who apparently have a control issue with their marketing plan much as the U.S. government would rather you didn’t know too much about civilian casualties or the like, pulled it. I mean like seconds ago — it was there and I was ready to go and then it was gone. If you didn’t see it elsewhere, it was all Shakespearian and stuff and had more than a touch of “King Lear” to it, which makes sense as it’s directed by Kenneth Branagh.

So, since I don’t have the Thor trailer, here’s not one but two trailers. The first, a bit of Branagh directing actual Shakespeare and the probably never to be rivaled best ever quasi-Lear in cinema history. Enjoy, as you taste my bitter fanboy tears.

You know, I love Shakespeare and all, but his stuff is so full of cliches. Well, you’ll see none of that from Kurosawa-san.

Action Movies, Comic-Con, External Entertainment, External Movies, Horror Movies, Movie Dramas, Movies, News, Sci-Fi Movies

Comic-con — notes written with tired feet

July 24, 2010 /

Comic-Con has gotten so enormous and so unfriendly to writers (and, in different ways, other folks I’m sure also) that it even nearly did in a high end reporter with gazillions of studio contacts like Anne Thompson. I’ll save my no doubt semi-cynical reflections on the thing for later, but here are just a few movie stories from the con that I have time to write about it in a very brief window.

* You might consider going from Tolkien to a ride at Disneyland a major artistic comedown, but Guillermo del Toro obviously thinks otherwise and is a huge fan of what I admit is also my favorite ride at the park. The Wrap has more, oddly enough with no mention of the mansion. Was this another event? Still nice to see that the monster-loving del Toro’s uncensored speaking style hasn’t been cleaned up by PR standards and practices.

People Guillermo del Toro

Also from “The Wrap”: Dominic Patten writes that Zack Snyder’s “Sucker Punch” lived up to its name.

* I can’t watch the video here, but you can apparently see a now-bearded Joss Whedon personally confirm that Jeremy Renner will, indeed, play Hawkeye in “The Avengers.” Oh, and I guess that means that Whedon really is directing it, after all, official like.

* “The Green Hornet” is sounding a bit more fun to me.

* The perceptive and usually geek friendly Ms. Thompson was not personally wowed by “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” but she reports the audience at the screening she attended was. She does however have a video interview with writer-director Edgar Wright, which I haven’t had time to watch yet.

* I just had a bit of snafu/disappointment in terms of getting some good stuff for later on “Green Lantern” but the folks in Hall H had their geek buttons well pushed, it appears. (Not among them, a friend of mine here, who waited 2.5 hours in line and didn’t make it in, six people from the front of the line. He should have made it three hours.)

* An item having nothing to do with Comic-Con. According to a sexual harrassment suit, Casey Affleck appears to have a problem. I hope it’s only a legal one.

* Meanwhile, back in the real world where people pay to see movies, “Inception” is ruling the roost but sharing some of the wealth with the Angelina Jolie action vehicle, “Salt.”

Angelina Jolie in an arresting moment in

Action Movies, Actors, Actresses, Comic-Con, External Entertainment, External Movies, Horror Movies, Movie Comedies, Movies, News, Sci-Fi Movies

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