Daily Archives: July 9, 2012

Movie News & Opinions

Christopher Nolan Declines ‘Justice League’ Movie

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Christopher Nolan has been a busy man. He has got the conclusion of the best comic book movie trilogy coming to an end next week. He just got a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He is also serving as producer to Man of Steel, the new Superman movie due out next year, which is also getting its big unveiling at Comic-Con later this week. Obviously in doing press, his future plans have been asked along with his producing role on Man of Steel and the enormous success of The Avengers, and his involvement with the Justice League movie. His response?

Nope, I’m good.

According to Entertainment Weekly, Nolan says he has zero plans for the Justice League movie.

“No, none at all. We’re finished with all we’re doing with Batman. This is the end of our take on this character.” He also goes on to say he has no intention to be involved with any future Batman movie projects. “Batman will outlive us all, and our interpretation was ours. Obviously, we consider it definitive and kind of finished. The great thing about Batman is he lives on for future generations to reinterpret, and obviously, Warners will have to decide in the future what they’re going to do with him,” Nolan said. “We’ve had our say on the character. I’ve got no plans to do anything more, and certainly, no involvement with any Justice League project.”

Obviously this news is disappointing but at least he is sticking to his guns. I think trilogies are pretty much the way to go because you do not want movies to overstay their welcome and characters to become stagnant. Especially superhero movies where you get origin story, defining moment that results in epiphany on their responsibilities to the world, then the final test that validates their existence… and past that? It’s just retread. There needs to be a beginning, a middle, and an end. The idea of reboots annoys me, but we see it in comic books all the time where people have their take on the characters. It may disrupt what we know but you cannot help but acknowledge that the expansion on the character due to different writing perspectives reinvigorates the genre and the game plan (see: The Amazing Spider-Man movie). You never want to wear out the welcome or be the one getting kicked out of the party. You want to leave while everyone screams how epic that was.

That is how Nolan wants to leave it and while I would love for his take Justice League, it would not make sense for his Batman perspective, something that is rooted in reality, to be mixed with Martian Manhunter and Green Lantern. It is just not in the same universe of his thinking. Plus any original material from Nolan would be gold. Like I said, good job sticking to his guns and Warner Bros. embracing the trilogy idea instead of shoving the same drivel down our throats repeatedly.

Movie News & Opinions

‘Amazing Spider-Man’ Does Well, Also the Sky Is Blue

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In the least surprising story from over 4th of July weekend, The Amazing Spider-Man decided to destroy everyone in its path on its way to a $140 million dollar tally in North America, and a total worldwide tally of $341 million dollars according to EW and various other sources. Obviously the chatter is high on this movie about the future because  possible sequels, and that ending. In fact, no one will shut up about theories on the ending. We will obviously leave that last because it will be spoilerish if you have not seen the movie yet so let us tackle the movie future of Spidey.

Trilogies are the thing these days and you know that the new Spider-Man will follow in the same footsteps as Tobey and Sam Raimi. According to GammaSquad and FilmDrunk, looks like we are heading that way. It was already thrown on the official Facebook page that the movie would be the first in the trilogy, and obviously I believe everything on Facebook (seriously, that bitch should dump that asshole for posting that status about her), but even the producers Avi Arad and Matt Tolmach are definitely in the mood to raise the bar. 

Sinister Six? I mean if The Avengers can do the hero version, why can’t Sony just throw the villain version their one Marvel property that does not star Will Smith (MiB for those that forgot about the Malibu/Marvel buyout)? But a trilogy that leads to six villains who will not (and should not because of the title of the movie) get the same setup that Avengers did with Iron Man, Thor, Captain America might be a bit ambitious. Don’t get me wrong, if you can throw Doc Ock, Vulture, Mysterio, Kraven, Sandman, Rhino, Electro, Hydro, or whoever they want to fill their lineup, that will make for some damn good action sequences. But Spider-man against the six seems almost overkill. I am still smarting from seeing Franco, Spidey, Venom, and Sandman battling out on the silver screen, and having a bored and unimpressed taste in my mouth. Then again, Avengers pulled it off so that’s the reasoning in Hollywood. If they did it, we can too! Hence 80% of the productions in Hollywood being sequels or reboots.

Regardless, check those links out above for the full interviews but Avi Arad reeks of movie producer and looks sleazy so I am more entertained by that image of him being part of the Sinister Six. The part of him being the one that exploits Spider-man and bleeds him of any financial profits and culture importance until they are forced to reboot six years later because ‘Venom played by Eric Forman’ was a shitty idea. Speaking of, Venom is happening and shockingly, it will be tied into the Spider-man universe. Again, obviously nothing to do with the success of The Avengers and the producers swimming in a vault of gold coins. Please do not mess Venom up. A great character, but if Garfield struts down the street as the evil Fonzie then I will scream for a reboot. Again. For the 3rd time.

Okay, now that is out of the way, let us jump into the ending. First off, stop if you have not seen the movie. If you go further, you suck as a human being because you are depriving yourself of a good movie. Actually, no you are not. The spoiler ending is pretty much telling you exactly nothing and let us be honest, who here thought Spider-man would lose to the dude from Notting Hill posing for paparazzi in his skivvies? Anyways, when Dr. Connors is locked in his cell, we see a shadowy figure appear out of nowhere with Dr. Connors trying to make sure Peter Parker remains out of the grand scheme of plans that Oscorp may be up to. But who is it has been burning up the intraweb lately. We can ask Dr. Connors himself thanks to GammaSquad via AICN, although whether he’s a credible source remains to be seen.

Capone: Okay, what do you think about that ending?

Rhys Ifans: Well, Connors is basically locked up in a very high-security mental institution.

Capone: We were debating whether it was a prison or a mental institute.

RI: It’s not a zoo. [laughs] I kept seeing it as maybe a mixture of both. Then a representative from OsCorp appears miraculously in the room. How he gets in there and how he leaves, we don’t know. Maybe we will find out. But it’s not Norman Osborn.

Capone: It’s not? You can say that?

RI: Yeah. But it is someone who is in the employ of Norman Osborn without question.

Capone: Someone we’re familiar with, who we don’t know is employed by Osborn?

RI: Yeah.

So supposedly, it is not Norman Osborn. Of course not, that would imply he got better from whatever debilitating illness he had been suffering. So it is someone of his own employ. We can all speculate and I did myself before seeing that part of the interview. I was thinking Vulture because he was an older man and it would seem to fit that path. Although if it is not Malkovich doing the Vulture, I am not interested at all. Regardless, we shall see. We will see a Green Goblin appearance later down the line whoever that may be in the same prison cell because…well…Gwen Stacy is involved. And we all know what happens there. Or at least the cool people do…

Movie News & Opinions

The Dark Knight Rises – Behind the Scenes Featurette

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Well Dark Knight Rises fans have I got something for you, we now have an extensive behind the scenes featurette which included talks with Nolan, Bale, Hardy and pretty much everyone involved.  Then we have a butt load of behind the scene footage which thankfully gives no spoiler. This featurette is the best and most extensive look in to the upcoming The Dark Knight Rises. Please watch below and I hope you enjoy.

So what else do you really need to know for this film because this really did just talk about everything and most importantly didn’t give away anything away (not sure how that happened). The words action from start to finish really excited me, really! One part that shocked me was the sheer amount of scenes that weren’t CGI most amazing was the Bat was actually made for shooting and the football field that was to be blown up with an extra level of field, just spectacular.

Aww he’s not that bad, ok well Bane is evil. But Tom Hardy is a big kid.

Ok so let’s talk a little about bane in this, he says a couple more things which is always amazing plus we actually hear from Nolan that he thought Tom Hardy did a fantastic job of being Bane. This point is important as I can imagine it’s hard to get emotions and normal physical reactions when you have that mask covering his mouth and nose, all he can use is his eyes and I think he can do better acting with just his eyes than most actors can do in general.

Seriously no special effects there or in those riot shots.

So finally I think that this featurette cements my current view on this film. Christopher Nolan has never made a bad film. Every trailer to date for this film has shown an amazing film. The cast are all known and well tested actors. The visuals are a mixture of real shots and CGI which are in my opinion the best. “When Gotham is in ashes, you have my permission to die” That just gives me Goosebumps. Lastly this shows everyone’s passion for the film they have made which always gives me faith that the film won’t disappoint and will give the fans the end that this story deserves.

POP CULTURE

Hellboy/Ron Perlman is a Good Dude

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I figured that it is time to get some good news up in this joint and via the Hollywood Reporter, this is will make you give some thumbs up to some people who step it up in the world. Ron Perlman, Hellboy himself, found out through the ‘Make A Wish Foundation’ that six-year-old Zachary wanted not only to meet Hellboy, but also wanted to become Hellboy as well. The makeup house Spectral Motion, who did the makeup for both Hellboy movies, setup the meeting after hearing the story and pitched it to Perlman, who obviously being awesome, was down for the idea.

So he got in the make up chair for another four hours in order to deliver the kid his wish. He showed up in full regale and Zachary even got the opportunity to sit in the chair as well to get his second part of his wish…Looking at the pictures and seeing obviously what the kid has gone through with his leukemia, I thought this was an amazing thing to do. It is one thing for a kid to be like, yeah I want to be Superman or Spiderman or something where you throw a suit on that you bought for 40 bucks at the Halloween Superstore. It’s another thing to pick a badass hero and then be like, yeah, I want the whole makeup and nine yards. Hats off to this kid for not only picking an awesome wish, but facing his illness and probably being like, I’m Hellboy, you can’t bring me down.

Also Ron Perlman and Spectral Motion – You guys definitely got the gold star for the day.