:Tony Scott, creator of bespoke celluloid chaos since 1985, has revealed exclusively to Empire that his next project, a remake of Walter Hill¹s The Warriors, will be a very different take on the gritty tale of a gang of teenage hoods battling their way home across enemy turf. For a start he’s moved it 3000 miles West, to L.A.. “Well, New York is visually vertical,” he tells Empire, “and L.A. is more horizontal so that¹ll be a big visual difference”.”
…and setting it in LA? Didn’t they already do that trick with the 2nd “Escape from NY” film!
“James bond posters have become one of the most popular items of film memorabilia. Launched to advertise Dr No in 1962, the posters have continued to become extremely popular and successful. With some of the rarest original posters reaching thousands of pounds, the world of James Bond posters forever continues to astound, aspire and entertain.
The James Bond movie posters have always captured elements that have made the films so successful. Often featuring scantily clad seductive women, exotic locations and devious villains; the posters portray a dangerous – sometimes violent, yet exciting, combination of elements. In an ever-increasing political correctness climate, it is perhaps the James Bond posters risqué elements that make them so appealing.”
According to Variety Hollywood has pulled the plug on the a remake of the classic 1984 film “Revenge of the Nerds”. The article claims the head of the movie studio killed the flick because “the film felt smaller than the kind of pic he’s aiming to release” — as if they were expecting the next Citizen Kane?! Anyway, nerds rest assured no one is going to mess with your classic. Besides everywhere know that “Real Genius” (1985) was far superior to the lowbrow humor in “Revenge of Nerds”…
“Frank Miller, who wrote and co-directed Sin City based on his graphic novels of the same name, told SCI FI Wire that he plans to co-direct the upcoming sequel, Sin City 2, with Robert Rodriguez, despite rumors to the contrary. “Yes and yes,” he said in an interview following a preview screening of footage of 300, another upcoming film based on his work.
“We have all kinds of technical things we want to do, but there’s a major story called A Dame to Kill for [which was, fittingly, the second Sin City story and is a prequel of sorts to The Hard Goodbye] that we’re going to adapt,” Miller said. “That’ll include a new femme fatale and other characters.” Rodriguez has reportedly spoken with Angelina Jolie about playing Ava, ex-lover of Clive Owen’s Dwight.”
“The initial goal was to try and do three big stories in one DVD. So I wrote three scripts, featuring Sheridan, Lochley, Galen and Garibaldi. (I wanted to focus on the human characters initially so we’d have more time for prosthetics R&D for the next one.) The stories, as noted previously, were huge…all over the map, from Minbar, to Earth, Mars, the future, the distant past, as well as B5 itself obviously. We’re also going to be trying some new production technologies, again trying to stay ahead of the tech curve, the way B5 has always stayed ahead on these things.
And over the last few days, as we began to bring on crew and lay out the production, looking at just how complicated these mini-movies were going to be, the idea of making three of these monsters began to become a bit much for us to pull off on out first time out the gate, especially since I’m still kind of new as a director. So we decided to postpone one of the three to the next DVD, and lengthen the other two to make up the difference. GIven that the Garibaldi story was the most complicated visually and technically, also the most difficult from a CGi perspective, that’s the one that got pushed until, potentially, next time.”
This is one of my favorite classic science fiction movies, it’s not quite as cool as Metropolis but on the plus side H.G. Wells did the script and the soundtrack and special effects are very well done:
“Things to Come is a 1936 British science fiction film, produced by Alexander Korda and directed by William Cameron Menzies. The screenplay was written by H. G. Wells and is a loose adaptation of his own 1933 novel The Shape of Things to Come. The film stars Raymond Massey.
Plot: On the Christmas Eve of 1940, war begins as the city of Everytown is bombed. The war lasts 66 years, during which time civilization falls into anarchy. Eventually the warlord who calls himself The Boss emerges to establish brutish control over the chaos. But then a scientific group called Wings Over the World emerges and is able to quash the regime of The Boss using a peace gas. The scientists then set about building a shining white new scientific Utopia on the ruins of the old civilization. In the year 2036, the culmination of the new society’s scientific vision is the launching of the first Moon shot.”
Part of me wonders if this is just a bad idea, it’s been ten years since Pulp Fiction and I’m not sure if Travolta could pull off a prequel. And I’m assuming of course that it would have to be a prequal as the Travolta character got killed off in Pulp Fiction. Of course if there is a person who could come up with a creative solution it would be Tarantino:
“One of the projects that I think most of us have given up on long ago was the sequel to Pulp Fiction focusing on the Vic and Vincent Vega, played by John Travolta and Michael Madsen. It turns out that Madsen himself hasn’t given up hope, and he tells me that QT has approached him with a story concept that could make a movie happen.
Last week I got on the phone with Madsen to talk about the 15th anniversary DVD of Reservoir Dogs (which is coming a year early) and the new Reservoir Dogs video game, and I took the chance to grill him on various upcoming projects. He brought up the Vega Bros movie, something I would never have even thought to ask about.”
Bad news campers, it looks like the powers that be are set to make another Mad Max movie! I’d like to see Tina Turner be cast in the lead role this time:
“Mad Max 4 is so prepared, there seems to be a lot of momentum for it to get done. Right now, I’ve got another, smaller film to do, and then we’ll gear up and do “Mad Max” again. In what form and so on, I don’t know. But it hasn’t gotten stale in the meantime, and I’m very very keen to do it. It seems like there’s the appetite out there.”
Mystery Science Theater 3000 fansboys should check out RiffTrax, from MST3 head writer Michael J. Nelson. His site allows you to buy a MST3esque mp3 files that you can play along while you’re watching a movie. The tracks are pretty cheap and so far he’s covered the Matrix and has plans to cover the first Star Wars movie:
“Do you feel that some of the movies coming out of Hollywood are just, well, missing something? At RiffTrax, you can download Mike’s running commentaries and listen to them along with your favorite, and not so favorite DVDs. It’s like watching a movie with your funniest friend. And it’s easy to do. Don’t just sit back and take whatever Hollywood throws at you. Transform the DVD experience with RiffTrax. It’s the most fun you’ll ever have at the movies.”
“Stanley Kubrick never threw anything away. On the other hand, he didn’t have much of a filing system, and when he moved — permanently, it turned out — from Hollywood to London in 1962, a great many things went astray. Among them was the sole copy of a film treatment called “Lunatic at Large,” which Mr. Kubrick had commissioned in the late ’50s from the noir pulp novelist Jim Thompson, with whom he had worked on “The Killing,” a 1956 bank-heist story that became his first successful feature, and then on 1957’s “Paths of Glory.” The manuscript remained lost until after Mr. Kubrick’s death, in 1999, when his son-in-law, Philip Hobbs, working with an archivist, turned it up, along with a couple of other scripts, and set about trying to make it into a movie.”
…Part of me will always be somewhat let down that Kubrick didn’t a chance to create a few more films before he passed away, but on the other hand if they give a project to thi sto the right director you might get a bit of magic. In fact when AI came out I hated it because it wasn’t directed by Kubrick, but the more I think back to it the more I like it.
Below: Kubrick on the left and noir pulp novelist Jim Thompson on the right.
This film is Akira Kurosawa’s adaptation of Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s short story dealing with the subjectivy of eyewitness evidence in the solving of a crime. In July 2006, a Japanese court euled that all Japanese films produced before 1953, including this one, are part of the Public Domain.
“Fans of Mystery Science Theater 3000 rejoice! Three of MST3K’s writer/characters — Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy — have started a new venture: The Film Crew. The Film Crew has been entrusted with a very important mission: providing commentary tracks for every movie that doesn’t have one. Typically, they’ve chosen to start at the bottom of the barrel, and now you get to vote on which B-movie will get the Film Crew treatment on DVD first.”
“Jeliza-Rose is a young girl in a very unusual situation both of her parents are junkies and she is usually left to her own devices for entertainment. When her mother dies, her father takes her to a remote farm in the country, she escapes the vast loneliness of her new home by retreating into a world that exists only in her mind. Here, fireflies have names, bog-men awaken at dusk, and squirrels talk. And the heads of her four dolls Mystique, Baby Blonde, Glitter Gal, and Sateen Lips long since separated from their bodies, keep her company.”
I’m always down on the Sci Fi channel for nottaking chances, well this time I’m wrong! It seems they are doing something quite cool and joining up with the Sundance channel to have a contest for science fiction films:
SCI FI, Sundance Launch Exposure
“SCI FI Channel announced that it will join forces with Sundance Channel to launch Exposure, an eight-week short-film competition to find the best science fiction, horror or fantasy films to post on SCIFI.COM and SundanceChannel.com, with a grand prize of the chance to pitch a project to SCI FI Channel’s Pictures Group. Both sites are now accepting submissions from up-and-coming filmmakers of two-to-eight-minute movies in the genre.
The short films will be judged by a committee of SCI FI Channel and Sundance Channel experts, who will review the submissions and post the best ones online each week. Viewers will cast their votes on either Web site to determine a weekly winner, ultimately determining the eight finalists. The eight shorts will be featured in an on-air special, to be broadcast on SCI FI Channel (airdate to be announced) preceding the online voting to determine the grand prize winner. That winner will be awarded a trip to New York to pitch his or her project.”
It seems an interview has come out which claims that Kubrick thought that Cruise and Kidman ruined ‘Eyes Wide Shut’, and I have to say that I agree! Cruise gave a a great performance in ‘Magnolia’ and Kidman was fantastic in ‘the Hours’, but they two together just didn’t work on screen: Cruise and Kidman ruined Eyes Wide Shut – Kubrick interview
“Director Stanley Kubrick thought his last movie Eyes Wide Shut was a “piece of s**t” that was ruined by interference from its stars Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, according to actor R Lee Ermey. Ermey starred in Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket and remained in contact with the legendary film-maker up until his death in 1999.
When the pair spoke shortly after Kubrick had completed work on Eyes Wide Shut, Ermey recalls the legendary director expressing his disappointment with the movie. He says: “Stanley called me about two weeks before he died, as a matter of fact. We had a long conversation about Eyes Wide Shut. He told me it was a piece of s**t and that he was disgusted with it and that the critics were going to have him for lunch.”
…however I’d have to note that Sydney Pollack gave a great performance:
“Kurt Cobain turned down a small part in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction, according to the late rocker’s wife Courtney Love. The Nirvana frontman was lined up to appear alongside Love in the 1994 movie. Cobain would have starred as a drug dealer, while Love would have played his heavily pierced girlfriend. The roles were eventually taken by Eric Stoltz and Rosanna Arquette. Love says, “If Kurt had survived we’d be taking private jets by now. He’d have loved that”.”
…it is sad to me to think that Cobain has been dead now for over 12 years. It would have been nice to see what ever creative projects he would have gotten into.
“POWER, precision — and don’t forget speed,” says the young martial arts whiz Chen Zhen, played by Jet Li, to a bunch of eager students in “Fist of Legend” (1994), and you know this very serious-looking guy isn’t just talking the talk. As Mr. Li demonstrates in the movie (and had, at that point, been proving to Asian film audiences for more than a decade), he can walk the walk, and kick the kick too. And since power, precision and the kind of speed that doesn’t sacrifice either of the first two qualities are not currently in long supply on the world’s screens — even in action movies, where you’d think they were pretty much required — it’s fairly alarming news that Mr. Li is calling his new picture, “Fearless” (set to open Friday), the “conclusion to my life as a martial arts star.”
No it’s not the “real” Star Wars, but that’s what makes it so much fun. And looking at the the trailer on the promotional website, the production values don’t look half bad!
“The original Turkish Star Wars is absolutely legendary in cult film circles and I’m still a little shocked that they’ve gone and made a sequel to it after all these years, but lo! There’s a new trailer and this one includes actual footage. Alas, it isn’t Turkish Empire Strikes Back – the title actually translates to The Son of the Man who Saved the World – but it certainly looks camp enough for a troop or two of Boy Scouts …”
“This is a topic really close to my heart for a variety of reasons, which are all inter-related. As a guy who has always loved innovation, novelty, diversity and variation like so many other Indians, it’s depressing to see how our Bollywood has taken us for a ride all these years. 90% of the movies with similar stories? 4 superstars in 6 decades?
This is not healthy, it’s the sign of an industry that is scared to experiment, lest they might fail. However they don’t realize that they have given birth to a whole new generation of dissatisfied viewers that watch maybe 5-10 movies a year out of the 200 odd movies that Bollywood makes. Don’t get me wrong, I still love our movies and probably watch more movies than an average viewer, but that’s because I am an addict. The fact that I love it so much, makes me think, that we can do a lot better than this.”
…maybe what’s needed is for more Bollywood films to be exported to markets like the United States (like anime)? That might allow film makers in India to take more chances if they had a larger audience.
I guess my other advice is – if you don’t like something, change it! The low budget YouTube digital video revolution allows people on a low budget to make films. If you want to see Bollywood make indie films that explore new genres, do it yourself. The best way to find the Harvey Weinstein of Bollywood is to become that yourself, that’s the true indie film maker spirit.
Below: Fusion cuisine! Latino pop singer Shakira doing a Bollywood dance number:
