How’s this for a trio? Melissa McCarthy, Tiffany Haddish…and Elisabeth Moss! It’s happening, as THR reports Moss has joined the duo for The Kitchen, the upcoming mob drama based on the DC/Vertigo comic book series.
Despite the casting, this isn’t going to be a comedy, and if you’ve read the source material you’ll know why. Set in 1970s Hell Kitchen, the story follows the wives of Irish mobsters who take over for their husbands when they are rounded up in an FBI sweep. Moss will play the timid wife of an abusive husband who eventually falls in love with he violence of the criminal underworld. *gulp*
Directed by Straight Outta Compton‘s Andrea Berloff, The Kitchen opens September 20th 2019.
Last week on Legends of Tomorrow, the Legends actually got a win finally against the Dahrks as they were able to obtain the “death” totem, they even were able to go on a time-traveling adventure and got to meet Elvis Presley in the process. Now with them holding the fire totem as well as the death totem, their luck seems to be taking a turn for the better, right?
Of course not! The death totem, like the Ring of Power, has its own will and desires. Managing to look into each of the Legends hearts/souls, it found a way to enact Mallus’ will to be freed from his time-based prison. That means that he needs to get a new prisoner to turn: Sarah. This is very much a Sarah-centric episode, but each of the Legends got a chance to shine in their own way, and we even got another appearance from our favorite Warlock, John Constantine.
Speaking of John Constantine, Sarah awakens from a nightmare screaming his name. Remember, he helped her a few weeks ago when she was having problems with Mallus when she was trapped in his world on the ancestral plane. Now, it’s not the best idea to scream a former lover’s name when in bed with your new lover, agent Ava Sharpe. Ava asks who John is, and Sarah tells her about her recent history with Constantine, including her sleeping with him three weeks ago. Of course, hearing about your current lover sleeping with anyone else isn’t going to make them all cheery. Sarah manages to save face by telling Ava that she thinks of her as her girlfriend, which brings a smile to her face.
As the team goes about their current activities of fixing time aberrations caused by the Dahrks and Sarah orders the team to split up so that they can tackle all the different problems throughout history. However, she’s having her own problems, a massive headache. While it’s dismissed as a simple headache, it’s really something more nefarious. She is compelled to the box holding the death totem, she begins seeing visions of herself when she was Black Canary way back on Arrow before her death.
The team comes back from their different missions to find Ray unconscious and his lap trashed. Almost fatally injured, the team realizes that whoever attacked him is still on the Wave Rider. One by one, each of the Legends not only sees some sort of vision connected to the pain of their past, but they see an almost mirror version of Sarah (complete with black eyes and white hair) wearing the death totem and under the possession of Mallus. The team realizes they need some help, they need John Constantine.
However, they are not in the position to get in contact with Constantine, so agent Sharpe and her lackey Gary track down Constantine while he’s performing a chicken exorcism with the hope that he can help Sarah be free of Mallus. This allows Constantine to perform some of his mumbo-jumbo magic to transport to Mallus’ spirit realm to free Sarah, who is dealing with the truth that she is impacted by death, without Mallus help. Ava is also dealing with her jealousy for the fact that Constantine and Sarah slept together, creating a pretty decent love triangle for the show.
While Constantine and Ava try to get Sarah back from the spirit world, the rest of the team try to use the other totems to stop Mallus-possessed Sarah. Nate tries to use the earth totem, but gets stopped by a vision of his grandfather. That leaves it up to Amaya and Rory. Amaya convinces Rory to use the fire totem, after all, he is “Heatwave” already. Rory powers up using the totem and fights against Sarah. After knocking her out, Ava tries to speak to an unconscious Sarah to help her snap out of her trance. She eventually reaches Sarah, who rejects Mallus and Norah Dahrk’s offer to join them and return back to the land of the living.
Sarah thanks Constantine for helping her in her time of need. Although the two slept together, they have a more cordial bond. Constantine even tells her not to hurt Ava’s heart as he can tell she cares for Sarah as he leaves the ship. Fear, not Constantine fans, it’s just been announced that Matt Ryan has been promoted to a series regular for next season of Legends of Tomorrow. However, Sarah, fearful of her darkness, does the opposite and it ends with her and Ava seemingly breaking up. Ava does leave a note on the bed that her side that reads “The spot reserved for the girlfriend of Sara Lance,” so maybe there’s hope.
Speaking of Ava, we’ll be seeing more of her, like many more copies.
Most sequels you can see coming a mile away, but Sicario 2: Day of the Soldado, definitely isn’t one of them. Denis Villeneuve directed the first one, a drug thriller that launched Taylor Sheridan’s unofficial law enforcement trilogy with Hell or High Water and Wind River. But the drug war flick never seemed like it needed a followup, unless it was going to do something like focus on mysterious killer Alejandro Gillick, played terrifyingly by Benicio Del Toro. Well, that’s exactly what the sequel does. Bring it on.
While Stefano Sollima is behind the camera for this one, these movies really belong to Sheridan who is back as screenwriter. Del Toro and Josh Brolin are together again for a story that will find their federal agents unleashed in a new war against the Mexican drug cartels. Here’s the synopsis:
In Sicario 2: Soldado, the drug war on the US – Mexico border has escalated as the cartels have begun trafficking terrorists across the US border. To fight the war, federal agent Matt Graver (Josh Brolin) reteams with the mercurial Alejandro (Benicio Del Toro).
Sicario 2: Day of the Soldado opens June 29th and co-stars Jeffrey Donovan, Isabela Moner, Matthew Modine, and Catherine Keener.
Nanjiani is expected to star in the film alongside Mark Ruffalo, with Pablo Larrain (Jackie) directing. Larrain has been on the project since early last year, but still this has felt like a film that was going nowhere fast. It’s a terrific story, too, which is why it never quite died and why Bigelow is sticking around as a producer. It follows the true tale of Rais Bhuiyan, a Bangladeshi American military veteran who survived a deadly attack at the hands of Mark Stroman, who had been swept up in the post 9/11 anti-Muslim hysteria. Strowman killed a couple of other people that day before he was caught, and a decade later it was Bhuyian who returned to plead for him not to get the death penalty.
It’s great to see Nanjiani getting a chance to spread his wings into dramatic territory because I was getting worried his breakout lead performance in The Big Sick was being overlooked. Ruffalo hasn’t done a lot outside of the Marvel Universe lately, either, and it will be good to see him when he’s not big, green, and smashy. Larrain is one of the best directors around and should bring a unique perspective to the material, just as he does with all of his work.
No word on when production begins but I am hyped to see this one finally happening. [TheTrackingBoard]
Ben Kingsley is one of our greatest living actors and a chameleon who can play virtually anybody he puts his mind, even the occasional supervillain. But, let’s be honest, he doesn’t always have the best judgement in the projects he takes on. I’m going to hold out hope for his latest, An Ordinary Man, as it reteams him with Hera Hilmar, the underrated actress from The Ottoman Lieutenant.
Directed by Joseph Ruben (The Good Son) and co-starring The Tick‘s Peter Serafinowicz, the film stars Kingsley as a war criminal and former general on the run from international authorities. Helmar plays the maid at his new secret hideout, with the two developing a relationship before he uncovers her true identity, which changes everything.
An Ordinary Man hits theaters and VOD on April 13th.
Disney has become such a dominant force that they no longer need to worry about releasing their movies too close to other studios’ big projects, they need to worry about crowding themselves out. Good thing they’ve got that subscription streaming service launching next year, and now one of their upcoming live-action adaptations is heading there rather than theaters.
THR reports that Charlie Bean, director of The Lego Ninjago Movie, will get behind the camera for Lady and the Tramp. The film will be penned by Andrew Bujalski, yep the guy behind Computer Chess and fitness comedy Results, and will be a live-action/CGI hybrid. The original 1955 film is best known for a particular scene in which street-wise mongrel Tramp shares a plate of spaghetti with Lady, an upper-class Cocker Spaniel. The two suck down noodles before accidentally sucking face. Awwwww.
I’d say this is another big get for Disney’s subscription service, but it’s not like they had to fight for it or anything. They can put all of the huge movies and TV series they want on this thing, and probably will.
Damn, that script for Triple Frontier must be killer! The forever-in-the-works drug trafficking drama was originally penned by The Hurt Locker writer Mark Boal for Kathryn Bigelow to direct, but she pivoted to Zero Dark Thirty instead. That began a revolving door of filmmakers and stars (Tom Hardy, Mark Wahlberg, Tom Hanks, Will Smith among them) on the project, lasting for years without gaining any real traction. But now that’s changed, the film has a home at Netflix and confirmed cast ready to make this thing a reality.
Ben Affleck, Charlie Hunnam, Oscar Isaac, Garrett Hedlund, Pedro Pascal, and Adria Arjona are confirmed for Triple Frontier, which JC Chandor has stuck around to direct. Interestingly, Affleck was briefly on board for a time while his brother Casey was in consideration along with Mahershala Ali, only to drop out. Now he’s returned for the story of five friends who unite to take down a drug lord. The title comes from the notorious border zone between Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil where the Igazu and Parana rivers converge, a known hotbed of organized crime.
That said, the title is going to get reworked because that area is now much safer after all of these years, becoming a tourist destination. See what happens when too much time passes? Expect Netflix to get rolling on this soon so as to avoid another headache.
We’re a little over a week before Steven Spielberg’s Ready Player One hits theaters, bringing with it a wave of action, adventure, and nostalgia that fans are eager to see from the director again. And already that has us looking forward to Spielberg’s next blast from the past, a return to swashbuckling adventure with Indiana Jones 5, expected to be his next project going into 2019. The one thing we haven’t heard is a confirmation of that from Spielberg himself, at least not until the weekend when he took time out from the Empire Awards to give an update on Indy 5‘s status…
“It’s always worth the trip when I get to work with this deep bench of talent coming out of the UK. The actors, and the crew, the chippies, the sparks, the drivers — everybody who has helped me make my movies here, and will continue helping me make my movies here when I come back in April 2019 to make the fifth ‘Indiana Jones’ movie right here.”
Ah, well there we go. April 2019 is when shooting on Indiana Jones 5 kicks off. However, that could could put a dent in his plans to shoot a second movie next year, either an adaptation of musical West Side Storyor a secret project he recently held table reads for. We can’t expect this to be as quick a production process as The Post was, so don’t be surprised if Spielberg’s next film gets moved to 2020. [Empire]
By now you’ve probably watched the new Avengers: Infinity War trailer a thousand times like I have, but have you noticed anything missing? While there are about two dozen Avengers running around, not to mention Thanos and his Black Order, nobody seems to be able to find Hawkeye anywhere. What’s up with that? A frequent complaint since Jeremy Renner notched his first arrow as Clint Barton way back in 2011’s Thor is that his character has been given short shrift, but this seems particularly egregious.
Well, there’s apparently a reason Hawkeye isn’t anywhere in the trailer or the promotional images, and frankly the answer given by co-directors the Russo Brothers sounds like a bunch of crap.
“Hawkeye, coming out of [“Captain America: Civil War”], is in the same position that Cap and Falcon are at the end of that movie. And Ant-Man. And coming into this movie characters who were on Cap’s side coming out of the ‘Civil War,’” Joe Russo told Cinemablend during a set visit. “Some made certain decisions and others made other decisions that led to different paths in them dealing with oversight in this movie in a different way. So Hawkeye’s on his own journey in this movie.”
Anthony Russo adds, “He has a unique reaction to the ‘Civil War’ situation that puts him in a special spot in this film.”
A special spot that places him out of the promos? Just for choosing Cap’s side? But that hasn’t stopped us from seeing Falcon, Black Widow, Black Panther, Bucky, and others who stood against Iron Man’s support of superhero registration. Whatever. I’m going to go with there were simply too many characters to promote them all and Hawkeye wasn’t “cool” enough to warrant attention. That and there’s a good chance he appears in this movie not as Hawkeye, but under the guise of Ronin.
For the record, Renner has some words for other Hawkeye haters out there…
Omg… You’re right!!!!! Next time , I’ll stay home so at least I’m comfy as I’m bored and overlooked ….. ????????
Meanwhile, Twitter artist BossLogic has dropped two great pieces of fan art. The first is a poster with enough Hawkeye to last until he’s killed off next month (Kidding! Sorta.). The other, seen below, features most of the Avengers crew coming together for “The Last Schwarma”. A cool way to end Infinity War is if Thanos and the Black Order stop for some schwarma before blowing up the planet.
The comeback of Shia LaBeouf is about to take an unusual turn. The controversial actor is set to co-write and star in Honey Boy, a biopic of his own life. Okay…but he won’t be playing himself. Instead, that honor will go to Oscar nominee Lucas Hedges (Manchester by the Sea), with LaBeouf playing his own troubled father.
LaBeouf has been talking about this a little bit for a while now, mostly in an Esquire interview. The film’s script, which he wrote under the pseudonym Otis Lort with co-writer and director Alma Har’el (documentary 11/8/16), found its way onto the prestigious Black List, and takes place in the early 2000s which is around the time he was starring on Disney’s Even Stevens, and when his film career was just beginning. The title Honey Boy comes from a name given to him by his father as a child. Fortunately, the characters in the movie will be given different names, so Hedges won’t be called “Shia” by Shia, which would be hella weird.
Hopefully this helps LaBeouf deal with any lingering daddy issues, and sets his career back on the right path. He’s getting solid reviews for his work as John McEnroe in Borg vs. McEnroe, and I still think his performance in American Honey is one of his best. [THR]
