(Photo by Claire Folger / Lionsgate / courtesy Everett Collection. KNIVES OUT)
Knives Out is 5!
Before he would get to utter the words “Bond, James Bond” to the delight of millions, Daniel Craig built up a durable if not spectacular resume, showing up in a range of films from the first Angelina Jolie Tomb Raider to A Kid In King Arthur’s Court. As the sniveling son of mob boss Paul Newman in Road to Perdition, Craig was able to make an impact with a broad audience in a film that already had plenty for us to look at, including Conrad L. Hall’s rain-drenched cinematography and a rare anti-hero turn from Tom Hanks.
By 2005, Craig was on the cusp of a major breakthrough with a co-starring role in Steven Spielberg’s Munich, and crime flick Layer Cake, essentially a stylish and gritty feature-length audition tape to play Agent 007. The following year, he and GoldenEye director Martin Campbell launched Casino Royale, a rousing and hard-nosed crowdpleaser revealing a James Bond for a new cynical generation. He’s since reprised the role three more times with Quantum of Solace, Skyfall, and Spectre, and when he returns in 2020 with No Time to Die, Craig will have the longest consecutively tenured Bond in film history.
Of course, when you’re James Bond, every non-Bond role you take becomes something of an automatic sensation. Some roles, like Logan Lucky or David Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo really demonstrate Craig’s range. Other films, like Dream House or The Invasion, are spectacular bombs. And the rest, along the lines of Cowboys & Aliens and The Golden Compass, are right in the mushy middle.
We know on which end of the spectrum Craig’s latest film, the Rian Johnson whodunit Knives Out, lands. (Hint: It’s his best-reviewed movie ever.) With No Time To Die‘s April 2020 November 2020 April 2021 October 2021 release now behind us, and Knives Out his main acting outlet (with Glass Onion follow-up Wake Up Dead Man activating in 2025), take a look back as we rank all Daniel Craig movies by Tomatometer!
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(Photo by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures)
After drawing some mainstream attention for her role in the preposterous, very ’90s guilty pleasure Hackers, critical acclaim came for Angelina Jolie with 1998’s Gia. That biopic of the tragic ’70s supermodel was an HBO movie, limiting its reach, but Jolie would only have to wait one more year to cross the megastardom threshold. 1999 not only saw her first box office smash (The Bone Collector, co-starring Denzel Washington), but also her first (and only) Oscar win, as Supporting Actress in Girl, Interrupted.
After that, it was pedal to the metal for Jolie’s career. Literally, her next role was the grand-theft-auto blockbuster Gone in 60 Seconds. She would quickly go on to star as Lara Croft in two Tomb Raider movies, attempt to revive the swords-and-sandals epic with Alexander, and release the action crowd-pleaser Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Jolie had her best run with the critics at the end of the 2000s with Wanted, Kung Fu Panda, Beowulf, and A Mighty Heart all released next to each other, all Certified Fresh. In A Mighty Heart, Jolie stars as Mariane Pearl, wife of American journalist Daniel Pearl, who was murdered in Pakistan in 2002. The film appeared to mark a new humanitarian drive to part of her work; the specter of war hangs heavy over three movies Jolie has directed since: In the Land of Blood and Honey, Unbroken, and First They Killed My Father.
Jolie was nominated for an Oscar thanks to Changeling, and Salt was a credible action effort, but The Tourist with Johnny Depp in 2010 was a high-profile misfire. Ditto By the Sea, which she directed with then-husband Brad Pitt. But no worries! She’s been accepted with welcoming arms into the Disney family after kickstarting the Disney live-action remake trend through 2014’s Maleficent, as well as its sequel Mistress of Evil. She joins the MCU later this year with Chloé Zhao’s The Eternals, but before that releases, we’re celebrating her birthday by looking back on all Angelina Jolie movies, ranked by Tomatometer! —Alex Vo
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Charlize’s hair apparent to her Furiosa character in Mad Max: Fury Road is Atomic Blonde, as she inhabits a new badass creation with a license to break bones and drub clowns across ’80s Germany. We could go Theron and on but let’s cut to the chase: Here’s 24 more female action movies, ranked by Tomatometer!
Ratchet & Clank: Recently re-imagined for your PlayStation 4, now appearing on the big screen for the first time. The movie invites viewers back to see the origin team-up of the duo (one a robot, the other a bobcat-ish thing, probably a descendant of prolific serial killer Bubsy), which inspires this week’s 24 Frames gallery: a history of video games-based movies by Tomatometer!
This week’s Ketchup includes movies development news stories that include new roles for Anne Hathaway and Matthew McConaughey, and news about the sequels Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.
Based upon the existence of this story, we can now gather that the notion of there ever being another Tomb Raider movie was hinging upon the success of the recently released videogame reboot that took Lara Croft back to her first adventure as a young lady. Something else that this is a sign of is that this was a slow news week. Anyway, the Tomb Raider reboot also has a new studio in the form of MGM, which is not really that surprising inasmuch as MGM is the place where they’ve never met a reboot or remake they didn’t love. The two movies starring Angelina Jolie were produced by Paramount Pictures, and then Warner Bros was trying to get a reboot going for a few years there, too. There isn’t much else to know or report about this Tomb Raider reboot, except that one might speculate that the new movie might follow in the steps of the new video game, and de-age Lara Croft to tell a similar “my first adventure” type of story. The success of a movie like The Hunger Games might, therefore, have also been a factor in this project continuing to attract attention from a studio like MGM.
With eight films now under director Christopher Nolan’s figurative belt, a movie fan might feel like they have a pretty good grasp for the sort of actors that Nolan might be considering for his next project, the sci-fi movie Interstellar. Nolan in the past has been pretty big on Aussies (Guy Pearce, Hugh Jackman) and Brits (Christian Bale, Tom Hardy). Right when such choices appear to be that predictable, that’s when the news hits that Christopher Nolan has offered the lead role in Interstellar to Matthew McConaughey. Which was the Internet’s cue to start breaking out the “lawbreaker” and “alright alright alright” jokes. Because those are things characters played by Matthew McConaughey have said in movies that people have seen the trailers for. Paramount Pictures has scheduled Interstellar for a release date in November, 2014.
The first movie of Marvel’s Phase 2 (Iron Man 3) is still not yet released, but already, we know about the six movies after it that Marvel has planned, taking us into Phase 3 already. Phase 1 and Phase 2 are both known to end, respectively, with The Avengers and its sequel The Avengers 2, but news came this week that Phase 3 might end quite differently. Let’s put the pieces together: Last week, the news broke that Robert Redford has been cast as an unspecified S.H.I.E.L.D. agent in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. There’s also been rumors of Gwendoline Christie (Brienne of Tarth from Game of Thrones) being cast in a cameo role in Thor: The Dark World as Brunnhilde the Valkyrie. And finally, we know that the second movie of Phase 3 is expected to be Doctor Strange (after Ant-Man in late 2015). Tying in with all that are the reports this week that the third Phase 3 movie will be Namor the Sub-Mariner, devoted to one of Marvel’s oldest characters (dating all the way back to 1939), who also, by the way, predates by two years the more famous DC Comics “Atlantis monarch” character Aquaman. We also know that Marvel plans on using the Hulk in more movies in the future, but not necessarily in another solo Hulk movie. Which brings us, finally, to what exactly ties Doctor Strange, Namor, Valkyrie, Robert Redford’s mysterious character (who might be “Kyle Richmond”), and the Incredible Hulk? That answer may come in the year 2017 with the release of the final movie of Marvel Phase 3… The Defenders, based upon Marvel’s other major superhero team which isn’t The Avengers, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, the Guardians of the Galaxy, the Inhumans, the Eternals, Alpha Flight, West Coast Avengers, Force Works, Midnight Sons, the Invaders, S.H.I.E.L.D., S.W.O.R.D., the Warriors Three, Heroes for Hire, X-Force, X-Statix, Excalibur, the New Mutants, The Initiative, Power Pack, the Runaways, Young Avengers, Pet Avengers, the Great Lakes Avengers, or the Champions. That’s right, The Defenders, that 1970s team of misfit superheroes that started around the trio of Doctor Strange, the Hulk, and Namor the Sub-Mariner, and grew to include… anyone that wasn’t already in a super team, because… why not. It sold comics… for a while. And then… APRIL FOOL’S! (admittedly, a few days early, but this column only gets published on Fridays, and April 1st is a Monday this year). We swear The Defenders is the only joke entry in the Weekly Ketchup.
For all these many years since we first heard that Marvel might really someday make a Captain America movie, those who love all things cheesy about superhero comics have wished (perhaps secretly, perhaps in denial) that we could maybe someday have a movie that featured Batroc the Leaper. There are basically two types of comic book fans, and that division can come right down to what they think of Batroc; it’s basically a question of whether or not they like “fun” (and those on the anti-Batroc side of course deny that they despise fun). Batroc is French, has a ridiculous accent, speaks in puns, wears purple with a silly mask, kicks people in the head, and calls himself a “lea-PAR.” Well, anyway, that day has finally come, it appears, because current UFC Welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre has reportedly been cast in Captain America: The Winter Soldier as Batroc the Leaper. Keep in mind that we don’t know how big of a role Batroc actually plays in the film (it might be one scene or even just part of a montage or something), but it appears to be real. Georges St-Pierre isn’t technically French, but he does come from the French part of Canada (Quebec), which might make him even more “French” than actually being French would. Walt Disney Pictures has scheduled Captain America: The Winter Soldier for April 4, 2014.
Director Lynn Shelton (Humpday, Your Sister’s Sister) is still definitively “indie,” but the cast that she’s able to recruit for her films continues to work its way up the “A list” ladder. Anne Hathaway, Chloe Moretz, Sam Rockwell, and Mark Webber are now all in “deep” negotiations to star in Lynn Shelton’s next indie film, Laggies. If all goes through, Hathaway will play a late-20-something who is freaked out by her boyfriend’s (Webber) wedding proposal, and so she spends a week pretending to be a teenager hanging out with an actual 16 year old (Moretz). Laggies sounds like a movie that premieres at Sundance, and so it probably will the next time the festival occurs, which will be in January, 2014.
The continued stumbling blocks for two different musicals may combine to ensure that at least one of them actually gets produced sometime soon. And the winner is… the Jersey Boys movie, based on the hit Broadway musical, itself based upon the true story of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. And likewise, the loser may be Warner Bros’ long-standing attempts at making another A Star is Born entry. The defining factor here may be whether Clint Eastwood really does sign on to direct Jersey Boys, rather than work on A Star is Born, which he’s been developing with Warner Bros for several years now (formerly with Beyonce Knowles, more recently with Esperanza Spalding). As for Jersey Boys, the last we heard, it was a project that Jon Favreau had been considering directing, but then he dropped out, which may be where Eastwood steps in (if he does).
We’ve been hearing so much about the humans in the sequel Dawn of the Planet of the Apes that it might have been forgivable if someone guessed that Andy Serkis would remain the only “name actor” attached to play any of the apes. But, alas, nope, we finally have news of someone else playing an ape, and she’s even a lady type person. Judy Greer (Arrested Development) has been cast as Cornelia, the female chimp love interest for Caesar. This will presumably mean that Greer will soon have lots of little ping pong balls attached to her personage, if this sequel is filmed the same way the first movie was. Filming of Dawn of the Planet of the Apes starts in April, and 20th Century Fox is expecting to release the film on May 23, 2014.
Director Matthew Vaughn’s name has come up a few times after X-Men: First Class, most notably with either the sequel X-Men: Days of Future Past, or as one of the contenders to direct Star Wars Episode VII. We finally know now what he will be directing next. The answer keeps Matthew Vaughn at 20th Century Fox, for whom he will direct an adaptation of the Mark Millar comic book The Secret Service. As the title suggests (albeit deceptively), The Secret Service is about the world of spies and other espionage-type craft work. 20th Century Fox has scheduled The Secret Service for a release date of November 14, 2014.
This was a slow news week. How slow? Even with an April Fool’s Day joke, there was still enough space to cover a Hugh Grant comedy that reunites him with the director of Two Weeks Notice, which in most weeks probably would have not made the 10 story cut. Writer/director Marc Lawrence has also worked on movies like Miss Congeniality (and its sequel) (as screenwriter, not director), and Did You Hear About the Morgans? Lawrence’s RT Tomatometer has many more green splotches than “Fresh” tomatoes, which is why this untitled comedy is one of the week’s Rotten ideas. Marisa Tomei, J.K. Simmons, Alison Janney, and Chris Elliot will also costar in this story of an Academy Award winning English screenwriter who takes a job at a small college where, instead of picking up young students, he instead falls in love with an older single mother (Tomei). And love (and possibly other high jinks) ensues.
There are stories, hopefully every week, that remind this writer what a fun job he has, getting to cover the hottest movie development news. And then there’s Michael Bay’s reboot (as producer) of (not Teenage, not Mutant) Ninja Turtles, of which, yeah, this is the part where it feels more like a job. So, we now know the names of the four actors who have been cast as the four turtles. And sure, enough, they are indeed names. Alan Ritchson (The Hunger Games: Catching Fire), Pete Ploszek, Jeremy Howard, and Noel Fisher have been cast, respectively, as Raphael, Leonardo, Donatello, and Michaelangelo. Paramount Pictures has scheduled Ninja Turtles, which will also costar Megan Fox, for release on June 6, 2014.
For more Weekly Ketchup columns by Greg Dean Schmitz, check out the WK archive, and you can contact GDS via Facebook.
This week, Hollywood really took some time off from making announcements in the days in between Christmas and New Year’s. So, it’s time for the obligatory Yearly Ketchup; twelve major stories that broke this year, one for each month. This doesn’t necessarily cover all of the big stories that broke this year, as some months were bigger than others. An emphasis was made in this particular list to focus on either new projects, or ones that got new life after years of development. And finally, in addition to the potential big blockbuster type movies, I made room for the new projects for a couple of major directors, as well as a couple of projects that some will definitely think are “Rotten Ideas.” These are the news stories that made the Weekly Ketchup all the more fun to follow along with each month.
Warner Bros announced that the studio is in early development of a reboot of the Tomb Raider franchise, based upon the popular Eidos video game franchise, and a big part of what made Angelina Jolie the star she is today. The reboot is expected to revamp the character, and “bear little resemblance to the original pictures,” which means that a new actress will be cast as Lara Croft. Since the announcement, little has been said about the Tomb Raider reboot, but that may be partly because WB-based producer Dan Lin has a particularly busy plate that includes dozens of WB’s most anticipated projects.
While Marvel continues with their ambitious plans for the next few years, Warner Bros and DC Comics made their own big news this year with the green light for Green Lantern, based on the popular intergalactic space cop with the incredible power ring. The first big news this year for the project was the hiring of director Martin Campbell (Casino Royale), and that was later followed by the casting of Ryan Reynolds as Hal Jordan, with the actor also signed this year to star in a Deadpool movie. The original release date for Green Lantern was to be in late 2010, but that has since moved to sometime in the summer of 2011. In related DC Comics news, Warner Bros is expected to announce their full plans for their DC Comics slate in January, 2010 (or so). Those plans will probably include news of other DC superheroes, especially other members of the Justice League, in the hopes that the member heroes can get their own movies in preparation for eventually teaming up together in a team movie, similar to the 2012 Marvel plans for The Avengers.
Joel and Ethan Coen announced this year that their next movie after A Serious Man will be an adaptation of True Grit for Paramount. This will be based on the the novel by Charles Portis that was previously adapted as the 1969 Western that earned John Wayne his Academy Award. The Coens’ version, however, promises to be closer to the original book, and will focus more on the 14-year-old girl at the heart of the story. Since the announcement, there has been a good deal of True Grit news, including the casting of Jeff Bridges (in the John Wayne role), Matt Damon and Josh Brolin, and the currently ongoing open casting call to find the young actress who will have the starring role. The Coen Bros have an incredible track record, but the idea of them remaking a classic Western in particular has movie fans excited.
At the annual ShoWest convention in Las Vegas, Sony announced that the third movies in both the Men in Black and Ghostbusters franchises were gearing up for releases in 2011. In the following months, both movies received regular updates. Men in Black 3 will see the return of Will Smith and director Barry Sonnenfeld, with Josh Brolin in talks to costar as a younger version of Tommy Lee Jones’ Agent K (that Smith’s Agent J meets via time travel). Director Harold Ramis revealed just this week that he plans on filming Ghostbusters 3 this summer, with the original guys returning to help introduce some new “young” Ghostbusters (and there’s also a rumor out there that Bill Murray’s Peter Venkman will be a ghost himself this time).
Fran Rubel Kuzui, the director of the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer film is working on bringing the heroine back in a rebooted movie. Joss Whedon later adapted his original movie screenplay into a much more popular TV show but won’t be involved in Kuzui’s reboot at all. The movie also won’t include any of the supporting characters created for the TV show, which includes many fan favorites, such as Angel, Willow, Spike and Xander. When it was announced, the producers were just starting to meet with writers to hear their takes on ideas for the reboot, but the central idea was to build upon the notion that each generation has its own vampire slayer, and that they were aiming for a “darker, event-sized movie.” There’s been little news about the Buffy the Vampire Slayer reboot since, but given the massive fandom of the TV show, this is obviously something people will be following for years.
Coming off the success of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, director David Fincher’s next project is The Social Network, a comedic biopic for Columbia Pictures about the founding of the popular social website Facebook, from a script by Aaron Sorkin (The West Wing). The setting of the movie will be the Harvard campus in 2004 when a sophomore created Facebook, which went on to become an Internet “juggernaut” with over 200 million members. Since the movie’s first announcement, filming started in October, with the ensemble cast including Jesse Eisenberg as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, supported by Justin Timberlake, Rashida Jones, Max Minghella and many more.
Warner Bros and Legendary Pictures announced plans for a movie based on the popular MMORPG game World of Warcraft in 2006, but it wasn’t until this year that the project got its most exciting announcement in the form of director Sam Raimi (Spider-Man, Drag Me to Hell). Raimi is currently in pre-production on Spider-Man 4, but the director hopes to start filming of World of Warcraft when that movie wraps, with development of the script by Robert Rodat (Saving Private Ryan, The Patriot) continuing in the meantime. World of Warcraft is a Blizzard videogame set in the fantastic world of Azeroth. There, two factions (the Alliance and the Horde) find themselves on opposite sides of a series of epic conflicts, with the latest one being against the Lich King, the corrupted son of one of Lordaeron’s greatest former kings. The actual plot of the World of Warcraft movie hasn’t been announced yet, but there are certainly lots of possibilities, as the game has a massive background lore that fills up one of the most active Wiki-style sites on the web.
This was a big year for director Bryan Singer, as he signed on to both Jack the Giant Killer at New Line (a modernization of the classic fairy tale) and X-Men: First Class, which will likely his next project after Jack the Giant Killer. As big as his return to the X-Men franchise was, however, the most discussed new project for Singer this year was probably his (long term) plans to adapt the popular TV show franchise Battlestar Galactica for the big screen. Battlestar Galactica has had two very different lives as a TV show, first as a relatively lighthearted 1970s show and then in the 2000s as a very serious, more dramatic take. Singer’s movie is at least three years from happening, but it’s obvious that the 2009 parallel is J.J. Abrams’ reboot of Star Trek, as this project will bring a popular TV sci-fi franchise to both the big screen and possibly a whole new audience. Singer’s plans to make a Battlestar Galactica movie go way back, to 2001, which was at the time sidetracked by the Sci-Fi Channel’s plans to revive the series.
September saw the announcement from Universal that the studio had acquired the rights from Mattel to their iconic Barbie doll franchise, to be adapted as a live action movie. There has already been a direct-to-DVD animated Barbie movie, but the aspirations of a live-action movie are obviously much bigger. Barbie has had many careers over her 50 years as arguably the most popular girl toy, including being a pilot, teacher and even an astronaut. Big movie news tends to be dominated by boy-friendly titles, but if there is one franchise that is the total opposite, it is Barbie.
A few months after the release of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, director Michael Bay made the inevitable announcement that development had started on Transformers 3, starting with a five-hour meeting with ILM in San Francisco, followed by a meeting with writer Ehren Kruger. This news came after a flurry of quotes from Megan Fox about her involvement with the second movie, and so Bay included in his statement the sentiment that she would be welcome back for the third movie, and that “I promise no alien robots will harm you in any way during the production of this motion picture.” Bay is also wasting little time in getting Transformers 3 started, announcing a release date of July 1st, 2011.
In addition to the Star Trek prequel that was announced even before the film was released, J.J. Abrams also revealed his plans to produce a movie based upon the popular 1970s-1980s line of Japanese Micronauts toys. The toys were known for their interchangeable parts, and for a mythology about being aliens and robots who arrive on Earth to find that they are much smaller than everyone else here. Although the toys were also a hit in the United States, Micronauts is also memorable for starring in their own Marvel Comics title, which is where much of the background story comes from. With Star Trek 2 likely to start filming earlier rather than later, it’s unclear exactly when Micronauts will be produced, but given that there is not yet a screenwriter attached to the project, it will probably still be a few years off.
Last year, Peter Jackson’s plans on making his sci-fi debut got sidetracked when the HALO movie got shelved. But Jackson is not yet giving up on the genre, and plans for a secret project called Mortal Engines have been revealed to a newspaper in his hometown. Based upon a series of novels by Philip Reeve, Mortal Engines is set in a post-apocalyptic world where cities have become giant vehicles that must go to war with each other in order for their populations to survive. Weta Workshops is reportedly already at work on designs for the giant cities. Jackson has not yet made an official announcement about Mortal Engines, but it is likely that we will learn more in 2010.
For more Weekly Ketchup columns by Greg Dean Schmitz, check out the WK archive, and you can contact GDS through his MySpace page or via a RT forum message.
This week, after spending some time in Utah hitting the slopes and pretending to care about independent filmmaking, Hollywood got right back in the groove, doing what they do best: greenlighting prequels, sequels, remakes and reboots. Of this week’s top 10 stories, only three movies don’t fit into one of those categories.
#1 TOMB RAIDER: LARA CROFT RETURNS
After making two Lara Croft: Tomb Raider movies starring Angelina Jolie, Paramount let their rights to the Eidos videogame lapse, and so Warner Bros has swept in, with plans to reboot the movie franchise (without Jolie). Tomb Raider is being shepherded by WB Producer Dan Lin, who is also the man behind Terminator Salvation, Sherlock Holmes and the recently announced Tom & Jerry. There’s no writer or director signed on yet, but curiously, two days before this news hit the trades, a Spanish source broke the news that Megan Fox (Transformers) was supposedly being considered for a new Tomb Raider movie. Megan Fox’s reps were quick to debunk the story, but it’s still interesting that this rumor came out before anyone even knew that there even was a Tomb Raider reboot in the works.
#2 THE A-TEAM LOVES IT WHEN A PLAN COMES TOGETHER
After director John Singleton left the project, it seemed like maybe The A-Team would never become a movie after all. 20th Century Fox has now, however, signed Joe Carnahan (Narc, Smokin’ Aces) to direct, with Ridley Scott (Black Hawk Down) producing. Much ado is made in the Variety piece about Fox “avoiding the series’ campy tone”, which seems to signal that they don’t quite get that what made The A-Team an awesome TV show was the tongue-in-cheek sense of humor. The new A-Team, who get their start as soldiers in the Middle East instead of Vietnam (for obvious age reasons) haven’t been cast yet, but the movie is being fast tracked to meet a June 11, 2010 release date, so we should start hearing casting news soon. Joe Carnahan is teaming with videogame voice actor Brian Bloom to polish the script by Skip Woods (Hitman, Swordfish) to “make it as emotional, real and accessible as possible without cheesing it up.”
#3 SAMSON GOING BACK TO THE FUTURE
Hollywood needs to leave writers some ridiculous ideas we can use for our April Fool’s Day jokes. Warner Bros has paid out an upfront seven figure deal to screenwriter Scott Silver (8 Mile, cowriter of The Mod Squad) for Samson, which retells the Biblical tale of Samson and Delilah… IN THE FUTURE! The sale followed a three studio bidding war, and Warner Bros has signed Francis Lawrence, who directed their massive hit, I Am Legend (also set in the future). It’s interesting to note that this is not the only wildly revisionist sci-fi project WB has in the works: last October, they announced plans to produce a version of Homer’s The Odyssey set in outer space, starring Brad Pitt. As for Samson, the Hebrews described him as a legendary figure who was able to kill 1,000 Philistines with the jawbone of an ass, but when Samson falls in love with the sexy Delilah, he reveals that his strength comes from his long hair. Delilah betrays Samson to the Philistines, his hair is cut, he gets weak, is blinded and enslaved, but eventually gets his revenge. So, imagine all that, but with maybe cyborgs or zombies or something.
#4 JAMES BOND AND BILLY ELLIOTT HEADLINE TINTIN
Steven Spielberg has started 3-D motion capture filming of The Adventures of TinTin: Secret of the Unicorn in Los Angeles, and with that, we now know that Jamie Bell (Billy Elliott) will be starring as Herge’s young Belgian reporter in this and Peter Jackson’s next TinTin movie. Also joining the cast is Daniel Craig, who will be playing Red Rackham, a 17th century pirate whose exploits were also key to the story of Red Rackham’s Treasure, which suggests that might be the movie that Peter Jackson will be directing, as it is basically the second half of the story that begins in The Secret of the Unicorn. Andy Serkis, who has plenty of experience with motion capture (Gollum in Lord of the Rings and Kong in King Kong) is costarring as the gruff Captain Haddock, a frequent TinTin character who is very instrumental to both books, and Shaun of the Dead stars Simon Pegg and Nick Frost are playing the bumbling look-alike detectives Thomson and Thompson.
#5 BY THE POWER OF… PANDA
Kung Fu Panda co-director John Stevenson will make his live action debut with a movie based upon a 1980s cartoon and toy franchise: Masters of the Universe. Joel Silver is producing for Warner Bros, and the first script draft was written by Justin Marks (Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li). Under the title of Grayskull, that script received a glowing A+ review over at Latino Review last summer. Warner Bros is aiming to make Masters of the Universe one of their big tentpole blockbuster hopefuls. Hasbro is also producing, so the emphasis in the press is mostly on the fact that the toys came first, but I think the He-Man cartoon is probably how most people remember it, and it provides this second movie (the first starred Dolph Lundgren and Frost/Nixon star Frank Langella as Skeletor) its story. Prince Adam is a bit of a fop, but when he yells “By the Power of Grayskull!”, he gets all buff, rides around on a massive cat, and fights villains with very literal names.
#6 THE THING PREQUEL STRETCHES ITS CREEPY TENTACLES FORWARD
It’s clobberin’ time! That, anyway, is what I’d be saying if Ben Grimm was getting his own movie. But nope, today’s news concerns Universal’s plans to make a prequel to John Carpenter’s The Thing, which will focus on what happened at that Norwegian camp that Kurt Russell and crew find all messed up, as victims of the monster’s first assault. The John W. Campbell, Jr. short story, “Who Goes There?” and the original 1951 movie, The Thing from Another World are also cited as influential sources. Ron Moore, responsible for the beloved Sci-Fi Channel revamp of Battlestar Galactica is working on the script, and commericals director Matthijs Van Heijningen will make his feature debut. When I first heard of plans to return to John Carpenter’s The Thing, I was frankly dismayed, but Ron Moore’s involvement is making me consider a 180 turnaround. I’m left wondering what they’re planning on doing about the fact that the crew of a Norwegian Antarctic camp probably speak… Norwegian?
#7 NICOLAS CAGE TO LIGHT HIS HEAD ON FIRE AGAIN IN GHOST RIDER 2
Bloody-Disgusting.com is reporting that Columbia Pictures is looking for writers for Ghost Rider 2, with Nicolas Cage already signed on and attached to return. Although the 2006 original, based upon the Marvel Comics character, was critically panned (28% on the Tomatometer), movie audiences didn’t let that stop them from making Ghost Rider a $115 million hit.
#8 HILARY DUFF TO STAR IN THE STORY OF BONNIE AND CLYDE (YES, REALLY)
What I wrote about April Fool’s Day in the Samson story applies doubly here. Lizzie Maguire star Hilary Duff and Kevin Zegers (Dawn of the Dead) will star in The Story of Bonnie and Clyde, an independent movie which goes back to the true story that inspired Bonnie and Clyde, one of the best movies of the 1960s. Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were a pair of Depression-Era bank robbers and cop killers who traveled the Midwest and the South, in love and destined to have a lot of holes in their car. Written and directed by Tonya S. Holly (2006’s When I Find the Ocean), The Story of Bonnie and Clyde is scheduled to start filming later this year in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.
#9 1066: THIS… IS… HASTINGS!
New Regency, which has a distribution deal with 20th Century Fox, has hired screenwriter William Nicholson (First Knight, cowriter of Gladiator) to write 1066, a historical epic about the strained relationship between King Harold of the Anglo-Saxons and William the Conqueror of the Normans, which led to the Battle of Hastings. The movie, which is expected to start filming on a large budget later this year with two big stars as the two leaders, will feature two massive battles and one naval battle. The year 1066 is one of those dates that you really shouldn’t get out of your history classes without knowing, as the results of the Battle of Hastings are generally credited with shaping English history from that point forward. It’s about time the Battle of Hastings got the sort of big budget epic movie it deserves.
#10 NEILS GAIMAN AND JORDAN TEAMING UP ON THE GRAVEYARD BOOK
The day after winning the Newberry Medal for Best Children’s Book of the year for The Graveyard Book, comics writer and novelist Neil Gaiman appeared on The Today Show and announced that Neil Jordan (Interview with the Vampire, The Crying Game) will be writing and directing a movie version. Inspired by The Jungle Book, The Graveyard Book is the story of an orphaned boy who is raised by the supernatural residents of a graveyard, with each chapter set a year or so apart as the boy grows up.
For more Weekly Ketchup columns by Greg Dean Schmitz, check out the WK archive, and you can contact GDS through his MySpace page or via a RT forum message and Greg also blogs about the TV show Lost, at TwoLosties.Blogspot.com.
From the "sequels we’re not dying for" department, we get a few tidbits regarding the possibility of A) "Tomb Raider 3" and B) "Point Break 2." (Really?)
Screenwriter W. Peter Iliff, who wrote the first "Point Break," is said to be moving forward on a sequel with production company RGM Films. Apparently Keanu Reeves‘ character will not be involved, but the one played by Patrick Swayze will be. (No word yet on if Swayze is signed on.)
Mr. Iliff (who also wrote "Patriot Games" and "Varsity Blues") will be making his directorial debut on the project, which will take place in Asia and center on an ex-surfer who joins the Navy in order to track down some Asian bad guys. Sounds like an all-around bad idea to me.
Speaking of bad ideas, someone on the video game side of the "Tomb Raider" series really wants to get another sequel out of Paramount. (Yes, still.) "At this moment in time it’s still not green-lit, but the signs are there … They’re willing to put a scriptwriter on board. Angelina Jolie has an option to do a third movie," is what TR creator Ian Livingstone had to say — although the operative words in that quote are "willing" and "option." Ian, get back to us when you have words like "signed contract" and "green-lit."
Source: Moviehole.net, Cinematical.com
Considering how weak the first two movies were, this news strikes me as kinda disturbing … but apparently someone in MovieLand is hoping to get a "Tomb Raider 3" off the ground! Ack!
It seems that the guys who make the "Tomb Raider" games are the ones pulling for a new "Tomb Raider" movie — and I wish someone would make them stop.
From ComingSoon.net and EuroGamer: ""There’s a possibility – we’ve been talking to Paramount, who’ve agreed to assign a scriptwriter," he told EGTV. "That’s nowhere near the green-light process but it’s a very healthy start to have a scriptwriter which they’re going to pay serious amounts of money to write the first script."
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"He" being Ian Livingstone, head of Edios Interactive.
Thoughts from the peanut gallery? Anyone out there think "Tomb Raider 3" would be a good idea? Personally I don’t think Angelina Jolie would even be interested at this point.
The London set of upcoming James Bond flick, "Casino Royale," was severely damaged in a fire Sunday that partially collapsed the roof of the storied Pinewood Shepperton Studios.
A Pinewood Studios soundstage had been standing in for Venice during the Bond shoot, which studio reps assured had already wrapped. Officials also confirmed that the sets were in the process of being removed at the time of the fire. Guess they won’t be needing any re-shoots for those scenes…
Nobody was hurt in Sunday’s fire, which local officials say took eight fire engines to put out. The cause of the blaze is being attributed to the explosion of "several cylinders of flammable gas," similar to the 1984 destruction of a set caused by exploding gas after the same soundstage was used to film Ridley Scott‘s "Legend."
Daniel Craig is the Blonde Bond in the upcoming "Casino Royale"
The particular set affected by Sunday’s fire was first used to film the 1977 Bond film, "The Spy Who Loved Me," although the majority of 007 productions dating back to 1962’s "Dr. No" had been shot in Pinewood’s various other locations.
Pinewood has played host to a bevy of movie productions in its 70-year history, including many Hollywood action flicks. In addition to hosting the Bond movies, Pinewood’s multiple-stage estate has attracted films like "Mission: Impossible," "Tomb Raider," and "Eyes Wide Shut," housed the Louvre set in "The Da Vinci Code" and the Fortress of Solitude from the first two "Superman" films. Most recently, the production of Neil Gaiman‘s "Stardust" had been shooting on Pinewood grounds.
Pinewood Studios also stood in for the Louvre in this year’s "The Da Vinci Code"
In a statement released Monday, Pinewood reps confirmed that the Bond soundstage will "need to be demolished and rebuilt," but that the rest of its 41 stages would be open for business "by the end of today."
"Casino Royale" is set to open in the U.S. on November 17, and will be the first Bond role for controversial blonde Daniel Craig, replacing four-time 007 Pierce Brosnan.
Wolverine, Professor X, and the rest of their soul patrol will launch a full-scale attack on the North American box office this weekend as the gargantuan comic book film X-Men: The Last Stand invades the marketplace on Friday ready to dominate the long Memorial Day holiday weekend.
Rival studios have ceded the frame to the much anticipated Fox sequel as no other film will open in wide release. But with the religious thriller The Da Vinci Code coming off of a spectacular opening, and the animated hit Over the Hedge doing well with family audiences, it should be a very busy four-day weekend at the megaplexes as all types of moviegoers will have something worth spending money on.
The world’s favorite mutants embark on what could be their final mission in X-Men: The Last Stand which has its eyes set on breaking the opening weekend record for the Memorial Day frame. After directing the first two successful installments, Bryan Singer jumped ship to helm Superman Returns opening up the director’s chair on Stand for Brett Ratner (Rush Hour, Red Dragon). All the primary cast members have returned including Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellen, Halle Berry, Famke Janssen, Rebecca Romijn, and Anna Paquin. Kelsey Grammer joins the cast playing Beast.
The X-Men franchise has grown in size throughout this decade. After the demise of the Batman franchise in 1997, the comic book genre seemed dead until the first X-Men arrived in July of 2000 with a powerful $54.5M bow firmly planting Marvel in the feature film business. Three years later, Fox plugged the sequel X2: X-Men United into the prominent first weekend of May slot and blasted off to the tune of $85.6M. Final domestic grosses reached $157.3M and $214.9M respectively and with video and television, the franchise lured in more and more converts. Unlike most of 2003’s other summer action sequels like Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle, X2 was a second installment that was even more popular than the first making fans crave yet another film in the series.
X-Men remains one of the top comic properties around and speculation that this will be the final installment will make fans not want to miss out. Between the escalating actor salaries and the heavy dependence on expensive special effects, Fox and Marvel Entertainment probably couldn’t afford to bankroll an X-Men 4 even if they wanted to. With the Star Wars prequels having finished up and this franchise closing up shop soon, Fox is looking to squeeze every dime it can out of The Last Stand. Its next big super hero flick won’t take off until June 15 of next year when Fantastic Four 2 hits screens a cool six weeks after Sony’s Spider-Man 3. It’s no surprise then why Fox is rolling out its tentpole pic in almost every major market around the world this weekend.
For this weekend, X-Men has a secret weapon in its arsenal which should propel its numbers at the box office – teens. Studios have not done a good job over the last several weeks in exciting the most desirable of all age groups. MI3, Poseidon, and The Da Vinci Code all skewed older leaving high school students thinking these were their parents’ summer movies. Afterall, the average 16-year-old was only six when Tom Cruise first wowed audiences in Mission: Impossible. Finally with the mutant posse, Hollywood is delivering the goods for teens and young adults offering an action-packed adventure heavy on the type of special effects and action that people are eager to pay money for. No wait-for-the-DVD here. A strong turnout from this age group should be at the core of X-Men’s success this weekend.
Most folks who drove X2 past the double century mark three years ago are likely to return this time. That film had virtually no competition to deal with whereas Last Stand will face a pair of potent sophomores that could rake in over $70M combined over the four-day stretch. However, the new film has the added benefit of three years of ticket price increases, a holiday frame that should power Sunday and Monday numbers to exceptional heights, and a fan base that is likely to have grown even larger since the last film.
For nine long years, Steven Spielberg‘s dinosequel The Lost World has held the record for the biggest Memorial Day weekend opening ever with a colossal $92.7M over four days including Thursday night previews. The record for the largest overall weekend tally over the frame is held by 2004’s Shrek 2 which hauled in a stunning $95.6M over four days while in its second weekend. X-Men hopes to become the first film to open to nine digits over this long holiday span.
The month of May has been chock full of eye-popping four-day openings from effects-driven action films appealing to mass audiences looking to start their summer off with a bang. Four-day opening tallies in recent years include $158.4M for last year’s Star Wars Episode III, $134.3M for The Matrix Reloaded, $110.2M for Star Wars Episode II, and $85.8M for The Day After Tomorrow. The Last Stand may not have the same level of anticipation as some of those blockbusters, but it does have a loyal fan following that is ready to pounce on theaters this weekend. Fox is aiming to dominate the box office this weekend opening X-Men: The Last Stand in 3,688 theaters. The super hero extravaganza might fly off with around $108M over the four-day Friday-to-Monday holiday session setting a new industry record.
With only one major studio release invading theaters, a number of smaller distributors are using the holiday frame to launch limited release titles. Yash Raj Films enters most major markets on Friday with the Bollywood release Fanaa which stars one of India’s biggest box office draws Aamir Khan. Paramount’s new specialty division Paramount Vantage opened Al Gore‘s global warming documentary An Inconvenient Truth in four theaters on Wednesday. The PG-rated film chronicles the former Vice President’s mission on educating the world on environmental issues that are threatening our civilization and will expand into more markets across the country in the weeks ahead.
Opening in solo houses in New York City are the Jewish road drama Shem and the Filipino thriller Cavite. HP Releasing’s Shem finds a young man traveling across Europe to find his great grandfather’s grave while Truly Indie’s Cavite is a no-budget kidnapping drama in which a man arrives in the Philippines and is forced to commit heinous deeds by a terrorist if he wants to see his family alive again. Both films open in Los Angeles later in June.
Last weekend, Ron Howard‘s The Da Vinci Code opened to explosive results grossing a staggering $77.1M in its first three days. Over the holiday frame, the conspiracy thriller will benefit from adults having extra time off, a four-day span, and the fact that the only new film entering theaters will play to a somewhat different audience. However, Code generated a frontloaded bow last weekend with Friday accounting for an extraordinarily high 39% of the three-day take and Saturday sales seeing a slight dip. Fans of the book certainly rushed out on the first day to see Tom Hanks play symbologist Robert Langdon so now the film must survive having already burned through its core crowd.
Studios routinely pick the weekend before the Memorial Day frame as a launching pad for their biggest blockbusters, but sophomore declines over the holiday can vary. In 2003, the much-hyped sci-fi sequel The Matrix Reloaded saw its four-day holiday gross tumble 50% from its three-day debut gross. The following year, Shrek 2 slipped just 12% while last year’s Star Wars Episode III dropped a more moderate 35%. Code does not play to a sci-fi crowd or to an audience of children so its numbers will be closely watched.
The Sony smash has performed admirably during the week grossing a fantastic $8.8M on Monday, helped in part by Canada’s Victoria Day holiday, and another $6.2M on Tuesday. Code looks to crack the magical $100M mark by the end of its first full week in theaters before heading right into a sophomore frame cushioned by a holiday. Since word-of-mouth is just average, The Da Vinci Code may see its four-day take drop by 40% to around $46M. That would allow the much-talked-about film’s 11-day cume to surge to $148M.
The animated comedy Over the Hedge got off to a solid start last weekend and should continue to be the leading choice for families with younger kids. A 20% drop to about $31M over four days would give Paramount $79M after 11 days. The studio’s spy sequel Mission: Impossible III looks to fall by around 35% to roughly $7M giving Tom Cruise a total of $114M. The disaster flick Poseidon could fall by the same amount to around $6M lifting the sum to $45M for Warner Bros.
LAST YEAR The Memorial Day weekend box office was on fire thanks to a selection of red hot hits helping the top four films alone gross more than $200M over four days. Star Wars Episode III remained at number one for the second weekend with a commanding $70M over the Friday-to-Monday span boosting its 12-day cume to an eye-popping $270.5M. DreamWorks went after younger kids with its animated hit Madagascar which bowed to a hefty $61M to take second place while the studio’s future parent Paramount was close behind in third with the Adam Sandler comedy The Longest Yard which opened to $58.6M. The two blockbusters, which both featured Chris Rock, went on to gross $193.2M and $158.1M, respectively. More funny flicks followed with New Line’s Monster-in-Law dropping to fourth with $12.8M over the long weekend and Universal’s Kicking and Screaming taking in $6.5M.
Author: Gitesh Pandya, www.BoxOfficeGuru.com
IGN FilmForce brings us some maybe-news from semi-reliable sources: Seems that Ms. Angelina Jolie may be grabbing hold of her pistols once again — and stepping into "Tomb Raider 3" — but only after she’s had Brad Pitt’s baby, loses a little weight, and comes back from Africa.
""Paramount has optioned [Tomb Raider III] and Angelina has agreed to star in the third," Ian Livingstone — fantasy author, Eidos co-founder, and creator of Lara Croft — told the paper. Eidos Interactive, now owned by SCi, created the wildly popular computer and console game series based on the adventures of archaeologist Lara Croft. The franchise continues to be popular with the release of the company’s latest game, ‘Tomb Raider: Legend.’"
For the rest of the so-far story, check IGNFF.
Rian Johnson won last year’s Sundance Jury Prize for Originality of Vision with "Brick," his teenage film noir starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt — and we’ve got the first few exclusive photos from the pic, here.
"Brick" follows Southern California high school student Brendan Frye (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) as he unearths a twisted circle of crime in his neighborhood, searching for his missing ex-girlfriend (Emilie de Ravin). Judging from the trailer (and a clip shown at this year’s WonderCon), "Brick" has the noir feeling down, with its deceptively sunny SoCal setting, a cast of shady characters, and a hero that’s as hard-boiled as a high school student can be. In addition to indie vet Gordon-Levitt and "Lost" star de Ravin, "Brick" stars Lukas Haas, Nora Zehetner, Meagan Good, Noah Fleiss, and Richard Roundtree.
Check out the exclusive stills, see our flipbook images, and make sure to watch the trailer!
"Brick" will be released by Focus Features in New York and LA March 31, with more cities starting April 7.
Simon West, director of the recent one-weekend hit "When a Stranger Calls," will return to Sony’s Screen Gems to direct another horror flick, this one a newlywed thriller called "Vacancy."
Says The Hollywood Reporter: "Simon West is booking another reservation with Screen Gems. The helmer, whose latest effort, "When a Stranger Calls," recently opened at No. 1 for Screen Gems, is in negotiations to direct the horror thriller "Vacancy" for the Sony genre label. Penned by Mark L. Smith, "Vacancy" centers on a young married couple who become stranded at a desolate motel and realize that their lives could be in danger. Screen Gems is eyeing a mid-June start date. Hal Lieberman is producing through his Lieberman Prods. Eric Paquette is overseeing for Screen Gems. West’s $15 million-budgeted "When a Stranger Calls" has grossed nearly $43 million domestically since opening three weeks ago. His helming credits also include "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider" and "Con Air.""
There’s been a bona-fide explosion of new movie trailers over the past week or two … but this is the only one I’ve watched more than once, because I’m a desperately sick horror junkie. Hardcore gorehounds are obviously familiar with Wes Craven‘s classic "The Hills Have Eyes," and now comes the very first trailer for the remake by "High Tension" director Alexandre Aja. And it’s pretty darn cool.
"The story of a family road trip that goes terrifyingly awry when the travelers become stranded in a government atomic zone. Miles from nowhere, the Carters soon realize the seemingly uninhabited wasteland is actually the breeding ground of a blood-thirsty mutant family… and they are the prey."
Scheduled for release (with an R rating, thank the horror gods) on March 10th, the new-fangled "Hills Have Eyes" stars Aaron Stanford, Ted Levine, Kathleen Quinlan, Vinessa Shaw, Emilie de Ravin, and a bunch of mega-mutated murderers. Can’t wait.
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Also just hitting the internets earlier today is the all-new trailer for Screen Gems’ PG-13 remake of "When a Stranger Calls," which you can see right here.
This one’s a re-do of the classic "Have you checked on the children?" story, only instead of Carol Kane and Charles Durning, we got Camilla Belle and Brian Geraghty. Simon West, the man behind "Con Air," "The General’s Daughter," and "Tomb Raider," is in the director’s chair for this remake, which opens on February 3rd.
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So there you are: Trailers for two new remakes of two 70s horror flicks. And now you have at least two months in which to rent the originals. Don’t forget!
The Business Online reports that Paramount and video game production company SCI are in talks to produce a second "Tomb Raider" sequel for Angelina Jolie to star in. No word on if those involved in the talks have actually SEEN either "Tomb Raider" movie.
"SCI, the computer games company that owns Lara Croft, along with her Tomb Raider franchise, is in talks with Paramount Pictures over licensing the property for a third Hollywood movie.
The previous two movies have grossed more than $450m at the box office and are based on the video game of the same name.
It was originally produced by Eidos, a one-time stock market darling that has slipped from its £1bn valuation and struggled financially in recent years. The company was bought by SCI earlier this year.
Sources in Hollywood say negotiations have started between Paramount and SCI for the latest movie, and Angelina Jolie has once again expressed an interest in starring as Lara Croft, the English archaeologist-adventurer.
The video game and film industries have grown closer over the years, as games are licensed to film studios. The Tomb Raider game has sold more than 30m copies since 1996."
