Adapting Japanese manga for American audiences has a spotty track record. Hopefully, that won’t be the case for The Promised Neverland, which Amazon is developing as a live-action series from Heroes star Masi Oka and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse co-writer/co-director Rodney Rothman.
Variety reports The Promised Neverland is being developed as a live-action TV series for Amazon, with Rothman directing from a script by Meghan Malloy. The Promised Neverland is based on the manga by writer Kaiu Shirai and illustrator Posuka Demizu, centering on a group of kids at a seemingly idyllic orphanage. When one of their own turns up dead, the children learn a deadly secret about their supposed refuge, and enact a plan to escape and save the other kids.
Oka will be on board as exec-producer. Oka’s previous credits adapting manga was with Netflix’s live-action Death Note movie. He’s also developing movies based on Mega Man and Attack on Titan.
The Promised Neverland is immensely popular in Japan, where it has been adapted into a hit anime series entering its second season, plus a pair of light novels with a third on the way. A live-action movie is due to open in December of this year, as well.
Mandatory Credit: Photo by Denis Poroy/Invision/AP/Shutterstock (9213624n)
Fans walk under a Comic-Con logo on day 1 of the 2014 Comic-Con International Convention held in San Diego
2014 Comic-Con - Atmosphere, San Diego, USA - 24 Jul 2014
Under normal circumstances, pop culture fanatics like yours truly would be feverishly preparing for San Diego Comic-Con, booking flights, hard-to-get hotels, and locking down panels to attend. But that’s not happening this year. The coronavirus put the kibosh to that, but organizers came up with a solution that was announced last month. Comic-Con At Home, a virtual comic-con experience open to anybody and everybody from the comfort of their couches. And now SDCC has revealed some details on what all of us geeks can expect. The event will be FREE and held from July 22nd-26th.
Plans for Comic-Con@Home include an online Exhibit Hall complete with everyone’s favorite exhibitors offering promotions, specials, and limited-edition products unique to the celebration. As well, Comic-Con@Home promises exclusive panels and presentations about comics, gaming, television, film, and a wide variety of topics from publishers, studios, and more. As if that weren’t enough, Comic-Con@Home will also have a Masquerade, gaming, and many other activities in which fans can participate from their own homes.
What else? Attendees will also get their very own Comic-Con badge which they can boast “proudly” while watching the festivities. It’s unclear how the Exhibit Hall is going to work, and whether the promotional and sale items will be the mind-numbing, soul-crushing mess they are in-person. Considering Comic-Con @ Home is free to attend, it really could go either way. The good news is you won’t have to stand next to the sweaty guy in the Captain America t-shirt to get a cool toy you paid too much money for.
No details on special guests, panel schedules, etc., but look for SDCC to drop more info on their official blog very soon. It won’t feel like Comic-Con without an exclusive trailer or two, so hopefully they can get the big studios involved.
If Disney wanted to get my attention with a jukebox musical, one way to do it is to based it on the music of Lionel Richie. Variety reports Disney has hired Pete Chiarelli to develop just such a film, All Night Long, which is titled after Richie’s #1 hit single from 1983.
There’ll be much dancing in the streets with chants of “jambo jumbo” if they pull this off. Chiarelli will write the script for All Night Long, which Disney hopes will replicate the success of Mamma Mia!, which used the sounds of ABBA to tell a love story. That film spawned a successful sequel in 2018.
Chiarelli’s past credits show him to know his way around a hit rom-com. He previously co-wrote 2009’s The Proposal, and co-wrote Crazy Rich Asians.
While Lionel Richie may be known best to some as the father of Nicole Richie, his string of hit singles over the decades is impressive. “Say You, Say Me”, “Easy”, “Dancing On the Ceiling” are just a few. There are so many I have no idea how Disney is going to choose which to use.
There’s no official start date and a director has yet to be named, but given the popularity or music dramas I expect that’ll change quickly. For now, let’s indulge in my personal favorite of Richie’s many classics…
I was just thinking that we hadn’t really seen Joseph Gordon-Levitt in a while, not in a lead role, anyway. His last starring gig was in 2016’s Snowden, while he’s made some fun cameos (The Last Jedi, Knives Out) in his buddy Rian Johnson’s films. Well, now he’s back with Amazon’s plane hijacking film, 7500, which puts him in the role of an unlikely hero.
7500 is a little bit different from other plane hijacking movies, in that Gordon-Levitt’s character isn’t some badass action hero. He’s just a typical, everyday co-pilot who is the only one capable of saving the day when terrorists attempt to takeover the plane, threatening passengers and the crew, which includes his girlfriend.
The film is written and directed by Patrick Vollrath in his feature debut. Vollrath is best known for his Oscar-nominated short Everything Will Be Okay.
Amazon Prime will premiere 7500 on June 19th.
SYNOPSIS: It looks like a routine day at work for Tobias, a soft-spoken young American co-pilot on a flight from Berlin to Paris as he runs through the preflight checklist with Michael, the pilot, and chats with Gökce, his flight-attendant girlfriend. But shortly after takeoff, terrorists armed with makeshift knives suddenly storm the cockpit, seriously wounding Michael and slashing Tobias’ arm. Temporarily managing to fend off the attackers, a terrified Tobias contacts ground control to plan an emergency landing. But when the hijackers kill a passenger and threaten to murder more innocent people if he doesn’t let them back into the cockpit, this ordinary man faces an excruciating test.
It’s been interesting over the last week or so to watch studios try to clean up some of their past history with race. It’s kinda funny when Bryce Dallas Howard suggests better options than watching The Help right now, but for a studio like Warner Bros. it ain’t so simple as their history stretches back nearly a century. Gone with the Wind has always been a problematic film for them with its romanticized view of the antebellum south, and WB is doing something about it now on streaming service HBO Max.
According to a statement issued to Deadline, WB is removing Gone with the Wind from HBO Max, for now, due its racist depictions of black characters and glorification of the Civil War south.
“‘Gone With the Wind’ is a product of its time and depicts some of the ethnic and racial prejudices that have, unfortunately, been commonplace in American society. These racist depictions were wrong then and are wrong today, and we felt that to keep this title up without an explanation and a denouncement of those depictions would be irresponsible. These depictions are certainly counter to WarnerMedia’s values, so when we return the film to HBO Max, it will return with a discussion of its historical context and a denouncement of those very depictions, but will be presented as it was originally created, because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming these prejudices never existed. If we are to create a more just, equitable and inclusive future, we must first acknowledge and understand our history.”
Like many other films, Gone with the Wind has been the target of renewed controversy of late. 12 Years a Slave writer John Ridley may have expressed his attitude towards the film best in an LA Times op-ed…
“It doesn’t just ‘fall short’ with regard to representation. It is a film that glorifies the antebellum south. It is a film that, when it is not ignoring the horrors of slavery, pauses only to perpetuate some of the most painful stereotypes of People of Color.”
“It is a film that, as part of the narrative of the ‘Lost Cause,’ romanticizes the Confederacy in a way that continues to give legitimacy to the notion that the secessionist movement was something more, or better, or more noble than what it was — a bloody insurrection to maintain the ‘right’ to own, sell and buy human beings.”
So it looks as if WB will bring Gone with the Wind back, perhaps as part of a special category where the context can be fully explained? Perhaps each film will be preceded by a segment from someone like Ridley, or another film historian? I’m curious to see how this plays out, but with WB also pulling the use of guns from Looney Tunes cartoons, they are on a mission to be as socially acceptable as possible.
The fates of AMC Theaters and Christopher Nolan’s Tenet are inextricably linked, and it’s all coming to a head next month. The theater chain’s financial woes are well-documented at this point, with many seeing the Warner Bros. release as a potential lifeline, not only for them but the entire industry. By the same token, what’s the point of releasing Nolan’s pricey blockbuster if the largest venues in the world are closed? Well, according to AMC CEO Adam Aron, that should no longer be a concern.
On a recent earnings call (via THR), Aron says AMC Theaters will be “fully open globally in July.” That timing is perfect for Tenet, which is set to open on July 17th, making it among the first major studio films of the summer. AMC has been teetering on the brink of financial ruin for a long time, and recently expressed concern they might not be able to pull out of it. Suffering a $2.17B quarterly loss due to the COVID-19 outbreak, as revealed during the call, only made an already-terrible situation far worse.
This is a bit of bright news, though, that AMC will at least be able to give themselves a fair shot. Of course, nothing is certain at this point. But with Cinemark and Regal likely to follow a similar schedule, it does look as if Tenet will be available everywhere for those who want to venture out and see it.
There was a stretch when Spike Lee seemed to have lost his voice. During that time he became, what I feel, was a very mediocre filmmaker delivering forgettable movies that dabbled with relevance but never really were. She Hate Me is provocative, but…meh? But when Spike Lee is on, and has a vital message to deliver, nobody is better. Right now he’s on the top of his game like never before, and Da 5 Bloods, the rare Vietnam War movie that feels timely and important, is Lee connecting the dots of this country’s racist past to its racist present through the lens of the military.
Backed by the soulful anti-war sounds of Marvin Gaye, Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods is a story of brotherhood, a story of protest, and a story of African-American soldiers fighting for a country that feared and hated them. The question, which Lee has posed often, most recently in BlacKkKlansman, is how can this country move on when we are still haunted by the sins of the past. Lee tackles this question in incendiary, if uneven fashion, weaving an overlong but compelling war movie the likes of which few filmmakers would dare to tell.
The film gathers together a number of veteran black actors rarely given their moment to headline. Delroy Lindo, Norm Lewis, Isiah Whitlock Jr., and Clarke Peters play Vietnam War vets who served under the command of Stormin’ Norman (Chadwick Boseman in a supporting role), a revolutionary who leads with a “Black Power” fist in the air. On a mission, they uncover a cache of gold intended to pay off the Vietnamese army and decide to bury it and return for it later. That plan blows up when they come under attack, Norman is killed under mysterious circumstances, and the area is napalmed so there’s no chance of finding the buried treasure. Years later, the men return in-county when a mudslide reveals the location, but the ghosts of the past still linger, bringing heartache and pain to the returning soldiers.
Lee, along with co-writers Kevin Willmott, Paul De Meo, and Danny Bilson, put a lot of burden on themselves to tell as vast a story as possible. Da 5 Bloods very easily could’ve been a simple adventure story, even with Lee exploring how black men have been dying for America since Crispus Attucks. But he also tackles America’s part in the Vietnam War disaster and the devastation they caused that country, and its own struggle to rebuild. There’s even more, as the lost treasure becomes almost like a means of the soldiers getting what they’re owed for fighting and giving their blood to a government that doesn’t give a shit about them. Gold bullion as reparations? For some of the returning vets, like Paul (Lindo) who harbors resentments and guilt over his past actions, he sees reparations as a way of making himself whole. For some others, like the well-to-do Eddie (Lewis), the gold can be used to advance causes that help black people as a whole, seeing it as exactly what Norman would’ve wanted.
There’s a lot going on in Da 5 Bloods, which may explain the heavy 2 1/2-hour runtime, but it still feels like there’s too much padding. Other factors are thrown into the mix, including the sudden arrival of Paul’s estranged son (Jonathan Majors), causing a bit more volatility to a powder keg already set to blow. Mistrust simmers within the group, and so does old age, while tensions with those of other races nearly derail them at every turn. Lee gives each soldier a different perspective, though, to keep it from being preachy and one-note. All of them are political, but only Paul proudly wears his “Make America Great Again” cap on the retrieval mission, which makes him an outcast among outcasts.
It’s always interesting to see Lee’s style put to use in a battlefield setting, and visually it resembles his 2006 film Miracle at St. Anna. The usual Lee techniques are here, from the mixing of archival footage to the classic dolly shot, the latter saved for one of the film’s rare moments of true hope. Violence is off the charts, and the digital blood can be distracting when everything else is so authentic. He also does something interesting in that he doesn’t recast the characters during flashback, nor does he digitally re-age them until one particular moment, almost as if Lee is making the case that the ghosts of war are ever-present. Further making that point is Lee connecting all of this to recent movements, including Black Lives Matter, to show that the struggle for equality rages on, and that the blood spilled by those who fought for it will not be forgotten.
Da 5 Bloods works on a number of levels; as a war movie, a buddy film, and a treasure-hunting adventure ala The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. While the lack of a true focus can muddle the message somewhat, Lee is never short on big ideas and he’s one of the few directors we would trust to share them in the way he does.
Blumhouse is making the classic Universal monsters cool again, and following the box office success of The Invisible Man, they’re embarking on a bunch of other horror updates. Recently we learned Karyn Kusama had been set for a new Dracula movie, and fans of her films Jennifer’s Body and The Invitation know that’s reason to get excited.
Well, there’s one more reason, because Kusama promises (via The Kingcast) her vision will be “fairly faithful” to Bram Stoker’s original novel, with one change from modern interpretations…
“…it is using the idea of, I think, something that gets overlooked in adaptations of ‘Dracula’ in the past is the idea of multiple voices,” Kusama added. “In fact, the book is filled with different points of view, and the one point of view we don’t get access to, and most adaptations give access to, is Dracula himself. So I would just say, in some respect, this is going to be an adaptation called ‘Dracula,’ but it’s perhaps not the same kind of romantic hero that we’ve seen in past interpretations of ‘Dracula.’”
The interpretation of Dracula as a romantic character comes from the seductive, sexual view of vampires, and that take on them has largely stuck. But the original Dracula was an evil monster, and hopefully Kusama can give us that once again. Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 movie came closest in a while to making Dracula a creature to be feared, but even that one deviated from Stoker.
COVID-19 has film productions on ice at the moment, but expect Blumhouse and Kusama to get Dracula out of his coffin sooner rather than later.
WWE superstar Adam “Edge” Copeland is only days away from having the “Greatest Wrestling Match Ever” at this weekend’s Backlash PPV. But after that, chances are the next time he’ll be seen is in his latest movie, Money Plane, which is unfortunately not a sequel to 1995’s Money Train.
Money Plane stars Edge, Kelsey Grammer, Denise Richards, and The Punisher himself Thomas Jane. If there’s any justice, all of them will get speared out of the plane all the way to the ground.
Here’s the synopsis: A professional thief with $40 million in debt and his family’s life on the line must commit one final heist – rob a futuristic airborne casino filled with the world’s most dangerous criminals.
This looks pretty ridiculous, but that only makes me want to see it more. Besides, Copeland has actually proven himself to be a pretty good actor with roles on The Flash,Vikings, and Highlander: Endgame. He retired from WWE in 2011 and began an acting career, which has turned out to be pretty successful. Not sure Money Plane can be considered the pinnacle, but I’ll definitely be checking it out on July 10th.
Duncan Jones put himself on the map with his retro sci-fi film Moon. While he went studio with his followup, Source Code, Jones returned to his “Mooniverse” with 2018’s quietly-received Mute. Now, Jones is looking to wrap up this loose trilogy, not on the big screen, but with a graphic novel, titled Madi: Once Upon a Time in the Future.
Jones has teamed up with comic creators Alex de Campi and artists like Glenn Fabry, Simon Bisley, Duncan Fegredo, and Pia Guerra for Madi, which they launched a Kickstarter for. The financing goal was reached in a matter of days. Here’s the story synopsis:
Madi Preston, a veteran of Britain’s elite special operations J-Squad unit, is burnt out and up to her eyeballs in debt. She and the rest of her team have retired from the military but are now trapped having to pay to service and maintain the technology put into them during their years of service. They’re working for British conglomerate Liberty Inc as mercenaries, selling their unique ability to be remote controlled by specialists while in the field, and the debts are only growing as they get injured completing missions. We meet Madi as she decides she’s had enough. She will take an off-the-books job that should earn her enough to pay out her and her sister, but when the piece of tech she’s supposed to steal turns out to be a kid, and she suddenly blacks out…she finds herself on the run from everyone she’s ever known. In a globe-spanning adventure from Shanghai to Soho, Madi has to stay one step ahead of the giant corporations closing in on her from all sides.
Screenrant spoke with Jones, who said there are “a couple of small” connections between Madi and Moon, while there is a bigger one to Mute. He also talked about his reason for choosing a graphic novel to complete the trilogy rather than a feature film…
“I think the reality is that in the world of IP driven content, it’s damn hard to finance an indie at a big-budget level…and if you know my stuff, you know its always going to be a little off the beaten path,” he said. “That said, Madi is a big, old-fashioned action story. The beauty of telling it through a graphic novel is that I needn’t make any concessions to budget or to shooting schedule. No worries over stuntmen getting hurt. No worries about seeking a four-quad balancing act. Instead, I get to experience the very real thrill of learning how some of the best people in the world of comics do their visual ‘floor set.’ That run of visual gymnastics that adds a soundtrack through pictures. Madi is what Alex and I wanted it to be, but it’s also what the amazing roster of artists we are working with conjured up. And being a Brit who was brought up reading 2000 AD, I am getting to work with some of the legendary artists I grew up loving.”
