Netflix is on the verge of yet another huge acquisition, one that will bring Kevin Hart into the fold. The streaming service is close to landing the comedy Black Stallions, which will feature Hart in a supporting role alongside leads Don Cheadle and Get Out‘s Lil Rey Howery.
The script is by Jay Longino, who recently directed Howery in the surprise hit comedy, Uncle Drew. The story for Black Stallions will follow two brothers, played by Howery and Cheadle, who are also rival jockeys. Hart’s role is being described by Deadline as “showy”, but doesn’t sound like it will be a lead.
Clearly this is still very early on as no director has been named and deals on the cast are being worked out. Next up for Hart is Night School opposite Tiffany Haddish. Howery is coming off the success of Uncle Drew, and the Cheadle recently reprised his War Machine role in Avengers: Infinity War.
One of my favorite directors is teaming up with one of my favorite actresses, and all is right in the world. Jennifer Lopez is set to star in the true-life crime thriller The Hustlers, which will be written and directed by The Meddler‘s Lorene Scafaria. Try and stop me from smiling.
The story is based on the New York magazine article detailing the true story of “a crew of savvy former strip club employees who band together to turn the tables on their Wall Street clients. Lopez will play the ringleader of a group of ambitious women, who take their plans a bit too far. Scafaria’s script takes place in the late aughts in New York City in the wake of the financial crisis, and explores the toll it took on the livelihood of the dancers who relied on their Wall Street clientele. The story will also focus on themes of identity, loyalty, survival and control.”
Sounds like a potentially gritty, street-level crime movie, but that’s not necessarily what I would expect from Scafaria. She had a terrific breakthrough writing the charming script for Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist, then made her directorial debut with the underrated (and my favorite movie of that year) Seeking a Friend for the End of the World. She most recently directed the mother/daughter comedy, The Meddler, which is also pretty good.
Lopez has been in need of a big screen comeback for a while now. It’s not like she ever really slowed down or anything, but it’s been a long time since she had a truly great acting vehicle, and hopefully this will be it. She can be seen now on the final season of NBC’s cop series Shades of Blue. She also has the romantic comedy Second Act due out in November.
Scafaria knows how awesome Lopez can be given the right material, and had this to say about her leading lady…
“The film is an empathetic look at women and men, our gender roles, what we’re valued for, what we’ve been told is our value in every movie, TV show, every corner of culture. Men have been told they’re worth the size of their bank accounts. Women have been told they’re worth the symmetry of their faces, their bodies, their beauty and that’s what this film is based on. The rules of the club are the rules of the world. There is no other actor who could embody this raw and dynamic character with such complexity, humanity and intelligence. It’s always been her. She’s fucking Jennifer Lopez.” [Collider]
Rebecca Hall’s big breakout role came in 2006 when she starred in Christopher Nolan’s The Prestige, and she has continued to work with top directors ever since. Woody Allen, Steven Spielberg, Ron Howard, and Antonio Campos are just a few of the filmmakers she has had the chance to watch and study, and now we’re going to see what she’s learned.
Hall is set to make her directorial debut with Passing, an adaptation of Nella Larsen’s powerful 1929 novel about racial passing, which is posing as one racial group when you are really of another. If you need a cinematic example, Anthony Hopkins’ character in The Human Stain is an African-American who has “passed” for white his entire life. Hall’s film will star Tessa Thompson and Ruth Negga, which is about as good of a starring duo as a debuting director can ask for.
Here’s a synopsis of the book:
Clare Kendry [Negga] is living on the edge. Light-skinned, elegant, and ambitious, she is married to a racist white man unaware of her African American heritage, and has severed all ties to her past after deciding to “pass” as a white woman. Clare’s childhood friend, Irene Redfield [Thompson], just as light-skinned, has chosen to remain within the African American community, and is simultaneously allured and repelled by Clare’s risky decision to engage in racial masquerade for personal and societal gain. After frequenting African American-centric gatherings together in Harlem, Clare’s interest in Irene turns into a homoerotic longing for Irene’s black identity that she abandoned and can never embrace again, and she is forced to grapple with her decision to pass for white in a way that is both tragic and telling.
This is a subject that engenders really deep resentment in the African-American community for obvious reasons, and continues to be relevant today. Helping Hall to navigate her debut feature will be exec-producer Angela Robinson, who recently directed her in Professor Marston and the Wonder Women.
No word on when this will kick off. Thompson has been on fire of late, and you can see her right now in Boots Riley’s Sorry to Bother You. Negga is a regular on AMC’s Preacher and has Brad Pitt’s Ad Astra later this year. [Deadline]
A sequel to the 1996 animated/live action basketball comedy Space Jam has been in the works for years with Lebron James set to star with Bugs Bunny and the Looney Tunes characters. But it hasn’t really gone anywhere since the days when Justin Lin was considered to go behind the camera. You might think King James is too busy winning championships, building schools for at-risk youth, and fending off criticism from the douchebag-in-chief, but Space Jam 2 is still happening and may have finally found its director.
According to The Wrap, An Oversimplification of her Beauty director Terence Nance is in advanced talks to helm Space Jam 2. Wow, this is quite an unexpected move. If you’ve seen Nance’s 2012 film, it’s a highly experimental, partially-animated love story that received great reviews when it debuted at Sundance. Doubtful he’ll be able to bring any unique changes to the classic Looney Tunes style, but still this is very promising news.
Nance hasn’t done much on the big screen lately but he did just a new series, Random Acts of Flyness, on HBO. You can check out the first episode below.
Supergirl is one of the most popular characters roaming around CW’s Arrowverse, so it only makes sense Warner Bros. would want to bring her to the big screen. Just don’t expect the film to star Melissa Benoist. But a Supergirl film is indeed in the works, and a writer for it has already been named.
Deadline reports that Oren Uziel, best known for writing 22 Jump Street and The Cloverfield Paradox, has been hired to pen a Supergirl script. There aren’t a ton of details beyond that, but we know it will be separate from anything Greg Berlanti is doing with the character on the TV series. A female director will be sought if the project goes forward, and presumably it will fit somewhere in the DCEU.
In 1984 Helen Slater starred as Supergirl in a live-action film that also featured Mia Farrow, Faye Dunaway, and Peter O’Toole. It still wasn’t very good although it’s become something of a cult favorite over the years.
Supergirl is Kara Zor-el, Superman’s cousin and another survivor of the planet Krypton’s destruction. There have been multiple iterations of the character in the comics, and which one they’ll run with for the movie is unclear. Frankly, I’d much rather see a Power Girl movie, if there must be a movie about another Kryptonian heroine. Maybe this is a way to also bring Henry Cavill’s Superman back into the picture? Time will tell.
We’re happy to offer our DC readers the chance to attend a free advance screening of Crazy Rich Asians. The anticipated adaptation of Kevin Kwan’s hit novel is directed by Jon M. Chu and stars Constance Wu, Henry Golding, Michelle Yeoh, Gemma Chan, and Awkwafina.
SYNOPSIS: “Crazy Rich Asians” follows New Yorker Rachel Chu (Constance Wu) as she accompanies her longtime boyfriend, Nick Young (Henry Golding), to his best friend’s wedding in Singapore. Excited about visiting Asia for the first time but nervous about meeting Nick’s family, Rachel is unprepared to learn that Nick has neglected to mention a few key details about his life. It turns out that he is not only the scion of one of the country’s wealthiest families but also one of its most sought-after bachelors. Being on Nick’s arm puts a target on Rachel’s back, with jealous socialites and, worse, Nick’s own disapproving mother (Michelle Yeoh) taking aim. And it soon becomes clear that while money can’t buy love, it can definitely complicate things.
The screening takes place on Thursday, August 9th at 7:00pm at AMC Mazza Gallerie. If you’d like to attend, simply go to the Warner Bros. ticketing site here and download an Admit-Two pass. Please remember that all screenings are first come first served and having passes is not a guarantee of entry. You will need to arrive early to ensure receiving a seat. Enjoy the show!
I don’t use MoviePass, but I read the comments of those of you who do. And it seems the best feature of the subscription service is that it allows you to see as many movies as possible for one low rate. Over the last couple of weeks MoviePass has struggled to course correct when their financial woes became public knowledge. A number of severe changes were announced, including a price hike and a limitation placed on first-run features. Well, now there’s been another big change to the service, and it’s to the one most users seem to enjoy most.
So that price hike to $14.95 a month? That’s gone, and the $10 price will remain. HOWEVER, you will no longer be able to see an unlimited amount of films. Instead, the number will be capped at three. Yep, only three movies a month. Here’s their statement to Variety…
“Because only 15 percent of MoviePass members see four or more movies a month, we expect that the new subscription model will have no impact whatsoever on over 85 percent of our subscribers.”
Isn’t that MoviePass’s best selling point? Sounds like a good way to cripple your business, taking something like that away. But to be fair, MoviePass CEO Mitch Lowe seems to know the score. They’re struggling, and this is something they feel needs to be done to stay afloat. And he hopes subscribers won’t really notice the difference…
“We are well aware that during our journey to innovate moviegoing — a form of entertainment that over time has become unaffordable and broken — we’ve encountered many challenges. However, any industry-wide disruption like MoviePass requires a tremendous amount of testing, pivoting, and learning. We discovered over several months of research that our customers value a low monthly price above nearly everything else, so we came together to create a plan that delivers what most of our loyal MoviePass fans want, and one that, we believe, will also help to stabilize our business model.”
How many of you are still keeping your MoviePass subscription? What impact will this change have on your decision to keep it or not? Let us know!
If you know the website Worldstarhiphop then you’ve probably gone there to watch some of the craziest videos on the internet. Want to watch people fighting, having, or peeing in public? Worldstarhiphop is where you go. Well now they’re getting into the movie business with the Netflix comedy, The After Party, which has just released its first trailer.
Behind the camera is Ian Edelman, best known for the short-lived HBO series How to Make it in America, and it has a similar feel. Hip-hop artist KYLE stars as an aspiring rapper who, along with his best buddy, are trying to make it big in the rap game. But after a concert ends in projectile vomit and a seizure, all hope seems lost. That is until the after party leaves them with one more shot at getting a record deal, but first they must get through the night.
Hip-hop superstars French Montana, DJ Khaled, Pusha T, Wiz Khalifa and more make appearances, and it’s clear by the trailer they’re counting on them to draw in audiences. Harrison Holzer, Shelley Hennig, Teyana Taylor, Jordan Rock, Amin Joseph, Andy Buckley and Blair Underwood round out the rest of the cast.
Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood may be a fictional story of a down on his luck TV actor, but its backdrop is very real. Set during the time of the Manson Family murders, the death of Sharon Tate apparently factors in a big way, and it’ll be interesting to see how Tarantino handles that, and how Margot Robbie fares as the slain actress.
Well, we at least have an idea of how she’ll look in the role, as Robbie has dropped the first image on social media. She definitely looks the part, and I doubt we really have anything to worry about with her performance. Let’s just hope Tarantino’s script treats Tate with the proper respect.
A post shared by @ margotrobbie on Aug 6, 2018 at 7:22am PDT
Also starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, Burt Reynolds, Damian Lewis, Luke Perry, Emile Hirsch, Dakota Fanning, Al Pacino, Scoot McNairy, Tim Roth, Kurt Russell, James Marsden, and Timothy Olyphant, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood opens July 26th 2019.
Of the Guardians of the Galaxy cast most upset over the firing of director James Gunn, Dave Bautista ranks right at the top. He’s also the guy you’d least want angry with you, because he used to Bautista Bomb John Cena on a regular basis. Well, he’s still pissed, and with it looking increasingly unlikely that Gunn will be rehired, Bautista is making ht known that he won’t be happen when it comes to shoot Vol. 3…
Batista took to Twitter and tweeted, “I will do what Im legally obligated to do but @Guardians without @JamesGunn is not what I signed up for. GOTG w/o @JamesGunn just isn’t GOTG. Its also pretty nauseating to work for someone who’d empower a smear campaign by fascists #cybernazis . That’s just how I feel,”
Yeah, that’s not good, and Disney has to wonder how many others in the cast will feel the same way. Days ago they released a unified statement of support for Gunn, but it notably said nothing about wanting out of their contracts. So most likely everyone will show up to work as expected, but there might be a few grumbles during interviews. But Bautista is really showing some nuts by speaking out like this, knowing that it won’t make his bosses happy. It takes guts, and not a lot of actors would do it.
I will do what Im legally obligated to do but @Guardians without @JamesGunn is not what I signed up for. GOTG w/o @JamesGunn just isn’t GOTG. Its also pretty nauseating to work for someone who’d empower a smear campaign by fascists #cybernazis . That’s just how I feel https://t.co/Ym4FwruVDu
