(Photo by MGM / Everett Collection. THE ACCOUNTANT 2.)
In an age where toxic masculinity rages online, young boys are being influenced by the wrong people, and blatant sexism and bigotry will land someone in a position of power rather than shunned from society, Jon Bernthal is pushing back. This talented actor, known for playing best friends with an axe to grind, brooding and conflicted assassins, and argumentative and dangerous siblings, has an impressive and effective resume. But perhaps equally important as Bernthal’s acting roles might be his podcast.
Another actor with a podcast, you say? “Real Ones” with Jon Bernthal is different, and a welcome bastion against the forces of darkness from an actor who has long supported positive role models. This podcast has open and heartbreaking discussions with interesting people, without any particular agenda in mind. Bernthal also a strong ally to the LGBTQ+ community and a frequent critic of those who misuse the Punisher symbol for their own ends.
Interested in perusing some of Bernthal’s many roles? Here’s an overview of his career, followed by a ranking of his movies and TV shows by Tomatometer.
THE WALKING DEAD: Seasons 1 & 2 (2010-11): The first place most of us saw Bernthal’s work was in AMC’s The Walking Dead, based on the long-running comic book series created by Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore. In the first two seasons, Bernthal plays Shane, the best friend of main character Rick Grimes. Right away, fans and critics latched on to Bernthal’s simmering performance, especially since Shane enters into a secret relationship with Rick’s wife Lori while Rick is in a coma at the start of the series. Shane ultimately isn’t thrilled with Rick’s reemergence following the zombie apocalypse, and is the first of many to try and kill Rick with fatal results for Shane. Indeed, reviewers early in Season 2 (and readers of the comic book) were starting to catch on to Shane’s deception.
Salon’s Matt Zoller Seitz on The Walking Dead: “For some reason, Jon Bernthal’s performance exudes untrustworthiness; I keeping hoping he’ll turn out to be a conniving and selfish character, the kind of guy that the young Burt Lancaster or Kirk Douglas might have played back in the day.”
DAREDEVIL (2015-2018), THE PUNISHER (2017-19), DAREDEVIL: BORN AGAIN (2025-): We next saw Bernthal in an example of perfect casting: his co-starring role in Marvel’s Netflix series Daredevil Season 2 as the gun-toting, single-minded assassin, The Punisher. Bernthal injects this comic book character with loads of internal conflict and pathos. Bernthal’s performance was so effective that he graduated to his own show, The Punisher, which lasted for two seasons toward the end of Marvel’s run on Netflix. As mentioned below, Bernthal is back again, and even more compelling, in 2025’s Daredevil: Born Again.
/Film’s Jacob Hall on Daredevil Season 2: “In a season with many new highlights, Bernthal shines the brightest. It takes an actor of great skill to make ‘vengeful soldier sets out for revenge’ interesting, but he finds an angle. Even when his face isn’t a mask of bruises, his Frank Castle looks like he’s in constant pain, a twitchy mess looking for someone, anything, that will bring order to his broken world. And in his case, that anything happens to be violence. There’s a dark nobility to his performance, a single-mindedness that lets us know (long before the characters onscreen know) that the Punisher may be the sanest guy in Hell’s Kitchen. And that makes him all the more frightening.”
In Daredevil: Born Again, Bernthal’s Punisher returns, 10 years after he originated the role, and the two very different crime fighters trade philosophies about their approaches: Daredevil prefers to beat up the bad guys, but never kill, and Punisher simply takes out his opponents as quickly, and permanently, as possible.
San Francisco Chronicle’s Zaki Hasan on Daredevil: Born Again: “That moral conflict is woven throughout the series, even bringing back Jon Bernthal as the Punisher, Marvel’s gun-toting vigilante who debuted in the previous show and starred in his own series for two seasons. The Punisher’s brutal methods starkly contrast with Murdock’s own struggles. Their philosophical debates on the nature of violence provide some of the season’s most engrossing moments.”
BABY DRIVER & WIND RIVER (2017): In between Marvel seasons, Bernthal scored a couple of highly memorable roles in two highly rated crime movies (both Certified Fresh) from two first-rate filmmakers: Edgar Wright’s Baby Driver and Taylor Sheridan’s Wind River.
In Baby Driver, Bernthal plays Griff, a security man in the heist crew, someone who takes his work extremely seriously, and a criminal who is perpetually annoyed to a humorous degree by the music-obsessed title character, Baby (Ansel Elgort).
The Wall Street Journal’s Joe Morgenstern on Baby Driver: “The gang has its own claims to distinction. Jon Hamm is Buddy, formerly a stockbroker on Wall Street. Eiza González is Darling, Buddy’s volcanic—i.e. crazy—girlfriend. Jon Bernthal is Griff, a hard case and a funny one.”
In Wind River, Bernthal’s small role is a riveting one, as he delivers an extended heart-rending speech about loss. Sheridan’s projects are known for incisive monologues, and this is no exception.
THE BEAR (2022-): Remarkably, Bernthal’s performance as Mikey in The Bear, the brother who ended his own life, kicking off main character and younger brother Carmy’s (Jeremy Allen White) ascent to head chef at the family restaurant, is notable for his absence and effect on the other characters throughout the series. Bernthal appears very sparingly but sharply in flashbacks, as Mikey’s happy-go-lucky (with a drinking problem) personality contrasts fully with Carmy’s intensity and Mikey’s best friend Richie’s (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) loud brashness. This is never more apparent than the infamous Christmas flashback episode “Fishes” in Season 2, where a seething and utensil-throwing Mikey nearly comes to blows with his Uncle Lee, played by a very angry Bob Odenkirk. This brief but pointed presence throughout the series landed Bernthal an Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series.
Financial Times’ Joe Einav on The Bear Season 2: “Before Richie’s moment of tenderness comes a bruising hour-long episode that flashes back to a nightmarish Berzatto family Christmas. Starring Jamie Lee Curtis and Jon Bernthal as Carmy’s volatile mother and late brother (Bob Odenkirk and Sarah Paulson also appear), it is an extraordinary piece of tragicomedy — at once a hysterical farce and a raw, soul-draining domestic drama. You wish more TV could be this intense while feeling relieved that it isn’t.”
THE ACCOUNTANT & THE ACCOUNTANT 2 (2016 & 2025): One of Bernthal’s major breaks in movies came through in Ben Affleck’s The Accountant, where he plays a familiar role as a grumpy but talented assassin and foil to Affleck’s autistic thinking-person’s killer. As revealed, Bernthal’s and Affleck’s characters are brothers, and in Certified Fresh sequel The Accountant 2 the two very different siblings play off each other effectively in between killings.
The Wrap’s Matt Donato on The Accountant 2: “Bernthal and Affleck share beers, push buttons and liberate guarded encampments as brotherly mercenaries who are fine apart — although Bernthal does no wrong all film — but captivatingly hilarious together. There’s a buddy comedy vibe that sustains when no one’s dying, which is lucky because action sequences are front and back-loaded.”
Bernthal has two new interesting roles: a quasi-ally to Rami Malek’s CIA revenge quest in The Amateur, and in Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, an adaptation of the epic poem, out in 2026. As Bernthal’s roles have become meatier over time, he’s revealed many facets to his acting talent, focusing on masculine characters who aren’t afraid to show dimension and emotion. At the same time, he’s been willing to return to morally conflicted assassin characters that kicked off his career. It’ll be fascinating to see what intense role he takes on next, and what deep and involved conversations he has next, and with whom, on “Real Ones.”
In the meantime, catch up on Bernthal’s roles with this list in order of Tomatometer ranking, with Certified Fresh films and shows first. (Steve Horton)
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Fandango is celebrating its 25th anniversary!
One of the greatest things about cinema is that it has the power to connect audiences with impactful stories while simultaneously connecting us with each other. And for the last 25 years, Fandango has been the bridge, serving countless viewers across the country.
“Over the past 25 years, Fandango has proudly helped more than one billion moviegoers experience incredible entertainment in the best way possible: on the biggest screens with the best sound, a community of likeminded cinephiles, and of course, a big bucket of popcorn,” said Fandango President Will McIntosh. “We have a lot of people to thank for helping us reach this milestone, like theaters and studios, but none of it would be possible without the fans, especially the fans on Rotten Tomatoes!”
Celebrate with us and check out this list of 25 highest-ticketed films via Fandango since 2000, from Disney favorites like Incredibles 2 and Finding Dory to recent blockbusters like Barbie and Deadpool & Wolverine. Do you spot any of your favorites? (Or did one of your faves get snubbed?) Let us know in the comments, and share your most memorable moviegoing experience while you’re at it.
Be sure to also check out Fandango’s special Social Sweepstakes on Instagram for your chance to win a $500 Fandango promo code — just follow, like, and share your favorite movie from the past 25 years to enter.
Cheers to 25 years!
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(Photo by Ryan Billings / Everett Collection)
We’re ranking by Tomatometer the films of director Ryan Coogler! Let’s start with his Certified Fresh films. In fact, all of them are Certified Fresh, with the social justice drama Fruitvale Station, the Rocky revitalizer Creed, the Best Picture-nominated Black Panther, its sequel Wakanda Forever, and the original horror revelry Sinners.
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(Photo by New Line, 20th Century Fox Film Corp./courtesy Everett Collection)
The latest: Cronenberg is back with his 23rd film, The Shrouds!
Over the course of six decades, David Cronenberg has built a bloody, slimed-over, and warped throne of flesh and bone to sit upon as the king of body horror. His first two films, Stereo and Crimes of the Future, are little-seen, ready for Cronenberg fans to re-discover and find that his obsession with pushing the boundaries of science, sexual perversity, and our oh-so-tenuous grasp on our physical self was present from the beginning.
Rabid and The Brood made more of a squeamish splash with general audiences. And in the ’80s, Cronenberg came into his own: Scanners was all over horror magazines for its legendary exploding head sequence. The Dead Zone contributed to a hot streak of Stephen King adaptations happening across the industry, following Carrie and The Shining. The Fly was the rare excellent remake and had the good sense to parade Jeff Goldblum around in his underwear (and vomit). And Videodrome seemed to best express Cronenberg’s vision of how the self can be utterly compromised by sinister forces.
The ’90s saw Cronenberg experimenting with an expanded dramatic palette (M. Butterfly, Naked Lunch) with varied results, which would pay dividends in the following decade. That’s when he released A History of Violence, which would become his highest-grossing movie, be nominated for two Oscars, and mark the start of a fruitful collaboration with Viggo Mortensen. The actor was nominated for the Oscar in their follow-up Eastern Promises, which boasts a bath house fight that’ll please those who think the tighty-whities Goldblum wore in The Fly were too much clothing. The third Viggo movie was A Dangerous Method, a kinky yet classy flick of psychology that brought in Keira Knightley and Michael Fassbender.
And you know how Robert Pattinson is your new favorite actor, especially after you had written him off for those Twilight movies? You can thank Cronenberg for giving Pattinson the opportunity to do weird roles to shake up his image, in movies like Cosmopolis and Maps to the Stars. Cronenberg had appeared to have retired in recent years with the shifting movie and media landscape, but in 2022 he returned with Crimes of the Future, another body-horror shocker unrelated to his early film of the same name. If that’s the case, then it’s been an impressive, influential, and gross – really, really gross – career, which we’re celebrating now with all 21 David Cronenberg movies ranked – Certified Fresh films first! —Alex Vo
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As much as we all love the movies around here, there’s nothing quite like binge-watching a fresh batch of well-made serial entertainment, and this weekend, Netflix is serving up one of the year’s most highly anticipated new seasons. We’re talking, of course, about Stranger Things — and in honor of its return, we decided to dedicate this feature to a look at some of the many films that helped inspire the streaming service’s ’80s-set horror hit. Toast up some Eggos, because it’s time for Total Recall, Stranger Things style!
(Photo by 20th Century Fox Film Corp.)
Stranger Things‘ setting of Hawkins, Indiana is clearly quite different from the reaches of deep space where we meet the crew of the Nostromo in Alien. Still, it’s easy to see how the Duffer brothers took inspiration from Ridley Scott’s sci-fi/horror classic — most obviously in the way those imprisoned in the Upside Down are forcibly used as incubators for the offspring of its monstrous denizens, and in the way the Demogorgon’s nightmarish face opens like the world’s worst flower (or a xenomorph’s egg). Given the way poor Will yarfed up a nasty remnant of his time in captivity, we’re guessing we’ve seen far from the last instance of Alien‘s body horror influence on the show.
(Photo by Warner Bros. courtesy Everett Collection)
The first time Eleven is plunged into her sensory deprivation tank in order to access the Upside Down, film buffs saw a clear parallel to this 1980 cult classic, in which William Hurt plays a psychologist who uses a similar apparatus to explore the theory that human consciousness is far more vast and complex than we’re able to understand in our waking hours. Using a combination of drugs and sensory deprivation, he undergoes a series of progressively more profound transformations, until — like Eleven — crossing the line between realities threatens to consume him altogether. Stranger Things hasn’t given us primitive man or a many-eyed goat yet, but as the second-season teasers have shown us, there’s still a lot we don’t know about the Upside Down.
Steven Spielberg’s classic 1982 hit is a lot of things, but underneath everything, it’s the story of a group of kids banding together to protect their powerful yet vulnerable — and decidedly unusual — new friend from an encroaching adult menace. It’s a fight that comes with no small amount of peril, and one that’s destined to demand some heartbreaking sacrifice before it’s over, but our brave protagonists still insist on standing up for what’s right, and doing it largely without (deliberate) assistance from the unwitting adult authority figures in their lives. And okay, so Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) never made a bike fly across the night sky, but she did flip a freakin’ van with the power of her mind — and just like E.T. loved his Reese’s Pieces, she can’t get enough Eggo waffles.
This is a little bit of a cheat, because although the Duffer brothers were clearly influenced by Firestarter — along with an assortment of other Stephen King stories, including IT — they took their inspiration from the bestselling horror master’s books rather than their film adaptations. Still, we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention the story of young Charlie McGee (Drew Barrymore), a young girl whose growing pyrokinetic powers are the inherited result of a shadowy government program… and very much desired by the men in pursuit of Charlie and her dad, who’ve fled their captors’ grasp and are determined to live in freedom rather than be forced to use their gifts for potentially nefarious purposes. Eleven did a pretty bang-up job of evading Dr. Brenner during Stranger Things‘ first season, but if she ends up back on the run in season two, Charlie’s adventures might offer a few tips for staying a step ahead of special agents.
(Photo by New Century Vista Film courtesy Everett Collection)
You never know what’ll be waiting when you open a portal to another dimension, but it’s always a pretty safe bet that at least one nasty surprise will be waiting on the other side. We’ve seen it happen in sci-fi over and over again for years, and 1987’s The Gate offers a perfect (and perfectly ’80s) example of those dangers in action. Like the foolhardy crew at Hawkins National Laboratory who coerce poor Eleven into mucking around with the Upside Down, the boys in The Gate (played by Stephen Dorff and Louis Tripp) end up getting more than they bargained for when they poke a hole in the barrier between worlds — heck, we even see the old “stretching wall” trick in action.
(Photo by Warner Bros. courtesy Everett Collection)
Long before Stranger Things rounded up a gang of junior misfits to tell a tale of adventure with horror overtones, dozens of directors made memorable use of that familiar dynamic for films that thrilled audiences while making them nostalgic for their misspent youth (or, for younger filmgoers, sent them home with dreams of doing anything half as cool as the stuff they’d just seen). But given the Duffer brothers’ fondness for all things ’80s, we’re inclined to point to The Goonies and The Monster Squad as two of the show’s more obvious sources of inspiration. Like the Goonies, our Hawkins heroes aren’t the coolest kids in school — and like the Monster Squad, they’ve experienced stuff that would send many of the adults in their lives straight into therapy. Strength in numbers always counts for a lot, but it’s even more meaningful during the years before you get your driver’s license.
(Photo by 20th Century Fox Film Corp.)
The post-Watergate years were great for paranoid, politically tinged thrillers — particularly in the early ’80s, when rapidly advancing technology mingled with Cold War fears to produce cinema that imagined computer-driven conspiracies lurking behind even the most innocuous-seeming suburban landscapes. That paranoia fueled 1986’s The Manhattan Project, in which a government scientist’s top-secret lab is disguised as a medical company in upstate New York… and a particularly smart kid ends up bogarting plutonium from the facility so he can build a bomb for his big science fair project. The kids in Stranger Things haven’t had to defuse a warhead yet, but the secret misdeeds going on inside the Hawkins National Laboratory could end up being far more explosive.
(Photo by New Line Cinema)
The Demogorgon doesn’t have a razor-clawed glove, a fedora, or a ratty striped sweater. Still, there are some clear parallels between A Nightmare on Elm Street‘s Freddy Krueger and Stranger Things‘ big bad from the Upside Down — first spotted in the second episode of the first season (titled “The Weirdo on Maple Street”), during which the wall of Will Byers’ room is seen stretching with the strain of something trying to get in, Krueger style. In the season climax, Jonathan and Nancy decide to do battle against the Demogorgon by outfitting the Byers home with booby traps and luring the monster in — much the same way Freddy met his (first) demise in the original Nightmare.
(Photo by MGM)
After poor Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) gets trapped in the Upside Down, and his mom Joyce (Winona Ryder) struggles to communicate with him — first via freaky phone connection, then through messages sent by Christmas lights — it is, like much of Stranger Things, both scary and poignant. But it’s also kind of familiar, at least to anyone who’s ever watched Poltergeist: poor Carol Anne Freeling (Heather O’Rourke) spends much of the movie separated from her desperate parents, held captive by a supernatural evil and only able to reach out through the static on the family TV. And like Carol Anne, Will is ultimately drawn back to life by the power of his mother’s love — although it isn’t enough to prevent lingering traces of the other side from coming with him.
To see the influences exerted by some of the movies on this list, you need to have a fairly observant eye. Not so David Cronenberg’s 1981 sci-fi horror classic Scanners, which — like Stranger Things — involves a shadowy group of powerful people determined to maintain control over a powerful telepath. Stranger Things has included a lot less head-exploding action thus far, but hey — we’re only up to the second season so far. You never know what might happen next.
(Photo by Columbia Pictures courtesy Everett Collection)
It would be easy enough to draw parallels between Stranger Things and any classic movie about kids on a potentially life-threatening adventure. Still, Stand by Me stands out as one of the more obvious points of reference — not least because it was adapted from a Stephen King story. And while there may not be a straight line between Stranger Things and King’s tale of four friends braving local bullies to catch a glimpse of a dead body, there are a number of visual references, and there’s still plenty of overlap; both are period pieces, albeit set in different eras, and both delve into the darker elements of that fraught area between childhood and the adult world. (Also, they both boast a killer soundtrack.)
This week on home video, we’ve got an animated sequel, a puzzling sci-fi tale, and the second season of a much buzzed-about BBC America TV series. Beyond that, we’ve got a handful of notable smaller movies, as well as two excellent choices from the Criterion Collection. Read on for details:
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Jesse Eisenberg and Anne Hathaway reprise their voice roles as Blu and Jewel, the pair of blue macaws who found love in Fox’s 2011 animated film Rio, in this sequel, which follows them as they pursue the trail of another recently spotted macaw. Along the way, Blu, Jewel, and their three kids clash with an illegal logging operation in the Amazon, reunite with Jewel’s family, and run into some trouble in the form of an old nemesis. Unfortunately, critics weren’t as smitten by the colorful couple’s antics this time around, saying Rio 2 felt simply like a bigger, busier retread of its predecessor and rewarding its efforts with a 46 percent on the Tomatometer. Nevertheless, it may serve as a colorful distraction for your little ones, especially considering the special features include an extensive playlist of both sing-along and dance-along songs, among other things.
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Those of you looking to hunker down with a copy of Under the Skin this week purely because “it’s the movie where Scarlett Johansson gets naked” might end up with more than you bargained for (don’t worry; we know that’s not really why you’re watching it). Jonathan Glazer’s (Sexy Beast) third film, an adaptation of Michel Faber’s eponymous sci-fi novel, is the stylized account of an alien who takes the form of a woman (Johansson) to seduce men and, ultimately, absorb their innards. Over time, the alien’s predatory instincts give way to curious observation, but to what end? Critics mostly agreed that Under the Skin‘s visual themes and narrative ambiguity might not be accessible to all viewers, but they also praised Johansson’s performance and the film’s haunting, heady ideas, making the film Certified Fresh at 86 percent. Available on DVD and Blu-ray this week, special features include a little over 42 minutes’ worth of featurettes on topics ranging from the casting and music to the production design and visual effects.
BBC America’s hit sci-fi series has been a coming out party for its star, Tatiana Maslany, who acts opposite herself in multiple roles and has earned a Golden Globe nomination for her efforts (no Emmy nom, though, much to the dismay of fans). After a first season that slowly drew an increasingly larger audience by word of mouth, Orphan Black returned for its second season back in April, expanding its narrative to include more characters, more twists, and more evidence why Maslany deserves the lion’s share of the credit for the show’s Certified Fresh 97 percent Tomatometer. For those of you looking for some extra clone goodness, the season two Blu-ray that hits shelves this week includes a number of making-of featurettes, including an extended version of the four-clone scene (dance party, woohoo!) and clone character profiles.
You guys! Check it out! You aren’t going to believe this, but…it’s a news item about a remake!
What’s getting the do-over treatment this time? Why, it’s David Cronenberg‘s The Brood, the 1979 horror classic starring Oliver Reed as a psychotherapist whose, um, unorthodox techniques cause Samantha Eggar to “give birth” to a small army of creepy kids who act out her repressed anger.
The new Brood, according to Variety, will be written by Cory Goodman and released through Spyglass Entertainment, and is reflective of what Variety refers to as “something of a renaissance” for Cronenberg; aside from the critical praise enjoyed by his most recent projects, A History of Violence and Eastern Promises, his earlier films are becoming trendy remake subjects — in development alongside The Brood is a Darren Lynn Bousman-directed update on Scanners.
Source: Variety
It’s easy to remake old horror movies with newfangled CGI effects. Recapturing their spirit is another story. That’s what David Goyer hopes to do with his script for "Scanners," originally David Cronenberg‘s telepathic exploding head movie from the ’80s.
"’Scanners’ is a great movie but it’s also very dated to a certain extent," said Goyer. "Largely in socio-political terms it’s very dated. Cronenberg’s movies are always very political and very specific. That original film had a lot to do with corporate America and the Reagan years and all of that stuff and that’s not what’s happening now. So my whole thing was, and I love that movie and I don’t want to ruin that movie, so it’s not a slavish remake. It’s kind of taking the best stuff from that and trying to apply the same sociopolitical template."
One need only turn on the news to find material for telepathic warriors. "Read about all the stuff that’s going on in Iraq, or the stuff that’s going on in the Justice department or Guantanamo Bay and all the rights that are being trampled on. That’s what I’m trying to deal with in the remake of that."
And exploding heads, of course. "Of course we’re going to blow up a head but we have to go further than blow up a head because we’re 20 years down the line. With ‘Scanners,’ it’s just fun to know I can just go for it and I don’t have to do the toned down version of it."
As a fan of the original, Goyer does hope Cronenberg approves. "I figured the best way to do it would be finish it and send it to him and either get his blessing or take my lashings."
He’s written some of the most popular movies of the past few years, but writer/director David S. Goyer isn’t slowing down. His remake "The Invisible" hits screens soon, he’s got a cool-sounding project called "Super Max" on the horizon, and he’s planning to remake a well-regarded David Cronenberg flick called "Scanners."
Yep, "Scanners," the movie in which Michael Ironside makes human heads explode just by thinking about it (and concentrating real hard). Mr. Goyer is taking the smart route with this remake, being careful to praise Mr. Cronenberg’s very influential work while mentioning how he’d like to ‘modernize’ the story.
"I’m a huge Cronenberg fan, and ‘Scanners’ was definitely one of my favorite films as a kid," Goyer said. "What we’re trying to do is take all the best elements of that. … He obviously made it on a shoestring budget, so this time hopefully we can expand upon what he did," is what Goyer had to say, among other things.
Darren Lynn Bousman looks to be on board as the new "Scanners" director. Production on the remake is supposed to get rolling in early 2008.
Source: Sci-Fi Wire
Darren Lynn Bousman, director of "Saw 2," "Saw 3," and the upcoming "Saw 4," will soon be helming a remake of David Cronenberg‘s "Scanners" for Dimension Films. They also signed a pretty good screenwriter for the gig…
…and that writer is David S. Goyer, whose flicks include "Dark City," "Blade," "Blade 2," and "Batman Begins."
For those who don’t remember the original "Scanners," click right here to check out the now-famous "exploding head" sequence. (It’s a pretty cool old Cronenberg flick, one that’d make for a great double feature with the man’s "Videodrome.")
Sources: IGN Movies, Variety
Directors Bryan Singer and Richard Donner were on stage together for the "Superman Returns" Q&A, but before that, Singer showed a blooper reel. Oh the things coming out of the cast’s mouths.
I won’t give it away here, but don’t worry, Singer assures us it’ll be on the DVD for those of us who can’t attend Comic-Con. Read on for the highlights of this panel and my one-one-one with the director. Also got a little preview of the "Snakes on a Plane" 10-min clip.
Superman Returns Sequel, X-Men and Logan’s Run
The "Superman Returns" sequel will have more action, director Bryan Singer reveals, but he probably won’t get around to it until 2009. He plans to either take a rest or do a smaller movie next, citing the tolls in doing movies like "Superman Returns" and "X-Men."
When asked if he’ll return to direct another "X-Men" movie, director Richard Donner answered for Singer that he will. Given Singer’s close relationship with Richard Donner and the producer of the "X-men" movies is Donner’s wife…it may happen.
"Logan’s Run" remake is on hold at the moment. Another director may take over should Singer ultimately passed, according to producer Joel Silver, whom I spoke to earlier.
Snakes on a Plane
A ten minutes clip of the movie was shown, with director David R. Ellis, Samuel L. Jackson, and snake handler Jules Sylvester on hand afterward to Q&A. The clip is as bad-assed as one can expect from a picture like this. Check out my description of the clip or watch it here.
Author: Binh Ngo, RottenTomatoes.com
Moviehole shares some interesting news and insight regarding the potential remake of David Cronenberg‘s cult classic "Scanners": "Artisan announced their interest to redo the film in 2002, but now that Lions Gate has taken over the company – it’s their baby. Pierre David, René Malo and Clark Peterson will serve as producers on the film. Cronenberg’s not keen on the idea saying previously that ‘I’d prefer that they not [revisit my earlier work].’"
