Be still my heart! You mean to tell me there was a chance we could’ve had my man crush Matthias Schoenaerts as the Dark Knight? And Ben Affleck got in the way? This is news I really did not need to know!
The info comes from Zack Snyder, who (shocker!!!) was giving an interview and the conversation turned to his work in the DCEU on Batman v Superman and Justice League. As we know, Affleck played Batman in both films, and was quite good at it even if the movies weren’t great. But there was a time when Affleck wasn’t sure he wanted the part, and during that stretch Snyder says he had Schoenaerts as a back-up plan…
“I was talking to [Schoenaerts] a lot about it,” said Snyder. “He never got in the suit, but I did a bunch of mock-ups with him because Ben [Affleck] was on the fence. I don’t blame him. Everyone should be on the fence when you’re asked to play Batman.”
Ugh. This just burns my soul. Schoenaerts is an incredible actor whose physical intensity is off the charts. It was his roles in Bullhead and Rust & Bone which showed his commanding presence, while films such as Far from the Madding Crowd and The Danish Girl revealed a more sensitive side. I don’t know how fans of Batman would’ve reacted to him being cast as Bruce Wayne, probably with a shit ton of negativity, but I would’ve been down for it. I’m still down for it. Somebody make this happen. He’s still due for a major superhero role someday, but I guess Netflix’s The Old Guard will have to do for now.
For director MJ Bassett, making movies isn’t just a job, it’s a call to action. Bassett, who is perhaps best known for films such as Solomon Kane and Silent Hill: Revelation, has combined filmmaking with her passion for wildlife conservation. The result is the action-thriller Endangered Species, which follows a family on a safari vacation-gone-wrong in South Africa.
The film stars real-life couple Rebecca Romijn and Jerry O’Connell, although they don’t play the married pair. Romijn is joined by Philip Winchester, a Bassett favorite who had just finished working with her on Rogue, another action movie with similar goals in mind.
I had a chance to talk with Bassett about Endangered Species, a film that was shot during lockdown, which led to some interesting issues in South Africa. Bassett also talks about working alongside her daughter, Isabel, who not only stars in the film but co-wrote the screenplay. We also discuss how Bassett balances her movies’ themes with the big action her fans have come to expect.
Endangered Species is available in select theaters, Apple TV, and more on May 28th. Check out the interview below!
The cast of Netflix’s series adaptation of Sandman is already pretty great, but there’s some exciting news for fans of Neil Gaiman’s seminal comic as production begins. The full cast has been revealed to include Patton Oswalt, Jenna Coleman, Kirby Howell-Baptiste, Mason Alexander Park, Donna Preston, Niamh Walsh, David Thewlis, Kyo Ra, Razane Jammal, Sandra James Young, and Stephen Fry, but there’s a connection to a popular DC Comics hero that is pretty cool.
What does that say at the bottom? “Jenna Coleman is Johanna CONSTANTINE”?? Yeah, Constantine. She’s described as an “Eighteenth-Century occult adventuress” and the great-great-great-grandmother to the Constantine we know and love, who has been played previously by Keanu Reeves and Matt Ryan. So while we aren’t getting the familiar Constantine, this shows there will be some fun ties to the chain-smoking hero. Johanna Lumley voiced Johanna Constantine in the audiobook version of Sandman.
They join a cast that will be led by Tom Sturridge as Dream of the Endless, Gwendolyn Christie as Lucifer, Sanjeev Bhaskar and Amid Chaudry as Cain and Abel, Charles Dance as Roderick Burgess, Vivienne Acheampong as Lucienne, and Boyd Holbrook as The Corinthian.
Sandman is shooting now so we could see it on Netflix later this year or early next.
A rich blend of modern myth and dark fantasy in which contemporary fiction, historical drama and legend are seamlessly interwoven, The Sandman follows the people and places affected by Morpheus, the Dream King, as he mends the cosmic — and human — mistakes he’s made during his vast existence.
It’s official: Amazon has purchased MGM, one of the most storied movie studios in history, for $8.45B. That’s a lot of money, but considering the wealth of franchises and a library of nearly a century’s worth of films, it’s actually quite a steal.
No need to get into the specifics here. For one thing, we don’t have all of the details yet and neither does Variety‘s report. But also because we went over them when rumors first surfaced. The key points are that Amazon now takes hold of the valuable James Bond franchise, along with Robocop, Rocky, Creed, and more.
Will this put Amazon on the same level as Netflix in the streaming wars? That’s the question, but expect some news to drop soon on what they plan to do in terms of bringing some of these big-screen blockbusters to Amazon Prime, where they can drive the subscriber numbers.
Escape Room, the 2019 horror film based on the trendy group problem-solving craze, was a perfectly serviceable flick. I mean, it’s mostly a Saw rip-off, but for those desiring a bit less gore and a few more puzzles it was a fun 90 minutes. It’s no surprise that a sequel is on it’s way, with the original pulling in $57M on a budget that was a fraction of that. Escape Room: Tournament of Champions has dropped it’s first trailer and it looks like we’re in for more of the same, in the best way possible. Sure, the trailer shows some spotty dialogue and questionable logic but that’s not the point of films like this. Whether it’s Saw, Final Destination, or Escape Room: Tournament of Champions we aren’t looking for anything more then creative kills and a bit of suspense.
The sequel appears to pick up after the events of the first film, following Zoey (Taylor Russell) still on the trail of those responsible and trying to blow the lid off of their sick game. They end up in a subway train that’s been planted by the bad guys and from their the game is on. All evidence points to this flick following the proven sequel formula of “more” with the sets and traps seeming to up the ante of what we saw last time around. I’m hopeful, these movies are always fun when they get them right!
Escape Room: Tournament of Champions hits theaters on July 16th, 2021
Of all the ways to interrupt the World Cup, soldiers from the future is the weirdest. The Tomorrow War is a sci-fi action flick that looks like it could be the start of another franchise for Chris Pratt. The teaser that dropped a couple of days ago didn’t show us much, nor did the character posters released yesterday, but now the full trailer is here to show us what’s in store.
Directed by Chris McKay (The Lego Batman Movie) in his first live-action film, The Tomorrow War stars Pratt as a teacher who is drafted into a war to save humanity from an alien invasion. The catch? That war is happening 30 years in the future, and he’s part of a ragtag bunch that will leave the present to engage in an unexpected battlefield.
Also in the cast are Sam Richardson, Yvonne Strahovski, JK Simmons, Betty Gilpin, Edwin Hodge, Keith Powers, Jasmine Mathews, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Seychelle Gabriel, and Theo Van.
All you had to tell me was Strahovski, Simmons, and Gilpin were in this. That’s all I needed. Give me this movie now. Too bad we don’t see more of the aliens, though, which tells me that perhaps their look is still being worked out by the visual effects team.
The Tomorrow War hits Amazon Prime on July 2nd.
In The Tomorrow War, the world is stunned when a group of time travelers arrives from the year 2051 to deliver an urgent message: Thirty years in the future, humanity is losing a global war against a deadly alien species. The only hope for survival is for soldiers and civilians from the present to be transported to the future and join the fight. Among those recruited is a high school teacher and family man Dan Forester (Chris Pratt). Determined to save the world for his young daughter, Dan teams up with a brilliant scientist (Yvonne Strahovski) and his estranged father (J.K. Simmons) in a desperate quest to rewrite the fate of the planet.
Masking a poorly-fitting retcon of one of their iconic villains with an awesomely eclectic soundtrack, Disney’s Cruellaworks if you’re willing to accept a sympathetic turn for the cruel (I mean, it’s in her name!) fashionista who wanted to skin 101 Dalmatians because she really liked fur coats. Emma Stone’s version of the character bears no resemblance to de Vil other than a striking haircut, but there’s still some fun to be had with this glitzy, pop art origin story that’s basically The Devil Wears Prada in a new outfit.
Stone embodies a dastardly, but not quite malevolent aura as Estella, a misfit kid (played as a child by Krypton‘s Tipper Seifert-Cleveland) bullied in school for her weird black and white hairdo and poor upbringing. Estella is a nice girl, for the most part, but she has no problem fighting back in defense of herself and others. She even has a love for dogs, befriending a stray mutt and making him her own. But after pushing the school administration too far, Estella is kicked out and she departs for London with her single mother. Along the way, her mother makes a mysterious stop at a ritzy gala only to be killed by a pack of guard dalmatians who were in pursuit of the nosey child.
Racked with guilt, Estella takes to a life of petty street crime alongside her newfound pals, Horace (Paul Walter Hauser, I Tonya) and Jasper (Joel Fry, Yesterday). But as the years go by, Estella decides she wants to take her love of fashion to the next level. Her insane, punk rock style and brazen attitude catches the eye of The Baroness (Emma Thompson), who takes her under her devil’s wing, mainly to steal the young upstart’s best ideas. When Estella finds out something truly awful about the already-heinous Baroness, she manifests her Cruella personality and sets out to get revenge by destroying her mentor’s career.
Set in the 1960s, Cruella takes advantage of the unique U.K style of the period, with costume designer Jenny Beaven almost certain to win another Oscar for the flashy get-ups on display. Production design absolutely kicks with energy, and you’ll find yourself admiring the swinging London vibe when the story starts to stall out, which it does in fits and starts. More than 40 tracks clutter up the soundtrack, but the needle drops are so damn funky you won’t care too much. Cruella doesn’t sound like your typical Disney movie and that’s a good thing.
The problem I had with Cruella is that it’s tough to buy this softening of the character. Unlike Maleficent (why is it always the Disney villainesses who need a fresh coat of paint?), which goes out of its way to provide motivation for her Sleeping Beauty heelishness, Cruella just throws the character out altogether. Your mileage will vary on whether you can accept her as a dalmatian-loving PETA advocate, but it didn’t work for me. Screenwriters Dana Fox and Tony McNamara don’t seem to understand who she is supposed to be, either. Is she an antihero? A good person? And it’s not as if the filmmakers, which include director Craig Gillespie, don’t recognize what’s happening. At one point, Cruella blurts out how dalmatians would make a great fur coat, teasing the murderous side we all expect. It leads to something entirely different and wildly inconsistent. The characterization of Cruella is all over the map, and we’re just meant to accept it because The Baroness is so much worse. At least she’s consistently evil. We always know where she’s coming from. Cruella, not so much. There’s something of a love story at play here, too, between Cruella and Jasper. As much as I enjoy Joel Fry playing the straight-man for once, this entire subplot is a distracting mess.
However, it’s a joy to watch Stone delight in playing Cruella and all of her many personalities, which she changes as frequently as her outfits. Stone slips easily between the softer Estella and the wicked Cruella, and audiences will be inclined to cheer on her hijacking of the fashion world. Sparks fly whenever Thompson is on the screen, though, sinking her teeth into a character that is closer to Cruella de Vil than Stone’s, ironically. If you told me The Baroness actually became the iconic 101 Dalmatians baddie I’d have believed you. That would have been a fun twist, actually.
Cruella opens in theaters and Disney+ Premier Access on May 28th.
Yorgos Lanthimos has always put together some surprising casts of stars that we rarely see together. And he appears to be doing the same with his next film, Poor Things. With Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe, Mark Ruffalo, and Ramy Youssef already on board, the latest addition is comedian and director Jerrod Carmichael.
Variety has the news on Jerrod Carmichael joining the cast of Poor Things, which is a Frankenstein-esque story about a woman who is brought back to life but with an infant’s brain. Lanthimos has done some pretty wild shit, like The Lobster and even The Favourite, but this definitely out there.
Carmichael has been on a roll ever since he abruptly left his own NBC sitcom a few years ago. He has appeared in Transformers: The Last Knight, as well as Jonah Hill’s Mid90s. At this year’s Sundance Film Festival we got to see Carmichael’s impressive directing debut On the Count of Three.
The Tomorrow War, another victim of the COVID-19 year of delayed release is now scheduled to bring it’s big time blockbusters action to Amazon Prime on July 2nd, 2021. If you have any doubts about this flick qualifying for blockbuster status you can look at three things. The $200 million Amazon paid for the worldwide distribution rights, the cast, and the synopsis. The cast, who also compose the subjects for the motion posters below, is stacked to say the least. Chris Pratt, Yvonne Strahovski, J.K. Simmons, Sam Richardson, Betty Gilpin, Edwin Hodge, and Theo Von, just to name a few. The synopsis, now tell me this doesn’t sound like a good old, classic, American blockbuster:
A man is drafted to fight in a future war where the fate of humanity relies on his ability to confront his past. The world is stunned when a group of time travelers arrive from the year 2051 to deliver an urgent message: Thirty years in the future mankind is losing a global war against a deadly alien species.
I’m pumped, obviously. None of this is even mentioning that it’s a return to having a promising, star-led, summer tentpole movie that is neither comic-book related or a sequel, reboot, or reimagining.
Check out all of the motion posters below, courtesy of The Tomorrow World twitter account and look for the films debut on Amazon Prime, July 2nd, 2021.
? This is a message from the future. ? The enemy is already here. We need all the help we can get. The draft begins tomorrow at 0600 PT. pic.twitter.com/oQugrFoodL
HBO is moving forward with another of its many Game of Thrones spinoffs, this one titled 10,000 Ships, and already has a writer in place for it. Deadline reports Person of Interest writer Amanda Segel will pen the stories which take place about 1,000 years before events in the main series.
10,000 Ships will center on Princess Nymeria, a warrior who flees Essos along with the surviving Rhoynars and heads to Dorne. Upon arriving, she burns the accompanying ships so that nobody can escape their new island home. It’s there that she impresses the influential Martell clan and marries into their family, helping to build them into one of Westeros’ most powerful kingdoms.
Fans of the show and George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Fire and Ice will recognize Nymeria as the name Arya Stark gave to her dire wolf in season one.
This is one of many Game of Thrones spinoffs in the works at HBO, the furthest along being House of the Dragon which tells an early story of the Targaryen dynasty. Martin had a hand in co-creating that series, but it’s unclear what his role will be with 10,000 Ships. All you probably need to know is that he’s more of a TV guy now than an author who has a book to finish writing, so I hope you’re not still waiting on that.
