A movie based on a ride, that itself was based on a show? Only in Hollywood folks! Snarky opening line aside, I can’t believe we’re just now seeing real movement on a blockbuster film version of Disney’s iconic Tower of Terror. It’s been almost 20 years since Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearlsurprised everyone by proving that a theme park ride could be turned into a critically and commercially successful motion picture. Results since then have been hit or miss, and honestly few and far between. I’m amazed that the 2000’s weren’t littered with Disney ride adaptations after ‘Pirates’ success. Tower of Terror, which comes with it’s own defined narrative and backstory, seems like it would have been the first thing the execs thought to give the big budget treatment to. I was kind of surprised to learn that they actually had adapted the ride previously, in a TV movie starring Steve “The Guut” Guttenberg and Kirsten Dunst, but that couldn’t have given the expierence the shot it deserved.
That shot is now loaded thanks to Scarlett Johansson, whose star never seems to stop climbing. ScarJo is signed on to produce and star in the film with John August having written the treatment. Not much else has been revealed at this point, and it doesn’t seem like they’ve secured a director yet, but that’s not going to keep me from being excited. Sure there’s a long Hollywood tradition of A-listers making their bank on a throwaway big studio blockbuster but since Johansson is producing as well I feel like she’ll put her considerable talent to use making a film that can satisfy on multiple levels AND ignite a new franchise (she’s conspicuously short on franchises these days after all, RIP Widow). No official comment has been released, but make sure to check in with us here for all the latest on all things Disney.
Of all the Tom Hanks classics out there, Turner & Hooch is, crazy as it might seem, the one best suited to becoming a Disney+ series. The concept is so incredibly simple, centering on a cop who must work with an unruly canine to solve a murder case. The comedy practically writes itself, and should work now even with new stars, both two-legged and four-legged.
Taking over the human lead is Josh Peck, who plays a U.S. Marshall who is actually the son of Hanks’ character from the first movie. Does that mean we’ll see a cameo from Hanks? Probably not.
Joining Peck in the cast are Carra Patterson, Lyndsy Fonseca, Vanessa Lengies, Brandon Jay McLaren, Becca Tobin, Jeremy Maguire, and Reginald VelJohnson who returns as former detective David Sutton who is now mayor.
Turner & Hooch was created by Matt Nix (Burn Notice) and hits Disney+ on July 21st.
When an ambitious, buttoned-up U.S. Marshal inherits a big unruly dog, he soon realizes the dog he didn’t want may be the partner he needs. “Turner & Hooch” stars Josh Peck as Scott Turner, son of Detective Scott Turner portrayed by Tom Hanks in the 1989 film of the same name.
This week on Cinema Royale the guys dive into Kevin Hart’s tear-jerking dramatic turn in Fatherhood, then head to animated Italy with Pixar’s latest, Luca. Plus a brief look at horror-comedy Werewolves Within with Sam Richardson and Milana Vayntrub. Plenty of news to bound about this week as we get into the new trailer for The Suicide Squad, the announcement of Transformers: Rise of the Beasts and everything else that piqued our interest!
All of this and more!
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If Disney was hoping to diffuse talk about Harrison Ford’s age going into Indiana Jones 5, this is not going to help. The 78-year-old screen legend suffered a shoulder injury while training for a big fight scene in the anticipated sequel, the first since 2008’s Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
Here’s the statement by Disney: “In the course of rehearsing for a fight scene, Harrison Ford sustained an injury involving his shoulder. Production will continue while the appropriate course of treatment is evaluated, and the filming schedule will be reconfigured as needed in the coming weeks.”
So that’s not great, but at least it doesn’t appear to be too serious. No talk of pushing back production or shifting the July 2022 release date. Still, it’s something to keep an eye on while shooting continues. Ford notably broke his leg while filming his return as Han Solo for The Force Awakens, so maybe this is a sign to stop reprising old roles? Nah, he survived Blade Runner 2049 pretty well, I think.
Indiana Jones 5 has Ford co-starring alongside Mads Mikkelsen, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Boyd Holbrook, Shaunette Renée Wilson, and Thomas Kretschmann. James Mangold takes over as director, with Steven Spielberg as a producer. [Deadline]
That beef between Vin Diesel and Dwayne Johnson during the filming of The Fate of the Furious? It was all a misunderstanding and definitely not a couple of overly-muscled, bald alpha males butting heads.
At least, that’s what Diesel says in a new interview with Men’s Health. Diesel attributes the feud, which eventually led to Johnson leaving for the Hobbs & Shaw spinoff, to trying to get the best performance from his co-star…
“My approach at the time was a lot of tough love to assist in getting that performance where it needed to be. As a producer to say, ‘Okay, we’re going to take Dwayne Johnson, who’s associated with wrestling, and we’re going to force this cinematic world, audience members, to regard his character as someone that they don’t know.’”
“Hobbs hits you like a ton of bricks,” he continued. “That’s something that I’m proud of, that aesthetic. That took a lot of work. We had to get there and sometimes, at that time, I could give a lot of tough love. Not Felliniesque, but I would do anything I’d have to do in order to get performances in anything I’m producing.”
Hmmm…I’m not so sure he’s being completely honest here. It’s not like Johnson needed to be acquainted with making movies or anything. He was, and some would say still is, the biggest star in the entire Fast & Furious franchise, Diesel included.
Anyway, Diesel and Johnson seem to have squashed their feud. While Johnson didn’t return for F9: The Fast Saga, the franchise is far from over and there’s a tease in the film that suggests we haven’t seen the last of Hobbs & Shaw as part of the core team. Be sure to stay through the credits, that’s all I’ll say.
Let’s be honest, since the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s creation in 2008, we have not seen the sexuality of its characters explored very well. Other than hetero relationships for Captain America, Tony Stark, and a few others (Even Wanda/Vision in a weird sort of way?), that’s all there’s been. That’s left fans to call out for more LGBTQ representation, something Kevin Feige has promised would happen in the future. Well, in the latest episode of Loki those fans got their wish.
In today’s episode of Loki on Disney+, a conversation between Tom Hiddleston’s God of Mischief and the alternative, seemingly female variant named Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino) had a conversation that removes ANY doubt the character is queer.
It’s something Loki director Kate Herron was keen on making a big part of the character when she came aboard. You can see her comments, along with that key scene, below.
From the moment I joined @LokiOfficial it was very important to me, and my goal, to acknowledge Loki was bisexual. It is a part of who he is and who I am too. I know this is a small step but I’m happy, and heart is so full, to say that this is now Canon in #mcu#Loki ??? pic.twitter.com/lz3KJbewx8
This revelation will be a surprise to those who are only familiar with the Hiddleston version of Loki, but Marvel Comics readers know he’s been gender-fluid and bisexual for years. It was long overdue for it to happen on the big screen, in my opinion.
Fans have also been speculating that Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie is bisexual, so we might see that aspect of her life made canon in Thor: Love & Thunder. It’s my assertion that all of the Asgardians, all gods for that matter, are bisexual because gender norms are a human construct. Anyway, good on Marvel. Let’s see what they do with Loki from here on out.
Go ahead, say his name and he’ll appear! Nia DaCosta and Jordan Peele’s Candyman sequel/reboot is finally set to terrorize theaters in August, and a terrifying new trailer is here to remind you why A Quiet Place 2 isn’t the only horror heating up the summer.
Directed by DaCosta from a story by Peele and Win Rosenfeld, Candyman brings back the hooked killer and Chicago urban legend whose rage is fueled by a history of racism. DaCosta, who tackled themes of race and class in her breakout film Little Woods, will do the same in this contemporary version.
The film stars Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Teyonah Parris, Nathan Stewart-Jarrett, and Colman Domingo, along with the O.G. Candyman himself, Tony Todd.
Candyman opens in theaters on August 27th.
For as long as residents can remember, the housing projects of Chicago’s Cabrini-Green neighborhood were terrorized by a word-of-mouth ghost story about a supernatural killer with a hook for a hand, easily summoned by those daring to repeat his name five times into a mirror. In the present day, a decade after the last of the Cabrini towers were torn down, visual artist Anthony McCoy and his partner, gallery director Brianna Cartwright, move into a luxury loft condo in Cabrini, now gentrified beyond recognition and inhabited by upwardly mobile millennials. With Anthony’s painting career on the brink of stalling, a chance encounter with a Cabrini-Green old-timer exposes Anthony to the tragically horrific nature of the true story behind Candyman. Anxious to maintain his status in the Chicago art world, Anthony begins to explore these macabre details in his studio as fresh grist for paintings, unknowingly opening the door to a complex past that unravels his own sanity and unleashes a terrifying wave of violence that puts him on a collision course with destiny.
“It’s not what’s under the hood. The only thing that matters is who’s behind the wheel.”
The wisdom of Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) has fueled Fast & Furious for two decades (!!!), and while it reflects his views on the racecourse that is life, he might as well be talking about the franchise as a whole. As each film continues to outdo itself with one gravity-defying stunt after another, defying the odds to evolve from a simple west coast car racing movie to a globe-hopping international $1B blockbuster, what separates the top-end from the rest is the man behind the camera. Justin Lin, the director behind the franchise’s complete reimagining, is back for the fifth time after taking an eight-year hiatus. Lin’s return for F9: The Fast Saga is a much-needed shot of adrenaline and proof that nobody can steer these movies quite like he can.
In complete contrast to the overdone and somewhat dull Fate of the Furious, the steady thematic drumbeat about “family” feels well-earned in F9. At this point, you are either down with these movies or not, and nothing is going to change that, but what’s great about this one is an acknowledgment to those who have stuck around. Lin’s return is part and parcel to all of that. Appropriately, F9 has stronger connections to Lin’s first movie in the franchise, my beloved Tokyo Drift, with characters from that seemingly random racer emerging to play key roles, including one who emerges from the grave after being thought dead. The personal stakes have always been hammered home for us but they’ve never felt quite as prescient as they do in F9, a credit to writers Lin and Daniel Casey.
There’s also an acknowledgment that Fast & Furious has become, ironically enough, the cinematic equivalent of pro wrestling. With the introduction of ex-WWE champion John Cena into the mix as Dom and Mia Toretto’s (Jordana Brewster) estranged brother Jakob, F9 is what Vince McMahon would call a soap opera for dudes. The wildly theatrical family squabbles that morph from love to hatred and back again in the span of a single movie are all here, along with a healthy concession how ridiculous it all is. That self-awareness was sorely missing in Fate of the Furious. If you’re going to have a movie in which people return from the dead with alarming regularity, magnet cars decimate entire cities, and a second-hand vehicle rockets into outer space, please don’t take yourself so seriously!
The arrival of Jakob triggers a flashback to the ’80s, and the event that changes a young Dom (played by spitting-image actor Vinnie Bennett) and his brother (played by Finn Cole) forever. Where else could that be but on a race track, where their father’s fiery death unleashes Dom’s violent side in defense of his family. But it also led to a split between Dom and Jakob, literally driven home in a race to decide who stays and who goes. But now Jakob is back, as an international badass spy or something (they say “spy”, but none of these folks are very covert), and he’s got a chip on his shoulder. Plus, he’s on the hunt for some doomsday weapon that he’ll either use to destroy the world or sell or…something. Who really knows or cares?
All we need to know is that Jakob and Dom got beef, and it’ll have the crew literally racing between exploding landmines, swinging their cars across vast mountains thousands of feet in the air, and surviving assaults from hundreds of armed, supposedly well-trained soldiers. In fact, the feats are so ridiculous a running gag involving Tyrese Gibson’s comic relief character Roman Pearce suggests they all might be superheroes, and thus immortal. Who’s to say they aren’t? I’ll put the shit these people accomplish against anything the Avengers have done.
Of course, a lot of it is silly as all Hell. Jakob ziplines through London like he’s away at camp, and of course, Tej (Ludacris) and Roman rocket off the planet in a makeshift car held together by spit and bailing wire. While most of the action is off-the-wall amazing, there’s some are quite familiar. But I think that’s unavoidable after nine movies of vehicular destruction. It’s also sort of the point, too. The crazy antics are always going to be there, but what makes these movies is how much investment we have in the characters.
F9 shows us a side of Dom that we haven’t seen in a very long time. No longer living his life a quarter mile at a time, Dom has settled down for peace and quiet with Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) and his young son Brian (played by Diesel’s real-life kid). He’s spent all of these years fighting for family, but now his family has grown and he’s got a legacy to pass on. Of course, when the old team comes calling, Dom is right there to put all of that aside. And the whole gang is here, too. Letty gets a lot more to do this time, as she’s never been able to settle down like Dom could. Mia finally gets her shot to kick some ass, no longer relegated to the sidelines behind Brian (the late Paul Walker, his character referenced frequently); Sung Kang’s Han is back and as enigmatic as ever, along with Charlize There’s villainous techie Cipher, Kurt Russell’s CIA spook Mr. Nobody, and Helen Mirren’s Queenie Shaw for a riotous getaway through the Edinburgh streets. And that’s not all, either. F9 truly feels like a family affair, designed to pop fans with so many callbacks to the past, some of which are too good to spoil.
For many people, F9 is the movie they’ve been waiting to make their return to theaters. You won’t be disappointed. You’ll relish the deafening roar of the engines, the blast of the explosions, the boom of giant magnets, Dom’s growl as he literally pulls a building down. After a couple of so-so efforts, I can say that F9 is a barnburner and return to form for a franchise that isn’t close to retiring to that great junkyard in the sky.
F9 opens in theaters on June 25th!
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(from left) Tej (Chris “Ludacris” Bridges) and Roman (Tyrese Gibson) in F9, co-written and directed by Justin Lin.
Pete Davidson’s life is basically a real-world version of She’s Out of My League, and so it makes sense that he’d star in movies that reflect that to some extent. He’s set to star alongside Kaley Cuoco in romantic comedy Meet Cute, that will do what so many films claim to want to do and that’s to deconstruct the genre.
Aren’t rom-com deconstructions passe at this point?
Meet Cute is directed by Alex Lehmann and is described by Deadline as “a wildly inventive deconstruction of the romantic comedy built around the question: What would you do if you could travel to your loved ones’ past, heal their traumas, fix their problems, and change them into the perfect partner?”
Actually, this sounds more like the time travel version of She’s All That.
Cuoco is coming off her acclaimed series The Flight Attendant, which earned her multiple award nominations. Davidson may have just wrapped up his final season on SNL, and will be seen next in The Suicide Squad.
Steve Martin and Martin Short? Hey, those are two of the Three Amigos! They’ve been doing this comedy thing for longer than their Only Murders in the Building co-star Selena Gomez has been alive. But it’s her inclusion in Hulu’s mystery series that makes it intriguing because none of us knows how she’ll do opposite two comedy legends.
Martin, Short, and Gomez play three true-crime enthusiasts who find themselves part of the mystery when a murder is committed in their Upper West Side apartment building. Also in the cast are Amy Ryan, Aaron Dominguez, with appearances by Nathan Lane. The series was created by Martin and Alice in Wonderland actor John Hoffman, and Dan Fogelman.
I get strong Manhattan Murder Mystery vibes from this trailer, with the neuroticism of Woody Allen all over it. Martin has always been on the edge of that, anyway, so this is terrain that should be perfect for him. Also, it’s just damn good to see him and short together again after so many years.
Only Murders in the Building hits Hulu on August 31st.
From the minds of Steve Martin, Dan Fogelman, and John Hoffman comes a comedic murder-mystery series for the ages. “Only Murders In The Building” follows three strangers (Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez) who share an obsession with true crime and suddenly find themselves wrapped up in one. When a grisly death occurs inside their exclusive Upper West Side apartment building, the trio suspects murder and employs their precise knowledge of true crime to investigate the truth. As they record a podcast of their own to document the case, the three unravel the complex secrets of the building, which stretch back years. Perhaps even more explosive are the lies they tell one another. Soon, the endangered trio comes to realize a killer might be living amongst them as they race to decipher the mounting clues before it’s too late.
